Zaibaa's Evaluation

Full Evaluation of Coursework

Ancillary Task 1.. Digi Pak Panels!

As a group we were all required to work together to produce a DigiPak. We decided that we would all create a panel each and then create the front panel together as a group. I decided to do one of the inside panels. Here is my Panel:

 

 Zaibaa's Inside Panel.

Ancillary Task 1.. Digi Pak Panels!

Our Front Cover

Audience Feedback: Final Video.

Jess' Audience feedback (video project)

View more presentations from Jessica.

Zaibaa's Audience Feedback

Saliah's Feedback

Video - Audience Feedback - Saliah

Video Audience Feedback

     This is the audience feedback which we recieved on our music video from our class.

Progress

We spent an extra day in college to complete the video, and after a few more minor adjustment the video will be finished. We finished editing our footage to match with our storyboard and are now adding colour to each clip to get a different party light effect in the video. After we finish doing this this we will be done editing and are hoping to watch the video through fully a few times in order to see if there are any further minor adjustments we can make to make our video better

Ancillary Task Progression.. ..

We have our pictures and we're ready to go! from the pictures we have taken of our "artist" we have each chosen one image which we like and would like to work with when creating our individual panels. In regards to the front panel which we have all decided to create as a group we've also looked through our collection of images and we've each chosen an image we like but to make it fair we showed 20 people all three images and asked each person which  image they like and we noted down each persons answer and we used the image which recieved most 'Likes'. Creating a panel for our DigiPak panels is a task which fortunately are not having trouble creating as it isn't a task which is too difficult. I myself am lucky in the sense that at AS level when doing coursework, I chose to do the print option which entailed creating a music magazine cove, writing the feature article and creating the contents page for my magazine. In order to do this I was required to use InDesign and Adobe Photoshop. In order to create our panels we must use these two pieces of software, as a group we're finding that it is easy for us to use these pieces of software as they are fairly straghtforward. So far progression DigiPak panels is coming along well and we aim to be done within the next couple of lessons.

Progression of Editing

So far editing has been going according to plan despite the fact that before we got started neither I nor Jess or Saliah new very much about how to use Final Cut Express, however as time went by we all have found that it is becoming considerably easier for us to use. We've made a lot of progress since we first begun editing. I'm quite pleased to say that I feel i my skills have grown a lot from what they were when we did our training on Final Cut Express, to what they are now that i've spent a lot of time editing the video and using the software to its fullest extent.

We hope to have our video finished and edited within the next week or so. For now that its all.

Progress.. .. ..

Fortunately for us since our last progression update we've had much more luck as we finally got our party footage. Though Jess wasn't feeling well we decided together that we should press on and get our footage despite her absence, this meant that i was filming on my own as Saliah plays the role of our leading lady in our music video. At first the thought of handling this responsibility didi phase me a little and left me unsure of doing it but as we got into it i found i was ok doing it and I am pleased to say that i feel i managed it well. However all did not go as planned as we did not get to use the lighting equipment which was alittle let down however in retrospect I think it may be good that we didnt as it our footage is clear and it gives our "party" a realistic look as we wouldnt see a party funded by students using professional lighting equipment at a house party. Now all we have left to do is do our last bits of filming with the Green Screen, this may prove to be more difficult than it should be as for us its a matter of timing as we are not all free at the same times so this is definitely something we are working out as we feel that as long as either myself or jess are present to film and saliah and imtiaz are present (lead actors) we should be able to get this done. Editing is proving to be a tricky task as myself, Jess and Saliah are new to Final Cut Express but we are determined to master it and create a video which shows our skills and ideas in the best light. With that being said editing our footage will be easier than getting the Green Screen footage as we can all stay back during workshop hours to edit it which would suit us as then if we need any assistance it will be easier for us to get help from Mike or Nikki (our colleges Media Technicians).

Equipment and Technologies

In order to produce our music video we will be using the following equipment and technology.

• Motion Camera (possibly also a Tripod)
• Final Cut Express (for editing purposes)
• possible use of Green Screen and Chroma Key

Considering the basis of our music video is a party I thought it may be a good idea to use some professional party lights and possibly a smoke machine in order to make our party scene look more authentic. we figured this wouldn't be a problem as we knew where we could get our hands on this equipment. Lucky for us I happen to know someone very closely who owns this equipment and is generous enough and willing to let us use this equipment. We are aware of the safety precautions we'd have to take that are involved with the usage of this equipment and we all acknowledge that we would have to be careful so that neither of us get hurt nor our actors when maneuvering around the set. As a team we sat and discussed the prospect of us using these aforementioned equipment and together we decided the smoke machine would be too much and wouldn't give our scene the ambience and atmosphere we want it to have. we came to this as when we thought about it we realised that if we'd have used it it would make it difficult to film our footage as visibility would be poor even on the lowest setting. I know this from experience as i have seen first hand how poor visibility is despite the smoke machine being on the lowest setting and not generating as much as it would on the medium or even high setting. Taking all this on board we have decided not to use the smoke machine however we still hope to use the lights.

We feel that by using the above equipment and technology we can achieve our goal of creating a good music video which be-fits our genre and entertains our audience. We agree that from using this equipment and technologies we will be able maximise our performance and our work.

by using the green screen we hope to create a scene in which our leading male (Imtiaz) gets what he wants and finally reaches our leading lady (Saliah). We feel Final Cut Express is the best editing software for the job of editing our footage as it is better in all aspects in comparison to iMovie as it has better tools and also there's a lot more which we can do with it.  Though we may not use them, there are much more SFX available to us for use. also we feel Final Cut Express is better to use due to it being more sophisticated than iMovie also I personally feel it is easier to use despite it being the more "complicated" piece of software.

Progression..

Unfortunately for us luck hasn't been on our side so far. We aimed to film the majority of our footage over the weekend just gone, as we thought this would be more than enough time to get our footage as we had a 3 day weekend due to monday being a study day for us also we figured it would be a practical, productive and effective way for us to use our study day. (20th Nov - 22nd Nov).  however we were faced with a set back from the very beginning as on the sunday neither Jess nor Saliah or I were able to film on Saturday due to prior commitments which we did not see as a problem as we still had Sunday and Monday. However we were set back once more as on the sunday Jess and I were not well. By monday Jess had not recovered however I had and so me and Saliah were prepared to continue as planned but we were unable to as our actors did not turn up therefore we could not film anything. however we didn't waste our day, we sat and thought of our back up plan. We plan to get our footage this coming thursday and monday as those are the days when we are all available at the same time to get our footage.. and thats is pretty much it for now.

Our filming location...

In regards to choosing a location for our video, as simple as a task it is, it's not been easy for us to actually get one. Since we chose our song we have brainstormed all our possible ideas and we've narrowed it down to one. When finding our location we had a specific idea in mind of what we want out location to be like, what we want the atmosphere of our location to be like etc. this made it easy to come up with ideas of where we'd like to shoot our videos for. Initially we thought of filming our video in the main hall of a local community centre however when inquiring about whether it was possible for us to do so, our luck ran out as it was unavailable till january. Fortunately we had a back up location in mind and so I asked a family member if we could shoot our video in her house. It pays to be the favourite as now we have our location! Hurrah! (pictures to come)

Music and Lyrics...

In regards to choosing a song to which we wanted to do create a music video for at first we found it a little difficult for us to fins a song which all of us liked and were willing to create a music video for as at first we all had quite deifferent ideas and we each liked a different song. However our luck changed when we came across a website called Jamendo. Jamendo is a website on which you can find the songs of a vast number of different and unsigned artists. When browsing the websit we had the option to browse songs through genre tags, and so we seacrhed songs by clicking on the tabs which applied to us. When doing this we came across many songs, some of which did not belong to our genre however those which did when we listened to them a few were quite different and were quite good however we found one which did appeal to us all. The song was called Sex Light by Marcc Gregory.

When we first listened to this song we all liked it and thought we could make our music video for this song. We all felt that the artist had a nice voice and that the song fit with our genre.However it then ocurred to us that we would not be able to create a music video suitable for the song as we felt the song was a little too "out-there" and we didn't feel quite comfortable making a music video for this particular song. After much thought we decided to change our song but sticking to the same artist (Marcc Gregory) in order to get the same sort of sound, as he specialises in our fusion genre. We went back on to Jamendo to see what other songs Marcc Gregory has and after what felt like a long long time we finally found a song which all 3 of us agreed on as a group.The new song which we have chosen to create our music video for is "I know - Marcc Gregory". this song is fairly similar in regards to the genre of music, we feel it fits in better with our chosen genre as it has more of a R&B sound to it.

And here are the lyrics:

oh oh oh

oh oh oh

ohh ohh

I know

that you want me babe

that you want me babe

CHORUS 

I know that you want me babe,

you want me babe,

I know,

cuz I feel you babe.

I see you talking to your friends

looking

at me, then

I know, cuz i see you babe

see you babe.

VERSE 1

Lady i see you looking at me over ther,

in my mind tellin myself that i want you,

to come over her.

you giving me the eye, let me know that i'm

that guy that you're looking for,

so why dont we get on the dance floor, no need to waste no time no more.

BRIDGE

the night is young and i'm up for some one on one

you knoow, when i sing baby.

ther'es only just once for me and you, this has

just begun.

we can take the night so slow yeeah

CHORUS X2

VERSE 2

So i came right in yes i got mad money to spend,

and some for me to just offer you,

So what you wanna do?

cuz baby cool I ain't got a prob buy drinks for two,

we linked up tonight just the way i want to, me you,

loving your style cuz lady, you,

on the dancefloor looking so beautiful.

BRIDGE X1

CHORUS

I know that you want me babe,

(I know)

you want me babe,

(cuz you want me baby)

I know,

cuz I feel you babe.

I see you talking to your friends

(I see youu talking)

looking

at me, then

I know, cuz i see you babe

see you babe.

(see you babe)

I know that you want me babe,

(iiii...)

you want me babe,

I know,

cuz I feel you babe.

I see you talking to your friends

looking

at me, then

(i see you baby)

I know, cuz i see you babe

see you babe.

Come over here, I wanna know you better,

we, can work it out, oh

I know that you want me

(I know)

I know that you want me

cuz i want you too

and i want you too

I really really do baybay

I know that you want me

(I know)

I know that you want me

cuz i want you too

and i want you too

I really really do baybay

oh oh oh

heyye-ey

Target Audience & Listener Profile

Before choosing our target audience we took a look at chart activity of the past month or so as this gave us an indication of first of all, whether songs of the genre we've chosen to focus on chart or not and second to see what age group listens to music of the genre we've chosen to study. Thankfully we found that songs of our genre do chart.
I then went onto looking closely at the lyrics of a handful of songs in order to get a look at what age group is likely to listen to this genre of music as the lyrics of the songs would give us more or less a clear indication of which age group. From doing this I found that the age group which is most likely to listen to our music is people between the ages of  15 - early 20s.

We decided that this would be the best target audience for us as our song as our song more or less runs along similar lines to these songs i.e the story line is familiar, as is the actual music. 


In order for me to define our target audience I have crated our Listner Profile. I've done this so that it's easier for me to show our idea of our ideal audience members. We feel it is universal universal therefore applies to all members of our audience.


Listener Profile:

Gender: Male & Female

Age: 15 - early 20s

Musical Preferences: Listens to namely R&B and Dance but also Soul and New Jack Swing. Likes artists such as: Usher, Lady Gaga, Black Eyed Peas, Tiesto, Armand Van Helden, 112, Benny Benassi, Ginuwine, ATB, Shai, Jagged Egde.

Dress Sense (Female): Cool and casual; bagg/skinny jeans, long/short t-shirts, Boyfriend cardi/ zippy hoodies, trainers/flat ballerina shoes, stylish but one-of-a-kind coat. Always carries something to listen to music on but  not always listening to it.

Dress Sense (Male): Cool and casual; bagg/skinny jeans,  T-Shirts, cardi/ hoodies, trainers/ pumps, stylish but one-of-a-kind coat. Always carries something to listen to music on but  not always listening to it.

Interests: Music(durh!), reading, going to concerts (but only on the odd occasion), Video games, Comedy TV & films.

And there you have it our Listener Profile! It may seem a little specific but that's becasue in order to make it easier for me to build our listener profile, i've looked at those around me who, besides myself, enjoy music from our fusion genre. I noticed that most actually do dress in this way and do have these interests therefore that is how and where i derived our Listener profile...

Music Video Analysis...

One of the videos which i have chosen to analyse is Justin Bieber Ft Usher - Somebody To Love.

 

 I've chosen to analyse the video for this song as i feel it fits with the genre which we have chosen our video to focus on, which is a fusion of R&B and Dance. We chose this as from looking at recent chart activity it is becoming more often than not that we see songs of this fusion genre entering high in the charts and remaining there for long periods at a time e.g. Usher's "DJ Got Us Falling In Love Again".

Another reason why I've chosen to analyse this video is that like Usher's song, this one also entered high in the charts and reached the number one spot for a solid three weeks. Justin Bieber focuses mainly on on R&B music however in the short time between first appearing before us with his hit single one time and now his music has since evolved slightly. Bieber now infuses Dance with R&B as we see in this single and in the video.

Bieber's "Somebody To Love" has a rhythmic, dance hall, club/party feel to it. It's very uptempo and as most say it's a song you can move to.

Andrew Goodwin had a theory about music videos. Goodwin stated that there are 7 key conventions of music videos:

• A relationship between the lyrics and the visuals.
• A relationship between the music and the visuals.
• Particular genres of music having their own video styles and iconography.
• Close ups of the main artist(s).
• The artist(s) develop their own iconography.
• Likely to be a reference to voyeurism.
• There are likely to be intertextual references.

Justin Bieber is essentially an R&B artist however however like his mentor, Usher, he too is now creating music from a different angle. Bieber and Usher both are now beginning to create music which fits in with our fusion genre. In terms of intertextual references I myself don't see any visual references to any other media texts. however i do think that the general theme of the video i.e lots of dancing, synchronised routines etc it is similar to other media texts such as: "Ne-yo - Closer", "Usher - OMG" etc. The video doesnt fit in with the lyrics of the song, it is completely unrelated to the lyrics, it is focused on the dancing talent of the artists and the extras. In regards to the genre having its own style and iconography from looking at other music videos of this fusion genre and I've noticed that songs of this genre tend to be up beat, catchy and have good lighting and have memorable lyrics. This song most definitely ticks all of those boxes, I feel the lighting is extremely good ad has been used in the best and most effective of ways. The song itself is catchy and memorable  and the music is upbeat and has a good tempo. The video has been edited to the pace of the song and effects have been put in place which at first glance aren't as noticeable e.g. in the beginning of the video a girl appears behind Bieber and disappears behind him when he moves revealing that nobody is stood behind him. In the video we see many different shots have been used, there are close ups, medium close ups and also long shots of the main artist and also the featuring artist.

I feel the video fits with the vibe of the song and synchronises well with the tempo of the song. It shows Bieber's fans what he's like as an artist and it also reflects his youth. For the listener it creates a party/dance mood as the beats are fast the kind of music we expect to hear when watching a quick-step dance routine. Simply from hearing the pace of the music makes it easy for the listener to comprehend which genre of music Bieber has chosen to follow, however this isn't a one off we see Bieber sticks to this fusion genre in other songs too such as "Baby" and "Love Me", both these songs also have a Quick-Step feel to them.

When the video starts off at first we don't pick up the party vibe, as in the beginning Low Key Lighting and Spot Lighting has been used, it first appears to be the typical scene we would see at a dance off, the low key lighting and spot lighting being used for dramatic effect along with the smoke. However as the video progresses we begin to get more of the party vibe due to the Strobe Lighting used making it very bright and signifying energy. In the video it is visually subtle that Bieber has gone for a party vibe in the song however the sound makes up for this subtlety.

This particular video was shot in a studio however a green screen was not used at any point, I personally do not see this as a bad things as the video relies on the talent of the dancers and the artists to keep the audience entertained and interested. It gives an idea of what fans look for in music videos of songs like this one when listening to this fusion genre. Even though a Green Screen hasn't been used to create the video or even bits of it, there are certain effects used many times in the video e.g. at many different points in the video the artist walks across the screen and the dancers in the background disappear. We can see that people like to see dancers, dance routines that people would see in dance-offs at a party, lights, things that don't completely fit, which in the case of this video would probably be the fire. All in all it shows us that people like to see things that make them feel good and want to get up and join in dancing.

In this video we see many different shots of Bieber and Usher, mainly long shots, medium shots and close ups. I feel this is effective as the video focuses mainly on dancing and showing off talent despite it being unrelated to the lyrics of the song. We see close ups of Bieber frequently throughout the video mostly when he's singing the chorus saying things which he'd say to a girl like the promises he'd make to one e.g. "I don't need nothing else, I promise, girl, I swear, I just need somebody to love". When we see the close up of him singing these lines, he uses a direct mode of address; looking right into the camera, i makes it look like he's speaking directly to a girl in the audience thus showing the emotion behind the song. When the medium and long shots are used they are used to show the artists while they're dancing showing they're dancing talent, the long shots also show the background dancers and their routines fully. We also see in the video that a number of different angle shots have been used for example at one point in the video we see a shot of Bieber from low angle shot with him looking down on the camera. 

In this video we see conventions of music videos which are typical of both R&B and Dance. for example in regards to Dance quite obviously we have dancers and as the main visual focus, after the artists of course. Typically in Dance videos we see that the lighting is a key component of the video i.e. in a number of dance videos which I have studied for example "Firestarter" by The Prodigy, the setting itself is quite dark but it is illuminated purely by singular scattered lights. In this particular video in the first half of it the setting is dark and spotlighting has been used to illuminate the artist and dancers. It is only in the second half of the video in which more lighting has been used, a number of strobe lights have been strung across the ceiling to illuminate the setting. I feel this is a good element of the video as I feel it is quite creative, also I like how in the very beginning of the video the spotlights come on one by one to reveal a different dancer.

This video has elements which i feel are quite inspirational e.g. the dancers and lighting etc. In our music video we hope to have elements such as the ones specified as we feel they would make our music video that much better. I particularly am very keen on the idea of having multiple dancers in our music video as this would link the dance side of our fusion genre into our music video. Though i have not discussed it in my analysis i find the costumes to be quite inspirational as they could give us an idea or two in regards to what our actor(s) will wear how, what props, if any are used, they will use. This video has been extremely popular, it's been edited in ways which reflect the artist's personality and talent. It has a catchy and memorable beat and well choreographed dance routines. We hope to create a video which is both entertaining and creative, which captivates and interests our audience, just like this video does.

Hello, hello, hello!

Hi we are Zaibaa, Saliah and Jess and for our coursework we've decided to do the Music Promotion brief. After much thought we've come to decide that our music video will be focusing on a fusion genre. A Fusion Genre is when two or more different genres combine as one to create a different type of music. The fusion genre which we have chosen to focus on is that of R&B and Dance. However our fusion genre is not completely balanced between the two it leans more towards R&B in regards to the lyrics the music itself is of a dance background blended with an R&B feel. We have chosen to do this as from looking at recent chart activity it is becoming quite common that we see music of this mixed genre entering high in the charts.

The song which we originally chose to create a music video is "Sex Light - Marcc Gregory"

we chose this song as we thought it fit well with our fusion genre. It fit well with both sides of it through various elements. For example it fits with R&B due to the lyrics and what the song is about but at the same time it fits in with dance too due to the music itself.

However after much thought we decided to change our song but sticking to the same artist (Marcc Gregory) in order to get the same sort of sound as he specialises in our fusion genre. We decided to change our song as we felt it was a little inappropriate and found that it may be difficult to create a music video which would fit with the lyrics as well as being appropriate to show. 

our target audience is 15 to young adults and  also we feel this song is appropriate to our audience. the new song which we have chosen to create our music video for is "I know - Marcc Gregory". this song is fairly similar in regards to the genre of music, we feel it fits in better with our chosen genre as it has more of a R&B sound to it.