Presentation Video

Greg and Chloe - Presentation from Chris Earl on Vimeo.

Evaulation Interview

Greg and Chloe's Evaluation Interview from Chris Earl on Vimeo.

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

      Media technologies were used throughout the course of the whole product, but as mentioned earlier there was a learning curve when it came to using some of the technologies. The majority of the research and evaluation stages mainly required the use of word document for writing out and planning the different blog entries and responses to the questions, and to map out how everything would look. When it came to research the internet became the most useful tool, as through the use of the bands own website and Youtube, it allowed me to gather all the research I required to start work on my own look for the band whilst staying true to the bands own look and style. Youtube was the most effective website when it came to gathering research on other music videos, and as I mainly used the bands back catalogue of music videos, Youtube was the only website that has these music videos, so it proved very useful in that respect. Google images also became something that was highly useful when researching the digi pack and the magazine advert. This applied more to the magazine advert, as a lot of the research for the digi pack came from actually looking through real digi packs, to get ideas for design and how it should look, and what kind of style it should take shape. But Google images proved very effective when looking at magazine adverts as it had multiple different examples for each different style of genre, so we knew which direction to take the advert in terms of a look that fitted and suited the band, as well as fitting with the bands image. Although this research showed most magazine adverts have very similar layouts and designs, with the only real difference being the visuals present on the advert. Microsoft Publisher, was something that became useful in the planning stage of the advert, as before using Adobe Photoshop to create the final text products, we used publisher as a way of mapping out and planning what we wanted, in particular the advert, to look like. The digi pack wasn’t planned out on this software as at this point I was still coming up for a hand drawn idea for the digi pack before that idea was replaced with a all photo digi pack. In the actual creation stages, the only two software’s that were mainly used was Adobe Premier Pro and Photoshop, both of which came with a slight learning curve for me personally, as I had very little experience in both, as I didn’t use them that much in my AS project. However once this curve was passed, both played the most effective part of the project, as without them, the video and the texts wouldn’t be up to such a quality standard, and I became quite fluent and confident in my skills at using these software’s. This came from countless hours at both software’s, changing, adding, tampering and constantly modifying both the video and texts, constantly adding more details and reducing same parts, and as mentioned, make some major and minor changes. One final thing that played an important part was the camera I used, which once again came with a very slight learning curve as it was a new camera, so required me going over it and learning the different functions on it and how to operate it properly. I was also a lot more hands on with the operating of the camera, as in AS we used my then partners own camera, so he did the majority of the camera work. One thing that was a letdown in terms of the technology used to film was the multiple tripods we used. Besides one we borrowed from Mr Earl, which actual worked, the other two we used either broke or were too unstable and kept falling over. Which resulted in the majority of the band footage to be shot by hand or using objects stacked up to capture full band shots if we were without a camera operator for a certain reason.

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Despite not receiving a whole lot of audience feedback, ones we did receive were generally positive. Many people believed it was an effective video and had the look and feel of a music video. One quote from my father, Ian Wilson, even said that it was “better than most of the ones on TV these days”. Feedback is difficult to report back on in the most part as despite receiving many hits, pretty much nobody left a comment about it, with most feedback occurring from word of mouth. One of the major feedbacks towards the video was that of the picture quality. Something that both my teacher Mr Earl, a friends of mine Charlotte Sullivan as well as a couple of other people pointed out about the video was that it looked slightly pixilated, which resulted in some segments of the video, in particular the band scenes, becoming very hard to make out. On Adobe Premier Pro the quality looked absolutely fine, but the difficulty was when converting it, it was difficult to try and find a format that converted it into a decent quality, this was mainly due to because the camera I used is an HD camera, so it automatically shoots footage in HD. Eventually after several different conversions, we found a format that worked well, and produced a decent standard quality video in terms of visual quality. Something else that helped improve the visuals was that we uploaded it to video website Vimeo, which is good at condensing down the format and making the quality even more improved. Something else that was benefitted from the audience feedback, was the pace of the video itself. Originally there was quite a slow pace to the cuts between each shot, with each one lasting 5 seconds or more at a time. But Mr Earl pointed out that it didn’t fit with the pace of the song, so instead when it came to filming more band shots, we filmed more than originally needed to, so we could produce a lot faster edits and reduced to each cut, in particular the band shots, making each one last 3 seconds at a time, sometimes a bit more and sometimes less. This resulted in the video being a lot better for it and it fit with the different genres of music associated with the band. Overall audience feedback was something that proved highly effective when creating the video, as without it the video wouldn’t be the same final product and it wouldn’t prove as effective.

2. 2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

1.       The video and the ancillary texts both fit together effectively. The colour scheme that was chosen for the band and its image was a red and black scheme, and it is theme we carried across all different aspects of the project. Before I even had the idea of the video, I had to come up with an image and a brand for the band, complete with a logo and colour scheme, and rather than create a new logo and given that I had permission for the band to use them in my project, I just used the bands old logo that they used to use. We then changed the colour on the logo, so it would fit with the red and black colour scheme that I chose to use. There were several reasons for choosing those two colours, with one of the reasons being to tie into with the horror connotations linked with the band. As mentioned before the band use a lot of references to horror and obscure B movies, so just like the video being heavily influenced by horror, I wanted to carry that across the whole project. Reds and blacks obviously being primary colours associated with horror, with the reds having connotations with blood and the blacks having connotations of night time, all typical conventions and themes linked to horror. Another reason was given that the band aren’t specific to a key genre, as they are influenced by so many, which comes across in their music, I thought red and black was suitable to fit with the varying genres, as they are both colours linked to rock, grunge, punk and metal music, all different genres that can be linked to the band. Originally I wanted some kind of skull and inverted cross symbol to go with the band given that they are typical iconography associated with the band themselves. However any ideas I created looked to serious to fit with the image of the band and decided to just leave that part out and just stick with the text I altered. The final thing I created for the branding was a production logo for our production team. The name I can up with was “Rory O Haras Suicide Productions” as it acts as a reference towards the band as it is taken from one of their song titles “I’ve Got Guest List To Rory O Haras Suicide”. The logo itself was something that Chloe created in the end, just a simple logo covered in red and with a slight fade affect put over it. Once again sticking to the typical scheme.The scheme of the ancillary texts, in particular the digi pack is something that is linked to the video. Both use similar themes, in that of colour scheme i.e. the red and blacks, and the affects used, which was a blurred and distorted affect. The affect served as a similar purpose for both products as a way of improving the quality of both the footage and the pictures used.  As both are from the same setting and place we used to film the band segments of the video, the affects disguised that the band were playing on a stage, whereas I just wanted them playing in black background area, just to make the video even more simple. The colour scheme is also used on the magazine advert as well, once again demonstrating that how they both texts and the product combine together.

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

1. Music videos in themselves are part of their own huge media empire, they can be anything from an advertising tool to a source of entertainment, with the premise that they are eye catching, remember able and really sell what the song (and sometimes the band) is all about. Which is why when it came to coming up with an idea for the music  video,  I wanted to create one which really captured the essence and nature of the band I was using, especially because it’s a band that’s a personal favourite of mine, so there was even more or personal incentive to do it justice . In order to do that I looked through all of Pulled Apart By Horses music videos to gain some ideas and quite a lot of my influence, for my very own.  The common theme with the band, and this was reflected in my research of their past music videos, is they use multiple references  to different horror movies, which is featured in things such as their song lyrics, song titles and of course their music videos. It was this aspect that I decided to use as a main focus, which in a way allowed me to play with my strengths, given that I worked on a horror film for my AS project, it was something that I had much experience and understanding of. The main movie that became a big influence for the video was “The Evil Dead” franchise, in particular the first two movies, “The Evil Dead” and “The Evil Dead 2”, because in these movies there is certain feature I wanted to use in my video, which was this supernatural force that is never shown on camera, with whenever this force being used in the film it was shown from a point of view shot, so the audience could see through the “vision” of this force but would never see it. This is what I used for my video, as the horror aspect, but to have a character being chased by it. I think this is something that challenges the usual codes and conventions of a music video as it is something that is so stripped back and simple, as it allowed us to use a horror aspect but without all the usual make up and costumes associated with horror, creating something that is imposing but simply done, and all it required was a simple effect over the footage to highlight that it was some kind of force that was chasing the character. The setting of the video is something I really wanted to be key with the video, because once again drawing back on influence from “The Evil Dead” and one of the bands past videos for single “Back To The F**k Yeah”, both were set in a very cliché woodland, one that is mainly compiled of trees without leaves, surrounded by fog and all the dead foliage on the ground. So the original premise was to have it set throughout a similar style woodland, however this proved to be too difficult and time restraining to do in the end, with the main issue being getting musical instruments to and from the woods, with the drum kit in particular being the main cause of issue as I don’t own one or knew anyone close enough that they would let me use it. Something else I had to factor in here was the fact that shooting took place from around October time to January, so if that had remained the location, weather would have most likely caused issues in terms of continuity mainly because that would have been winter time we filmed and snow fall and rain would have been a regular occurrence. The setting we ended up with in the end, in a way changed the forms and conventions of the video, especially from a horror point of view, as the setting of this whole suburban area, part woodland and building setting, is something that, although used as frequent horror settings, was changed in terms of the fact the video is set in broad daylight, obviously something that would be an intentional choice as the quality of the cameras we had at our disposal would have been really poor. But the broad daylight aspect of it gives  it a different take on the usual setting that a horror would take place. One aspect of the forms and conventions that the video does follow, is the fast paced editing used. Given that the band are a mix of bits of punk, hardcore, indie, grunge, classic rock and  many other similar styles of guitar driven music, the video required a fast paced edit in order to keep up with the speed of the song. Meaning that it required mainly short shots that constantly kept on jumping to the next one, with each one lasting roughly about 3 – 5 seconds, so there was this constant flow maintained, as if it was a very slow edit with lengthier shots, then it wouldn’t have the same drive or charisma, and wouldn’t fit with the style and genre (or in this case genres) of the band.  The overall point of the video was to make something that was to draw people in and make them want to watch it again, creating a sense of mysticism about the video, brought by the content of the video i.e. the unknown force. Something which has seemed missing in most recent music videos, rather than just being straight forward, we created something which adds a sense of mystery doubled with the fact it has an ending where it just abruptly ends, with no showing of what happened to the character and what was actually chasing him.