A2 Main Production & Ancillary Task EvaluationBy Sam Walton

Q1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our music video, used a range of influences for the style we used:

-The music style is Indie pop.

-Indie pop style usually involves images or objects that juxtapose each other to intrigue audiences.

-Locations can include: woods/forests, gothic castles, churches, cemeteries, places with some mystery-landscape very important.

-Costume with a symbolic meaning to it.

-Visual style soft focus, soft lighting.

-Lead singer has a particular individual style which audiences will recognise in both music videos and live performances.

How we used the Indie Style.

Q1 ContinuedA Pre-Raphaelite painting called “Lanterns.” This has influenced our group for our night shots for our music video. We experimented with lanterns during our second attempt because our first attempt didn’t work well due to blurred footage. We wanted to highlight the style of our music video with the influence pre-Raphaelite paintings such as this one. We did this to appeal to our intended audience of festival goers and consumers who listen to indie music .

The style of the main artist in the band has influenced us on how to style our actress in our music video. Florence Welch has a dominated permanent style that her fans can associate with. She is commonly recognised for her fiery red hair. Our actress Georgia, has red hair and in our magazine advert we have used tools that highlight her hair as the main focus and feature that our fans can associate with. We have researched the conventions of her lyrics by what they mean and how we can present her words visually, by analysing her music videos and how they connect to her audiences as well as appealing to the younger generation which we want to achieve.

Our first idea was to create our magazine advert in the style of black and white but from our feedback our peers wanted more colour. So with the help of Adobe Photoshop, I brightened the main image so it stands out.

Q1 Continued

Conventions of a Magazine Advert:

-Captivating image of main singer.

-Maintain the brand image-band name font, costume, make-up, colours.

-Text should be minimal but with easy readability, position not to obscure the main image.

For the main image, we Thought about costume And how our main singerCan be brought acrossAs being captivating toOur audiences. Here, weAre maintaining the brandImage by also highlightingHer fiery red hair.

We have edited the amountOf writing, because we didn't want it To swamp her and obscure the Main image. We have created a Ticketline and made up a websiteinstead of listing where and when this concert is going to be because we wanted our audiences to see the long shot of our main singer.

For the Ticketline andWebsite, we have usedA minimal font and writingStyle so it is easy for our audienceTo read it.

We found a page in an Indie mag called NME whichPromotes tours. We had to cut down ourAdvert so it fits into the spaceOn the tour advertising page.

Q1 ContinuedConventions of a Digipak:

-Usually you would use an image of the lead singer for the front cover.

-Have an inside booklet containing images either from a music video or images of the lead singer, lyrics (snippets of lyrics) Thank you page or magazine reviews (preferably placed on the back cover.

-Use a reoccurring colour scheme that matches the overall style and genre of the singer.

-We were influenced by the album Lungs by Florence and the Machine who also uses images of the main artist. We used their album cover as an outline but we made it our own.

Q1 ContinuedThis is the front cover of the Lungs album by Florence and The machine. The artistic designer, has used Florence as His main focus by having a medium shot of her lying down.It can also be interpreted as an aerial view shot.In addition, the designer has used the theme of natureThroughout the album by having her lying down on a bed ofLeaves. The writing style is a reoccurring style throughout theAlbum and audiences know that this is associated with theartist.

Throughout the inside booklet, the designer has used appropriate images of the main singer in different costumes and situations to show how she is the main focus. We have also incorporated this into our Digipak. This influenced us to get still images from the music video and incorporate them into our inside with snippets of the lyrics. The lungs album did influence us.

Q1 ContinuedThese two pages inside the booklet show a detailedDescription of all of the tracks inside the album, and the artist herself is giving her opinion about the tracks and what they mean to her personally. She wants her audiences to feel something while reading this booklet. She has also included a thank you page to show how she is appreciating all of the creative people who inspired her and helped her with this album..

This is the back cover of the album. The designer has used dull colours to bring out the x-ray image of the lungs. The numbers around the lungs, represent the number of the tracks and at the bottom it tells the consumers the name of the songs. In our Digipak, we have used the back cover as a review page and we have quotes from magazines and professional people of what they thought about the album.

Q2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Florence and the Machine

Dog days are over

Run fast for your mother run fast for your father.

The combination between our main production and the ancillary tasks, is effective, because in our Digipak we thought about using the locations of nature and forests from our main production and incorporate them into our ancillary tasks. We did this by designing a background for our Digipak by using colours such as green and browns to link to the concept of the artist and what genre this music video belongs to.

During our first rough draft of the inside booklet for the Digipak, I have incorporated still images from the main production to show a link and how we are not drifting away from the concept with our creative ideas. In addition, I have also used snippets from the lyrics that relate to the pictures.

We made our background as a collage of images overlapping each other to bring across our genre. It worked well because we had images of bird cages, scores of music and other images that don’t mean anything symbolic or don’t work well together. Over the top of this creative collage, Emily had the responsibility of writing snippets of the lyrics to go on top of the background. Our writing style changed throughout the whole process but we wanted a fixed style that our audience that associate the artist with and it is a reoccurring brand image.

Q2 Continued:

She hid around corners and she hid under beds

“It's brilliant.”

“It's a masterful yet primal tour-de-force of

folk/pop/rock that reveals a beguiling talent that should surely be regarded as one of

the finds of the musical year.”

“'Dog Days Are Over' succeeds in capturing a powerfully 'live' studio

sound”This links to the music video because we have used still images from the video to show the link and we have used snippets of the lyrics which was influenced by the lungs album.

Q3: What have you learnt from your audience feedback.

Alex Harpley 17Sam Whitehouse 18They both like indie music.

To help us get opinions on our music video I held a focus group for people who go to festivals and enjoy listening to indie pop music or folkie music. I had a range of questions that I asked my focus on what they thought about our music and whether it appeals to our target audience. I also asked them if we can improve any elements of our video or if some sections don’t entirely work.

Questions included:1.Did our music video appeal to you and the target

audience?2.What elements did you think links to the indie

genre?3.What elements did you like?4.What elements do you think we can improve on?

Q3 Continued

Did our music video appeal to you and the target audience?Alex: It appealed to me because I liked how it built up into an anti-climax and I liked the use of the lanterns highlighting her facial features.

What elements did you think links to the indie genre?Samantha: The costume and the overall style of the girl links to Florence and the Machine and the different camera shots and angles highlight the girl and the dress.

What elements did you like?Alex :I liked how you reversed the shot of the leaves drifting from the water.Samantha: How the visuals linked to the lyrics such as the shot of the horse.

What elements do you think we can improve on?Alex: The horse shot in my opinion was too blurry.Samantha: Some of the nature shots went on for too longAlex: I didn’t understand the concept of the light thing that follows the girl.

Q3 Continued:

Florence and the Machine presents The Dog Days Are Over tour

2011

Monday 13th June and Tuesday 14th June 2011

(The 02 Arena)

Friday 17th June and Saturday 18th June 2011

(Wembley Arena)

Monday 20th June 2011(Manchester Evening News Arena)

Thursday 23rd June and Friday 24th 2011.(N.E.C Arena Birmingham)

Thursday 30th June and Friday 1st July 2011

(Odyssey Arena Belfast)

How we incorporated feedback on the magazine advert:

This is the first draft of our magazine advert.

We had to change:

• The font size

• The brand name style.

• Brighten up our main image.

• Make her hair brighter.

We did this to make our tour advert bright and

appealing to people who consume this magazine.

During our research process for the ancillary task, we intended for our magazine advert to advertise the album but through time we decided to make it into an advert advertising a tour. We would see our magazine advert in an indie magazine called NME which advertises tours. We wanted to relate to real media products by using actual old dates from Florence and the Machine tour.

Q4: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Using Adobe Premiere to edit our main production: We used a range of effects such as a lens flare (below) to give our actress more of a motive and it links to the style of our piece and it was a risk because it could work or it couldn’t. In my opinion, it did work because the girl is acting as if she is looking up at it while it follows her. The two other members of my group, didn’t like it at first but I thought it worked because I spent two hours working and polishing it.

Using Publisher: I used Publisher to create the first designs for the magazine advert and the inside booklet of the Digipak. In my opinion, Publisher didn't give me the opportunity to be creative because I was restricted on tools but after creating the designs on this publication I then transferred these Ancillary tasks onto Photoshop and I improved them before the final deadline.

Q4 Continued:

Use of the Internet:

Google-To get images to help us with our planning process and to help us research the style.

Blogger-We used Blogger to record our planning process, editing, filming of production and the overall process of the production and the two ancillary tasks.

YouTube-I used YouTube to look at Florence and the Machine music videos for research and I used YouTube videos to link to my blog.

Slide share-I used Slide share to upload my “Analysis of a Professional Product” presentation and my “evaluation” to embed into Blogger.

Q4 ContinuedUse of hardware:

Canon Mini DV Camcorder

We were shown how to do manual override of the automatic settings for focus and aperture and colour.

Still DIGITAL camera

Low lighting with candle light