Print Research- Magazine advert

Full page advert

This magazine advert is very eye catching due to the use of the entropic image. The strange image is used to attract the audience and to connote a sense of Indie through the use of warm colours. The advert doesn't include any of the band members, which appears redundant for Indie band adverts. The font used for "the killers" gives a brand identity as they commonly use it. The colour scheme and layout used is typical use of the Indie genre as it is eye catching but the page isn't over busy. The full page advert is used to have the full attention of the audience and they can afford it due to being a well known band. The target audience is clearly Indie styled and could be targeted at a huge range of ages, due to the relaxed layout. The release date is clearly presented, which promotes it well. I'd like my video to focus on the image and important information, such as the release date and so follow a similar layout. By doing this I can use an entropic image to attract my young audience and still follow the Indie genre with the relaxed layout.



Half page advert

This magazine advert has clearly focused on the bright image and band and song name. The bright colours used give a brand identity as it is unique to the band. The image is an entropic image as it is unusual. However, for an Indie band, perhaps it is a redundant feature as strange images seem to be used  commonly in this genre. The page doesn't consist of much information, which connotes that the band is well known enough to not need much detail. My magazine advert would perhaps include more detail as they are unsigned and so would need more promotion. The layout is simple, which is redundant for an Indie genre and typically fits for the young target audience, as they are drawn to colours and not interested in large amount of information. The font is another brand identity feature as the band uses it commonly- which is a redundant feature for adverts. The half page advert connotes a lower budget band, due to unavailable funds to pay for a large advert. My advert would also be a half page advert as my band is unsigned so therefore low budget.

It is important to have an appealing magazine advert, as part of a promotional package, because people are drawn to music by colours and how they connote the type of music and audience. It also can attract new people to listen to the music, because it is the advert that influences them to listen to the song. Most people read online, instead of magazine's now, so magazine adverts have less impact than they used to but they can be used online also to promote the single to a wider population and to inform fans that they have a new song out.

Print research

Now I have finished my music video I am going to start looking at digipack and magazine prints that aim to attract a similar target audience as mine and are an Indie genre. I am going to analyse them to get a clear idea of what elements are needed to attract my target audience and what promotional techniques Indie bands use. I will look at use of images, fonts, layout, detail and the size of adverts appropriate for the band and target audience. 

Final cut

Filming update

Yesterday we re-filmed the computer scene:

Location: Vitor's house

Props: Computer

Actors: Sophie (me) 

Filming: Vitor

This was a successful filming and we now have the extra scene we needed for our video. 

Time management update

Unexpected overrun of time

Unfortunately, editing took more time than we thought, so we have now run over our plans for this week, which was to start package.

Action plan 

We intend on taking action on the changes we need to make to our video and have a final deadline for our music video on Wednesday 19th December. 

Today's lesson: Check lip syncing and add editing tools to make scenes run smoother. 

Tonight: I am going to film the scene that needs to be changed. 

Wednesday 19th December: Add scene to video and make any further changes needed. (We may take extra time after class to finish this if it is not done within the lesson). 

I will begin to research digipack's in the Christmas holidays (21st December-7th January) and create a mock-up of my own digipack. 

How we are going to respond to feedback

• We are going to make our editing smoother by adding tools such as fade in, fade out in between scenes that seem a bit "jumpy" 
• We are going to change the scene where Sophie (me) is on the computer looking at Vitor. We are going to change the picture on the computer of a picture of Vitor wearing the make-up, because we made the mistake of putting a picture of him not wearing any. We are also going to make the scene longer and emotional to allow the audience to understand the story line more, make a connection with the characters and to reduce performance scenes. 
• We are going to double check the lip syncing in our performance element to make sure he sings in time with the music. This will make the video look more professional. 
• We are going to upload the video with better quality so the scenes are clear and the audience can view the reactions of the characters.
• We are also going to lighten the scenes of performance, so the audience can view the band clearer. 

Facebook Feedback

We decided to use Facebook to get feedback for our video, because we can get more of a wide spread response and from people we could not ask without using Facebook.
These are the questions we asked:
1. Do you think our video suits the indie genre?

2. Do you understand the narrative/ story?

3. Do you think there is a good balance between the narrative and performance? Or does it need anymore?

4. Do you feel there is a comical element in this video?

5. How could we improve our video?

6. Do you feel you can relate to the characters in the narrative and why?

And here are the responses:

This person gave positive feedback but we will respond to her criticism by double checking the lip syncing. We will not change the comical element unless the majority of the other agree with her, because our video needs to target our whole audience, not just one person within it.

This person gave all positive feedback and gave nothing we could improve on.

Most feedback given by this person is positive, however he makes a point that our narrative seems rushed. We will improve upon this by changing one scene that we also agree appears rushed. In this scene we will also add another shot that connotes emotion to respond to his criticism about not enough focus on the relationship of the narrative.

This feedback is positive for our video and we cannot make any adjustments based on this response.

This feedback is positive and has no criticisms.

This person gave mostly positive feedback, but she mentioned the performance being too long. To respond to this we are changing a narrative scene to make it longer, which therefore shortens the performance element. She also commented on the lip syncing not being accurate, so we are going check and change that.

This person gave mostly positive feedback but commented on transitions between scenes, to respond to this we will experiment with different transitions to see if there is room for improvement. We decided against including a scene where the band and actors in the story are both included because in other similar music videos they usually include both together throughout the whole video or not at all. We chose not to include them together at all, because that would mean we would have to film our video all again, which we do not have time for.

Focus group feedback

Here we gathered three people who we think suits our target audience and asked them a range of questions about our music video. The questions were the same questions we asked on our Facebook group, but we felt in a focus group they would express their opinion more and give more detail about what they think.

1. Do you think our video suits the indie genre?

2. Do you understand the narrative/ story?

3. Do you think there is a good balance between the narrative and performance? Or does it need anymore?


4. Do you feel there is a comical element in this video?

5. How could we improve our video?

6. Do you feel you can relate to the characters in the narrative and why?


We found out from this how we could improve our video in a range of ways. For example, one of these people commented on the lighting in the performance element of the video, so we may make change to the lighting. There was also a comment about the editing and how it is slightly jumpy, so we will also make changes in response to this comment. 

It is important to respond to criticism made by our target audience because they are the type of people who will watch our video. We also want them to enjoy the video in general and for the video to promote the band.  

Editing update

Like planned, we have finished editing our rough cut:



We have produced a Facebook page with our video on it, questions and a range of people in our target audience so we can get feedback on our video and change any changes that need to be done:


1. Do you think our video suits the indie genre?

2. Do you understand the narrative/ story?

3. Do you think there is a good balance between the narrative and performance? Or does it need anymore?

4. Do you feel there is a comical element in this video?

5. How could we improve our video?

6. Do you feel you can relate to the characters in the narrative and why?

Editing update

Today we didn't manage to finish editing our music video, due to unexpected problems while editing, but we are not far from finishing our rough cut. We plan to finish editing our video on Wednesday and get feedback that same day using Facebook  We will then get further feedback with a focus group on Friday. Using our spare time, we hope we can understand what or if we need any changes for our music video by Monday.

Applying what I know about editing to my video

Jump-cut 

A jump cut is a transition between two shots which appears to "jump" due to the way the shots are framed in relation to each other. This type of editing is usually used in a comical sense and so I intend to use this to create a sense of humor in my video. The jump cut will be used when the actor Vitor is doing a dance that is meant to be viewed as funny, this editing will help to illustrate this. 

Fade out

This is a shot which starts at full brightness and gradually fades into total darkness. We will use this at the end of our music video to end the video, this will create a sense of emotion for the actor (Vitor) it will fade out from. 

Continuity 

This editing reduces time and smooths scenes out. We will use this editing in our music video to make movements look natural without each scene being too time consuming. 

Eye line match 

We will use this type of editing to show who is looking at who and to create a bond between people in our video. 

Editing update

Today we have done further editing of our music video and hope we will finish our rough cut for Monday. We have edited all of our narrative into sections and have placed them in time with how we have planned. We have also edited part of our performance element and we are going to edit them to fit in with our music video on Monday/

Editing update

Today we have captured the performance element onto the computer and have started to organise the narrative and performance in order of the music video.

Editing

Today we started capturing our footage on the computer, ready to use and edit tomorrow. Our deadline for our rough cut is the 3rd December, so we have made a plan of when we are able to edit and we may be able to edit on other days if we need it.
Here are a few pictures to show our captured footage:

Time management update

Filming update

We filmed the performance element of our music video today. We have now finished filming our music video.

Location: Alice's loft

Actors: Jake, Elliot and Chris

Props: Microphone, Guitar and bass 

Videoing: Sophie (me) and Alice

The filming was successful and we managed to film the performance element within two hours. We are going to edit this part in the next lesson.

This image shows how we positioned the camera at a low angle, close up of Elliot playing the guitar. We decided to do this to make sure we have a range of shots and on the guitar solo the camera can concentrate on him.

 This image shows how we are positioning the camera in this shot. This shot is a long shot at eye level of the bassist and the singer. We decided to do this to get a range of shots and to show the audience the whole band in different ways.

This image shows how we positioned the camera at the back of the room to ensure we can film long shots and do close ups. 

Audience theory

The cultural studies Approach to Audience

According to Morley, audiences aren't just passively affected by media texts, they take an active role in reading a text. 

• Preferred reading: The audience recognize the values being offered by the text and accepts them as natural and correct. 

• Negotiated reading: The audience recognize the values in the text as legitimate and accept them in general, but adapt their reading of the text to fit in with their experiences and interest. 

• Oppositional reading: The audience understands the values of the text, but disagrees with them and rejects them. 

How might audiences read the values expressed in your video and print work in a preferred, negotiated and oppositional way? 

A preferred reading would be taken by our target audience, because they understand elements of the Indie genre and enjoy it. They would find our slightly entropic and comical element to our video entertaining and enjoy how the beat matched the editing of our video. 

A negotiated reading would be taken from people who are not part of our target audience but may enjoy the occasional Indie song. They wouldn't enjoy the entropic elements of the video but they would understand how it may be funny to some people. 

An oppositional reading might be produced by someone who doesn't like Indie music and would prefer a music video to link with the lyrics completely in terms of the storyline. 

What are you going to do to encourage the target audience to take a preferred reading?

To make our target audience take a preferred reading to our music video we are going to make sure Indie elements are clearly used and use a mixture of performance and narrative to anchor the audience into wanting to know what will happen next in the storyline. We will also include humorous elements that are clear, but cannot be taken offense to. Our characters will be dressed casually as part of the Indie genre and the face paint may draw in the audience and create a sense of interest.

What kind of person might take an oppositional reading?  

This may be a person who doesn't enjoy Indie music or indie conventions, such as relationship based narrative and humor. They will not be our intended target audience and wouldn't enjoy following a storyline. They may enjoy music videos that are mainly performance based or concept based. 

 

Filming update

Today I filmed the rest of the narrative element.

Location: Vitor's house 

Actors: Vitor

Videoing: Sophie (me)

Props: Computer, facepaint and brushes 

This filming was succesful and we managed to film within an hour. We are going to film the performance element Monday 26th November, because everyone in the band is free after college hours on this day.

Here is a long shot of Vitor entering his house. We filmed him walking into the house and up the stairs in separate shots to create a sense of continuity. This breaks up the scenes and reduces time.

The high angle viewing the Vitor climbing the stairs suggests he is changing for the good, as he is climbing and growing. (taking off the make up) It also adds variation to the shots.

This shot allows the audience to view Sophie looking at a picture of Vitor on Facebook. This connotes a sense of youth, due to the use of technology and will attract a young audience. The use of the owl hat also shows the audience it is the same character as before.

 Here are two images viewing before and after the change. In the image where he is applying make up he looks unhappy and the lighting is dark. This creates a sense of sadness. In the next image he has removed the makeup and he is smiling and the lighting is light. This creates a sense of happiness. We can see the clear change. In the second image we are viewing him from the mirror, suggesting he can see clearly and is looking directly at himself in confidence.

Filming update

Today we filmed two scenes:

Scene 1:

Location: the pub "the blueboar" 

Actors: Sophie (me), Vitor, Sophie, Alice and Alice 

Videoing: Took in turns because there was no shot where we were all involved

Props: Beer and other drinks

Scene 2:

Location: Costa Coffee

Actors: Sophie (me), Vitor, Sophie, Alice and Alice

Videoing: Again took in turns

Props: Glasses and mugs

These scenes were successful and we managed to film them within an hour. We only have the performance element and scenes located in Vitors house left to do. I am going to film the rest of the narrative element on saturday.

Here is a long shot showing the girls in a pub, having a few drinks. This follows a stereotypical view of young people and our target audience will be familiar with the location. This is a redundant element to the video. The girls are all sat close together and leaning into conversation, connoting they are close friends.

This is a mid shot of Sophie (me). It shows the perspective of Vitor and due to the closeness of the shot, connotes that the actors are becoming more close. The side view and sad expression, however, connotes she is not feeling connected to him, due to his rude behaviour.

This is a long shot showing Vitor alone. He is positioned alone and toward the centre of the frame, connoting the loneliness and strangeness of the character.

In this image the girls are parted slightly more than in the pub and Sophie's expression is sad. This connotes the situation is affecting the girls relationship, because they laugh at the guy Sophie likes.

Filming update

Today we have filmed two scenes:

Scene 1:

Location: street

Actors: Alice, Vitor

Videoing: Sophie (me)

Props: Face paint

Scene 2:

Location: Castle

Actors: Sophie (me), Vitor

Videoing: Alice

Props: Face paint

Both scenes were successful and we managed to film within two hours. We now have 4 scenes of the narrative left to film and the performance. We plan to film the next scene on wednesday.

 These two images are long shots of the two actors approaching each other. This allows us to view the surroundings, so the audience knows they are in the same place and walking toward each other. The angle is slightly higher when viewing Vitor to connote that he is smaller, because he is strange and unpopular.

Here is a close up of Vitor's painted face to connote a sense of strangeness. This close up allows the audience to view how strange his face looks and this will draw the audience to watch the video to find out why he has his face painted. We can also view his expression in this close up, so we can see his emotions. The camera shot also allows the audience to feel more involved with the actor, because it is the first front close up of this actor, so they may feel less negatively about him now.

This image is a two shot of the two main actors. Vitor is alone on the side of the image, which creates a sense of loneliness. Sophie (me) is towards the middle of the frame and looking at Vitor, this creates a sense of drama, because the audience can see she is approaching him and something significant is going to happen.

Change of actors

 Unfortunately one of our actors (Esther-friend of main actor) couldn't be in the film anymore, due to her unavailability and so we decided to use her sister as the actor as she is very similar to Esther and she also has a lot of free time and is around Ludlow college a lot, which is near the location we would like to film her. She has an Indie style and is a very giggly person, which suits the character she is acting as.
Alice:

My inspiration in creativity

 This has inspired my creativity, because it is humorous, entropic and very upbeat. It inspired me to use face painting in my video and to add a humorous element to it, because it was very entertaining and caused me to watch the whole video to find out why the clowns were going crazy. By using face paint in my video I hope it has the same effect and people want to continue watching to find out why he has his face painted.
 This video inspired our story line of our narrative element. In our video we decided to create a character who avoids positive attention and ends up attracting a girl who gives him positive attention. This movie clip is similar because it is about a monster who tried to scary people but a girl doesn't find him scary and laughs at him.

Creativity

Creative from Vitory

I feel that all these ways do make me more creative as they expand the way you think and motivate and develop ideas more to make them better:

Filming this week

We have decided to film this week, starting today. We have completed our storyboard and have all the props ready to use. We have organised when people are free to film. Today we are going to film the last scene.

Location: Linny

Actors: Vitor, Sophie (me)

Videoing: Alice

Props: Flower

This filming was successful and we managed to film within 2 hours. We plan to film two scenes next monday.

Here we used an over the shoulder shot to show Vitor's perspective. This draws the audience into the scene. The young audience will also be able to relate to this scene due to the age of the actors and the situation. This will allow the audience to be involved in the narrative.

This is a long shot of the main character sitting on a bench. This allows the audience to view the surroundings and what the actor is wearing. The young, indie audience will be drawn to this image as the style is what we expect our target audience to wear and the surroundings are a place where young people hang out. This shot is to show where Vitor was looking, so we videoed this from where he was standing.

This is a long shot at a low angle of Vitor approaching the area. This camera angle creates a sense of power for Vitor and suggests a change in him, because we are looking up at him. He is dressed smartly, yet still casual to still give that indie look and he is carrying a rose that attracts the eye of the audience.

Time management

The storyboard

This is our storyboard illustrating what we intend to do for each scene and how we are filming it.

Facebook group of actors

We have made a facebook group that includes all the actors of our video so we can organise when we are filming, what time and where at.

The performance element

I have looked at a range of Indie music videos to give me inspiration on where to film the performance element of my music video.

In this music video the performance element is videoed on a stage. This is an redundant location as many indie bands perform on a stage for their music video. I decided this was a possible option for my music video, because it would give our video a sense of redundancy and would suit our young audience as they expect this type of location for a band to perform. A possible location is the Drama studio, which has a stage for the band to perform. Here is a picture of the stage and people on it to give an idea of how it would look like in the video:

However, this location is not available on many days, which could potentially put us behind on schedule.

Also, by looking at other similar music videos, we have noticed bands perform in places they are comfortable or have a sense of old style band to it, such as a garage or an attic. This is a redundant idea, because bands commonly perform in these places to create a sense of them being a band that practice together in a house when they were younger.


This video influenced us to film here:

I think this place has a relaxed atmosphere, which connotes a sense of Indie and I think it will suit our song well, because it is a old looking place which creates a sense of old school. It is also available at all times and so we can organise a time around when our band is free.

We have also decided, by looking at other similar music videos and listening to our music, to switch from narrative and performance constantly and more quickly when the beat is faster. This was inspired by Goodwin's theory that the music matches the beat of the song and also music videos, such as Franz ferdinand- Micheal.