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

What have you learned from audience feedback?

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

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

Question 1 by

Evaluation Question 1 - In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

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

The media concepts of: genre, narrative, institutions, representation, audience and overall media language can be applied to my media coursework. The song I chose ‘Wreckin Bar (Ra Ra Ra) by The Vaccines took the form of the Indie genre. The concepts can also be applied to my magazine advert and digipak.

My music video features solely of performance and has no narrative running through it. I did this because the song was fast and upbeat, so a narrative style would not fit well. Moreover, the lyrics in the song are so random and without a true meaning, meaning it would be hard for me to add a narrative to a song that doesn’t give much away. This challenges and subverts the conventions of typical music videos as the majority have a narrative running parallel with the performance. I mainly features on a series of close ups of different characters in ‘weird and wacky’ costumes. This reinforced the random lyrics as the audience could interpret the characters how they wished and relate to each one differently. No close up was on the screen for my than 5 seconds meaning the song flowed very quickly so that the audience was not bored. The lyrics say “Ra, ra, ra” several times throughout the video and this gave me great opportunity to use a technique used in many songs in which they use the speed and beat of the song to cut the scene. Every time the words “ra ra ra” was said I would do a series of fast cuts in time with the music video which worked effectively.

 In my video there is also a link between the music and visuals, a concept created by music video theorist, Andrew Goodwin. There are no female models in my video, challenging the typical music video. Additionally Goodwin suggests that part of the appeal of music videos is voyeurism and the notion of looking, and my music video does not conform to this partly because there is no narrative running through and partly because there are no females in my video. 

From this I can apply Laura Mulvey’s theory of the voyeuristic male gaze. As there is no female to be ‘gazed’ at, this theory does not work however, Mulvey identified two types of the male gaze: ‘voyeuristic’ and ‘fetishistic’. The voyeuristic male gaze refers to seeing women as objects of possession to their male counterparts, whilst the fetishistic male gaze refers to seeing women as glamorous and independent women otherwise known as 'Madonna's'. However, the voyeuristic gaze in my video comes from the performers looking at the audience. Each shot features the performer staring into the camera giving direct eye contact with the viewer. This once again challenges the codes and conventions of music videos as there is mainly a female to attract the male gaze.

The male characters on my video all take different forms. Many of the characters have several personas meaning the audience can interpret them how they wish and relate to each one individually. Using close ups and medium close ups of my performers mean that you can never see their height or body leaving that a mystery to the viewer. This challenges the conventions of typical music videos as the performer has to be ‘perfect’ to entice a wide range of people and entice them to the video. Mine does not do this as I like to leave it open and up to the audience to interpret it how they want.

My music video fits into the indie music genre, and so as a result follows many of the generic conventions, which was also suggested in Goodwin’s music video theory. However it mainly challenges the conventions for example, my video features only male models, and typically indie music use females in their music videos as a large portion of fans of their music are heterosexual males. It could be said that the objectification of and voyeuristic attitude towards women are characteristic of indie music videos, however my video challenges this. Compared to rap music videos for example, my video does not focus on the material wealth of the artist; instead it focusses on the music and the artist’s performance.

I have conformed to several stereotypical features of an Indie music video. The music video and song ‘Matilda’ by the band Alt-J also uses a series of close ups in their music videos. Additionally I dressed the band members in clothes similar to both real-life performers and fans of indie music. For example, they are all wearing relatively dark colours but somewhere Indie style glasses and others wear checked shirts to relate to different people. This is conventional, and allows the audience to relate to them.

Primarily, the target audience for my music video will be males aged from 15-25. These males will be generally heterosexual and conform to the Indie genre. The males in the narrative are of the same age as the target audience, this allows them to relate to the performers enticing them to the music video. However, my video, like many other Indie music videos, would also attract a secondary female audience of a similar age. This is due to the style of the music instead of the artist and performers. However there may be a tendency for the female audience to watch as they may be sexually attracted to the performers.

With my video, it is easy to apply Bulmer and Katz’ ‘Uses and Gratifications’ theory which states the primary reasons as to why audiences consume media types: entertainment; surveillance; personal identity and personal relationships. My video features a ‘fun’ and ‘eccentric’ feel to it so audiences would mainly watch it because of ‘entertainment’ and visual pleasure. Moreover, some may watch the video for personal identity as they may relate to the performers and lyrics in the video.

The irregular format and unconventional narrative style of my music video means that it is hard to apply Todorov’s narrative theory to it. It is quite basic meaning the equilibrium-disruption-new equilibrium template cannot or is hard to be applies to it. In terms of my video, it just follows equilibrium throughout. As the song’s lyrics are random and do not follow a conventional format, applying this theory if difficult. However, the music starts off fast and upbeat, paralleling equilibrium in Todorov’s theory. Although, throughout the song, the music does change a little, going from fast paced to slower pace. These two separate narratives conform to the postmodern ideal of scepticism towards metanarratives, by toying with generic conventions the black-and-white narrative enforces this sense of postmodernism, and overall my video has a strong sense of style over substance.

The editing of my video was not complicated to a professional; however it was difficulty for me as I had never used Adobe After Effects before. I started by taking away the background on Adobe After Effects as I filmed on a green screen. I put in different colours so that each colour fit in with the tone and feel of the video, challenging typical Indie music videos. I then added a gradient to make it look more professional yet still keeping the simplistic feel of the song.

Magazine Advert

Although my music video does not conform entirely to the conventions of real life media products, my magazine advert does. The name of the artist is located at the top of the page so the audience are immediately drawn to it. Also I have featured the name of the single in big bold font so that it is easily recognisable. I have a quote and a star rating from the Guardian and NME newspaper that appear on several albums covers, critiquing an album.  Many of my audience will read these newspapers and magazines meaning they will be able to relate to it. Moreover, at the bottom of the page there is a caption saying ‘available on itunes’ which is important in the current technological revolution of this time. I have also included a blackberry pin code so that the audience can get new alerts about the band sent straight to their phone. A blackberry is a phone commonly used by my target audience and is essential in enticing this demographic. The primary colour of navy blue that is featured throughout my products is very basic and simplistic like the music the audience here, adhering to real life media products. I have used a female model to attract and entice a different kind of audience. It will attract males on a  voyeuristic approach as well as other females who can relate to the performer. 

Digipak

My digipak unlike my music video adhered to the conventions of digipaks. It contained the same colour scheme found throughout my poster so that the audience can recognise it easily. This made it look professional, as if it had been done by the band themselves. For my digipkl I took photos of my model in different Indie locations such as, the woods, a park and in an urban area on a brick wall. This gave a great Indie feel about the digipak and I could use the pictures effectively on my album cover. The text I initially used was Impact as it stood out and I had used it before on other products, however, I thought it looked unprofessional and did not quite match the genre so I changed it to Bodoni which was a lot more unique and fitted with the genre.

My digipak also has the blackberry pin located on the inside cover which happens to be a lyric book, something I haven’t seen on any other digipaks in a long time, so is quite unique. Also it include the institutional information including: the producer, the record label and the name of the album and date, adhering to the common Indie digipak. It also features a bar code so that it feels as real as possible.   

Overview of the course and of adjustments

Digipak 2- Final