EVALUATION: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

By Nicole Harman-Smith

Combination of main product and ancillary texts:

The three products of which we have created for our coursework have been designed to work together, for example the poster advertises the new album, while the music video and both ancillary texts help to promote the band ‘Unhinged’. They have all been made very similar following the same theme using typical codes and conventions of the electronic/dance music genre of which we discovered while producing our initial research. These similarities include those between the use of typology, colour scheme, simplicity of the overall design, characters and effects such as the pink smoke.

Music video: Digipack: Advertisement:

Difference in the design of Digipack

However with the digipack front cover design, we chose to push boundaries and experiment, to be different. This was a common act that electronic bands and artists did with their music and products, to stand out and be different from others. For example Deadmau5 named one of his albums ‘Album title goes here’ which goes against traditional ideologies, codes and conventions of digipacks. We decided to use a Kaleidoscope design for our front digipack design, inspired by the debut album cover by the electronic artist flume who also used this type of album cover design to be different. However, we made sure to include the same image of the masked character and pink smoke to keep the same theme and colours and make it recognisable to the band ‘Unhinged’. I believe this choice was effective with the combination with the rest of the ancillary texts as it uses the same features but stands out more to capture peoples attention and curiosity.

Simplicity:

Design simplicity of ancillary texts:

We kept to a simple design and theme when making and designing our ancillary texts as we found during our research that simple designs were more successful in the sales of digipacks. Simplistic advertisements and posters also had more of an impact as it looks more professional and straight to the point. Both out digipack and advertisement follow this simplistic design and professional approach as we mostly focused on the quality of the visual aspects as this was what out target audience was more drawn to, rather than large amounts of text.

Simplicity of main task

Our main task music video continues with the simplistic theme and style as we found during our research of typical codes and conventions of electronic music videos that they often use simple ideas and concentrate on the visual and artistic element rather than having narratives. We therefore followed and worked on this convention when creating initial ideas and when working on the production of our music video; examples of this simplistic approach included videos by artists such as Skirllex and TEED.

Music video:

Typology:

Typology:

We wanted to keep the magazine advertisement and digipack simple and as clear as possible. Therefore, when it came to selecting a font for text on out ancillary tasks we chose and style of font that would reflect the simplicity and clarity. We used this font on the track lisitng and information about the bands website, as this was information that did not need to stand out in comparison with the bands names and album title.

Album Title (Typology):

Typography that was also kept the same on all of our media texts is that of the album title. We chose a font that reflected the simplistic approach to our ancillary texts and kept it within the codes and conventions of the electronic/dance genre but also selected one that stood out.

We used the same this same font on the digipack disk, digipack cover and advertisement as this would make the font recognisable to the band and their forthcoming album.

Digipack disk:

Digipack cover:Advertisement:

Artists Name(Typology):

There is a clear link between our digipack and advertisement through the use of font for the Artists name. We carefully selected a font that was best suited to represent and become recognisable to the band ‘Unhinged’.

We discovered through our research that the font used to represent an artist or band is repeated and used on a wide range of media platforms as this is the image that is then used and is associated with them. The font also has a clear characteristic which is unique and individual, in the case of our artists’ name typology we selected a font which was elongated at the edges of the character ‘N’; this would always be used to present the bands name ‘Unhinged’.

Digipack:Advertisement:

Images:

Colour Scheme:

An important feature when combining and linking our three media products together is the shared and combined colour scheme. This is helpful in making our products all link and relate to each other which is important as they are all representing the same album and artist and therefore must all look similar. These colours include pink, black, green and white. Colour was taken into consideration with the location, props and costumes. As we wanted the smoke and masks to be the most dominant features of our media products, we drained the colours of the surrounding location and dressed the actors in black. This helped to make our products more professional looking and thought out as they are all combined through the colour scheme.

Music video:Digipack:Advertisement:

Smoke Effect:Digipack: Advertisement: Music video:

A repeatedly used visual feature that we used throughout the three media products was the pink smoke. The use of the colourful smoke follows electronic/dance music genre codes and conventions by creating an individual style and theme associated with the band. We purposely used the pink smoke to create an interesting and colourful atmospheric contrast with the dark natural surroundings of the woods. We made the pink smoke present on all three media products to help make the combination of the main product and ancillary texts as effective as possible. It helps to create a well designed and strong visual link between the three products, which leads viewers to recognise this and instantly associate this feature with the song, album and band.

Masked Characters:Music Video: Digipack: Advertisement:

One of the main theme and ideas in our production was that of ‘hidden identity’, we interpreted and incorporated it through the use of the actors wearing animal masks. The use of the masks was inspired by research on existing electronic/dance bands and artists who use costumes, make-up and masks to hide their identity and present themselves as a character or as someone completely different; such as Daft Punk and TEED. The use of the masks is ‘Unhinged’ main selling point as it is unique and individual to them and can be instantly recognisable. This is effective as we have incorporated it on both the main task and ancillary texts, keeping a running theme to combine our products together. We used the rabbit mask as the main character of these products and featured her as the main image and focus on all three media products, again linking them together with a running theme.

Conclusion:Overall, I have learnt that it is important to produce a series of products at a high and professional standard through the effect and use of a combination of a theme/style, images, colour, typography and design as this helps to link them all together and portray the same message when promoting an artist, band or album.

Our products interlink and work together, promoting and advertising to its target audience on a large scale as we made sure similarities were kept throughout so that each of the ancillary task and main task can be recognisable to each other, and the band ‘Unhinged’.