josephmarlesmedia

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 Research - http://josephmarlesmedia.tumblr.com/tagged/A2research A2 

Planning - http://josephmarlesmedia.tumblr.com/tagged/A2planning A2 

Production - http://josephmarlesmedia.tumblr.com/tagged/A2production A2 

Evaluation - http://josephmarlesmedia.tumblr.com/tagged/A2evaluation

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What have you learned from your audience feedback?-Evaluation question 3...

From our focus group we received various positive comments. The first we received was that the constant black and white colour scheme was really good at matching the pace of the song. This is something that we aimed for at the start and was really the main reason that we went with the black and white theme in the first place as we felt that it matched with the acoustic/folk genre. Someone also said that the range of shots were good and on a technical level it was all very good camera wise as the pull focus shots were used to good affect and the overall range of different shots was good. In particular, the crabbing shots were brought up to attention with Jack in particular liking them and how they linked the start and end together, as well as stating that he like the guitar playing saying that it matched on a lot of the beats well and to good effect. We also received a comment that stated that our editing was done well with shots often been cut accurately on the beat and the simplistic cut of shots using the razor tool worked well with the slow pace of song. The one dip to black shot we used also brought up good reviews as it worked well with the shot of the male protagonist kicking leaves into the camera.

We did however also receive some negative comments about the music video. The most stand out one being that although technically the video was very good, there wasn’t much going on in the video and Jordan even went as far to say it was boring throughout. Jack also stated that he didn’t like the lip-syncing but the main reason for this is due to the acting, as it didn’t look too convincing especially with the mid-shots of Ben.  The final real negative that we received was that the focus group would’ve liked to have seen more shots of Katie throughout the video as they were confused by her role. Some thought she was just in ben’s imagination where others thought that she might have been a dead past girlfriend.

Taking these comments on board I think we would both make some changes if we were to do this again or simply work as a group again. Firstly I think we would have to plan more and think more carefully about the actual narrative of the music video as opposed to focusing almost entirely on the technical aspects of our work. This would include adding more detail to the storyboards in order to help tell the story. Doing this would help with a couple of the negative comments we received, ensuring that the story line wasn’t boring and disengaged the viewers as well as helping to establish the role of Katie as we tried to make it unobvious in order to create some enigma codes but perhaps we made a little too unobvious to the point of encouraging confusion. Finally we would spend more time actually filming and although we had many more re-shoots this year compared to last I still think we could’ve done one or two more in order to perfect some of the shots and gather some more footage in general. This would ensure that we could spend more time with our actor and make it clear what we wanted him to do, especially with the lip-synching part of the video.

These comments taught us that producing and editing a music video is much harder than producing a film. With a film you have to simply tell a story. However with this music video we had to do that while also matching the story to the pace and the beats of a song. We tried to match the story to the slow pace of the song and this may have came across as being ‘boring’ for some which just demonstrates how hard the process of production really is, especially on the narrative and editing aspects of things. Most people also agreed that the editing was more tricky this year despite using a more limited range of tools.

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Here is our second focus group in order to gain some outside insight of what people thought of our music video. This is also part of our third evaluation question in which we asked our focus group what positive comments they had about the video, what negative comments they had and what we could’ve done in order to improve the end result. The next post will be explaining what was said in the focus group as well as sharing our own views on what we though was good and bad about our own music video. 

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Here myself and Ed have commentated over our music video, explaining why we chose some of the shots we did as well as pointing out which shots were our personal favourites as well as showing which areas probably could've been improved if we had the opportunity to do a fourth shoot.

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Evaluation Question 2- How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Throughout my three media products I have kept a constant brand identity across them in order for them to link and almost become one media product in which each product can help to sell each other product. This all started off in the planning process where we decided that we would have a black and white theme to the video in order to match the acoustic nature to the song. I then decided that the digipak and advert would also stick with this black and white theme in order to create this house style. It is important to keep this constant brand identity as it helps to show the viewers something about the personality of the artist themselves. This then leads to more sales as the customers feel somewhat a connection to the artist themselves. It also helps to create a consistency across the brand which makes it more recognisable for the audience. In order to do this it could range from anything form a particular visual style (like we’ve done with the black and white theme) to something as simple as a brand logo that is consistently displayed. An example of brand identity in music is Tame Impala who have a very recognisable colourful animatic theme to go with their psychedelic music.  

                                  In order to create this brand identity that I was going for I had to incorporate many different aspects. As mentioned before I kept a constant black and white theme to all three of my media products so that they can sort link off each other. This idea was inspired mainly by the Arctic Monkey’s first album ‘Whatever they say I am, that is what I am not’ as they also kept a very black and white theme across their products and this continued in later deals which helped to build their brand identity. The Mise-en-scene is also kept constant throughout with the setting for some of the music video along with digipak and advert all being deserted rural settings to symbolise the male protagonist’s loneliness. The digipak and advert in particular are very similar to each other with similar pictures used for each as well as the same font as the font looks very ‘tree-like’ and so can represent the settings around in the picture. Doing this allows the advert to act as a sort of sneak-peek for what the digipak has to offer which would help encourage people to buying the digipak itself. Doing all of this allows for a constant style to be kept across the three products, with the style being an edgy alternative feel due to the black and white nature along with the protagonists clothing and overall style.

The digipak itself will help to sell the song greatly. The digipak gives away a little about the identity of the male protagonist but also leaves enigma codes, encouraging to listen to/watch the music video in order to get the answers to their questions. The images used and the black and white filter applied on the digipak also have a link to the song, with the protagonist featured in both always being surrounded by things in the images (trees, plants etc.) which has connotations with the name of the actual song itself (Small Things). This was done on Photoshop by going on adjustments and then clicking on ‘black and white’ before I adjusted the saturation and levels settings. The setting is also very similar to one used in the song as they are both rural and secluded places which give away little. The digipak also conforms to Andrew Goodwin’s theory of music institutions using lots of close ups of the artist due to demands of the record label as it helps to sell the product by giving it a personal touch from the artist.

Then comes the advert which helps to sell the digipak which then ultimately leads to helping sell the song/music video. As mentioned, the mise-en-scene is very similar across the two products which the exact same setting being used for one of the pictures on the digipak and the picture on the cover of the advert. The advert also helps to promote the album, especially the song ‘Small Things’ as it includes the name of the song on the cover, promoting it as the ‘hit single’ from the album, hinting at people to buy the album just because of this one song. The advert and digipak also help to promote island records as their logo is displayed in the corner of the front covers of both products. Doing this promotes island records which then promoted Ben Howard at the same time as it may encourage the audience to engage in the record’s back catalogue and discover some of Ben Howard’s earlier work also. However, one last minute change that I made to the advert was changing the colour of the text of the ‘Ben Howard’ part to a dark red/burgundy colour which meant this was the only bit of colour over the three products. I did this in order to make it stand out a bit more, something which I felt I could do as I had already established a pretty constant brand and identity with the combination of three products. This sight move away from the theme established so far will draw in even more attention which can only be a good thing for the artist and record label.

Both products also help to communicate a particular genre over to the audience, giving them an idea of what genre the music video/song will be. Small Things and Ben Howard's songs in general have a folk/acoustic genre to them and I wanted to try and incorporate that genre into the music video and then display that in the digipak and advert. That’s why we went with the black and white theme for the music video as it gives the pieces a slightly edgy look and somewhat disguises the identity of the artist, only giving some bits away. We tried to make the music video itself as matching to the genre as possible by including a guitar in when possible (despite our actor having no guitar playing knowledge) as well as having our ‘artist’ in the video as much as possible. We also used lots of quiet settings in order to portray a sense of loneliness around the protagonist. The costumes also helped to portray the look we wanted to achieve with our actor wearing ripped jeans and 90′s inspired trainers in order to giver a hipster/alternative look about him, which is what we wanted with this particular genre as it is not your mainstream chart music.  

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Evaluation question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

http://prezi.com/w2uoutwuatcy/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

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This is my finished digipak for Ben Howard's Album, ‘I Forgot Where We Were’. On the front cover I included most of the common conventions found on the front of a digipak, for example I included the artists face which means the cover complies to Andrew Goodwin's theory that the record label demands close ups of the artists face in order to give the product a sense of identity. I also included the name of the the artist themselves and also the name of the album which appears on both the front cover of the album as well as the spine. The font I chose also appears in the advert which is a font which I think resembles the trees around Ben, giving it a slightly edgy effect. The final common convention that appears on the digipak is the names of the songs on the back of the digipak. With this, I decided to use a different font to the one on the front as I felt it needed a more simplistic text because of the complex background which has quite a lot going on with various depths.  

With the coloring, I decided to keep a constant black and white theme across the product so that the music video, digipak and the advert all link together to create one media product. Having them all link together means that they can all compliment each other and up sale each other which is beneficial. With the inside panels, I kept a constant theme across the three pictures and tried to make them all link them all together into one panel, with Ben being the focal point in the middle. The trees surrounding him represent the small things gathering around our male protagonist which is fitting to the song we did for our music video. I then decided to add lyrics to the song ‘Small things’ to the two outside back panels as I felt they needed something extra as it looked a bit plain before. Plus I felt I needed some sort of representation of the song we did our music video too as I wanted that to be the stand out piece of the album. As for the extra panel, I wanted to show Ben being deserted and surrounded by other small things that are distracting him. 

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This is my finished album poster for Ben Howard's album 'I Forgot Where We Were'. I decided to stick with the black and white theme for the large majority of the poster as it therefore links closely with the black and white theme of the music video meaning that the two compliment each other and can be seen as a single package. The advert includes all the basic information needed with the date of release on there as well as advertising the single 'Small Things' (the song we did our music video too). Obviously it also included the name of the artist themselves and the name of the actual album. I decided to choose this font as I thought it resembled closely with the trees in the background image and also gave the advert a slightly edgy look about it. I also changed the colour of the ‘Ben Howard’ to a light brown in order to make this part pop out of the poster and to avoid the whole product being completely  black and white and this could be perceived by some as being quite dull.  I also put in a few reviews of the album in order to shine the album in a positive light which would help to encourage buyers when viewing the advert. Then, finally at the bottom of the poster I have the website link to Ben Howard’s website along with the island records logo in the bottom right hand corner. 

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Music video analysis #4:

I have decided to do a music video analysis for the Arctic Monkeys’ video for ‘Why do you only call me when you’re high?’.  The song is a popular one and the music video, I believe, is a bit out of the ordinary, which allows for plenty of idea and interpretations to be made. The video itself starts with lead singer of the band (Alex Turner) playing a character in a nightclub. The video itself starts with seemingly diegetic sound of another Arctic Monkeys song playing in the background. For the first minute and half of the video this continues and the audience portray Alex as a ‘drunk’ or someone clearly under the influence of drugs. The camera work focuses on unsteady and seemingly off-balance shots, which have connotations to the drunken character portrayed at the start. Several close-up shots show confusion in Alex’s eyes as he is under the influence of substances. This confusion then leads him to texting ‘Stephanie’ which is shown on screen with editing.  This sets the tone for the rest of the video. Having the lead singer as the main character in the video has strong connotations to Goodwin’s theory that the label will demand lots of focus and attention on a band/band member in a music video, as it is good on the advertising side of things. Having an identifiable figure in the music video makes it much more likely that people will buy the record.

Alex then is tracked into the bathroom in the nightclub where the transition from non-diegetic to diegetic sound is clear as the music fades out. A close-up reflection shot in the mirror along with some editing creating a wavy-like reflection of Alex’s face further demonstrates that he is on drugs.  At around 1 minute 30 seconds the song starts and it starts with a mid-shot of Alex leaving the club along with the lyrics ‘The mirrors image, tells me it’s home time’. Here there are clear connotations between the lyrics and the visuals, which again is demonstrating another Andrew Goodwin theory, the video is an illustrative one, with the lyrics almost telling a story to go along with the video.  The video continues with more shaky tracking shots, which move with Alex’s unsteady movement.  Editing is the complimented with the lyrics to further emphasise the idea of telling a story as the lyrics ‘and its three in the morning and I’m tryna change your mind’ are shown with the text message ‘ I wanna see you’.  At this point the audience are starting to become interested in this love story which incorporates Bulmer and Katz’s uses and gratifications theory, the idea that we consume media in order to suit our individual needs. In this the video, the purpose seems to be entertainment and hooking the audience in.  

 Using the video for entertainment is a common convention for music videos. However it doesn’t apply itself to many other conventions, considering it is a rock band there is next to no performance in the video from the band.  There is also a real lack of quick and fast paced editing which is uncommon is rock music videos, instead sticking with slower paced tracking shots for the majority.  Point of view shots are then used to show Alex imagining the girl everywhere with different men, all because the influence of drugs. Close-ups of his face are then used alongside this to show his confusion as he sees her everywhere, despite knowing that it is all an illusion.  His confusion is also shown in the editing, as a distorted blur is used as he is walking down the street, almost giving a perspective of what he’s seeing while he’s high on drugs. There are also further links between the video and the lyrics of the song as takeaway bar is called ‘Why no answer?’, again applying itself to Goodwin’s theory.  The music then makes another switch from non-diegetic to diegetic as Alex is shown falling over in a mid-shot and hits his head, this is then complimented by blurring out of the music as he lies on the floor, followed by the continuation of it when he gets back up again.  This gives the audience the impression that the song is all in his head, which is further emphasised by the previous strong links between the lyrics and the visuals.

 Sticking with the idea of visuals, a lot of the colour in the music video is either black or grey, including Alex’s outfit, these dark colours have connotations to the dark feeling of the song of someone who’s clearly fixed on someone else.  Next is an over the shoulder shot of Alex imagining the girl again along with the lyrics ‘I haven’t found what I was hoping to find’, again providing the link between lyrics and visuals.  At this point he feels like he’s running out of time to find her as the morning approaches.  A long shot is then used to show him approaching a house, encouraging the audience to presume that it is the house of Stephanie, this before a pull focus shot is then used to show him knocking on the door of the house. This pull focus shot could convey the idea of Alex drifting in and out of focus himself, he’s managed to get to the area where Stephanie lives but he can’t remember which house because of what he has taken. Several mid shots and close-ups shots are used as well as a low angle shot in order to portray him alone on an empty street knocking on a house door of a random old woman. He’s so high that he gets the wrong house (not Stephanie’s). He then texts Stephanie telling her that he’s outside but then a pan shot at a 45 degree angle pans from Alex down on the other street all the way up to Stephanie’s house where she can see Alex from the window outside the wrong house. This is the first time that we see her in the video and it is also the last time. The text comes through to her and Alex’s name saved on her phone is simply ‘Alex the band guy’. This helps to portray the idea that she doesn’t know him as well as he thinks he knows her. He’s clearly quite obsessed with the girl however the girl seems to barely know him due to the name she has him saved as on her phone. This may be due to the reason that he only ever seems to show his interest when he’s high. This is the closest we get to hinting at Laura Mulvey’s male gaze theory as we see the whole video through the perspective of the male Alex and then we get a brief interaction between the perspectives of the two.

The pan shot also reveals the physical distance between the two which could be seen as resembling the emotional distance between the two in everyday life, they really aren’t as close as they seem to be at the start of the video. This confirms the illustrative style to the music video, with the lyrics and the visuals working together constantly in order to tell a story. As we reach the end of the music video, enigma codes are created for the audience as we begin to wonder if Alex ever found the girl. The use of enigma codes and the ending the video on an unclear note is very common for those videos are illustrative. I failed to find any inter-textual references to any other pieces of famous media. There are several references to Levi Strauss’ binary opposites theory as are opposition views from the male and female protagonist in the video.

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Ben Howard- Small Things

This is our finished video for the song ‘Small Things’ from Ben Howard’s album ‘I Forgot Where We Where’. We had four shoots in order to gather all the footage to fill out the 3 minutes 47 seconds of audio, which we had to cut as the song was previous over 5 minutes 30 seconds. This compared to just one shoot for last years work, this time we really tried to perfect every shot and if we didn’t think it was good enough we re-shot it. The first shoot was in town and this was done successfully, however it was in Clutton where three shoots would take place across two locations. Lighting problems meant we needed another re-shoot for Ben’s singing, then after some peer-assessment we realized that Katie's role wasn’t very clear as she only appeared at the end of the video in the town scene. It was clear that we needed to make it more clear so we had to do a fourth and final shoot in order to include Katie in some more of the shots in Clutton in order to make it more clear that that Katie was an integral part of Ben’s life.  If needed, we have always have time for a re-shoot if our actors are available but asking them to do a fifth shoot may be asking a bit too much of them. 

In conclusion me and Ed are proud with the finished result and we feel this is a significant improvement on last years final piece with the camera work and editing being much better as we feel it is very suited to the theme and genre of the song itself.

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Annotated script.

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Risk assessment

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Digipak advert analysis- The Vaccines-What did you expect form the Vaccines?

At the top of the page is the name of the band itself in capitals and a very clear font. The colour of the text is also a different colour to all the other text on the page meaning it stands out more. Like on the advert for the kings of leon album, all of the text on this advert is over a black background meaning it all stands out, is clear and is easily readable. Below this is the name of the album itself, ‘What did you expect from the vaccines?’, which is quite a bold move for a title considering it was their debut album. It sort of sends out the message that just because they are an indie-rock band it doesn’t mean they’ll be any different from the other indie-rock bands out there, no new ground is being explored here. This approach of asking the public ‘Why are we going to be any different?’ resembles The Strokes debut album ‘Is this It?’.

The centrepiece of the album advert is the image in the center. The image is of a girl seemingly looking unhappy, linking to theme of a majority of songs that are mostly about relationships and break-ups. The image also adds a nice bit of colour to the advert and if this was in black and white for example I don’t think it would have the same ‘stand out’ effect that the advert has. 

Below this is the name of some of the most popular songs on the album, which is a convention of most album adverts as King’s of Leon also did this on their one. Another convention that some adverts include is some of the top rated reviews that the album has been given from major magazines/newspapers. For example above a variety of four/ four and a half star reviews have been given from The sun, The Telegraph etc. This helps to sell the album and portrays it in a more positive light to those looking at the album. At the bottom of the page are the words ‘The album of the year’ which again helps the album to sell, despite the quote being given from only one source. Finally there is a link to the bands website as well as a link to their social media page in order to self promote their work even more, another common convention of most album adverts. 

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Digipak advert analysis-Kings of Leon-Only By The Night.

First of all at the top of the page is the name of the ban in a clear big font. The name is also in capital letters, making it stand our further. The colour of the font is also important as the white text over the black background makes the text even more noticeable. Also the size of the text is well laid out as the text covers the whole of the top page and it is where your eyes are first drawn to.

The part that takes up the majority of the page is the picture of some of the band members crossed with a picture of an owl. The green colour means it stands out from the rest of the advert as the majority of the rest of the page is mostly black and white. The dark shade of green really emphasises the shadowing of the image which has connotations to a night time theme, relating the title of the album ‘Only by the night’. The owl theme with the pictures also relates to the name of the album with owls of course being often associated with night. Finally the shade of green is also very important as it sort of resembles the idea of a night vision colour, once again relating to the name of the album.

The name of the album itself is also in a similar shade of green to the picture meaning they are clearly related. Like the band name, the text is in capital letter, covers the width of the page and is placed on top of a black background in order to make it stand out, as the name of the album is one of the major selling points. Below this we have another major selling point, the name of arguably the three most popular songs that were already released in an attempt to lure people in to buying the album because it includes these songs. 

Finally at the bottom of the page, the text ‘Out now’ is displayed in capitals. The use of red text on this part and not on any other piece of text on the advert means that this part instantly stands out from the rest of the advert content. There is also information on where a downloadable version is available in the bottom left hand corner, further broadening their market. This as well as having a link to their own website right at the bottom, maybe to attract fans to buy other albums, singles, merchandise etc.  

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Digipak analysis- The 1975- The 1975

Above is the digipak made for the indie band The 1975 for their 2013 debut album called ‘The 1975′. They have also gone with a black and white theme much like we have with our video which is why I have chosen to analyse it. I also like the simplistic style that it offers and it will be something that I look to pull off when I come to make my own digipak. 

Once again like the Arctic Monkey’s album that i analysed it used a black and white effect throughout which breaks the common conventions usually found with a digipak. However it also stands out for other reasons too. I think the black and white effect is used to create connotations with deep emotion, an idea that is reflected strongly in the songs and lyrics themselves as they focus strongly on the idea of relationships and emotions. This is also an idea that we are looking to use for our video as the black and white filter will be used in order to help emphasise the emotion in the male protagonist and make the story more relatable.  

However apart from this it more or less follows the common conventions of album covers and digipaks. Although it is not on the front cover of the digipak like some albums, the pack does include a fold out picture of the band themselves which is good for advertising and could also add to the how well the album sells as it can act as a piece of collectable merchandise. They are all wearing very casual clothing which is usually typical to indie bands and it makes it easier for people to relate to them. The picture also keeps to the black and white theme...

The front of the album also conforms to common conventions with the name of the band on the front cover of the album, albeit it in a slightly odd font. However the simplistic text on top of the rectangle with a glow from behind means the album cover still stands out despite being in black and white. The rectangle feature is a common feature of the 1975 as this is also used a lot at live performances as a backdrop for example. This also gives me the impression that the front of the album could be deliberately the backdrop for a performance as what seems to be a wire can be seen in both the front and back covers. There is also a list of the names of the songs on the back of the album which is often found in a large majority of albums. The back also keeps with the simplistic theme and the use of the common rectangle with the glow from behind and the reflection of the list on the floor. 

Finally there is the disk itself which closely resembles the front cover of the album. It conforms to the very simplistic theme of the album which is resembled in all aspects of the digipak. The font used is exactly the same as the one used on the front of the album and the disk itself is completely black with a slightly darker shade used for the writing, again portraying the idea of deep emotion.