Evaluation

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

Our media product used the forms and conventions of real hip-hop media products in many effective ways. It uses the same procedure, which a hip-hop media product goes through in all the production stages; pre-production, production and post-production. We used a real media product to base our product on, the song we used was; ‘4 My Town’ by Birdman, Lil Wayne and Drake. We used the original instrumental and the lyrics, but manipulated it to our liking, however we did not change it too much as we wanted to portray the same message and not drift away from the conventions. We also used our previous knowledge of the genre, to help us plan and produce the product. We researched other hip-hop products to make sure we used the proper forms and conventions. After thorough research and our own knowledge we found that it is imperative for the video to include; money, cars, hip-hop style clothing and women. However we could not find women that were willing to take part in the video, but we knew that it was vital to in some way include the female figure so we created silhouettes of women on Adobe Photoshop and incorporated them into the video, but for this to be completely successful we found that we should also silhouette the men, so it does not come across demeaning but at the same time it creates an effect for the video. This also in a way challenged the conventions of a real product as no woman was properly shown. Another way we challenged the conventions was, we used different cultures equally within the product; Black, White and Asian, where in a real hip-hop product it would mostly represent black people. We used a plain white background to make the product look clean, but also as it is used a lot in other videos of this genre. We used many effects such as ‘Brightness and Contrast’, ‘Glint’, ‘Starburst’ and ‘Light Flare’, to create a ‘bling’ effect and make the people shine, as they do in real media products. Also, usually in hip-hop music videos there is no narrative, the rappers just perform to the audience, as they are talking to them, so we did this throughout the video.

Ways in which we developed these forms and conventions?

We developed the forms and conventions of a music video in many different ways. One way we did this was by the shining of the people, although it is used in real media products, we used it to an amount where the glow is obviously shown. Also we used the white background throughout the video, where in real media products there are other backgrounds or clips from other places, using just a white background could make the video seem quite dreary, so we added the silhouettes, wording and other effects to liven it up, so this shows that having a simple video could also be interesting. Adding the silhouettes developed the conventions in a way because it shows that you can show women and buildings in silhouettes and it would still have the same effect and still portray the same message.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

The combination of our main product, digipak and website was very effective. The combinations showed that that there was clear branding, as they all displayed the same message, money. The digipak displayed a high class, expensive car, the Aston Martin with the rappers standing in front of it and the other member of the group at the back, this is because the rappers are the main people, so we showed that they are the most important as clearly as possible. The car portrays that we have money and this is a big thing in the hip-hop genre, we properly combined this with the other products as the same car is shown in the video and the website. The characters’ postures were relaxed on the digipak, as the ‘we don’t care’ look much like the album covers, this same message was shown in the music video. The basic colour theme was black, white and red; we chose this theme because it gives quite a dark and ‘gangster’ feel, rather than an amusing and happy look, the theme was also used in the website and the music video. The digipak front cover was also used within the website to so it is easily noticed. The effective combination makes the product look professional and so when the people see the digipak or the website they know straight away which music video it is for.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

I have learnt a lot from audience feedback. When we were in the research stage, we held a focus group so we can see what type of music video is most appealing to the audience. The audience liked the three different music videos that I displayed because it looks like they are having a good time, so we incorporated this into the video by asking a lot of people to come and dance around to make it look like they are having fun. We also asked the audiences what the elements in the music videos that represent the hip-hop genre were and they said; the clothing, the women and the dancing represent the hip-hop genre so we knew that it was imperative to somehow include all of these elements into the video to follow the conventions of the hip-hop genre. Once we created the music video, we showed friends, family and teachers, to get feedback on what needs to be improved and we got a lot of useful feedback such as there is too many of the same shots which makes it look dull and there are some good effects that need to stay continuous throughout the video. So we used the feedback to re-edit the video and come out with a clean professional looking final product. We did the same with the ancillary tasks, one we created the digipak or the website, we got feedback from friends, family and friends, however we had to re-edit these more than just once for the audience to be satisfied with the final product/s, and for us to come out with the best looking digipak and website. So although we were satisfied with products, the audience bought the best out of us with their constructive criticisms.

How did you use media technologies in the production of your film?

We used media technologies in a number of different ways for the production stage of our film. We used the HD cameras; the greens screen room and the editing suite. The HD cameras gave our video a clean and professional look, also having them on stands also helped as it means that the camera would stay still, but also were able to move it around smoothly without it shaking. We used the green screen room because it gave us a good place to work in, where we would not be disturbed but also because we knew we could use it to our advantage in the pre-production stage by adding a background. The editing suite took us some time to figure out, as there was no teacher properly qualified to teach us, so we had to learn our selves, but once we figured it out it because very useful and easy to use. It gave us the ability to easily press pause, stop and record easily and the footage would save straight onto the system so it would not become a hassle in the later stages. We used ‘Walkie Talkies’ so we could communicate to each other from different rooms, so the person in the editing suite knows when to record/stop, so we would not have to keep running around. We also used the recording studio to record the lyrics for the song, this is because we wanted a high quality sound to go with the HD video, because if it was not it would look rather unprofessional and quite irregular. We used a Blackberry to take a few pictures may have used for the film, but ended up not including them, we knew that the Blackberry would not give a high quality outcome but we decided that it would not matter as we would be manipulating it a lot later on in Adobe Photoshop.