How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?
How the digi-pack and advert use the appropriate conventions in terms of style and layout. Firstly our digi-pack follows the traditional format of a real digi-pack, it is made of 6 panels each of which are the correct length and width. We have divided each one, and using our plans have incorporated ideas, from each into our final design. Half of our design is upside down this is so that when printed and folded it will be correct. We have also laid out the digi-pack in the correct manner, with the CD cover In the right hand bottom corner etc... A main convention of a digi-pack that we have followed is the band/ artist name included on the front cover of the digi-pack. We have used the same font throughout both our digi-pack and advert to follow a consistent theme and keep it to a professional standard. The main color of our digi-pack is black and this is the reason we have chosen to use a white font for the text to create a stark contrast between them. The stye of our digi-pack is quite dark- which follows the atmosphere/ mood of our music video that we have created which is why there is a link between them. We have used the three block colors on the front cover, as this contrasts with the lack of color within our video. The colors used (green, red and blue) are primary colors which are quite basic. The back cover and the top left hand corner panel are similar in style, both black with white writing placed on-top. The back cover lists the songs on the album which is another convention of a digi-pack. Almost every digi-pack should include a image of the band/ artist which is why we have added a image of the band Keane, however we have applied various editing techniques to this picture to make it stand out and follow the layout/ theme that we are trying to create. We have also added a picture from our video into the digi-pack as this is also a convention that would be used in real media products. The actual design of CD is suppose to be an eye, however after editing the picture it seems to be slightly abstract- we decided to keep this because it looks effective and again fits into the theme of our song in that the protagonists goes through a series of events in one day that would trigger a variety of emotions. We have chose an eye to represent these emotions because many emotions can be conveyed through the use of the eye. Our advert follows the same theme as our digi-pack, however the layout is different as this follows as set of different conventions. We have kept our advert simple, this is so that it is not overcrowded and the audience is not overloaded with information. The band name is dipalyed in large font at the top of the advert ti immediately draw attention to the poster- again we have used white on black to create a contrast. Another convention we have followed is the use of an image, this is an image we have taken from our video and edited in photoshop, affecting the color and design of the image. We have also added a review from NME, after researching real adverts we saw that this convention was always used. In addition to this we have added the release data however challenged this convention slightly by writing ‘OUT NOW’ instead. Finally we have added the record label and a small image of their logo as this is where they are usually displayed on real adverts. together the digi-pack and the advert work well together and convey a positive image/ message about the band. They work effectively well together along with the video.
Our three media products all share a similar scheme of colour and images to create a solid band identity, one that is easily recognisable and will therefore help to sell music commercially, with consumers able to relate between the advert/music video and album, leading to a purchase. The music video sets the precedence for our products, by enforcing a theme of dreary dullness. This is emphasised with a high contrast, lack of colour (apart from certain concentrations) and heavy shadows. The high contrast is also employed in the magazine advert and digipak. In the advert, the protagonist is displayed, although almost totally white due to the use of exposure/contrast. The same can be said for the digipak, where the front cover uses three different contrasts of silhouettes, the inside front has a very high contrast image of the band, and the back uses an almost identical filter to the music video. The lack of colour is also used in both products, using only a series of coloured blocks in each (both identical for sub-conscious recognition by the consumer). All of these features combine to create a dull, dreary theme that relates directly to the music. It is also very relevant to the theme of the real-life band Keane, which is also insipid, using carefully rationed splashes of colour to keep the audience looking at specific things, although the real band are much more abstract, often favouring abstract drawings and senseless combinations of colours and shapes.
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real music videos?
The Style of the Video: A very dull and dreary style is enforced throughout the music video, which goes hand in hand with the theme of the music. This style is enforced through the use of other filming elements, which create a dreary overtone and slow pace. At no point does the pace rise, which keeps the style consistent throughout and matches the music. Having a style that harmonises with the song is probably the most common convention of music videos. The style we chose very much relates to the style used in other Keane videos. For example, comparing it with 'Bedshaped' reveals the same dull and dreary negativity, except it is far more abstract in it's narrative. Our video challenges the conventions of Keane music videos in this aspect, as it has a solid narrative that is made obvious through constant character development. Setting and Location: This building was specifically chosen for the 'office-monkey-esque' aura it emits, allowing us to use it as a tool for character development. The idea of shattering normality is a common feature of music videos. A good example would be pendulum's 'Slam' in which a deceivingly average suit-clothed worker strips off his shirt and dances wildly to the song. Other locations were also chosen for the purpose of character development, such as the messy bedroom which is used to introduce the audience to the average lifestyle of the protagonist.
Costumes and Props: Props was an important part of setting the scene at the beginning of our music video, we used a variety of different props and set the mise- en- scene carefully in order to convey the characters personality/ lifestyle and allow the audience to make their first assumptions about this character. As the video goes on the protagonist further develops and the audience becomes aware the he is a sloppy, careless character. We used the mug on the floor, the full bin, clothes on the floor and the plate with leftover food to portray this. We have challenged Keane’s usual use of props as in their music video ‘Everybody’s changing’ there is a limited use of props and the main props used are the music instruments. The video follows an abstract narrative and therefore the props used have no particular meaning to the audience. We chose to dress our protagonist in a suit to represent the type of job he does for a living and the location of his workplace. We used a purple tie as this colour represents his emotions/ feelings perfectly. He is not happy with his life, and is on the verge of depression. We dressed the ‘mugger’ in dark clothing and more importantly a hooded jacket as this is a generic stereotype of this type of person and allows the audience to recognize this immediately. Music videos usually dress their characters according to the narrative and performance of the video, therefore we have followed this convention.
Camerawork: In our music video we have used a variety of different shots, including; tracking shots, high angle shots, low angle shots and medium to long shots. Here are some example to illustrate this. Including a variety of shots has allowed us to be creative in the making of our video. At the beginning of the video we have used 4 close-up shots showing items within his room, to convey his personality and illustrate his lifestyle. We have also used an ariel shot when he is laying in bed to show the lack of emotions in his face ad how this relates to the shots previously (lifestyle). When lip syncing has been used we have used close-up and extreme close-up shots, so that the focus is on the characters face/ mouth. For the chorus of the song, we have used a tracking shot which allowed us to change the background as planned. Filming this part was the hardest as we had to use the same shot roughly 15 times changing the location. It was also important that we started the tracking shot from the same distance each time to make it look consistent and professional. We have followed the convention of using a variety of different shots each time to convey a different mood/ setting. As the beat of our song is quite slow, we didn’t need to use as many shots as a normal upbeat music video would use. Finally we have set the length of each clip, to fit in with the beat of the song as well as keep the video flowing and keeping the audience entertained. An example would be at the start of our video we have used four, one second shots. Although these shots are important, they are not required to be any longer otherwise the audience would get bored.
Editing: We have used editing consistently throughout our video, from previous research we know that the shots that include lip- syncing must be edited in time with the music so that the lip syncing looks consistent and looks professional. We have used lip syncing in various shots within our video, and have successfully edited in time with the music. It was difficult to do this as we decided to change some of the timings that we originally agreed on, this meant that parts of the lip syncing was out of sync. As well as this we have used slow motion twice in our video, when the spoon is falling and when the character gets pushed over.
Special Effects/Techniques: One of the main aspects of our music video is the changing effect of the background. We had the protagonist continuously walking during the chorus, but the background was changing to different locations each time. We used this technique to relate to the theme of the song, and to break up the chorus from the verse. To make this technique effective and successful, we had to ensure we used a variety of locations, including a forest, alleyway, street etc. When filming each shot, it was important that each one was at the same angle and distance, to make it look professional and to show the effect of just the background changing. During the editing of these clips, we cut each shot to the beat of the song so they changed in time with the music. This kind of effect isn't usually used in music videos, so we decided to add it, as we thought it made are video more original; and wanted to challenge the typical conventions. Keane's music video's are usually quite abstract, which I feel we captured in our video, but we didn't focus so much on performance, which Keane did in the official video for 'Everybody's Changing'.
We didn't really use any special effects in our music video, as this would have been quite difficult and we wanted to focus on the narrative of our music video. However, we did use a filter on the clips to make the colouring slightly darker, which added to the mood and atmosphere of our video. This successfully reflected the emotions of the male protagonist, to make the audience more intrigued. This special effect we used develops the typical forms and conventions of Keane's music videos, because they are usually quite dark and sombre, and not bright and colourful. This shot shows how we altered the saturation to create a black and white effect, to emphasise the tedious atmosphere.
Performance Performance is one of the main conventions that is used in music videos. To develop this convention, we decided to incorporate this into our music video. We didn't continuously use performance throughout the entire video, as we didn't want to distract the audience from the narrative and storyline. As a group we thought it would be best to have the character lip syncing to the song, rather than another person portraying the artist; because we wanted to have the protagonist tell the story so the audience could relate to it more. To be creative with the performance of our music video, we incorporated the lip syncing into the plot, so the character was carrying on with their everyday tasks, drink a cup of coffee for example which can be seen in the shot below, whilst still lip syncing to the song. Performance makes up a very large proportion of music videos and is nearly always used throughout a song, in order to promote the artist. Keane often rely on performance in their music videos, as this can be seen in the videos for 'Perfect Symmetry' and 'Somewhere Only We Know', so as a group we decided to be original and challenge this convention, whilst still capturing the element of Keane's music videos.
How Does The Video Suggest The Music Genre of The Track? From our research into Keane, we found that their genre of music is classified as alternative rock, and tends to quite mellow as they use a piano as the lead instrument. 'Everybodys Changing' isn't particularly upbeat so to reflect this we made the character quite depressed and emotionless, by having them show no expression and using a black and white costume. The beat and style of the song is fairly abstract, and our video suggests this as we used the background changing effect and slow motion. Both of these elements aren't that common in music videos, so by including them, it shows the abstract and alternative aspect to the song.
How Does Your Video Reflect Research Done Into The Style Of The Artist's Other Videos? From our research into Keane, we found that their genre of music is classified as alternative rock, and tends to be mellow as they normally use a piano as the lead instrument. Some of Keanes music videos are quite abstract, in particular 'Bedshaped' and 'Is It Any Wonder?'. We found that the video for 'Bedshaped' helped us to scope our idea, because the video follows a narrative and tells a story, but it doesnt it in an unconventional way, as seen below, which is want we wanted to achieve. We feel that our video reflects this, because the narrative can be clearly identified by the audience, and we incorporated creative techniques such as slow motion, and the background changing effect to make it more abstract. From our research into Keane, we found that they use some sort of performance in every music video (to the best of our knowledge). This helped us to decide that we should develop this convention, and reflect the style of Keane, by using performance in our music video as well. However we just used a singular character to do the lip syncing and performance, rather than an actual band performing.
Another part of the ancillary task was to create a magazine advert for our music video, that captured the idea and meaning behind our video. We had to complete research to find out what the conventions of a magazine album advert are.
- name of artist - name of album/digipak - release date - images of the artist - images from the music video - artists website - MySpace address - relevant visual images - reviews - record label - music store logo (eg. HMV)
I have decided to analyze another magazine advert as this will help with our research and help us when creating our magazine advert. This is a advert for the ‘The Best Of The Vines’. Firstly the advert is made using a white background and has many images placed on-top, the images added looks effective as they have been made using a bright green color which contrasts against the white background. Secondly the name of the artist/ band has been included, the name has been incorporated into one of the green image, it blends in well and looks as if it is part of the image. the advert is quite abstract, however this may well be the theme of this particular band/ artist, for their fans this theme may be immediately recognizable. Another convention of a magazine advert advertising a CD is the date of which the CD is released, however in this case ‘OUT NOW’ has been added as the CD has already been released. Some basic information about what is included on the CD has also been added to allow the audience to make a decision on whether they want the CD or not. ‘Plus exclusive bonus track, 4EVA’ has been included this is to persuade the audience and allow them to think they are getting something for free. Finally information about how the audience can purchase the CD is included and a small logo of the band/ artists record label has been added right at then end.
This specific Gorillaz magazine advert is used to advertise their tour, and encompasses many common conventions of adverts. Firstly, the band is visible, and not just the physical band but also the animated one (although the music is real, the band is imaginary). The name of the band in its classic colour scheme in font is visible and provides a point of instant recognition for long-time fans. Information concerning the concert is written in a clear font, black against a white background. This technique is not aesthetically pleasing, but it is more functional and efficient, and is prevalent in the majority of music advertisements. Two website addresses are visible, one for band information and one for ticket purchase. In the last few years this idea of online exposure has become very popular, and is evident in most if not all music adverts. A convention that has not been included that is very common in music adverts is a logo of their record label. However this is most probably because the advert is for a concert and not an album. Finally, a convention that has become less common over recent years but is evident within this advert is the promotional offer, providing the opportunity to enter a competition through a website and win tickets. This provides network traffic for the website in question, along with increasing interest in the concert.
I have to chose to analyse a magazine advert, advertising Gwen Stefani’s new album. Firstly the background of the advert follows the convention of ‘images of the artist’ . The image that has been used as the background is actually a larger image of the picture that is used on her album cover. Effects have been added to the image to make it stand out and look effective. Using the picture from the album is a good way to advertise the because when people see the album in the shops it will be immediately recognisable and will stand out against the others. Secondly all the colours used within the advert- coordinate together. They work well together and look professional. The colours have been chosen carefully so that the text placed onto of the images does not distract focus away from the image. Also there isn’t one colour that stands out, they all blend in together. Another convention that has been used in the magazine advert is, the artists name, this is obviously so that we can identify the artist of the album. Although there is a picture of her, some people may be unaware of her appearance, there for is important to add the name. The font style used on the text works nicely with the images used on the page, a girly- posh font has been used, obviously as this would attract and be suitable for the target audience of the album. Another convention that has been used is a small image of the album, so that people know what the album looks like. When people go to buy the album they will already know what they are looking for. The image has been added in the bottom left hand corner of the advert. The album name has also been added underneath the artist name, and finally some smaller information has been added at the bottom of the page for example the record label and her website where more information would be available.
After creating our digipak, that’s consists of six squares we decided that we would analyse two each. We created each part of the digipak in Photoshop. This is the CD: Firstly we decided that the majority of the didgipak would have a black background. We decided that we would make the CD into an eye; we chose to do this because of the many close-ups of the characters eye/ face in the music video. The song we choose is quite slow and storyline of our music video illustrates the main character experiencing a terrible day, many emotions can be conveyed through the use of the eye. To create the eye, we searched ‘eye’ into Google and found an image that we thought would work best. We then cut around the coloured bit of the image and placed this onto the black background. The problem was, once we had cut out the white bit and around the eye, it didn’t really look like an eye anymore, it looked more like a hole. We tried a few different experiments and found that adding different colour affects and filters worked really nicely. We played around with the colour and as a group decided that the blue worked really well and looked effective on the black background.
The second part I am analysing is the back cover of the digipak, Again we decided to use a black background to stay consistent and to a professional standard. When we researched the conventions of a digipak, we found out that the track list is usually printed on the back cover. We made up eight different song titles and listed these flowing downwards in a logical order. We wanted to keep the back cover simple and not over crowd it, so we thought that just sticking to listing the songs would be enough as we didn’t want to confuse the audience by adding other text. We used white text on top of the black background to create a contrast between the two colours and make it stand out effectively. To finish we simply found a picture of a barcode and added this in the left hand corner, as this was another convention that we had researched.
By Rebecca Gomes
On one of the inside covers of our digipak, we included the song lyrics to Everybodys Changing. We decided to use this because it is a typical convention of digipaks. We used the white text and black background to continue the theme throughout the digipak.
This is a still image taken from our music video, when Daniel is mugged and pushed over. We chose to use this because it is a dramatic image, and reflects the meaning of our music video. We edited the image using Photoshop, to make it slightly more abstract and effective.
When we had finished creating our digipak, we uploaded it to our blog. We then decided that we would analyze 2 parts of the digipak each. The front of the digipak: We used the black background to be consistent with the rest of our digipak and make it look professional. the reason we chose to use the three colors (red, green, blue) to symbolize the theme of changing that is present throughout the song (also relevant is the different levels of thickness). We used the same technique with the three men in different shades of grey. Finally we added the name of the title and artist name in white to create a stark contrast between the background and the text in order for it to stand out and be eye catching.
The reverse front of the digipak: To create this image we first downloaded an actual picture of the band from the internet. We then split it into 3 layers, the background, the skin and the clothing. The background was changed to pure white, to contrast directly against the silhouettes of the band. The skin was changed to grey, symbolizing lifelessness and negativity. Finally the clothing was saturated to make it more colorful, emphasizing the desaturated skin of the band members.
After we had done the research into digipaks, we could begin the planning process. We each designed our own digipak for the artist of our music video, Keane. We used the template to create our digipak. We had to ensure that we use all the conventions of digipaks, while still using images to reflect our music video.
- name of the artist/band - name of the album - track listing - artists website and MySpace address - the record label and logo - record labels website - images of the artist - other relevant images - price - barcode - song lyrics - reviews on the album(usually from newspapers and magazines) - album credits(including editors, writers, producers, directors, recorders) - year of production
