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

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

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

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

3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

DRAFT EVALUATION.

EVALUATION DRAFT

Rickie & the Islanders - End Of The Night (OFFICIAL VIDEO)

video Update.

I haven't posted in a while as it's been abit manic although all my filming is completed which is a relief.
A computer virus infected my computer which meant that my footage was under threat and put my schedule behind although the footage is okay but as I had to clean my computer to a previous date, my music video had been reviewed to my draft and all the editing I had finished had gone.
My editing had to be done again and on tuesday when things were going okay, a new problem arrose as my trial for Premier Pro and After Effects had run out. Hopefully I can resolve this problem tonight and finish my video for my deadline tomorrow.

There has also been a last minute change of direction as filming concerns. After editing my video before it was wiped from my computer, I realised that I needed to re-film some of Rickie singing so that it was more believable. I also decided to change the last park location to an inside shoot of Catherine at her dressing table. This is to be remeniscent of a scene in the film 'Factory Girl' shown below of Edie. I also had the idea to possibly add a short scene before the music starts using this footage. This may or may not work, we shall see.

Digipack.

AdvertisementRickieandtheIslanders

DigipackRickieandtheIslanders Digipack Back DigipackCover

The Band.

So, after the shoot at the studio on Monday night, I looked through the images and found one that stood out to me in particular.

I feel that this image is the perfect one of the band. I think that as well as the whole image compilating well together, the image also allows an audience to understand who is the lead singer of the band etc, without someone telling them.

I think that the shoot went extremely well overall, I think that both girls lace dresses are a great contrast to Rickie's leather styling.

When editing this image, I firstly adjusted the lighting curves and saturation before using the 'stamp' tool to airbrush each of the band members and make sure that their skin tones matched i.e. the foundation on the girls faces and their arms. I used the 'dodge' tool to add highlighted areas on the skin to make the image appear softer and well balanced in terms of lighting etc. I also used 'burn' in comparison to this, so that details could be highlighted, for example on the earrings, as well as darken the shine of Rickie's faux leather jacket to make it appear more like genuine leather which I feel adds to the proffessionalism of the image.

I used 'liquify' in order to heighten Catherine's beehive as it had lost volume in the car I believe. I also felt that by doing this, Catherine's hair would have a similar height as Sarah Jayne's hair on the left which was unedited.

I used the 'stamp' tool as well as 'liquift' and 'mask areas' to edit out festival wristbands that Catherine was wearing and could not remove for the shoot. This was a long and greuling task but I think that I achieved the illusion of them not being there in the end.

Although this image caused me a late night on Photoshop, I think that the image is successful and comes across as professional.

Filming Update.

Last night w\as hectic but well worth it. I had booked the studio in Oadby for half seven and when I got back at four, I had so much to do.
All day, I had been organising lifts for everyone and what times, confirming that we were coming and props etc. and as soon as I got in, I had to get the camera ready, style and dress both girls as well as Rickie who would be arriving abit closer to when we were leaving as he didnt finish college until five in Coventry.
The band instruments were all set as well as the clothes, other props, makeup, tripod etc. as well as some Dutch courage as we definetly needed some!
We got to the studio at about quater past, everything was going smoothly which was good. The studio was an outer building of the owners house as he was a photographer himself. It was perfect, really well lit, panoramic screen, huge macbook, we even got tea and coffee.
As we were all dressed and ready, we could start immediately and not waste any time.
I had decided that we should shoot the promotional and digipack shots before filming so that everybody's styling was fresh and so noone looked tired in any of the shots.
The lighting really helped, connected to my E-PL1 by a wire to its flash sync socket and set to manual, I could easily check the aparture and change it in order to make the white balance in the photos correct.
We had two hours to film and shoot everything, which proved to be the perfect amount of time. The owner was really nice and showed me around the studio which I really enjoyed. It was good to be in a professional environment as I feel it furthened my learning and I hope that the professionalism is translated into the music video.
All that I need to do now is film the final park location which I can do in the next two weeks before the deadline which is no problem. Tonight I will begin the editing for my final digipack draft which I am really excited to start doing.

Feedback from Peers and Analysis.

In today's lesson, we had to leave feedback on eachothers blogs and give some positive and constructive opinions. Here are some of my feedback comments akthough they were e-mailed to me instead of posted, due to a techinical default with my blog at the moment.

The first comment was left by Hannah about my Draft Digipack. 

'I really like this digipack- it looks really professional, mostly due to the really well tied together colour scheme. The only thing that may be a struggle is getting marks for the camera work as you haven't used any actual photos- though with the genre and the design of you digipack I'd say that really doesn't matter. Altogether it looks really professional and linked together.'

I am really happy with this comment overall. I am happy about the feedback on the colour scheme as I was unsure about the dark aesthetic, although I think it is rleveant to the warhol films and black and white photography. I still need to take my first-hand images of the band which I will do on Monday at the studio shoot.

The second comment was left by Molly about my video draft.

'I really love the way the characters are dressed! Can't see much of the guy, but Catherine looks really good! The focus shots where it comes in and out of focus looks really effective and fits the type of music. Is there a reason why there are blank spaces? I haven't read much on the other posts so I don't know, but regardless it looks really good! Pretty professional :)'

On the whole, this comment is also very positive which is good. The fact that certain band members aren't shown as much in the draft will be dealt with when more footage and different locations is edited into the final cut.

I am extremely happy with the response.

Digipack Draft Feedback.

After getting the feedback for my Digipack, I am pretty happy with the mark I got, considering that they were not my own images. The marks I got were 8/10 for my CD Digipack and 7/10 for my magazine advert which were both pretty much what I expected.
To improve my CD Digipack for the final draft, I will take my own images and edit them with a similar look to the images I found of Warhol and Bailey, except using Rickie, and I will also increase the number of panels of my digipack to six. I also had the idea to produce a in-sleeve booklet with lyrics and location shots etc which could be quite easy yet effective.
To improve my magazine advert, I will use my own images as well as increasing the band font size and making the date slightly smaller. My feedback is positive about the simplicity of the large date and minimal text on the page so I'm pleased about that.
I will also need to adapt and use a record company name and logo to use on both my CD Digipack and magazine advert. Apart from those few things, I think that the digipack could work out well and I can achieve the level grade that I want.

First Draft

Filming Update.

I have completed the filming of the factory location with both Rickie and Catherine which is ready to be edited for my final draft although due to people being unavailable and the throwback that happened with Joanne not being able to film anymore has left me in a dilema.
The weather and time of year is also a huge set back as it is so uncertain with one day being sunny and another with pouring rain, which means that it is just impossible to film the park w/fountain location as everyone will get wet including my camera.
So, there is no alternative but to edit the first draft with shots from the animoto and filmed footage combined.
The studio location is also a dilema as I can't get a time when everyone is free to film, so therefore, I have discovered a studio hire that will allow us to film at nightime that I shall book for the earlier half of next week.
The good news is that we have a final member of the band! Sarah Jayne, who I used partly on the contents page for my media last year, will be featured in the studio 'band shots' as planned and possibly the park location which is a huge weight thats been lifted!

Note to Examinor and Change of Direction.

Examinor,
I have recently encounted a problem with the filming and production of my music video. One of the members of 'band' is no longer able to take part in the music video due to family commitments that I was not aware of beforehand. Due to this poroblem, the filming of the video has been put a few days off of schedule.
Because of this, I have come up with the solution that until I can find an alternative band member, Catherine will represent the part of 'Edie' primarily and Rickie will represent 'Andy'. The new band member will only need to take part in the studio filming which I have booked for the early half of this week, allowing me time to edit the viodeo in time for the draft deadline this friday.
This problem is pushing the schedule quite tight but if this happened in industry, the production team would have to deal with it and finish the video in time for the release date.

Location #2 - The 'Factory' Update.

So, yesturday, as the weather was nice, I thought it would be the perfect oppertunity to start the week-full-o-media by clearing out my garage for the 'factory' location.

I started to clear all of the clutter and stuff away, moving stuff we'd need in the future to the back of the garage, so that I could use the front part of the garage to use as the 'factory' and decorate.

I had painted the walls white beforehand, so that I would have a clean canvas to work with as well as the floor, which I should've done after as I had to wait for the floor to dry before covering the walls with tin foil.

At first, I was a bit apprehencious about putting foil on the walls as it might look a bit too make-shift, until I researched that the real Warhol factory was decorated with tin foil aswell, so I went aheadwith it. The result was pretty successful, all I need to do now is finish covering the walls, add lighting and we are sorted.



Below is an image still taken from 'Factory Girl' the film, I realised that to add realism to the location, I should cover some sort of piping with foil aswell to make the space look like a factory interior.

Edie's 'Butterfly' Earrings.

Edie's Butterfly earrings, origionally designed by Steve Sasco Click Here , are famously related to Edie's signature image. There are many images of Edie wearing the earrings and I felt that they needed to be featured in the video.
Now, intead of paying £45 for them on ebay or amazon, I just opted for the cheaper option and DIY them myself.
On a trip to Leicester town, I went to Primark and found four pairs of 60's inspired earrings that I felt would look great through the lens of a camera. One pair in particular that I found were similar to that of the famous pair although after looking at them, it seemed simple enough to edit the design slightly with some tweezers and wire clippers.
Above, I have taken before and after images of the earrings to easily compare them, as well as an image of Catherine wearing them in an unintentional similar position to Edie in the image below it.
The last image is a movie still of Sienna Miller as Edie in the 2006 film 'Factory Girl'.

Location #3

Today was the second day of my media week, I went into Leicester town and one of the things I managed to do whilst I was there was take pictures of the third location for the music video.

I have not been to this location since I had the idea about filming there but it was as good as I remembered. The only thing I didnt think about was that the fountain would have water in it and therefore the band would not be able to climb on it which I featured in my animatic. Although, there is a statue there which I think could prove useful for those shots. The idea for the shot came from the film 'Factory Girl', a movie still shows this below.

The location is meant to be representative of Central Park in New York, this is hardly Central Park but I think the visual element will be there in the music video.

There are also a series of steps shown in the slideshare below which I think could prove useful for the walking shots of Rickie and one of the girls.

Location #3

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Styling and Makeup (Girls)

Testing Out Editing Software and Styling of Catherine.

After testing out the makeup and hair styling of Catherine, I thought it would be a really clever idea to film a screentest almost, much like Andy Warhol would do with his actors before producing his underground films. I said to Catherine to 'channel Edie' and I think that she did a brilliant job with both locations. When filming, I wanted to test out the zoom and effect that the blur would give when I pressed the shutter button whilst zooming in and out on a subject. The loaded the footage into Adobe Premier Pro and began playing around with the software. The footage enabled me to learn and become confident with the programme in preperation for the real shoot. I then used Adobe After Effects to add lens flares and change the grain and curves of the footage in order to add a vintage effect, similar to the techniques used when filming and editing 'Factory Girl' Below are some footage stills I created in Adobe Premier from the video, I think that these show the most effective points of the video as well as inspire me to possibly involve stills inside my digipack, to link it to the music video.