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

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

After successfully completing the ancillary texts which include the music video, magazine advert and digipak, I feel as though they are all very effective however some parts have their doubts. One reason I would give for this would be because of the same sort of expression and feel has been exerted over all three of the different texts. In addition to this, when looking at the digipak and magazine advert everything that is going on in that picture relates to the music video, which therefore means if the public were to look at these without seeing the video they could straight away get a feel of what the story line will be about.

Process of the digipak;

These two pictures show the progress of the digipak creation. As you can see above, at this particular time I was uploading the pictures individually, in order to put them in their layer in the right box; this was accorded to the way we would look at the digipak on paper.

Final Digipak;

Above is a picture of what the final version of the digipak looks like, as you can see from the previous pictures a couple of things have been changed for example the colour and style of the text.

When looking at the digipak along with the magazine advert and music video, I would say that if it was to be produced and then offered out to the public, I would say that it would have a high chance of being sold. There are several reasons why I think this and one of them would be due to the fact that all of the pictures link up and relate to one another, there isn’t one or two pictures that are different and look odd; this therefore gives the public one view of the whole song not just a jumbled up idea of what they think it could be about due to the unnecessary pictures. The second point I would say about would be that the same expression and feel has been exerted over all three of the texts, some pictures being taken from the actual video and put as the digipak and magazine advert picture.

Disadvantages;

On the other hand, as mentioned earlier there are several disadvantages to certain aspects of the digipak that I feel could have been done better if I had more time to complete them. One of them would be the colours on the rims of the digipak, even though they fit in to a certain extent I do think that the colour could have been more matched in with the colours of the pictures. Another one would be that there are more pictures of the female than the male, this makes it unbalanced and I think that if there was two pictures of each and the others about the story line then that could have been related a bit better. 

Magazine advert; 

Above is the magazine advert in which I produced to go along with the music video and the digipak. As you can see, the main picture is one of the pictures in which I took and used for the digipak, and shows a linkup between the two. I feel as though this would be a good eye catcher for the public to notice my music video. The feel on the advert is very calm and relaxed, with not too much going on in the picture; this is good because if it was too busy people may not be interested as much as there’s a lot to look at.

Changes;

Colour- With the colour for the magazine advert, I used a tool on picnik in which darkened the image. The reason I did this was so that the white wall would stand out more in order for me to put the text onto it.

Text- The text I used is in italics; I thought that this font went nicely along the side of the image, making all of the information clear for the public to view when observing the advert.

My Opinion;

Even though I was the one in which produced these ancillary texts, and would have a biased opinion I would say that these pieces of texts would have a good chance in being sold to the public and think that overall, together they are quite effective and are in general not bad. As mentioned earlier, all of them in some way or another link up together, meaning the same sort of feel and expression is being exerted over the different texts. This gives the public one overall meaning and doesn't give them any confusion or mixed up messages of what the whole song or album is about. Everything needed for a digipak and magazine advert to be successfull is shown on them, things such as barcodes information on release dates and places to buy have been included making them very appealing and eye catching.
However, even though I have stated that I believe this would have a good chance in being sold to the public, there are several aspects in which I either would like to have included or have included that doesn't work as well as I would have liked them to. These were things such as the colouring used on the digipak, as I didn't have enough time, I couldn't play around with the colours seeing what one matched the best to the pictures and the feeling of the whole pack together. Another one would have been the type of text in which I used, even though I think it's suitable, I would have much preferred something that fitted better and was more presentable.

Audience Feedback;

As I couldn't just use my opinion for the feedback of my ancillary texts, I decided to carry out audience feedback by getting random people to look at them and using small pieces of paper write down what they thought; these could be likes and or dislikes.
Below are three pictures in which I took of some of the audience's feedback;

Audience 1:

As you can see, this statement claims that they like the darkness of the images used for the magazine advert and that because of this there is a link between the magazine advert and the song. This certain piece of feedback is useful to me because this is the feel that I wanted to get across, this kind of disgusting dirty feel to express the situation about prostitution.  

 Audience 2:

This person's feedback has said that the same feeling has been exerted across the several different ancillary texts and they feel this is a positive thing, using the word 'love'. This in actual fact links up with the the feedback from the person above, commenting on the expression and feel.   

Audience 3:

This person has said that they would be willing to buy the ancillary texts, and said they are all well presented and are very appealing. Appearance and presentation is a huge factor that needs to be considered when planning on creating a magazine advert and digipak. 

These are not of the feedback's in which I gathered from random people who I had shown my ancillary texts to however they are just a couple different ones in which give you some information of what people think. Overall, I would say the majority of the comments were positive and the majority of people said that they would buy them saying they are effective with there appearance and presentation, along with the pictures used and the feel being exerted.

Question 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Question 4: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Final Music Video

SurveyMonkey

Click here to take survey

If you click on the link above you are taken to the survey in which I created to gather feedback on what people thought about my music video. This will therefore give me information about what aspects I could have either included or what I shouldn't included. This survey is only 8 questions long, and the reason I haven't made it any longer is so that people taking the survey don't get bored and loose interest in it and the reason for it not being too short is so that I can get a good amount of feedback from what I have produced.

Creating a SurveyMonkey

Magazine Advert Progression

Process of the Magazine Advert 

This image above shows myself individually adding in several pictures that I wanted to advertise on my advert,. At this point, I had already added an affect onto the image in which darkened it and highlighted myself and the white wall. 

The image above shows myself experimenting with the different styles of text. I actually found one in which I liked and decided to use it in the colour black and decided to place it along the left side of the advert against the white wall which makes it stands out more. 

As I wanted to use the star rating on the advert, I had to look around on picnik for shapes that were stars. The only ones in which I could find were hand drawn ones; although I did find these to be very effective. 

This is the final product that I came up with, and above is an image in which I took of saving the image into my documents on my computer at home. 

Magazine Advert

In order to keep a relation and link between the music video, digipak and magazine advert I come to an idea that for the magazine advert I would use one of the six pictures from the digipak as the main picture.

Theory Work- Suture

Suture; 


Classical Hollywood narrative , editing sound and mis-en-scene 'sutures' or positions the audience in certain ways making only one preferred reading possible, however unconscious the audience is of that position.

This is shown in different scenes of the film 'Crash' as the director and producer of the film make sure that in such a way when making the film they use a device in which makes us as the audience think of it in their preferred way.

Theory Work -

In each case there was a media and political outcry for the texts to be banned. In some cases laws were changed, films banned and newspapers demanded the burning of films. Subsequently, in each case it was found that no case could be proven to demonstrate a link between the text and the violent acts.

The effects model contributes to moral panics whereby;

• the media produce inactivity make us into students who won't pass their exams or 'couch potatoes; who make no effort to get a job 
• the media produces violent 'copycat' behaviour or mindless shopping in response to advertisement.  

The Uses and Gratifications Model 

• It is still unclear that there is any link between the consumption of violent media texts and violent imitative behaviour. 
• Also, the theory is flawed in that many people do watch violent texts and appear not to be influenced.
• Therefore a new theory is necessary

The Effects Model 

• The audience is active and uses the text
• The audience uses the text for its own gratification or pleasure 
• Power lies with the audience not the producers 

This theory emphasises what audiences do with media texts how and why they use them. Far from being duped by the media, the audience is free ti reject, use or play with media meaning as they see fit. 

Audiences therefore use media texts to gratify needs for;

1. diversion 
2. escapism 
3. information 
4. pleasure 
5. comparing relationships and lifestyle with one's own (only way is essex) - constructed reality television 
6. sexual stimulation 

The audience is in control and consumption of the media helps people with issues such as;

1. learning 
2. emotional satisfaction 
3. relaxation 
4. help with issues of personal identity 
5. help with issues of social identity 
6. help with issues of aggression and violence 

Music Video

After successfully finishing the editing of the music video, I have in actual fact produced a whole music video to the song 'Tonight I Let You Go' by The Colours. I think that the story I chose to go with the song fits perfectly and it expresses what is trying to be said in the music. Here is the link to the music video in which has been uploaded onto youtube; 

Final digipak

This is the final product for my digipak and as you can see all of the images in which have been used all in some way are related to my music video in which has been successfully completed. On my digipak I wanted to get a sense of a deteriorated relationship across, showing the girl in a short skirt, black boots red lips etc and the boy with really dark puffy eyes. I thought a good way to emphasis what the video is about was to show an image of drugs for the front cover with the title of the band and song written across and also an image of words in which means they no longer work sort of thing.

As you can see on my didgpak I have included a barcode, a title for the album with the artist band, a tracklist a little production company name and a circle in which will represent where the cd would be placed once it had been produced. 

Editing of the Digipak

As shown above, you can see from the programme I am using that in actual fact this was a screen grab in which I took in order to show the process of editing my digipak. It also shows you that at this current time I was trying to get the circle in which is being used for the cd to make it more transparent so that the picture underneath could be seen more and the cirlce was only faint.

Digipak Nearly Finished

Digipak So Far

Front Cover

Back Cover

Inside Cover

Inside Cover

Cover for the disk

Inside Cover

These images above are the images in which I have taken to show the digipak so far, even though it has not yet been finished. As you can see they all relate to one another as there are several different pictures of myself as the girlfriend in the music video sitting on the floor in prostitution, and there is an image of Charlie the boyfriend with his puffy dark eyes looking directly at the camera. For the front cover I have decided to use an image of drugs as mentioned before the abuse of drugs is one of the main aspects in our film and I would like for this to be portrayed the most so that it stands out.

Overall View

This is an overall view of what my digipak looks so far, since the last post I have added in the barcode to the back cover as well as the song list and on the front cover is the name of the artists band and their hit single 'Tonight I Let You Go'. As you can see, I tried to make all of the pictures relate to each other and mean something towards the music video and is the reason why there are several pictures of myself sitting on the floor on the streets in really cheap and flaunting clothing; there's also a picture of the boyfriend in which will be located at the back of the digipak and shows his droopy dark eyes to show off his drug abuse. 

Digipak progress

Today I decided to start on my digipak as in the previous day I took pictures in which I thought would be good to use, and that would relate in some way to my actual music video. Here are some snap shots of the process;

As of yet I am not entirely sure which picture I will use as the front cover and which will be used for the back cover etc. This however is only a rough draft so it may be totally different when it comes to the final draft.

Ideas for Digipak

Injecting drugs

Even though I don't think this is a particularly good picture, this is sort of what I would want for the front of my digipak. The reason for this is because one of the main issues is the injecting of drugs in the video in which leads to prostitution etc. The good thing about this picture is how tatty and scraggy the boy looks, the bruises on his arm which shows this is not the first time and the dirtyness of himself. 

Heart Break

This would also be a good idea to use for my digipak as it's representing  heart break and this is what I've tried to represent in my video. I like the way there are different textures and colours used and the main focus is on the red colour which is the love heart. 

Prostitution

Above is a picture of a girl in prostitution and I have decided that for my digipak I would like to create an image like this. I think that this is really effective as it has a focus of the main subject in the picture, and the lightning creates a great affect.

What needs to be included on a digpak?

There are several things in which need to be included on a digipak in order for them to be one sold to the public and two, for people to recognize them and find them appealing. These include;

• Barcode
• Artist name
• Albumn/CD name

• Picture
• Track list
• Label name
• Label sign

The reason I have decided to update this post is so that it can help me and my group get to grips the things that we must provide on our digipak. We want ours to be appealing, eye catching and also want it to be unique, if we don't do this then it will not stand out and be nothing different from the others.

Analysis of CD cover

CD cover

Back cover 

CD

Above I have analysed the covers for Beyonce's '4' album and have detailed what things she has included, and what effects are created from what she has done. Having done this it will help me and my group to come up with an idea for what we will do on ours. 

Research into creating a digipak

As well as having the task of being able to come up with idea's of a music video, putting the idea's together and actually producing it we have also been given the task to produce a digipak in order for our CD to be packaged in. A digipak is usually linked to the general theme or idea of the song/album and would have features on the song on the CD, for examples pictures from the video or words from the lyrcis.
In order for the CD/album to be sold to the public, the digipak must be appealing to customers and must stand out. Therefore, to help me and my group decide how and what we will produce for our digipak I decided to go onto 'coverdude.com' which is an online site that offers you a wide range of different CD covers, digipaks, DVD covers etc. By going onto this site it has given me an insight of what we want to include on ours, what things wouldn't be so good and what the general theme we want to come off from it.
One of my favourite CD covers in which I found on this online site is the CD cover of the 'Red Hot Chilli Peppers' -'I'm With You'.


CD cover

Back cover

CD inside

The way in which the front cover of this album has been produced is amazing, even thought it's so simple the way in which it has been laid out creates a huge effect and draws you in. I love the way that the fly has landed on a drug look alike with the words of the album 'I'm With You', this shows promotion and the way this is all upon a pure white background which draws attention to the fly; it is very simple yet so appealing to us as the customers. Next is the back cover, the back cover provides you with a list of the songs in which are on the album, a barcode and several other things. Even though there is not a lot on the cover it is still effective and makes people want to buy it, this is better than it being overloading and looking like it's all de-arranged and bundled together. The actual CD of the album is linked to and is practically the same as the back cover which makes it clear and simple.

Editing

Today I carried on with my editing and think that the whole progress was really successful as I was able to get a lot done. I decided whilst editing that I would have the whole of my video in black and white and it adds to the gloomy and grotty atmosphere of the whole situation. However, the only shot I have decided to keep the normal colour is the first part where the male character and me are sitting on the chair in the front room watching television so represent the past in their relationship.

Editing

I am currently in the process of editing my video, all is going well and I believe so far it looks good.

Editing- Tutorials

As several problems occurred whilst the while process of making the video come about, I decided to leave the group and go off on my own. As I was not completely brilliant with the programme 'Final Cut Express', I decided to go onto google and then look for final cut express tutorials in which would therefore guide me through aspects in which I was not sure of. I found this to be excellent as it helped me a lot, helped me understand how to create different effects using different tools etc. 

Editing Information

As explained in another post, in order to be able to edit my video as well as doing the tutorials I decided to also go onto google and type in a question, for example 'how do I fade in one picture whilst another picture is being shown', by doing this several different people had posted information on how to do this on there in a method step by step which allowed me to carry this out at the end of my music video.

Shots of filming

Above all are the images in which I took when I was filming Charlie singing to the song I have chosen for my video. This was also where I was filmed being a 'prostitute', and thought it would be a good idea if he was in the same places I was singing.

Filming

Yesterday, I started to come to an end with the filming of the video, as I have already got loads of it done. Tomorrow, I will be shooting the last bit and hope that it is a succesfull day with the shooting. It will only be myself and Charlie at these filming scenes as we are the only two characters in the video.

Process of make-up

Adding a little bit of eyeliner

Starts to get darker

Dark and puffy
We decided to give Charlie really dark and puffy eyes so that he came across to people in the video as living a rough life doing drugs, smoking and drinking alcohol. I think that his eyes look effective and work well with the video.

Making a bruised arm
In order to make a bruised arm my Mum had to use a red pen and a green eye pencil. She decided to do it right near where the injection would be inserted into the arm and I think it looks really effective.

Shooting video

Last night, I carried on shooting bits to my music video. The location of this was in a tower block of flats, Hawkwell House Gosfield Road. I thought that the filming was very successful as when I got home I replayed what had been shot and thought it was what I wanted it to look like.

Props; the props used in this part of the filming was the staircase of the flats. I got Charlie who was recording it to focus in on my hands sliding down the sides of the handles. I then got a low angle mid shot of me walking down the stairs paying a lot of attention to my face as I wanted my facial expressions to be shown.

Clothes; last night and the previous time I filmed, I made sure that the clothing I was wearing wasn't that appealing, I tried to make it come across as a  bit too revealing and grotty. I had several holes in my tights, with a fair few ladders in them. I had big gold and black hoopy earings in with bright red lipstick. This bright red lipstick could portray something sexual or something to do with blood.

Ed Sheeran- The A Team

Above is an excellent screen shot that I got whilst watching the Ed Sheeran video- The A Team. Because I like this section of the video so much last night I decided to try and do my own version of this. 

Filming

Last not I was actually able to start shooting my music video. After replaying back the bits we had shot I thought that it went really well.

Arctic Monkeys - When the Sun Goes Down

This is also another video in which was described to me that basically portrays what I want to portray in my music video. I like the fact that the whole situation about prostitution is grotty and everything in the video is grotty itself.

Above is an image that I screen grabbed from the video and thought it was a great example to show whilst trying to express what I feel about this video. As you can see, the building they are standing in front of looks as though it's been involved in a fire and the pavements and colouring of the screen is really dark and gloomy.

Ed Sheeran- The A Team

Above is a youtube clip of Ed Sheeran's song 'The A Team'. The reason I have decided to put this on my blog is due to the fact that whilst getting ideas together about what I could for the story of my video, someone I know come up with an idea that similarised my ideas with Ed Sheeran's song. After looking at the whole clip I can see where this person is coming from and thought that this video was very good. I will therefore use my own ideas however I think that after looking how effective it was in black and white, I will do the same either throughout the video or at certain points.

Mood Board

Above is the mood board I created to express the different moods and aspects that will be presented in my music video. Therefore, as you can see there are various pictures of drugs and injections into the arm.  This is saying that the whole story is basically based on the abuse of alcohol and drugs which results in prostitution and the break up of a deteriorated relationship. 

There is an image of red lips as well, this is expressing either a violent aspect or flirty and in this case it relates to the prostitution in which the girl performs in order to receive money for her boyfriend so that he can get his supply. This also relates to the gold hoopy earings in which the girl wears when she goes out to put herself on the streets, and by wearing these I want her to be portrayed as a bit of a slapper and a bit cheap. 

In addition to this, there are two pictures which represent love, 'Together Forever' and 'I was in love with you' and these two represent the fact that once upon a time this couple were in love with each other until a further addition was added to the relationship, alcohol and drugs. This therefore deteriorates their relationship and ends up in heart ache. 

Locations

Here are several images of locations that will be used and seen in my music video;

The reason I chose to set 'Hawkwell House' as one of my locations was because, the actual building itself looks a bit grotty and not very pleasant. Therefore, in my video I want to convey dirtyness from the girl going out and having it off with men for money and therefore thought this building could help express it.