Finalised Ancillary 2

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Finalised Ancillary 1

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Evaluation-Media Technology

My production used the standard hardware you'd expect, a DV camcorder, Laptops, Computers, and digital cameras. Throughout the production the hardware resulted in a few issues, mainly the dirty heads on cameras which resulted in re-filming many shots. There was also a few problems with the age of the camcorders that became prominent when I attempted my night shots and they weren't quite up to the quality I would have liked. Other than that though the hardware technology worked well and provided adequate results. I used a far wider range of software media in my production. This ranged from Adobe photoshop and premier which were used for the editing of my main production and heavily used in the creation of my ancillary tasks. Despite one or two crashes in both products they worked relatively well and consistently. I also utilised online products to a huge extent, Blogger has obviously been used to host all my work, and this has worked well in all areas except the video hosting aspect which basically failed hence why i had to use youtube. Facebook was key for audience research as it allowed me to reach such a wide range of people which was required because of my large target audience. Overall software was more useful to me than hardware but all in all technology held little issue for my production.

Evaluation-Learning from feed back

I decided a good way to display a representation of how audience feedback can feel would be a still image with the metaphorical feedback being shot in to the receivers mind and overflowing. Because sometimes when you're receiving a lot of commentary on your work and have a large number of people suggesting different ideas it can become slightly overwhelming. Obviously the trick to audience feedback is decoding the mass of jumbled letters and words and finding the key areas from which to improve on, often the easiest way to do this is pick the issues which crop up most. In my earlier production (when i was still attempting the Eminem video) i quickly learnt from feedback that just still images wasn't enough to create a video, from later feedback on, what is now my current production, the snow patrol video I learned that to create something abstract and different you really had to push it, most importantly you couldn't have any shots go on to long as it broke the strange feel and the audiences immersion was cut, which had a negative impact on the video and was a key complaint from the first screening. After this i addressed these issues by mixing shots up more, and using even more visual effects. I feel i have managed to correctly decode a good section of audience feedback and the jumble is a degree clearer.

Evaluation-The effective combination

The use of reoccurring themes across both ancillary tasks and the main product unifies the three of them and creates a more effective overall impact. The main reoccurring theme is the lighting, the image below highlights how well the to sections sit together, the images on the right are screen shots from the video and the imagery on the left is taken from the album artwork and magazine advert.

The audience feed back from both the production and the ancillary work also suggests how effective the combination of the two is. Similar adjectives are used to describe both items, words like "dream" and "different" came up repetitively. However the combination wasn't perfect, there were some issues as the ancillary work was so abstract some felt it "didn't quite gel" and that perhaps some of the artwork from the video should have been worked in to the ancillary tasks. Yet overall both items seemed to give of the same feel making them an effective combination.

Evaluation-Use, Develop, Challenge.

The conventions of a music video vary greatly based on genre, audience and even the year the video was produced. However there are some broad conventions that apply such as the artist being shown performing, the lyrics of the song influence what is shown in the video, the pace of

editing fits the pace of the music, and the codes of dress reflect the mood of the song.

The following video of my production has had annotations added to highlight the way media conventions are used, developed and challenged.

Specific audience feedback

I did some research as to what other people believed snow patrols target demographic to be and received a huge range of results, it seems that snow patrol appeal to everyone from 12 year old girls to 40 year old men, then i cross referenced this with people who would usually enjoy more abstract/artistic videos, this ruled out the lower age bands and meant the people i showed the video to were aged between 16 and 30 with 60% being girls because the song lyrics seem to lend themselves more the feminine ideas of emotion. I compiled a series of quotes in to the image below as a representation of audience feedback.The quotes are "Different", "interesting", "weird", "funny", "calm", "soothing colours", "ethereal", "haunting", and "sad"

going Forwards in Reverse.

As the time constraints were so tight on re-shooting an entirely new video, the blog suffered from a degree of neglect whilst re shooting took place. So I would like to give a brief run down on how the new video was filmed. Filming took place within two primary locations, my house and my car. The fact so much of the video was shot at an abstract macro level in the house made the standard singular location rather irrelevant. The shots taken from inside the car were used as a baseline to cut between and have effects overlayed on.

Shooting took place over a few days, the only actor involved was brief backlit shot of myself which was actually salvaged from the previous video (a secret homage to the failed project). The prop list was a strange mixture of items, it included; a straw cowboy hat, a clear vinyl record, a watch, an overpass bridge, a car,a gas cooker, and a glass of juice.

Finalised Ancillary

The digipak includes (in descending order); the CD case front cover with CD, the insert booklet with lyrics and band signatures, a special edition vinyl record, and the back cover with CD.
The A4 print advert which includes album artwork, and brief quotes/ratings.

(For more in depth information about both tasks please see earlier posts.)

Bokeh Inspires

(image from talkphotography)

Bokeh- "In photography and film, refers to the creative use of lens blur as a composition technique. The aim of bokeh is to deliberately blur the background or foreground (or both) in order to draw the viewer's attention to a particular area of the photo or film"

Throughout my video i intend to manipulate this technique for emphasis on the abstract and surreal nature of the lighting which makes up a key part of my production.

Use of technology, in depth photoshop

Photoshop is a powerful tool and is used prominently within my production, mainly within my ancillary tasks but it is also integrated to my music video. what follows are some making of shots of other work to help display how i create these images, I used a variety of brushes and varying opacity settings, to finalise the image i used the curves tool and adjustment layers.

A light touch.

Much of the imagery within my production is based around lighting effects and what lighting can be used to represent, for example the line "My fingers in creases of distant dark places" is linked with light piercing through multiple small holes and creases with an overall dark screen (the light in this case representing the singer pushing through in to these dark places). Here is some inspiration from other light art.

This light painting entitled "so far away" was partial inspiration for the night time traffic shots.

The unique very bright effect and colour scheme created in the light painting "tunnel" inspired the ending dream scenes of the video."I am on fire" by Benegizer provided inspiration for the album artwork with its smoky ethereal flowing lines (although how i created my imagery and how Benegizer created his is very different)

Finally i decided to create a quick response piece of artwork with some simple photoshop tools.

The face in the video

Part way through the song there is a line that says " Their words mostly noises, ghosts with just voices" at this stage i decided to incorperate some link to people and drew up this rather eerie figure of a boy and then set that layer to hardlight and placed it over the video layer. The boy was a rather simple digital sketch (just block colours on a photoshop canvas smudged together) and then i over emphasised the eyes and made the facial shape far gaunter.

Feed back from rough cut

There was some disagreement over the range of camera skills, the audience regarded them as very good but in terms of technicality there is lack in range however this is a stylistic choice, and I'm not sure if im prepeared to sacrifice the vision I have of the video to introduce extra shots purely to gain marks which would then conflict with the rest of the video. The filming whilst driving recieved good feedback and the intergration of the boys face (which i'd drawn on photoshop) recieved very positive feedback due to its link to the lyrics and the surprise nature of it. Overall the lyrical links recieved positive feedback although more general "journey" shots could be used and the flames could be replaced with a better fire shot. Other improvements include the fact one shot of night traffic went on for to long however feedback said that the in and out of focus on this shot was good.

Full Digipak

For the full digipak i decided to include something for everyone, a 7 inch vinyl for older fans, a free digital download of the track for the digital native generation and for the major fans the inside front cover has the bands signatures (and the lyrics). Obviously this is a special edition Digipak not the standard CD set. All this was created in photoshop below is a print screen of the layers and canvas.

Ancillary feedback

I presented to the class the ancillary work that had been done so far. The first key section of feedback i really wanted was whether to use the abstract lighting piece or typographic one, the class majority voted the abstract light design to be far better for many reasons, they said it's use of black space made it seem "classy" and emphasised the colour. In terms of font on it the size, typeface and use of square brakets was all good also the positioning of the font on top of the smoke lines recieved positive feedback as it drew the eye well. The quotation at the bottom "anchored" the piece and made it more solid. Interestingly it was widely agreed that although it was abstract the lighting and colour fit well with the connotation of what is to be expected from a snow patrol album cover. The overall impact was said to raise questions, it encouraged people to find out more about this and was a striking design, one student said "the colour, layout, style, just perfect". The impovements to be made are relitavly simple, add the band name on the magazine advert to fit with conventions more, and for the Digipak use a similar but slightly altered design so the two aren't identacle.

after effects tests

After a few hours experimenting in after effects, i may or may not have achieved something, it's not quite what i wanted and i'm having some issues with exporting it in a manageable file size so it may or may not make the final video cut.

Piano introduction

For the first ten seconds or so of the song there is a piano introduction for this i've decided to go slightly experimental, im currently obtaining a trial version of adobes "after effects" a special effects software to hopefully create an abstract music visualization to fill these first ten seconds. Here is the style I'm aiming for http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEqMS-NYf_g
This also links to the album artwork I intend to use.

Advert ideas (again)

So here is another rough mock up of the advert. I decided to just utilise the album artwork again, but also an image of the product itself. Then worked in the same fake magazine quotes, hoping to appeal on a simple but effective nature and arouse the viewers curiosity with the lack of direct information yet again, but also utilise a more conventional product advertisement, I do feel however it looks a little bit to busy and i prefer the other design.

Advert ideas

So here is a rough mock up of the advert. I decided to just utilise the album artwork and then worked in some fake magazine quotes, hoping to appeal on a simple but effective nature and arouse the viewers curiosity with the lack of direct information.

Magazine ad.

Here are some examples of music adverts, although they aren't related in terms of genre, its more of there format i'm interested in. The key features seem to be large titling, album artwork and something similar to the billing block on movie posters at the bottom. One of the three also features a release date, I don't think I will feature one in my ancillary task nor the actual product, although i feel i will use the album artwork to make up the main body of the advert and then just use text, billing blocks and logos to build up the ad.

Processed Ancillary work

Here are the previous images, mocked up in to a CD digipak format.

Rough ancillary work

Above are two images i mocked up which could be utilised in the Digipak task. The first goes in a different direction from usual album covers, utilising typography and blank space to create a striking design. The second focuses more on the aspects i wanted to draw from the other snow patrol album covers.

(Both were made in photoshop by myself)

Altered Ancillary

Obviously now the main production has changed, the ancillary tasks i had been working on have had to change to. Here are some covers which i'm drawing ideas from to fuel my ancillary work .

The most interesting part of these covers is the lighting, and unique nature of them. The first manipulates a series of surreal shapes in combination with a spotlight effect to create a deep and dramatic feel. The second utilises Bokeh with a unique line drawing over the top. And the final uses space and a single light source to create a striking cover.

The elements I plan on utilising from these covers are the abstract nature of the first, the dramatic colourful lighting of the second and possibly the space utilised in the third.

Filming through.

Most cameramen use a series of filters to achieve different effects whilst filming, for example in this still from topgear they have a cool blue gradient filter in front of the lens.

Yet obviously i don't have access to such equipment, but there was nothing to stop me from placing other everyday objects in front of the lens to see what kind of effects could be achieved, so i set about picking up glasses, CD's, clear vynil and even a straw hat, and in turn placing those between the camera lens and usually a strong light source to see what kind of effects could be achieved, some of the results were actually rather interesting.

changes and similarities

Although my song choice my have changed, what i aim to do hasn't. I still don't want this to be a set in stone simple music video which uses the same old tired techniques, a lonely girl lip syncing, crying over a letter etc. etc. i don't want it to turn in to something like this basically:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6jf3I2H2jw

Sure the same themes are going to be there, because that is the overall tone the music sets. But i want to use less conventional shots and just bring something a little different to the table.

Inspiration

A rundown of videos and images that feature ideas that could be utilised.

Time lapse traffic-interesting light trails

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8bSWa71_sQ

Cold plays use of reverse footage in the scientist

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxNJHuM0Js0

The use of abstract lighting here (and the incorporation of bokeh in the image below)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qkYWEHwtSo&feature=branded

And finally the overaly textures here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvgZkm1xWPE

Scrap metal

After much work there is nothing more that can be done for the eminiem video, the project has been jetisoned. It was over ambitious and the technology availible couldnt be used for what I needed. Now from the ashes a new project has risen "Set fire to the third bar" by Snow patrol. The video will draw inspiration from "the scientist" with the hook being reversed shots. The premise behind the song lyrics appears to be a journey from a man to his love, focusing on this idea of journey I aim to use multiple traveling shots and close up detail shots interspliced to hint at their former love.

Album Covers

Mood board reviews

Noir board

Techno board

Of the two boards the techno board had a better reception, people saw it as striking and of the two more people sided with it due to its vibrant nature. However within the context of the project it was commented that the Noir board would be more appropriate as it kept with the feel of the song and the style of the filming. Therefore i have decided that for the album cover/ Digipak i will aim to work with a noir colour sceem although i may introduce some cold blue colour to add depth and reflect public opinion.

Peer to Peer