Brief – A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with these two ancillary texts –
- A cover for its release as part of a CD six panelled digipak.
- A magazine advertisement for the digipak.
For my media coursework I have chosen to produce a promotional media pack of my product using the Twee Pop genre as my main house style.
My products are a music video, a poster which promotes the release of a six panelled digipak and the six panelled digipak itself.
The genre I have used is Twee Pop (1886) which originated from bubblegum indie pop. The style needs an active audience as it references the ideology of the postmodern consumer society that we are. The conventions of Twee Pop are made up from individual ideas that express one persons thoughts, feelings and their own ideologies. With influences from Punk Rock for the stylistic ideas and nostalgic lyrics that have a quirky beat such as most of ‘The Smiths’ songs, the genre itself is a bricolage of creativity from the past that has been rolled up into one substantial idea in the present.
When presenting my work I used the internet, I used a website called ‘Blogger’ which is an online blog, it allows you to upload pictures, videos, graphs and writing. The pros of using this website is that it is neatly presented and dated for you so that my work is chronological. Along side this I also used the Google search engine to help me with my work. I researched my videos and information through it. Using YouTube to view videos and Wikipedia and official fan websites of artists I researched such as Gwen Stefani.
The music video contains my protagonist who is dressed to show the audience the quirky style that Twee pop is; She wears a floral white and red dress, pink shoes, curled blonde hair and rosy cheeks. Revealing the eccentricity and innocence of the character. This style also emulates celebrities such as Lilly Allen, Katy Perry and a modern day Marilyn Monroe, therefore challenging the conventions of original pop style music videos. My music video requires an active audience in order to understand and appreciate why my protagonist is dressed in that particular way.
In other scenes such as when my protagonist is laid on a pink bed, she wears multi-coloured polka dot pyjamas. Further challenging the audience as it uses the conventions of a chic-flick film rather then a music video. In the film ’13 going on 30’ (featuring Jennifer Garner) a scene similar to mine is used, in which the protagonist Jenna is dancing on a bed, in her pyjamas singing to ‘Love is a Battlefield’ by ‘Pat Benatar’. Although the reference is not direct, my scene is a pastiche of a chick flick in which reveals the idea of people singing in their own privacy.
See blog – 7/10/2010 – thirteen-going-on-30.
In comparison to a real media product, I would say that my music video lacks in different camera angles. Unfortunately this criticism means that my video lacks creativity and shot variation, therefore my video does not look as creative as I imagined. However, I would say that my video makes up for the camera work in other areas. I looked at ‘Peter Gabriel’s steam train’, the director of this music video uses mainly long shots, medium shots and wide shots, like my video. The style of my video is again similar to Gabriel’s music video because of the use of stop-motion.
Originally, my idea came from the song ‘What You Waiting For? – Gwen Stefani’. (2004, Interscope Records) This music video uses intertextual references to Alice In Wonderland, in which Gwen Stefani plays the protagonist Alice
Before filming my music video, I researched and planned. I researched the history of music and analysed a number of music videos. See analysed music videos 8/10/10 on blogger. After I did enough research to find strategies and ideas on music videos I began to base my initial idea. I then draw up a detailed storyboard explaining what was going on in the shot, the type of shot and the duration. After I did this I logged on to a computer that had a scanner installed and scanned my pictures onto my computer. I then logged into my blogger account and uploaded them.
Firstly, I rented a Canon MD25 video camera and a tripod.
I shot the chorus outside on a field that was essentially empty to give the audience the impression that it was a big space. Whilst filming I played the song and my protagonist sang along with the song so that the singing looked believable on the editing suite. However, as my protagonist was only in a dress and the weather was cold we filmed inside a house. This is when my ideas mostly changed. I used a variety of locations so that the audience felt close to the surroundings and the protagonist. See blog location list – 15/10/2010, and shooting list 16/10/2010.
After filming, I plugged a usb cable into video camera into the edit suite and extracted all of the footage so that I could start a new project and edit. Using Adobe premiere pro I began to edit my footage. I used a variety of tools including the razor tool so I could cut my clips and matrox media tools so that I could change the colours of objects. In the matrox folder I also selected a lens flair in which I used over my chorus. After I edited my work into the desired size and context. I downloaded my song and placed it onto my memory stick. I then plugged the memory stick into the editing suite and imported the song onto my new sequence. Lip sinking then had to be done. To lip sink I tracked where the piece of music I wanted started and ended and placed diamonds on the sequence bar so I knew where to place my video tracks. If this failed I checked the waves on the actual song bar which is located at the bottom of the screen on the edit suite. After weeks of work my video was complete. I then Exported the video so that it changed into an avi file. I was then able to watch my finished project on software such as windows media player. After this I burnt the track onto CD and submitted it.
Alongside my music video, I have created two ancillary texts. The first being a six panelled digipak. Conventionally, albums, DVDs and posters that promote a particular celebrity and their music video are effective because the products look alike. Such as Rihanna. The number one song ‘Umbrella’ which was said to be number three of the top 100 songs of 2007 by Rolling Stone magazine, uses a promotional synergy in which a long shot of Rihanna from the actual music video ‘Umbrella’ is used as the front cover of the single and the album. Therefore following the conventions which helps the audience to recognise exactly who the artist is and what song is featured on the album. However, I have chose a different approach.
The front cover of my digipak is a picture of Leonie with a sky background.
The casual dress wear that Leonie is wearing is not related to the music video, neither is the bright hair colour that she has. I have used this technique to express the genre of Twee pop and also the individuality of the artist. This idea was formed from researching Andy Warhol’s pop art, this links closely to my chosen genre. Famously Warhol created numerous “Mass-produced” pictures of famous ideological celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley. The start of ‘Pop Art’ was during the 1960’s. I have produced a pastiche of Warhol’s work to express the desirability of Leonie. This idea works well with the genre and the music video as it requires an active audience to understand the references I have made. Therefore I have gone against the conventions of a typical promotional pop cd.
To create my digipack I used a Olympus sv-500uz digital camera to take pictures of Leonie, in which I used the colleges green room so I could easily subtract the image of Leonie away from the background using Photoshop Cs3. After taking all of the pictures I needed to upload them onto the college’s DELL computer. I used a usb cable to retrieve the pictures off the camera. I then used windows slide show to look through my images, after selecting the imaged I wanted I edited them in Photoshop Cs3.
Firstly, I opened my desired pictures and started a new Photoshop document in which I used many tools to get my required look for my digipack.
I then duplicated the layer so I had a background copy, this enabled me to take the green background away from Leonie. The denotation of image is that she has flawless skin which is conventional to models that are seen on album artwork. To do this I edited the levels so that the contrast appeared brighter. Prior to this I used the spot healing tool to ensure that my protagonist had a perfect complexion before making her appear lighter skinned. I then needed to use Warhol’s influences that wanted, I decided that my protagonist would have brightly coloured hair, different in every panel of my digipack, for this I used the colour replacement tool which enabled me to carefully work around Leonie’s hair to change her hair colour into, pink, purple and turquoise. However, the image still had a green background from the green room so I used the rubber tool to rub away the background. I then imported my image of clouds that I had taken using the same camera and again changed the levels darker. This way they was a contrast of the colours used. Also making Leonie appear more pure then she already did. I then placed the cloud background under my image of Leonie and that’s how I edited the initial image to get the look I wanted. I then saved this image as a JPEG so that I could use Microsoft Publisher to write the song titles and heading on my album work.
The conventions of albums, specifically digipaks is that it has shot variation of the band or singer. Along side this, the name of the album, the artist and the songs that are on the cd. Instead of writing on the band name and album name on the front cover I simply didn’t. I didn’t use the conventional style front cover, instead used picture of Leonie. The idea behind this is that the band is so popular that their target audience of teenagers would automatically know who it is.
For my second ancillary product I created a cover for its release as part of a CD six panelled digipak. Again I used a Olympus sv-500uz digital camera to take pictures of Leonie. Using the green room again so I could extract the background from my photograph in Photoshop cs3. I used the Photoshop cs3 to edit my desired picture.
I chose a picture in which you could only see half of Leonie’s face. I did this to go against the conventions. Also so that the audience would only need to see half of her face to recognise who it is.
Firstly, I duplicated the layer and then removed the background using the magic lasso tool, after this I used the spot removal tool and changed all of the levels to ensure that Leonie looked flawless. Then, I used the colour replacement tool to change Leonie’s hair and make-up colour from pale and blonde to bright pink. I chose to do this so that Warhol’s influences showed and so that I deliberately challenge the conventions of pop styled music CD’s. Saving the file as a JPEG I was then able to edit the text in Microsoft Publisher.
Music videos are all a simulacra, no music video is a new idea, they are all taken from videos that have been created before and reference other texts or use a pastiche of other texts using a bricolage and montage editing.
My three texts are effective when combined together because they do not look similar. My aim of this was to pretend that my musician/band was so famous that my audience do not need the same promotional design to recognise the artist.
Firstly, the digipak and promotional poster do look similar. They look similar because I have used the font ‘Bradley Hand’, I changed the font into bold size 14 and stretched it to give it a windy effect after the band name ‘Windy Ling’. They background for both texts are also the same, a darkened sky which is a great contrast between the background and the pale glowing female. They also both have multi-coloured hair colours which shows the audience that they are both promoting the same product. I therefore think that all my products work well together as a promotional package.
When my work was finally complete, I asked a few friends and people in the media room in which I was mainly based for a long time doing my work. I asked them to watch my video, view my digipak and my promotional poster for the digipak and to write anonymously what they though of my work using these questions –
- What’s your personal opinion on the music video? Does it look realistic?
-What’s your opinion on the digipak and poster? Can you see anyone’s influences?
- What audience do you think these videos and products are for?
- What would you change?
See blog Audience feedback – 28/10/2010
All in all I think that my media products worked well. I think that using a variety of methods to ensure that my product worked well as a promotional product.
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