Earlier in the week, we made the decision to (for now at least) scrap the video, as we could not get it to upload.
Instead, we have worked rigorously on creating a new piece in the little spare time we have had - we have all had tight work schedules. We have created a Sliderocket presentation for the evaluation question: What have you learned from your audience research?
Tuesday, 20 December 2011
Sunday, 18 December 2011
JC: Audience research - little progress
I have endeavoured to upload the video - which was playing back fine at school - however, despite trying three different computers, I have also failed in doing so, and so have therefore accepted that there is a problem with the file which cannot be resolved until we return to school. I had a small flash file saved as well (in total four different files were saved - see right) which I have been able to upload, however this was a mere twenty-two seconds in length.
Friday, 16 December 2011
JC: Final day of term problems

JC: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Looking at Andrew Goodwin’s forms and conventions of a music video, it would appear that ours in rich in connotation. Goodwin’s first feature says that music videos demonstrate genre characteristics, which are recognisable throughout music videos belonging to that genre. Before we set about our creative process, we decided it would be a good idea to look into the generic conventions of a typical music video and found that for indie/rock videos, although there is great variation in the style of different videos – due to the individual aspect of the genre – this should include a stage or band performance, a sense of camaraderie and costumes typically consisting of jeans or chinos, pump shoes, normal shirts and jackets.
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our photo |
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The Pigeon Detectives band photo |
When we set about the planning of our music video, we felt that it would be crucial to include at the very least aspects of these conventions, regardless of which basing (performance, narrative or concept) we gave to the overall video, because we could then compare our piece to that of both our artist and others. Despite having four different locations, and therefore four different costumes, in each one we can be seen to conform to the genre through our clothing. Furthermore, the predominant footage in our video is band performance. Whilst we were reasonably happy with the original footage, after changing the brightness and contrast on the recording we found that an authentic band performance, perhaps at a concert or gig, was given out. This can be seen in videos such as that for ‘We Don’t Celebrate Sundays’ by Hardcore Superstar. Comradeship was also evident in our video, as can be seen through our jump cuts and opening shots, where we can all be seen in the car together. The performance, which constitutes the bulk of our work, is also evidence of band union because we are all performing together. The costume and camaraderie constituents of our work are also visible in our printwork – with a band photo on the inside cover of our digipak, which can also be seen in real band posters for The Pigeon Detectives.



In my opinion, the slow motion handi-cam tracking shot of Cameron throwing the paint pot is a great example of how camerawork connotes rebellion and anger. This is because it captures his movement and non-verbal language as he throws the pot, accentuating the maliciousness with which the normal speed shot was intended. The Camaraderie aspect of the genre is also captured by the inside car footage, which appears to represent a home video feel to the images, similar to the ‘lads on tour’ or group trip scenarios that youth or adolescents are often associated with. We also provided a number of close-up Meat shots for the consumer which conforms to the conventions of music videos in general.

As I stated earlier, there is a certain style of clothing associated with the indie rock genre. We have been successful in replicating this convention in our work, as can be seen in the pictures where we are dressed appropriately in all situations, with the instruments of a band further reinforcing this meaning. These are also similar to the costumes worn in some promotional material by The Pigeon Detectives.



In our video, the representation of young adolescent males conforms to the indie/rock genre. Because this is the only group present, we were able to connote restlessness and youth frustration, whilst when the restrictions of the ‘real world’ were removed the rebellion and freedom that then occurs was present in our video, as can be seen through our shots of Cameron throwing the paint pot, and myself and Cameron smashing some rubbish up.
JC: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
Just as we had decided early in the planning process which song we were going to use, we came to the conclusion early on that we were going to run our advertisement on the back cover of NME, as we felt it was the Magazine in which we would be able to appeal to the greatest number of followers of the indie genre – who would therefore be more likely to buy and consume our product – due to the similar style of music covered in the magazine. The advert was designed to be the same dimensions as the magazine, so as to be a replica of what an actual advert might look like.



Our digipak has a widespread, recognisable image, which has been manipulated to create a unique, slightly ironic image. The bold colours used in the piece also help our digipak to stand out from the crowd, and thus make our digipak more purchasable. We took a different approach to the Digipak than we did with the music video – create a slight tongue-in-cheek feel. I chose the images due to their link to the album title, which is unique to our piece, and then built the rest of the printwork – apart from the band photo – around this. This also creates a mischievous feel to the piece, which conforms to the dominant ideologies held about young male adolescents, because they are often associated with acts of rebellion, disobedience and tomfoolery. There is also presence of generic conventions in our digipak, as I placed a guitar – an iconic image associated with the indie/rock genre – next to the track listing on the back cover. The font used also links in with the ‘Emergency’ title and image of the man, as it is similar to fonts such as that for ‘Superman’. It is also similar to that used by The Pigeon Detectives in their album cover for ‘Up Guards and at ‘Em’. There is coherence within our printwork because both our digipak and advert use the same font and image, meaning that the album will be more recognisable to the consumer if they want to buy it. By using the same font throughout our digipak, booklet and advertisement there is consistency throughout our promotional material as each links together.
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Our font |
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Richard Dyer |
Richard Dyer set out a ‘stars theory’ regarding the influence of stars across different medium. He suggest in this that these stars are semi-mythological sets of meanings constructed around performers in order to market themselves to a large and loyal audience. He says that fundamentally, the star image is incoherent, incomplete and open, which is based on two key paradoxes:
· The star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer
· The star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer

Thursday, 15 December 2011
JC: Updated Digipak and booklet
JC: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Media processes and technologies have played a crucial role throughout the advanced portfolio module.
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Youtube user feedback |
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Survey monkey |

For both the Foundation and Advanced Portfolio production, the blog has been the most significant media tool used in our creative processes. It has been an excellent resource for the documentation of thoughts, write-ups and work exhibition, appearing in a more aesthetically pleasing manner than, for example, a paper document. It has allowed us to integrate examples of other artists’ work when talking about them thus allowing a reader to understand what we mean and what we are referring to, whilst also allowing us to highlight key words within our work which exaggerate the point which we want to make. Along the way, there were only minor problems I experienced with the application; when logging in, if the stay signed in box was ticked then we would be unable to comment on any posts. The image layout within each post was also difficult to alter because the image movement was not flexible, and finally the background design has been difficult to alter, because a number of the images which we have wanted to use have exceeded the alloted file size.
Our animatic was an area in which we could perhaps have improved. Although we had most of the shots we had agreed to shoot included within it, there was little description of what we intended to show within each shot so for the outside viewer it might have been a little unclear what exactly it was that we intended to show. However, despite not looking back at the animatic on a regular basis, the process of creating the storyboard was useful because it was the first opportunity we had to put together our creative ideas and grasp what they might look like.




The font I used on the digipak design was chosen due to it’s connotations; I chose the font, named Heroes Assemble because it reminded me of the font used in comics - such as Superman - which feature superheroes. Writing the word Emergency in this font gave it superhero status in the same way that adding a cape to our emergency exit man had done, and because superheroes are often found in Emergency situations I felt this font would be a good one to use. I downloaded the font from the website Dafont.com which meant that writing it out would not result in it becoming pixelated. I then selected the normal version (i.e. not bold, in italics etc.) and wrote out the band name in the top Left hand corner (so it would be the first thing the consumer read) and the album name in the bottom right hand corner (so it was the last thing they read and therefore made the connection between then image and the name) so neither covered any of the white space.
Premier was the editing software programme we used to assemble our music video. Whilst my attention was focused predominantly on Photoshop creating our digipak – we delegated different tasks to each of us to save time – I was involved in the creative ideas process and edited a couple shots that were included in the shoot. Once we had finished filming, we captured the shots and then opened them in Premier ready to edit . For me, my most iconic piece of editing was the jump cuts from Brighton . After importing all of the shots that we had recorded, I then dragged the song track onto the timeline and then also dragged the chosen shot onto it, above the music. To begin with I moved the selected shot along to the part of the track which it roughly belonged in, and then eventually dragged it onto the point where Sam’s stationary shot lined up with the first power chord in the music. I then cut the video until I was stationary in shot, and then Alex and finally Cameron. Once this had been done, I moved them next to each other and made sure each jump cut was in time with the power chord change. After this, I dragged the selection bar across to this section of the track so that only this part would be exported. Once this was done, I saved the file to the D-Drive and once this was complete, exported it onto YouTube.
I also created the sped up Police car shots, by importing the shot into the editing timeline and decompressing time on it, and used the same tool to alter the speed of the car travelling through the tunnel towards Brighton . In addition, I also added a black and white effect to these shots, as we had done throughout the rest of the piece.





Tuesday, 6 December 2011
CM: Editing Process
For our music video I was editing on Adobe Premiere 10.0 at home and Adobe Premiere 9.0 at school because it gave our group extra-time outside of school to edit our production. Due to the fact that I was the only one at mine and had to make all creative decisions alone during the "home edit". Then so that the group could view the work and comment their creative ideas I would upload the footage to Youtube and then embedded it onto the blog. This allowed a group collaboration and we could then edit as a group the following lesson to change what needed changing. This has been greatly beneficial as last year for our AS coursework "Hitlist" we had only Adobe Premiere 8.0 and had poor playback taking much longer to edit. The new software has made lip-synching possible for our music video which is about 80% of our video, so our editing ability and speed has improved due to updated software.
For all our performance shots we turned the Brightness down to -33.2, the contrast and saturation up to 142.3, this made the performance seem much more authentic and the background became hidden rather than being three cardboard planks behind the band. Also by having this lighting controlled it enabled us to create the illusion of a crowd as when the camera looked out from the stage it was pitch black due to the spotlight creating low key lighting.
To create our performance base layer, we took the six different versions of our performance. Then we layered them on the time line above the audio track. Then we watched put the best performance on the top layer and when there was a inadequate bit of footage we would cut it and reveal the underneath performance we kept doing this until we had the a well cut and interesting performance video.
Our music video needed to be more than just a performance video in order to retain the interest and repeatablity for our audience. All our chorus's were intercut with abstract shots, our favoured abstract shot was the paint scene. To do this we filmed some slow-motion paint throwing and also smashing of wood/guitars/boxes, this helped to create a sense of anger and rebellion. We were inspired by Martin De Thurah's work especially "Carpark North: Human" as had slow-motion liquid to face sences. This created repeatablity within our music video, as made the audience question: why was this happening? Where is this person? Where are they performing? This helps to create a narrative fuzz and thus keeps the audience watching music video and eventually go and buy the track and so is a great promotional tool.
For the editing process it took much longer than "Hitlist" due to the amount of footage needed to retain interest and also "Hitlist" was only two minutes long. Whereas our music video was four minutes and forty eight seconds. A convention of music videos are the amount of cuts that are needed and also the many different types of shots. During our planning stage we looked at other music videos such as, Natty "July". Which had over 150 cuts, whilst watching it one didn't notice this however when technically analysing it I realised just how much footage was needed to create a captivating music video. The editing process took much longer this year than last due to the amount of cuts that were needed. However I feel we created a much better production at the end of the course.
For all our performance shots we turned the Brightness down to -33.2, the contrast and saturation up to 142.3, this made the performance seem much more authentic and the background became hidden rather than being three cardboard planks behind the band. Also by having this lighting controlled it enabled us to create the illusion of a crowd as when the camera looked out from the stage it was pitch black due to the spotlight creating low key lighting.
To create our performance base layer, we took the six different versions of our performance. Then we layered them on the time line above the audio track. Then we watched put the best performance on the top layer and when there was a inadequate bit of footage we would cut it and reveal the underneath performance we kept doing this until we had the a well cut and interesting performance video.
Our music video needed to be more than just a performance video in order to retain the interest and repeatablity for our audience. All our chorus's were intercut with abstract shots, our favoured abstract shot was the paint scene. To do this we filmed some slow-motion paint throwing and also smashing of wood/guitars/boxes, this helped to create a sense of anger and rebellion. We were inspired by Martin De Thurah's work especially "Carpark North: Human" as had slow-motion liquid to face sences. This created repeatablity within our music video, as made the audience question: why was this happening? Where is this person? Where are they performing? This helps to create a narrative fuzz and thus keeps the audience watching music video and eventually go and buy the track and so is a great promotional tool.
For the editing process it took much longer than "Hitlist" due to the amount of footage needed to retain interest and also "Hitlist" was only two minutes long. Whereas our music video was four minutes and forty eight seconds. A convention of music videos are the amount of cuts that are needed and also the many different types of shots. During our planning stage we looked at other music videos such as, Natty "July". Which had over 150 cuts, whilst watching it one didn't notice this however when technically analysing it I realised just how much footage was needed to create a captivating music video. The editing process took much longer this year than last due to the amount of cuts that were needed. However I feel we created a much better production at the end of the course.
GROUP: Audience Research ideas and progress
Rather fortuitously, yesterday afternoon we were able to gather a group of 12 peers and screen our music video to them, before asking them some questions about the piece. Some of the questions for this focus group had been thought up before we shot the piece, whilst others were made up on the spot. Cameron asked the questions whilst I filmed the sequence to ensure that we would have more than one attempt to record the data in case we missed anything out.
In total, we asked six questions:
Did the video conform to the genre?
This was probably the question where we had the most mixed reviews; although the majority of the people said yes to the question, two people both said they were confused as to why paint was being thrown at Cameron, but nonetheless said that they had enjoyed the shot. One person said that they thought the camerawork - particularly in the studio - was fantastic, whilst another said that the backlighting in the studio gave it a 'tour performance' feel.
After watching the video, what image were you left with?
For this section, the image that seven of our group were left with was the shot of paint being thrown at Cameron, whilst another thought that the slow motion shot of paint dripping from Cameron (inspired by Martin de Thurrah) was their most iconic shot. Other highlights for our peers were the shot of myself screaming into the camera, the jump cuts, archway shot and opening performance.
Is the video a good promotion of the track?
One person said they were uncertain as to whether or not the music video worked with the track, but elsewhere there was unanimous support for our video and the Keep on Your Dress soundtrack. One suggested that it could be enhanced was promoting the band within the video - by placing 'mock up' posters or similar within our music video.
What word or emotion did it evoke?
Again for this question there was clear support within the group for once word - rebellion, which was chosen by half of the group. Similar words such as anger and frustration were also chosen, with the only off topic choices being inspirational and indie.
What stage do you think the band are at in their career?
The majority of the group said that from watching the video purely, they thought that the band were at the beginning of their career, as the video had a small home-video feel to it.
Did you enjoy the video?
To our relief, our music video got the thumbs up from all of the people we surveyed.
For us, the next step now is to interpret this data and look at what that means for our evaluation - what can we gain from this research? We do however intend to continue to our audience research, with another potential focus group for both our music video and digipak/advertisment designs, and a possible questionnaire to give our research more credibility and validity. As our video has also been posted on Youtube, we can gain response from this source - through video likes and user comments.
In total, we asked six questions:
Did the video conform to the genre?
This was probably the question where we had the most mixed reviews; although the majority of the people said yes to the question, two people both said they were confused as to why paint was being thrown at Cameron, but nonetheless said that they had enjoyed the shot. One person said that they thought the camerawork - particularly in the studio - was fantastic, whilst another said that the backlighting in the studio gave it a 'tour performance' feel.
After watching the video, what image were you left with?
For this section, the image that seven of our group were left with was the shot of paint being thrown at Cameron, whilst another thought that the slow motion shot of paint dripping from Cameron (inspired by Martin de Thurrah) was their most iconic shot. Other highlights for our peers were the shot of myself screaming into the camera, the jump cuts, archway shot and opening performance.
Is the video a good promotion of the track?
One person said they were uncertain as to whether or not the music video worked with the track, but elsewhere there was unanimous support for our video and the Keep on Your Dress soundtrack. One suggested that it could be enhanced was promoting the band within the video - by placing 'mock up' posters or similar within our music video.
What word or emotion did it evoke?
Again for this question there was clear support within the group for once word - rebellion, which was chosen by half of the group. Similar words such as anger and frustration were also chosen, with the only off topic choices being inspirational and indie.
What stage do you think the band are at in their career?
The majority of the group said that from watching the video purely, they thought that the band were at the beginning of their career, as the video had a small home-video feel to it.
Did you enjoy the video?
To our relief, our music video got the thumbs up from all of the people we surveyed.
For us, the next step now is to interpret this data and look at what that means for our evaluation - what can we gain from this research? We do however intend to continue to our audience research, with another potential focus group for both our music video and digipak/advertisment designs, and a possible questionnaire to give our research more credibility and validity. As our video has also been posted on Youtube, we can gain response from this source - through video likes and user comments.
AT: Editing Process
For our music video we were editing on adobe premiere 9.0, this was extremely faster than the previous version we were working on. This made the editing process go alot smoother, than previously when creating our movie opening, especialy as we were dealing with more footage at a faster cutting rate.
The main editing technique we used was 'image control' this enabled us to change the brightness, saturation and contrast, this is what made our performance look authentic as we had a wooden backdrop in the drama studio were we filmed our performance and made it less evident that it was a studio instead it was meant to be a live performance on stage.
For all our performance shots we turned the brightness down, and contrast up and then colour saturation up. This made the performance look much more authentic and gave more interesting lighting.
To keep interest in our music video we intercut the performance with our 'abstract shots' In our abstract shots we decided to have it juxtaposed with the performance and used it to increase our cutting rate, for example when the tempo builds up in the chorus we have constant intercutting of driving along shots. This was then transformed into black and white again using the image control turning saturation right down (black and white) contrast turned up to bring out the backdrop more then brightness down to create a better feel for it.
We were inspired by Martin De Thurah's work especially the use of slow motion, this was to connote the rebelion in a different way to normal conventions, this is evident in the indie genre breaking mainstream conventions. In order to slow down the footage we had to shoot it in 60FPS, then slow it down by half speed.


Monday, 5 December 2011
JC: Video feedback
On Monday, we had a viewing session of every group's videos and printwork. This was particularly useful given that we are now starting the evaluation process, as it gave us some constructive criticism and audience feedback on our works.
From a simple questions and answers piece from Miss Fernandez, we found that the most striking image that the class were left with was the use of black paint. A restless theme was recognised, and we were encouraged by the fact that nobody felt that the video dragged, especially considering that it is nearly five minutes in length. The one area that was highlighted as possibly not working was the use of the sped-up police cars.
In terms of what we could then go on to ask in any research questions, we were given three starters; what do the audience think of the artist? What point do they think they are at in their career? and what emotions does the video evoke?
From a simple questions and answers piece from Miss Fernandez, we found that the most striking image that the class were left with was the use of black paint. A restless theme was recognised, and we were encouraged by the fact that nobody felt that the video dragged, especially considering that it is nearly five minutes in length. The one area that was highlighted as possibly not working was the use of the sped-up police cars.
In terms of what we could then go on to ask in any research questions, we were given three starters; what do the audience think of the artist? What point do they think they are at in their career? and what emotions does the video evoke?
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