Evaluation Question 3; What have you learned from your audience feedback?

To start off with, at the beginning of the course, I interviewed a member of my target audience. Charlotte, aged seventeen and a huge fan of Hip Hop. 
This was so that I had a clear idea of what people that listen to Hip Hop want to see in a music video. Knowing what this person imparticular liked about this genre influenced me to do further research online about my target audience. For this, I looked on sites like UK tribes and Radio 1 Xtra.
 These websites were very useful for finding out what sort of thing we need to include in our music video that our target audience would enjoy to see. For example, my interviewee said that she would like to see urban locations and a confident actor that fits in with the genre Hip Hop. This influenced us to arrange this so we could include the things that were said. 
UK tribes was useful as it gave us statistics of the typical stereotype from the audiences associated to Hip Hop, such as 'blingers' and Urban teens. This showed us things like the brands they wear, technology they may be into, and how and where they consume most of what they see and hear in the media.










After doing this research online, we wanted feedback on the ideas we had for our own music video. So to get this feedback, we presented a pitch to our class mates. Below is the video of our pitch of ideas.

We got lots of feedback which was useful, both positive and negative, this was: 
Positive:
- The concept seems basic and easy to stick to.- The use of generic conventions have been thought about well. e.g. Props such as caps and hoodies.
Negative/to improve on:
- We need a clearer concept on exactly what is going to happen throughout 3minutes 26 seconds and to consider the time management.
- Locations are quite vague at the minute, the more locations we use the better.
- Make sure a crowd of people at a 'gig' looks realistic else it could look unprofessional.
- Ethnicity is key in Hip Hop as any white boy trying to look like he has swag may ruin the realistic look of the video. So characters need to be good actors or have some kind of realistic swag/gangster look about them.
What we are going to do to improve the feedback we got:
- Think more about the concept of the video so that we have a clearer image in our head.- Consider locations we are available to.
- Consider who the characters may be to make our music video look professional.


After receiving this feedback, we adapted our ideas to fit with what was said. This was important so that we could create a successful music video.

We ahd then found out all we needed to know to create a successful video and created it to 'Drake - Headlines' baring in mind of what the audience wants to see.

Sharing my video in different ways;

Facebook - Most o out traget audience have a Facebook account and are fully into multimedia. For this reason, to get some feedback on my music video, I posted it onto Facebook. This is the first post I put on and the comments I recieved.

These comments weren't critical or helpful towards evaluating the music video. But all those that commented enjoyed it and said it was good! Because I didn't get much useful feedback here, I posted it again a week or two later. This got me much more useful feedback and thoughts from the target audience. 

Twitter:
I also posted my music video on Twitter. This was then able to be viewed by my followers. Gideon Seglah, who is the actor in the music video re tweeted this for his followers to see too.

Our school's media department has recently set up a Twitter account, on this there was a post tweeting the finished A2 music videos. Ours was included in this, which I also re tweeted.
From Twitter, we didn't receive much feedback from anybody, but was worth sharing the video in different ways.


YouTube:
Before actually finishing our music video, we uploaded a preview video onto my YouTube account. We got a little amount of feedback from this, but not much. What was said by this is that 'I want to see the actual video'. This was good to hear as it shows how short clips of what's in our video well to get the target audience interested to start with. 
We also had our finished music video uploaded on to YouTube. This was so that we had a simple way to distribute our video for anyone to see, and to get the feedback we need from our particular target audience.


Email:
I heard on Radio 1 that Nick Grimshaw (radio presenter) was creating a site via BBC radio one of home made music videos by the radio one listeners. So I sent him an email with the link to our music video which we created for our A2 production. 

Questionnaire;

I thought I should do some further audience feedback to get more useful and critical feedback. To get this, I made a short questionnaire. I showed this to three classes aged 17 and 18. Also to two people over the age of 30. 

The questions asked were:
-How old are you?
-Do you think this video looks like something you'd expect to see on music channels?
-What didn't you like about this video or what could be improved?
-What did you like about the video?
-Any other comments?





All the points made from this questionnaire were very useful as feedback. The main points made were:
- This video looks like something that would be shown on music channels such as MTV and 4 music. 
- Some places in the video were too dark.
- The x-ray effect was really good.
- The actor was really well chosen because of his ethnicity, meeting the conventions of the Hip Hop genre.
- Mise en scene was well thought about, especially costume as he was dressed appropriate to the genre.
- Good syncing!
- Nice variety of locations.

Overall feedback on my ancillary tasks:
After asking my target audience for their view on my ancillary tasks, which were a digipak and a magazine advert promoting the digipak, I found that most people if not all, had only positive things to say about them. It was said that there was clear brand identity throughout each of the products and after seeing the music video too it all really links well together. Many people thought that our idea of having all the song lyrics on the inside with pictures of the actor on the inside of the digipak was a good idea. Nobody else in our group did this either so it was something that was individual and worked well. Many people said that both the magazine advert and the digipak both looked very professional and as if you could buy them in a shop. This was pleasing to hear because that is what we were aiming to do. Our audience made us realise how professional looking our ancillary tasks actually were. However, some said that the image on the front cover of the digipak was a bit dark and could've been better if it was brightened.

Overall feedback from my music video:
Overall, my target audience enjoyed the music video to Headlines which Tom and I created. We got some useful critical feedback and many positive points. The main points mentioned were that the scenes which we shot in the school hall were a bit dark. This was because we used a strobe light in a dark room. I personally liked this lighting effect, but for others it was distracting because it was difficult to see the actor. One person pointed out that there was a part in the same scene where it jars and the contrast changes. This was something Tom and I didn't notice but we sorted it out once it was pointed out and had to reload it onto YouTube with the edited effect that we changed. Something that was liked in our video by many people, was the x ray effect. This was three different layers with a glowing colour tint on each. This was something we were experimenting with near the beginning of our music video, so we only put it in the music video twice. If I were to do this again I would definitely include this effect a little more throughout the video. Everybody said that our choice of actor for this song was perfect. Race in hip hop always has an effect on whether his actions and characters work with the song. If we used a white British boy instead of black, I don't think our music video would of been anywhere as near as successful as I think it was.
Audience feedback was one of the most useful things to help us with our creative decision making the whole time. I learnt a lot from them and found asking audience for their views was very useful.

Evaluation Question 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

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

Evaluation Question 1: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

This is our finished music video. The genre was Hip Hop. We created a music video for a song by Canadian rapper, Drake to his single 'Headlines'. 

To come up with an answer for this question, I think it's best to go into detail about what conventions even are. A convention is a way in which something is usually done, within a particular area. We get conventions in everything. Here I am going to focus on the conventions of music videos as this is the media product which I have created. A music video is a videotaped performance of a recorded popular song, usually accompanied by dancing and visual images interpreting the lyrics. Conventions of a music video are things that we expect to see throughout. These include:

• A variety of camera shots. Long shots, close up, extreme close ups, and mid shots. Close ups are used to reflect the emotion within the song and the lyrics as well as a connection with the audience. 
• A variety of camera movements, such as tracking panning and arc shots. These are used to follow the artist or the actor throughout the video.
• mise en scene:

- Props that are appropriate to the genre. E.g. Hip Hop would use Bling.

- Costume that is appropriate to the genre.

- Lighting that is appropriate. E.g. outdoor natural lighting, or indoor artificial lighting.

- Actors that are appropriate tot he genre. Such as ethnicity, age and gender are all important.

- A setting that is appropriate to the music genre.

• We all expect to see the artist or band members throughout the music video too.

Besides conventions of music videos, we all expect to see certain things in a particular genre of music video. We have created a Hip Hop music video. This had many conventions that we met, developed and challenged throughout. Hip Hop is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, which is a rhythmic speak that is chanted. This includes artists such as Jay Z and Drake. Conventions of the Hip Hop genre include:

• Usually a male artist in the foreground, dominantly in the camera and highly confident.
• The use of black and white in Hip Hop is often used in editing.
• Usually filmed in urban areas, this can suggest the characters life or background, such as 'rags to riches'.
• Females in the Hip Hop genre are usually wearing provocative clothing, showing a lot of skin and cleavage.
• Males often are the opposite to the females in Hip Hop, and wear baggy clothing with a lot of Bling. This connotes Hip Hop well and shows wealth.
• Lighting is often low key, reflecting on what the song is about.
• Actors are often bold and confident and proud of who they are. Sometimes we may class tattoos as a connotation of Hip Hop too.
• Props we expect to see are, a lot of jewellery, phones, money, sometimes guns. These are all things that make the artist look wealthy, or show a lower to higher class contrast. The gun being stereotypical of the genre linking with crime.
• Narrative - The storyline throughout Hip Hop music videos are usually about women. The artist usually left alone and not winning the girl. If they are not about women then the other storyline is often about crime and street life. We know this by the artists/characters roles and how the lyrics match with the visual.
• Iconography is signs and symbols that we expect to see throughout the video. In Hip Hop, we expect to see dollar signs, brands, clubs/parties, dominant gestures, big houses and champagne. Young money's 'Bedrock' below, is a video where lots of iconography is shown. 

Shots and editing used in Hip Hop:

Some of the shots that i found were often used in Hip Hop videos were:

• Low angled shots, these made the artist have more power and showed dominance and importance to the video.

• There is often, bright and coloured lights in editing and in club scenes. These make 
• Editing fits to the pace of the music in Hip Hop music videos. Meaning that if the music is fast, each frame will have to be just as quick.

Considering all of the conventions of Hip Hop as listed above, we met, challenged and developed these throughout our video. 

Conventions in our genre that we met:

• The appropriate use of black and white in editing
• Black artist/actor
• Fast paced editing

Conventions in our genre that we developed:

• A club scene, without the crowd.
• Having provocative girls around him, we linked a clip of a pole dancer to him instead of with him.

Conventions of our genre that we challenged:

• Bling, would usually be exaggerated, we kept it simple and classy
• We didn't have any of the artists friends around him throughout which is something that usually is throughout Hip Hop videos that we challenged.

To get some inspiration on what we wanted to include in our music video, we researched other music videos in the Hip Hop genre. We took things in videos and made them our own, developing the conventions throughout. Tinie Tempah's 'Passout' music video was useful as it gave us some ideas of different shot types and angles. Tinie Tempah smashes filament lights to build suspension in their video. We liked this idea, so we decided a bottle smashed by the artists was a good interpretation of this. 

Tinie Tempah's smashing of filament lights.

Editing:

Our developed interpretation.

The beginning of our video starts with establishing shots, and quick paced shots flickering between each other to establish the character and the setting, setting the scene throughout. Jay Z's video to 'Money,Cash,Hoes' also uses establishing shots for us to identify the setting, also showing the characters in the first few seconds of the video. I think this works well to our chosen genre as it fits with the pace of the editing.
Below is two shots from the start of a hip hop video by Jay Z. In comparison to the similarity in  our music video opening. The first two are shots from a Jay Z video. The second two are shots from our own video.

We decided after watching many other videos from the genre Hip Hop that editing was a key thing to think about and whether or not we wanted to keep it up with the pace of the music throughout. We did decide to keep up with the music after looking at music videos from the same genre. There are many effects used in Hip Hop music videos, some even being surreal effects. I found a Drake Video 'Over' which uses consistent effects throughout the whole video. Some of these effects I wanted to have in our video. We interpreted each effect differently. The use of green screening and the background effects worked best for this. At 1.25 in this video, the blurred effects of the artist is something I wanted to include in our music video. So that it wasn't too similar I had a look at many effects and below Drake's video is my interpretation of the blurred editing.

In many Hip Hop videos, girls are shown provocatively. We met this convention, however didn't have it throughout our video very often. We met this by having a girl pole dancing. The flashing lighting helped to set a scene that is often relevant in Hip Hop. Her gestures are very provocative which is good in Hip Hop because this is the way in which girls are represented in this genre . Below I put together two clips which we included in our music video.

We used different types of shots throughout our video, a lot being still yet we had a few hand held shots to represent the artists lifestyle. We have seen in various Hip Hop music videos, the use of handheld shots in effective ways. An example of this would be in a video that In analysed at the start of the year, again by Jay Z '99 problems'. This uses hand held shots effectively throughout.

Our videos hand held shots are when the artist is walking through a club. This is used to make him look important and hand made. This is an screenshot off our video of where we have used hand held shots.

Digipak

For my ancillary task I used a lot of conventions including track listing, bar codes, release dates and having the artist on the front cover.  I used these as they fit with the usual conventions of a digipak.They are an essential convention of a digipak so it was vital I included one on my digipak. We decided to have the artist on the front cover as I feel that this will draw people onto looking at the CD cover as it has a well known artist on the front. This is also a regular convention of a Hip-Hop digipak, as the artists are often very confident. 
An album that I took some inspiration from was Jay Z's 'reasonable doubt'. I liked this digipak because even though it was quite simplistic, it works well in promoting the artist and the genre.The use of black and white is effective too as this is a convention in the hip hop genre. This album also used a parental advisory label on. These are all things that I wanted to have on our digipak. His magazine advert for this album showed clear brand identity between the two as it has the image of the album on the front, also the same fonts and sizes which all link together showing clear brand identity.

After looking at this album and previous ones I have analysed earlier on, we came up with our own complete digipak which I think meets all the conventions of Hip Hop.

Advertising Our Product

We are now very close to completing our media product: a music video. So we thought that we should think about where and how we are going to advertise our product. We think that our target audience will be the sort of people that listen to Radio1xtra. This is a radio station that plays a lot of Hip Hop songs, old and new. They advertise new songs on air, and they also have a website where we think that our product could be successful on.
The majority of our target audience are online, and are fully interested in the music industry. Therefor we feel that another great way to advertise our music video would be online. The age group we are aiming to please too are those that are probably following their favorite artists on twitter, and liked them on Facebook. This tells us that Twitter and Facebook too will be a great way to share and advertise our media product. Reaching out to our target audience successfully. YouTube too, is full of advertisements to the latest tracks in many genres. YouTube will probably be one of the best places to advertise our media product.

Filming: Night Club & Studio

This is our final shots of filming that we did. Firstly we filmed the studio scene in a small music room at school. This room was very small and it was difficult to get the shots that we wanted. But we are still using the clips as cutaways throughout the video. These are the shots of Gideon in the studio. We put this shot into black and white on our music video. We did this because black and white connote the Hip Hop genre.

We have now filmed in Tokyo night club in Lincoln too. This was during the day, we got permission to use any of the rooms. We chose to use the VIP booths and rooms. We used a variety of angled shots, also a handheld shot of Gideon walking through the club. This was to represent the hectic lifestyle of Drake. These are some of the shots we used.

 Below are images of the two rooms that we used to film in.

Shooting Schedule

We are hoping to film for the last time to complete our video to a higher standard.
We are going to film at De Aston School once more, using the music rooms mixing and recording desks as a studio, so that the video has a bit more of a narrative to it. We have also received permission from a night club 'Tokyo' in Lincoln to film in a VIP booth for a couple of hours during the day. This should help to improve our video greatly as they're both professional looking places. Both in which we hope to look professional in our music video.
We are going to use a variety of shots for these scenes, as we have noticed that the camera throughout is very still, besides one pan that we have at the moment. We hope to include high angle shots, hand held effective shots and a high angled arc shot.
Below is our shooting schedule just for these two scenes.

Shooting schedule template from hjacklinmedia