Q4 - How did you use media technologies in construction and research, planning and evaluation

BethNewton

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I didn't know how to use Photoshop when I first started this project, I'd never used it before so had to ask my friend how to even begin. My friend taught me how to import images, to resize a picture, how t overlay them, add text and use colour correction. Everything else was a course of trial and error on how to use it.

For my CD cover I wanted to use an image that had me looking away. Because the idea for my artist was to be more interested in selling the music than the artist. I chose two images of me looking away, one was taken in the summer and the other was taken in the winter. I overlapped the two images making one of them more transparent creating a wistful style of image. I added text to my image, the artist name and the album title. I used a similar font to what I used for the website. Then I created a shadow effect for the text by creating a duplicate layer. I chose to use a white font because it stood out against the darker background.

The back cover of my CD pack has an image of a sunset on the back to link my CD pack to my video. I added text to show a list of tracks that are on the album. Because I wanted to use a white font again I had to create a shadow effect so you could still see the text. I then added a barcode onto the image which I made online. I then added a production company address to the corner of  the Cd pack.

For the insert booklet I used images of lights, something that is a convention of the indie folk genre. I added lyrics to create the insert booklet because I wanted to add lyrics because it would tell the 'stories' that my artist wanted to tell.

I used Wix to create my website, using a simple template the website offered before I started editing it. I used images of nature like I had used with my video and my CD pack. I added stickers from the website to make things look hand drawn to create a personal idea between the artist and their followers. I then used the blog feature on Wix to be able to create a blog from my artist to their followers. I think Wix is a good platform, the templates it offers make it simple for you to produce an effective and professional looking website with very little complications. However, I find it to be limiting in that the templates it offers only allow you to do certain things.

Through my research and planning, I have used a range of different programs and websites. Some of which I really took to and others I didn't. One I used frequently was Canva. I found this to be very useful, it allowed me to make posters, presentations and infographics. I found it very easy to use and very simple to customise and change. This was an effective tool and helped me make my research and planning more effective. Another program I enjoyed using was Sway. I found this program worked really for making a textual analysis because it allowed me to gather screen grabs from different videos and add text whilst keeping all the information together. It was very simple to use and worked for what I wanted to use it for.

A program I really didn't like was Prezi. I hated using Prezi. I found it really complicated and really slow. The website crashed several times when I was using it. I found the circles it offers you to add text to be too small making it inconvenient for adding text because you have to have more than one circle on a particular topic when you only needed one. It's also really complicated to try and add more slides when it really didn't need to be. Also, whilst I'm writing this, the Prezi app is only for viewing Prezis. As someone who does a lot of work on my iPad, I found this really annoying because the website doesn't allow you to access it via a tablet. Sway and Canva both have apps where you can edit and create media simply. Prezi doesn't.

Q3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback

Q3 by Beth Newton

Q2 - How effective is the combination of your media product and ancillary texts.

Q1 -In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products

Final Website

HIRAETH - official site

After the last update on my website i decided there were a lot of changes I wanted to make to my website.

Final Website by Beth Newton

Final Production

Final CD Pack

Finishing my CD pack I put it into a CD case to make it look professional and to see how it looked all together

I think the front cover and the back cover both work well to create the look of a professional CD pack. They are similar colours, the fonts match and are clearly linked. 

I added a barcode and a production company location to the back cover of my Cd pack to make it looked more professional. 

The insert booklet for my CD pack contains four double page spreads of the lyrics which go with the tracks listed on the back of the CD. Each page has a picture of lights, whether that be fairy lights, a star projector or blurred lights from the fair. This is one of the conventions of the indie folk genre so this worked to link the CD pack to the genre.

Website draft

website by Beth Newton

HIRAETH OFFICIAL

Editing The video

I wasn't very confident with using Premier-pro when I first started editing my music video. I'd done a little bit of editing on my thriller last year and had edited my practice video but I didn't feel as though I was overly confident.

Looking at my shot list and listening to the song, I noted where the pacing changed slightly and what sort of things I could. For example, when the guitar part picks up in the second verse and the last chorus I made some shots shorter than others with some quicker cuts. I asked a friend of mine to look over my editing and she suggested that I varied the length of the shots. This was quite difficult to fit with the music because for a lot of it the pace of the music remained the same. So I chose clips carefully that I thought still fitted together and cut them together to make the pacing work and change the length of clips.

I wasn't very confident in editing at first but learning through trial and error and I feel I've gotten a lot more confident with it as I've gotten closer to finishing my video. I feel I've become more confident in working out which shots should follow each other to make the video flow. Some of the ones I had in my shot list didn't work when it came to editing them together.

I've used fades between the clips to create the idea of memories fading like it suggests in the song 'they always fade out so soon'. I've also used a lens flare effect on the some of the clips. There was some footage where I had achieved a natural lens flare without needing the effect but there were some I chose to use it on. I've also used effects of colours moving across the clip to give it the dream style I wanted.

CD package First Draft

YouTube| Case Study

YOUTUBE by Beth Newton

Marketing and Promotion

Music videos, CD covers/artwork and websites play a large role in the marketing and promotion of the artist and their music:

The music video shows the artist and allows another viewpoint of the song used. The artist can be shown in several different lights dependent on the video and the song. The CD covers and artwork can have another style to promote the artist, the artwork can link to the album or can be completely different. The cover can either focus on selling the artist or the music. The website can link everything together, tying the music video and the artwork together and giving a bigger picture of the artist.

Originally music videos were just the artist being filmed singing, they then progressed to further sell and promote the artist. Early music videos were recording of live performances before they moved onto being like mini-films, used for entertainment as well as promotion.

In the 1960's, there was an increase in having people TVs in their household, this meant more people were watching TV meaning more content was needed to be made. The original purpose of having 'music videos' was to sell the records. The 1970's saw a start in artists recording videos to go specifically with the song. These videos could be produced as video equipment became portable and the video was produced to sell records.

MTV was launched in the 1980's, a whole channel dedicated to music videos. MTV needed music videos to be made for content and artists suddenly couldn't go without a video. Videos became bigger and artists spent more on them. Hard disk editing came around in the late 80's/early 90's making video editing easier. Videos would eventually be taken off MTV to make way for the new videos that were being produced. This meant that if people wanted to watch the videos again, they would have to buy them on VHS or DVD if they wanted to watch them (Pre-YouTube)

The 2000's saw the continued expansion and experimentation of form. There was a rise in auteur directors and the music video started to become as memorable as the song. There was a rise in the amount of hardware and the hardware was becoming cheaper making videos easier to produce.

The invention of YouTube meant that videos could be shown online constantly. The music video can be shown online forever rather than disappearing after being shown on TV. The videos we see today are still to promote the artist, but they can also have other purposes such as raising awareness of a charity the artist is associated with, promoting a film or to just give the viewer a different opinion on what the song is about.

An example of music videos giving completely different views into what a song is about is when YouTuber, Gabbie Hanna, released her first single 'Out Loud' in 2017. Hanna first released the song allowing people to believe it was about a break-up, she then performed it live at a YouTube event and everyone then believed it to be about her mental illness. When the music video was released it showed a woman mourning her boyfriend who had died. Although this wasn't the true meaning behind the song for Hanna, she said on her Vlog channel that she wanted to give different perspectives to the song and wanted everyone to be able to relate to it rather than allowing it to be about one thing.

Walking On Cars - Speeding Cars Textual Analysis

Ideas for my CD Pack

For my CD pack there will be a front and back cover with a booklet. I want the booklet to contain song lyrics and the back cover will have the track listing of the album.

For the front cover, I don't want to have the face of the artist because I believe with the type of artist I'm working with they would be more focused about the music. In using the artist's face it suggests your also selling the artist as opposed the music. I think the album would be along the same theme to the music video, have a theme of nostalgia with subtle washes out of colour and feature out of focus lights.

I've looked at various CD covers that are of the similar indie/indie folk genre to the song I've chosen.

The album covers from Kodaline are all quite different. Coming Up For Air showed the faces of the band but they were distorted and overlapped creating a ghost like effect. The previous album In A Perfect World had a scenery picture as the CD cover rather than using the artist. For the I Wouldn't Be EP the cover had a picture of a house, the songs on the EP are very nostalgia driven. Each album has similar font for both the album title and the band name. 

  The artist that originally sang the song I have chosen is called Passenger. Looking at his last few albums, none of them show the artist's face but are in some way related to the title of the album. Whispers and whispers II are the most popular albums by Passenger with their CD covers have a direct link to each other. Showing two children whispering on the first and two older people whispering on the later album. The actual CD for Whispers showed simply the album title and the name of the artist.
the boy who cried wolf was once again a very simple approach. The music for this album had a more relaxed feel to it than the music from the previous albums Young As The Morning Old As The Sea, Whispers and Whispers II. I think this shows them trying to sell the music more than the artist.

 For Jamie Lawson's album 'The Pull Of The Moon' he used the ides of old style film and developing with the blur and overlapping of colours. The album cover shows a butterfly pulling the moon. Jamie Lawson's other albums 'Jamie Lawson' and 'Happy Accidents' have simple front covers. 'Jamie Lawson' has a simple nature outline that has an orange coloured overlay. 'Happy Accidents' has a blue and yellow cover with a picture of Lawson as a child on the front.

Everything This Way was the debut album by Walking On Cars and the grey scale background with coloured balloons fitted with the slightly dark songs on the album. The indie folk/indie rock style of the album had some dark tracks but there were positive elements woven thorough out, moments of happiness expressed in the coloured balloons,.











Looking at the different albums from the artists I listen to, I think the cover will have a washed out look on the front with brighter colours on the back to contrast it. For the booklet, I think I want to do something with the idea of blurred/out of focus lights. I've chosen the track list for the album and there is a mix of happier songs and more emotional or dark ones and I think the contrast of light and dark through the album cover will relate to that as well as the website.

James Lees - music video director

James Lees first started off in theatre but chose to start making films. His first short film went on to win several awards at the European Film Academy Awards. He has made several short films and made one of the top ten documentaries made for Channel 4. As Well as Short films and documentaries, Lees has directed music videos and tv adverts for Converse and the BBC. In directing music videos, Lees has worked with many different artists, working especially close with British singer/songwriter Passenger.

Music Videos 




When We Were Young - Passenger
Lees has directed several videos by Passenger. 'When We Were young' was first released in 2016 and has almost six million views on YouTube. The video has a very simple precise, a group of older people sat in the pub together, talking, looking through photos and watching videos. The video has a very nostalgic feel to it flowing the song's theme of looking back at the past and realising how quick the time goes. The colours of the video are quiet dark as the video seems to use natural lighting through a window in the pub. The lights colours and the dark colours contrast each other well to show the difference between being sad about the past and looking forward to the future.

Scare Away The Dark - Passenger
Another video by Passenger which Lees directed was 'Scare Away The Dark'. The song talks about how we as society have become obsessed with computers, phones social media and technology and have ultimately turned into bitter and judgmental people. The video starts with Passenger being wheeled into a very dull looking office. Lees creates the idea that the people in the office are all bored of their monotonous lives and that they're all stuck. As the video progresses, nature starts to take over the office. Water runs out of a picture of a boat, leaves fall out of a cupboard, vines grow out of the printer and rabbits surround Passenger as he sings. As the people in the office realise what they've been doing wrong, the scene changes to being outdoors. For the exterior, Lees creates a brightly coloured woodland area, a happier looking place to the one the people had previously been in. The bright colours of the outside directly contrast the dull colours of the office. Lees successfully shows the meaning of the song through the video, showing how important it is to walk away from the technology and the media sometimes.

Fight Song - Rachel Platten
Released in 2015, 'Fight Song' shows Platten as she struggles to progress with her music career. The music video shows her struggling to write new music and get people to listen to her. As the video progresses, Lees shows Platten decide to just do things for herself, the video shows her going to the coast, meeting new people and standing around a campfire. Lees creates a warm feel to the music video, using natural lighting, creating a warm glow over the artist and the others in the video.



Counting Stars - One Republic
In 2013, Lees directed the video for One Republic's 'Counting Stars'. The video showed the band performing whilst above them there was some kind of prayer meeting/preecher. the video is full of quick cuts from the group, the preecher and a crocodile that seems to be moving closer. As the song progresses, the beat picks up and it becomes more dramatic. This is shown in the video as the lights with the band seem to flicker more and there are close ups of everyone shouting and singing loudly. Lees brings the video to a close as one man falls through the floor to land before the group, suddenly all the music and the shouting stops.



27 - Passenger
Very different from the other videos Lees has directed for Passenger, 27 is brightly coloured and is filed with tracking shots, following the artist as he's walking along and people keep trying to talk to him. Lees relates the characters in the videos to the song lyrics. When the lyrics say 'a week brushing my teeth and a week getting my hair cut' the video shows a dentist and a hairdresser trying to speak to the artist. Another example is when the strings are played during the bridge the camera pans to show a string quartet playing. This video is very different to the other videos that Lees has directed for Passenger. When We Were Young took a very naturalistic approach whilst Scare Away The Dark didn't use the artist as a focus point, instead having him appear every now and then as the focus was on the workers in the office. The video for 27 focuses on the artist talking about the last twenty seven years of  his life, showing him meet the devil, the people who want him to just write songs that will get into the charts, confront all the cigarettes he's smoked

Website Draft

Film Contributor Release Form

For one scene in my music video a friend of mine is present so she signed this form giving her consent to appearing in the video .

What needs to be filmed

So far I've about half of my video filmed. Left to be filmed is part of the second verse and part of the final chorus. Scenes I need to film are 

• Carrying a box of photographs 
• looking through photographs
• photographs on lights 
• scenes with writing
• lip sync
• photo albums 
• blanket
• every day activities

My artist - who I have created and their audience

For the artist I have created I wanted to create someone who produced similar music to what I listened to. The style of music I listen to is usually acoustic, indie folk/indie music. With this I think my artist would have a certain 'edge' or 'style'. For example looking at other artists such as Passenger, Kodaline and Lucy Spraggan...

The art for the albums (screenshots from my spotify) are all quite dark, the colours have quite an earthy feel or there are lots of blacks and greys used. For the album package I'm going to create I want to go with this idea of 'edgy'. The songs of the albums are very narrative based or have a clear message of experience which I aim to follow in style for my own.

When I did my practice piece for my artist and music video I created a band called Hiraerth. I've decided to keep the name of the artist as Hiraeth but I've changed it from a band to a solo artist.

Spotify

CD Package Analysis

Website and Album Analysis - Lucy Spraggan

Textual Analysis- Dear You, Lucy Spraggan