LEILA'S EVALUATION

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

My group and I picked unsigned artist 'Aim'with the song 'Sunshine' she fell under the Hip-Hop genre. So the next stage was to do as much research and planning into this particular genre . I looked into Hip-Hop/rap music videos and noticed there were particular motifs and themes that were constant throughout. We took the following conventions and applied it to our music video ;
-Mise en scene
-Religious symbols
-Drugs
-Gangs
-Violence
-Clothing
-Camera shots
As a group we wanted to conform and develop our Hip-Hop/Rap conventions and not challenge them, by looking at the style of the artists, mise en scene and camera shots and other motifs . In most Hip-Hop/Rap music videos the mise en scene tended to be rather dark to illustrate the dark cold life as a gangster on the streets, we really liked this idea and did the crime scenes at night and when it came to the editing the colour scheme we put a dark contrast throughout our music video for example When Nia and christina walk to meet eachother ( split screen) we lowered the tone  to make it seem gloomy and dangerous, so by darkening the contrast we followed certain conventions.
 The clothing in rap music videos is quite big and bulky with hats and hoods to disguise the gangsters identity and to make them seem threatening . We took this convention and forward it to our costume design for Nia. Throughout the video she wears hoods to make her seem threatening and dangerous, which again relates back to our research to most rap-stars having a threatening image because they fall under a niche audience who follow this particular trend ( also it can fall under John Goodwin's analysis theory 'demand of the record label'). As well as looking at music videos for research I looked at online magazines, the magazine 'vibe' gave us an idea which also ran throughout most Hip-Hop/rap  music videos, which was religious elements. On an issue of the online magazine 'vibe' it had an image of popular rap star 'Eminem' who had a cross around his neck this related to the suffering on the streets and wanting forgiveness, so we took this convention and put it forth to our music video also to our Ancillary tasks as well, so both products had a consistent theme that ran throughout.
In a lot of Hip-Hop music videos there is a repetitive amount of direct address with the rappers confronting the camera ,we took this piece of research and used it for our choruses. One of the influential videos for this particular idea was ' Jay Z-99 problems' throughout the whole video it uses direct address which connects well to the niche audience . It was also shot in black and white we liked this idea so we did some further research to help us develop the idea , we found that most Hip-Hop music videos used the black and white shots and dark colour schemes ( as i mentioned before). Following on we developed this idea for our chorus scenes. We used three actors including myself to rap to the camera, this would relate to other former gangsters suffering on the streets as well ( and it would link in well with our fragmented narrative because most rap music videos had this particular linear). The mise en scene for the choruses would be in black and white for the audience to easily establish between certain events that happen throughout our fragmented narrative. The location for the direct address was in an industrial urban-like setting . The clothing would have an urban feel with big coats and jackets to make them seem hard and tough, we wanted the actors to use a range of levels but it was filmed from a low angle  to make them seem powerful and threatening to the audience. We placed them on stairs and near railings , the idea of having them on the stairs came from 90's Rap video ' word to ya murther' where in the video we noticed that most of the rappers were on stairs and in industrial locations. The location concept for all Hip-Hop/rap music videos is set in urban or industrial places this illustrated the toughness of the gangsters surviving on the harsh streets An example of this is the end scene in our music video when Nia gets beaten up by tough looking gangsters in an industrial setting, so we wanted to conform and make Nia seem homeless and survivng on the harsh streets as she comes across bad consequences such as drugs, crime and gang violence which are occuring conventions throughout our research.
Our music videos also follows conventions of other Hip-Hop music video camera techniques and not challenge them. In our research we watched a range of different Hip-Hop artists from 2pac to Jay Z and noticed that in their music videos they had a lot of wide camera shots , cutaways and establishing shots so we used these particular techniques throughout our music video because it looked effective and we were able to include more mise en scene. The storyline for our music video was developed to follow other music videos plots for example the music video 2pac ft Elton John - Ghetto gospel the main character ( protagonist) is forced to sell drugs and it ends in a bad consequence we liked the idea of our main character Nia to suffer ( protagonist) and to be forced into this world of felony and wanting to 'runaway'# lyrics ; We illustrate the lyrics through changing the meaning , the word runaway is wanting to escape  then we further developed this idea to 'heaven' which linked into our religious concept and also one of the main meanings behind Ghetto Gospels music video.
2.) How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

The main theme that runs throughout both music video and ancillary tasks is a religious concept. This was further developed by our research into Hip-Hop/Rap images from magazines adverts and album covers. Firstly we researched and did planning such as sketches to how we wanted it to look, we wanted to follow certain conventions for example Hip-Hop stars have images that focus on them and the font print is strong and bold, we liked this idea a lot and made the Nia the main focus for the magazine advert and the front cover of the Digi-Pak . we looked again at the hip-hop magazine 'vibe' and noticed that a lot of rappers had religious symbols either as jewellery or body art . Furthermore from our the research we gathered for our Ancillary tasks we took the font conventions and developed it to the colour blood-red i.e Representing Nia suffering and for marketing purposes the colour stands out and perhaps open up to other audience types.
The pictures we took for both Ancillary tasks were very effective we took into account mise en scene, costume and lighting . The location for our magazine advert was in an alley-way, we had Nia against a concrete wall with graffiti on it, this was effective because it represented the Hip-Hop genre perfectly because we used that industrial , urban-like setting. In relation to Nia's costume we had her in the same outfit as she was in the music video so it had significance not only to the music video but to the genre itself, she had her hood up staring directly into the camera in a threatening yet vulnerable manner , this was effective because it has a noticeable quality to the character Nia the protagonist in the music video. The Font , design and imagery on the Ancillary tasks are effective and relate well to the music video because it carries certain themes for example the cross necklace, this is repeated on the magazine advert and digi-pak in relation to the idea of faith and suffering in music video.
The technology we used to produce both our Ancillary tasks was photoshop. We had intial ideas for the magazine advert that stemmed  themes from our music video. We used the stained glass tool which transformed the whole image of Nia making it religious, it looked really effective and eye-catching. We darkened some areas for it to relate to the music video because the music video had a dark colour scheme, this was very effective. We also wanted to close in the darkness around her to make her the main focus of the image ( following conventions) and by using the highlighter tool we gave Nia a Halo effect around her hood, which again relates to the religious theme. Under her eyes we used the burn tool to darken underneath to make her look rough like she would on the streets, this combines well with her as that particular character in the music video. The image itself is invasive and focused on the good and bad , pure and evil. We decided to use the same character from the music video to represent the artists 'Aim' on both Ancillary tasks because it would be effcetive and it made the Ancillary tasks come with a story and to have siginificance , easy to relate to and also be influenced by the music video where the Hip-hop/rap genre is easily depicted and effective.
 Both Ancillary tasks are extremely effective because they relate to our music video and fit perfectly into the conventions of the genre. The Digi-pak has similar effects, on the back of the Digi-Pak the image is focused on Nia's hand gripping a cross to represent faith and strength with the track list along side her hand which is effective because it doesn't overwrite the image itself. Overall Both Ancillary tasks and the main product create an effective combination because they follow conventions of the hip-hop genre and captavate the niche audience.
3.) what have you learned from your audience feedback?

You definately can learn a lot from your feedback, it helped my group and i create ideas and also to discard of any errors that came across through the making of our main product, and both Ancillary tasks.
First off as we researched and started coming up with intial ideas for our music video, my group had to give an individual analysis of a particular Hip-Hop/rap music video, and what certain elements or motifs ran throughout them and how we would illustrate them.
 When filming our main product; as always there is constructive criticisms...the class and the teacher told us that we needed to elaborate more on the location for our music video and to think about cast members and risk assessments. We took this feedback into account and started to map out and get a final idea of the location. We came to this conclusion of filming in an urban-side of windsor because we were to film at night so both casts and crew were familiarised with the location, in relation to cast we ended up appointing a pupil from our group to play the main character due to reliance issues and we all knew what conventions we had to include, the risk assessment was one of the major things we needed to consider , we examined the locations and jotted down any risks that would take place and why the whole crew and cast had to be notified about the safety of us and others. On a more positive note we were also told how good our analysus on the rap music videos were , including good media terminology , they especially liked our ideas for transitions , camera shots and effects. The teacher liked our descriptions on the music videos i.e mise en scene, colour schemes , camera shots and angles including the conventions for that particular genre. I wrote a questionnaire to establish our target audience and what they thought about HIp-hop music videos and what common factors were they most likely to see.
 The feedback we got from this was great we established what things we needed to include in order to make it good storyline - the audience preferred a fragmented narrative because it was intense to watch, also the feedback helped us establish certain themes i.e religious elements, drugs, gangs and violence.
We then shot the footage for our music video which we thought was good and then uploaded it and edited it on Final Cut- Pro this was then examined by the teacher and another media teacher and their feedback was that we didn't include a variety range of shots , and more of a ' bad side' to the character Nia. We were only following certain camera technique conventions that other Hip-hop music videos had...BUT! we took this advice and went out and filmed close -ups and extreme close-ups of Nia smoking ( what a gangster indeed) this proved to be very effective and much better when we showed our teacher. My group and I showed how our main product to our friends and other classmates they said the narrative was clear and the effects and camera shots were excellent and really fit the conventions of the Hip-hop/rap genre.

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

Within the time period from the start of our advanced portfolio my group and I have been technology crazy! Firstly all our work, such as planning,research,images,evaluations and footage is up on our blog wesite Thewindsormediablogspot.com. We used cannon video recording cameras to film and capture our music video and also it was used to take pictures of our Ancillary tasks, for us to then upload certain footage or images we used a USB cabel to upload it from the tape to the Mac computer to edit our main product on the software Final Cut-Pro. Once we captured the images we wanted for our Ancillary tasks we edited it on the software Photoshop, which was used to edit using a range of different tools and effects. We also burned our artists track onto iTunes and then converted it to Final Cut-Pro, once we were happy with our main product we had to use quicktime converter which changed the file so it's easily read on our blog and youTube , so we changed certain settings to better. As well as using a cannon recording camera to capture pictures , we also used a  Sony digital camera for our Ancillary tasks and risk assessments we then converted what was on the memory card via USB and then uploaded it onto photoshop and used a range of different tools and effects in order to create the perfect image we wanted for example the burn tool, size tool, contrast effects, sponge tool and different layers.
YouTube and google search engine was a big research help for us , we used YouTube in order to view different Hip-hop music videos for our research and planning, if we liked a certain video and wanted to analyse it we would embed it onto our blogs by clicking embed and copying and pasting the code into the HTML bar on the blog so it allowed the blog viewer to watch the video clip on the blog and not as a hyperlink. We surfed the net including google images to examine and analyse pictures of magazine adverts, digi-paks and rappers. We also used the search engine google as well, to look at online Hip-hop magazines for more research . Wikipedia gave us more information about certain artists and record labels which helped us during research and planning for our Ancillary tasks and other artists analysis. Microsoft office was used in order to create slide shows and to write evaluations. Throughout the process of planning, research, construction and evaluation stages we used a wide variety of technology in order to make our main product and both ancillary tasks to the best they could be.