A2 Music Videos

 

evaluation 3

evaluation 2

evaluation 1

In my music video I split the colour scheme half black and white and half in full colour. We didn't think of the black and white until quite far into filming however i feel it works very well. We contacted a survey for what people thought looked best, here are the results.

This is a magazine album that belongs to Wretch 32, i have analysed it with the purpose of using some ideas for my advert. I believe the main image of the artist is important as it the main selling point of the album.

The first thing consumers see on a digipak is the front cover hence why I especially researched Drake's 'Take Care' album cover. Drake has proved to be extremely successful in the music industry, possibly being the most successful rap artist in this decade proving he knows how to market his music products. I created this on Word Document.

Here is some research and analysis I did on Tinie Tempah's album 'Discovery'

At the start of the course we had to email Annie Lennox's manager in order to gain permission to use her version of 'I put a spell on you' otherwise we risk breaking the law due to copyright regulation. Luckily we got a quick response allowing us to do so meaning we could engage in creating our own music video for the track.

'Duke Ellington' or formally known as Edward Kennedy, was born in April 29 in 1899. His career began to bloom when he was 23 as he became a pianist then later becoming a composer then finally a band manager of a jazz orchestra. He was born in Washington DC however was raised in New York but gained his fame when he started performing in Harlem with his fellow band members, from that point his career sky-rocketed. Some of his records sculpted the jazz music we hear today hence why i consider him such an important aspect of this genre of music, these tracks include 'Mood Indigo' (1933), 'Sophisticated Lady' (1933) and 'Solitude' (1935). During the great depression in America, his record label let 90% of their artists go however he remained due to his raw talent. 

Louis Daniel Armstrong was born in 1901 on August 4th in New Orleans, one of the birth places of jazz music. He started his career as a trumpeter, singer and composer and occasionally got involved in acting. His career spanned five decades from 1920s to the 1970s and he eventually made it into the Rythmn and Blues Hall of Fame in 2017. He was very popular during his prime and was often referred to as 'Satchmo' or 'Satch'. In 1964 he won a Grammy award for best male vocal performance for his song 'Hello, Dolly'. Overall he was a huge icon in the jazz culture and i feel he helped me massively as he was an inspiration towards my project.

Jazz  first emerged in the black cultures of New Orleans from the mixed influences of ragtime (songs with a syncopated rhythm), blues, and the band music played at New Orleans funerals. The term jazz derives from a Creole word that means both African dance and copulation. Some will say that Jazz was born in 1895, when  Buddy Bolden  started his first band. Others will say 1917, when  Nick LaRocca  and his Original Dixieland Jazz Band recorded the first Jazz record, " Livery Stable Blues ." The most influential jazz artists of all time, according to the BBC, are Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong or Duke Ellington. The most successful Jazz orientated record labels are Early Bird Records and East Wind Music.  Jazz music is referred to as the most hybrid form of music and there are over 40 sub-genres. 

What are conventions of a magazine advert in the music industry?   • Name of artist – to create a distinguish of the particular artist easily and quickly   • Name of album – allows a direct search to be easier   • Main Image - Catches the audiences attention • Logo – easily recognisable to audiences   • Release Date- informs and creates anticipation • “Includes the single…” – well known single to broaden        audience   • Record Label Logo – informs the audience (Blumler & Katz, Uses and gratification theory is fulfilled)   • Artist and Label Websites – gives the audience a place to buy the artists work   • Social Media Links – provides the audience with a place to find out more and to talk about albums thus          creating    a wider potential audience   • QR Code – windows of exhibition for the audience to use   • Reviews – creates a heavier persuasion for one to buy an album

Magazine adverts are useful because they cause promotion. This is towards both the album advertised but also the artist in general – a direction towards their other platforms. Visual adverts allow people to see aspects such as a logo or face which helps people remember the advert to. Another benefit of magazine adverts is that it can act as a persuasion method towards audiences meaning they may well buy the album. The adverts also build hype and buzz because people note there is a new album coming out which they may be interested in, this may be particularly relevant to existing audiences. But moreover, adverts can attract new audiences too.

Laura Mulvey's theory of the male gaze, coined in 1975, explains how in the media women can be used for the viewers pleasure. Since our music video is heavily based around female characters we decided we wasn't going to fall into the trap of using the male gaze and and made sure no scenes were sexualised, all actors were dressed appropriately and there was no opportunity for women to be objectified.

Despite having many scenes where we used tripods to film, we also used a selection of hand held shots. This was because we were trying to create the impression that it was from Serine's POV. The story line shows Serine's character following her boyfriend round as he cheats with other girls, as a result to try and give the audience the idea it is from her perspective. Not using a tripod creates less stable and slightly jittery effect helping to look like its a point of view shot. All shots that seemed a bit shakey were intentional to make it more enjoyable for viewers as consecutive shots on a tripod could get boring.

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 u pload 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 u pload 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

After editing our music video we noticed some continuity errors which resulted in us having to re-film what we had already done. After a Wednesday media lesson i travelled back to Wood Green Shopping Mall to plan out what we had to re-film in order to get the highest mark possible. Having slight errors in the narrative can be destructive, despite the error being having different piece of clothing being worn in two different shots in the same location it is an opportunity to lose marks hence why it was important i went back to the filming location so i can accurately plan out what was going to be filmed when we re-visited as a group.

Each  candidate will evaluate and reflect on the creative process and their experience of it. The questions that must be addressed in the evaluation are: 1. In what ways does your media product 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 learned from your audience  feedback? 4. How  did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages? 

When researching Digipaks it was clear to see there was always more than 2 songs, therefore i needed to think of extra songs to make my digipak look authentic. I Put A Spell On You Magic Thats How I Feel Everything And Nothing Ruined Reckless Its Not Easy Cold I tried to think of names that could related to the theme of our original song 'I put a spell on you'. In jazz, romance is a common theme so i also tried to include possibly love-related song titles.

   Results of the poll we conducted base on the potential narratives we could of produced. The results show that women being put under a spell by another women is the most popular, as a result we tried to go ahead with this however a lack of female actors prevented this from being possible.

Here is the audience feedback we conducted after our music video was complete.

Below i have included research that shows the demographic of jazz listeners based on a recent survey in the America by Jazz Audience Initiative. From the research we can see jazz music is usually proffered by people with a high level of education, furthermore most jazz listeners are in full time work. 

During the music video i produced I decided to include a hidden message for the audience to try and uncover. During the scene of me walking with Ellie, she stops to look at wedding rings however the character i play continues walking on as he takes a phone call (possibly from his real girlfriend). The hidden message is in the fact that despite Ellie's character stopping to look at the jewellery she isn't  the one who ends up getting proposed to, it is his original girlfriend played by Serine. Adding this in the video creates an extra dimension and helps to transform this music video into a well thought out, complex narrative.

I felt it was essential to use the same theme for the advert and the digipak as it is a key factor is marketing for the audience to be able to recognise your product. The reoccurring yellow font is eye catching and contrasting from the black background found on both my digipak and advert making them look similar to each other. One example of a matching advert and album cover is Lana Del Rey's 'Born to Die'.  

In my music video there is a 50/50 split between the filters used, when the scene shows me talking to other girls there is a black and white effect used as it differentiates these scenes from the others giving the audience an idea something is wrong. The black and white theme also helps to make my music video like a real jazz music video as the mise-en-scene is more old fashioned.

Despite the genre of jazz booming in popularity in the 60s, 70s and 80s I still believe people will show an interest in today’s society. In my video I showed how younger people can relate to jazz and soul music through using a contemporary narrative relating to the lives of many young people, furthermore this combines older fashioned music with a storyline that many young people can relate to or find interesting. As a result the target audience is very broad as the genre may be appreciated by adults however the visuals are appealing for younger viewed (teenagers). My aim was to create a music video where the genre doesn’t limit the demographic who can enjoy, which was accomplished by using a stereotypical jazz themed opening and cut scenes with a modern looking narrative.

Finished Video

As my choice choice was a mix of the jazz/ soul genre i felt it was necessary to keep my digipak design in theme. When researching other jazz artists didgpaks the common theme was using darker colours as the background and using brighter colours more subtly. Due to the modern twist in my music video i decided to give my digipak a more vibrant appearance however not making it over the top, small yellow details and yellow font was all it took to separate my digipak from being dull from being eye catching and unique. I also followed the theme of having the artists in the centre, as the main focus. I used an editing software called Wondershare to adjust the colouration of the main image in addition to obtaining additional font which is not found on Microsoft Word aswell as distorting the image. Lastly, Wondershare helped me lay one image of a flower on top of another whilst changing the saturation of one to create a more sophisticated look. I also included a rose as it symbolises love howe

 

Colour theme: Black and Yellow. When researching i found that most classical, jazz and soul adverts have deeper colour palette, with the main colour being back or just slightly off black. As a result i specifically chose a dark theme for my advert. To contrast the darker colours, I included a vibrant yellow, this is to contrast the darker colours and make the advert stand out if it were in an actual magazine, furthermore the use of yellow connotes the modern twist in the narrative as vivid colours are often associated with more modern cultures. Main Image: I screen-shotted a clip from my music video (at 39 seconds in) for my advert. I noticed many jazz adverts have the artist who is being advertised performing as the main focus therefore i thought i would continue this trend into my advert. I used photoshop to adjust the saturation to make it look more old fashioned to further link with the old school style jazz/ soul theme. Despite making the image darker the yellow contrast pro

After further research into music adverts in magazines i learned it is a common theme to have the artists name in large font, asa result i adjusted the 'ANNIE LENNOX' to a slightly larger font than previous. In addition to adjusting the size, i also changed the font to 'lucida bright' as i felt is works better with the jazz theme.

When researching music magazine adverts a common theme was to have the artist as the main focus, as we can see below Beyonce, Lana Del Ray and Olly Murs are what immiedietly capture our eye when we look at them, so it is clear to see that including the artist will be conventional. Beyonce's advert is slightly different to the rest as it is uses a deeper colour palette whereas the other two are more vibrant. In addition i feel the colours used are based on genre and meaning of the music, for example Olly Murs' songs may have a brighter and more joyful theme where as Beyonce's are more meaningful. I like the idea of black and white when relating it to my project as it could link to jazz and soul music as it is often considered more old fashion tying with the black and white theme. I also noticed the artists names are very bold and take up a lot of space on the advert however there is also smaller writing below with further information about the artist/ music.  

Here is the magazine advert i created for the song we chose.

Marvin Gaye was an American jazz/ soul artists who helped to shape the sound of motown in the 1960s. During the 1970s he recorded the albums 'Whats Going On' and 'Lets Get It On' and became the first jazz artists in motown, as well as Stevie Wonder to break away from a production company. He was a solo artist however he had hits with Diana Ross, Mary Wells, Tami Terrell and Kim Weston.  His most successful song was undoubtably 'Sexual Healing' on his 'Midnight Love' album released in 1982. Another great piece of work created by Marvin Gaye was 'Inner City Blues', I especially like this due to the black and white theme. Researching fellow jazz artists will be beneficial as I'm starting to become more familiar with the genre and as my knowledge of jazz and soul music increases so will the quality of the ideas i have for my music video.

When deciding what music video to create we got stuck on deciding a genre, at the start of the year i wanted to make a video to a rap/ R&B song however i then learned these types of music video soften have very high budgets and as a result would be hard to recreate using minimal funds. Looking deeper into genre choices we realised many other groups are going with genres such as pop and indie so we felt like it was a good opportunity to be different and ambitious and go for a totally different genre, jazz.  

This is the pitch we presented in class to share our ideas and gain criticism.  

At the start of the year we had to present our current ideas to the class in return for ideas or constructive criticism, this process is helpful as we may be introduced to new ideas we may of not previously thought of. Despite the video not coming out in high quality we still found the audience feedback helpful.

Here is the feedback and questions we received after we showed the class our prelim. This process also prepares us for when we premiere our finished music video and we will need to take constructive criticism from the audience.

To successfully recreate Beyonce's '1+1' we had to make Serine look as close to the original video as possible. Therefore Ellie covered Serine in olive oil to give her a shiny effect similar to Beyonce. We also used additional high-key lighting.

For our preliminary task we had to recreate another existing music video. As we are not graded on this task we felt it was important to not spend too long trying to perfect it however we used the opporunity to learn some of the skills we would need for our real project. After around 20 minutes of researching music videos we decided to go with Beyonce '1+1'.

At the start of the school year we was told our annual task will be to produce a music video, as a result we created a preliminary music video as practice for the real thing. It took roughly half an hour to film which taught us an important lesson as 30 minutes of filming may only equate to 30 seconds of high quality footage. In this video we see Serine re-inacting Beyonce's music video '1+1'. When Ellie edited the video footage of our prelim it was quick an easy, however, the problems arose when we tried to match the footage to the lyrics/soundtrack. Nevertheless, after much perseverance I managed to match them as close as possible. I also had a few problems when it came to matching the "Picture in Picture" to our video footage, but now it starts ever so slightly before our footage of Serine, however, I feel as though this is justifiable we want them to be able to see what we are going to attempt to recreate.

As a group we are planning to film each separate scene on separate days as it allows us enough time to focus on capturing exactly what we want rather than rushing around trying to cram all filming into a short period of time.  Day 1. We are using Enfield Grammar School's main hall stage to recreate a scene from another Jazz artists video, Marvin Gaye. Furthermore we have arranged for a lighting specialist to help us create a high-key effect on Serine which contrasts from other jazz videos as they tend to be more relaxed and use softer tones.   Day 2. We are filing at Ellie's house where we can use her jacuzzi for a scene, we have set up additional decorative lighting as it helps to make the rise-en-scene look more romantic helping to provide the music video with more depth and helping to give viewers a clearer idea as to whats going on. Furthermore in many jazz videos alcohol is a common theme and therefore we felt here is the time to include some fake alcohol to give