Blog Reflection Six

One of the slides from our digipak
analysis

This week we had been analysing existing products (Magazine Adverts, Music Videos and Digipaks) so that we could look at the use of images, text and the conventions of each product and then later apply them to our own work when we're creating our own products for the chosen unsigned artist. The way that my partner and I had shared out the work on our job roles document was that we would split the Digipak analysis, I would analyse magazine adverts, and my partner would analyse music videos. This had been a tough week as I had analysed the wrong kind of magazine adverts, I had analysed cosmetic products rather than music products, although this error was rectified. 

The main hurdle for this piece of work was finding products to analyse, as I had to do alot of research to find these products as there is not many images of Digipaks or magazine adverts available online, although in the end I had found products that I was happy to analyse.

Magazine Advert Analysis

DigiPak Analysis

Music Video Analysis

Blog Reflection Five

The job role document for my
partner and I.

This week is the first week where we had worked with our partners, We had distributed the job roles evenly, keeping in mind our strengths and weaknesses. Then we had to decide what song we were going to use, and after a long discussion with Akif about what we could do with each song, we had chosen his song, "Gym Anthem" by the Pure Music Generals. . After deciding we had shortlisted a few styles that we would use and what we would stay away from, we had decided to stay away from surrealism and animation, as they didn't suit our song choice, we had shortlisted the following styles; Narrative, Performance (Direct Address to the camera) and pastiche/homage (parody/humour). We had created a questionnaire for our audience about our joint ideas, and what they liked/disliked, and had also conducted a focus group researching the same things. The first task we had to do was analyse three music videos, magazine adverts and digipaks, as we would be creating them later on in the project and this research was critical. So overall this week was mostly researching about audience and analysing existing products.  

My Ideal Audience Member

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 we'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.

Blog Reflection Four

Me pitching my idea to the class.

This week we had all individually pitched our ideas about our chosen songs, we had identified who we were targeting, the locations that we would film, possible actors(cast), what our initial ideas were for the music video. This pitch had to be detailed so I had to make some important decisions about what where I was going with the music video and I had to decide what elements I wanted to include, and also how I was going to show different emotions on camera, such as have a couple on camera to show they're together and in love with bright lighting and have a more busy environment, with dull lighting when their relationship is challenged. 

After conducting the pitch we used a focus group to gather feedback on the ideas pitched, and conducting the focus group allowed us to channel the ideas and get additional suggestions about how I could expand on my idea and what they believe would work, and giving me feedback on how they think the artist would look, while giving me an initial idea of who I should cast.

Pinterest Board for "PMG - Gym Anthem"

We had created a Pinterest Board for our chosen song, and it shows pictures of things that would be associated with our target audience, such as clothing, artists they listen to and shops they would shop in.
Click the hyperlink to view our Pinterest Board;

http://www.pinterest.com/satveerd/gym-anthem/

Pre-Production Music Video Pitch/Focus Group/Evaluation

I had created this powerpoint about my chosen song Da Poe - Girl For You, It has my brief ideas, my tweet sent to the artist, link to the song, a little bit about the artist although I couldn't find much, target audience and possible locations.

My Pitch:

My Focus Group - Feedback on the Pitch

I think the main weakness of my pitch was that It was very broad and wasn't explained in detail, I think that instead of mentioning the Rihanna and Drake video, I should have played it, turned the volume down and talked over the video, to show exactly what my ideas are. I think that on my powerpoint I could have added more text as this would allow me to speak in greater detail. I have thought of different ideas after I have given this pitch, I have thought deeper into the lyrics and have thought that I could have a narrative of the main character cheating on his girlfriend, and this would divert the music video into a more serious video, like the "N-Dubz - Playing With Fire" music video, where it has each member of the crew cheating on their partners in different locations and eventually they all get caught. 

I think that the focus group was successful as it had given me a idea of the characteristics/artist brand, as i had gained the following feedback and ideas;
(00:58 - 01:16) I had also said that the relationship status would have an effect on the "energy" of the shot, so If the relationship is going well, the shot will be calm and peaceful and when the relationship changes and gets rougher the shots will get more busy and have more people in the shot so that It is harder to place these two people together, connoting that the couple are drifting apart to the audience.
(06:10) I would like my artist to have the characteristics of Eminem who isn't afraid to make a fool out of himself in music videos, as this builds the impressions that he doesn't care what anyone else thinks, and we had also established the look of my artist would be similar to Dappy in that he would wear snapbacks backwards. To conclude the main characteristics would be an unique character, who sets their own trends and represents where their from in this instance urban working class.

Since this pitch I have thought about my idea into greater depths, such as moving away from making the music video cheesey towards a more serious meaning, that maybe some of the female members of the audience could appeal to.

Lyrics Analysis

Target Audience:
Age: 16-21
Gender: Typically Males
Interests: Relationships, Rap music
Location: South-East London (England)

How I would make this a music video:
I think that when producing my music video I think that the song would fit a performance/narrative style, as the lyrics tell a story about a guy and his commitment to his girlfriend, and how he wants to spend the rest of his life with her.

My vision is to have my artist performing in a studio, on a black screen, singing into a recording microphone, in the streets and sitting on a wall, but this will be small areas that will be cut to, the main body of the music video, I see the visuals interpreting the lyrics, having a couple sitting in the park, and flashbacks to where he met the girl. Although, the song could also be about cheating looking deeper into the lyrics these could be some excuses that he is saying to another girl. Using the alternative narrative could be added as a surprise at the end of the music video as it is not something we could be expecting and then this would add rewatchability to the composition. 

Throughout the song there is a "clap" sound, Whenever I hear this I imagine a cut to the next scene so the tempo of the song is reasonably quick, the "clap" sound isn't consistent in some parts of the song, but this means that some scenes could be longer also following my brainstorm of the alternative narrative each time the song has the "clap" sound it could crosscut to a different scene where he is with different girls. Towards the end of the song before the chorus repeats itself 6 times there is a relatively large break of approximately 15 seconds where we hear dead silence and this could be where he is caught as this breaks the tension that was built throughout the music video.

At the moment the I have a lot of different ideas about the style and content of this music video, the ideas above are a brief vision of mine, but I think the music video will be going in that direction.

Blog Reflection Three

This week we had looked at genre and representation theories and applied them to real music videos, we did this so that we could get an idea of what we could put into our own music videos, and how we could add greater meaning and depth to the composition. 

Firstly, we looked at genre theories and the following theorists;

- David Bordwell

- Steve Neale

They had thought of the following theories; Neale - "Genre as a system of orientations, expectations and conventions" He had said that this had circulated between Industry  and Text as a subject.

For example; When we think of rap videos we think of a few different conventions, such as wealth- artist wears a lot of jewelry and expensive, trendy clothing. Although some videos could go against this convention, such as Biggie Smalls - "Sky's The Limit" music video all of the rappers are wearing smart suits, and are in a mansion so this would go against the usual conventions, as they look more posh and upper class.

Bordwell - "Any theme may appear in any genre" - some music videos would include themes that apply to a more youthful audience, some of the themes could be; Rebellion, Romance, Sex and bullying. Having this genre theory could help my own production as this gives us more flexibility to what we could include, therefore we can convey different/more messages through our music video.

We had then looked at Representation theories, and looked at the following theorists and their theories;

- Stuart Hall: Encode/Decode

Stuart Hall had said that the media has evolved and how we read it had changed, the old view within the media had only one reading and meant only one thing, now the audience must investigate the media as it is open to interpretation. He had said that media could be read in three different ways;

Dominant Reading: The reader fully shares the texts code, accepts and reproduces the texts reading. 

Negotiated Reading: The reader partially agrees with the code of the text and broadly accepts the preferred reading, but the reader sometimes resists and modifies it in a way that reflects their own opinion.

Oppositional Reading: The reader doesn't agree with any of the texts codes and totally resists them.

- Laura Mulvey: The Male Gaze

Mulvey had argued that the "central active" characters in movies were male, and that the male audience, and the male audience look toward females as passive.

She had said that the practise of camera lighting on the bodies of females was strong evidence that females are being viewed as sex objects for the gratification of men. For example; James Bond, he is the main hero and it has become apart of his brand to be accompanied by/mission to save an attractive female. Identifying women as weaker in society, some movies that go against this theory are movies such as Lara Croft; Tomb Raider, and Kill Bill, where the female takes the lead and beats all of the men.

- Andrew Goodwin: Voyeurism

He had stated that voyeurism is present in many music videos, especially towards females but in terms of systems of looking; using screens within screens, cameras and mirrors. He argues that a female performer will be objectified through a combination of camera work, displaying exaggerated female body parts, making the female become more sexualised. From a males perspective voyeurism is used to boost the males ego by surrounding themselves by "physically fit"  female dancers.

Looking at these theories has given me a greater idea about the thought/planning that goes into music videos, and how the media strengthens some out-dated stereotypes to get their media products viewed and know. 

Job Roles for Music Video Project

Genre Theories

Neale's theory of genre as a system.
The Biggie Smalls music video of "Sky's the limit" had met my expectations of a hip/hop/rap video as the mise-en-scene was not conventional for the genre as Biggie Smalls and his friends were dressed in suits, carrying a cane, this shows us that he has a lot of money. This music video is slightly subverted as he isn't dressed in baggy sweats and is not on the streets. He is dressed looking suave, in a big house with a swimming pool, with girls- showing success as he's achieved his goals.  

Representation and Difference.
In the music video "all the small things" is from the rock genre and has some generic conventions of a rock video, such as the live performance element - with the guitarist on stage, but some of the elements on the video weren't conventional as they were mocking other boy bands, such as using sunset locations, tickling each other with flowers on the beach, standing under a waterfall and wearing bright clothing, usually this is not how rock stars behave. They have used a parody to add some humor to the video.


Bordwell's Genre Themes.
Using Bordwell's theory will give me more flexibility in the production of the music video as it will allow me to divert the themes/styles of the music video into many different directions and convey different messages, and I could make my music video in a style that isn't conventional of a usual rap music video, for instance surrealism.

Representation Theories

To understand representation in the media today we looked at three theories; Stuart Hall's Preferred reading, Laura Mulvey - The Male Gaze and Andrew Goodwin - Voyeurism. They had researched and created these theories about how audiences interpret certain representations. 

Stuart Hall - Preferred Reading Theory

Stuart Hall has looked into Old Views and New Views;

The old views were that information was resubmitted  there was only ONE fixed set of meanings, and that representations are understood after experiencing them. Now that the media is more complicated the views of representations are slightly different as now the audience investigate representations in greater detail, and can be interpreted in many different ways.

"The question of power can never be bracketed out of representation" - Stuart Hall

Stuart Hall had studied the way in which media text's are decoded; He had told us that it is decoded in three different ways;

Dominant Reading: The reader fully shares the text's code and accepts the preferred reading, the code seems "natural" and "transparent".

In the Miley Cyrus video, the dominant reading would be that she has just broken up from a relationship and she is broken, hurt and vulnerable. The destruction is represented by the wrecking ball, hammer and her vulnerability is shown through her nudity, the meaning of naked means "Without the usual covering or protection" - and in the Miley Cyrus video she is telling us that she has lost her protection through this breakup. A fan of Miley Cyrus would decode the text through a dominant reading as they would be loyal towards her, and feel her emotions of pain and vulnerability.

Negotiated Reading: The reader partly shares the text's code and broadly accepts the preferred reading, but resistis and modifies so that it reflects their own position, experiences and interests.

In the Miley Cyrus video the wrecking ball could symbolise her breaking her old image and breaking into this new wild character, and the destruction of the old good girl musician. When she is licking the hammer this could be a symbolic of sexual activities, again showing us that she has changed from this good girl to this wild, carefree "rock chick".

Oppositional Reading: The complete opposite of the dominant representation, the preferred reading is  understood but they do not accept the text's code and they reject this reading.

This is the reading that I personally believe for Miley Cyrus' music video, Wrecking Ball  I believe that is is a publicity stunt to get more publicity, as in media there is "no such thing as bad publicity", she was dressed in very revealing clothing at the VMA's, while dancing sexually with Robin Thicke, and in the Wrecking Ball video nudity had spread vast word of mouth promotion getting hundreds of million views on her new album/song.

Laura Mulvey - The Male Gaze

Laura Mulvey Argued that males are the "central active characters" in media text's, and that women are seen as passive. For example; James Bond is the hero, always with an attractive female, usually wearing revealing clothing. She had also argued that the camera staying on the women's bodies was strong evidence that women are seen as sex objects for the gratification of men.




 




Andrew Goodwin - Voyeurism

 

Voyeurism is present in may different music videos for Males and Females, usually through systems of looking, for instance; screens within screens, cameras and mirrors. We had created a "frankenstein" image to demonstrate voyeurism as Goodwin argued that a female would be objectified through camerawork and editing, by highlighting certain areas of their body, creating a sexualised image for the star. For males this is different as they are made to look more powerful, by surrounding themselves with female dancers to boost their own persona. This theory can become more complex as when we see the male body on display and we may raise questions about how the female viewers are invited to respond, and also in some media texts the female role is sexual but the female is shown as powerful, this raises some intersting points for discussion, but coming away from the sexualised views, movies such as Kill Bill show the female lead (Uma Thurman) to be powerful as she defeats many men in combat.