Evaluation Commentary

Transcipt Evaluation Commentaries

Script:
Tom Halkyard: Ok, so we were set the task of coming up with 3 media products for the release of an album as part of a promotional package. This had to include a Digipak magazine advert and a music video all created by ourselves.

Tom Halkyard: We were given the track, ‘Much Against Everyone’s Advice’ by Soulwax. We didn’t know much about the band but after researching them we were very happy with our choice.

Alex Winter: Our first step was to come up with ideas for the products we were going to produce. We created a pitch and presented it in front of our peers and got feedback used to improve ideas for our products

Tom Halkyard: Feedback we received was very useful and had lot of positives in it as to why our ideas were useful to our product. We received some feedback that helped us and put us off going with our ideas but most of it was good and we followed through with most or our ideas.

Keeley Moore: After receiving feedback from our pitch we researched further into the band soulwax and other bands from the genre indie/rock. We then e-mailed the band soulwax and asked their permission to film a new music video using their pre-existing track. They then e-mailed us back a few days later giving us their permission.
Using these ideas we created a storyboard and a shot by shot timeline so on our shooting day it would be easier to film all the footage we needed.

Tom Halkyard: So it came to the day of the shoot and we were all very excited and we had the storyboard and the shot by shot timeline ready for us so that we could stick to the script of what we had to do. There were a few challenges of our shoot such as:

Alex Winter: All our music video needed to be in the daytime so time was a massive issue

Tom Halkyard: We were only given a day to complete our filming so everything had to be planned very well in order to fit it all in.

Keeley Moore: It started raining in the beginning of the morning when we were planning to shoot.

Alex Winter: We did face some problems while filming, one of these was that it rained quite heavily in the night and the morning which hindered us going to some of our chosen locations.

Tom Halkyard: Also the rainy atmosphere was not part of the mise-en-scene we had planned for so we had to make some alterations to things such as camera angles.

Keeley Moore: Later in the day the weather turned out to be quite sunny there was still rain on the floor which created some glare on the camera in some of our locations.
Using the footage we filmed on the filming day we managed to compile a rough cut of our music video
But our rough cut was nothing like our final product due to time issues.

Tom Halkyard: The feedback wasn’t on the perfect rough cut we would have hoped for so some of the feedback we received was going to be negative anyway and we had already taken it into consideration. However, some feedback we received really did help us with thinking about how we can improve it for our final cut. This included techniques and other ideas of how to improve music video.
When we came up with the different frames idea we decided to practice the technique on simple images. Here is how it turned out.

Alex Winter: To improve the authenticity of the lip syncing we had the music playing in the background while we were filming and also the lyrics.

Tom Halkyard: The feedback we took into consideration the most was that we needed to include more close-ups. This way we would have better representation of the artist and everyone would know who the band members are closer up whereas before in the rough cut we had quite long distance shots

Alex Winter: So we decided to film tom, the main singer of the band singing the whole song in 3 different locations.

Tom Halkyard: This way we could cut to and from the distance shots to have good varied shot lengths.

Keeley Moore: Using this extra footage we collected we edited it and mixed into our original footage to create our final music video.

Tom Halkyard: Now our music video was complete we moved onto the ancillary products. The first of which was the Digipak. We looked at samples of them from real life examples such as Blur and Alicia Keys.

Alex Winter: We looked at the conventions of indie/rock genre Digipaks. We found from this that they are quite colourful.

Tom Halkyard: Other, more obvious, features of the Digipak are; the album title, the artist, the record label and the track listings as well as others.

Keeley Moore: After researching more into this information we then went out to our previous locations we filmed in to take pictures for the digipak and magazine advert.

Tom Halkyard: Going back to take pictures where we filmed added to the effectiveness of the combination of the products.

Alex Winter: It also created a link.

Tom Halkyard: We also looked at examples of magazine adverts particularly from our genre and the conventions of these.

Alex Winter: The conventions of the magazine advert have more advertising details such as the release date of the album.

Tom Halkyard: After research and planning we set about creating our ancillary products using many of the conventions we had found from the samples

Keeley Moore: We used many of the different photoshop tools to edit our images to make them look the best for our magazine advert and for our Digipak.

music video evaluation

Evaluation

1.We were set the task of coming up with three media products as part of a promotional package. This included a digi pak, magazine advert and a music video all produced by our self. We chose the track, Much Against Everyone’s Advice by the band Soulwax when we started our music video, magazine advert and digi pack we looked into our song genre which is indie/rock, we looked at convention's of the genre and Goodwin's analysis of music videos, (lyrics and visual,music and visuals,notion of looking demand of record label and genre characteristics) we found that music video for this genre have strong conventions and we used this in the planning and production of our music video and decided the conventions we wanted to challenge and the conventions we were going to use. The way we challenged them was to only have three people in the band whereas most bands of the genre have at least 4 members we did this because we didn't we didn't want to cramp the shots with to many people and it makes ou music video different to other of the genre. our video is a performance style video which is typical of the rock\indie genre we also used the mise-en scene of the genre buy all the band members being dressed in indie style clothing, We found that in other music videos of our genre that there was a strong link between lyrics and visuals we took this in to consideration and decided to have the name of the song (which is also the chorus) be spelt out on the screen, also with music and visuals we had a location changes on the beat of the song we used these conventions because we want the audience to know what the genre is. our digi pack and magazine advert have very bright colours and also have all the band members included in a location that was in our music video. before we started our magazine advert and digi pack we looked at already existing digi packs for example blur to see what other artists were promoting there album and band we also looked at NME magazine to look at the adverts for new music which gave us a lot of ideas of we wanted our magazine advert to look like and how to represent the artist in the best way possible, we sketched out ideas and chose the one that we thought would look and work best. when we looked at existing music videos of our genre we found out that nearly all of them were in the daytime we also wanted our video 2 be in the day this caused problems as we only had on day to film and it got dark at about five at that time of the year but we did manage to complete all our footage. we found that the function of a digi pack were ait is a Collectors Item and it would have extra's such as Interviews with Band/ Behind the Scenes on Tour/ Documentaries

'Making of' Featurette, Live Performance (video and audio) B-sides/ Covers/ Rare songs
Greatest Hits we then looked at the conversions which were Song/ Album title, Artist's Name, Visual links to video - intertextuality, reviews - newspaper/music press/celebrities/DJsTracklistings, Ratings,record Label Logo ,Running Time, Band Members - Pictures,Personal Notes we included all these in our digi pack, We then looked at the function of a magazine advert we found it was to promote the artist ,sell the song. We found it must include release date, artist name, where you can buy it, record label, website song and album title, visual link to video reviews from newspaper, music press, celebrities we used all of these conventions in our magazine advert.

from this image you can see the indie style clothes were used to keep to the conventions of our genre we kept the mise-en scene the same throughout our music video, magazine advert and digi pack.

2.the combination of our main product,magazine advert and digi pack worked very well as we created a strong link between all the products, we created this link by having the members of the band on all the products we made and on the magazine advert and the digi pack the band members are colors were as the background is black and white it directs shows who is in the band and shows there importance , we did this to create artistic representation and brand awareness to meet the demands of the record label which is very important of promotion of music products. we used the same mise-en scene throughout, for example the same clothes were worn and the same location was used in our digi pack and magazine advert we did this to create a theme for our products so our target audience would connect with the band. we used the same font throughout our magazine advert and digi pack to give a more professional look and to keep the link. with use Photoshop we made our images for the digi pack and our magazine advert black and white then selected the bench our t shirts and made them colour we did this as its fits in with our genre and that it creates synergy throughout our magazine advert and digi pack we also use the same colour scheme for the same reason. as a whole there is a clear theme that runs throughout all our products. when we storyboarded for a music video we took into consideration the magazine advert and digi pack and how we could film things that were possible to replicate or have similarities to what we wanted to do for our magazine advert and digi pack this again was an effort to make sure that all our video and promotional package would work well together and to make sure there was a link that would go through our products.

The top image is from our digipack front cover and the bottom image is from our magazine advert you can clearly see that we have used the same font and colors we did this to create brand awareness which is crucial so the products relates 2 the target audience and for promotional reasons. we also used simaler colors in our music video. also as you can see from the picture we used similar photos in the same locations this location was also in are music video we decided on using the same location fro all three when we storyboarded and made a careful decision about were we wanted this location to be as it needs to fit are genre so we looked at existing videos and found a location that was similar to what they used.

3.All the way through our music video project we have received feedback for everything we have completed, this was very use full as it helped us to think what we could improve about our products and have a different opinion of what we should do rather that what we thought we should do for example when we first stated our product we had to create a pitch and in this pitch we had to present to our audience what our initial ideas were the feedback we got from this was that our main idea of having lots of different frames was going to look very busy and would take a lot of intense story boarding to look good we took this into consideration and we decided to use text in different frames and not footage so it wouldn't look to busy and be confusing to the audience. our next feedback was for our rough cut, we had time issues with our rough cut so we already had taken into consideration some of the feedback before we got it for example we hadn't got all our footage in sync with the audio but we did get feedback about needing some more close ups in our music video. We solved this by doing some extra filming we filmed our lead singer in three different locations singing the whole song, we had the song and the lyrics to make lip syncing more accurate. after we got this footage we added to our existing footage. also because we used an online blog for our planning anyone could comment ion any bit of work we had completed another way that we received feedback for our promotional package was from the online video sharing site youtube were again anyone could comment.

This is a screen grab of our music video uploaded to youtube, online resources were a crucial part in the development of our music video, magazine advert and digi pack it gave us the chance to get wide range of feedback from a number of people also gave a place to record all the planning and production stages of our products.

4.cameras were an obvious necessity for our project and we were lucky enough to have these recourse's also we used apple macs with all the appropriate programmes we need to edit footage/pictures with this was crucial for the production for are music video magazine advert and digi pack. For all our planning we used an online blog to record all our ideas and feedback was also posted directly on to the blog and this is also were we received are feedback . before we started our project we looked at existing products and videos, we looked at Michele Jackson's dirty Diana video and created a power point showing how Goodwin's theories and how they were used in the video and for our digi pack we looked at the bands blur's digipack which gave a number of ideas of what we wanted to do and what our genre of music conventions for this were. We looked at our band (soulwax) website and this is were we got the idea of using different frames as the website has eight different section with something different in each bit this was one of are main ideas for are music video . we then e-mailed the band soulwax and asked their permission to film a new music video using their pre-existing track (much against everyones advice) they then e-mailed us back four days later giving us their permission to re shoot the video and use there track much against everyones advice. after this we planned using the blog to record our planning and filmed our footage.using all our ideas from our planning we created a storyboard and a shot by shot timeline we did this so when it came to shooting day it would be easier and quicker to film all the footage we needed we edited our footage using finale cut, finale cut is very simple to use and helped create to moving letters in frames and the cuts between shots that makes our music video interesting it also has a lot of tools for tweaking your footage for example fades, filters and double frame animation these were key to the development of our product. even though finale cut is simple to use it is very time consuming, which created time issues for deadlines but we put extra time in and completed everything. we used photoshop for our digi pack and our magazine advert. photoshop made it possible for us to have our image in black and white but keep bits we wanted in colour in colour also has numerous text editing tools to make the product more professional this also highlighted the band members which was good for artist representation it showed all the members which therefore promotes the band. There were some problems with the cameras, on our shooting day it had rained very heavily all night and most of the morning which left puddles in our filming location the sun reflected of the water and made everything we filmed to bright so we had to film when it had dried which caused time issues with filming.

This is a screenshot from our online blog that we used in the planning, research and construction stages of our task, this was also useful for feedback as anyone that looked at our blog could leave us a comment.

Alex winter

2040 words

Digi pack

Magazine Advert

Soulwax - Much Against Everyone's Advice FINAL VERSION

This image would be good to use as it has all the band members in the shot also the location of this image is one of the locations we filmed in for are music video so this would create a link between the two, another reason we should use this image is because tom is centred in the frame giving him a dominant positions and showing his importance ans the lead singer of the band where as me and Keeley are on either side. we are in casual positions this is good because are song is very casual genre. the picture also has instruments in so you can tell the picture is of a band.

Digipak

Function:

• Collector's Item
• Interviews with Band/ Behind the Scenes on Tour/ Documentaries
• 'Making of' Featurette
• Live Performance (video and audio)
• B-sides/ Covers/ Rare songs
• Greatest Hits

Conventions:

• Song/ Album title
• Artist's Name
• Visual links to video - intertextuality
• Reviews - newspaper/music press/celebrities/DJs
• Tracklistings
• Ratings
• Record Label Logo
• Running Time
• Band Members - Pictures
• Personal Notes
  

Magazine Advert

magazine ad:

• to promote the artist

• sell the song

• eye catching - visually striking

must include:

• song and album title

• visual link to video

• reviews - newspaper - music press - celebrities

condense information content:

• release date

• artist name

• where you can buy it

• record label

• website

Response to Feedback

Intertextuality
we agree that we took a lot of inspiration from current videos of are genre. we used performance and the use of instruments as seen in real professional work. The comment made about many bands using three members is also true and it does make our video seem more realistic.

Lyrics and Visuals
we appreciate that performanc ebased music videos do often not have a huge relationship between lyrics and visuals but it is a technique we tried to implement. this however may not have come across as we chose not to show the whole video as a rough cut. had they seen the whole video they would have seen that some actual lyrics are displayed on the screen throughout the video.

Music and Visuals
Again, with the choice to end the rough cut footage half way through the actual song we realised this wouldn't give the true impression of our whole work so we agree that the current ending is not good enough.
We tried to insert the worded visuals well and we spent time making this the case and are glad that has been accredited.
we are still in the process of fitting our footage into the most appropriate places to create the best effect and putting the heavier guitar footage with the heavier guitar passages in the song is a main focus.

Genre Characteristics
We studied our genre and the general characteristics of music videos inside of it. Dark clothing was one of our focusses to follow conventions aswwell as instruments, live performance, relating to the band and of course transitioning between shots in time with the music.

Rough Cut

Filming and editing

overall are filming went quite well we had a string storyboard to follow but there were some problems we face when we were filming some of these were, its rained quite heavily at the start of the shoot but did stop eventually but left the ground very wet which caused problems with glare from the sun reflecting of the water so we couldn't used all are desired locations. also it was hard to find location that didn't have any people in as it was the middle of the day in Cambridge but we did find location that we wanted but did take longer than expected, thing brings me to another issue time we needed to shoot all are shots in daytime to keep with continuity of the video but we also didn't want to rush it fortunately the day stayed light for longer than usual so we managed to get all are filming done. For part of are video we wanted letters on various walls we used plumbing tape and made it into letters we then stuck on various things we used tape because it was cheap and easy to use the problems were we had to wait until there were no people to film the letters also the tape wasn't as sticky as we expected and sometimes fell of. we id have some issues when we filmed but we manged to solve them all and have a very good day of filming.
The car park were we filmed most of are band footage. we filmed on the roof of the car park luckily there were not many cars about at the time


are editing went well with are letters coming in and out of the screen to spell words we did the easily on finale cut but we later decided we wanted are footage in a different order so we had to shuffle all are clips in to a new order which which did take a long time this meant that we couldn't make are rough cut as good or what we wanted it to look like but its very easy to sort are footage out.

Testing Multiple Frames Idea Video

We tested out our idea for using different frames within our music video, this is the footage that we put together, after completing this footage i am confident that i will be able to effectively use this idea in our actual music video successfully.

Souwax Album Cover

Soulwax - Nite Versions Album Cover
Soulwax - Any Minute Now Album Cover

Lyrics - for Much Against Everyone's Advice

I
seem to have a history
at missing the point
at this stuff
apparently
very absentmindedly
I care
but never enough
for
you

TIME -to put the record straight
TIME -to stop communicating
please anticipate

AND I'M TRYING TO COMPREHEND THE THINGS I WRITE
AND I'M LIVING THE LIE THAT I CANNOT SATISFY
MUCH AGAINST EVERYONE'S ADVICE
I'M STILL TRYING I'M TRYING I'M TRYING I'M TRYING

faith
cheated me of everything
but I laughed until
I stopped
publicly
very, very openly
I sat alone with my thoughts
for
you

TIME-to put the record straight
TIME-to stop communicating
please anticipate

AND I'M TRYING TO COMPREHEND THE THINGS I WRITE
AND I'M LIVING THE LIE THAT I CANNOT SATISFY
MUCH AGAINST EVERYONE'S ADVICE
I'M STILL TRYING I'M TRYING I'M TRYING I'M TRYING

These are the lyrics to our chosen song, the writing in RED are the words that we are going to be spelling out on screen. We are going to spell out the title of our song within the video one word at a time and with each letter in the word being set in a different location and in a separate frame starting with "Much", then "Against", then "Everyone's" and finally "Advice", so through our video the title will have been shown, and at the end we are going to put the words one after another to illustrate that we had spelt out the songs title within the song.

Reply Message From Artist

We Can No Longer Cheat You By The Cribs

Are ideas for this music video are using narrative concept because this song has strong lyrics that tell a story so it would be easy to compliment the lyrics with the visuals which is part of the Goodwin, Are digi pack is going to be linked to the narrative of the track, the music video and the media magazine article

Contacting the Band, Soulwax

We contacted the band, Soulwax, the artists of the track we have chosen to get permission to use their song as part of our project.

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