Throughout researching, creating and evaluating the ancillary and main task my group and I have used a range of technologies to ensure the final products were to the highest possible standards.
The research process which I carried out for both the main and ancillary task involved looking into a variety different styles of music videos and images. Once we had found the style in which we was aiming to create, we took large amounts of time analysing songs with videos and digipacks of this style.
The two main technologies which we used to complete the research stages of my coursework were Youtube and Google .
When looking for generic music videos at the beginning of my research I found that popular video social networking website Youtube was the most useful tool; allowing me to browse a range of videos and providing me with suggested options of similar videos which was useful when looking for products to back up ideas which I had. It was difficult to use Youtube as a method of research when I was at school as this is not a website which is available for students meaning that I had to seek assistance from the technical staff when I wanted to assess the website and they gave me another account to go into. This was difficult as it meant saving work was across two user log ins and it was not accessible without assistance, therefore work requiring this website was easier carried out at home.
Similar to youtube, another method of looking at music videos was through using the Vevo app on my iPhone. This was especially useful when I needed to look at a specific music video at the same time as completing work on my own account as I could do both at the same time where as youtube restricted me with this.
Another on-line resource which was extremely useful, especially for the research of images for ancillary task was Google images. The most popular search engine on the web allowed us to look specifically at digipacks and posters for artists of a similar genre and songs of a similar theme to our own meaning we were able to analyse these and find out what would make our own successful. Similarly to you tube, some of the result provided were blocked by the schools filter system under the reason of 'entertainment' meaning I had to go through the inconvenience of using the you tube account. Due to this the research process using this was easier carried out at home as I was able to complete it more thoroughly and quickly.
Planning using iPhones
All of my group and our model having an iPhone meant that we were all able to communicate easily via imessage. This was not only useful for us when we were planning filming sessions but also for sharing footage and ideas with each other aswell. Being able to send both pictures and videos via imessage was a way which we planned the outfits we would be wearing during filming as we would be able to see in advance what each other was going to wear and ensure that we all had something which suited that. We was also able to gain each others opinion on any of the tasks that we were completing without other group members there. This ensured that there was no conflict in our group as we did not make any changes if someone did not agree with it and this was a way to clarify this.
The camera which we all had on our phones were very useful for taking pictures, which did not need to be of especially high quality, for our blogs or to plan sessions. They are a device which we all always have on us therefore the camera was available to us at any time and there is a number of ways which we could extract the pictures via leads or email so this was not an issue. When taking pictures on our phones iMessage made it easy for us to send these too each other instantly and free of charge.
Another useful feature of the iPhone which we took advantages of was the calender which we planned out the dates for filming on. One my phone we in putted all of the dates which we would be working and assessed when we were left with time to film. Putting this information into a calendar was a good way to ensure we was sticking to schedule and was on track to meet our deadlines.
Construction
Music videos are an advanced product, it was not until 1980 that they become recognized when MTV launched a medium which was based around the product. Since then music videos have adapted with the advances in technology becoming much more high quality and containing many more special effects and gimmicks. They are now not only available on MTV,but an array of different music channels as well as on-line YouTube,and a number of different smart phone apps being the latest advance meaning they can be watched on the go.
Due to these advances in technology myself and the group had to ensure that the programmes and equipment we were using was to a good standard to ensure that our final products would be in line with the likes of real media products.
In order to create both the main and ancillary task, we used a Lumix DMC-FZ50 camera which allowed us to record videos and take still photos. By completing both of the tasks with the same camera meant that we was able to ensure that both of our products were to the same quality standard and the fore there was more connection between them. Choosing to use Lucys camera instead of the schools meant that there was more flexibility over the times which we were able to film as we did not have to take into consideration when others would be using the camera, this was especially useful as some of our filming sessions were spontaneously decided upon a day of good weather and this would not have been possible if we had to book the schools camera in advance. All of us found the camera easy to operate and it was compatible with the schools tripoid which we used at most sessions as well to ensure that our filming was smooth. We was very happy with the quality of filming which we was able to achieve on this camera and found that the shots captured both inside and out were to the crisp standard that we required for our plasticy video.
When shooting on a white background which we had to do for a number of shots in our video ,as well as the photos for our ancillary task, we had a number of difficulties with this at first. The main problems that we had was that the white cottons sheet we were using was largely creased and the photography lights we were using as a necessary method of lighting where highlighting this further. After the first shoot I took the sheet home to iron it however it was again poorly mistreated by the technical staff before our second shoot and there was no visible improvement in the quality of the videos. We then began to look into other methods of shooting these scenes rather than using the white sheet. We found that a matte white wall, where a projector is usually shined on would be our best option. There was only two photography lamps which we could use and found after experimenting with different ways that one of them diagonally lighting the models and one of them slightly behind them, lighting the background was the best option to achieve the best shots.Once we had found how to achieve the best results for video clips against a white wall we were confident with the way we should light our model against a white wall for our ancillary photos.
Serif Movie Plus was the programme which we used to compose our video footage together into the final cut. This was the best programme for us to use, that was had access to use due to its variety off features, most of which we made use of. The programme allowed us to work on a timeline, with different layers for the music soundtrack, visual clips and TV logo. On this timeline we were able to cut down clips which was extremely useful for us as we found that when filming we would film minutes worth of footage for a 5 second clip in order to capture a natural feel for the video, and this feature allowed us to crop out the tiny bit of footage which was most suitable for the video. We was also able to add effects to the video such as slow motion and blur, two effects which we added to the barbie falling scene as a way of disorientating the viewer and merging the doll and model together.We was also able to increase the brightness of scenes which did not have the same level of lighting as others meaning that the video was able to look consistent throughout. Before the A2 course none of us had used this programme before, and the most advanced piece of video software any of us were familiar with was Windows Movie Maker. Despite this we did not have much difficulty operating the programme and found that we come to terms with all of the features that we were using actively very quickly, for example importing the media and cutting it down. In order to put the videos onto the video we all saved them to our own user areas to ensure that they were backed up three times even though the video was being made on Lucys account. The main problem that we found with this was that they took up so much memory causing us to keep having to ask the technical staff to increase our allowance until we hit the maximum. All of the video editing that we did for the video was done at school s this was a programme which was on the school network and we did not have assess to at home therefore we spent a large amount of lesson time on this programme as although Lucy did majority of the editing we all worked on parts of it and had a huge input on what we did and did not like, therefore it was easiest to do it when we were all there.
In order to construct the ancillary task I used three main Adobe programmes; Photoshop, illustrator and in design. In conjunction these three programmes allowed me to save work and open it on others in order to make the most of the available tools on each of them. Photoshop was the programme which we used to edit the photos we took. The lasso and magic wand tools allowed us to select areas which we wanted to work on, or invert these sections to allow us to whiten the background which we did to all of our images. The adjustments feature was also one which we heavily used to give her skin more colour as we found she looked washed out under the bright lights especially when wearing all white. To ensure that all of the pages for the digipack were the same size we used the image size option on Photoshop to make them all 593x593 which was also a perfect square. Illustrator was the programme which I used to create the template for the CD using the pen tool, I was then able to transfer this deign template into Indesign where our font was and put that onto the disk to complete it. One of the most useful tools which designed allowed me to use was the type on a path tool where I was able to make the copyright information on the CD disk go around the edge of the disk in a circular pattern. I found using these programmes relatively easy as I am familiar with them and the tools available from my AS media as well as ICT A2 which I am also currently working on.
Another programme which we used to edit photos was PE-Fotlor, a free iPhone
app available from the app store. This was an app which Maisie was familiar with through using it before we stared this coursework. However when she familiarised Lucy and I with it we all found it a really useful and easy to use. For aspects such as removing blemishes and hair from the models body it was a lot easier than the clone tool on photoshop and they were removed simply by the strike of a finger across the picture. We were then able to email these edited images back to ourselves on the computer and continue with more advanced manipulation on photoshop.
The way which I was able to present my coursework for other group members and the teachers to be able to look at was through Blogger. I found this much easier than I did last year during my AS coursework as I was familiar with all of the features of it that I would need to use, for example creating posts and not pages, and using labels to group my work together. One of the only problems which I encountered with blogger was how long it took to upload videos; when one video was uploading and then processing I was not able to upload another until that had finished. This made the process of uploading our many clips to the blog very long winded and time consuming. We could also not view the videos at school on our own account as they appeared in you tube format and this was not accessible. Apart from this I did not have any issues and found that I was overcoming issues that I had last year such as aligning images which shows the progress I have made with the programme.
Evaluation
In order to complete the four evaluation questions on my coursework I used a few different technologies to present my work, making them more interesting to read than plain text.
Prezzi is the technology I have used to create evaluation question 1 as it allows me to present my argument in a number of different segments meaning that it is easier for the reader to understand. The question involves me mentioning many aspects from both my main and ancillary task a well as referring back to my research and using theories to support this therefore it would not make sense if all of this different information was in one lump. I found this an easy programme to use due to being familiar with it through my other subjects as well as using it earlier in this course as a way of analysing my rough cut.
To present my work for evaluation question 2 I used Slide Share as a way of breaking down my work into smaller pieces in order to make it more reader friendly, similar to question 1 however I wanted to ensure I was using a range of technologies. Slide Share involved me creating a presentation on Microsoft power point and then uploading it to Slide Share where it could be embedded onto my blog. I found making a power point to display my answer very easy and useful for this question as I wanted to insert a number of pictures to each slide to back up my argument as well as text boxes under them and arrows to highlight points; if I was to have created this on Prezzi I would not know how to do this.
In order to complete evaluation question 3 which was based upon audience feedback, myself and the rest of the group posted our video and ancillary tasks onto social medias , twitter, facebook and instagam. With the target audience for our products being modern day youth, sharing our products on these medias was especially effective as this is where we would reach our target audience. Our video and its title '#HARD' is focused around the craze which youth have around social media, in particular twitter and instagram, and this was proved by the responses which we received.
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