TV Advert Final Evaluation

What was the brief?

We were told to look at Unilever and the products that
produce and distribute. We needed to take an existing
in their range and rebrand it so it appealed to a
target audience. One advert we looked at before we
our task was that of Old Spice who had rebranded their
to reach a younger target audience.

What was your chosen product and how

you decide as a group to choose it?

they
product
different
started
product

did

I decided to choose Vaseline as my product to rebrand, firstly and most

importantly because it was part of Unilever. I have always used Vaseline mainly
throughout the winter to save from the pain of chapped lips, so it was in the back
of my mind when this task came about. Vaseline is
stereotypically a female product and I felt it would be
good to rebrand it to meet a new target audience
that being males. We were arranged into groups
according to what we had chosen to rebrand, I was
put in a group with Lois and Alana who had also
wanted to rebrand Vaseline which made it a whole
lot easier when planning as we all had similar ideas.

Who is your current target audience for the

product and who did you decide to appeal to?
The current target audience of Vaseline is middle aged woman and there isnt
really a social grade that Vaseline fits into due to
its
affordability yet good quality. After looking at
the Old Spice advert and taking inspiration
from it I decided that products can be rebranded in a way that can then appeal to a
new target audience. I knew as said
previously that Vaseline was a
predominantly womans product and
hadnt reached out to males before, this
was my plan.

How did you collect the

feedback (comments from others) on your finished advert from
your target audience?

I decided the best way to collect results would be from an online surveying
website, I used Survey Monkey. This was the best way to achieve a large reach
and the most economical in terms of time. I could also monitor who was
responding to the survey and create visual aids that help with the analysis side.
Not only was the analysis side better than any other way
of collecting results but I could delete and silly responses
or responses that I didn't need.

Do you think you managed to get the main message to your

target audience you specified in pre-production? Would the
advert have an appropriate impact on them?
The idea of the advert was to base the whole narrative on a stereotypical
situation with a stereotypical lad. We wanted to make the characters in the
advert stereotypical so you could connect with them easily without having to
think deeply about it. I feel that the way we delivered the advert meant that we
were able to make a
considerable impact on them
in a way that they may be interested in
the
product. Of course when it comes to rebranding
its not going to win over everyone but
from the
survey responses it seems there advert
did a good
job. As most males said they would
purchase
the product. I feel the pub atmosphere
was the biggest win for us
though as everyone has been to a pub
and its a friendly
environment where all walks of life can
connect, Vaseline is a mainstream product
and needed that similar
atmosphere.

Do you think your

finished advert effectively sells the product to the specified
audience through its storyline/narrative
Our objective was simple; create an advert that appeals to the mass male
audience. We had to find a way of doing
that and trying to create a manly
environment with a typically feminine product.
Using the pub and the girls provided the
perfect stimulus to base our advert from and I
feel the narrative was perfect. The feedback
proved that the
narrative was relatable to and people would
purchase the Vaseline. In my eyes, that
means the advert worked.

Use of mise-en-scene, camera, editing and sound.

Pre-production was very important for us as this was the time when we would
figure out what kind of feel we wanted to create in filming and post production.
We wanted to keep the feel fairly rustic and natural, two of Vaselines traits that
we wanted to reflect within
the advert. When completing our recces
we felt the pub was perfect, the natural
lighting was good and the layout of the
pub worked nicely as well. I was
behind the camera and directed also,
I wanted to keep everything natural looking so
we used no artificial lighting and made
sure that I captured the entire of the
rustic pub features. I used the
storyboard throughout the shoot and
referred
to it when looking at what shots I was about to
use which meant everything
ran smoothly on set. It was important we were not too bland when it comes to
camera shots but we also didnt want to over complicate things as we only had
30 seconds to get sell our product and complicating camera shots wouldnt have
helped us. Sound was the trickiest thing for us and we had to re-dub a few pieces
of dialogue. The pub had a lot of ambient sound and this was tricky to shoot on
the built in camera we were using on the camcorder. If we could shoot again I
would have used an external microphone for optimum sound quality. One piece
of speech near the end was almost un-hearable so we re-dubbed this. In terms of
editing we carried out all of this on Adobe Premiere Pro and followed the
guidelines when it came to organising files. I had some basic knowledge when it
comes to editing and Alana and Lois were also great help, there was nothing
major to be done. The only things we done was add music, cut clips where
necessary and add some colour correction to clips, this was probably the most
simple part for us.

Clarity of communication: what was the message you were

trying to send to the target audience? What were the main
techniques used to send that message:
The message of this advert was to send the message that men wearing Vaseline
isnt embarrassing and should be acceptable as its currently something that
could be looked down upon as not being manly. The end quote in our advert is
anything is possible, by sending this message not only does it give off the
thought that Vaseline could boost confidence but also make dreams become
more realistic. Within society it seems ideologies are shifting towards people the
belief that anything is possible and individualism is at an all-time high, although
Vaseline isnt a huge product in terms of effect we feel that putting the quote in
at the end will help males connect with the brand. Of course on the surface the
advert is simply a man in a pub trying to impress some girls, but connotation can
be read from this into a man slowly building confidence by using a product and

overcoming fears to become a better product. We tried to convey a fairly

complex message with a simple advert, we think it worked.

Overall do you feel your advert is fit for purpose? Does it look
professional and comply with advertising regulations:
First of all I think our advert does look professional, we shot the footage and
edited it in a way that would make it look professional. We concentrated a lot on
continuity so there would be no mistakes when it came to that as that would take
a lot away when it comes to professionalism. Not only did we concentrate on the
basics but we were able to use industry standard equipment which
helped us make the advert look as good as it could. We recorded the
footage in full HD and were able to edit in state of the art
editing software which made the whole process a lot easier
and more importantly a lot more professional. In regards to
advertising regulations we also followed these. Due to us
advertising Vaseline there were many different categories we
came under and had to comply to in order to stay in compliance with ASA and
BCAP. The first thing we made sure we didnt do was provide misleading
advertising as this is against the BCAP code, for example everything within the
advert was true its word. The only part that could have been misleading was the
part where Adam (man in advert) gets served after applying Vaseline which
probably wouldnt happen in real life but the majority of replies proved to us that
it didnt come across in a misleading way, instead in a humorous way. Code 04 in
the BCAP rules states that no harm or offence must be caused on a widespread
level, after reading this we decided to veer away from any kind of comedic
element that would have the possibility to cause offence, we ended up with an
advert that complied with BCAP ruling 4 due to this. We also had to comply with
code 19 in the BCAP rulings which was to do with alcohol as there was alcohol
within our advert. The main ruling within this code is that irresponsible drinking
cannot be shown on screen and this is shown under the BCAP rulings 19.2, we
only had one pint being pulled in the advert which complied with UK laws
evidently meaning that the drinking in the advert was responsible. Before
completing the advert we researched into whether you could use alcohol as the
catalyst to becoming a better person. When we looked into it we found that
advertisements cant contribute to an individuals popularity but we then looked
into code 19.6 where it states alcohol can be used in a flirtatious manner which
was the case in our advert so we complied.

Personal reflection
How does your final advertisement compare with your original
intensions? Reflect on your documentation, e.g. storyboards
and other pre-production, final advertisement and
audience/peer/tutor feedback.

Overall the advert went very well and is pretty much exactly how I thought it
would look when planning. I think that our vigorous pre-production work allowed
us to carry out the shooting process exactly how we wanted to, it was much
easier to organise when in the pub shooting and I knew exactly where the actors
needed to be and also what shots I was about to carry out and what miseenscene I wanted. In our group Alana decided to take control of drawing the
storyboard and me and Lois fed her ideas that she then illustrated, this was the
best possible thing to do as she had the best ability when it came to drawing
which made the visual element of pre-production easier to understand. Of course
the main objective we wanted to achieve was to successfully re-brand Vaseline
to a make demographic which I feel we done successfully looking at both
audience and tutor feedback. Our surveys show that the majority of our new
target audience would purchase Vaseline after watching the advert and the
narrative was enjoyed by the majority of our peers. Throughout the whole
process we worked closely alongside out tutors to optimise what we had at our
disposal, Josh had incredible knowledge when it comes to Premiere Pro and Ellie
helped us when planning our narrative to get the best possible effect. Overall I
am very happy with how everything came together from pre-production to the
finished product.

Reflect on how satisfied you were with your final advert. Would I
do anything differently if I was able to undertake the task
again? Evaluate your own involvement in the project.
Overall I was very happy with how my advert turned out as it reflected my
original ideas which were drafted up
in pre-production work. There are a
few things I would do differently
though as Im sure when most
creators finish work there are things
they are not happy with. The first
thing is the sound quality, if I was to
complete this task again I would
have definitely used an external
sound recorder as the one built into
the camcorder was very poor and
created some nasty sound that wasnt
ideal. Another thing I would have
changed is the lighting, I was happy with the majority of it but some artificial
lighting may have helped, I decided to keep it incredibly natural to create the
pub atmosphere but due to relying on
sunlight, it was inconsistent at times. A
good example of this was at the start
the footage was very bright and when
playing pool the light dropped. Except for them two minor
things I was very happy with how everything went and
wouldnt have changed anything else.

Finally lets talk about my involvement in the project. The duties were very much
equally split in pre-production with all of us carrying out different tasks and we all
had equal workloads, my main task in pre-production was relaying ideas to Alana
to then illustrate into a visual form on the storyboard. When it came to shooting
our footage I decided to direct and also take charge of the camera, it was my
responsibility to organise all of the actors and also take control of the technical
side recording the footage. I thoroughly enjoyed this as it allowed me to take
my idea and translate that into shooting it, there was also pressure to deliver and
a time limit to meet. I was very happy with my involvement and also happy with
how my group worked.