Final Production/ Music video

Dear examiner,

This is my final cut of the music video for my A2  production.

This blog contains all of my pre- production, production and post- production work contributing to my final piece.  

Ancillary text - DVD cover

Here is the DVD cover I designed as a part of my ancillary text to encase the music video I produced.

Ancillary Text - Website

Here is the website for our artist that we created as a part of our ancillary texts:

http://meerock10.wix.com/usesomebody#!contact/c16fm

Evaluation Question 1

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

Evaluation Question 2

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

Both the video and the ancillary text demonstrate the same style of  music as well as the genre through the use of colour treamtment, format layout (website and DVD cover) and use of the same images across all three products. I decided to use some screenshots from the music video and embed them into the design of the website and cover in order to make them appear as though from the same collection of products.

I decided to incorporate a simple logo onto the dvd cover. this is the small red piano that is located next to the name Jazmine Flowers, it can also be seen as water mark on the back of the cover as an under layer the to text. I looked for ways to involve this logo within the music video as another strategy of pulling the products together but I was unable to find a suitable place for it to be located, especially without looking tacky.

During my research into DVD covers I made the decision to have a dark or light background so that the text and images would stand out as well as making it clear to the audience which elements of the product to focus on. I feel as though I have stuck with this idea and proceeded to successfully design a cover similar to those I liked during my research.

As part of an audience feedback I was told that  "The elegance of the text and the sophistication of the video compliment each other really well". This tells me that the overall products weren't contradictory of themselves and that they each took the same amount of time when planning and researching how to go about producing them.

Evaluation Question 3

What Have You Learnt From Your Audience Feedback?

To answer this question, I used Facebook to message people who had seen my music video and asked them each once question in order to gather some solid audience feedback.


The first thing I learnt from my audience feedback was that the narrative was successful as well as being  clear to the viewer what the character's situation was.

Overall the feedback I have been given is showing that I have been on track with what I was aiming for my video to show as well as my ancillary texts.

there was some controversy over how supporting the ancillary text is of the main production. one person answered that the DVD cover is in keeping with the colour theme as well as the feeling of isolation and escapism through the use of music. However a different member of the audience said that the DVD cover could be made to look more professional and realistic. he went on to say that as much as represents a product he would buy, he doesn't feel it look commercial enough (despite it being a prototype ).

Evaluation question 4

How did you use new media technologies in the construction, research, planning and development and evaluation stages?

Evaluation Question 4 by emma dlq

Colour Treatments

here is our first attempt at colour treatment. we have increased the contrast of the image and decreased the saturation. I have seen this being done many times in media products for scenes that are more negative or dangerous. I wanted to to the same for my media piece as I wanted to create the feelings of loneliness, isolation and even potential danger as the main character is in a new environment and doesn't know what to expect.  I watched a clip from a different media blog that looked at colour treatment. This helped me as I was scared that by changing the colouring of the picture I would be making the piece look too artificial. However after watching this video it reassured me because I realised that people won't know how the original image looked, they will only know what you show them, and if the continuity is good then audience shouldn't realise if the colour scheme is unnatural because you have convinced them that that's how it is within the world of your production.


http://marlboroughmediastudies.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/colour-grading-and-treatment-for-film.html

Here is a link to the video I watched.

Ancillary text: DVD cover research

In order to produce a successful and effective DVD cover for the distribution of my music video I have been looking into some existing products. This will help me pick elements from each that I like and feel have worked best for the product to enable me to produce my own to the best of my ability.

I chose the Lady GaGa cover because I feel like there is some similarity with the artist I am using as they are both individual female artists. I chose The Beatles cover because I wanted to demonstrate that although the two artists are from different eras and have very different styles, the covers are actually quite similar; showing the artists on the cover, having a dark background and having the contents on the back. What I like about these two designs is the dark background and the contrast it creates with the photos as well as the text. The dark background also allows the front of the cover to connect with the back cover which makes it flow better. However one thing that I don't like about the Lady GaGa cover is the variation of font and colours on the back of the case.

What I like about these two covers is the way the pictures are of the artist in motion, playing their music rather than just a photo shoot of their profile. I feel that using these pictures make for a more dynamic cover as well as presenting the artist as a performer rather than just a stylised figure. Compared to the DVD covers shown above (Lady GaGa) this album artwork is more timeless as it doesn't represent a specific fashion or current style.

The next 3 media products aren't all DVD music covers but they are DVD covers. at first when I saw the 'Roxy Music' Cover it lead to me think about the 'Dirty Dancing' and 'Pretty Woman' cover. Both of which have their own soundtracks tailing off from the films so as well as being video/DVD covers they are also used as soundtrack covers. Like the darker backgrounds I feel that the white background also emphasises the texts and images. the simplicity makes it easy to focus on the important parts, the artist, the title and the contents of the DVD/ track list. these three covers 

After looking at the different styles of DVD covers and talking about which elements I like and which I don't. It's clear to me that I would like to incorporate the theme of either a dark background or light to contrast with the text and images as well as keeping the design timeless and try not to make it a certain style that it specific to this time.