Amandas Media Blog

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

Media technologies had a huge part to play during the course of our production project, from the availability of information that the internet offers to the programme that we used to piece our production together. Without the help from these resources it would have been a lot more time consuming to attain the effects and research that we needed to complete our objectives.

Media technology helped us straight from the start of our project, since the internet was the main source of our research. Although we were unable to access main video distributor, Youtube, from school, we found other means of accessing music videos on the internet as part of our research. We spent much time looking at relevant videos that also used the reverse technique, such as The Scientist by Coldplay, and From Your Mouth by God Lives Underwater. It was very useful having instant access to these videos straight after we gained our initial ideas, so that our creativity wasn’t hindered.

The programme  – iMovie, shaped the way out media product turned out, because it contained the effects that we needed in order to create our ambitious visuals. The reverse and speed changing functions available on the programme were very beneficial in allowing us to warp a normal image, without having any filming complications. Because we had used an older version of the iMovie for our AS production work, we spent a lot of time experimenting with the newer version of the programme and its functions in preparation for our music video. For example, we experimented with the visuals that looked most impressive when reversed and compiled a video with the different effects that we had found. The programme was also extremely useful to compile a series of other videos that showed certain research processes, such as the VOXPOP and location video. As well as allowing us to report back and present all our findings in a visual form, this gave us practice with the camera settings and jazzy transitions that iMovie had to offer.

By the time we had filmed the content for our main task, we were very much used to iMovie and the editing technique that it involves. This meant that few complications arose whilst editing apart from the one scene mentioned earlier, where we applied an irreversible effect to that reduced its quality. We were able to alter the hue of the piece to give it a highlight in the darker scenes, which even gave a silvery tone to some of the imagery from the squash courts. I am very pleased with the editing technique that we used, since there are movements which fit perfectly in time with the music and give it a very rhythmical appeal.

The production of our ancillary tasks required a lesser amount of technology than our main task, since the bulk of the image was created from raw paper cuttings and stills from the video. However, a great deal of editing went into the photographs post-production, using the software Photoshop. This allowed us to change the contrast of the images and therefore make them a lot brighter, emphasising the colours in the paint and highlighting the significance of the text. I believe that taking photos of the raw images produced makes it seem more home-made, and reflects Santigold’s ability in the video to create and transform.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Our audience feedback that we gained from other media students proved very helpful, since it gave us a few ideas as to how we could adjust and improve our media product. Much of the feedback was positive, so it was assuring to hear that we were doing the right thing. However, a few members of the audience said that there was room for improvement where introducing the location was concerned.

We had included a few ‘subliminal message’ style shots to weave together the two locations, although some members of the audience thought that they wanted to see more of the second location further on, being the more interesting. They said that this would maintain their interest, and tease them into being keener to find out how the video would progress. We decided that this is what we wanted out of our media product, so we valued this piece of audience feedback and adjusted our rough cut video to include a spare quick shot of the second location earlier on.

Another piece of audience feedback from a sound technician spotted that a few of the fast paced shots were out of time. This included the scene where the artist drags pieces of magazine out of the air, with the video cutting to later snippets of film each time. If we were presenting the video in the real world it would have to be passed through people who are very experienced in editing, so we took this feedback into account since he had practice in this field. We have since changed these sections to be more rhythmical and in time.

As mentioned earlier, we had a few members of the media studies class who said that they would prefer the video if it had a narrative. However, we were certain that a narrative would not have given any benefit to the video because it is based around the interesting visuals, being a more conceptual piece. Because we gained a lot of positive audience feedback about the visuals, we decided that perhaps those who wanted a narrative did not like the genre of music and therefore didn’t agree with the video, as a matter of opinion. We have learnt that those outside of the target audience would have preferred a different media product. Also, the audience who the video is targeted at liked the video, since they were expecting the forms and conventions (within reason) that we kept to.

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

I thought it was very important when completing the ancillary texts to keep to the same visual style that we used for the main product, to promote a consistent image for the artist, Santigold. I therefore kept to a similar design which was vivid, colourful and promotes the artist as a talented individual.

Directly linked to the video, I used stills from the video as imagery for the digipak front and back cover, as well as a re-created image of the paint bucket shot in place of the CD section. We also incorporated raw objects and symbols that are used in the video, such as party popper confetti on the front of the digipak and the picture of the paint splattered sink in the same colour scheme. Although the imagery that we produced for our digipak was taken through a very raw creative process without much digital technology, we applied a great amount of editing to the tone of the panels to highlight the rich colours. I am pleased with the effect that this had particularly on the front cover and inside panel, where the gold streamers look particularly vivid. This overall means that the audience would instantly be able to recognise this imagery and combine their depiction of the artist from the two media texts.

I believe that the image of the paint splattered sink used on the inside left panel of the digipak applies the same concept as our music video, where Santigold has created a very normal space into one of her own that is very bright and garish. In this image we wrote ‘Santigold’ in streamers as if she has left her mark, surrounded by splashes of paint in clashing colours, glitter and confetti. What I like about this image is how everything appears to be draining down the sink, whereas Santigold’s name has been left behind. This could represent how our character is one to be remembered saying ‘The rules I break got me a place up on the radar.’ I therefore believe that this image in particular mirrors the concept in the video, combining one single image of our artist for the audience.

Our next ancillary task was to create a magazine advertisement for the digipak, which I believe was successful in giving Santigold an intriguing, individual image that relates to the other media texts. We were greatly influenced by the work of Isabelle Lumpkin for our poster, so the outcome was a collage of a single image, ripped into streaks and repeated in two different hues. I believe that our poster reflects the kooky behaviour from the artist that is shown in the video, although it is a bit hard to read (something I would improve upon if given another opportunity.) I think that the ripped edges of the paper emphasise the artist’s reckless approach. Since the poster uses the same text and also incorporates party popper streamers as seen in the Digipak, I believe this combines the media products together, producing a solid and consistent image for the artist.

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

After the completion of our music video, we can compare the finished product to other music videos and their conventions. Although they are massively influenced by the genre of music, comparing the forms and conventions gives us an understanding as to whether the video would serve its purpose well, or just break the boundaries too much to be unrecognisable as a music video.

In the planning and research stage of our project we looked at other videos from Santigold, to gain an idea of the visuals that were created from the same musical genre. We found that her videos contained much political reference, with bright and colourful vivid effects. We therefore mimicked this idea by setting up the mis-en scene to be very lively and intriguing, such as the rocking horse set up in the horse lorry and the re-occuring theme of the party poppers and balloons. I believe that we developed this form through the reversing effect, which we had advanced in by ourselves through much experimenting. We also made sure at the editing stage that our piece was perfectly in time to the music, eventually flicking between shots from both locations at a fast pace as the song built up. I believe that this gave much upbeat, rhythmical character to the piece which accompanied the song, which is a normal convention of a music video of our particular genre of music.

Another feature of a music video, including Santigold’s is the tendency to focus on the artist themselves for promotional purposes, maintaining the spotlight through costume, camerawork or live performance. Since our actor was the only character throughout the piece, I believe we stuck to this convention, making her and the reversed events the centre of attention. I believe that this was emphasised by our mis-en scene, especially into our second location where our actor was contained into a very small space. Against the plain white walls of the squash court, the denim playsuit and curly hair made our character stand out. In the horse lorry however, our character’s white tights contrasted greatly against the darker metallic walls behind her which highlighted her peculiar movement to the music, giving her a kooky and individual image. I believe that it was very important to stick to this convention since one of the purposes of a music video is to promote the artist and give them an image for their audience to relate to.

Relating to the previous argument, in Santigold’s videos the artist actually sings the lyrics to the song which helps to connect significant lyrics to relevant imagery in her videos. I believe that this would have made our piece stronger seeing as there are a few noteworthy lyrics in the song that relate to the content in the video. I believe that we did not get enough time to carry this out on the set of our location, although it would have elevated our piece to be more of a performance from our artist.

In our audience feedback, some members disagreed with our choice not to include a narrative in our media product. A narrative is often contained within a music video, although it is not a solid convention especially with the examples that we looked at. Therefore, it was our decision from the start not to include a story with a beginning, middle an end but to make it more of a visual, conceptual and contemporary piece. Furthermore, I believe that our product still holds an element of progression, reflecting our character’s desire to express her in the space she is contained in, which advances throughout the piece. Backing this, a piece of positive feedback received stated that there was a flow within our piece, since we were always introducing new ideas and visuals that retained the audience’s attention. I therefore believe that not using a narrative challenges the forms and conventions of a music video, making the audience decipher their own story from the conceptual visuals.

I am now onto the other task – creating a poster to promote the digipak. As research, I looked through various copies of NME magazine since they hold many examples of music advertisements and promotions. I also chose to use NME’s examples because we used their name as a star rating, therefore they target a similar audience. Their advertisements tended to use the band’s name and a particular image to grab the audience’s attention, each one managing to reflect the genre of music it was advertising. Therefore, semiotics played a big part in the audience’s expectation of the media product. We decided that creating a poster that went with the digipak’s imagery and the video’s vivid concepts would be a good idea, so that the audience could group the media products together and gain an overall image of the artist.

We made the poster while we were compiling the digipak, because this meant that we could re-use some of the imagery such as the text (on paper ribbon shapes) and the party popper confetti. We wanted to make our own interpretation of Isabelle Lumpkin’s work, since it reflected Santigold’s present style and again, targets the same audience that we are appealing to. We took two versions of a picture of our actor, helen, one in black and white and one in a purple hue. We then ripped up sections of the images and placed them together at the bottom of the page. As we were pieceing together the different strips, it came to us that we could incorporate text using photoshop over the sections that left a white edging. Once we had layered the pieces together into a pattern that we liked, we took a photograph and then added the finishing touches on photoshop such as a star rating and an ‘out now’ label.

The two images we used and the finished product can be seen below:

We have finally put together our digipak by choosing the four most appropriate images for each panel. Edited into photoshop and placed over a template we found on the internet, the finished product can be seen below:

Panel one – inside right

This panel shows the image of the paint bucket, intended to be circular to encapsulate the shape of the CD. We believe that it mimics the imagery of the paint that is used in the video, and forms a picture that is similar to that of the world. However, the paint splatters around the edge signify the humanly and messy input to the image, suggesting Santigold’s rebellius nature.

Panel two – back cover.

This image takes a still from the music video itself as the background, photographed with ribbons of paper and text placed on top of it with the song titles on. The image has been edited on photoshop to allow the text to stand out. I beleive that the ribbon shapes for each individual title gives each one particular significance which stand out from the page. We also created a barcode with the text ‘YAKPRDCTNS2010’ which makes it seem more realistic.

Panel three – Front Cover.

This front cover uses repetition of two stills from the video, cut out and overlapped, incorporating other decorative objects. We used the image of our actor spinning a stick since she is in such a strong and powerful stance. Again, we edited the contrast of the image on photoshop to allow the colours to really stand out. We also used the same idea for the text as the back cover, inforcing the words ‘Santigold’ and ‘Creator’ onto a paper ribbon which stands out from the page. We did this to be consistent in our layout. We also added a star rating onto the front cover, since it is one of the features and something that the audience look out for when buying a CD.

Panel four – Inside cover

This bright and bold image is from the kitchen sink after i’d been playing around with the paint in the bucket. We chose this one since the lettering of ‘Santigold’ was the clearest on this particular image, although it has been manipulated on photoshop through cropping and colour contrast, to focus the attention on the colours and text. I beleive that this is a fun image, as if Santigold has left an impact on things.

I decided to take a range of photos that could be included for use in the digipak (or indeed the poster.)  We were inspired by the circular image of the paint bucket in our video to be used as the CD section, however the still of this image from the video was of very poor quality. I therefore re-created the image in the bucket and took some photos using a digital camera. However, I carried on creating more images from the remnance of the paint after being poured down the sink. Since I still had some party poppers to hand from our video production, I incorporated the inside of a party popper to some of the images, and wrote the word ‘Santigold’ out of the streamers.

A collection of the photos I took can be seen below, along with some stills from the video of our actor which have much potential to be used on the ancillary tasks:

I beleive that like the work of Isabelle Lumpkin, these images are quite raw, bold and creative.  I am hoping to re-work these images into collages to be used as different panels in the Digipak and perhaps the poster.

= the inspiration that we needed

To get an idea for the visual style that people connect with Santigold, we took a look at her current album artwork which is intirely designed by Isabelle Lumpkin. (www.isabellelumpkin.com)

The following webpage shows a cutting from the New York magazine, where Isabelle Lumpkin publishes the process of putting together Santigold’s album cover.

http://nymag.com/news/features/artifact/45784/

The main feature of her work is collage, where she uses repeated, bright, cut out and fairly random images that are arranged into an interesting pattern. We were very glad to see the repetition, since it reflects one of the main aspects of our video! She arranges the images into a pattern that she likes, sometimes incorporating real objects and then takes a photo. Below is a selection of her work:

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The images above show a style that is very different to the conventional album covers, because they do not use technology in the same way to create the layout. Instead, she cuts out the font from paper and places it on top of other images to then be photographed. I believe this technique to be a very raw and creative approach to creating the album artwork.

From this work we were inspired to mimic her bright and bold collage style. We created an image using magazine cut outs which were repeated and mirrored where possible. This practice gave us the inspiration we needed to create our own album artwork in the form of a collage, which we decided will be done using stills from the video.

Before i start to make my digipak, I will look into the forms and conventions of digipaks to make sure that I am including the right things. I will also look at other examples of digipaks and the artist who designed those by Santigold.

So what is a digipak?

Manufacturers have sought to reduce environmental impact and improve functionality by introducing recycled components into its trays; one has announced a 100% post-consumer PET tray made from recycled bottles, which also eliminates the need for the brittle “teeth”. Many printers use recycled or sustainable material for the board stock.

Digipaks come in the form of four, six or eight panels, which retain more information/cds.  Features of a digipak (alike a CD cover) include:

• Album artwork
• Artist’s name
• Track listing
• Lyrics
• Barcode
• Thank you’s
• Copyright information
• Band imagery.

The cover serves three main purposes:

1. To advertise and identify the contents of the music product.
2. To convey the artistic aspirations of the original artists
3. In reproductions of the artwork, to serve as a primary image in the promotional efforts surrounding the product, as an identifiable image associated with it.

Here is an example of a digipak and various album covers:

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Looking at the album covers in the gallery above, it is apparent that the artist/producer has chosen an image that will stand out on the shelf, making the logo and image the most prevalent feature. From my research, I have found that a Digipak is essentially a CD package although it is considered to be more environmentally friendly. This means that the features of the digipak promote the music that is holds, and therefore the aesthetic logos and artwork need to target the same audience. Therefore, to be recognisable to the audience I will produce an image that represents the genre of music, using similar visuals which are also associated with the video.

Now that I have completed the Main task, I can move onto the two ancillary tasks which accompany and promote the music video:

• A Digipak for the record
• A poster to promote the Digipak.

I will stick to the same conventions that I used with the music video, that accompany the style/genre of music.

lets get this party started