Evaluation One

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

Music Video

Our music video location after our change of plan was influenced vastly from music videos such as
Imagine Dragons- Believer and Ed Sheeran- Thinking Out Loud using the stage idea with coloured
lights. This stood out to myself and Steph as it works well with the solely performance aspect of our
music video and as we decided to no longer use the original location idea of the church (influenced
by the song name) because we wanted an open space that would work with our dancers and singer.
Also taking inspiration from music videos by The 1975 such as The Sound and UGH! gave us the
inspiration of using coloured lights as we felt this connoted an indie approach in our music video and
we could achieve this effect using the stage. We chose to use purple lights as we felt this worked
well with the stained glass window as well as working well with the dramatic element myself and
Steph wanted to convey in our music video. We chose to use dancers as we gained inspiration from
Sia- The Greatest and P!nk- Try as we felt this was a creative approach that made the videos stand
out. Also by combining this with our singer, we felt this would achieve a professional approach as
our dancers dance regularly with a club and our singer has joined the drama group ‘Future Faces’ in
the past and has singing experience from that.

Another place we gained inspiration from was a dance show which we attended seeing a
contemporary dance to the song by Hozier ‘Take Me to Church”. Myself and Steph loved the
dramatic aspect of this and the idea of using dancers stood out to us as the performance was very
different to the original Hozier music video and upheld our interest throughout the entire song.
However, we chose to select a slower version of the song in which we discovered Sofia Karlburg
meaning we chose a female singer. However, Sofia’s take on this song is not quite as dramatic as
Hozier’s suggesting a slight challenge to this media product as we are presenting the song in a
different way using dancers. Another challenge in the video could be through the use of the
transitions using a cross dissolve rather than simply a cut as we felt during the post production stage
that this worked better than simply a cut from each clip as the dancing faded into each other and
worked well with the shorter clips.

Myself and Steph decided to base our singer of female indie artists such as Gabrielle Aplin, Birdy and
Lana Del Rey and decided to go for a simplistic approach clothing wise for our singer as this is the
approach many artists go for which is clearly shown in Gabrielle Aplin’s video Please Don’t Say You
Love Me. We also decided to use a statement cardigan in our draft music video however upon
receiving feedback for our video myself and Steph realised the cardigan didn’t work in comparison to
the rest of the video and didn’t convey the dramatic effect we wanted so we re-filmed all footage
with our artist in for our final music video. However, taking inspiration from the dance show as well
as Sia’s music videos we decided to dress our dancers in more dramatic attire choosing black
leotards with defined makeup which made them stand out in the video.
Upon receiving feedback from myself and Steph’s draft video, we realised many of our shots were
very static so in preparation for our re-film of the video we looked at a variety of music videos to
gain inspiration to add more movement to our camera shots. A specific artist that showed this was
Sam Smith in his two videos ‘Too Good At Goodbyes’ and ‘Lay Me Down’ demonstrating the focus on
the artist yet the slight camera movement kept the audience interested in the video. Taking
inspiration from Sia’s music videos such as ‘The Greatest’ and ‘Chandelier’, it helped us to film closer
shots of the dancers as this was feedback we received from our teacher in order to emphasise the
emotions they convey in their dance. In Sia’s video of ‘Chandelier’, this particular video inspired us
with how to frame our dancers in the shots especially in eye-catching movements such as a leap. The
video demonstrated to us how this can be effective without necessarily needing to show all of the
dancer in the whole frame, following this convention means our video will be interesting for our
target audience as well as creating an effective product.

Our music video also demonstrates some of Andrew Goodwin’s features of a music video suggesting
our product is using features shown in real media products. This is shown how I feel our video clearly
shows characteristics of an indie genre such as the female solo artist whose style we based off other
indie solo artists such Birdy and Gabriele Aplin. There is also a relationship between the lyrics and
the visuals such as we have a stained glass window in the background of the entire video giving the
impression of a Church motif. This suggests an illustrative approach for various parts of the song
such as the lyrics “worshipped her sooner”, “heaven I’ll be sent to”, “take me to church”, “tell you
my sins” and “amen” which all closely relate to a Church. Although there limited illustrative
moments in the music video other than when dancer’s demonstrate a praying notion during the
lyrics “amen”, it can be suggested the dance in the song amplifies the lyrics due to the dramatic
notion of the performance heightening the emotions and connection the audience feels with the
music video which will ultimately make the video more memorable. Using these features shown by
Andrew Goodwin suggest that our media product is using features that real products also use
suggesting a professional element of our video and the indication it would work with our target
audience.

Also showing how our media product uses and develops conventions of real media products is
shown through how we show the features commented on by the narrative theorists Sven E Carlsson
and Steve Archer. Calsson believes videos can be split into two different types of video, performance
and conceptual and our video fits the conventions of a performance video. It can be suggested that
there is an element of “commercial exhibitionist” which Carlsson defines as creating a
performer/artist that our audience can aspire to be. Due to the fact our video belongs to the indie
genre, our artist is presented as relatable to the audience meaning our target audience may aspire
to be like her to an extent due to the normality displayed in her presentation. Another convention of
performance videos Carlsson demonstrates includes how we included both singers and dancers.
Upon receiving feedback from our draft video that a lot of our shots were fairly static, taking
inspiration from videos such as Sam Smith ‘Too Good At Goodbyes’ when we re filmed the majority
of our video we took care to include movement into our shots demonstrating how our video shows
the features commented on by Steve Archer having to include movement within the video. Looking
at the quality difference between our draft and final video, it shows following the conventions of
real media products and fitting the features commented on by Steve Archer made our video more
engaging and interesting for the audience and added a more of a professional element to our video.
Digipak

Following the rule of thirds shown on my digipak is a convention shown by most real media products
which splits each panel into thirds displaying the main image and/or information in the centre panel
as this is predominately the area where the audiences’ eye is drawn to. This is shown how I framed
the song names on the back of the digipak in the middle long with the image behind and on the
inside on the right with the artist image or the stained glass window effect image. In the front over
of the second digipak with my artist framed to the left, she is still clearly in a third of the digipak and
with the bold font across the bottom of the digipak it means it still stands out to the audience.
Another convention I I followed shown in my digipak is the use of a bold font throughout my digipak
which is shown in many digipaks due to the fact the font is eye-catching and easily readable.

My digipak inspiration was first from the digipak ‘Evolve’ by Imagine Dragons as it was this continued
rainbow colour scheme that made me consider using a stained glass window pattern throughout my
digipak. Myself and Steph were already going to use a strained glass window in our music video due
to the relevance to the song and we felt this statement design would connote an indie approach to
our music video and stand out to our target audience. Many digipaks such as Gabrielle Aplin- English
Rain and Lana Del Rey- Ultraviolence follow a similar colour scheme throughout their digipaks and
generally feature a predominant colour for the title of the artist and so on to make it stand out.
Taking inspiration from this, I chose to use our singers’ lip colour as myself and Steph bought a
lipstick for the music video that both our singers and dancers wore to present a subtle and
unobvious sense of continuality in our video. I made this colour stand out by putting it as the spine
colour as well as darkening the photo of our artist on the back of the digipak and alternated my
predominant colour with white to make the songs easily readable as well as stand out.

Magazine Advert

For my magazine advert, I followed the convention of the close relation of my advert to my digipak
and music video. For this, I had the stained glass window effect in the background of the advert, as
well as having the artist and colouring the text in the same predominant colour used throughout my
digipak (white and the colour of the lipstick). I also used my artist shown on the cover of the digipak
which is a convention that will help the success of the digipak due to the fact the target audience are
likely to see the magazine advert and recognise the artist which will mean when they see the digipak
they are likely to make the reference and be more likely to purchase the digipak. With the
positioning of my artist, I decided to have my artist looking down and to the side to present a sense
of ambiguity which I gained inspiration from an Artic Monkeys magazine artist with the woman in
the image presented with a mask which will intrigue the audience and make them more likely to find
out more about the digipak which is being released.

The framing with the artist name on the top of the digipak was inspired by artists such as Artic
Monkeys and Kasabian with the bold contrasting font immediately grasping the audiences’ attention
with the image below. I gained inspiration to include the formats the digipak is released on such as
on CD, Vinyl and digital from the magazine advert ‘Lungs’ by Florence and the Machine which is an
element of the advert that stood out to me as it demonstrates to your target audience that the
digipak is being released on a variety of materials. I ensured I includes the same record logo I used in
my digipak and at the end of my video to present consistency throughout my work to present a
professional element in my work. I also gained inspiration to add the artist’s website and twitter (the
same twitter myself and Steph set up in our research) from Florence and the Machine’s magazine
advert of ‘Lungs’ which shows her website. This means if the audience are intrigued by the artist
they will be likely to look at more of her work promoting the artist for future tours and albums being
released. Overall, the production of my music video, digipak and magazine advert has taught me the
importance of research and planning which I feel has vastly benefitted my work to create three
consistent and effective products.