What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Questionnaire for ‘Under China’

1. Is our music video visually exciting?

Yes

No

I wanted to know whether people visually enjoyed my music video. It is crucial that audiences enjoy watching the music video, so that they want to watch it again.

2. Is it clear that there are two elements to our music video- a domestic violence element and a fantasy element?

Yes

No

This was a very important question, because there are two themes to my music video: Fantasy and Domestic Violence. If the themes were ambiguous to the audience it would ruin the whole objective of the music video, which is to make people aware of domestic violence and represent and realistic view of it (Dalia needing to escape).

3. Is the narrative clear?

Yes

No

I wanted to see if audiences understood the music video, Libby and myself tried to make the narrative as clear as possible. However, having such a complicated narrative made it difficult to make the narrative clear. It is important that the audience understand what is going on in the music video and the shots are consistent otherwise it can make the music video look badly made and will not be enjoyable.
Goodwin said that the structure of the narrative for music videos reflects the music. Goodwin suggests that music videos don't follow the grand narrative. This applies to my music video, as it does not have a grand narrative.

4. Does the video reflect Indie/Rock genre?

Yes

No

The genre of 'Under China' is Indie/Rock, it is therefore important that the audience identifies some elements of this genre in the music video, so it appeals to the audience that listen to this genre of music.

5. Does the video reflect the lyrics?

Yes

No

Libby and myself used lyrics of the song and applied them to whats happening visually in the video. It will be interesting to see if the audience pick up on this. However, it is not important if they don't.

6. Which age groups do you think this video appeals to? (circle one or more)

8-15 years

16-25 years

25-40 years

40+

It is crucial that the music video appeals to our target audience (16-40 years). We have targeted are video to this audience and they are the people that are most likely to enjoy the genre of the music and the music video itself. Audiences should roughly pick up on which age group it will appeal to.

7. Describe our music video in three words:

This gives participants the opportunity to give their individual opinion on the music video. I will enjoy seeing how other people perceive our music video.

8. If you could improve one thing about our music video, what would it be that you would improve?

This will give participants the opportunity to identify faults with the music video. By seeing the faults that people suggest, it will enable Libby and myself to realise how we could improve the music video if we were to create it again.                                                                                                                                                                                                            

9. What aspect of our music video stands out the most to you?

I would like to see which aspects of the music video stand out most to people. In my opinion the themes stand out the most to me, however people may identify particular shots that they found really worked. It will be nice to see which shots people appreciated the most.


Here is a copy of the questionnaire I created. I have evaluated my reason for asking each question below in purple. I have used a range of questions that will produce both qualitative and quantitative data. The quantitative data will enable me to clearly and quickly analyse my results, but the qualitative data will allow me to see peoples individual opinions on the music video. By using both data's I feel that I will produce numerical data and detailed information, making my results beneficial.

I gave this questionnaire to 50 people (25 male and 25 female). By using a relatively large sample size, I will be able to apply my results to everyone. Participants were aged between 15 and 45. I chose a large age range, that fitted in with my target audience, as their response is crucial. I chose to use equal males and females, to make the research fair and so that I could compare gender responses.

All participants selected 'Yes' for question one, this shows that all participants found my music video visually exciting. This shows that audiences enjoyed my music video, which is extremely important as they are more likely to enjoy the song if they enjoy the video. This tells me that I have successfully promoted the song 'Under China'.

23 out of the 25 males answered 'Yes' on question two and 25 out of the 25 of females answered 'Yes'. This shows that the majority of people thought that the two themes in my music video were represented clearly. I am concerned that 2 people found the themes ambiguous, as the themes were the main aspect of the music video. I wanted to raise awareness of domestic violence and wanted people to feel as though they were able to relate to the this theme and the fantasy theme. I wanted people or people that knew of those that had been affected by domestic violence to feel as though they could relate to the music video. I also wanted audiences to feel like they could relate to the aspect of wanting to escape from your life. There is a clear difference in male and female responses here, males seemed to find it harder to clearly see the two themes represented in my music video. This may be because males are less likely to relate to the themes and therfore are less aware of them. I am representing the issue of domestic violence through images. The wider metaphor for the video is the fantasy aspect. The refrain of the fantasy aspect, is the use of the spinning sky image. The consistent use of this image makes the seperation between the two themes a lot clearer to audiences.

For question 7, I found that people gave a mix of responses this reflects the genre of my music video: Indie. Suggesting that people are individuals. Examples of a few of the words:

* Realistic.
* Exciting.
* Summery.
* Colourful.
* Powerful.

The repsonses were completely unique and individual and this reflects our Indie genre. This aslo reflects Michel Maffessoli's idea that we each belong to a 'tribe'. The tribe for the response to this question would be 'individual' as each person gave a different and unique response.



For question 8, 4 males and 2 females said that the video could be more clear when representing Dalia going to her fantasy land. This tells me that if I was to make the music video again I would create a more distinctive feature to represent the difference between the two themes in the video. Or I would make the themes more dramatic and obvious, for example I could have more violent domestic violence scenes and much more unrealistic fantasy themes. Initially Libby and myself did want the fantasy scenes to be extremely over the top, using ideas from Alice In Wonderland, with Dalia sitting on a long table with imaginary creatures. However, we decided this idea was far too ambitious for students to achieve. My original storyboard contained the Alice In Wonderland shots. The aspects of this idea Libby and myself decided would be difficult was firstly being able to get a long table and china plates etc to go on it and secondly was finding the space to put this table to film it. We decided it was too much hassle and achieved our fantasy shots in a different way. We achieved our fantasy shots through using two seasons (summer and winter) and using different conventions within this to represent the fantasy. Some of these conventions were: Sunlight, Lily, a Maze etc.

We could have used closer shots of Dalia in much more dramatic and bright make-up, adding to the unrealistic element of her fantasies. We could have used inspiration from artist Lady Gaga - who often wears eccentric clothing and make-up. This would have created a much more dramatic and unrealistic fantasy land, which may have been clearer to audiences. Although Lady Gaga is not of the Indie/Rock genre, we could still have used make-up ideas from her, as the point of the fantasy land is to be dramatic and unrealistic; Dalia's make-up does not need to reflect the genre of our music video. We thought the music video would be more exciting and unique if we used elements from a variety of artists and music videos as inspiration. This will also widen our target audience.



This could also be applied to the domestic violence elements, by creating bruises with make-up to really emphasise the point that her boyfriend is violent and physically harming her.

For question 9, 5 males and 7 females said that the snow scenes stood out to them mostly and 2 males and 10 females said that the fighting scene between Dalia and Fraser stood out to them the most. This tells me that mainly females found the fighting scene between Dalia and Fraser the most striking scene. This tells me that this scene successfully portrays the message of domestic violence. The snow shots are also clearly very successful, these shots are my particular favourites, as they are so beautiful and pure with the thick white snow. One female aslo mentioned that the use of two completely different seasons stood out most to them, I am glad that we filmed in the summer and the winter, as it makes the music video more visually exciting with two such extreme different seasons.




I also uploaded my music video on to Facebook, to receive a few responses on there. I did this because Facebook is used so widely and it ties in with the age group of my target audience. However, I only received a few comments just saying that they enjoyed the video.

Overall, by receiving results from the questionnaire I have been able to reflect on the aspects of my music video that worked well and it has enabled me to see what audiences felt didn't work so well. So if I was to replicate my music video, I would know what to do differently in order to create the most successful music video as possible.

Below is a copy of an example of one of my questionnaire responses:

 

What have you learned from audience feedback powerpoint

View more presentations from lmanning51.

The process of making my album cover

This is the original image of the picture I have used for the album cover to my music video 'Under China'. I took this photograph by accident as Dalia flicked her hair. But really liked it and decided to use it as the album cover.

I firstly started by getting rid of the bed in the image, to do this I used the 'background eraser tool' on Photoshop. This took a long time to do and the end result wasn't entirely perfect, but I felt the image looked a lot more professional without the bed. I then brightened the picture, to make it more striking and so that Dalia stood out more. I did this by increasing the brightness on Photoshop. I then wanted to make Dalia's skin smoother, so I used the 'Spot Healing Brush' tool, which makes her face look smoother and creates a softer image.

I then added text to the image using the 'Text' tool. I experimented with a variety of fonts, but decided on this one. I chose this font (Freestyle Script) because it was elegant and creates a much more personal feel to the album. The font looks as though it could be handwritten, which makes audiences feel as though the album is personal to them. 

I then experimented with different lipstick colours. I decided on using pink as it adds to the femininity of the album, which emphasises the fact that the lead singer of Auction For The Promise Club is female.

I also had  to crop the photograph in order for it to be square to fit in with the size of the CD cover.

This was the original image for the back of my album.

I started by getting rid of the trees in the image, I did this by using the 'Background eraser tool', this created a clearer image. I then brightened the photograph, by increasing the brightness. This made the glitter and the image of Dalia more dominant. The brightness also gives off a surreal feel to the album, reflecting the fantasy aspect to Under China.

All I did with this photo is increased the contrast, so that the glitter stood out a lot more.

Audience response to my music video

Here is a video of me interviewing 2 people using my questionnaire.

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

When making our music video, we were able to use a number of technological devices: digital video camera, a tripod and adobe premiere elements. The digital camera helped us to view our footage as we were filming. This was extremely helpful, as we were able to film a shot then immediately view it to check it was successful. If it wasn’t we were able to pick up on this and re-shoot it. This saved us a lot of time, as we weren’t having to wait until we put the footage on to a computer to watch it. This also meant that we had extra time to spend experimenting with different shots and seeing which worked and which didn’t. However, the fact that the screen on the digital camera was so small meant that we weren’t able to pick up on all the faults. This meant that we would not pick up on the fault until the footage was on a computer in our next lesson. We would then have to schedule another shooting time to re-shoot. For example, when shooting shots of Dalia on the trampoline, Libby (without realising) was in all attempts of the shot. We were unable to see this when filming, as the screen was too small to identify it. However, when putting it on the computer we noticed it and arranged to re-shoot it. One thing we were able to identify on the camera, was the lighting. This was helpful, particularly for the domestic violence shots, as we were trying to create dull lighting which was extremely difficult without the shot becoming ambiguous. We were able to see a shot back and if it was too dark, we were able to re-shoot it with extra lighting to make the shot clearer.

We edited our music video on an Adobe software. We chose to use Adobe, as it offered a variety of skilful tools. This enabled us to use a variety of effects for our final music video, ensuring we created the best film we possibly could. One effect was especially beneficial to us, this was the cross-dissolve effect. It helped to make sure each shot blended in gently with the next. Making the whole video flow a lot smoother and look much more professional. We had a lot of problems with the cross dissolve effect, as it kept deleting certain parts of a shot or adding extra images in. By persisting with it we eventually overcame this issue. However, we were not able to use the cross dissolve feature in a few shots due to this issue. We also used an effect which blends two shots together. It did this by making one shot opaque so you were able to see another shot beneath it. This enhanced the video, as we wanted to express Dalia’s disorientation in one particular shot. We showed this by having a shot of Dalia singing to the camera (after having a fight with her boyfriend) and we blended in an image of the spinning sky. This helped the audience to understand how Dalia felt disorientated and confused. The sky also represented Dalia going to her fantasy land, making it a lot clearer to the audience that she escapes to a fantasy land. When receiving peoples analysis of our music video, one thing that was criticised was the fact that it was ambiguous when Dalia goes to her fantasy land. Libby and myself discussed ways in which we could make it clearer and came to the conclusion that by consistently using the spinning sky each time she goes to her fantasy land it will become a lot clearer to the audience. When receiving analysis’ of our video again, people said it was a lot clearer and the spinning sky worked very well.

New technology is not only effecting producers and audiences individually, it also effects the relationship between the two. Producers and audiences are now much closer due to new technologies. It has given audiences much more of an insight in to the process the producers go through and has enabled them to feel like a part of it. New technologies have made it possible for producers to produce even more fantastic things than ever before. This makes audiences happy, creating a positive relationship between the two. New technologies also now give students and people like myself the chance to be a producer and broadcast their videos to the world. It has enabled people to produce a music video on a very low budget.

New technologies like You Tube also mean that audiences can view music videos for free at any time they like. This was not the case years ago, audiences used to have to pay to view music videos and they were not as easily accessible.

When researching for our music, we used a variety of websites:

http://www.totallyunsigned.co.uk/
http://www.myspace.com/
http://www.unsignedbandweb.co.uk/

YouTube was a brilliant way of immediately accessing artists. I was able to search videos for inspiration for my music video, the main inspiration being ‘Love The Way You Lie’. I used certain videos to inspire me for my own, without YouTube I wouldn’t have been able to do this. It was also useful going on websites of artists of the same genre as mine. I was able to pick up on certain themes they had used or certain aspects that reflect their genre and apply it to my own final product. For example, Florence and The Machine’s website http://florenceandthemachine.net/ was very elegant and used a lot of floral patterns. This gave the website a very feminine and elegant feel, which is how I wanted my band to be represented. I used this floral idea in some of my CD cover designs, although I never actually used it. I also researched Bat For Lashes website, as they are a band of the same genre also with a lead female vocalist. http://www.batforlashes.com/ This website gave me inspiration for my CD cover, as it uses very neutral pink and beige colours, which connote elegance and femininity.

We eventually picked a band from www.totallyunsinged.co.uk. We used all the websites for our research and narrowed our choices down to three. We then decided to go with ‘Under China’ by Auction For The Promise Club. We emailed this band to ask for permission to use their song. They were delighted to hear that we were using their song for our media work and have kept in contact throughout the process.
When wanting to receive evaluations of my final music video, I used the social network site Facebook to receive comments about it. This ensured that I had a wide variety of evaluations. I decided to use Facebook, as it is a very popular social networking site for my target audience for my video. I therefore knew that I would receive evaltuations that are relevant.

When planning our music video, certain music channels came in useful for inspiration. The main channel we used was NME, as we knew that bands of the same genre would have videos shown on here. However, it was also useful to use channels such as: TheHits, MTV and VIVA, as pop music has very happy videos which could be applied to the fantasy aspect of our video. We also wanted to keep our options open and not just watch videos of the same genre, but instead use a variety of ideas from different genres.

Technologies have assisted me with inserting and embedding my music video. YouTube has enabled me to broadcast my video to everyone and embed it on to my blog.

I have created a Prezi for this question

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages? on Prezi

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

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts? on Prezi

The target audience for my music video and my ancillary texts is the same. The target audience is fairly young, ranging from age 14 to age 30. This is shown through many elements of my music video. The first being the song to the music video- ‘Under China’. The genre of this song is Indie rock, which is a sub-genre of the alternative rock that originated in the United Kingdom in the 1980’s. This genre is very modern, which therefore gives it a young target audience. Our main product reflects the genre and target audience in a number of ways. Firstly, we have used young actors (Dalia: 18 and Fraser:16) this means our target audience will feel as though they can relate to the characters. The theme we have used in our music video is domestic violence. This reflects the rock genre of our song, as a lot of Rock songs are about issues in everyday life. Audiences will appreciate the honesty of the realistic representation of life. A lot of music videos are very optimistic and give a false representation of life, whereas our video does not. Some of our audiences may also be able to relate to the theme of our music video, as they may have been victims of domestic violence or know of people that have been affected by it. Our video also has a fantasy aspect, which all audiences will be able to relate to. Everyone has a moment in their life in which they feel like they want to escape or disappear to a fantasy world. The majority of our target audience for our music video is female, this is due to the fact that the lead vocalist is female. A lot of women may appreciate the music video, as it shows a female overcoming being involved in a violent relationship and escaping it. Some males may feel that they are represented unfairly in this video, however a very high majority of violent relationships are initiated from the male. This was our reasoning for choosing to have a violent male. The music video also reflects the Rock n Roll genre, through the smoking and the violence used in the video. There is one specific shot of Fraser smoking a cigar, which is very Rock n Roll and would therefore appeal to our audience hugely.

Libby and myself had to do a lot of planning and research before creating our final product. We designed two different storyboards before deciding on the theme of our music video. By spending such a large amount of time planning and brainstorming about out music video, we were able to come up with a lot of ideas and combine these together to ensure we had the best idea possible. I came up with the idea of domestic violence, as a song at the time of our planning that was extremely popular was ‘Love The Way You Lie’ which involves a video of a couple that are involved in a violent relationship. From watching this video, I felt as though they glamorised domestic violence and created a false representation of it. I therefore decided I wanted to created a much more realistic view of it and how the victim of domestic violence is desperate to escape. In order to ensure I did this in the best way possible, I took out a lot of research in to it. I researched in to people that had been affected it by it and the way it made them feel, helping me to decide how I wanted Dalia to show her emotions, especially in the close up shots I was going to create of her. The research that helped me massively was the video of Patrick Stewart (posted on my blog).This helped me to understand how an outsider can be affected by domestic violence, my audience were going to be the outsider and I therefore found it very helpful in understanding how the video should make them feel. The lyrics to the song of Under China (posted on my blog) fit in very well with the domestic violence theme. This is important as it helps audiences to understand and focus on the lyrics much more and enables the to visualise this.

When creating our final production, we found it very important to creating an atmosphere through the lighting, location and mise-en-scene. In the domestic violence shots we wanted to use dull lighting, however this was very difficult in ensuring each shot wasn’t ambiguous. We overcame this by using various lamps and torches. This made sure each shot was dull, but still very clear. The fantasy shots had to be bright and colourful, this meant that we had to shoot them at specific times of the day. We shot the first half of the fantasy shots in the summer. This ensured we had bright lighting and colourful trees, grass, flowers etc. We tried shooting some fantasy shots in the autumn, but discovered they did not creating exciting or bright enough shots. We therefore decided to use the opportunity of when it snowed to shoot some fantasy shots. They ended up working fantastically and with the bright sun reflecting off of the snow, creating bright shots. It was also a great juxtaposition, having shots from the summer and then shots of the winter.

I researched in to other album covers when creating my own. I picked three album covers of different genres, to see the way in which the covers reflected the genre. By analysing other album covers, it made me much more aware of small detail on my album cover. It also reminded me of the fact that I needed to reflect the genre of my music video and that I needed to appeal to my target audience. I used Ellie Goulding’s album cover for inspiration, as I decided to use glitter- of which she uses on hers. I feel as though it reflects the fantasy aspect of our music video perfectly. It also draws attention to the album- appealing more audiences. The glitter adds to the femininity of the song and music video, appealing to our feminine target audience. I have decided to use photographs of Dalia and not Fraser, as she is the main character of our music video. I also felt it was appropriate with adding to the elegance and femininity of our final product as a whole.The back of the album cover represents the fantasy, a shot of Dalia jumping in the air, with glitter pouring next to her. The camera is focussed on the glitter and Dalia is slightly blurred in the background. This suggests that she is not really in a fantasy land and it is all her imagination and the glitter represents her reality (which is why it is in focus).

Although my CD cover reflects the genre and target audience, it is much more mysterious than my music video. I wanted to show Dalia’s two different sides- her domestic violent lifestyle and her fantasy imagination- however, I did not want this to be clear on the CD cover. I therefore just used two very different shots of Dalia without making it obvious what these shots reflect. I felt it was important to leave the theme of domestic violence as a mystery, making the music video much more exciting.

For my advert, I decided to use a photo of Dalia face down, giving no eye contact to the camera. This connotes her lack in confidence and vulnerability. The lack of eye contact also adds mystery to the advert, leaving audiences questioning what she is looking at. The reason for having a photograph of Dalia looking down, is because it connotes her looking down on her realistic 'domestic violence' character, from her new fantasy life that she has created. It gives audiences a glimpse of the character of our music video and certain traits she may have. I have used plain colours: grey, black and white. My reason for this is because I feel it creates a classy feel to the advert and I want the advert to reflect Audience For The Promise Club's classy and respected music. The plain colours are also a metaphor for Dalia's dull life, being involved in a violent relationship. So although she is looking down on her realistic life and is in her happy fantasy land, she can never escape her violent boyfriend.
For the advert, I have used an Italic font. This also adds to the classiness of the advert. It also gives the advert and album cover a much more personal feel to it, as it looks as though it could be handwritten. This will make the audience feel as though the album is personal to them.

Overall, I feel that the combination of our final production and my ancillary texts was very effective. The ancillary texts reflect all aspects of the final production and they both represent the target audience and genre. I thought it was very important that they both portrayed the same message to audiences. However, the ancillary texts do differ from the final production, creating an exciting sense of mystery to the audience.

Advert

I have used this image for my CD advert as I felt it was very powerful. I have used the Rule Of Thirds for this image, with Dalia being in the middle third. This means that she dominates the whole image. The title is also central, drawing the audiences eyes straight to it. I have used an image of Dalia looking down, as it connotes her lack of confidence (she is not able to give the audience eye contact). I have used the same font that I used for my album cover, for the same reason that it is elegant and gives it a personal feel.

CD Cover

Back Cover

Front Cover

Inside

I have used glitter in two shots of my album, this is because I feel that it represents a feminine feel. I was inspired by Florence and The Machine, who also have a lead female singer. They use a lot of glitter in a number of their music videos. I decided to apply this to my album cover, as I wanted it to have an elegant appearance and to show its femininity. Here are two examples of Florence and The Machine music videos that use glitter:

I used Florence and The Machine as an influence, as they are such a worldwide success.

Font ideas

I experimented with several font ideas for my CD cover:

I have experimented with a variety of fonts here. My reasoning for doing this was because I wanted to create the most effective font as possible. I could only decide which would work best by visualising them and drawing out my different ideas. I have annotated each design, stating what they connote and whether I feel they will work on my album cover. I found that the elegant and feminine fonts worked best, however the blunt and robotic designs did create a powerful and striking image. I decided I really liked the handwritten design, as it would give a personal feel to my album cover. So I decided to combine both the elegant and feminine designs with the handwritten one. This was my final font choice

CD advert research

Laura Marling

This album cover is very plain, it states when the album is being released and contains a photograph of the album itself. However, it uses very plain colours, mainly white. This makes the advert less appealing and quite dull. They have used two different fonts, one very plain, the other quite feminine and floaty. I think it would have looked more effective if the whole album was in the feminine font, as it gives the advert a personal feel and relates to the fact that Laura Marling is a female folk singer.

The Killers

This advert draws your attention, it is very colourful and bold. The font is very bold and it is all written in capital letters, making it stand out more. The font gives off a masculine feel, this is achieved by the bold font. However, the light purple colour used is quite dominant and this colour can be seen as feminine. The advert therefore successfully appeals to both males and females.

Beyonce

This is a whole page glossy magazine advert for Beyonce ‘I am SashaFierce’ album. The image is a photograph of Beyonce in a couture costume. most of the photograph is in black and white apart from the artists eyes and the main part of the costume. The black and white makes the advert feel classy and glamorous, which are two words that could be used to describe Beyonce as an artist. The  advert breaks a lot of conventions by not saying the name of the artist or the date in which the album is going to be released, it just merely states the name of the album. This is because Beyonce is such a worldwide well known artist that people know exactly who she is just from seeing an image of her. I have applied this idea to my advert, as I am not going to put the release date on it. I will just state the artist and album name. I have done this because it makes the advert feel much more personal and exciting.