Final Evaluation

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

To ensure our main task, a music promo video, looked professional and was successful, and specifically appealed to our target audience, we ensured to use as many conventions of a music promo video. To display how we have particularly used, however also challenged conventions of a music promo video, we have selected to compare our product to professional music promo videos, in particular those that are of a similar genre of music to our chosen genre, indie/electronic/grime/rock and those that also target our chosen target audience. These music promo videos, consist of:

- Hadouken! - Liquid Lives
- You Me At Six - Gossip
- Travie McCoy - We'll Be Alright
- You Me At Six - Kiss And Tell

We have selected video clips from both our music promo video and the videos above, comparing the use of camera shots and movements, mise-en-scene, editing and lighting and sound, which is displayed in the video below. 

Camera Shots & Movements Conventions

Mise-En-Scene Conventions

Editing Conventions

Lighting & Sound Conventions

Whilst both using and challenging conventions within our music promo video, it was also important to both use and challenge conventions within our printed tasks, the CD digipak and magazine advertisement, to ensure they looked professional and were consistent with their genre, whilst also ensuring they appealed to our target audience. To display how we have both used and challenged conventions within our printed tasks, I have created interactive presentations using the website Prezi, comparing our finished products to those of a professionals, which are displayed below.

CD Digipak Front Cover Conventions

CD Digipak Inside Sleeve Conventions

CD Digipak Back Cover Conventions

Magazine Advertisement Conventions

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2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
In order to ensure our overall project looks professional and our target audience are able to identify that each aspect of the project are related to one another, it is important to ensure the combination and consistency of our main product, the music promo video and the ancillary texts, the CD digipak and the magazine advertisement, is effective. 

When designing and creating our ancillary tasks, it is important to relate these tasks to our main product in order to create a marketing package, that will be easily recognisable by our target audience. 

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3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?
To ensure our products appeal to our selected target audience, it is important to gain feedback, to observe their thoughts and opinions on whether it is suited to them. If we were to create the entire product and then gain feedback afterwards from them, this could be very time consuming if a large number of amendments would be required and the product would need to be altered greatly. Therefore to avoid this, we gained feedback as often as possible after producing each draft, to allow us to make a small number of amendments at each stage. 

After producing the first and second draft of both our printed tasks, the magazine advertisement and the CD digipak, we then felt it would be very suitable to gain feedback, before completing our finished products. To gain feedback, our lecturer gained responses from our peers on the drafts of our printed tasks, which can be displayed in the feedback response forms shown below.

CD Digipak First & Second Draft Feedback Response Form

Magazine Advertisement First & Second Draft Feedback Response Form

After gaining the feedback on our initial ancillary printed tasks, there were a few amendments we needed to make, to alter our products to appeal to our target audience and appear to a professional standard. For our CD digipak, they felt we had a very good understanding of our target audience and had well integrated the images and text with one another. However they felt that we could create and use more controversial images to project the correct atmosphere, with a larger use of props and attitude. Although we applied these amendments to all of the CD digipak, for the front cover specifically, we felt the initial design did not suit the other aspects of the CD digipak and the overall theme. Therefore, rather then applying small changes, we decided to redesign the cover with a more suitable layout and use of colour and imagery and retake the photographs used, with a larger use of more controversial attitudes and props. This change we feel was extremely beneficial for our final product, which can be compared in the images displayed below of the initial and final design of our CD digipak front cover.

CD Digipak Front Cover First Draft

CD Digipak Front Cover Second Draft

For the first and second draft of our magazine advertisement, they specifically enjoyed the use of colour and images, and how it appeared full of energy and projected the quirky and youthful nature of the theme. They also felt we displayed a good understanding of the conventions of a magazine advertisement. However they did feel there were some key elements missing from the advertisement which could be added to benefit our product, including endorsements and featuring reviews of the CD. Therefore to ensure our product seemed professional we applied these changes to our product. 

After making the necessary changes to both our CD digipak and our magazine advertisement, we were able to create the final draft versions of our printed tasks. However before publishing these as the final versions of our products, we felt it would be suitable to gain audience feedback to ensure the product appealed to our target audience effectively and looked professional. To do this, we printed out our printed products and placed them onto paper, allowing members of our target audience to annotate around them. The feedback we gained from our target audience, can be displayed in the images below. 

To gain feedback from our target audience on our music promo video, we previewed our music video to a sample of people, of whom were within the age group of our target audience and gathered their responses by allowing them to provide both positive and negative feedback comments, with the positive comments being placed onto pink post-it notes and the negative comments being placed on yellow post-it notes. The feedback we gained from our target audience, can be displayed in the images below. 

Positive Feedback Comments 

Negative Feedback Comments

Overall, from viewing the audience feedback on our main product, the music promo video and the ancillary print tasks, the CD digipak and the magazine advertisement, we have learnt that we were able to create a rather successful product that appealed to our target audience sufficiently. Our target audience felt that our products appeared very professional and that the theme was very consistent and effective and the products were very well produced. They also felt we had provided a good representation of our target audience age group, allowing them to relate themselves and their lifestyle to our products effectively. However if were to create or reproduce this or a similar project in the future, we have learnt from our audience, there are some areas of improvement we could make. For the music promo video, we could improve particularly in the areas of editing and sound. Although we did use a good variety of shot types, the quality and continuity of the video could be improved greatly. The sound, specifically the dialogue, could also be re-recorded to ensure it can be heard clearly above the music soundtrack, to ensure the music promo video is up to a professional standard. However for our printed tasks, I feel there could be no improvements made. We applied all the correct conventions to ensure our products looked professional, projected our theme throughout the product and ensured they were consistent with the theme and applied a sense of realism, relating our products to the lifestyles of our target audience. 

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4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Within each stage of our project, the research and planning, the construction and finally the evaluation, we have used a large variety of new media technologies, in the form or both software and hardware. 

Blogger - Step-By-Step Process Of The Entire Project

Equipment - Computer/Camera/Tripod

Construction of Printed Tasks & The Music Video

Gaining Feedback

Overall Final Package - Music Promo Video, CD Digipak & Magazine Advertisement

Now that we have completed all the research and planning, and made all the suggested changes to each draft, we have finished the final draft for our overall package. Displayed below is the final draft to each aspect of our overall package. 

Music Promo Video Final Draft

CD Digipak Final Draft

CD Digipak Final Draft (Outside)

CD Digipak Final Draft (Inside)

Magazine Advertisement Final Draft

Magazine Advertisement Final Draft

Overall we are extremely pleased with our completed package. We feel the each aspect of the package, compliments each other very well, and the theme of 'chaotic, reckless teenage/young adult behaviour' is reflected and consistent throughout the music promo video, the CD digipak and  the magazine advertisement. This allows the package to look professional, but more importantly to be effective, as it would be easy to identify the CD digipak with both the music promo video and the magazine advertisement, to ensure the CD is purchased.  

Peer Feedback - Music Promo Video Final Draft

In order to see if our music promo video has been successful and is appealing to our target audience, we conducted peer feedback. To do this, we displayed the final draft of our music promo video, to our media class peers, of whom are within the age group of our target audience and asked them to write down both positive and negative feedback on post-it notes, with positive comments on the pink post-it notes and negative comments on the yellow post-it notes. The feedback which was placed on the post-it notes, is displayed in the photographs which are shown below. 

Positive Feedback Comments 

Negative Feedback Comments

From viewing the feedback, we are very pleased with the positive comments that were gained and we feel we have created a professional music video, which appealed to our target audience successfully. Our target audience felt that our video appeared very professional with a good use and variation of shot types and angles. In particular they enjoyed the use of the hand held camera, as it allowed them to view the footage as if they were seeing it from the perspective of an individual, which made the video appear more realistic, relating to them more effectively. They also liked the idea of choosing to play the footage in reverse as they felt it was rather unique, interesting and and original concept. Lastly, they also felt the video depicted a good and accurate representation of teenage life, which we were very pleased with as our main aim was to create a realistic music video, that would easily relate to the lives of our young target audience. Although in general our peers felt that the concept and idea of the video was very good, they also gave negative comments, mainly targeting the editing and audio. Many felt the length of time for some of the scenes and shots lasted too long, specifically to be paired with such a fast paced music track. However although we do agree with this statement, we had to include some shots of a longer time length, to allow the video to last the entirety of the song. Many also felt the dialogue audio which was featured, was rather quiet and hard to hear. To ensure the audio was louder, we could have re-recorded the dialogue separately, and then placed the audio over the original scenes. Many also felt that the video lacked a storyline and was very repetitive. However we intended the video to be quite chaotic, as we felt this reflected the controversial theme of the overall project and was also better suited to 

When gaining feedback from our peers within our media class, we were aware this was rather a small sample of our target audience, and may not paint a clear representation of whether our music promo video appeals to our target audience successfully. Therefore to gain a larger sample, in addition to gaining peer feedback from our media classmates, we also wanted to upload our music promo video onto the internet. To do this, we opted to chose to upload our music video to two popular social networking websites YouTube and Tumblr. 

Uploaded Music Promo Video Onto YouTube

Uploaded Music Promo Video Onto Tumblr

We chose these two particular websites, as they are extremely popular with the age group of our target audience. Therefore this would allow our music promo video to be viewed by those of our target audience age group, from a large number of people, of whom have internet access for free, allowing us to determine whether we had appealed to our target audience sufficiently. Unfortunately, as we had only recently finished the music promo video, it has not been uploaded onto either of these social websites long enough to generate a large number of responses. Therefore, we simply had to view the small number of comments the videos had gained, with many feeling we had a good use of camera angles and shot types and a unique idea, using a montage and playing the video in reverse, which we then took into account with the comments made by our class peers, for an overall feedback. 

Music Promo Video Second & Final Draft

After gaining the feedback from the first draft of our music promo video, our peers enjoyed the way we had placed the video clips together and the narrative which we had created and applied to the music video, with their only specific criticism being that there was no music soundtrack or dialogue, however we had intended to add this too the second draft of our music promo video, regardless. 

After placing all of the video clips together to create the narrative concept, we then need to alter the video to the create the final draft. To do this we simply uploaded the video into Adobe Premiere Pro and changed the video to reverse speed, to allow the video to play backwards, allowing the end of the video 'the morning after', to play at the beginning of the video. After the reversed portion of the video has finished, when then wanted the music promo video to then begin playing forward again, however this time with the dialogue audible. In order to this we then added the original video clips, with sound, of the specific part in which I, myself am persuading Nikki to come to a party. After placing all of these video clips together, we then uploaded the soundtrack 'We Are Rockstars by Does It Offend You, Yeah?' and placed the song over the top of the video clips. Furthermore, we also lowered the volume of the song on the area in which it is placed over the video clips with dialogue, ensuring the dialogue can be heard clearly by the entire audience. After completing all of the above, the final draft of our music promo video was complete, which is displayed below. 

After viewing the final draft of our music promo video, we are very pleased with the final outcome.  We are happy with the outcome of the narrative, specifically in that we were able to create the video exactly how we had intended, beginning with the morning after a party, then displaying a montage of the party with a variety of camera angles and finally ending with the beginning of the party. We are also pleased with how close we were able to create the music promo video to the initial drawn story board and shot types, which furthermore ensures we have a large variety of shot type, angles and movements included.  Although there are a few continuity errors, in the form of jolts or an accidental pause, we feel the editing and continuity overall is quite professional and completed sufficiently. Although, the quality of the camera is rather grainy and could be of a better quality, we felt it was more suitable as it reflected the careless and chaotic nature of the 'party' theme and narrative within the music promo video. Overall we feel our music promo video, portrayed our theme of 'party and chaos' very well and is very consistent with both the CD digipak and the magazine advertisement, to allow the audience to identify each aspect of our project with one another. 

Music Promo Video First Draft

For our music promo video we wanted to play the majority of the music video in reverse, with a small portion at the end playing in the correct time format. This would display the events of the party from end to the beginning in reverse, with the music in the background and then beginning to play the night from the beginning correctly, yet this time with dialogue. However before we could edit the music video into this format, we needed to combine all the separate video clips we had taken together to create the story and party montage. Below is the first draft we had created of the music video, which displays the overall story correctly, however without the dialogue or music added. 

We have placed the clips together, using the software Adobe Premiere Pro. We have placed the clips together in the correct time format, to display the story from beginning of the night to the end of the night. The story begins with my character knocking on the door of my friends house (Nikki) and persuading her to come out to have a 'quiet night out'. This night out is then displayed in a serious of clips, like a montage, that jump rapidly from one another to emphasise the chaotic nature of the events. The story then continues onto the morning after, displaying two of the band members (myself and nikki) falling out of the disused warehouse and attempting to get home by walking through a near by forest area. We are very pleased with how well the video clips seem to blend in with one another quite effortlessly, to create a better continuity and professional appearance. 

Music Promo Video Shoot Recordings

To ensure we had a good range of footage to use within our music promo video and wide variation of shot types and movements, we shot a large amount of footage for us to select from and use. Below are the initial footage clips that were produced.

Before creating our project in Adobe Premiere Pro and merging all of the footage together, in order to form the final draft of the music promo video, we first went through all of the footage we had, cutting them down to the specific clips we wanted to use.  Above are the video clips we edited, before placing them into the music video and editing the speed and audio. We were very pleased with the outcome of the video clips, as we had a very good range of shot types and movements and felt we had gathered footage that appeared very similar to the initial design of our storyboard, like we had hoped. 

Music Promo Video Props & Equipment

In order to achieve the shocking and controversial effect we are hoping for and too ensure our theme of a 'wild party' looks realistic and professional, it may be beneficial to use a large variety of props. Below is a variety of images we have collected from the website weheartit, displaying party type situations, in which we have observed to find conventional props we could use in our music promo video. 

Props Collage

After observing the variety of images we have collected and numerous music videos, we found their were many props that were present in them all. The props that were present and that we have selected to use within our music video, consist of the following:

• Water guns
• Cans of silly sting
• Food (To use within a food fight)
• Balloons
• Streamers
• Fancy dress costumes
• Cigarettes
• Alcohol (Bottles containing fake alcohol)
• Confetti
• Fake sick (Vegetable soup)

As a group we have tried to obtain many of these props, for as little money as possible by looking through our own belongings, whilst also getting into contact with family or friends. We have been successfully able to gather many of the props above, we had hoped for, which will ensure that we achieve our desired affect for our music promo video. With the use and combination of all the props above, we will be able to create and enhance the effect of an out of control and wild party. If we were to include no props within our music promo video, this could cause the video setting 'a party' to look very unrealistic and unprofessional. This could also minimise the shocking and controversial effect we are hoping to create, with emphasis from our selection of props. 

Music Promo Video Chosen Location (Original Images)

After producing the research, shown previously, for the location of our music video, we wanted to locate the majority of our music video in a derelict/disused warehouse/building and also in a wooded/forest area. However as we were worried about whether we would have to gain permission to film in an actual disused warehouse, we aimed to find a room or building which would could gain access too, that would just provided us with the appearance of a disused warehouse/building. 

Outer house/Garage Before Items Were Removed

Outer house/Garage Before Items Were Removed

Outer house/Garage Before Items Were Removed 

Outer house/Garage Before Items Were Removed

Above is an image of the location which we used for the indoor 'party' proportion of the video.  The location we used is my garage/outer house building, with all of the items seen in photograph above removed. We felt this would be appropriate, specifically as it gave a derelict appearance, with a cement floor and bare brick walls, creating the illusion of a disused building. We also felt that as the room was quite small this would play to our benefit, as with a small number of people, the footage would still appear as if the room were quite packed and busy, like an actual party. 

Disused Warehouse

Above is an image of the location we used for the morning after sequence of the party. This location is the disused warehouse we had intended on originally filming in. However as we were unable to gain access to it, we simply filmed the location from a particular angle, whilst my self and Nikki were walking away from the building, to allow it too appear as if we were leaving the warehouse and the party had taken place inside, when placed directly after the party footage. 

The image above, displays the last location we used for the music video. This location displays the tree/forest area which is situated nearby the disused warehouse location. We chose this location, as it causes the location of the party to appear as if it were in the middle of a desolate location. This location also benefits the music promo video, as it also provides a good view of the surrounding sky, displaying the sunrise, allowing the viewers to see that it is the morning after the party. 

One Of The Group Members Houses

One Of The Group Members Houses

One Of The Group Members Houses

Asides from the main locations used within the music video, we also used Nikki, one of the group members  house as the location for the beginning of the story, which can be displayed in the image above. We simply used this location for the beginning of the story, in which I myself, is persuading Nikki to come out the party.