Personal view on our group...

What did I struggle on?

I struggled at first with the timings. The lip syncing especially, this was very hard as we put this footage in last due to all the re-filming we had to do. This meant that when it came to putting footage in we had to move a few of the other clips around to fit them in correctly and make sure they are perfect. 

What skills I learn?

I learnt skills that i will most likely use a lot later in life as i want to be involved in Media somehow in the future. Some of these skills include: the

- Speed play; 

- Reversing clips; 

- Cutting clips shorter; 

- Making clips longer; 

- Split screens; 

- Using markers; 

- Lots of different short cuts

- Video transitions 

- Effects 

And much more 


How I felt our group worked together?

Throughout the production process, personally i feel that our group worked very well together and communicated with each other like mature and responsible adults. At first we didn't really know each other and i feel that we had a very professional relationship more than a personal friendship although i like to think that working together has made us become friends and i am very pleased with the way our products turned out. Overall i feel that we got everything done efficiently and mostly on time. We did struggle with timings a bit with the magazine advert and album cover but in the end we managed to pull it together and we finished it and in my view it looks amazing! A big well done to the people that had that role and a big well done to the editors  and everyone that was involved in our filming. Everyone had an equal role and everyone helped in every way possible which helped us to get to the high standard we are at now. 

My Roles...

Role as a Cheerleader:
As a cheerleding within the music video i had a lot of fun. As a cheerleader we usually have certain groups within a team. However my team were unable to take part in this filming so we had to improvise. Emily, the other cheerleader, who is usually a base, had to become a flyer. That was the first time she had flown in cheerleading and I think that she was very very good at it. Our back-spot and front spot were also first timers and I had to teach them what to do. All things considered I think that that group worked very well together and I had an enjoyable time teaching and performing the skills we did.
Role as a Dancer:
This role was more embarrassing that others, I had to dress in a leotard and shorts which made me look silly and I felt silly performing all those dance moves. However, due to me being a cheerleading I am use to dancing in front of people which helped me a little to overcome the embarrassment slightly. As I was meant to look funny while performing this I was allowed to laugh and make funny facial expressions, which helped me when filming as I didn’t have to worry about acting serious as well as dancing while wearing clothes I was uncomfortable in.
Role in a Duo Dance:

This was very awkward at first as my partner was shy and didn’t know what he was doing. Billy, my partner wasn’t a very good dancer, so I had to help him a little. Traditionally the male is meant to lead the female but in this situation, the female lead the male and made it look like he was the one leading, which was very difficult. We were asked to dance together and spin and do what we call the romantic drop. He spun me around and I lent back and we stared at each other. This was very funny and we tried very hard not to laugh while performing.

Problems that occured when editing:
We found that using the speed play made our frames shorter and this had an effect the amount of footage we had. This meant when I came it the end of our footage we still had lots of space on our timeline. Therefore we had to go out and re-film some footage and come up with new ideas. However, after using the programme for a while, i got use to all the icons and learnt shortcuts that sped up the editing process. My favourite pat of Final Cut Express was using the speed play. Watching the footage over at different speeds was funny and made the editing part of the production process a lot more enjoyable. 

Personal feelings:
Editing was probably the most difficult task i had to face. This role required a lot of time and work. It also involved some skill. I had previously gone through different editing exercises like Tom Jones, Pink panther, Piliminary sequence ect... to help me out. These exercises helped me to speed the process up as i learnt how to use markers, which helped me to position frames onto the time line correctly. 

Final Magazine Advert

Final Digipak

It's Finished :D

WE FINISHED OUR MUSIC VIDEO!!
This video was a challenge at first, we found that we didn't have enough footage to start with and had to go back a do some more filming. Another problem that occurred was that the singers footage was too dark, looking at the Rough Cuts you can see that we have changed the lip syncing footage and change the location of the footage as well. This new location gave more natural lighting and really highlights the singers face and actions, it also makes the overall video look more professional and realistic.

While filming we found that the camera was left recording and this played to our advantage and we used this footage in high speed to match the rest of the video and gave a more realistic effect to the narrative of our music video. Another section that wasn't planned but a moment of pure silliness, was that of the swivel chair. Our actors thought it to be funny to play with a swivel chair they had found and finding this funny we thought it would be a good idea to film this and found the idea amusing. Personally i was very amused and felt it would be a good idea to put this in our video. So we did.

Tricky parts that had an effect on the timings of the video production was the lip sync and the stop motion. We had to make sure that it was precise and accurate to ensure the professionalism of the video. The lip sync was one of the last bits of footage we placed on the time line while editing as we had the trouble of having to re-film it. This created problems in parts as we found that there wasn't enough space in areas to add this footage in. This meant we had to cut other frames of footage on our time line to make it fit. As this took u most of our time we got ever stressed toward the end and struggled to finish the video in the time giving. However, saying this we managed to get it complete and finalised the video in time and we are very pleased with the final product.

Our Final Music Video Product - FAMOUS

Here you can see that we have finally finished our Music video.

Evaluation - Question 4

Sasha Thompson - Q4: How did you use new media technology in the research, planning, construction and evaluation stage?

In the production of this music video we used a number of different aspects to complete our overall product. Using the cameras and tripod was easy after a demonstration and short lesson, which helped me to learn the different ways of holing the camera to create different shots and angles. The technology I found most difficult to use was the editing, However, using these techniques and effects on this programme appeared to be less problematic that last year, as we found the technology to be a great deal easier to use. We had been through different editing exercises to help us get use to the program and have a smother process when it came to the editing of our music video. Tom Jones was one of the first video we used. This exersie helped us with the lip syncing mostly and we gained a new skill for when it came to creating our music video. Some of the other editing exercises we used to help us include: the 'pink panther' exercise and 'Key Framing' exercise. This exercise helped us with timings.  We learnt to use markers which would make the changes in the frame more snappy and on time with the music. We used these a lot when editing our video and saved us a lot of time. Another technique we learnt to use on the program included an exercise that zoomed in and out on certain picture at a certain time. Although we only used this once on a picture of our actor in a banana suit and on the word 'Famous' we zoomed in on his face. However, although we didn't use this exercise much, it still came in handy when editing our video. 

There was a lot of planning involved in the first stages to setting up for our first lot of filming. We first had to think of what actors to use for certain characters within our film and once we had done that we needed to make sure that they were all available on the same day and that they knew exactly what they needed to bring. We used a combination of different equipment belonging to both the school and ourselves. The borrowed equipment from the school, meaning the camera didn't have the same quality as the cameras we had brought in ourselves. When footage was put onto the editing station it created a gray discoloured effect which we didn't want within our music video. This resulted in the footage being faulty. Therefore we had to make more arrangements for the footage to be re-filmed using a high quality camera. These extra sessions took up a lot of time for both our group and the actors involved. This had a negative effect on the re-filming as there was evidence of annoyance in everyone as the initial 'hype' of the filming had worn off.

Despite this, the only major technological issue faced was that with the lighting. Although the cameras were correctly white balanced because of the different cameras used the lighting on one was not the same for another, meaning that if we needed two cameras for one shot the lighting would most likely be off on one of the cameras. After this the editing process came next, which was to be conducted on Apple’s Final Cut Express. We found once knowledge was obtain of how to achieve certain effects the retaining of such was an easy process. For example, once we learnt how to achieve increased speed on our music video we could repeat the effect.

After the footage had all been added to 'Final Cut Express' and editing in the way we wanted it to be, we came across a major problem. We had run out of footage to put on our video. We couldn't use anymore repetitions of acts or frames as that wouldn't get us the higher marks and people would just get bored of watching the video. As a result we had to come up with more ideas to add to our video. This is when the stop motion came into play. As a result of re-filming we were unable to get all the actors in on such short notice and had to work with who and what we had. This turned out to be less problematic than originally thought. As well as doing stop motion with the actors we thought of the idea to do stop motion with words to link in with the lyrics "We all want to be Famous". This turned out to be a big success and the audience feedback was very positive. When it came to creating our promotional aspects of the product we used certain programs that allowed us to make our digi pack and magazine advert look more professional and it was quick and easy to learn how to use. Photoshop helped us create these products to help promote our music video and if we were putting this video on the market then I feel that it would have a big chance in becoming a high selling and high viewing video to a wider ranged audience.

The site blogger has allowed our production team to exhibit our work. We found to be a rather simple task, as the website was easy to use. We also found that YouTube was a good website to use. We used this site to upload our rough cuts of our music video when pasted these on Facebook, the social site that almost everyone uses. This gave us even more audience feedback and from this we were able to change anything that needed changing. Another audience feedback device we used include a questionnaire. These were very helpful and helped us make a final decision on what we would put into our music video. 

For the evaluation it was thought to be a good idea to have a little website that showed all our work and this seemed to be successful as well. All this technology has helped us along the way to creating our Music video along with all the promotional aspects to promote the video. I have learn so many new techniques and gained so much knowledge and experience creating this product, and had so much fun in the process. Media had defiantly helped me gain new experiences and also educated me at the same time.

My webiste will also show my evaluation. View and be amazed: http://www.wix.com/smartiepantsproducti/evaluation-test#!question-4

Sasha Thompson

Evaluation - Question 3

Sasha Thompson - Q3: What have you learned from your audience feedback? 

Our target audience was aimed at the teenagers that enjoyed comedy. The age gap was between 13 to about 20. As teenagers are the largest age group that go to cinemas and watch the most amount of TV, we thought that it would be a good idea to make our target audience a large audience. Elements that we incorporated into our music video include the element of comedic effect, we thought that this would appeal to our target audience as that's what would appeal to us as a group. We are hoping to have a large viewing audience that want to watch our film (Pull audience) and not an audience that are force to watch it (Push audience).

To appeal to our audience we had to make sure all the conventions of comedy were present in our video. We had to make sure our camera movements/frames were correct, also costume and Mise-en-scene was important. You can't have a comedy without the wired and wonderful costumes. Our costumes were defiantly wired. We had Clowns; Baby's; Army Cadets; Michael Jackson and many more. All these costumes contributed to our music video and made it appeal more to the viewing audience.

Our audience feedback was one of the most important aspects to creating our music video. When we received our first piece of audience feedback, we used the information and changed bits within our video. Our first piece of audience feedback was when we created our Pitch. This pitch was full of the ideas that our group had come up with to have in our music video. Here is some of the clips that were talked about in our Pitch:

Most people thought that the idea of the auditions being made funny was a good idea along with the high speed of the music video. However we thought of an idea that we would make people pose in cardboard cut-outs of different people like Audrey Hepburn or James Dean, and we also thought that a girl could pose as a boy and a boy to pose as a girl. People thought that this wasn’t a very good idea and would just look rather odd as they are something that involves standing still. We took this into consideration and decided it would be a good Idea not to go ahead with that.

When receiving my audience feedback it all mostly said the same thing. Everyone liked the idea of auditions and having the film at high speed as it gave it a more comical effect. They were also very intrigued by our use of props. We had a cardboard cut-out of our logo and on the other side a picture drawn of a TV. They thought this to be cleaver as it makes a visual match with the idea that ‘Everybody wants to be on TV’. The idea of having our logo on the other side was to promote our brand and also created a nice idea to flip the cardboard in high speed and again create more interesting footage for our viewing audience.

Other products that we created to promote our music video also had some audience feedback, one type of feedback we used was just within our group. We looked at everything and pointed out what we liked and what we thought needed changing. We all had a fair amount of input when it can to our video, editing and our promotional products like the Digi pack and the magazine advert. When we created these we wanted them to match our video style. We wanted them to be colourful and stand out in the shop. The colours we chose were bright and aluminous colours like pink and orange and blue and yellow, these colours worked well in attracting audiences  When receiving feedback from others on these, they said they liked the idea of the bright colours and it attracted them to look at the covers to see what it was all about.  Our magazine advert was a little tricky to create. We had to get a picture of the band and place it on the magazine advert to promote our artists just like Andrew Goodwin's 6 point analysis tells you that it creates a good product and more audiences by promoting the artist within the product. The picture was taken in front of a green screen which allowed us to play with the pictures background and create whatever we wanted to go there. The font was also something we had trouble with. We had to use lots of different fonts before we found the one we thought looked the best. 

I feel our music video would have a fighting chance out on the market and grab the attention of the audience. As our magazine advert and Digi pack are so colourful and stand out people would be drawn to the product and want to know more. Our music video is very funny and energetic all the way through and I feel that our target audience would love this type of genre within a music video.

View my website: http://www.wix.com/smartiepantsproducti/evaluation-test#!question-3

Sasha Thompson

Evaluation - Question 2

Sasha Thompson - Q2: How effective is the combination of our main product and the ancillary texts?

The artists image is all promoted through the use of BRANDING. The importance of the main product is shown through-out, highlighting the artist as the singer. The branding of our logo is emphasised within our Music Video. The logo promotes our production company as is easy and simple to remember. SmartiePants Productions logo involves a pair of shorts that have Smarties on them. 

Through-out the production making stage we did come across a few problems that moved us a step behind other production groups. When filming we had problems with the actors and the equipment. Actors turned up late or with missing items of their costumes and considering we provided most of the costumes, they didn't have much responsibility and they still didn't managed to do as they were politely asked, we were very put out by the behaviour of them. Another problem that occurred was at the editing stage of the production process. We found that we didn't have enough footage to start with and had to go back a do some more filming. Another problem that occurred was that the singers footage was too dark, looking at the Rough Cuts you can see that we have changed the lip syncing footage and change the location of the footage as well. This new location gave more natural lighting and really highlights the singers face and actions, it also makes the overall video look more professional and realistic.

While filming we found that the camera was left recording and this played to our advantage and we used this footage in high speed to match the rest of the video and gave a more realistic effect to the narrative of our music video. Another section that wasn't planned but a moment of pure silliness, was that of the swivel chair. Our actors thought it to be funny to play with a swivel chair they had found and finding this funny we thought it would be a good idea to film this and found the idea amusing. Personally I was very amused and felt it would be a good idea to put this in our video. So we did.

When planning our music video we had a lot of organisation to do and it was all written on paper. This made it more difficult to find and hard to read. We created a blog and this blog helped us organise ourselves so that everything was easy to find and easy to read. On this blog we have put all the planning up, we also thought it would be a good idea to add things like inspiration us on the blog. Through this blog we could keep everyone in our group updated with the progress made so far, for example our Rough Cuts. We could put up what we had done so far so that everyone could see what stage we were at. Blogger has made everything for us so much easier and got us more organised as a group.

Andrew Goodwin's 6 point analysis theory also comes into the planning of our products. One of his theory's say that most music videos have a lot of promotion for the artist through-out music videos, magazine adverts and CD album covers etc... We took this into consideration and decided that we were going to promote the artist and his band through-out our product making. This again shows the importance of Branding.

Our Digi Pack and magazine advert, follow a colour scheme of bright colours that stand out. We went for the "groovy" look on our Digi Pack and the album cover. These make the products stand out. If it was put on in stores we wanted it to be seen and draw the buyers in, by making thee colours bright and 'funky' this would catch the eye of the shopper and increase our chances of a sale. Our Music Video, Digi pack and magazine advert used a few different pieces of technology such as: Final Cut Express; YouTube; PhotoShop; Green Screens; a Camera and Tri-pod. These aided us in the making of our products.

But the question is, how effect is the combination of our main product and the ancillary texts? Well, we showed our products to a small audience and asked for their honest opinion. We had 9 out of 10 people say that they loved the main product and found the music video to be fun and full of energy. There was 8 out of 10 people that said the Digi Pack and magazine advert worked very well at catching their eyes and also like the colour scheme. They though it appropriate for the style of our main product. The one thing a few people did say was that the picture on the magazine didn't really fit in but it wasn't a huge issue. (PICTURE) After a group deliberation about the photo we decided to change it around slightly. Furthermore, all our branding play an important role in the promotion of our music video and ancillary texts and highlight out production company to the viewing audience.

Check out my amazing webiste :) http://www.wix.com/smartiepantsproducti/evaluation-test#!question-2
Sasha Thompson

Evaulation - Question 1

Sasha Thompson - Q1: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our media product was based around the song 'Famous' by Scouting For Girls. Our genre was comedy, the conventions of a comedy are all present within our music video. We adapted our music video of ‘Famous’ by scouting for girls to have typical conventions of a comedy genre as well as the video belonging to the pop genre. Within our music video we have incorporated a mix of performance and narrative as we have stuck along the lines of the lyrics to create our performance and made a story line out of our performance. Aspects such as the increased speed play a large part in our music video and add to the dramatic effect of the comical conventions. These involve humorous situations exaggerated to create the performance within our music video.

We were highly drawn to the idea of having a panel shown within our music video. These ideas developed form the shows ‘X Factor’ and ‘Britain’s Got Talent’. These shows create entertainment for the viewing audience. On shows like that they send all that funny acts that are really bad and create humour which keep the audience watching. Then eventually they bring on an amazing act that WOW's the judges. We used aspects of this and had all our actors do weird and crazy auditions that would make our audience laugh. These auditions we fun and entertaining to film and watch. This was used to create more entertainment for the audience and once again was heightened by the used of the high speed aspects of the video. By having completely different types of personalities on the panel, it created an even more humorous effect for the audience to watch and enjoy. 

The speed play wasn’t originally on our list of what we wanted to do without video but after seeing some of the footage and having a look at the effects in the editing stations of ‘Final Cut Express’ we found that the speed play makes the humour seen at normal speed so much more amusing at high speed. In parts of the video we linked the lyrics to the visual, this represents Andrew Goodwin's 6 point analysis and throughout our music video we have images that link with our lyrics. For example the line "We all want to be famous" near the end of the song has a visual match with the writing on the white board. 

When filming the music video we had to be aware of the comic conventions that make a good comedy what they are today. These elements were clearly there in our filming, however some just needed a bit more amusement added to the video. Our actors were very good at their jobs and created this comedic effect naturally without the editing. This was a huge benefit for us when it came to the editing stage. The narrative in this video were based upon the illusions of the audition sequence, as this is seen in over half of our music video. The inspiration for the auditions came from the success of music video ‘Moves like Jagger’ by Maroon 5 and the idea that it held great potential.

By having a main singer we were able to keep the continuity constant and also enable us to promote the singer throughout the music video. By having him sing certain lines and also having him and his band playing throughout the music video kept reminding the audience of the signers face and promoting him even more.  This here relates to Andrew Goodwin's 6 point analysis, showing that the advertisement of the artist is a key aspect of a music video. On the other hand the costumes shown within our music video also play a big part in our music video. These costumes create a huge part of humour as they are amusing for the audience to watch make assumptions from.

Have a look at my website: http://www.wix.com/smartiepantsproducti/evaluation-test#!question-1

By Sasha Thompson

Pictures for the evaluation

We uploaded the main images we would need for our evaluation so the whole group would have access to the essentials.