Evaluation Question 4

On camera talk about:

DIGIPAK
When we worked on the digipak, inside and out, we payed attention to detail. We wanted everything about it to look both good, but also believable. We made sure that all the images used were a high quality and edited to suit the tone and style of our website and our video.
Similarly to other digipaks we looked at. We really liked the colours of Naked and Famous, yet we enjoyed the style and tone created on the Crystal Castles cover. (Show)
To do this we used:

• Coloured filters on layers
• Show an example of it (Ham & Lou pic)
• sun bleaching at top (inside cover) 

We did this to keep the images consistent throughout. The front cover, which we made first, had the bleached effect at the top naturally, so to keep the entire digipak consistent we added that effect to the inside cover. 

• editing the font
• repeating/extending the images (brick pattern and tights) and warping (show example - bricks again)

(Show other digipaks)

IWEB
In iWeb we began with a basic, basic black template. It was decided early on that for consistency we'd keep the brick pattern a recurring theme. So we created the repeat background from a stock, royalty free image of an old factory wall, similar to the ones we wanted to use in our music video.

• Repeat Pattern BG
• Long-line design

(Consistent with other websites, such as YLHCSD and Unicorn Kid)

• Editing the header with us as the band, overlapping the logo slightly and fading under the main content of the page, done in Photoshop.
• 'blog'/news section links to merch media etc.

MUSIC VIDEO

• Pasting over at playhead - we had some trouble with it at times, moving clips around without meaning too
• editing the colours (party scene)
• show an example of reverse a shot /slowing it down
• planning the continuity
• cut aways and rapid cuts

MODERN MEDIA

• We used: iWeb, iMovie and Adobe Photoshop
• Research: Youtube, spotify/last.fm for similar artists, television
• Audience feedback: youtube again (we uploaded it to our own channel) and we intend on creating a small survey using Survey Monkey and posting a link to our peers on Facebook/Twitter
• Due to Youtube's sense of synergy in modern tech/media it is easier now than ever before to distribute and cross-promote a product digitally quickly, cheapy and efficiently. Using social networking such as facebook, myspace, twitter and tumblr it is a simple task to get our video out to a wide audience.

Evaluation Question 1

1. In what ways does your media product use, devolp or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Decide whether your music video uses, devolps and/or challenges the forms and conventions of other music videos from your genre.

Our Video:

A Similar Video:


This video starts in a similar way to our video and has several key similarities, such as the way some of the shots are framed, the sunny beautiful location, and the general composition and mise-en-scene of the 'flashback' scenes. The tone if this particular video is happy or euphoric, which we wanted to emulate in those scenes.
We had not seen this video before planning our video, so when we did come across it and see the similarities, it confirmed my own personal belief that we were on the right path in terms of style and tone.

Another Crystal Castles Video:
Crystal Castles - Celestica


This is the latest official video made by the band themselves. We used a lot of similar imagry to them in terms of mise-en-scene, such as a graveyard and wildlife, as well as old-style buildings.
When we acted as the band we tried to style ourselves similarly as well. There are a lot of tracking shots through the locations in the video whilst Alice sings the vocals.

In all the videos we looked at and liked there was a strong visual style that was consistant thoughout the video, whether it be neo-goth like Crystal Castles or the Hipster/Indie style seen in the M83 video, we liked the consistency and wanted to replicate that in our video, as well as the general conventions of fast paced editing, a variety of shots lenghts, types and camera angles to keep the audience interested.