Blog Reflection 8

What have you been doing this week ?

This week we was adding the last pieces of work which is involved in the pre-production stage of the advanced portfolio, throughout this week me and my partner had collaborated to finish the work.
My role in this week, according to the job roles, was to produce a shot list,  production schedule and the recci shots.
These two documents are vital to our filming, because it is what we are filming as well as where we are filming.
And then towards the latter stages of the week my partner had produced a Digipak flat plan and Magazine advert flat plan.

What were your main decisions and revisions you have made ?

The main decisions which we had to make this week was during the process of making our shot list and production schedule. This is because it would be based on what will be actually our music video shots, therefore we had to put a lot of thought process into it. Also our production schedule was crucial to get the dates right because time is not on our side to produce a music video and we felt we needed to be very realistic and focus on the filming dates. As well as these two pieces of work, all the other work produced this week such as the recci shots, Digipak and Magazine advert flat plan are also very crucial. The flat plans being important because this is what our product will look like, and the key decisions we made are all embedded in our final product, such as colour theme etc.

Digipak Flatpan

Magazine Advertisement Flatplan

Shot List

Production Schedule

Recci Shots

Recci Shots

Here are some idea's for locations to use for our music video, and some finalised ideas which we will definitely be using in our music video. Of course the locations need to be suitable and easily accessible therefore our choices have been based on these factors. Of course being a gym song, a prime location which we will have to use is of course a gym. There are many gyms which are accessible to us. We have chosen three Gym's in fact, because of various reasons. One of the reasons is that the facilities at each gym are very different, for example one of our gyms is purely a kick boxing and boxing gym. Here is an in depth picture of our choices for the gym scenes:

Lions Den Gym:

This is the first location we will be using, this gym is not a very expensive or updated gym with the newest equipment. However this is the image which we wish to conduct because I believe the song is of weightlifting and that these locations are shown in a more male orientated gym which is more likely to be very jam packed with weights. I have used this location before in another assessment and it had gone very well and smooth with no complications. Also this is my local gym which I have a membership for therefore it will be easily accessible. 

Seven Kings Gurdwara Gym:

This is the second location which we have chosen, mainly because it relates to the target audience of our product. Our artists originally are Asian, and getting some footage in a Sikh gym will identify the right target market. Also we can use many aspects of this for humour, as one of us is a member of the Sikh community and know a lot of people from the Gurdwara therefore they can be used for our acting. Meaning that this location is very easily accessible for us due to the ties we have with the Sikh community.

School Gym (Chadwell Heath):

Finally for our final gym location, is our very local school gym. Of course the accessibility will definitely not be a problem for us as we attend school everyday and have access to the gym in most days. But another reason behind choosing this location is that I believe the equipment is better than the other gyms for some scenery, therefore we have chosen this. If it had been far and very hard to gain access then this location would not have been chosen, however because it is so close and will look better I believe we have chosen the right decision in choosing three different locations.

Goodmayes Park:

We have chosen an outdoor venue to use for some scenes. A park is very often seen in many motivational music videos, we wish to show our character running in this setting. The park is not very far and is open at respectable hours, of course shut when it does get dark. Also we will not need any permission to film at all therefore I believe this will be a good setting for our outdoor scenery.

House:

The locations I will be using in my house would be my living room. This is to get access to my TV and computer which are both needed for some specific shots. Of course it being my home it will be very easy to access it and for my partner it Is not far from school at all therefore for both of us it is very easy to access and can be accessed at almost any time.  The living room will not be too flashy because  UK rap videos arn't associated to having videos which showboat very big and flashy houses, in fact it is the opposite. 

Blog Reflection 7

What have you been doing this week ?

This week we completed our final treatment, this is a document of all our final ideas after mending from feedback we received and also taking time to think of some more ideas.
The feedback we received was from our focus group which we also conducted in the same week in order to get a better view on who our audience is etc.
We played the focus group the song at first, and asked them their thoughts on the song. We then asked the audience in more depth about the song, whether they like it and who the ideal audience would be etc. The feedback had really helped us and our treatment is all carved in a way which meats all aspects of the feedback received from our focus group.

What key concept have you been focusing on ?

Our focus group was mainly to get a better view of the audience concept of our song. We wanted them to define the perfect audience, so that we could then match the characteristics they associate with the song to the audience we are aiming for in our treatment.

TREATMENT

 Artist:

The artist that we are working for is PMG (Pure Music Generals), they are a group of young men who produce music together.
The representation that they have is a positive representation to the audience as their music is suitable for most ages as their music is about keeping healthy and taking care of your body, not the usual topics such as; sex, drinking alcohol and drugs etc.

 

Audience:

Our audience will be based on 18-30 year old men; we believe that this age group can relate most to the song. This is because they will be able to understand the lyrics, as well as relate to them. They also will idolise the artists as they are very well portrayed men in the video who look to be very masculine. Our Feedback told us that the men will be the firm target audience; however parts of our feedback do reveal that Women may even be interested in this. The song can be interpreted into a different type of genre song such as a dancing upbeat song which then does not segregate the women anymore. We know our audience will most likely use this song for motivation therefore they will be men or even women who often go to the gym or aspire to go the gym often. PMG are a group of British Asian artists, therefore the ethnicity of our audience does straight away draw attention to the Asian background. However our audience is not based on Ethnicity as much therefore the other ethnicity's such as White and black will not be left out as long as they are British they will be able to still relate. Overall our target audience is based at Males aged 18 and over, who normally go to the gym or are looking to get fit and in shape. They will wear tracksuits and t-shirts to the gym along with the ideal running shoes. Our Digipak, magazine advert and music video will most likely portray all this things at once, however it may segregate a few characteristics such as women being able to listen this or people that do not go the gym.

 

 

 

 

 

Our Vision:

Plan for the music video and products;

The costume of our artist would usually be very casual wearing jogging bottoms, trainers, hoodies and t shirts while at the gym or with friends, but his costume would change with the location, for example; he would dress smarter for parties; wearing jeans and a shirt.

The props that we would be using would be gym equipment such as dumbbells, barbells, weight machines, punch bags and cardio machines, using these props would match our song as it is about going to the gym and the first thing that comes to mind when we say gym is “weights” but we also think of famous movies such as Rocky, as one of the movies conventions is the training montage.

The magazine advert and digipak synergy that we’re going to create Is using the same logo for each product, also the artist branding would be kept the same keeping the continuity as when the audience has seen one product, having the same colour scheme and logo and artist representation would show all the products are linked to that artist/group.

We’re going to go against the conventions of a rap music video and try and make our music video humorous, as this is a gym song we have drafted ideas such as using gym fails from You Tube in our music video (inspired by "Ghetts" music video), have women lifting more than some of the men (going against stereotypes that men are stronger than women) and also have skinny males tensing their muscles in the mirror taking photographs (focus group). Our main thoughts for the music video is to make it as funny as possible by showing all the things you should do in the gym etc.

This would all link to the artist’s representation…

Technology:

The technology that we will be using throughout the main production stage would be a camcorder (SD card), as this is what we’ll be using to record our footage, we would attach the camcorder to a tripod for steadier shots, we also have access to a green screen that would allow us to super impose images/videos onto the screen, this would make the gym fail idea possible. During the editing stages we would be using the iMacs to edit our music video together, using final cut to create a seamless music video, but also to add special effects.

 

Logistics:

At the moment we are still in discussion about various locations to film our music video. One of the obvious locations which we will have to film in is a gym. Now whether we choose an accessible gym and get the footage done or try and get a less accessible gym to make our video more effective is a very big decision which we still have to make. However the gym is one way or another sorted as a location and my two local gyms are more than welcome for us to use as I have used them both on previous occasions for some Media footage.  Another location which we are in discussion about is a park, this is a very easy location to choose. As we live in an era where there is almost a park or land full of grass within 10 minutes. I believe even if we would like to make the video more effective and put more effort into it we could choose parks which are well known for example a park like Hyde park. Even this park will take no permission to use to film our product.

Along with our desired locations I believe we will need the right time of the day and the right weather in some cases. For instance with our idea to use a park as a location, we will need good weather or else the camera work may be very shaky and will ruin the quality of the work. And as for the gym we need to organise our time so that it is not so busy we hardly get to use any equipment and that we can also experiment along with the place and try to make it look better in the video without making a hassle.

Audience Research on PMG Gym anthem

To gain a better idea on our audience I created a survey based on our chosen song " PMG- Gym Anthem". I used Survey Monkey to do the survey, as people can answer the questions online. My survey consisted of 10 questions overall which are about my chosen song itself, the representation of the song and artists, and about possible conventions we can use when re filming a video for this song. Out of our 10 songs I have analysed the most important which outline how the audience feel about the song and what they expect to see in the song.

We asked a census of 16-20 year old to answer our survey, all with different characteristics themselves. Meaning we had male and females of different ages, preferences and backgrounds. The feedback we received when asking them about the genre they would associate with the song, 75% of the 24 people which had done the survey said that "Rap" is the genre which they would associate. Due to their being one or more option allowed a lot of people had chosen rap and grime and this is evident due to the fact the percentages do not add up to 100%. Rap gained 50% from the audience which they think associates with this song

genres such as "R&B", "Hip-Hop" and "Pop" are all anomalies to the research.  

Overall I believe this is the right response because even when we chose the song we thought the genres were submerged within Rap and Grime. The representation of these two genres are normally of young artists, who are of an urban background. Normally based in the urban areas of their country. This is the same representation as our artists, and as our audience have acknowledged that we believe that this question has been useful because now they will know what to expect in the video.

The data above shows what age people associated with the song. A large sector of the feedback had said that this is most suited for 16-18 year olds. Another large sector being of course 11-16, with the ages of 18+ both being anomalies. This is very vital feedback for us because of course we initially had our target group down for a much older audience, mainly around the 19-30 age group. Now that we have received this feedback it now shows us that the census are in fact a little younger than we had thought. This makes our approach to the music video a lot more trendy, and more vibrant.

 

 

 

 

 

The whole population of my feedback had said that they listen to their music on YouTube. Some of them then went on to select TV, which gathered 40 % of the toll and then Internet(Radio websites) being the less favoured gathered less than 20 %.  This backs up the other questions answered, such as the age group for this work. This is because the younger generation are more technology wise, and will most likely use their technologically converged devices such as a Smart phone to view their songs on YouTube. Overall this information has given me more of an establishment that the audience for this song are people who are familiar with technology and again it outlines that the audience are most likely of the young generation.

 

After asking what characteristics they feel is typical of this genre, i received a variety of answers. They vary due to the fact some may be confused on what the genre is or maybe have different perceptions on the genre. Either way the feedback is very useful, the characteristics which were said on more than one occasions were; having female in the video, fast/high tempo beat and confidence. As well as this there was useful information on how they expect the camera work to be like, for example " fast paced shots". This is a great response because in fact although they are only giving feedback on the artist it shows they know what will be in the video, and that helps us fulfil their expectations.

 





 

Knowing that our artist had produced this song as a one off at the start, we knew there wouldn't be much comparisons to be made. However our feedback has helped us acknowledge the similar artists to PMG. For example "So solid crew" were twice said to be similar. This could be for the tempo style of both music groups or that the genre is very similar. We did get the often artist comparison in our feedback we thought was drastic such as " Dappy, lonely island", however it is very easy to see where they are coming from. Because this is music which young people listen to and that they can relate. As well as the fact both artists mainly rap which PMG do in their song.

 And finally the most realistic I believe so was Tempa T, they are very similar because the music is of similar topics, such as gym and being angry etc. Also in the following clip it shows Tempa T doing a workout with PMG members, and so the comparison will be made because they have previous media history together.

 

 

Overall this feedback has been very valuable and has helped me create a factsheet for my ideal member of the audience for this song. All of the feedback gathered was merged to make this fictional character, and he inhabits the characteristics which were made by the evaluation of the feedback received.

 

 

Magazine Analysis

Music video Analysis 3

Blog Reflection 6

What have you been doing this week ?

This week we had been asked to analyse three types of media products;
*Music videos
* Digipak
* Magazine advert
We had to analyse this with out partners, and we had to give at least 3 examples of our analyzing each media product. We were asked to make job roles also, which me and my partner had done initially late however luckily enough before we started analyzing these media products. Due to us completing the job roles, we had followed the table and I had analysed 3 music videos. We also co-operated for our digipak analysis, and my partner had done the Magazine adverts himself. Within the analysis we had related how it will affect our own media products and how we will look to change or make stuff the same.

 

What were the main decisions and revisions you have made?

Our job roles define what we have to do and who will do it, we had to decide what we were going to do separately and together. I believe deciding these were not only one main decision because there are many things which we decided on therefore the key decisions we made this week was deciding who will be doing what.

Music Video Analysis 2

Focus group and Evaluation of "PMG Gym Anthem" - Audience research

 

From our focus group we have gathered some positive and negative feedback. All the participants had given the strong side to the song we have chosen. As well as giving a fair opinion with negative responses and things which we can improve on. They also were given an insight in how our product will look and asked for their opinion.

(0:30-0:40)- When asked about their first thoughts on the song, we had been given a very good response. They had told us first that it is a "very motivating" song, this was of course an aspect which we are very happy was noticed because then now our video will be associated as "motivating", which is one of our aims for the genre of this project. When talking about the beat, it was described as "upbeat" and "work out song". Meaning the focus group had got the right picture of what the song is about and therefore now may have a better picture on how they want the video to look, hence we asked them this question first. 

(0:41-1:05)- After gathering their thoughts on the song we asked them what characteristics they would think of when hearing this song, their reply were ; " weights, shoes , running trainers ". We then asked more in depth on these characteristics and what they'd expect the artist in the video to wear. The response consisted of "tracksuits, hoods, casual clothing, trainers". We initially wanted this response because the costume aspect of our project is more or less the things which our focus group had described anyway. Therefore this was a positive response because what they would expect the artists in the video to be wearing will be what is in the video it self.

(1:30-1:45)- Before asking for our initial ideas, we asked more about the focus groups characteristics themselves. Most of them agreed that their favourite genre of music is "house music" due to the fact you can dance to it. This also gave us some very positive feed because when I conducted my previous focus group on my idea the response had been that this song has got a dancing feel to it and it can be played in parties. Also we asked them whether they can associate any other artists with this act, they told us that it does relate to a lot of rap artists. One specifically being Krept and Konan. 

(1:47-2:30)- The people in our focus group were all aged 17-18. When asked whether they feel this song is of their age group, they replied " yes" very assertively. This tells us that we have chosen the right target audience for our project. To support this we had asked a middle aged woman to say whether she felt this was of her age group, she replied with no and this is what her children would listen to, and also gave us an age group of 18-21+. Therefore we can conclude that the age group associated with this song is around 18-30, this is a  positive response due to the fact that we had already set out to design this to that specific age group anyway. 

(2:32-3:12)- We also asked where they listen to their music, mostly they said it was on music channels. We asked them whether they would change the channel if this came on and they replied with no and that it is a catchy tune therefore it would stay on. Also when asked about how motivating the song actually was they replied with a boundary of around 7-8 on the scale of 10 being the most motivational. Therefore again we have a positive response about the song, which sets our platform when designing the music video and gives us assurance our perception of the song is right. 

However they did give some negative responses on the song saying that the lyrics are not clear enough and are a bit fuzzy. Therefore this gives us the impression that in our video we need to lip sync them perfectly and also go about the lyrics more soundly so that the audience can get a better understanding of the lyrics.

(3:15-3:38)- Our focus group had already told us that they know its a gym song, therefore we didn't need to ask their opinion on whether that should be a location, however when asked what location should be in the video we received responses to do "more outdoor scenes", like "parks" and "on the street running". 

(03:40- 4:14)- The idea of bullying being the narrative was put across, was approved of and they thought it could be a good idea, however it was said to be of a more emotional subject and that this song was upbeat. But this response will help us think of more innovative ideas when planning the location and the narrative scenes in our film. 

(4:16- 4:30)Finally we started to conclude with our ideas, we told them that our theme of the music video will be of a parody. They seemed to agree with this style more than the bullying concept therefore they give us more confidence to carry on doing the parody style. When we told them one of our idea,  of the women being more stronger they had agreed with this and felt that it would be very funny.

We did receive some critical responses however, and when asked what we could improve on our ideas, they did give us some very good feedback. One idea they gave us, (4:35) -"was skinny guys taking pictures of them selves in the mirror". Since hearing this idea we straight away were appealed with it and decided to go ahead with it because even we find it very funny and relevant for our project and so did the focus group therefore it is a win-win situation. One of other great advice we received was at (4:45) "to not make it serious" and to keep it light hearted and it would appeal to them. Keeping the concept of the video light hearten video was a main convention we wish to use, and further backing on this had made us very confident on our project. 

(5:18) One negative we also received was that the females felt the song is more male dominated, but they also had said they would still listen to it and they do enjoy the song. On the other side another positive they gave us was that they believe our idea is great and think it is funny. This gives us again enormous confidence to go ahead with our ideas.

Overall the focus group has been tremendously helpful, we have received approval of our ideas. We also have received some ideas which have come across from the focus group. Ideas such as "skinny guys posing in the mirror", and some better settings such as more "outdoor" scenery. We received positive feedback on both our ideas and song. After gathering the responses from the focus group we feel extremely confident with our idea and it has made us more wary of what we need to improve and that the good ideas we have we need to emphasise on them and make them as good as they can be.

Amalgamate Ideas

Here is a link of many images which relate towards our artist, things such as music artists, food, the type of magazines , the type of clothes etc. All these relate to the target audience and they are characteristics which our ideal target audience who will listen to our artist PMG may share. This will all give a more clear picture on who are target market is and what they like.
http://www.pinterest.com/satveerd/gym-anthem/

Music Video Analysis 1

Blog Reflection Week 5

 

 

 

What have you been doing this week ?

In this week I had shown my class, my ideas for my music video. It was all shown in a PowerPoint my pitch. I had shown them firstly the song which I have chosen, and parts of the music video. Later I moved on to the potential location, and ideas which I will use in the music video. I also showed them what type of equipment I would be using to make the music video.
After I had finished my PowerPoint I gained some feedback and evaluated it, I tried to categorized what they said was good and bad as well as take down a note of the things they say which I could improve.

What key decisions did you make this week?

There was not many decisions to go through with this week, however of course there was many potential key decisions such as the locations I picked for my ideas and the actual ideas I picked. These are potential key decisions because they maybe what my end product will feature.

Blog Reflection 4

What have you been doing this week ?

This week I have been conducting a questionnaire as part of my audience research which is designed to help my understand my audience. I was also meant to design my ideal audience member however have not done this due to restricted time to collect all the feedback received from my questionnaire. This is because my ideal amount of feedback has not even be reached and I believe till I get more feedback then can I evaluate my ideal member.

What key concept have you been focusing on?

This week it is very safe to say I was focusing on solely my audience concept of the music video. this is because I was conducting my questionnaires for them and to get a better understanding as to who actually is my ideal audience. This will help me and inspire me because when I do eventually do my music video I can relate all the aspects of the music video to the audience and so that they can relate. As well as this I can get a feel as to who likes the type of song and their characteristics so my video can be more effective to the audience and I can base the video on them.

Styles and Coventions of Music Videos

Performance:

This is an example of what some performance style music video may look like, although their are different conventions within the video this is a great example of a Performance style music video.
The video mostly consists of the two artists performing at a concert. Very simply their concert has been filmed, however this is a style which many people feel is effective in getting an insight to the artists themselves. They learn about the artists by their body language, and after seeing the footage of how they perform the song people may actually get a different feeling to the song and feel as if this is the real meaning and mood to the song. For example this video shows that this song is a party song and happy and hyped mood song, Jay-z and Kanye West portray that by their performance because they are dancing as well where as if it was a mellow and quiet song it will most likely show the artist sitting down rather than being active and hyper like the two artists are in this video.
This video also shows the audience that the concerts are as lively as this, and it is almost an eye opener for their fans. Because now they may see the performance style video and feel as if they should witness this also and feel as if they are part of the song like the video audience was.

Narrative

This video shows the Artist hopeless and very lonely in the scenery of New York at times, it later shows a girl who has left him. The video also shows how he feels very low without her. The narrative style of a music video is to almost explain the song in a short film or to act it out for a few minutes. And this video has matched the definition of a performance style video very well, the artist was in fact singing of how lonely he feels and how his life is changing for the worse due to his partner leaving him.  The video portrays this exceptionally, it also gives the audience a feel to the song. As the actor is depressed and looks torn apart in the video therefore I believe the audience get an insight of the song's meaning and the mood to it. This will also enable the audience to see the actual action of the film rather than just hear it, and this is why I believe Narrative style of music video is good because it involves the audience more as they are watching the song acted out as well as hearing it.

Interpretative

The style of the video is when the audience can guess and associate with the lyrics and song, interpretative style speaks for it self as the video will be exactly of the definition of Interpretative. The word defines to help understand the meaning of something. In this video the lyrics match exactly the actions. For example in the video the female actor is mainly shown in the manner she is described in the song by the artist. This is a very basic way to perform a music video however it is a love song and it will be easier to understand and more "romantic" in a sense. However an audience will not prefer to see this type of mood to a song in every one of the videos, because it can get overdone and ruin the song for people only because the video is very basic and interpretative.

Impressionist

This video is a prime example of an impressionist style video. If you go through the whole video you will not see one lyric which has been synced, or one appearance of the artist. Therefore it is safe to say that there the video really has no relevance to the lyrics of the song. This is completely the opposite of what the expectation from the genre Hip-hop/R&B music video will produce. There are brutal images, however at times some nice scenery. Traditionally you would see two lovers or sexual scenes but in this video there are brutal images of blood and throwing up. Going against this representation of the two genres could possibly be a publicity stunt for the video to bring more attention to it, or it means there is an inside meaning to the song. Either way I don't think for my song that it would be suitable to use a music video style which doesn't have any relevance to the song because it will make the video ineffective.

Animation

This song is an example of a Narrative video used by Kanye West a Hip-hop and Rap artist. Although in the video the imagery it is all animated, it is almost a narrative styled music video as well. This is because it is a small story in the video and everything is relating to what is being said in the lyrics. The main animated character is the original artist Kanye West himself, and I believe that this style of music video shows that the song is not the only art produced by the artists that in fact the music video is also a piece of art. And I think that the audience will react positively to this different style, because it is the same expectations of the genre in the video but it is animated which makes it more entertaining and humorous at times. Animation can produce humour in a music video, and I firmly believe that it would be a very good style to use for my music video however then the seriousness of the song will be taken away and I feel it wont be as motivating. Therefore I will not use this style definitely although it is so effective in entertaining people.

Intertextuality-

 This song made by Trey Songz is actually the sound-track of the film Step-up 3d. In the music video it shows shots of the actual film, this of course promotes the film it self. Step up themselves having this song as their track list obviously means it is at some points in their song, therefore both Trey Songz and Step up are being promoted in this video. This will enlighten the Step up fans of Trey songz and vice versa for the fans of Trey Songz. Even though it is very effective, I don't believe this will work for us as our song has no other media product to relate to other than the original music video itself. Also this style does not suit the genre of our music, Rap.

On the whole I believe that evaluating this styles has made me more familiar to how music videos work and how to grab the audience and many other things. It has also drawn me to a conclusion for the final styles I will consider using, of course they all are effective at their best however for my style of song and to suit the genre I believe I can only use the Performance and Narrative style. I will also love to mix it up with a few parody conventions to generate humour.

 

Thrift shop Mash Up

PowerPoint Presentation of Pitching my idea

Job roles

Blog Reflection 3

What have you been doing this week ?

Throughout this week I was experimenting what song I could use and which would be the most effective to use for a music video. Initially I made a decision to use the song PMG - Gym anthem. Which then led me onto ask for permission which was granted later on the week and these turned out to be key decisions of the week and certainly a key decision in terms of my potential advanced portfolio. 

 

What key concept have you been focusing on ?

After evaluating my song and the type of song genre it was, I concluded to look at the narrative first. And I made a decision a main element of narrative it would be was of a performance genre because it would be hard to do anything else and performance matches the song choice very well. I also choice another sub genre of Parody as my own way of originality to the music video and to add my own twist to the music video.