1. Evaluation Question 1
IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE,
DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND
CONVENTIONS OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

2. Music Video
The song that I chose was a cover version of the song 'Toxic' sung by Yael Naim,
(Originally sung by Britney Spears) who helped create a big influence to my music
video as her version of the song is so different to the original, My media products
depend greatly on its genre of Indie because the cover version was much slower
and portrayed more of an emotion with the lyrics, because in this version the lyrics
are quite depressive, so I decided to emphasise this with my actor.
As a result of that I decided to stick with the Indie folk genre to keep both the song
and music video closely linked together, Indie stand for individual, so I had the
goal of making sure I put my own individual twist into the video.
When comparing the cover version to the original song and the original video, the
cover version by Yael Naim shows more of the depth of the song lyrics that could
relate to the audience and my music video creates the story that the artist is
trapped in a toxic craze of love and pain but that she has a kind of twisted love for
it.
This relates to Goodwin's theory of 'particular music genres may have their own
music video style and iconography'

3. One main convention when it comes to music videos is the reliability factor and
I made sure that I presented this into my media product, by showing the artist
express a lot of emotions and tell a sort of hidden story that may not be understood
at first, in just 4 minutes.
Throughout my music video I used the typical conventional method of close-ups
because I wanted to keep the focus on the artists emotions and expressions
throughout the video and the song but aswell as showing off the artist themselves,
which relates back to Dyer’s theory of The Star Image he said that the star
image ‘is achieved by continued consumption of the star through his or her
products’. The artist’s image is the main thing that I was aiming for in my music
video, as Music videos are also called promotional videos so my main goal was to
sell the artist as well as the video.

4. One video that I used for examples of shot ideas was 'Blue Jeans' by Lana del
Rey which is also quite a slow depressive song like 'Toxic', in this video its
creates an emotion portrayed to the audience by showing close ups and extreme
close-ups of the artist face showing her emotions. This also influenced my idea
to make my music video entirely black and white as I thought that when in
colour the surroundings brought more attention to but when I turned one clip
black and white all the attention was then brought onto the characters face

5. The narrative in my video relates back to the lyrics and weirdness of the cover
version of the song, and for the narrative I based my video on a sort of storyline
that consisted of the star being trapped in what looks like her bedroom, as this is
typically portrayed as the place where heartbroken love stricken people go to cry
and let the pain out. I portrayed my artist/actor to be so hurt and in love that she
turns crazy and love the pain that is given. To enhance this I got my actor to let
out not only sad emotions but for her to smile and laugh to show the crazy part of
the character she was showing.
The movement of the camera is also an important convention that I included in
my music video, particular panning of the artist's body and location, I used this
especially to establish the setting of the bedroom, showing the audience that she
is only in one room, I did this to give the audience the idea that she is trapped in
her room because she is so hurt and crazy from love and heartbreak.
I believe my video also embodies the key feature of Andrew Goodwin’s theory that
there is a relationship between bother the lyrics and the music to the visuals. The
artist is also seen engaging the audience, either by simple miming to the camera
or just by using different close up shots, allowing the audience to connect with the
star.

6. Music videos normally contain a lot of cuts to keep the audience interested
especially fast cuts so after listening to my song I made notes on when I could
incorporate the cuts to the beat. There are a lot of fast beats within it that can be
edited to have lots of quick cuts put into them; by doing this it not only uses the
typical conventions but challenges them as instead of just going with the beats
at the end I used my editing skills to do this throughout my whole video.
I had to spend time counting the beats and finding shots that I could use that
would catch the audience’s attention and drawn them in even more. I got this
idea from not on listening to the song by from researching other music videos.
One video that caught my eye was 'Standing in the way of control' by Gossip.
This song is much different compared to mine however as it is much more fast
paced and contains a lot more fast beats.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opWBRRCTDXg

7. For the lighting and colour, my whole video is in black and white. I used my
resources to look at other black and white modern music videos to see how they
can still use noticeable lighting. So for this I concentrated the lights toward my
actors face to highlight her features and emotions as it is usually close-up shots
that are used to create an closeness with the viewer, and when lip synching is
involved that’s what sells the artist to the audience the most.
One example that I found that was similar to my idea was 'Broken Hearted girl'
by Beyoncé, as even though the video is black and white there is obvious extra
light used to enhance Beyoncé’s face, projecting her emotions towards the
audience and making her face the main attraction part of the video. This relates
back to Archer’s theory of studying music videos, he said that 'lighting and
colour are used to emphasis key features from the song'

8. Digipak
Based upon the research that I have done into Digipak I found out that most
Dipaks include images of the artist, or images that relate to the artists songs, I
wanted to use this convention when creating my Digipak.
For the front cover of the Digipak I wanted to have a striking photo that can be
noticed from a far and the audience can relate to by seeing the unique styling of the
artist and remembering it.
Other classic conventions used in Digipaks are things like a track lasting, barcode,
credit block, logos and if the font fits in well with the CD layout. I made sure to
incorporate all of these things into my Digipak to make it the best it can possibly
be.
For the back cover I included another striking image of the artist that even if the
Digipak is seen from the back an audience will still be able to recognise the artist
from the styling and individuality of the Digipak . As well as adding in the
conventions of a barcode, logos, websites and the all-important track listing on the
back cover. For the track listing the font is completely different to the font on the
front cover because the writing goes over the artist’s hair so needed a bright colour
to make the writing stand out, as well as relating to the bright colours inside the
Digipak.

9. I wanted again to include Dyer's theory of the star image. So on the inside of the
Digital I kept with the theme of the star image and made the whole of the inside
just images of the artist, these I believe I could have improved on but I still think
they are eye catching to the audience, as well as selling the artists face! For the
inside I made the pictures Bright and colourful, being completely different from the
front and back cover. I did this to create a sense of surprise to the audience and to
create a range of image types that are attractive to the audience.
For the font and style of the final digital I used two different types of text for the
front cover, one Stand out text for the artists name to attract the audience and a
more simple text for the title of the album. I used the colour of black for the artist’s
names text to stand out in front of the white background whereas for the album
name texts there is a hint of colour used in it to signify the hidden splashes of
colour used inside the digital. I positioned the Artists name at the top so it will be
the first thing that an audience would see.

10. Front Cover Back Cover

11. Inside Left Panel Inside Middle Panel

12. Outside Middle Cover Inside Right Panel

13. Magazine Advert
For the magazine advert I wanted to keep the digital and the advert consistent with one
another, so that an audience will see the magazine advert and be able to remember the
striking image and recognise the digital and the artist. Aswell as seeing that the magazine
advert was promoting a new album.
For the main image I wanted to use the same image to keep bother the magazine advert
and digital linked together, as well as making the image as big as the page to make it
stand out more, one challenge I found when creating the magazine advert was that the
image was cut off and I had no way of making the image bigger without cutting off main
parts of the artists body.
So instead I challenged the typical conventions and covered the cut off bit with writing to
distract audiences from that default and focus on the writing about the album.
Continuing on with the text, I use the same artist name text as I did for the digital lie
many other artists put on all of their albums like a kind of branding of the artist. Helping
the audience remember them more. By recognising their individual style. To attract an
audience I made the writing twice as big and filling up the top half of the A4 magazine
advert. One convention that I challenged and develop was the star ratings from popular
magazines. I included these to give the audience the knowledge and expectance of what
the digital would be like.

14. I made sure I did this by using the Digipak front cover image on the magazine
advert so that audience will recognise the artist and become familiar with their
own personal individual style.
This is why I also used only images of the artist for the magazine advert and
Digipak, so that an audience could recognise the star image straight away, aswell
as being able to recognise the unique style of that certain artist.
One thing that I had to change was the writing of the album name as it didn’t
show up in front of the dark background. So to make it stand out I made it
bright red so that audiences can see straight away which album it is.