My Final Post

During my A Levels media has been my favourite subject and I will miss it dearly. Media has inspired me to work in the industry when I am older.

I hope you enjoy reading my blog and watching my groups music video.

This blog is now closed.

Evaluation Question One

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

The still shots on the left is of our music video but the still shots on the right hand side are of other artists music videos which we were inspired by.

(Click the image above to enlarge it and then you may need to zoom in to the web page)

1. Taylor Swifts video for 'Belong With Me' inspired our narrative and our location as it is set in the female protagonist bedroom, we decided that we wanted our artist to be getting ready and she would be performing in her bedroom. We felt that the audience would be able to connect with the artist because the pop genre is targeted at a young female audience and they are able to relate to the narrative. From watching Taylor Swifts video we realised that the artist performing in her bedroom gained a comical feel and it is also shows social realism.

2. The second frame is from Kate Nash- 'Foundations', the video uses an editing technique called stop motion which we felt would suit our music video. The director in 'Foundations' used stop motion to portray the unstable relationship between the couple. However, in our music video we used stop motion editing to show the fickle minds of teenagers which is presented by the different nail polish colours.

3. Shot three is from B.O.B ft Hayley Williams - 'Airplanes', the use of the projector inspired us to create a similar background for our music video. In 'Airplanes' there are moving sequences of stars which reflects the lyrics well "Can we pretend that airplanes in the night skies are like shooting stars". We used a combination of still and moving images on our projector, though in 'Airplanes' they only used moving images. In our music video we liked that the audience could create different interpretations by the use of the projector such as the purple fields could represent freedom and growing up through the blossoming of the flowers.

4. Our music video is similar to Alexis Jordan- 'Good Girl', as they are both performance base music videos. Also, both music videos use the same backgrounds such as the artist performing in front of a black and a white background which makes the video seem more sophisticated. There is fast pace editing in our music video and in the 'Good Girl' music video, through the fast pace editing we were able to change the artists make up and her clothes which is often seen in music videos from the pop genre.


5. In Alexandra Burkes music video 'The Silence' the narrative and performance is set so that Alexandra Burke seems like she is in a photo shoot, we felt that this made the audience connect with the artist as they feel like they are at the photo shoot. In our music video we wanted the audience to connect with the artist by the flashing lights on the artist in the mid shot and the extreme close up shot. It could be interpreted that the artist is getting ready to perform or she is at a photo shoot.


6. The sixth still shot is from Sia- 'Breathe Me' the photographs in 'Breathe Me' shows the artist in different places in the house and the artists movement. For the seventeen opening beats in our music video we wanted to use seventeen photographs showing the artist growing up, which fits with the idea of time and how quickly the youth of today grow up.

7. In our music video we wanted to show that our artist is an established performer, from watching Keri Hilson- 'Slow Dance' we was influenced to use an iPhone to introduce the song which creates synergy as we used a photograph of the artist to make the audience recognise the artist.

8. In Jessie J- 'Nobodys Perfect' clocks are used to show that the artist wants to go back in time to change certain events, in 'Nobodys Perfect' the clocks are used to taunt the artist and it shows that the events keeps playing in her mind. However, in our music video we are representing how quickly time passes.

9. The ninth still shot is from Labrinth- 'Let The Sunshine' we liked the close up silhouette shot of the artist as it adds mystery to the artist and the meaning of the song. We thought that we could use a similar shot would suit our music video as the heart silhouette has a dream affect, which portrays that love is a desire of hers which reflects the theme of growing up.

10. The still shot on the right is from Lady GaGa- 'Just Dance', in the still shot one of the extras writes on a mirror Dance which fits with the lyrics in the song. In our music video we decided to make the performer write a lyric of the song on a steamed mirror.

Evaluation Question Two

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

Evaluation Quesion 2

Evaluation Question Three

3) What did you learn from your audience feedback?

From the viewing of our music video we received great audience feedback and we feel that we have learnt a great deal from our feedback, here is some of the following comments:


(Click image to enlarge)To get a better understanding of our audience feedback we asked ten people to complete a scoring questionnaire of eight topics of our music video. Lip-syncing, Editing on Beat, Narrative, Colourful, Success of projected background, Stop Motion, Mise en Scene, Enjoyment. Here are the results of our responses in the formation of a bar chart.


Media Audience Feedback

Overall from analysing our audience feedback we have learnt we were successful in producing a music video with precise lip syncing, however we learnt our audience would prefer to have more of a narrative in the video because they were interested to know what happens next also because of the pop genre targeted towards a young females who are able to relate to the female protagonist in the video. At the beginning of the course we constructed a questionnaire to gain information of our audience preferences in a pop genre video. From this we learnt that the audience preferred an performance based video as they enjoyed seeing the artist, however the from comparing the feedback received before the video and the feedback received after the video viewing, we may have conformed to a performance based video too much because it was commented that the audience would have preferred to see more of a narrative video.

The feedback received it was clear that the audience enjoyed the fast paced editing especially of the photographs at the beginning of the video because the shots were edited to the best of the music. We learnt that this was successful because the photographs represented the theme of our video, 'Time'. A girl growing up and the change in time. We learnt that the mise en scene of the video was important to inform the audience of the pop genre. From the bar chart it is clear that the mise en scene was well received by the audience because the artist changed costume and make up through out the video similar to Alexis Jordan 'Good Girl' video. This made the video appear professional along with the studio lights in the photography room of the extreme close up shots. Therefore we learnt how important the mise en scene is in a pop video from the original questionnaires aimed at. We are pleased that from the following feedback we achieved a successful mise en scene. From the bar chart questionnaire we have learnt that our music video was well received and enjoyed by our audience.

Evaluation Question Four

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



Evaluation Question 4 Media

Audience Feedback on YouTube

Whilst receiving audience feedback we have always been a bit judgemental because the people are our friends, so we feel that they would praise our video even if they thought we should change some of it. So we was shocked and pleased when we received audience feedback on our YouTube account 'domemjesskayla', we do not know the person who commented on our final version of our music video which made us feel happy with our work. The user said that our video was "Excellent, very talented, great video, more realistic than the original!! xx", this makes us very proud of our work as this user said that it was better than the original Teenage Dream video, which was directed by Yoann Lemoine, who is a professional director.

Underneath is a screen shot of the page and the comment. (Click to enlarge the screen shots)

Music Video Screening at our School

Our media teachers organised a screening of AS film opening and A2 music videos in our school hall, they invited both A level years and prospective year 11 students were also invited to the event. We were allowed to invite our parents and our friends from outside of school, we found this beneficial as we were able to get our friends audience feedback.

In our media group I was given the opportunity to introduce our music video, which was very nerve wrecking because a lot of people turned up to the screening. This was the introd

uction that I said " The audience were given sheets of paper on which they could give feedback abo

ut each groups music video. The questions on the sheet were: We created our music video to Teenage Dream by Katy Perry. After many narrative

changes we finally decided to create a performance based video. in our music video we wanted to portray time and how quickly youth grow up. The female protagonist is shown from childhood to early stages of adulthood. "

After the screening the were able to get audience feedback, in the video corners that was set up for us. We asked a series of open questions such as:

1) What did you like about our music video? Why?

2) Was the idea of time expressed well?

3) Did you like our different locations? Why?

4) What was your favourite part of our music video? Why?

This is a Prezi that I made of the feedback that we got back from our screening.

Music Video Screening on Prezi