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

Evaluation Question 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Evaluation Question 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

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

To begin with, my A2 Advanced Portfolio (A music video for Catfish and the Bottlemen's 'Cocoon') develops and challenges forms and conventions of real media products in a multitude of ways. As well as my main product, I also created a magazine advertisement and a digipak for my advanced portfolio, which was inspired by previous, real media products.

Firstly, for my music video for 'Cocoon', the genre that was intended for the video was an Indie/Rock genre. After analysing multiple indie band's music videos and Digipaks such as The 1975, Imagine Dragons and twentyonepilots. These videos and ancillaries contained many abstract themes to their work which categorised the videos into their respective genres. Because of this, I included these conventions into my music video, for example, while the character is travelling to his destination abstract themes are played in the background with effects to further reduce the level of reality that the music video has, making it seem more like a dream rather than an actual passage of events. It was important to add these conventions into my music video so that my target audience are able to identify it as an indie music video, which links with Steve Neale's theory that 'Genres are instances of repetition and difference', and also suggested that 'Difference is absolutely essential to the economy of genre'. Because of this,  a music video and what genre it is classified as is determined by 2 things: How much the media text conforms with a genres stereotypes and conventions and also how much a piece of media text subverts these stereotypes and conventions of the genre. My music video must have kept some of these conventions so that it can still be identified as an Indie video, but must subvert conventions enough so that it can be identified as a unique piece of media without been identified as a clone to another video. Therefore, because of this, I conformed to similar conventions from real media products such as the 1975 and applied them to my Advanced Portfolio so that my target audience, young people aged 18-25, could identify both my main and ancillary products conforming to the Indie genre. However, I also subverted from the indie genre by adding my own unique twists to my music video to give the audience a more entertaining video. Also, I subverted some conventions of the Indie genre, such as using a linear narrative rather than having a 100% abstract video. This made the music video have enough conventions to be classified as an indie music video but had enough differences to be classified as its own individual media text.

Furthermore, I also used audience feedback to help me to develop forms and conventions of real media products. For example, for my ancillary tasks, a Digipak and a magazine cover for the album, I asked multiple people of different ages and genres to analyse my media products and give criticism on how to improve them. Because of this, my ancillaries looked much more professional and conformed to conventions of the indie genre. An example of audience feedback was when I gave the people who were analysing my media text an image of my digipak, and gave criticism such as 'Looks too serious' which in turn made me change the digipak to give off a more abstract feel, such as maing the main image more blurred and faded. This feedback allowed me to make my ancillary tasks much easier to develop and conform to the conventions of the indie genre.

In conclusion, I believe that both my main and ancillary tasks for my Advanced Portfolio develop and conform to conventions of the indie genre, however I also believe that they subvert some conventions of the indie genre which I think is good, as otherwise these media texts would just be seen as clones rather than its own media text.

My Final Music Video

My Final Magazine Advertisement

My Final Digipak

Costume Ideas

MAIN CHARACTER

This is what I would like my main character to wear, as it signifies the costume of a British youth. I want my character to wear trendy clothes while not looking like an upper-class youth as he is supposed to signify the average boy of today's age.

SECONDARY CHARACTER

This is what I would like my secondary character to look like, as these items of clothing would signify a successful businessman, which is the character that I would like to portray in the music video well.

Progress on Digipak

After receiving my audience feedback, I have decided to change the front cover for my Digipak so that it suits the needs of my audience more. Firstly, I have changed the colour scheme from a black and white background to a soft blue due to the fact that I received comments that my Digipak looked more like an album for a rap group rather than an indie group. I have also edited my main image so that it looks more blurry giving an abstract vibe to the Digipak which I intend to do. As well as this, I also included the name of the band on the digipak as I also received a comment that the Digipak could look more professional if I included the name of the artist, otherwise the audience would be confused to whether 'DETERMINED' is the name of the album or the artists, so I included 'Catfish and the Bottlemen as well.

Audience Feedback- Magazine Advertisement

In order to have a better understanding of how my magazine advertisement looks, I gave out multiple sheets of paper with my magazine advertisement on (as seen below) and asked the people I surveyed to write a comment about the advert. Here they are below:

"I Like the colour Scheme and the purple fade."

"Looks too unprofessional"

"Too bland/ Not enough to it"

"The bevel where 'Artist Name' is looks professional and stylistic"

"I don't like the fact that the advertisement is only on a little square and the rest is blank"

After receiving these comments, I believe that it would be wise to change my magazine advertisement so that it suits the needs of my audience more.

Digipak Changes

I have made changes towards my Digipak, making the cover look less serious as I believed that it looked more like an cover for a rap album rather than a cover for an album for an indie/rock album. I have also blurred the main image so that the album looks more abstract. Furthermore, I added the record label logo and a barcode so that the album looks more genuine.

Audience Feedback- Digipak

I gave this image to a variety of person in order to discover the bad things about the digipak, and asked my audience the question "If you could change this digipak in any way, what would it be?". Some of the key responses are below:

Person 1:

'I believe that the digipak looks too serious to be a digipak for an indie band, maybe you should change the colour scheme to one that is more abstract'

Person 2:

'To me the digipak is too bland and empty, I think you should add some things such as an image of the record label and a barcode so that it looks more real'

Person 3:

'I think the digipak needs to look more abstract to conform with conventions'

Beginning My Digipak

I have began to start creating my Digipak for one of my ancillary products. As you can see I have gone for a monotone style for my Digipak, making it look more professional and serious.

Character Profiles

MAIN CHARACTER

17 Years of age. Tall. Will be the main character of the music video. Labelled as an ordinary teenager, however as the music video progresses we later learn another side to him, a Robin Hood-esque thief. 

VICTIM/VILLAIN

Slightly older than the main character. Will be the main victim of the main character. At the point of his mugging we believe for him to be a normal businessman, however slightly arrogant by the amount of money that the character could have gave compared to the amount that he did. Also holds an aire of mystique with the sunglasses.

TERTIARY CHARACTER

The 3rd and final character from the music video, this character acts as a thug for the businessman and beats up the main character towards him. Will be wearing something to disguise his appearance such as a mask and/or his hood up, masking his identity and giving the characters conventions of a criminal.

Images for my Magazine Advertisement

 Here are the photos that I took for my music advertisement. Firstly, I will be cropping out the people from the backgrounds and will be placing them behind the brick wall shown in the top-left hand corner of the blog post. I will also be adding some effects to these images to conform with conventions of the Indie genre.

Magazine Advertisement CHANGES

I have decided to change the layout of my magazine advertisement after receiving criticism from my audience feedback form. I received comments saying that the advert looked too unprofessional, therefore I have decided to change the layout completely. Here it is below.

Organisation of Actors

Before filming my music video, I made sure that both I and my actors were available for filming them. I did this by reminding them in person and also by keeping in touch over Facebook, as you can see below.

Progress on magazine Advert

I have made progress onto my ancillary product for my advanced portfolio. Here is my advert from a music magazine now:
I have yet to take images of the artists for my advertisement, however when they are taken they will be in the very centre of the magazine advertisement.

Starting my Music Video

I have begun work on my draft for my music video. At the minute, I only have a handful of shots good enough for it, however over time I will be reshooting and adding some more scenes to it.

Starting My Music Magazine Advert

I have started to create my music magazine advert for my ancillary product for my A2 production. At the time of making this post, the advert currently looks like this:

Creation of Record Company

I have created a record company logo to go on both my main product and both of my ancillary products, named 'HARDY RECORDS'. This is the logo:

Digipak Cover Draft

For my draft, I have obtained an image from flickr which has the Creative Commons license, meaning that I can use it for educational or personal use.

I have edited this image to create an abstract mood for my Digipak, and I have created 3 drafts which could be potential covers:

I have used this image solely for my draft, however when I am going to create my actual Digipak cover I will be going to the location itself to take the picture. I will also be conducting a survey as well to see which version of the draft is most popular.