MUSIC VIDEO

WEBSITE HOMEPAGE

https://honormedia.wixsite.com/venusmusic

ALBUM COVER

The inlay of the digipak: 

The back cover:

The front cover:

The inside left hand side of the digipak:

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

Introduction:

Technology was key factor in the production of our product. It enabled us to offer more to an audience in a quick and easy way. We used technology in the pre-production, production and post production stages which helped us to create the product we have now. I am a prosumer in the workings of my campaign through using real media products to inspire me. I used a wide range of technologies in each of my 3 products. I valued the technology I had access to throughout my journey because it improved my digital savviness and made me more aware of technologies I had not come across before.

Pre-production:

We used Pinterest to created mood boards to visualise our ideas. It helped us to collate all the images and help us to evoke more ideas within our production plan.

When presenting our treatment of our original ideas we used Powerpoint to organise our thoughts to convey them in a clear way. It meant that our audience understood and created an image in their head of what we wanted it to look like.

We created an Animatic with a Black Magic camera and edited it on Adobe Premier Pro. This semi-professional hardware made us more digitally savvy and helped us easily create a vision and begin to look at what our final product would eventually look like.

As an online research tool, we used Youtube to look at similar genres of music videos to get inspiration for ours.

Production:

Conclusion:

By using digital media technologies I have used technological convergence to ensure that I have produced three products as a part of a successful campaign. My use of Youtube has enabled me to become a prosumer, a creator of media products to a near professional standard. The use of Adobe Premier Pro as a piece of editing software has taught me how to select and organise a music video to a very high standard using semi-professional media equipment. I have also been able to share ideas and research global and industry standard products. Digital technology has made available to me opportunities to upload, share and distribute my products using Youtube as a free online broadcast platform. It is also interactive because audiences have been able to feedback, like and comment on my products using features such as Youtube and other online tools. These new skills learned on this course have enabled to gain experience not only as a user of digital technology, but also to become a producer which is important for the understanding of the media in an online age.

Mind map of digital technology used in the production of our campaign

Today in class we created a mind map and noted down all of our digital technologies we used to create our campaign.

From softwares to hardwares, we made sure to write down every single application, website or program to plan out an effective evaluation task 4.

Evaluation Task 3: What have I learned from my audience feedback?

Conclusion:

I have learned from my audience feedback that I have constructed an intended star image and an effective campaign. My target audience has informed me what went well, for example, they immediately realised the colour scheme between all 3 products, as well as areas for development. If I was to make any future changes to the campaign I would have made a more obvious narrative in the music video.

Taking note of the audience feedback I understand how the audience inform me the success of  the campaign is and indeed allowed me time to make adjustments to the campaign before it went to distribution. Audience feedback is important market testing in post-production to see if I created the right star image and marketed this purposefully. As Henry Jenkins informs us that we live in a ‘participatory culture’,  where fans and audiences are important in circulating meaning and the strength of media messages.

I also recognise that my audience has engaged with the meanings in my music video in different ways, bringing their own contexts to the reading of the star image – what Hall argues is reception theory. I can understand how my audience can either reinforce or challenge intended meanings in the text.

Evaluation Task 3 preparation

Today I created my own Survey Monkey account, which I am able to make up to 10 questions in order to get feedback from audience members.

I am planning on interviewing specific audience members, asking them their general music taste and then giving them the survey to fill out.

This will be presented in the form of a video with the interviews of the people and their process of filling out the survey.

Here are the questions I am going to be asking the audience:

Evaluation Task 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

Throughout the campaign our main product, the music video, we have seen how effectively it has worked with ancillary tasks, our website and digipak, effectively and how it reflected the star image of Honor.

I have been effective in communicating the star image as part of a campaign successfully using the ancillary tasks and the brand image. Ultimately the brand image I wanted to promote was a care free girl who wants people to base their opinions on her music, rather than her image. This is important for any campaign or concept for example we can compare against actual artists like Lady Gaga, whose brand image is based on her style and attitude.

Secondly, I feel that I have given the campaign a unique selling point through the star image. The star image I have promoted is based around her sexuality and the way she is calm, but powerful. A unique selling used in a coherent campaign will provide different opportunities to market the star image. An audience who is able to spread the word about a publicity campaign can ensure success through the engagement with the text as a form of online media - helping spread, circulate and distributing meaning amongst fans.

Finally, I have technically delivered a coherent looking campaign through the use of coordinating colours in the music video, digipak and website. The music video promotes a release from the album, whilst the website acts as an effective online tool which helps to distribute and promote meaning for a  fan base. The circulation and spread of meaning by the intended audience helps with co-option (as Boyd suggested) amongst the fans, and aids me with the marketing and promotion of the album.

Evaluation Task 2: Script

Evaluation Task 2:

We used the CD digipak and website as a promotional tool to promote the single ‘Ignite Me’. All these elements have come together to create a promotional campaign. A key marketing strategy the music industry uses is star image, it is rarely all about the music. Keith Negus argues that the pop music video is used as a promotional tool, we agree with this because for us, creating Honor’s star image makes her more popular through strategies like social media.

CD digipaks are one of the most important promotional tools because it markets the image of the artist before the music is purchased online or in-store. They are carefully constructed with conventions to communicate certain messages about the artist, with Honor’s, we have a double exposure, glitchy portrait picture of her on the front of the album cover, suggesting that she does not want people to judge her on her image but on her music, being mysterious to the audiences.

Websites have the basis of promotion and information which is given to the audience. It serves 3 purposes: promotion of the single or the album release; promotion of tour or live appearance and merchandising like sales of posters and T-shirts. It contains information that promotes and publicise the artist's image to an audience. We include social media like Twitter, Instagram and the link to the single on every page on the website in order to let the audience co-opt with the artist.

How important is the image of the artist? According to Dyer, the visual star image communicates an individual message to each audience member. Audiences associate the look of the artist to the style of music they are listening to, called a genre. Marketing of a pop star has become iconic and famous and this has helped maintain the popularity of current favoured artists.

As part of a campaign, we have created a brand image for Honor by looking at current conventions of the genre of music we have chosen. Her look is very plain at first, but once put with an attitude and a song she fits in with it. We have attempted to represent an organic artist by having the look of minimal makeup, being open about her sexuality and in essence being only herself. All the pictures throughout the campaign are consistent because they all have a blue, pink and purple vibe to them.

We represented a girl with an attitude trying to sell her music to her favoured audience. We have achieved this through her attitude towards the camera in the music video and in the digipak. Her unique selling point is her sexuality because she can be identified with and the way that audience members that haven’t come out will feel more confident if they know their role model has.

Philip Kotler defined the marketing of a campaign as: “Human activity directed at satisfying needs and wants through exchange processes”. For Kotler, the key to success is marketing. We agree with this. Although, It includes 4 variables: Price: how much it will cost/consumers will pay for; Place: how is the product distributed and marketed to the target audience; Product: what is being branded; Promotion: how it is advertised where and publicised.

The single is going to be released at the same time when the music video comes out, and we are going to publicise the artist through the website, hyping fans up about when her album ‘Venus’ was going to come out at around September time. It would be released by the record company called ‘Island Records’ and subsidiary of the conglomerate Universal Music Group. The music advert would be placed on some billboards in cities, snippets of the music video on her social media. She is going to have secret sessions with bloggers and journalists which get to hear her music first and they can write on the internet about it to hype up the release of the album. The music video will be released on Youtube and iTunes. The debut of the album will be on a popular radio station like Radio 1 at prime time, around 9am. Radio 1 has a commitment to lifting new artists and most teens will be listening around that time on the way to work/school. The digipak will be available to buy physically in stores like HMV and digitally on iTunes. The album would be advertised on TV on the channel MTV on a channel which promotes new artists.

The intended audiences we are targeting are old teens and young adults who are laid back and resonate in the fact that she is herself and doesn’t care what anyone thinks about her. The VALS we expect our target audience to have are experiencers - young, enthusiastic, impulsive and rebellious people. They seek variety and excitement, looking for risk. We also look of innovators, people who wish to make their mark, and rebels who wish to remake the world in their own image.

The campaign itself is effective in showing the star image because on the website, it is a full-screen picture of Honor looking calm but powerfully into the camera; on the digipak she is double exposed, suggesting she is mysterious and you must find out more about her through her songs; and the music video, where her attitude is relaxed and passionate.

Evaluation Task 1: Introduction

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

Evaluation Task 1 part 2: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Evaluation Task 1 part 3: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Evaluation Task 1: Conclusion

Finishing our album digipak!

Today we finally finished the digipak! I am so happy with the outcome. As you can see we were very unconventional with the back of the album having the song names at the bottom, with the production company details at the top. We did this to fit the picture of the half black half colour picture. It's mysterious, pulling the attention to the music as you cannot fully see her image yet.

Process of editing the album cover

At first, Miranda changed the colour balance to focus more on blue and pink colours, like in our music video. The screenshot on the right hand side is the layers that Miranda went through to make the album cover. She used the eraser to allow her to take away any unneccessary things, like fly away hairs. Working on multiple layers allows you to go back to the start in case you make a mistake.

Here is how the album cover will look like after editing it:

Our teacher sent us an aspect ratio template of a digipak, and we put our picture over the top of the template. 

It is still a working progress, but we are hoping to complete it by the end of this week. I have the font that we are going to use on my laptop, so I will be completing the digipak.