post-modernism

Post modernism is the idea that nothing is new and we are just the same text as before. Making things which are old and emerging them together to make something new.

An example of a post-modernism, bringing different pieces and putting something together to make a post modernised text.

These text are all post-modenised, it is easy to spot a post modernised text because they are different, something that you have not seen before.

Ideology

I don't think women have been presented in a negative way through my music video, I actually feel that it has made women look even more courageous than what some people firstly think. One part of my music video is focusing on a girl who is skydiving. This is a different aspect on being brave; instead of something happening and then having to be brave, the girl has put herself in that situation where she has to be brave. This then could improve make the point of women being brave even stronger.

This music video also does not represent women in a sexual way, more music videos these days does represent people this way and it makes the men look more powerful. I don't like the way women seem to always be represented as the subject and that they never seem to have any importance. I have focused more on women in the music video and have put them into different views of light.

• A skydiver
• Main act
• Ringing mum

These are a range of ways that women have been represented and they all show different scenarios of being brave. Women can be stereotyped as not being brave; the ones that hide away and let the men face the fear. This is not true and I wanted to express that; changing the way women are perceived.

I decided not to leave this music video for just women, so I decided to add a scene of a male who was being brave. This scene of being brave was a man walking up a ladder but he was scared of heights, this man was brave because he walked up the ladder despite his fear. 

Audience feeback

After I had finished my music video I wanted to get some audience feedback of what they thought and what could be better.

Laura:
I enjoyed the video. I like the way that the video shows the different scenarios of people being brave. It makes it feel more personal and something that I can relate to. If I could suggest something to add, it would be to add some text onto the video.

Ian:
I thought the video it was good, I felt that it was interesting with the different stories. If i could make an improvement it would be to sort out a small section of the lip syncing.

Emma:
I liked the song, it was upbeat and something that easy to dance to. I would have chosen braver scenes though.

Rianna:
I really like the video, I like all of the different parts to it.

After getting this audience feedback it has helped me a lot, I can see some of the good points about the video and some of the things that I could improve on. Although the coursework has finished has it can't be changed it is good to reflect back on what I have done and see what could have made it better. The audience feedback has things which is good about the video and different things I could improve on.

From part of the improvement feedback was to sort out the lip syncing. This is something that I noticed that needed improving once I had finished the video. I think some of it was down to the video sometimes lagging. I am happy to take on board any comments and to work on them for the next time, I do something like this.

Music Video

This is my music video; I now feel that it is finished. I am happy about making this video because I have never done anything like this and I had not done media before. Something that was difficult was editing; this did take some time to understand but once I got the hand of it, I was happy. I know that while doing this music video, I struggled to stick to an idea. This did then cause me to struggle nearer the end. I do feel that the idea I have used it much better than some of the other ideas. Having a story board helped me very much and I now feel from that, it helped me get my filming and editing done much quicker, If I had to do this again, I would make sure I had a plan set in stone and I had made a storyboard. I know that there are some improvements and changes that could be made if I did it again, but I am happy with the progress I made and the final outcome.

Magazine poster

Here is my magazine poster for my music video; I have added a bit of color in it, but i have kept the main attention to he person and the name. I looked at different poster and they didn't seem to have too much information on and they all stuck to the key information. This is what I tried to do.

DIGI PACK

Thursday, 23 January 2014

DIGI PACK

 

Here is my digi pack; for the song 'Brave'. To do this digi pack, I used a website called Pic monkey. I found this website great to use because you could edit the picture very easily and in many different ways. I would definetely use this website again when editing any pictures. I decided to use a couple of pictures because I didn't want to fill the CD with them all. I then decided to go for a galaxy theme; which I think works very well.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

This is my main product:

These are my ancillary tasks:

DIGI PACK

POSTER

By having the ancillary tasks with the main task it feels more personal. You are bringing everything together to represent the overall package once each aspect is connected to the other. I feel that the video was effective, but once I added the tasks I felt that it became a united collection and that ithe combination worked well together. Every task enhanced the image of my coursework. I do not feel that the music video would have been as effective if I did not have the ancillary tasks.

The pictures in my Ancillary tasks don't represent being Brave. The reason for this is because that there are other songs in the album and I wanted to have a neutral poster and DIGI pack, which portrayed this.

I find that it is important for my tasks to be effective because people would not be interested in any of them. Each task has to be effective in it's own way. A Poster must catch the eye of somebody to be effective because you cannot hear this music and you cannot really get to know the artist. This is why the poster is not too effective on its own. The DIGI pack also needs to be effective; something eye catching is important because how else are you going to get people looking? I have a lot of colour on my DIGI pack and I feel for this reason, many people would have a look it and would find it appealing to the eye. This is effective combined but not very effective on it's own. Although it more effective than the poster. The music video is he key parts, it is bringing everything together and it is the highlight of the whole album. People are going to buy that album because of the video.

After asking people what they thought of how effective I got these results:

• I my opinion I believed that the task would work well together if they stayed together on their own, as they would be other be placed together for them all to see the effects of it becoming an advantage.
• I don't think that they are very effective because they don't represent being brave on the Ancillary tasks
• I think being effective is something to strive for

After getting this feedback I now know what other people think about the effectiveness of the tasks. I got some feedback saying that the tasks don't work well together with the song Brave. 

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, research and planning and evaluation stages?

Media Technologies I used

The different technologies that I used were Blogger, Pic Monkey, Final cut pro and the Apple Mac. These all had a different role to play in my course work and they all helped to make my coursework the way it is.

Blogger:
Every time I changed something about my coursework or wanted to add something to my work, I would upload it to Blogger. Blogger is a great way to bring all my work together and present it in a way that I want to. I had used blogger for AS so it was familiar to me. The downside with Blogger is that I cannot always lay it out how I want to, and this is something that I am not too happy about. I think the coursework is important because you should be able to present it in your own way and you can not do this with your layout on Blogger. Although you change the theme of your blog; this does make it more personal.

Pic Monkey:
I think Pic Monkey is great, it is simple and easy to use and you can edit any photo you like through easy steps. I did start to use other ways to edit photo's but I did not find them easy to use and I was struggling. I wanted something that was simple and that could give good results without all of the hassle of worrying which button to press. I would definitely use Pin Monkey again and I would highly recommend it.

Final cut pro:
For my music video I used Final Cut Pro to edit. There are different types of editing versions, but I stuck to Final Cut Pro because it was on the Mac. I did find Final Cut Pro difficult to use at first because there is so much that you can do with it. In my media group I did have people who had used Final Cut Pro before and they showed me how to use it. Once I had been shown how to use it, I started to see how good this application was and see how far I could develop my work. I would use final Cut Pro again if I did a task like this in the future.

Apple Mac:
Using a Mac is very different to any windows laptop or computer, so this did make it difficult at first. I did use it a lot during my coursework, and I became very fond of it. The Mac can be very technical and it does take a while to get the hand of it; so you will need to sit down and get to understand it. From using the Mac's at school I would very much like to get one now.

Construction and Research

The different research methods that I used for my coursework was Google, YouTube, Blogger. How I constructed my coursework was by using a camera and tripod and YouTube Down loader and Final Cut Pro.

YouTube:
When I was first given my coursework task, I knew that what I was going to do was look onto YouTube. This was so that I could find out what other people had done and develop my own ideas. Looking at YouTube helped a lot and it made me realise that any idea I had was fine to use because there were so many. When I started to research I looked at media music videos and professionals; I did this so that I could compare them and see what the difference was between them, and see what I could do to improve mine and see what I could change.

Google:
I used the web and Images on Google. If I wanted to search anything, I would go to Google. Google is very easy to use and I had used it many times before I did my coursework; this is why I did not have any problems with it. It was very easy to get pictures from Google to my Blog as well. I used Google for my ancillary tasks when researching what I needed to do.

Blogger:
When I was putting my coursework together I had a look at previous blogs to get inspiration from them. I felt that seeing other people ideas and views helps me make mine or stick to mine. Also seeing how others have put their blogs together is something that I was interested in.

How I constructed my coursework:

Camera and Tripod
To actually get my filming up onto the Mac's, I used a camera and a tripod. The camera's were very easy to use and I did not have any problems with them. The tripod was also very easy to use, I liked it because I could adjust the way I wanted to. When getting the footage of the camera it was very simple; all you had to do was plug it in. The only problem was that the Mac did not always read the camera and you had to keep switching it off and on.













YouTube Down Loader
Once I had finished my music video, I had to upload it onto my blog through YouTube. I started of by uploading it onto YouTube and then downloaded. I found that the down loader was very easy to use and was quick. If I had to upload anything again I would use YouTube Down Loader.

Final Cut Pro:
To actually put my coursework together I used Final Cut Pro. I found that it was easy to upload footage and that the editing of the footage was not too hard after practice. It was very accurate with the editing and I found that I could get very good results from it. When uploading my footage, it was quick. Although I did struggle to know how to do it at first because I did not think it was very simple. This is something that now I know will be quicker, but you have to learn a lot about it before you can get the best out of Final Cut Pro.

Planning

When starting my course work I started to think of ideas. Once I had my ideas, I decided to put together a story board. I made my storyboard through drawing pictures and writing on my lyrics sheet. I wrote time onto my story board so that I knew when I was editing what I needed to do. This then made my editing easier because I knew what I wanted to do and it took less time faffing about. Once I had my ideas, I then uploaded them onto Blogger, this was so that everything form research to planning was all there and in the same place.

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

What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

The reason that my work is the way it is now, is because I had feedback from people and I found out what they thought was good and what they thought was bad. I was happy to listen to all feedback and try and incorporate it into my work.

I was struggling with my music video during the earl stages, as what I was putting up was not very good. I did not have a definite answer and this did confuse me a lot when putting ideas together. When getting my feedback I asked questions to see what they audience thought; the reason I did this was so that I got a second opinion.

I asked questions such as:
What did you think of the video?
Write down one bad and one good point
What would you change?
Do you think the video represents being 'brave' well?

The feedback that I did get back what helpful in knowing how to improve it and which way to go about it. Some of the answers that I got from this were:

What did you think of the video?

• It was good
• I liked it, but there was a lot in there
• I think it looked really good, I like how there are different sections to the video

Write down one good point and one bad point:

• I thought the song was good, but I did not understand the Brave part too much from the video
• The way the video has been out together is better and the lip syncing is slightly out
• Editing was good, was not sure about the song

What would you change?

• Nothing, it is your video and the way you have interpreted it
• I would not put as many stories as being brave in, maybe one or two
• I would choose a different song

Do you think the video presents being 'brave' well?

• It was slightly difficult at first but, once I knew it was good
• Yes
• Yes, but I would have changed the different types of Brave's

After getting this feedback from my video, I knew what I needed to improve. I did realise once I had uploaded it. Instead of changing it, I wanted it to be something that I could improve on. Something that I know next time, I will pay more attention to and try and get it spot on. From this feedback, I can also see that some people did not get the connection from the song signing about being brave to the different types of film.

From this I have learnt that having a second opinion is paramount to knowing how good your work is. If you worked on it yourself and never showed anyone till the end, there will be things that you have missed and there would be some issues. Because I had a lot of people look at my work and comment on it; I feel that it suite my target audience a lot more than what it may have done before. This is why I like to get feedback before I say that I am finished.

For my poster I did not get much feedback, and this has been a negative part to what I have done. I did show people once I had finished it, and I did get positive replies. Since I did not go and get proper feedback, I may have now put myself at a disadvantage. 

For my DIGI pack I got feedback while I was making it and after I had finished. I got feedback from people which said that they liked the galaxy theme and that it worked well with the whole theme. Also I feedback saying that they wanted to see pictures of the artist in it. All of these points helped me improve my work and help me change parts of it. 

The good thing about audience feedback is that it is not biased. Everyone has different opinions and this makes it good for getting feedback. The only problem is that you won't always make something that everyone likes. There will always be someone that would say, to improve this you could... I am very happy with  the feedback and I have learnt that gathering as much as you can is important and trying to make the best out of it.

Magazine posters

These are some music poster; they are all different and all of the songs that they are representing are different. To start off the music poster at the top is by Sara Bareilles; this is the artist which I have done my music video on. This poster works well together; using light tones and bring different images together. I like the idea of putting the city on the piano. To me this represents Sara playing her music to the city and sharing all she knows with everyone. With having the light blue tone and the moon; this to me represents that everyone is calm and happy and are living together nicely. I really think that this poster has more meaning to it, when you look closer. I also think that this poster can be represented in so many different ways that it suits many people's needs.

 The next music poster is by Miley Cyrus. Miley is known for her slightly outrageous music videos and this is what makes her 'different'. I now believe that Miley is now such an iconic symbol that there is not much need to put much onto the poster.You know that this is true because on this poster, Miley's name is not mentioned. I like this poster because the picture answers the song name. It is like Miley is shouting out, that she cannot stop what she is doing and she is expressing that to you, with all that she has. I really like this poster. I think the close up on this works very well and it says a lot about this person.

 Lastly this poster is by Bastille. Bastille's music poster is very calm. The colour's that are used are subtle and it gives a chance for other parts of the magazine poster to stand out. The masthead 'BASTILLE' is very large and stands out so that everyone knows who it is. The next big thing is the concert date. I think that this magazine works well together and I also like the layering of the posters.

Looking back from AS magazines to music poster for A2

After looking at my first magazine poster and then to to my AS piece and now, I can see a lot of difference. I do feel that my AS poster looks better because I had a long time on that piece and I concentrated a lot on that.

Here is my first magazine; school magazine:

Considering this was my first magazine, I was happy with the outcome. I can see that I used a lot of colour and it did stand out a lot. From looking at this from AS and then using it to improve for my final AS piece I felt that there was a lot of improvement.
















Final AS magazine Poster:

I was very happy with this magazine and I felt I had improved so much from the last time. I stuck to have a magazine which had an artist on the front. This then shows who the magazine is about. I was very happy with this magazine.















My music poster for A2:

This magazine is very simple; I have kept it to having just useful information. I have the name of the artist 'AMY COLLINS', the name of the song 'BRAVE' and dates 'TOUR DATES FOR 2015 COMING SOON'. These will be what the audience what to see. The artist, song name and when it is in concert.

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

Albumn covers

For my Ancillary tasks, I am going to take some shots of the main person, Sarah. I am not going to go for a 'busy' CD cover because I think that it can look a lot better when there are little parts. Although because my song is called 'Brave', I want to have something on the cover which shows this. Here are some examples of covers that inspire me and which have some ideas that I may like to try to see if it works.

This is the actual album cover from Sara Bareilles, who sang the song 'Brave'.

I like this cover because it is simple and doesn't have too much going on; I like the way that the word 'BRAVE' have been enlarged so that it stands out to the audience.

The colour scheme is also very subtle; the main colours are black, white and brown; from the hair. I feel that covers look better when they have about 2-3 colours.



Here are some other album covers that I also like and would be a good idea to use:

 I like this Back cover because again it hasn't got too much going on; the main attraction is the girl on the front which draws the reader in. The song names are smaller and don't bring that much attraction to the page.








I like this cover because there are only a few colours being used, this album cover is nice and simple and it has been made from a different genre. I like this cover because it is different; you can see what effects has been used and it is good to see that this person was not afraid to try something different.

This is another cover that I also like; the difference with this cover to the Sara Bareilles one is that the name is enlarged and that is what is being stood out to the audience. Where as the Sara Bareilles one has the album name standing out. The colour scheme in this album cover is blue , and white. This is good because blue is a bright colour which stands out to the audience and makes them want to see it. The act; Lana Del Rey is the is stood right in the middle, underneath the mast head. This one is one of my favourite album covers.