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Evaluation Question 4

Evaluation Question 3

In addition to the audience feedback I mentioned in the video above I also received feedback on my Digipak and Magazine Advert. I have shown the results in the tables below, the actual options are shown in a previous post on my blog.
This feedback helped me decide which option was best suited for the task, target audience and genre.


 

Evaluation Question 2

Below is the link to the Prezi presentation incase it doesn't work above. 

https://prezi.com/view/UpsBonnWnrUlEuJyHnmw

Evaluation Question 1

Final Digipak

Above is my final digipak design.

Final Magazine Advert

Above is the final design for my Magazine Advertisement. 

Magazine Advert: Possible Designs

I am currently deciding between two slightly different styles of my magazine advert the first one is not completed as I will still have to add reviews to it, however I wanted to see them side by side to enable me to decide which one I think is most suitable for my genre, target audience and specification.

Digipak: A Few Possible Designs

Below are three varying designs for my Digipak I am currently unsure which one I will submit as my final design. All three have the same Front and Back covers it is the inside section that is proving difficult to make the decision on.

Target Audience

Below I have included graphs showing the demographic that listens to Jazz, based on a recent study in the U.S. by the Jazz Audiences Initiative (JAI), a project spearheaded by the Jazz Arts Group of Columbus (JAG).

Audience Feedback: Final Music Video

FINAL MUSIC VIDEO!!

Digipak: Track List

For the back of my digipak I needed to come up with additional song to go with the song that I'm producing a music video for. So below I've compiled the lists that will go on my digipak that I've come up with by taking inspiration from other jazz and soul love songs but also some classic r&b love songs as this album I feel is really about love and heartbreak.

1.I Put a Spell on You

2.If Only

3.Because You’re Mine

4.From the Soul

5.One More Time

6.Loving You

7.You and I

8.My One and Only

9.The Last Dance

10.Time After Time

Bonus Tracks:

1.A Man Not a Boy

2.Goodbye, again.

3.In Another Life  

Ancillary Research: Magazine Advert Analysis 4

Ancillary Research: Back of Digipaks...

Below is an analysis of one of Rhianna's CD Digipaks, however I have only analysed the back as this is where I needed the most inspiration for my own Digipak.

Below is the back of Taylor Swifts Fearless CD, again I've only included the back as this is what I need a structure for. Ive also included the spine of the album to take inspiration.

Ancillary Research: Magazine Advert Analysis 3

Audience Feedback: Penultimate Music Video

Ancillary Research: Magazine Advert Analysis 2

Although this is a Jazz Magazine front cover I'm still using this as a form of inspiration when creating my own magazine advert. In terms of Colour palette, font styles and images.

Ancillary Research: Advert Conventions

CONVENTIONS of a Music Magazine Advert:

• Artist Name
• Release Date 
• Web Address
• Product Content 
• Record Name and Logo
• Tour Dates 
• Images 
• Outlets (i.e. apps, amazon....)
• Offers
• Reviews/Endorsements (NME, Q, TIMES)

I have listed the conventions of music magazine adverts for CD's above so that a have some sort of checklist/guide to go by when making my own Advert. I already know that I want to keep the advert quite minimalistic because I feel like that a minimalist approach works really well with the jazz genre. Therefore in my advert I may not use all these conventions as they may make the advert look too busy and also because they aren't all specific conventions of jazz adverts so they're not all applicable. 

Ancillary Research: Magazine Advert Analysis 1

First Published Music Video

Despite there being a couple of things that I'm unhappy about in the editing of the music video so far, I decided to show the rest of my media class so that I can gain some very helpful feedback.
Below is the copy of the video that I showed to the class.

Evaluation: Mediums to Present My Evaluation Responses

When answering  my evaluation questions I will probably use a combination of these things...

1. PowerPoint Presentation
2. Prezi 
3. Short Film (YouTube)
4. Images and Annotations on Blog 
5. Focus Group 
6. Vlogs 
7. Essay-Style 

Evaluation: Questions

As part of the specification I need to evaluate and reflect on the creative process of creating my music video and ancillary tasks (Digipak and Magazine advert) and my experience of it. The questions that need to be addressed in my evaluation are:

1. In what ways does your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks? 
3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback? 
4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Ancillary Research: Production Company Name

When analysing previous Jazz DigiPak's I realised that they all features either the logo or name of the production company, somehow I had forgot about this aspect so today I came up with a Name and logo for my Music Production company. The name I decided on for the company is "Jazz for the Soul". I chose this name because I feel as though it is representative of the type of genre of music video my group and I tried to achieve. By this I mean that although the song is of a Jazz origin, I used the Annie Lennox version which had more of a beat so that I was able to achieve editing to the beat (part of the specification); therefore this more upbeat tune gives the song a slight Soul music twist and I kind of incorporated this into the music with the combination of Performance and Narrative. So bellow is the 'Logo' that I'll use in my digipak:

Music Video: Breaking the 4th Wall?

At the end of the music video Serine turns away from George and looks directly into the camera and sings "because you're mine".
Collectively we decided to this for a number of reasons. Firstly to establish to the audience that in-fact that the woman following George around with all these different girls is in fact Serine who is also the singer in the performance aspect. Secondly, its an explantation to the audience that no matter how many times George has gone off with numerous women he will always come back to Serine because he's hers; hence the line "because you're mine". Thirdly, I wanted a way to link the performance and narrative aspects of the music video together and I feel as though breaking the 4th wall in the narrative aspects links directly to the performance element tying it all together nicely for the the end.

Music Video: Song Title Font

Having researched into what looks best when referring to jazz albums and marketing I have decided on using the font "Snell Roundhand" an apple font as I believe it works really well with the content of the music video and adheres to the conventional font of anything Jazz related.  Below is the Alphabet using my chosen font:

Ancillary Research: Digipak Analysis 4

Millicent Stephenson's Digipak for her album "Reflective Notes".
Compared to the previous three this album has strong vibrant colours of Yellow and Green which almost give off a Reggae vibe. However, the text takes a very jazz font which looks very similar to "Snell Roundhead" which is also one of the fonts I'm considering putting in the music video. The image on the DigiPak is a slightly out of focus image of Millicent playing the Saxophone; this fits with the running theme of jazz artists being presented on their albums while performing.

Band Name: Changed!! (+ArtistName)

So after talking to my group about how I'm not sure how well "Ivy18" works as a name of a Jazz album, we have collectively come to the decision of calling the album "Because You're Mine" as this sounds much more like a jazz album as it sounds like it has more meaning to it than "Ivy18"; which is what almost all jazz albums adhere to.

On my DigiPak I have also decided to present the artists name alongside the album title as this is a typical convention of Jazz albums. So the name of our artist is "Ivy Moore".

Ancillary Research: Digipak Analysis 3

Gregg Karukas' DigiPak for vinyl and cd for his album "Soul Secrets"
Again like the previous jazz digipaks Gregg as the artist is in full focus; the designers have gone for a white background to make him stand out even more. Similar to the Fitzgerald Album cover the designers have chosen for the text to be a pastel base, which pops with the white background. Although this Album is a combination of jazz and soul it is still a very good exemplar for me to get ideas from for my own album cover and Digipak.

Film Day 5: Enfield Town

So today was productive in the number of shots and scenes we needed to get. So first we filmed a scene with George and I in enfield town park. we then filmed at Starbucks having gained their permission first. This is where we did a scene with George and Abbie (his 4th girlfriend).

After this we went on to film at Nando's. First of all we spoke to branch director asking for permission to film for a very short period of time. He said this was okay as long as we didn't get any reference to the restaurant in any of the shots. So once he had given us the designated area to work with we filmed the proposal shots.

After this with any luck we have finally filmed for the last time!!

Editing Session: Two and Three

Yesterday (19th Feb) afternoon and this Morning in my study periods I came into the media room and just buckled down to edit. I was very productive making sure I took on board everything that Miss Fitzjohn had told us in our lessons. So I made sure that there is plenty of editing to the beat and that the shots weren't too long as those are the conventions of the music video and are also on the specification on the music videos. I also inserted blank screens with the correct number of seconds so that when I edit the footage (that we're going to film tomorrow) it'll be easier for me to fit it in and edit it as everything is already planned out.

Ancillary Research: Digipak Analysis 2

Liza Minnelli's 2CD Digipak for "Cabaret...And All That Jazz"
Like the Fitzgerald Album cover the artist is in full focus with the picture taken or edited in Black and white. She appears to be performing on stage, which again sticks to the conventions of jazz album cover pictures being take to reflect the artists performance
The text on the cover is Gold which support the running black, white and gold theme throughout the DigiPak.

Ancillary Research: Typical Magazine Adverts

Analysis of Jazz Magazine Adverts:
The artists are all dressed in suits or causal clothing. 
Some of the photos are black and white but all of them are studio shots. 
There are no secondary images, just sublines. 
Mostly they are all posing with their instrument or in mid-song. 
The colour scheme of the text is bold and bright compared to the dull backgrounds.

Ancillary Research: Digipak Analysis 1

Digipak for Ella Fitzgerald's Album: "Something To Live For"
Here is a classic example of a Jazz Digipak cover where the artist is in full focus with the picture taken or edited in Black and white. She seems to be in a studio as you can see two microphones, which is how artist are often portrayed on their albums.
The text on the cover is very pastel but in contrast to the black and white photo it stands out quite a bit.

Band Name

As a group we have decided on the band name "IVY18". Our inspiration for this comes from Adele and her albums, the album titles she chose were based on how old she was at the time when she wrote them. So we've adapted this and instead of having our artists name followed by her age we're going to  have her name followed by the year she releases the album.

Ancillary Research: Target Audience

The target audience for Jazz is ever growing. Nowadays the audience has expanded to people aged 20+, though artist like Amy Winehouse who have made the genre more popular with younger audiences. 

Typically Jazz music and magazines aim to please and cater for a mixed gender audience between the ages of 30 and 50.

Ancillary Research: Codes and Conventions of Jazz

Conventions of Jazz Music:
Jazz magazines have simple yet bright designs. 
Artists are portrayed playing their instrument or singing. 
Artists are dressed in casual or smart clothing. 
There are no secondary images. 

Codes of Jazz Music:

Fun and happy 

Relating to their audience 

Often black and white photos 

Variety of men and women showing the genre is for everyone

Digipak Intro

What is a digipak?
A type of packaging for CDs or DVDs, typically made from cardboard with an internal plastic holder for one or more discs.

What are digipaks made of?

Material: 300grams per square meter card with matt or gloss varnish. Printed 4 colours (CMYK) or Pantone colours. Spot varnish, lamination and embossing available.

CMYK stands for cyan, magenta, yellow, and key or black. These are the four colors of ink used in the traditional method of printing hardcopies of images, called offset printing. 

The Pantone process is more consistent and able to produce colors closer in shade to the ones seen in the digital design stage. However, it is also more costly than CMYK in most cases, especially if the print job is small.

Dimensions (based on standard 4pp digipak): finished size of 139.5mm x 6mmx 125.5mm

Why have manufacturers moved away from Jewel cases?

Environment advocates have pushed for the elimination of especially harmful CD packaging and more widespread efforts to properly dispose of CDs and cases, which the vast majority of recycling centers do not accept. As for how long it takes for a compact disc to break down in a landfill, it essentially won't break down in any measurable way ever. 

Even worse than the CDs themselves are the plastic jewel cases that hold them. Made of polyvinyl chloride, a substance classified by the EPA as a human carcinogen, jewel cases are discarded more often than compact discs. Also jewel cases break easily and take up a lot of space. 

The alternative packaging  of digipaks was a significant improvement ecologically. Cardboard-based packaging reduces jewel-case greenhouse gas emissions by 95%, according to greenmusic.com. Not producing plastic jewel cases means not introducing to the environment known chemical carcinogens.

Creative Decisions: Breaking The 4th Wall

For the end of our Music video we wanted something dramatic which is why we went with the idea of the proposal at the end but we also wanted to do something on the last "because you're mineeeeee" so collectively we have decided that once George has got down on one knee Serine will turn to the camera and sing "because you're mine".
Also I feel that this will also tie together for the audience the plot of our music video.

Plot Change...

Due to uncontrollable circumstances my group and I have decided that it'll be in our best interest to change the plot of the narrative in our music video. This decision has not been taken lightly because ideally we'd all like to keep the original plot, however, due to issues with certain actors not being available or simply not showing up we feel we have no choice as we as soon running out of time.

So the new plot of our narrative is:
Shots show George with numerous numbers of girls (4) where you can see Serine in the background of these shots. At the end you see George and Serine celebrating an anniversary together where George proposes to Serine and it becomes an understanding to the audience that Serine has "put a spell on George" to be faithful.

Film Day 4: Wood Green

Our group met today to film in Wood Green Shopping City, so we started by getting permission to film on the premises from their management team, they called our sixth form and spoke to our media teacher to confirm we were being legit with them. Once they confirmed we were free to film and we just followed the couple around and shot some scenes in a couple restaurants.

We wanted to film them buying cinema tickets and/or playing games in the arcade, however, when we spoke to the manager they declined and said that we have would have to contact the Cineworld headquarters and get permission for them. collectively as a group we decided that the time it would take for us to go through headquarters that specific scene isn't just beneficial enough.

Editing Issues: Update 2

Returning to our Mac this afternoon I've discovered that nothing has changed and iMovie is still not working. As neither of my media teachers are in lesson today I went to get the IT technician to see if he would be able to help. At first he informed me that he doesn't know an awful lot about Apple Macs but he'll try his best. So long story short we were unable to fix iMovie which means all the footage my group and I have already filmed is lost. However, I found a silver lining in this dilemma; I managed to find the raw unedited footage which is great because none of the edited footage was still on the SD card.
So moving forward the nest step is to move the raw footage onto a new account on the same Mac so that we are still; able to use iMovie 9. I will then have to re-edit the old raw footage along with all the new footage we've been collecting over the past couple of weeks.

Film Day 3: Another Day at Grammar

Yesterday we had our third film day, both George and Ellie were unavailable for filming so me and Serine filmed on our own.

We started by filming at Grammar to get some more performance shots of Serine lip-syncing. We also wanted some shots of Serine establishing her as a part of the narrative and not just the performer. Therefore to achieve this we needed more casual scenes of her. One of the scenes we decided use was of serine at home which helped us tie in the Arabic and Black magic theme, I filmed her writing in a diary drinking "wine" and other short shots that we may or may not use in the music video. the other scene we shot was Serine walking through Brookfield park on her own just looking genuinely sad which I feel ties the lyrics to the footage nicely.

Broomfield Park: 

Editing Issues: Update 1

This morning when I first came into class and logged onto my groups Mac and opened iMovie the screen was still the same as we left it, I tried force closing it and when I reopened it the same message appeared. So I enlisted the help of one of my Media teachers (Ms Foster) she also tried force closing it and suggested restart the computer. I tried this a few times but nothing seemed to work, however, I've run out of time as I've got to walk over to Grammar to film some more scenes; so one hopes by next Wednesday it might of had enough time to work itself out.

Editing Issues

Having begun the editing process our Music video straight after our first film day everything was seeming to be piecing together and editing was going quite smoothly. However, today we attempted to upload some footage of a a piano scene, but instead of importing it like we usually do this time we accidentally dragged and dropped the footage into a new event. iMovie has now been stalling/configuring for approx. 2 hours but the lesson is done so hopefully when we come in for our next lesson it'll be up and running again.

Location Ideas 2

For scenes where we want couple things we are planning on going to Wood Green Shopping Mall. Where there will be an American dinner scene and scenes of them shopping together; with Serine close by.

Ancillary Tasks Breakdown

The DigiPak coursework is worth 20 marks in total and is broken down as shown below:

Ancillary Task 1:

-CD Cover

-Worth 10 Marks 

Ancillary Task 2:

-Magazine Advert

-Worth 10 Marks 

DIGIPAK COURSEWORK

• CREATE THE LABEL: Digipak - upload EVERYTHING below
• Analyse 2- 3 digipaks on paper using KEY MEDIA TERMS 
• Take a photo and upload onto bloG
• THEN design two versions of your own digipak
• Do some audience feedback (Vlog is easiest but you could also do a questionnaire
• Blog about audience feedback
• Blog about your reasons for choosing you final version

MAGAZINE COURSEWORK

• CREATE THE LABEL: Magazine Advert - upload EVERYTHING below
• Analyse 2- 3 magazine adverts on paper using KEY MEDIA TERMS
• Take a photo and upload onto blog
• THEN design two versions of your own magazine advert
• Do some audience feedback (Vlog is easiest but you could also do a questionnaire)
• Blog about audience feedback 
• Blog about your reasons for choosing you final version

Film Day 2: Enfield Grammar

Today we filmed at Enfield Grammar to produce the Performance element of our music video.

This scene involved a lot of prep in terms of the stage we were using and finding a time that the hall was free and I time that was convenient for the whole group.
When we arrived the stage was a mess it had Christmas decorations all over the place and instruments everywhere so after trying to make it look more presentable I suggested that we close the curtains and have one wide spotlight on the Serine with the idea that her black outfit will make a nice contrast with the red curtains.
We tried to film as much of Serine Lip-syncing as possible but it didn't help that she hadn't learnt most of the words. However, we made the most of what we had to work with and filmed her lip-syncing in a number of positions so that we have as much footage to work with.

Editing Session: One

My group and I spent todays media lesson editing scenes of serine at  Enfield Grammar and tried to make it flow with the hot tub and picnic scenes of George and Sabrine.

Film Day 1: Hot Tub and Picnic

Today our group met at Ellie's house along with Sabrine (Who will play George's girlfriend in the music video). We filmed 2 scenes from about 5 different angles, we got a lot of footage but I have a feeling it won't even make a dent in the amount of time we need to fill.

We encountered a few problems today including:

• We want a scene where Serine rides off on a motorbike but the main problem was that she doesn't know how to ride a motorbike. This meant that we will have to cut between scenes of Serine sitting on the bike and Ellie driving to and from the house on the bike.
• The second problem directly links to the first issue we had. So the problem was that we needed a clear shot of Ellie riding away from the house and to the house without any oncoming traffic, this posed a problem as it took about six tries to finally get that shot. 
• The weather also posed a problem because it was so cold that George and Sabrine were reluctant to get in the outdoor hot tub out of fears of how cold it will be leaving the hot tub in their wet clothes. 

Band Name Reasearch: Name Generator

   

1st Film Day Schedueld

Our 1st filming day is going to be on Sunday 26th November 2017.
Below are some examples of the shots we are aiming to achieve, we are going to record the whole song for both shots so that we have enough footage to play with when we begin to edit our music video.

 

                                                                             

Band Name Research: Class Task

Today collectively as class we carried out a random band name generating task. The task required us to write random verbs, nouns and adjectives on alternate pieces of paper. 

Some of the Names our group got collectively were:
1. The Amazing Dragons
2. Magical Jazz
3. Mysterious Music Makers
4. Jazz Giants
5. Beautiful Chicken Drumsticks
6. Musical Geezers
7. Purple Pumkin

My Storyboard

Prop Research: Microphone and Stand

Our media department already has the microphone we want to use in our performance scene (see below) however, we don't have access to a stand that can connect to the microphone. Therefore we are looking into purchasing one, but as the microphone has a specific connector this may prove difficult and expensive. In which we may purchase an ordinary microphone stand and try and make do or my will attempt to make use of what we already have access to. Below is a Screenshot of some of the stands we have found but unfortunately none of them are 100% suitable for the microphone we have in the media department.

Storyboarding: Preparation

Before beginning my AS production, last year, we were required to create a storyboard of our film opening. As we didn't know where to start with the storyboard I took it upon myself to research into how to create a successful storyboard. Amid my research I came across a very helpful powerpoint which explained how to storyboard and provided me with useful tips. Below I have included the slides that I found most useful and that I can still use in my A2 Production this year. 

First Location Sorted: The Stage

We have managed to gain permission from Enfield Grammar to use their stage in the main hall, we explained that we wanted to use the stage for our A2 media production of a music video. They were very helpful and it was also helpful that George attends Enfield Grammar Sixth Form. 

Location Ideas

Below I have put together a few collections of location ideas that we are thing of using in our music video.

Enfield Grammar Stage 




Shisha Bar - Serine's Connection



Enfield Parks