Evaluation Question 1

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

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Evaluation Question 2

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

Evaluation Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?
For the last two years, I have been studying Media Studies at A Level. During this time, I have had to use audience feedback for various tasks. More recently, I have used audience feedback for the making of my music video, magazine advert and digipak. This has been helpful as I have been able to render my work before it is too late and I have therefore been able to make it better. The three stages of the making these products are: the planning stages, the production stages, and the evaluating stages. The audience feedback is and has been very useful at all of these stages. I have used focus groups, Survey monkey, and I have even posted things on my Facebook account in order to ensue that I got a larger range of people and more thorough research.  Audience Feedback in the Planning Stages During the first stages, I chose the music that I would use. I managed to narrow it down to a possible three songs which were: "Fast Like You" by Chasing Thrill, and "Soldier" by Samantha Jade. I chose the latter and so began to prepare what I would do in order to make the music video as good as possible. In order to ensure that I had everyone telling me their ideas, I held a focus group with my class so that they could tell me their ideas and opinions on my initial thoughts. I listened to the ideas that were put forward but I was already confident that I knew what to do and how to effectively use these in my video. After having been given other ideas, I put these all together and I had a brief meeting with my partner to discuss the ideas that had been mentioned and so began to record the music video. Audience Feedback in the Production Stage  After I had filmed the first part of my video, I made a rough cut. I then had people comment on it while I held a focus group. I showed the rough cut to my peers and then asked for feedback. One person suggested that I should make the editing faster and that I should edit to the beat more effectively. I took this advice on board and proceeded to increase the speed of the editing. I noticed that the song was much faster than the slow editing. For this reason, I edited to the beat throughout the entire song. Another person said that I had not used very many locations. I looked through my song and found that I had, in fact, not used too many locations and that I would benefit from filming in other places. I then went out and filmed some more shots for the music video. I felt that it was a good decision to re-film and that by getting audience feedback, I made my video even better. Audience Feedback Evaluation: Final Stage After having completed my three products, I received my final bit of audience feedback with those that I asked giving me their final input. In order to show these results, I used the website "Survey Monkey" to get feedback about the music industry and my music video. I chose six questions that I would include on my page for some people to answer. I then evaluated the answers and posted the results below.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/7DQHQD6   The results from the survey monkey that I did showed that I have successfully ensured that the music video was relevant to the song. 100% of the responses that I got showed that I had managed to film relevant shots to compliment the song.  The results from the second question on my survey showed that the majority of the participants who answered my questions felt that I had filmed the music video in the style of a music video. Only one person was unsure of how the style of a music video should look. The results from my third question divided opinion amongst the participants. The majority of them thought that I had used a good variation of shots in my music video. However, some people believed that I could have done more to ensure that there was a wider range of shots. Some of the answers I had were that I could have had more close up shots and that more angled shots could have been included. My fourth question was about the timing of lip syncing was. The results from this question showed that everyone who took this survey agreed that the lip syncing was in time. This was a question that was important because if the answers had not been positive, then it would have meant that the music video wasn't very well done. "Was the lighting effective?" was my fifth question and I had all but one of my participants agreeing that it was in fact effective. This was disappointing as the lightning was important in the overall theme of the video. My sixth and final question was about how well the locations worked with the overall feel of the song. Unfortunately, I had mostly negative responses from this question. Some of the ideas that the participants suggested were that the outdoor locations were irrelevant and that there could have been shots in fun fairs with the boy winning prizes for the girl. However, one person said that they loved every location that was used. These are the people who completed my survey on survey monkey watching the rough cut of my music video. Overall, at every stage of the work that I have completed, audience feedback has been priceless in helping me get the work done to a good standard. It has enabled me to perfect my work and make it to a standard that I am very happy with.

Evaluation Question 4

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

Media presentation from Conor2

Digipak

Digipak

Magazine Advert

Final Magazine Advert

 Preparation for my Magazine Advert:

For my magazine advert, I have used a magazine name as the heading and I have used quotes about from reviews of the song. I have used the sharpening tool so that there is still a clear picture being used but it is a grainy image. I have also included the Spotify, iTunes, and HMV logo as these are the places that the album are available. I have also included a QR code so that potential buyers can view the album and listen to it on their mobile phones.

My magazine advert has a white boarder because the blog post is white you will not be able to see it unless you click on the image.

Filming the music video

Filming the Music Video

 When I was filming the music video, I went to various locations including Brighton seafront, a hotel in Brighton, and a local park. I had studied different music videos before setting out to film the music video and I had a good idea of what I wanted to do with my film and how I wanted it to look from the beginning. I knew that I would have to use a lots of shot variation as it would not look good enough after it was all put together afterwards. I got mid-shots on the balcony in Brighton and then I had filmed long-shots on the beach. I had also filmed shots on the train but they seemed to be unnecessary after having watched it back so I decided against including it.

 However, after I made my music video, I realised that I hadn't used very many shots after all. I was no longer in Brighton and so I just had to make-do with what locations were accessible with limited time available. Therefore, I included the shots that I had filmed in Brighton and went away and added the additional shots afterwards. The original copy was obviously not good enough as it lacked shot variation and it was quite boring. When I went away and filmed the other shots, I made sure that I included long shots, and also close-up shots as I hadn't included them in my original film. This made the music video much more entertaining and it did not feel as though it dragged. I recorded close-up shots in the park and I got different shots using mid-shot with the pond, and when there is an argument on-screen. I finished my film after a lot of editing and a lot more filming as I did not have what was required but I was happy with my end product.