Changes to Locations.

For the change of storyboarding, I also decided to find new and more exciting locations. These included:

A nearby park with small forest:

A bathroom which we would shoot in the bath:

 

And an alleyway:

Changes to Planning

During my filming, I encountered difficulties such as footage not looking effective or other actors not being reliable, and therefore decided to come up with new ideas to shoot which would boost the overall look and feel of my final piece.Here are the new storyboards, which I stuck to during filming and helped to create an effective final product:

Final Draft of Music Video

Final Drafts of Digi Pak & Advert

Q4) How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

During the research and planning section of making my music video and ancillary tasks, I used the site 'Blogger' to present my information and research that I did into the genre of my choice, which was synthpop. This proved to be a useful blogging site throughout planning and research, as the site is easy to use and presents the posts in a readable and neat way. The posts are available to edit any time, allowing me to keep complete control over my work and make changes at any time when they are needed. Through this site, I can now insert videos, photos, gifs and much more into my posts, working to make them super visual.

 Another technology which I used was google docs, to create a audience feedback survey at the time of research. This technology was easy to use and create a questionnaire  and provided an easy way to send it out to people for completion, by email. Other technologies used include YouTube, which was used thoroughly for research into similar music videos to the genre I chose of synthpop. From watching these videos I was able to plan and pick out the essential ideas which would also be included in my media product. 

In the process of filming, I used technologies such as a HD digital video camera. The advantages of using this technology included allowing me to preview the footage that I have just shot on the cameras display, easily letting me know whether the shot was correctly framed or if it needs to be re-shot straight away. The viewfinder screen can also be moved freely up and down, allowing the correct angle to be used when shooting for me to see how the shot looks, such as holding the camera on the ground and yet still being able to see what the camera is going to record. 

After the shots were filmed, I used technologies such as Final Cut and iMovie to import and edit my footage. These are programmes which I have had experience with before, allowing me to easily carry out the necessary processes to lead towards completion of my music video.\

Here is a video demonstrating the use of these technologies: 

Q3) What have you learned from your audience feedback?

At the beginning of my project, I asked my target audience a series of questions which could be helpful when making my ancillary and video tasks. These questions helped to aid towards my created music video, magazine advert and digipak, including what the audience wanted to see and what best suited the genre of synthpop.

I asked the audience what they would expect to see on a product associated with the synthpop genre, and here were my results.

By looking at this research feedback, I tried to adhere to what people expected to see, being able to fit easily into the recognisable genre. Photos of the artist were used, with brightly lit backgrounds and interesting 'urban' locations. I decided to not use elaborate costumes however, as I wanted my artist to look more down to earth and relatable, which relates to other existing synthpop artists. Although my first draft of my digipak did include photos with lots of colour and what could be seen as an 'elaborate costume', teacher feedback showed that I needed to remove these images as they didn't create the right image for the artist.

I also asked what the audience would associate with a music video or any promotion to do with the genre, and here were my results:

From these results, it can be seen that people expected to see a lot of dancing and bright, neon colours. For my music video we did plan to film a 'rave' or 'club' scene, however due to complications we had to change this. Instead I have included the idea that my artist is coming back from one of these events, and put an individual twist on the expected video.

We then had more feedback from our target audience once completed our second drafts our our ancillary tasks, which can be seen here:


This feedback helped me to make the final tweaks to the advertisement and CD cover and follow the audiences advice. From all this audience feedback, I have developed my ancillary tasks from :

To our finals:

Q2) How effective is the combination of your media product and your ancillary tasks?

Q1) In what ways does your media product use, develop and challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Advertisement Draft 3

CD Cover Draft 3

CD Cover Practice

During my research into the conventions of a typical CD cover, I decided to make a practice mock CD cover so that I would have some idea about what to create for my final product.

Ancillary Tasks Draft Two

Feedback on Ancillary Tasks - Dayna and Sophie

Draft one

This is our first draft. It is not complete however, as we have not filmed one of our scenarios that includes the performer singing in a 'rave' scene.

Ancillary Tasks Draft One

Here is our digipak for our album called 'Minted' by The Ka$h Mob.

 

Here is our magazine advert for the same album: 

Peer Assessment

Here is my peer feedback which I received following the first draft of my CD cover and magazine advert. I managed to achieve my target grade of an A, however still have areas for improvement which I'm confident once done will secure me a high A grade for this section of the coursework. 

Planning Documents

Shooting Schedule:

Here is our initial shooting schedule, allowing us to manage our time effectively and make sure that we get all the necessary footage which we need. It is important to plan out what is going to happen before going to shoot, as we can make sure we have all the props, costumes and equipment that we need and can get filming done quickly and professionally.

Photoshoot plan:

Here is our photoshoot plan, which we needed to plan out for our digipak and magazine advert. This included listing what props, costumers and locations that we needed, and allowed us to get our ideas down on paper so that we would not forget them on set.

Prop, costume and make up list:
Here are our final planning documents for our music video, which included listing the needed props, costumes and make up. This was used to make sure we were organised when going to film, and had thought carefully about our mise-en-scene in order to effectively create the image of a synthpop artist.

Coming up with the band name:

Here is an example of the process which we went through trying to come up with the band name, which we finally decided will be 'The Ka$h Mob'. This name was decided through using existing band names as inspiration, and following the conventions of a synthpop artist which would be fun yet individual and different.

Talent release form:

Here is our talent release form, needed in order to be able to film and photograph our actors for our final media products. This is a legal form used in professional media, which mimics the products we are trying to create through our A2 course.

Magazine Advertisement Draft.

Here is the first draft for my magazine advertisement for my artist.

This was further developed into this second draft, which appears more effective and will be used as my plan when creating the media product.

Costume, Makeup, Props & Equipment

Here is a video explaining our plans for the mise-en-scene of our video, including costumes, make up, props and equipment needed.


Equipment for our shooting will include:

• Video Camera
• Tripod
• Figrig 
• Storyboards 

Props we need will include:

• Leaves - for the forest scene
• Microphone & Stand
• Paint

CD Cover Design.

Here are our initial ideas and drafts of what could make up our final CD cover design, including images of the artists and other images which could be related to our genre of synthpop.

Location Permission

For our music video, we will be using 2 different locations specifically. Here is the permission slip for filming in Nonsuch Woods and the email to Mr Walsh about using PDH.

Photoshoot

For our digipak and magazine advertisement  we arranged a photoshoot with a male and a female model, representing Ellie Goulding and Calvin Harris. For the first part of the shoot, I took photos of Sophie & Jack inside, with a blank sheet as a background, as to not complicate the photo and force the attention on the artist. For the next photoshoot, we plan to splash paint on Sophie, or 'Ellie Goulding', then take photos outside to demonstrate a more free and eccentric view of both the artist and the song which we are advertising.

Lyric Annotation

Here is a gif of our lyric annotations, which will help us towards what we could include in our music video, making the images link with the lyrics. 

Locations

Against a black wall/fence - for the paint scenes. We decided to shoot in a location like this as we did not want the background or surrounding areas to distract from the actions and events which will be taking place between the boy and girl, e.g getting paint thrown over them, drawing on eachother.

PDH/Black drama room - for dancing 'rave' scenes. We have chosen this location as the room can be lit up specially as we want it using flashing spotlights and strobe lighting. This room also has no distractions, and will look like a typical place for a rave to happen. The black colours of the walls will hopefully make the actors stand out more, as they will be wearing bright clothes which is a convention of our genre, synthpop.

Forest - for scenes of the singer performing. We have chosen a forest due to the 'unusual' location type which fits well with our genre, and the fact that we want our artist to appear 'pure' and stand out by wearing a white dress. 

Storyboards.

Here is a sliderocket of my groups storyboards, after we cut them up so we could easily move the scenarios around and add in extra shots if need be. This was an effective way of spreading our storyboards out and helped towards planning.




This is the animatic using the storyboards we created, showing a brief outline of the sequence of our music video.

Initial Video Ideas

During a brainstorm for our initial ideas, we came up with our specific concept which we would like to include in our music video. This and the other ideas around the spider diagram include:

• Romantic relationship
• Crowd dancing --> man & woman either side of dancing, push through to eachother
• Flashing lights
• Neon colours
• Close ups of singers face
• Paint splashing 

Photoshop Practice

In order to practice masking in Photoshop, these are the following steps which I took.

I found an image online, for this example I used a photo of The Beatles walking across a road.

In Photoshop, I created a new canvas in the size of an A4 landscape. I then created a new layer, and put  in my photo of the Beatles. From this, I made the image the same size of the canvas by using the transform tool (cmd + T). Then I duplicated the layer, by clicking on the layer whilst holding CTL.

Then, I went to filters --> blur. From the different types of blur effects available, I chose to add a motion blur. This made my image look this this:

As I wanted the first two people to be in focus, I then clicked on the 'add vector mask' at the bottom of the layers panel. Switching the main colour to black, I took the brush tool and carefully outlined the figures which I wanted to be in focus. This is my final product:

Using this Photoshop practice, I created a mock CD cover for my genre of synthpop. This cover included many skills to create a final product which included a barcode, images in the style of our genre, neon green coloured writing for the track list and name of album/artist. These all fit the conventions of a synthpop CD cover - the images which I shot were influenced by previous covers which I analysed, including Crystal Castles and Ellie Goulding. I decided to use a black background, in order to place neon colours on top to make them stand out even more than they already would, fitting our genre. The tracklist included alternative song titles, which also fits my genre.

Green Screen Practice

In order to get some technical practice, as a class we set up the green screen and filmed a performance with 3 individual cameras. From this experience with the green screen, I have learnt:

• To give enough time to both pack away and set up the green screen, as it requires quite a lot of time to put everything up and away properly. 
• The green screen must be set out so that there are no creases - any darker parts or shadows on the screen and this will be hard during editing to match up with the background, which can be seen in the practice video which I created.
• In order to reduce any shadows, artificial lighting must be set up in particular areas around the screen, however with diffusers as to not create harsh, high key lighting.
• Multiple cameras filming at the same time helps to reduce filming time and can get the images needed to create a short video, seen in this video which we used 3 cameras set up at different angles to the performers.

Sophie and Dayna's Roles

Here is a video explaining what each of our roles will be within our group during our planning and research process, which will aid us towards what we should be doing at each stage towards the making of our music video.

Initial Ideas

This is a spider diagram of my group's initial ideas, which we created from the first time we were discussing about which genre we have chosen. This includes our ideas surrounding synthpop, including props, costumes, locations etc.

Audience Response

A total of 21 people answered my survey about the genre of synthpop. The demographic results of the audience mainly matched those of my target audience, showing that 12 of those questioned were female, making 9 to be male.

The age range mostly included ages of 14-18, which I have identified as the main target audience for this genre of music, due to the loud nature of the music and the intention for the listeners to dance energetically. However, 4 people surveyed were over the age of 26, allowing for an outsiders view of this genre of music, although these people tended to dislike or were unaware of synthpop music.

Next, the audience were asked how they get their music. Although this may not be relevant specifically to the genre of synthpop, this allows for a clearer understanding of what the person answering is like, and how music is general obtained. The majority of people get their music from the iTunes store, however many either download it illegally or use the YouTube converter to get music directly off YouTube.

To get a further grip of the audience's demographic, I posed the question of what they enjoy doing in their spare time, allowing to recognise how many of those asked fit the stereotypical profile of someone that listens to synthpop - usually someone very active who goes to many social parties and clubbing events. However, out of those surveyed, only 13 admitted to going to social parties, and a mere 6 spend their free time clubbing. This could prove that the expected personality of someone that listens to synthpop is not true, and that you can never guess the particular type of person who listens to a certain type of genre.

 The questions then turn to the specific genre of synthpop. When asked if the audience liked this genre, most agreed, however 8 people were not sure whether they had heard of the genre. This could be just that they were not aware of the genre name of this type of music, or that they did not realise the bands which fell into the synthpop category.

When asked where the audience usually hears synthpop music, most replied at parties. This shows that my chosen genre is played at events where people are expected to dance, fitting in with the motifs associated such as raving or clubbing.

I asked the audience what other sub-genres of pop that they listened to, as to get a feel for the most popular type of pop that would be listened to. The responses were manly indie and dance pop, both which are extremely upbeat, quirky and good to dance to.

The results for the next question showed that synthpop music generally makes people feel cheerful, energetic and pumped. This all fits the expected responses, which will allow us to incorporate these feelings into our music video, to reflect upon the audience.

In order to see which artists within this genre were most popular, we asked who our audience have listened to before. The results showed La Roux, Ellie Goulding and Lady Gaga to be most popular, who are featured on the radio quite often. This shows that less people have listened to off radio music artists such as Crystal Castles, suggesting they are less popular synthpop artists.

In order to gain research on what to include on our digipack, we asked the audience what they expected to see on front of this genre's typical CD cover. The results were as expected from my previous research, that the expected things to see included elaborate costumes, exotic locations, lots of colour, a photo of the artist and large, bright title of the album.

When asked what the audience associated with the synthpop genre, the answers included glowsticks, energetic dancing, loud music, discos and neon colours. Again, these results were anticipated, and were featured in research videos that I have looked into of this genre.

To bring the questions to an end, we asked the audience where they have seen these artists typically advertised. The results shown the artists are common to be heard on the radio, shown on TV or advertised on Youtube or other internet sites. As most (16) said they have seen advertisements mainly on the internet, this could show that the artists are less popular due to not being featured on many posters or by word of mouth.

Lastly, the audience were asked whether they would like to hear more of synthpop in the charts. 10 people surveyed said yes, however 3 said no. 8 people didn't care, again suggesting that this is a less popular sub-genre of pop.