How did you use media technologies in the research, planning, construction and evaluation stages?
When producing my different ancillary and main products i used a wide range of media technologies which i have presented in the format of a Prezi presentation.
To create a sense of brand identity for my promotional package i used the following; an image of the whole band on each of my products, the band name logo on the album cover and advert. Also, the photo's taken for both of my ancillary tasks were from the same day so the band member's were wearing the same costume on each product.
However, i did use a variety of different fonts on my ancillary tasks, this was something that was mentioned frequently in audience feedback and my target audience felt that using one font style would have improved the products and their identity as a brand.
What have you learned from your audience feedback?
SURVEY RESULTS
During the research stage of my A2 Media Studies coursework I produced a survey using the web site http://www.surveymonkey.com/ in order to gain responses from my target audience of teenagers and what they would expect to see in a music video, album cover and album advertisement.
From producing my questionaire I have found that the target audience demographic is a mixtue of both males and females. The average age of my target audience is beween 16-18 years old and therefore our aduiovisual main task must appeal to this age category.
Question One and Two of survey
Question Three of survey
Thirdly, I asked the question; what genre of music do you listen to most? The responses recieved conclude that the most popular genre of music is Indie with 66.7% which was closely followed by 60% for both Pop and R 'n' B music. These three genres of music have connotations with teenagers and for example; teenagers who are into Indie music are identified as a subculture through their choice of clothing (check shirts and chinos) and interests; going to music festivals. The emergnence and combinaion of club/ dance/ electonic; bass pounding music has in the last year formed Dubstep which recieved 46.7%. This style of music is clearly associated with teenagers who enjoy clubbing and partying at the weekend.
Question 4 and 5 of survey
The fourth question that i asked was; do you read any music magazines? Suprisingly, 86.7% of the responses given were no; this was not the result i was expecting to get from the teenage demographic as myself being a teenager am subscribed to NME magazine and Q magazine.I then asked the target demographic what music channells do you watch? The two most popular were Kiss and Viva with both having 50%. This result is conventional as the music that is played on these channell's is mainly Pop, R'n'B and Dance music which would therefore agree with the results of which music genre the target audience preferred. The third and fourth most popular were Chart Show TV and 4 Music with 42.9% of the vote; these channells also follow the conventions of the type of music to be aimed at the teenage audience of Pop and R'n'B. The joint least popular music channel's were Magic, Kerrang! and Scuzz. Magic is aimed at an adult demographic as they play "easy listening" and classical music which is not associated as popular with most of the teenage demographic. On the other hand, Kerrang! and Scuzz mainly play heavy rock and metal music and would be less appealing to the general teenage demographic and would only be popular with certain types of people who identify themselves as subcultures by dressing in a certian way and having certain interests.
Question 6 and 7 of survey
The sixth question i asked was how often do you watch music channells. The top response was Monthly with 40% which shockingly suggests that some of the teenage demographic do not bother keeping up to date with new music which seems suprising to me. The seventh question i asked was to do with the technical aspect of our main task; producing i music video. I asked what length of music video do you prefer and 80% of the results gained were 3-4 minutes long. When producing my music video; i have taken this preference into account as if a music video is worth producing then i also believe that it should be of a conventional length and be worth watching as a mini - movie.
The eighth question i asked was which radio station my target demographic of teenagers listen to; both Radio One and Kiss recieved 33.3% of the vote. I was unsurprised by this as these radio stations play the most up to date, mainstream and chart friendly music which teenagers like myself are interested in. Heart radio also recieved 26.7% of the vote which also plays mainstream music as well as songs from previous era's, such as; the nineties and the eighties and has become a popular radio station with teenagers.
The ninth question that i asked my target audience to answer was "What attracts you to CD covers?". I asked this question in order to increase the appeal of my own CD cover when producing my ancillary task. Some of the responses that i recieved included; "bright colours, band name, a good image, a good design, band logo's and a catchy title. When producing my own album cover i will take these responses into account in an attempt to meet the preferences and increase the appeal of my product to the target audience.
The final question that i asked was; "What do you expect to see from a music video?" I asked this question in order to increase the appeal of my own music video when producing my audiovisual main task. Some of the responses i recieved included; "dancing, catchy music, good lyrics, relevance, a story related to the song, the band playing in a set location, great camerawork and production value". The response that i found most helpful was "a story related to the song"; therefore when producing my music video i will create a developing narrative that fits the song's lyrics and is interesting and entertaining for my target audience of teenagers to watch.
FOCUS GROUP RESEARCH
I then conducted focus group research on teenagers of my target audience. In terms of music video's, i found that a teenage related costume and bright colours help to make the music video more eye-catching and appealing. Members of the focus group seemed to prefer the technique of fast paced editing as apposed to slow paced; this is arguably because it relates to a teenagers fast paced lifestyle, we therefore ensured to make most of our video fast paced to add further appeal to the target audience. Findings from the focus group also highlighted that a variety of different locations are needed to keep the music video interesting; although the settings used need to relate to the teenage target audience and the narrative of the video. Special effects also seem to be favoured, such as; animation, text overlay and references to social networking sites which gives a fun, teenage related appeal to the music video. Finally teen related props seem to have a good influence on the success of the music video, such as; mobile phone's, speaker's and iPod's; all of these items are in coherence with 21st century teenage culture.
In terms of album cover's i found that the type of camerawork preferred by members of my teenage focus group was a close up shot showing the artist's face so the consumer can identify with the artist. Also, a successful album cover appears to need a bold, eye-catching title to stand out from the product. The font style also needs to be appealing to the target audience of teenagers depending on the album genre.
In terms of album advert's i found that members of my focus group like a mid shot image of the band featured in the center of the advert or an image of the album cover itself; i took this into consideration when producing my ancillary product using an image of the band in the advert. Also, a successful album advert needs to include a one liner crtical review from another established newspaper or magazine that would feature the advert. The feature of weblinks, to the band's site is also a major convention of album adverts as it allows the reader to find out more about the band after seeing the advert in the magazine. Also, a typical feature is a release date as this tells the reader when they can purchase the album or download it online; i have incorporated all of these preferences when producing my own album advert.
The focus group research has allowed to personally find out what members of my teenage target audience expect and prefer in each of my products and has enhanced the success and appeal of my promotional package as a whole.
SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES FEDDBACK
After i had finished producing my ancillary tasks of an album cover and an album advertisemnt in
a music magazine I felt that it would be useful and benificial to gain feedback from my target audience of teenagers to see what they liked about each product, disliked about each product and what could could be improved about each product.
The easiest and most efficent way to gain feedback without having to print out each product and hand them out to each person seperately was to use the popular social networking websites; http://www.facebook.com/ and http://www.twitter.com./ I then posted my products on these sites and asked people to comment what they liked, disliked and what could be improved.
The aim of this was to achieve audience feedback directly from my target demographic of teenagers who would tell me what could be improved which would enable me to make my ancillary products better and more successful in relation to the satisfaction of the target audience.
From placing both of my album avertisements on my facebook page and asking people to comment on them i decided to use the first one based on the positive comments that i recieved; some of the comments that helped me make this decision were:
"The simple design and clear layout is a winner"
"The links are in proportion to the rest of the advert"
"The quotes work well in selling the album"
"The image fits in with the genre of music"
"The reviews and websites make it look professional"
Therefore i believe that this advert is most conventional and is the most appealing to the target audience out of the two due to it's conventional, clear layout and popular features of album adverts.
I also gained audience feedback on my album cover through www.facebook.com and www.twitter.com and the positive comments that i recieved suggested it was a conventional and successful product.
"I like the high quality image; it looks sharp and
professional" "The band name stands out from the cover as it is
in a large, eye-catching font and is a different colour to the
image"
"The costumes the band are wearing a typical of teenage
clothing; skinny jeans, hoodie, sunglasses and t shirts".
0.00 - 0.08: The opening shot sees the band playing on the rooftop through the use of a long shot which is conventional of music video openings. We also added an "aged" special effect" to all of the shots where the band are playing on the roof to give the video an authentic appeal and create a sense of continuity. The costumes that we chose are also typical of the way teenagers dress in skinny jeans and jumper's and the props used are also con;ventional of other music video's; through the choice of guitar's, drums, a microphone and a bass guitar. We also chose to add on a text title showing the name of the band and the name of the song in the music video; this is relatively conventional although less in recent music video's.
0.08 - 0.15: We then used a fade into white transition to blend in to the next shot of the lead female, Aimee playing the guitar to show she is a happy, cheery teenager. Throughout this shot we used a handheld camera type of shot to give it a playful feel which sees the camera zooming in on Aimee's face and then out again several times; this is conventional of music video's as this type of shot shows the importance of the character.
0.16 - 0.23 We then used a conventional fade out transition into the next shot of the guitarist Ben playing the instrument on his own on the rooftop. During this shot we broke normal conventions of indie music video's by using a slow motion effet to give the effect of slow paced editing. Through this shot we used conventional types of camerawork; opening with a zoom in on Ben's face to a zoom out near the end of the shot to show the whole location. The type of clothing that Ben is weaing is conventional of an indie band member in a music video; skinny jeans, a snapback hat and a retro jumper.
0.24 - 0.26 We then used a cube style transition into the next shot of the lead singer, Aimee sliding down the school banister; here we used a conventional long shot to convey her character as being fun and playful. We also sped up this shot as a special effect which is arguably conventional of other music video's of the same genre.
0.26 - 0.35 We then developed the music video's narrative by using a fade into black transition cutting back to Ben, the guitarist standing on his own outside smoking. The featue of one of the band member's smoking in the music video is conventional of similar producs as it fits with stereotypes of the indie/ alternative genre and the rebellious connotations of teenagers that listen to this style of music. Here we used a black and white special effect which is a conventional editing technique used in music video's. We used this effect to convey Ben feeling loney as he is apart from the lead singer, Aimee (who he fancies) which is also shown by his unhappy facial expressions through a conventional zoom in on Ben's face.
In our group we came up with a range of various band names. We then used www.surveymonkey.com to create a survey asking our target audience of teenagers "Which band name(s) do you like the best?". This was done in order to help us decide which band name to use in reference to the target demographic that we will be promoting the music video to. It could be suggested if the demographic like the band name they may be more likely to watch our music video. The survey shows the most popular band name choice is "The Racoons" with 88.9% of the vote; this is probably the most popular choice due to similar indie band names; The Wombats, The Maccabees and The Vaccines and the name fiits with coventional indie band names.
It is illegal to use a copyright product without permission, so in order to use Wheatus' song 'Teenage Dirtbag' in it's original entirity, we had to contact the band's record label who own the song and it's rights.We did this in order to use it for educational purposes for our A2 Media Coursework.
This is the letter that we sent the record label.
Crommwelll Commnity College
Wenny Road
Chatteris
Cambridgeshire
7th December 2011
Dear Sir/ Madam,
I am writing to your record label to ask for your permission to use the song 'Teenage Dirtbag' by Wheatus for our group's A2 Level Media Studies Coursework project.
As a group, we are aware that this song is a copyright song and i am therefore writing to you to ask for the record label's consent to use the song for educational purposes only.
Once we began filming, we realised that what we wanted to film of a party in a school was too ambitious in the time scale we had to complete the video. This led us to discuss the issue as a group to decide what we could do to still produce a high quality video but to also complete the filming of it by the deadline.
We decided on the new concept of:
Using band scenes for the chorus', which we had already filmed at this point and felt they should be a strong aspect of the video.
The plot would focus on Ben and Aimee being the couple that want to be together, which relates to the lyrics, such as; "her name is noel, i have a dream about her"
Therefore, we will use clips mainly of Ben and Aimee, (both together and alone) where they are acting naturally to show a visable connection between them to the teenage target audience.
I placed my ancillary task which was to produce an album advertisement for a music magazine on the popular social networking site: http://www.facebook.com/ in the Media Coursework Photo's section of my profile and asked people that meet the requirement's of my target age group of teenagers to comment under the product on what they like, dislike and what could be improved about the album advertisement. I decided to create two album advertisements in order to allow my target audience to compare both and allow me to find out which they prefer and which is most conventional. This is the second of the album advertisements that i have produced. This is a link to where the photo and the recieved comments can be found on my facebook profile: http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?fbid=10150736297909923&set=a.10150697087854923.458544.726604922&type=1&theater
I placed my ancillary task which was to produce an album advertisement for a music magazine on the popular social networking site: http://www.facebook.com/ in the Media Coursework Photo's section of my profile and asked people that meet the requirement's of my target age group of teenagers to comment under the product on what they like, dislike and what could be improved about the album advertisement. I decided to create two album advertisements in order to allow my target audience to compare both and allow me to find out which they prefer and which is most conventional. This is the first of the album advertisements that i have produced.This is a link to where the photo and the recived comments can be found on my facebook profile: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150697087854923.458544.726604922&type=3#!/photo.php?fbid=10150736293859923&set=a.10150697087854923.458544.726604922&type=1&theater
From placing both of my album avertisements on my facebook page and asking people to comment on them i have decided to use the first one based on the positive comments that i recieved; some of the comments that helped me make this decision were:
"The simple design and clear layout is a winner"
"The links are in proportion to the rest of the advert"
"The quotes work well in selling the album"
"The image fits in with the genre of music"
"The reviews and websites make it look professional"
Therefore i believe that this advert is most conventional and is the most appealing to the target audience out of the two due to it's conventional, clear layout and popular features of album adverts.
and then posted asking people that meet the age of my target dempographic to comment. This would enable me to find out what people of my target audience think about the posters and lead me to further develop and improve the poster.
Adorno's hyperdermic needle model suggests that the media injects a message into the passive audience.The message that is injected by this music video is that the singer; Example is lusting after a beautiful, idealised and picturesque girl. This is evidenced by the first shot being of the woman sleeping next to Example where he appears to be in love with her after gazing lovingly into her eyes. The camera focuses on the woman in the opening shot and shows her with long, blonde hair and the sun shining beind; this injects the message that she is the object of visual pleasure and is seen with bright, warm sunshine which influences the audience as a mass to engage with the video and accept the intended message. Blumler & Katz' Uses and Gratification Model can also be applied to this music video which suggests that the media satisfies different audience needs in four ways. The first way is Diversion; this is evidenced in the music video through the use of a tropical, picturesque holiday landscape of a beach which is seen throughout the video which provides the audience with an entertaining break from everyday life. The second need is known as Personal Relationships, which is where the audience watching this music video are intended to empathise with the singer, Example who wants to be with his female companion which forms a sort of social interaction. The third need is Personal Identity which is where the audience's identity are shaped by the media texts they consume and their responses to them. This would be shown in the music video as the audience who watch the music video would have a music taste of conventional mainstream, chart friendly, pop music and their response would be positive creating their own identity through the type of music they listen to. The final audience need that is satisfied is known as surviellance which is where the specific media of the music video provides the audience with information about the world setting around us which is evidenced in the music video which portrays a man and a woman falling in love with each other which is seen around the world.
Music video institutions are companies who help produce and fund music videos for their signed artists or bands. My target audience of teenagers commonly watch music videos everyday in order to keep up to date with new music or under the radar bands so we can discuss the video's socially with others.
Typically, new music videos are posted on to YouTube in order to start trends on the website which the target audience then share and copy the link onto social networking sites, such as; http://www.facebook.com/ and http://www.twitter.com/. The number of times that a particular music video is shared is representative of the video's popularity and success in appealing to the target audience.
Justin Bieber's debut music video for his single 'Baby' was posted on http://www.youtube.com/ on 19th February 2010 and has since had 722,077,183 views and 1,144,231 likes which clearly conveys the music video's popularity. YouTube also includes one click links to facebook, twitter, google mail and a link to buy the music video on http://www.itunes.com/ which shows the convergence of online media and the power it has.
The main music video institutions are EMI Music, Sony Music ,Universal Music Group = Warner Music Group
EMI Music
One of the world’s leading music companies; home to some of the most successful and wellknown recording artists. Through their own companies and network of licensees, EMI are able to serve their artists, consumers and partners all over the world.
EMI Music brings artists and fans together by driving action and creating value wherever music is to beexperienced.
Their record labels include Angel, Astralwerks, Blue Note, Capitol, Capitol Latin, Capitol RecordsNashville, EMI Classics, EMI CMG, EMI Records Nashville, Manhattan, Parlophone, Virgin Classics and VirginRecords.
Artists that are signed to EMI include Lily Allen, Bat For Lashes, The Beatles, Beastie Boys, LukeBryan, Coldplay, Depeche Mode, Gorillaz, David Guetta, Iron Maiden, Norah Jones, Lady Antebellum, MassiveAttack, Kylie Minogue, Katy Perry, Pink Floyd, Corinne Bailey Rae, Sir Simon Rattle, Snoop Dogg, Tinie Tempah,Thirty Seconds To Mars, KT Tunstall, Keith Urban and Robbie Williams.
EMI Music provides EMI’s list of artists – as well as independent labels and artists – with a global menu ofcommercial services and seamless access to expanding range of revenue streams and business models,including digital and physical distribution, sales, press and promotion, marketing, licensing, synch, brandpartnerships, live recordings and merchandising.
Sony Music Entertainment Inc
Provides music labels and recordings of artists and international superstars.
SonyMusic Entertainment Inc, was formerly known as Sony BMG Music Entertainment and changed its name to SonyMusic Entertainment Inc, in October 2008.
The company was founded in 2004 and is headquartered in NewYork.
It offers hip hop, country, classical, gospel, pop and rock archival recordings and labels.
Sony Music is one of the world’s most well known music companies, as it includes ownership and distributionover music companies such as Arista Records, Columbia Records, Epic Records, J Records, Jive Records, RCAVictor Records, RCA Records, Legacy Recordings, Sonic Wave America and others.
Sony Music’s featured artists include Avril Lavigne, Beyonce, Britney Spears, Chris Brown, Foo Fighters, FosterThe People, Glee, Jackie Evancho, Pitbull, Sade, Shakira, Willow Smith and many others.
Sony Music has a worldwide distrbution access for music artists who went to be well-known around the globe,this consists of artisst promoting their music in different countries around the world to attract a good fan-base thatwill mainly stick behind them throughout their career.
Universal Music Group
(UMG) is the world’s largest music content company with market leading positions, inrecorded music, music publishing and merchandising.
The recorded music business discovers and develops recording artists and then markets and promotes tehirmusic across a wide array of formats and platforms.
Universal Music Group’s publishing company, UniversalMusic Publishing Group, discovers and develops songwriters, in which they own and administer copyrights tomusical compositions for use in recordings , public performances and related uses such as films andadvertisements (through television, radio, posters, billboard and many more).
UMG’s merchandising company,Bravado, sells artist and music branded products by multiple sales point such as fashion retail, live performancesand the internet.
Artists that are signed to UMG throughout the world include North American Artists such as Akon, Mary J. Blige, Sheryl Crow, Busta Rhymes, Mariah Carey, JustinBieber, Nicki Minaj, Nelly, Jennifer Lopez, LMFAO and many more. European Artists include Duffy, BryanAdams, Adele, Taio Cruz, Cheryl Cole, Mumford and Sons, Florence + The Machine and many more. AsianPacific Artists include Vanessa Amorosi, Sa Dingding, Karen Mok, Will Pan, Alan Tam, Jacky Cheung, BernardFanning and many more.
Warner Music Group
Home to a collection of the bestknown record labels in the music industry, which includes Asylum, Atlantic, Cordless, East West, Elektra,Nonesuch, Reprise, Rhino, Roadrunner, Rykodisc, Sire, Warner Bros and Word, as well as Warner/ChappellMusic, one of the world’s leading music publisher, with a catalogue of more than one million copyrightsworldwide.
WMG comprises an array of businesses aimed at helping artists achieve long-term creative and financialsuccess by providing consumers with the highest quality music content available.
WMG is engaged in the recorded music business (including artist services) and the music publishing business.
Warner Music Group’s artists include James Blunt, Paramore, T.I, EmmyLou Harris, Kid Rock, Plan B, JoshGroban, B.o.B, Estelle, Bruno Mars, Janelle Monae and many more.
These artists have become extremely successful through the guidance of Warner Music Group, in which most of these artists have published their music to a worldwide audience.
