A2 Music Video Evaluation

Rory Haczewski

A2 Media Studies

Question 1 – In what ways does your music video use,

develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

• My music video is very different to other music videos due to it’s dark nature and editing.

• The song that I chose for the video contains no lyrics, meaning no real narrative. This meant that I could explore many different ideas for the video, so that an audience could interpret any type of story from the images presented in the video.

• The equipment, the setting and also the software for editing that I used, allowed me to create a video entirely within one area, so no confusion was met with audiences about locations.

Question 1 - Continued

• Since there are no lyrics, the editing does cut to the beat of the song, and the transitions also support this.

• My video can be accessed freely on youtube and distributed onto other websites through its embed code.

• There appears to be a connection between the music and the visuals. Using Andrew Goodwin’s theory, the music being mostly a piano ensemble supports the dark nature in the video, but it also helps to establish a point that the females in seem to overpower the male and that the treatment of women in the video is very different, compared with normal music video conventions.

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

• The music video combined with the DVD Digipak and the magazine advert is effective in giving the impression that the music in these advertisements is how it is in the video itself.

• I researched other magazine adverts for CDS and bands/artists to gain ideas for the magazine advert, and I researched other Digipaks ideas for influences on construction of my own Digipak e.g famous Oasis Digipak.

• I followed magazine advert conventions in my own project, featuring titles, quotes taken from famous magazines, and a small description of features being advertised.

Question 2 - continued

• My ancillary products (Digipak and Magazine advert) tie in well with the music video, following the music video’s conventions well, using the same background of black which is featured mostly in the video.

• It allows the viewer of the video/consumer of the digipak and advert to observe a running theme throughout the artist’s work.

Question 3 – What did you learn from your audience feedback?

• I used two particular websites to establish an audience feedback system. These were youtube and surveymonkey. I used Facebook also to advertise the video, and the survey to everyone for potential responses.

• It was easier to gain a more analytical response from surveymonkey, as people who observed the video were able to respond to what they thought of specific elements of the video using the particular questions that I was able to ask, as opposed to youtube, where responses were based on their own opinion all in one form, so a more detailed response was easily obtained from surveymonkey.

Question 3 – continued

• With the youtube feedback aside, the survey allowed more specific responses to be made to particular questions about the video. Such answers involved making changes to the video, best parts and not so good parts, and if the video reminded my audience of any previously seen music videos.

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

• Many different websites, programs and general technologies were used in the making of the entire project.

• I made good use of blogger to display all my work, as the same with my AS magazine project.

• In order to fully research and eventually advertise my own music video, I observed the website youtube. I also used lastFm and VEVO to gain a wider perspective.

• In order to gain a copyright free track, my research led me to jamendo, which allowed me to get a much clearer idea of what genre and style of music I wanted to feature in my video.

Question 4 - continued

• During the project, I was given the chance to use newer camera technology and editing software. I used AVCHD cameras for high definition picture and firstly tried Adobe Premier CS4 but then moved on to different editing software known as Final Cut Pro.

• It was interesting to note that editing became much easier after using Final Cut Pro, as I had access to more features and it became much quicker to edit e.g transitions between scenes.

• My research and analysis of particular parts of my project were able to be easily represented in Powerpoint presentations.

Question 4 – still continued

• The Digipak and magazine advert were able to be created and edited through the use of Adobe Photoshop CS3, which is the same program used for the AS Magazine project. Using Photoshop again enabled me to keep my skills and develop them from the magazine project.

• All of these technologies I used allowed me to create a music video and its other elements, and also making my project unique and different to any other project.

• I learned how to use new and interesting technology and was able to channel this knowledge to good use.