Thursday 13 March 2014
Wednesday 22 January 2014
Evaluation: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challange forms and conventions of real media products?
Research
Before I constructed my music video, I decided to do some vital research in order to help me follow essential codes and conventions. If I hadn't of analysed any existing videos this could have resulted in me not being able to produce appealing and successful media products.
During my research I found different types of music videos which helped me see the difference between each style of video that artists produce.
When researching what style of music videos KlangKarussell had created, I found it difficult to find many that they had already produced. When some of their existing videos, there wasn't a common style running through all of them. However, the ones I did find they were more of a concept video, rather than narrative. As they seemed to have a narrative in all their videos, I thought this is a convention that I must stick to. I did come across an animated video, but I thought this would of been too challenging for me to make a similar video in the amount of time I had to do make it in. When comparing the two main styles they have already done, I personally liked the concept videos because I liked their ideas that they had in their videos. The concept videos go better with the bands music as the music doesn't really tell a story either, they are always more of dance songs with little vocals. This was one reason why I decided to create a music video under this style.
Initial ideas
Before I had decided on my song and style of music video, I had a rough idea of what some theme or genre I wanted to do. This started out to be the complete opposite of what my video is today. After I had researched stop, go motion videos I decided I was creative enough to to be able to make a music video like this. I then decided a song which was called 'Counting Stars' by One Republic. I chose this song because it is up beat and happy, which was the type of song I needed to be able to make a stop, go motion video. However, after spending a week struggling to construct the video and realising how time consuming it all was I knew I needed to re-consider the type of video I wanted to make.
Therefore, after taking time to think and research, I realised that throughout the music industry recently there has been a lot more focus on festivals, parties and drinking. This is because with festivals and concerts becoming increasingly popular videos like this attract the audiences attention, as the majority of people like being able to relate to music videos or just escaping from their own personal lives by listening to a song or watching a video. Thus, I thought a concept video would be perfect for this genre. Another reason I preferred the concept videos was because I knew they were easily done and was more realistic for me to be able to make rather than stop go animation.
My initial idea was, like KlangKarussell's concept videos, I didn't want my talent to lip sync. This was because I think it looked better without her singing the lyrics than singing them. However, after constructing the video as receiving feedback I soon realised that I needed to incorporate lip syncing into the video to make it more interesting and to give variety.
Deconstructing existing music videos
After I decided what style of video I wanted to create, I thought it was best to look at existing videos from that genre and deconstruct their codes and conventions. I did my best to ensure that I stuck to typical conventions from existing dance videos that I deconstructed, so I was able to convince my audience that my music video (at first glance) was a stereotypical representation of a dance video, as there isn't usually a story line to them. I believe I conveyed this idea as best as I could.
Codes and conventions developed in my music video
Throughout my music video I kept referring back to two main existing music videos that I deconstructed, they were Adele's 'Someone like you' and Audio Bullies 'We don't care'. This was because I first looked at Audio Bullies music video and compared it to the original 'Sonnentanz' music video, by KlagKarussell. I quickly realised they are complete opposites in terms of the Mise en scene and also the music. However, when I was looking at them I watched the Audio Bullys video without music and had KlangKarussell playing in the background instead, and I thought it looked really effective. Therefore this is where I got the idea to make a rough looking music video to a juxtaposed song.
Throughout my video I constantly put dull effects on to the footage so it suggested the location to be needed sun light and that it was lifeless, whilst particular words in the song stood out e.g. "the sun don't shine". The dull effects are also seen throughout Audio Bullys video in the images that are shown below.
The effects I used were called the following: 'Black and White, Combat and Cold Steel. When I first used the effects on the footage it made the footage look very harsh and unrealistic to what the weather would look like on a dull day, or in the music videos I had researched. I mainly wanted the video to look more like Audio Bullys music video in comparison to Adele's. This is because the black and white effect that is used throughout Adele's video symbolises the sadness that she is feeling, whereas in Audio Bullys video the dullness that is used fits better with the mise en scene in my footage, the mood I was trying to convey and also the song. This is because the song I was using is a lot more up tempo compared to Adele's song.
When thinking about what types of camera shots I should use I look at both videos and noticed they both had a lot of tracking shots within them. From looking at this and also because I knew I wanted to film the talent walking through the town a lot, the best way to do this was to use tracking shots.
Audio Bullys video:
Adele's video:
My video:
I didn't use many close ups, however I did use some camera shots with the talent walking past the camera. For this I mainly looked at Adele's video because her music video contains a considerable amount of these shots and close up's. Below are the examples of how I have used the conventions of Adele's video in my own.
Adele's video:
My video:
This is just one part of the close up as my talent walks past, like the screen shot of Adele's video. In my screen shot, you can see the skip. When filming I found the skip, and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to use the camera shot that was used in Adele's video whilst using the to symbolise the rough surroundings.
For the mise en scene in my music video I looked mainly at Audio Bullys music video because it contains a variety of mise en scene that contributes towards the rough feel of the town he is walking through. Therefore, I picked certain props and characteristics out of this video and incorporated it into my music video if I was lucky enough to find it in the town I was filming in.
Audio Bullys video:
As you can see, to the right hand side of the image there are two phone box's that are in full view of the camera. I thought they denoted an English culture, I also think that with the posters over one of them that it indicates that its surroundings are messy. This type of appearance is usually found in rough places.
My video:
Above is my perception of the phone box idea when I first came across the phone box I noticed that it wasn't as dirty as I would of liked, however there was a bin to the left of the phone box and white marks all over the floor. I thought about the positioning of the camera so I could include all three things in the frame to make it look dirtier.
I also noticed in Audio Bullys video as the talent was walking along pathways a lot, there were a couple of points that the camera captured some cars driving past. I liked this idea and for this reason I incorporated this into my video. This is shown below.
Audio Bullys video:
My video:
Within my shot I of a car driving past, unlike Audio Bullys camera shot I didn't place the camera behind bars. Looking back, I wish I did because it creates a sense of feeling confined and trapped. This would of worked perfectly in my music video. Like Audio Bullys camera shot I have contained more than just a car. However, instead of containing the talent in the frame I chose to have a bus stop in the frame so there is variety instead of having too much of my talent in all the shots. It didn't feel necessary.
The main media codes that I have yet to mention are the lighting, colours, location and costume.
When I was filming it was early afternoon on a normal, bright day. As I was filming outdoors for all of the music video the lighting was high key and ambient. I would of preferred it to be darker compared to what it ended up being like, this is because it would of gone better with the genre and location of the video. For this reason, I ended up changing the lighting and colours of the footage do that they were darker and more similar to the style of the video. I wanted the lighting to be low key so it was symbolic of the mood within the video i.e. lifeless, dull etc.
The locations that the footage was filmed in was specifically used for a number of reasons, these were; because I needed the landscaping to be urban and rough as the location was the main support of the genre; another reason was because the urban landscaping represented the surroundings that the talent was in and also helped to be symbolic of their mood. For example, the footage I captured of the ally way and the graffitied wall showed how rough the area was as graffiti is seen as a very unsociable act and is expected to be seen in rougher areas, rather than well kept, cleaner areas.
As you can see in the image above the costume that I asked my talent to wear was a plain, dark brown jacket, plimsolls, jeans with her hair in a low ponytail. The reason I specifically asked her to wear this costume was because I wanted her to wear dark, basic clothes with her hair pulled back as if it was effortless. This was because I needed her clothes to be in tune with the video and the surroundings she was in, the costume also symbolises the lazy mood of the area and the talent because people that live in the this type of area in the video, usually don't make any effort with their appearance. Therefore I tried to show this through the costume. It wouldn't of looked right if I asked her to wear bright clothes with time consuming, complicated hair and jewelry. I specifically didn't want her to have jewelry on because it connotes wealth and luxury of the person. This is the opposite to the style within the video.
Conclusion
I believe that throughout the construction of my music video I have constantly kept looking back at conventions mainly within Audio Bullys and Adele's videos. This helped me to improve the professionalism of my music video and therefore I think I did well to develop the 'typical conventions' of existing videos in my own video because I thought about specific conventions and improved them by adding certain factors to them that would look better within my video.
Before I constructed my music video, I decided to do some vital research in order to help me follow essential codes and conventions. If I hadn't of analysed any existing videos this could have resulted in me not being able to produce appealing and successful media products.
During my research I found different types of music videos which helped me see the difference between each style of video that artists produce.
When researching what style of music videos KlangKarussell had created, I found it difficult to find many that they had already produced. When some of their existing videos, there wasn't a common style running through all of them. However, the ones I did find they were more of a concept video, rather than narrative. As they seemed to have a narrative in all their videos, I thought this is a convention that I must stick to. I did come across an animated video, but I thought this would of been too challenging for me to make a similar video in the amount of time I had to do make it in. When comparing the two main styles they have already done, I personally liked the concept videos because I liked their ideas that they had in their videos. The concept videos go better with the bands music as the music doesn't really tell a story either, they are always more of dance songs with little vocals. This was one reason why I decided to create a music video under this style.
Initial ideas
Before I had decided on my song and style of music video, I had a rough idea of what some theme or genre I wanted to do. This started out to be the complete opposite of what my video is today. After I had researched stop, go motion videos I decided I was creative enough to to be able to make a music video like this. I then decided a song which was called 'Counting Stars' by One Republic. I chose this song because it is up beat and happy, which was the type of song I needed to be able to make a stop, go motion video. However, after spending a week struggling to construct the video and realising how time consuming it all was I knew I needed to re-consider the type of video I wanted to make.
Therefore, after taking time to think and research, I realised that throughout the music industry recently there has been a lot more focus on festivals, parties and drinking. This is because with festivals and concerts becoming increasingly popular videos like this attract the audiences attention, as the majority of people like being able to relate to music videos or just escaping from their own personal lives by listening to a song or watching a video. Thus, I thought a concept video would be perfect for this genre. Another reason I preferred the concept videos was because I knew they were easily done and was more realistic for me to be able to make rather than stop go animation.
My initial idea was, like KlangKarussell's concept videos, I didn't want my talent to lip sync. This was because I think it looked better without her singing the lyrics than singing them. However, after constructing the video as receiving feedback I soon realised that I needed to incorporate lip syncing into the video to make it more interesting and to give variety.
Deconstructing existing music videos
After I decided what style of video I wanted to create, I thought it was best to look at existing videos from that genre and deconstruct their codes and conventions. I did my best to ensure that I stuck to typical conventions from existing dance videos that I deconstructed, so I was able to convince my audience that my music video (at first glance) was a stereotypical representation of a dance video, as there isn't usually a story line to them. I believe I conveyed this idea as best as I could.
Codes and conventions developed in my music video
Throughout my music video I kept referring back to two main existing music videos that I deconstructed, they were Adele's 'Someone like you' and Audio Bullies 'We don't care'. This was because I first looked at Audio Bullies music video and compared it to the original 'Sonnentanz' music video, by KlagKarussell. I quickly realised they are complete opposites in terms of the Mise en scene and also the music. However, when I was looking at them I watched the Audio Bullys video without music and had KlangKarussell playing in the background instead, and I thought it looked really effective. Therefore this is where I got the idea to make a rough looking music video to a juxtaposed song.
Adele
Audio Bullys
Throughout my video I constantly put dull effects on to the footage so it suggested the location to be needed sun light and that it was lifeless, whilst particular words in the song stood out e.g. "the sun don't shine". The dull effects are also seen throughout Audio Bullys video in the images that are shown below.
The effects I used were called the following: 'Black and White, Combat and Cold Steel. When I first used the effects on the footage it made the footage look very harsh and unrealistic to what the weather would look like on a dull day, or in the music videos I had researched. I mainly wanted the video to look more like Audio Bullys music video in comparison to Adele's. This is because the black and white effect that is used throughout Adele's video symbolises the sadness that she is feeling, whereas in Audio Bullys video the dullness that is used fits better with the mise en scene in my footage, the mood I was trying to convey and also the song. This is because the song I was using is a lot more up tempo compared to Adele's song.
When thinking about what types of camera shots I should use I look at both videos and noticed they both had a lot of tracking shots within them. From looking at this and also because I knew I wanted to film the talent walking through the town a lot, the best way to do this was to use tracking shots.
Audio Bullys video:
Adele's video:
My video:
Adele's video:
For the mise en scene in my music video I looked mainly at Audio Bullys music video because it contains a variety of mise en scene that contributes towards the rough feel of the town he is walking through. Therefore, I picked certain props and characteristics out of this video and incorporated it into my music video if I was lucky enough to find it in the town I was filming in.
Audio Bullys video:
My video:
I also noticed in Audio Bullys video as the talent was walking along pathways a lot, there were a couple of points that the camera captured some cars driving past. I liked this idea and for this reason I incorporated this into my video. This is shown below.
Audio Bullys video:
The main media codes that I have yet to mention are the lighting, colours, location and costume.
When I was filming it was early afternoon on a normal, bright day. As I was filming outdoors for all of the music video the lighting was high key and ambient. I would of preferred it to be darker compared to what it ended up being like, this is because it would of gone better with the genre and location of the video. For this reason, I ended up changing the lighting and colours of the footage do that they were darker and more similar to the style of the video. I wanted the lighting to be low key so it was symbolic of the mood within the video i.e. lifeless, dull etc.
The locations that the footage was filmed in was specifically used for a number of reasons, these were; because I needed the landscaping to be urban and rough as the location was the main support of the genre; another reason was because the urban landscaping represented the surroundings that the talent was in and also helped to be symbolic of their mood. For example, the footage I captured of the ally way and the graffitied wall showed how rough the area was as graffiti is seen as a very unsociable act and is expected to be seen in rougher areas, rather than well kept, cleaner areas.
Conclusion
I believe that throughout the construction of my music video I have constantly kept looking back at conventions mainly within Audio Bullys and Adele's videos. This helped me to improve the professionalism of my music video and therefore I think I did well to develop the 'typical conventions' of existing videos in my own video because I thought about specific conventions and improved them by adding certain factors to them that would look better within my video.
Tuesday 21 January 2014
Wednesday 15 January 2014
Evaluation: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
When creating all of the products for the ancillary tasks, I ensured that all of them fitted in with the urban landscape style. Therefore, I had to ensure that I kept continuity throught all my tasks. Below are the completed tasks for this project, such as the music video, magazine advertisement and finally digipak.
Video
Magazine advertisement
Digipak
One of the main ways I kept continuity was the fonts that I used on both ancillary tasks. I ensured it was a bold font, as on existing album covers, theirs are usually big and bold to catch the audience's eye. This is an example of house style. The bands name is consistently the same font and colour throughout each task. The images below show this.
The inside digipak image is also seen within the music video, however in a video format. This consequently creates a visual link between these tasks. This is similar for the outside image of the digipak and the music video. For example, the view of run-down houses is seen in a video format within the music video. By creating these links within each task, it means that when the audience looks at a specific task, e.g. the digipak, they will think of the music video and where they have seen the image before. This could mean two things; if they have seen the music video before the digipak might remind them of the video and cause them to view it again. Alternatively, the audience could see the digipak and be intrigued to look at the video for the first time. This can also work the other way around, thus it is good to make a link between the tasks. The images below point out the previous commonalities I have just mentioned.
Throughout the construction of my video I made sure that if some footage was too bright compared to the rest of my work then I would put a darkening effect on it. The same effect was put on every clip if it was needed, it is called 'Colbat'. This is one way that I kept continuity through the making of the music video and also the ancillary tasks as I also put darkening effects on the images I used.
Video
Magazine advertisement
Digipak
One of the main ways I kept continuity was the fonts that I used on both ancillary tasks. I ensured it was a bold font, as on existing album covers, theirs are usually big and bold to catch the audience's eye. This is an example of house style. The bands name is consistently the same font and colour throughout each task. The images below show this.
The inside digipak image is also seen within the music video, however in a video format. This consequently creates a visual link between these tasks. This is similar for the outside image of the digipak and the music video. For example, the view of run-down houses is seen in a video format within the music video. By creating these links within each task, it means that when the audience looks at a specific task, e.g. the digipak, they will think of the music video and where they have seen the image before. This could mean two things; if they have seen the music video before the digipak might remind them of the video and cause them to view it again. Alternatively, the audience could see the digipak and be intrigued to look at the video for the first time. This can also work the other way around, thus it is good to make a link between the tasks. The images below point out the previous commonalities I have just mentioned.
Throughout the construction of my video I made sure that if some footage was too bright compared to the rest of my work then I would put a darkening effect on it. The same effect was put on every clip if it was needed, it is called 'Colbat'. This is one way that I kept continuity through the making of the music video and also the ancillary tasks as I also put darkening effects on the images I used.
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