Final Products

Music Video

Digi Pak

Advertising Poster

Evaluation Question 1

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

Convention of form- Music Video

As a form of media, music video's have many conventions, however they are different in different genres.. The PowerPoint below explains how my product uses, develops and challenges the conventions of existing products and comparisons to real products.

Convention of form- Ancillary text

Convention of genre- Poster

In many ways my magazine advert conforms to the conventions of the genre. 

The artist name is large and across the top of the page making it noticeable, this is a convention as explored during my research.

The colour scheme is conventional, many adverts make use of bright colours to be attention grabbing.

Lastly, using balloon as a prop is unconventional, usually props are not seen and the focus is only the artist. I chose to use the props because it links to the narrative in my video for continuity. 

Representation theory and convention

Laura Mulvey 

Mulvey's theory focuses on 'visual pleasure and narrative cinema' her studies are based on how women are viewed as sexual objects initially in Hollywood films. The male gaze occurs when the audience is put into the perspective of a heterosexual man. A scene may focus on the curves of a women's body putting you the viewer in the eye of a male. The concept of gaze is one that deals with how an audience views the people presented. 

I conformed to Mulvey's theory as I often had extreme close ups of the artist lips and these are seen as a sexual object.

Mulvey suggested that female roles in media products often had little or no importance, for example in Scouting for Girls 'She's so Lovely' The female in the video has no real role, we have no insight into her personality or life, and merely see her through the male singer's (heterosexual) eyes as a sexual object.

I challenged this convention as in my music video Livi Fox plays the important role.The video focuses on her own. I believe the fact that Abbie (Livi Fox) was the only cast member in the music video reinforces the fact that the females role is vital to the product (as only she is seen thus the audiences full attention is on her). Having a one person cast consisting solely of a female aided me in challenging Mulvey's theory. 

Narrative theory and convention


Sven Carlsson

Carlsson suggests that music videos in general, videos in general, video fall into rough group’s performance, conceptual and narrative clips.There are elements of abstract and  performance in my music video. According to Carlsson these are 2 of the three major types of music videos I challenged this convention by incorperating elements of all 2 into my final product.

Performance - The artist is seen lip syncing and dancing, with a direct mode of address.

Narrative - there is no narrative to my music video

Abstract - Abstract costume and makeup with symbolism feature in the video.

Micheal shore

Shore argued that music videos are:

1. Recycled styles - This does not apply to my video, it challenges many conventions of the pop genre. 

2. They provide immediate gratification - Arguably my product does as it contains an attractive artist, but at the same time I have not used revealing costume.

3. They are information overloads - This is true for my product, ellipsis editing means that many days/weeks/months are seen in a few minutes, dramatic changes are seen in baby B's life throughout the video.

4. Violence: My music video does not conform to including violence. As opposed to physical abuse or metal abuse.

5. They feature heterosexual male fantasies: Arguable my product does contain hetero sexual male fantasies due to attractive artist and some clothing reveals skin.

Genre theory and convention

Steve Neale
Neale states that 'genres are instances of repetition and difference' and 'genres are not systems, they are processes of systemisation'. This is visable in my product because i have challenged many conventions of traditional Pop genre.

Evaluation Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary text?

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Evaluation Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Evaluation Question 4

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

Development of Ancillary Text

Digipak

This is the template I will be uploading on to Photoshop to be able to create my Digi-Pak, I will follow the structure of the template to ensure that my Digi-Pak looks as professional as possible and looks good enough to sell as a real product on the shelves in music shops like That's Entertainment or HMV.

Template view.

Looking at the digi-pak from the template view I am overall happy as the colours used are very eye catching and colourful and I believe this all links to the Pop genre. The used on the disk makes them look shiny therefore making them look realistic and professional looking. 

My Final Digipak Products

 

Here I have shown how my products would look if they were ever to be successful as you can see I have shown what the digi-pak would look like in an official case this will be helpful for when asking for feedback as audience will have a feel of the physical object. I have also shown pictures of what the product would look like on the shelf of a music shop again this is done to show realism. Another aspect I think is useful is I have shown what the album would look like if it was on iTunes this again help show realism of my product.

My final Advertising Poster 

Here I have shown how my products would look if they were ever to be successful as you can see I have shown what the poster would look like if it was officially advertised

 this will be helpful for when asking for feedback as audience get to see a visual view of what it would look like.

Name of Artist

Process of chosen name for my artist
The name of my artist is very important, many artists use their original birth name. Such as Freddie Mercury, Elvis Presley and Peter Andre. 

 

However in the current music industry there is a trend in the Pop genre of music were artists are increasingly using more and more obscure names in order to make it more catchy and memorable to the audience. Here is a list of POP artist and their actual birth name:

Bruno Mars- Peter Gene Bayot Hernandez

Calvin Harris - Adam Richard Wiles

CeeLo Green- Thomas DeCarlo Callaway

Charlie XCX- Charlotte Emma Aitchinson 

They're many other artist within other types of genre who use different stage names. Here is a website which shows many of these artists: http://www.vh1.com/news/1509/oh-na-na-whats-my-name-100-musicians-who-arent-who-you-think-they-are/ 

Finding this research has helped me identify that it is a convention for Pop artist to use a stage name also that it is a convention within other genres of music too. 

My Ideas

My artist birth name is Abbie Longley. 

I used different websites for inspiration:

http://popstarname.com/

I didn't find this website useful as the result was the artist name to be JOY MONROE yet I believe this name doesn't scream pop or even sound unique as its just an original name the name is also only based on gender and original name, I wouldn't recommend this website for people to use and they will be disappointed with the results. 

http://www.gotoquiz.com/results/what_s_your_popstar_name

This website was more of a success then the previous website as they asked series of questions about the artist as to what they would wear, how their concert would be and even how their friends would describe them. The results were useful as many names were created and with these results I will create a questionnaire and randomly select people as to which name suits/fits best for a Pop artist. The names that will be on the questionnaire are: Livi Fox, Kyrstal Kane, Karly Cassidy, Cynthia Rose and Tori Sweet. 

Here are my results from the questionnaire:

  

My final result is the artist to be named Livi Fox I believe this name is very well suited to my artist as its catchy, unique and memorable. The comments from my questionnaire is that people said some of the names sounded old and was not suited to the current music industry, this was helpful as it made Livi Fox sound more appealing. 

Ancillary Text Research

CD Album Covers Moodboard

I analysed many Female pop artist album covers and I discovered that the images used are often close ups of the artist face another convention of the artist pose is they are looking straight into the camera giving the impression they are looking at us however they're many others that don't give us eye contact as we have some looking down and other directions. Also most of the artist have their hand in the frame either on there face or head. Some of the photos are black and white and then there is some that are full of colour. Another thing I notice was the artist facial expression are all different as we have some looking seductive by having their lips slightly open another basic expression was they have their lips pouting. 

From analysis these different album cover I will consider using a close up of my artist face and suggest different hand gestures in order to see what looks best and in order to make them look more appealing to the male audience I will try to show as much skin as possible in order to make her look seductive. When i'm editing the front cover image I will consider turning the image to B&W and also enhancing colours used.

My Idea

My photos

In my music video the balloons are a prob that is often used therefore I decided to bring this into the photo shoot for the products, I believe using this product people will immediately associate it with the music video and the music video will link to the album cover and poster. 

Digi pak:

Whiles shooting the photos for the Digi pak I set the camera frame to square as this is the iconic shape of image used for Digi paks. I had my model looking in different directions in order to have a variation also as found in my research there isn't a conventional way of eye contact. The camera angle used for this part of the shoot was close up as this was the conventional camera angle used as i found out in my research. Within the photos them selves many improvements will be used whiles editing in Photoshop the things I will consider are erasing the bra strap, add more images of ballons in background in order to make it more full looking also enhancing the complexion of the model and also using a variation of different filters in order to find what looks good and also so that it can look professional as possible. The image I am potentially going to use for the cover of my Digi pak is were the model has her eyes closed as I believe it is the most effective compared to the others as it almost gives the message that she has a lot of secrets also it makes her look intriguing. 

Poster:

The poster photos where taking straight after Digi paks and I forgot to change the frame size therefore the first column images were not successful also we only used one balloon and I realised it was as effective so I used all the balloons. I change the camera frame to 2:3 there it has the iconic size for a poster. For this part of  the photo shoot the camera angle used was mid shot as this was the conventional shot used for advertisement posters. Some improvements will be made when editing the photo as I will use many filters in order to find out what is the most effective also I will be enhancing the models complexions in order to give her the perfection look. The photo I will potentially be using for poster is the photo in the second column and second row the reason for this is I believe its the most natural look as it looks like there's no effort made with the way she's standing and holding the balloons this is a good thing as she gives the message to her audience that she's not fake and not constructed to the media standard.