Vicky's Favourite Advert

Even though the poster is advertising a concert, in the bottom right hand corner it has an image of the album. This highlights to the audience which songs are most likely going to be sung and also advertises the album to people who are going to enjoy the music at the concert. Like the album the poster uses  a similar colour scheme (gold is present on both). However unlike the album, the poster has lost the sence of purity as the black is more prominant than the white.
The poster uses the same fonts as on the album, with the caligraphy styled writting for the artists name and the bolder font for the albums name.                                             

Album Name Decision

After coming up with a number of potential name ideas for our album, we decided upon the name 'The Escape'.

We chose this name because we thought that the name should relate to the primary message which the album conveys. Through the incorporation of the image of the key which is present throughout the video, digipak and advert, we decided that this should have relevance in terms of deciding upon the final name and overall thought it created a sense of consistency across our project.

Audience Feedback: Disc

Today we were working on the disc for our digipak, however we weren't sure what exactly we wanted on the disc as we originally thought a plain disc would be better however after looking at several possibilities we were unsure if this was the most visually interesting design. Therefore we decided to ask our target audience their opinion. Here are the results:

Disc One

Disc Two

Disc Three

We asked 22 people from our target audience, 11 people liked disc one, 3 liked disc two and 8 preferred disc three. We have decided to listen to our target audience and go with the design on disc one, however we are aware that there are still improvements to make on the page.

Track Names

After discussing with our target audience, we came up with the final track list that will feature on the back of our digipak. However, we are still to decide what bonus tracks will feature on the album but we know that there will be some extra tracks as this is a concept that is well received by our target audience. Here are the tracks we have decided on:

1. The Myriad
2. Orison ft. Ed Sheeran
3. Can't Let Go
4. The Escape
5. Out on my Own
6. The Train at the Station
7. Dead in my Mind
8. Tranquility
9. Fate Or Fortune
10. Perpetuality

Vicky's Favourite Digipak

In terms of the cover I really like the use of the two fonts: One for the artists name and the other for the name of the album. The use of two main colours (gold and white) highlights the type of music it is as it gives the impression that the music is going to be quite relaxing as the white connotes purity and innocents. The fact that the artists name is in a hand written styled font creates the look of the album being signed (this has also been used by other singers such as Pixie Lott). The fact that on the cover there is a medium shot of Taylor Swift also highlights who is singing the song and advertises her as a person. unlike album covers from other genres such as rock they mainly use images which are then related to them as a group. Folk pop however is mainly based on the person.

The use of the same font on the disk as the cover creates the continuity through out the digipak. I also like the gradient on the disk as it creates more of a natural look to the disk compared to a block colour which in my opinion wouldn't work with this kind of genre. Also the plainness of the background avoids taking the attention away from the writing at the top.

 

 

As I have previously said the hand written styled font is also used on the back cover. One thing that stands out to me is that the track list is kept seperate from the image of the artist, this means that the writing is easy to read and also that the artist is not being blocked by the text washing over her face. Also the colours have been used on the back page which also makes the digipak have a uniformed look through out.

Jess' Favourite Advert

My favourite album advert is Gabrielle Aplin's advert for her 2013 album English Rain:

Image: The main image on the poster works due to its simplicity. As the artist is the only person on the page it is the complete focus of the advertisement, which works well for this type of folk/pop music which relies heavily on artists being music based and not superficially image centered. This is further emphasised through the lack of focus on the artist's face, other more heavily pop focused music rely a lot on the image of the artist as being perfect, however the audience for folk/pop music prefer the artist to seem imperfect and relatable which comes across in the fun relaxed styling of the photo. We too will aim to create a very down to earth vibe through our photography, perhaps through also using a long shot of the artist and not a close up of their face. I also really liked the use of the prop of the umbrella on the poster as I really think that a strong link can be established between the advert and the album title through the use of a prop, perhaps we will use the key as we already have some great photographs of the key and it is a very symbolic prop.

Fonts: There are two different fonts used on the poster that contrast each other well, one is very clear and almost type writer like, this is used to show the actual information such as the release date. The other is used only for the title of the album, just to really highlight the title of the album to potential audiences. It is also in a handwritten font, suggesting a more personal connection between the artist and the product. We too will try to utilise a umber of fonts as this helps to add a bit of diversity to the advertisement and helps to keep the page interesting. We also love the handwritten fonts but think that it may be better used for the artist's name as then it will look as though it has been signed.

Colours: The colours used are mostly quite dull and dark, showing a connection to the title of the album 'English Rain' by incorporating the two together it creates a more consistent theme throughout the advert. Also by having the artist as the only section of the advert with colour on it, it centralises the viewers focus on the artist showing 'involved' they are in their music and also suggests that the artist's music brings brightness back to a dark world. I think that dark colours actually work quite well especially as it allows the writing to stand out more clearly. The use of contrast between dark and light can also be quite useful for us as this can often be quite metaphorical as it helps with the idea of Levi Stauss' binary opposites.

Information: There isn't a vast amount of information on the advert, sustaining the simplistic style of the image. Furthermore all the information is at the bottom of the page so as not to complicate the whole poster. An aspect that i in particular liked was the use of song titles on the advert as this is a good way of drawing in potential buyers. I think we should also have the majority of our text at the bottom of the advert as this will help to keep the page nice and simple. I also think it would be good to include the names of some singles from our artist's album, in particular Out On My Own as this would be a single as it has a video.

Jess' Favourite Digipak

My favourite digipak is Gabrielle Aplin’s English Rain digipak from 2013. I chose this as my favourite as I really liked the simplicity of the whole product. I think there is lots we can learn from this and hopefully this will help us with the more genre specific details of our digipak. Here is my analysis:

The Cover

Inside

The Disc

The Back

As you can see there are many features of this digipak that I feel are helpful in the planning stages of our own digipak and so I will bare this in mind an feedback this information to my fellow group members.

Jess :)

Anna's Favourite Digipak

My favourite digipak is for an album by Ellie Goulding.

Cover

On the cover of the digipak, a close-up of the artist is presented. This immediately enables the target audience to recognise the artist behind this album and it allows them to understand that she is the primary focus of this product. The close-up shot also makes the product seem more personal and it will allow the intended buyer to relate to the artist more easily.
Furthermore, a swirly, handwritten style of font has been used to present the name of the artist and the name of the album. This font allows the text to look like a signature which further adds a personal touch as it is suggested that the artist has signed this album personally for each specific member of the target market making them persuaded to purchase the album. Also the title of the album is 'The Writer' which allows the style of font to relate to this as it looks like the artist has personally written it, suggesting that she is the writer. The name of the album also relates to the artist as she is well-known for writing many of her songs herself which will appeal to the fans of Ellie Goulding.
The text is presented in a black coloured font which would not usually stand out on this page as the image in the background is also relatively dark in colour. Therefore, the text is backed with white boxes to enable the writing to stand out on the page in contrast so that the potential audience is able to read the writing more easily and it will be more eye-catching for them.
Image looks natural and is genre specific. she looks windswept

Disc

The disc for this album includes an image in the background. This allows it to appear more busy and interesting than the more conventional album discs which often just have a plain colour in the background.more busy less plain more interesting. This image presents a picture of the artist to suggest that she is the main focus of this product as she is presented on each page of the digipak in order to eliminate confusion throughout.
Furthermore, the font on the disc is also presented in a swirly, handwritten style to continue the personal touch which was suggested on the cover of the album. The text on the disc is further presented in front of white boxes to enable it to stand out on the disc to the viewer making it easier for them to read.

Inside

The inside page of this digipak includes a relatively simple image of the artist playing her guitar in the recording studio. This allows the genre of the album to be conveyed as Ellie Goulding is an acoustic-pop style artist who writes her own songs and this is suggested through this image. The prop of the guitar in this photograph also conveys the fact that Ellie Goulding is a talented musician whose music is entirely her own as she is able to produce backing tracks for her songs on her own. This will appeal to music fans as it suggests that she is talented in the music industry. Also, the image on the inside page has been edited using a warm filter in order to make it portray an element of happiness and content and, therefore, specifying the a=target market more specifically.

Back

On the back page of this digipak, the rule of thirds has successfully been applied as the text is presented on the left-hand side of the page and this allows an image to be included on the opposite side. Therefore, it efficiently uses up all of the space on the page to make it appear more interesting and less empty. The rule of thirds is a theory which suggests that the viewer's eye line is directly attracted to a number of specific points on a page. Therefore, the image and the track names have been presented on these points to attract the potential buyer's attention to them and to allow them to stand out on the page.
The image which has been presented is also appears relatively natural to portray the artist as a very down-to-earth individual which makes this page very genre specific as it suggests that Ellie Goulding's songs reflect her personality.
Furthermore, on the image, the artist is presented in the foreground in full focus while the of the natural landscape background is out of focus. This allows her to stand out on the page and it confirms to the intended market that this is the artist and she is the main focus of this product.
Similar to on the other pages of this digipak, the text is presented in a hand written font and backed with white boxes to enable it to stand out on the page in contrast to the light coloured boxes making it easier for the viewer to make out what the text says.
Finally, on the back page, a barcode and logo are included. This is suggestive of the fact that this album in a official copy as it adds a more professional touch to the album.

Anna's Favourite Advert

My favourite advert is Ellie Goulding's advert for her album, 'Lights'.

Ellie Goulding's genre of music is a mixture between acoustic and pop style music. This is portrayed through the advert as the image presents the artist looking relatively natural as she is wearing minimal make-up to portray her as a down-to-earth person. However, she is surrounded by a sparkled effect which adds a subtle hint of glamour. Therefore, those who view the advert will be able to recognise the genre of music which is being represented to allow them to understand more clearly what the advert is attempting to promote.

The image shown on this advert has a golden, sparky effect which allows it to relate to the name of her album 'Lights' and one of her tracks on the album, 'Starry Eyed'. This glittery effect is incorporated within the video for this song and will, therefore, enable the viewer to make a link and associate this artist with the song. The glitter on this advert also makes it appear visually cluttered to make it stand out and become an eye-catching advertisement.

I also like the chosen font for the key pieces of text on this advert. It is a relatively simple sans serif font which makes it easy to read. It is also presented in a gold colour with a subtle glow surrounding it which enables it to stand out on the page. It is, therefore, eye-catching and will attract people's attention.

The colour scheme of this advert consists of gold, black and white. I like how the image fades into the black colour as this makes the advert appear relatively mysterious and it doesn't give much away meaning the intended market will be more likely to buy the album in order to discover more. The smaller pieces of text are presented in white which is helpful as it allows it to stand out in contrast to the dark coloured background making it easier to read. Overall, I believe that the three colours work well together as the black adds an element of mystery while the gold and white colours successfully stand out on the page.

I think it is a good idea to include ratings of the album on the advert as included on this one. This enables the viewer of the advert to receive some feedback on the product which is being advertised to allow them to understand other people's opinions on it's success. A quote from a well-known newspaper has also been included on the advert as they are praising the album to convey to the target audience how good it is. This will potentially aid them when deciding whether or not to purchase the product.

Song Ideas

With the digipak being designed for an album instead of a single we had to come up with some possible ideas for other tracks that would be featured on the album.
These are the names that made it to the digipak:

The Myriad    
Orison
Can't Let Go
The Escape
Out On My Own
The Train At The Station
Dead In My Mind
Tranquility
Fate Or Fortune
Perpetuality

These are the names that didn't make it onto the digipak:

Another Day
Slow Motion
Repeat
Alone
Day Dreams

The reasons that these names didn't get onto the digipak is because they all sound like very depressing songs  for example Alone and Another Day where as some of the others have the feeling that they strive to do something and will do anything to get there for example The Escape and Out On My Own. Furthermore, on the style models which we looked at, the majority of their songs represented positivity and ambition and we attempted to convey a similar message in order to make it more successful amongst the target audience.

Digipak Moodboard

As we did our intitial research into digipaks right at the start of our project we thought now would be an appropriate time to refamiliarise ourselves with them. We have done this by creating a mood board full of digipaks from our folk/pop genre. By putting this together it has also helped us to brainstrom several ideas about our own digipak and has helped us to really think about what meaning we are trying to create through our photos we will soon be taking.

Digipak Focus Group

To help us with creating our digipak we put together a focus group of our target audience and asked them what they liked about the digipaks on our moodboard:

We will keep the information we have gathered in mind whilst we are creating our digipak and plan to refer back to this video if we are unsure of what our audience would prefer.

Further Digipak and Advert Research

To help us with the making of our digipak over the next few weeks, we have decided to each select our favourite digipak and advert, we will then analyse them in detail. This will help us to really identify what we can learn from existing media products and outline what it is we want to achieve through our own product. We will do this research over the weekend to help us focus our ideas next week and hopefully produce a very effective digipak and advert.

Editing Transitions

In our music video the majority of our transitions consisted of stright cuts and jump cuts as this is a key convention of many music videos which we have analysed so we believe that this will add to the overall success of our creation. It also adds an element of simplicity and allows it to appear more professional.

For the transitions between the indoor scenes and outdoor scenes, we tended to use a graphic match between these two clips. For the transition between them, we used a cross-dissolve effect to allow it to look more like a dream sequence.

Filming

In order to film, we used a Nikon SLR camera which was provided by the school. Therefore, we were required to learn about the key elements and how to use them successfully. This meant that, when filming, we had to suitably adjust vital features such as the focus.
We also had to be careful when filming as we were required to appropriately frame each shot in order to incorporate all of the elements which we wanted within each shot. We applied the rule-of-thirds when filming our footage to ensure that the key subject of each shot will stand out.
We also had to incorporate a wide variety of shot types and angles to add an element of variation to the video and to include interest band appeal regarding the target audience.

Final Video!

Today is the deadline for the final video for our project, here it is: 

 

Colour Correction Forest

When receiving feedback from members of our target audience regarding the rough cut of our video, we received constructive criticism as a number of people suggested that the footage taken in the forest appears relatively dull in colour and not very appealing to look at. Therefore, we altered the curves on these sections of footage in order to allow it to feel warmer and more like a dream sequence. In order to achieve this, we increased the master curve to increase the brightness of the clips before adding hints of red to add a warm feel. Overall this filter allowed the narrative to become more understandable due to the fact that it could be more easily identified as a dream sequence.

Here are some images of before and after we incorporated these alterations.

Before

 

 

After

Edited Lighting Correction

We recently re-filmed our scene which took place at the beach. However, due to the time of the year, it was difficult to film at a time when the natural lighting was suitably bright and it began to get slightly dark towards the end of our filming.

Therefore, we edited this on Adobe Premier as we altered the brightness and contrast of the clips to make the lighting appear more appropriate and lighter which also made it relatively easier to see. This was achieved by increasing the intensity of the brightness and contrast. We also slightly adjusted the curves in order to alter the colour of the footage to make it appear warmer. In order to achieve this effect, we increased the master curve to increase the brightness of the clips and we also added hints of red to each clip using the curves tool making this section of footage appear more like a dream sequence.

Here are some pictures before and after we edited the lighting.

As you can see this greatly improved our footage and created an overall more happy vibe to this set of shots.

Editing Moving Pictures

In order to add an interesting aspect to our music video, we decided to include an element of moving images. We believed that this would allow our editing techniques to be portrayed to the audience while successfully appealing to them and enticing them to continue watching the video.

Therefore, today we attempted to produce this effect within our video in order to add an element of uniqueness and to intrigue the viewer. We achieved this effect through using the programme, After Effects. Using this programme enabled us to place the footage of a certain location over the top of the moodboard which we used as a prop within the video. We then scaled these pieces of footage to an appropriate size so that they appeared to be a part of the moodboard. We then finally placed these pieces of footage into our final music video and it appears as though the images on the moodboard within the video.

We placed this effect on three images; the image in the forest, the image in the city centre and the image at the beach. We placed these effects on the images of these locations as these are the places that the narrative actress visits within the three dream sequences within the video. Therefore, it looks like it is her dream coming to life which is the message that we were attempting to convey. Therefore, the use of After Effects successfully made the narrative of our music video far more easier to understand for the target audience.

Indoors Mise En Scene

A piece of feedback we received from a teacher after our rough cut was that we needed to think more carefully about mise en scene and how this can help to convey certain meanings. After thinking about this we chose to add the following things into the scene in the house when we were filming earlier this week:

 

Holiday brochures: we wanted to demonstrate that going out to places no matter how near or far away they may be is what is constantly on her mind, we thought that they magazines helped to show how much she dreams of leaving and travelling.  

Books: a key way in showing that somebody never leaves the house is by placing books in the background of the scene, this helped to demonstrate how much time she has just sitting around inside. It also shows how much she likes to dream and be in a world different to the real one she lives in. We also deliberately chose the book on the end to be there as on the cover is a picture of a key, a symbol that we have already thought about using as it displays the idea that the girl is the one who holds the 'key' to her own release and freedom.

The Lighthouse: we like the idea of having hidden symbolism within the video, by hiding the little lighthouse in amongst the books we thought this was a nice link to the shots that actually take place at the lighthouse. 

 

Mug: alongside the books we chose to put a mug on the windowsill, as we thought this also represented someone who doesn't leave this house and it also has connotations of comfort and warmth. We also specifically selected a mug with a cute outdoorsy design that also displayed her desire to experience the world.

Although none of these items are featured heavily within the video we hope that this attention to detail will really help to create an overall more professional tone to the video and make it easier to convey the idea of a girl struggling with agoraphobia.

Making Nuala Sad :'(

After being told that our narrative actress (Nuala) didn't look sad enough in our rough cut video, we came up with the idea of playing sad music whilst filming the inside shots as this helped get Nuala into character and we really think it helped to create a sadder looking set of shots. Here is a link to one of the videos we found to make Nuala sad:

Organising Seaton Delaval Hall Re-Filming

After emailing Seaton Delaval Hall last week, we have not had a reply yet and so today we rang them up just confirm that we will be able to film there again on Sunday. We spoke to a member of staff who was very accomodating and agreed to let us film this Sunday 11 till 1. This should be more than enough time to gather the extrta footage needed to improve the performance element of our video.

Re-filming at Jess's House

One of the main pieces of feedback we received after our rough cut was that the distinction between the narrative girl's inside sadness and outside happiness was not clear enough. Therefore we decided to re-film the indoor parts of the video with the hopes of getting some sadder looking shots. Just like in our original indoor filming, we again booked out the red head lights to get some well lit shot, creating a more professional look to our video.

Collage Idea

One of the pieces of feedback we received after the rough cut of the video was that the zooming into the photos didn't quite work. Having the pictures of the places she wants to go printed out on A4 paper doesn't quite work and isn't very visually interesting. Therefore we have decided that the scene would work better if she was looking at a collage she had made that was very busy and full of varying locations, and so today we dedicated some class time to making this collage. Hopefully this will make our video have a more professional and thought out image. We are also considering instead of zooming into the photos, having the photos moving on the collage, a sort of frame within a frame thing. We think that this will be more difficult however it will create a smoother connection between the indoor and outdoor scenes, helping the storyline to flow better.

Re-filming at Seaton Delaval Hall

Today we re-filmed a lot of the performance footage at Seaton Deleval Hall. We decided to do this because, in our rough cut feedback, we were advised that there should be more performance within the video from a variety of different shots. Therefore, we re-filmed this footage and shot the performance, getting more than enough footage with a wider variety of angles and shot types.

Equipment

When filming the rough cut, we used a lot of equipment to aid the overall appearance of our initial footage.

Camera

When filming all of our footage, we used a professional SLR camera which we acquired from the school media department. Using this camera enabled us to get high quality footage in order to make our video appear more professional.

Tripod

For all filming, we used a tripod which we placed the camera on to ensure it was still throughout the entire filming process and to make sure that it didn't move around. This also allowed us to improve the camera movement as we were able to pan vertically and horizontally more smoothly making the footage appear more professional.

Redhead Lights

When we filmed indoors, we were advised that domestic lighting may appear too dull and may not appear very effective when it was watched back. Therefore, we used the redhead lights which were provided by the school. We used two of these in the house scene to add a brighter effect to the footage. We pointed them against blank walls and the light reflected onto the subject of our footage so the light wasn't too harsh and was softer and more natural.

Dolly

For the indoor scenes, we also used a dolly on which we placed the camera so we could move it around smoothly as we could simply use the wheels to move the camera around rather than having to move it by hand or zoom in on the camera. This allowed for smooth movement when filming tracking shots making our footage appear more professional.

Re-filming in Jesmond Dene

Today we re-filmed some of the footage for the forest scene at Jesmond Dene in order to improve upon our original footage. After receiving the feedback for our rough cut, we decided to re-film some of the forest footage at Jesmond Dene. Therefore, that is what we completed today. We were informed by our target audience that, during the footage taken in the forest, the narrative actress doesn't look happy enough. Therefore, when re-filming this section of the video we ensured that she appeared happier to emphasise the fact that it is supposed to be a dream sequence. For instance, we re-filmed the clip when she walks across the bridge as we noticed that the camera moves slightly at this point in our rough cut video so we ensured that the tripod was set up correctly. We also filmed some more footage of our actress, Nuala, for the narrative part of our video in the forest because we received some criticism from our rough cut as she didn't appear to be very happy. Therefore, we filmed clips in which she looks happy to make it look more like her ideal dream of being free outdoors rather than in the constraints of her home.

Here are some photographs of us during filming.

Our crew helped us with the idea of the actress being at one with nature by throwing leaves over her.

We ensured that the tripod was set up correctly before filming the scene when our actress crosses the bridge to allow for a smooth effect.

We re-filmed a clip of the opening sequence to the forest scene as we needed to place this image on the collage which she will use in the indoor scene. It was re-filmed to ensure the lighting was suitable.

Organising Seaton Delaval Hall - E-mail

In order to ensure that we were able to film at Seaton Delaval Hall, we decided to email them just to confirm that we would be able to return there. Here is the email we sent:

Final Cut Filming Schedule

 

Now that we have received lots of feedback on our rough cut video we have to re film some aspects of it. To keep ourselves running on time, to meet the deadline, we have put together this filming schedule for the next few weeks.