Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The project we were assigned to was the creation of making a music promo and two other promotional products for advertisement purposes of the artist as well as the song/album release. We used the website ‘unsigned.com’ to come across an unsigned, new artist and chose one of their songs to base our project around. The song we chose from the unsigned artist was then the song used to create our music promo and using this, as well as artist information we created a digipak and a magazine advert to advertise the artist and song/album release. Most bands use these aspects of advertisement as they are looking at expanding in the music industry as well as getting their name across all major music channels nationwide.

The purpose of these three elements – the music promo, digipak and magazine advert is to promote the new artists work towards their target market. Without these promotional materials artists don’t have a greater chance of connecting with their audience successfully due to a lack of exposer being viewed. These promotional materials aim to give of a better understanding and knowledge about the artist as well as giving the target market an idea of what the artist and their music is about.

The aspects within a music promo will help show the personality of the artist to the target audience as some of their own thought, ideas and opinions would have been involved so the audience can create their own opinions on the song as well as the artist. The record company that was responsible for the release of the artists will also benefit from the artists promo as it gives them a chance to be well known as to just being heard over the radio etc – it gives the audience an understanding of what name fits to the face.

Here is an example of a digipak from the artist Rihanna which is a method used for more advertisement of her as well as her music. Rihanna is a huge artist and is well established. As you can see the main focus of this is Rihanna, she is featuring on all the covers due to her being her own selling point. The eye catching images of the artist, album name and other features of this digipak are features we are hoping to use within our digipak, as well as our production and magazine advert also.

The main purpose of a music promotion is to promote the artist/band in the best possible way. This could be done by creating a unique, different music promo to make the artist stand out to other artists as well as to gain more attraction from the

target market. This way a wider range of people will be encouraged to listen/watch the artist perform which would increase sales. Having the audience watch the artist perform gives them a sense of creation behind the lyrics as well as the narrative being shown in the video. Various aspects would be expected in a music promo from people watching, these are,

Performance – shots are expected to be mostly of the band/artist performing and can range from shots such as a close up which would simply just show the emotion of the performer singing to an establishing shot to show the surroundings or shot of the band/artist. Shots of instruments are often shown; this can be done from a variety of different shots but will show the idea of what genre is being performed as well as giving a better idea of the band/artists style.

This shot is from the band McFly with their song ‘That Girl’. As you can see their performance side of their promo is based around shots of the band as well as them playing the instruments. This is something pop rock artists do within their promo which is something we’re hoping to achieve.

Narrative – this is often the second part of a music video due to most promos being mixed between performance and narrative. Narrative is often used to focus the audience of the story and meaning behind the lyrics to which the artist thinks – this would depend mainly on the genre of the track also. Different artists would have a different approach of how to show narrative in their music video, some would tend to be straight forward to help show the audience the ideas of their music as well as the emotions they want the audience to come across. Others can act simply on performance which would also depend on the genre of the track whereas some promos could mix between the both. There are three main parts that music promos seem to be based around; one of these is illustration which can simply just show the lyrics on the screen throughout parts of the promo, this keeps the promo simple yet still effective. An example of a music video using this method is ‘Fireflies by Owl City’ – this promo involves the artist playing a keyboard while other gadgets move around him. Various words are a stand out and are illustrated through electronics in the room.

Amplification is used in a music video and is based around not displaying the lyrics of the song on the screen and still manages to keep the meaning of the song focused on in a different way – this would mainly be used in marketing promotion. Finally, disjuncture is completely different to illustration and is used to ignore the meaning behind the song and display a different meaning throughout the video compared to the lyrics. This is still an effective part of displaying a music video/promo but could confuse the viewer into what the lyrics actually mean.

Camera work – camera work in a music promo simply depends to what genre of track is being used for example, within a rock or pop promo camera work would be quick and fast to keep up with the beat of the song and could also connote closely towards the artist/band. However, within an acoustic genre music video camera work would be smoother and less quick paced for example, a slow zoom effect would take place that would simply just work well together with the slow paced song.

Editing – when editing a music video the shots usually change within the beat of the song which would connote successfully with the audience when synced well. If it is not structured well within the song, editing would not be successful and the music promo wouldn’t be as successful. A lot of different shot types are used depending on the genre used however; most promos involve straight cuts as they are simple and work effectively with the beat of the song. The one shot that is used repeatedly is a close up which is used as the main focus to the audience to the performer/artist. This would suggest the audience feel closer to the performer – something they may not achieve when seeing them live. Normally the only sound heard within a music promo is the track itself however; unconventional music promos have an effect of putting the sound of the narrative through to set the mise-en-scene of the promo. This is something used effectively that will connote with the audience successfully.

The mise-en-scene in music promos again depends on the type of genre – locations vary from each genre for example, rock genres would typically be located at a rock concert of some sort whereas an acoustic genre would be location somewhere more peaceful such as outside in a park, field etc. The mise-en-scene would work effectively depending on the track as well as props used to create the atmosphere.

This pop rock promo helps show how genre affects the style of video as it shows establishing shots of the band on various occasions during the performance part of the promo as well as this, mid-shots or close-ups of individual band members are used when the focus is on them musically. This connotes that the band are the main attraction of the promo itself. There is a simple idea behind the promo by using both narrative and performance keeping a mixed view to the audience to see, letting the song be the main element throughout the promo.

Elements included in a pop rock genre are;

Foundations by Kate Nash)

 Moodswings (To Come at Me Like That) by Charlotte Church)

Both these videos influenced us a lot when creating our music promo due to the elements used within these. This is the use of stop motion used effectively that we were hoping to achieve in our promo as well as connoting to the audience successfully through this. Although Kate Nash isn’t a pop rock artist, Charlotte Church is a successful pop artist so we able to use elements within their promo and change it slightly towards ours.

This influenced us as we enjoyed the stop motion used within the music promo when watching. In the clip, Charlotte Church is sat in the same room on the same chair where stop motion is used in the changing of her clothes. We than aimed to do this while Jack (the performer in our music video) sat on the bed, singing the lyrics while he’s clothes changed. This was due to us thinking this was a simple, yet effective way to create a pop rock promo successfully connecting to the audience.

This influenced us as well due to the success of stop motion that has been used within this promo. In this clip, Kate Nash has used the success of objects around the mise-en-scene to move in the form of stop motion. This works well in the style of her song – something which we tried to create when planning/filming/editing our music promo. Using the lyrics from our chosen song we came up with the idea of using the clock as stop motion and how it would move from each clip, creating stop motion. If worked well, this would be something simple, yet effective within our music promo.

We kept our music video conventional in showing the performer singing to the song in the performance side of the promo. This showed his connection towards the song as well as to the audience. We had an equal amount of mix towards the narrative and performance within our video to which we were influenced by Kate Nash and her video ‘Foundations’ – this is due also due to the fair amount of mix between the two. We kept the editing to our promo relatively simple – something a pop rock promo tends to do. We had straight cuts between each shot. We thought this was something that would fit within the song as well as providing a simple effect to the promo. As well as this, we had various shots in slow motion compared to others to create a sense of time going slowly – something that connects to the lyrics.

We used a variety of different shots ranging from long shots, mid shots to high angle shots etc. This was a way of showing the actor at different angles throughout the promo and how it showed what happened throughout the day as it seems – connecting to the lyrics successfully.

We used the same location for our music video throughout the performance and narrative but used this effectively to our advantage. We used the setting of a house as we thought this fitted in well with the lyrics we analysed. For the pop rock genre, the location simply relates to the lyrics and how the artist wants to get across the song to the audience, either through narrative, performance or both. Locations can vary from outside through garages showing the band performing to having the artist perform on stage to their audience – something that shows a connection between the artist and audience. This can be shown in Rihanna’s music promo ‘Cheers (Drink to That) as it shows her performing to her fans as well as showing her life outside performing.

This is an example of a promo by Rihanna who has used conventions of the pop rock genre successfully for example, both narrative and performance has been used. Her performance side has been shown through her performing to her fans on a stage – a typical element used in a pop rock promo. However, her narrative side of her promo is shown by her having fun outside her performer zone – simply doing things other people would do. On the other hand, Kate Nash and her promo Foundations have used the same setting throughout. It is simply set in her house and has moments where she is singing along to the lyrics – something we used in our promo. Other times is when narrative comes in and she simply does things round the house connecting with the lyrics – also something we contained in our promo.

Conventions of a magazine advert and digipak:

Magazine advert conventions contain,

·         The name of the artist/band

·         Information on tour dates – places etc

·         Release date

·         An image of the artist – often the main focus of the advert

Digipak conventions contain,

·         The name of the artist/band

·         Album title

·         List of tracts

·         Background information about the artist

·         Reviews – from magazines – used to increase sales

·         Images of the artist/band – stills from the promo

  

·         large, centred image marketing the artist

·         white and gold text – stand out from the background

·         additional information – shows the success of the artist

·         includes record labels – show who the artist is signed to

·         artists name

·         album name

·         each element of the digipak contains an image of the artist – showing she is the main focus

·         stills from the promo

Before creating our two promotional activities a lot of research had to be done in order for this to be successful towards marketing our artist. We decided to use elements of the promo for both of these in order for them all to connect successfully as a promotional package for example; we used t-shirts in our promo to spell out the song title ‘fun’. We then simple used this as the main background in our magazine advert as well as a section of our digipak. We had the actor/performer of the promo as the main, centred image of our advert to show who the main focus is. We also used this image in the digipak as well as other conventions of a digipak such as lyrics of the song, track titles etc to create these two activities. This way the promo, digipak and magazine advert connected well together creating a successful promotional package our target audience will enjoy.

·         Key information for advertising purposes – a subtle title is shown not focusing the image

·         The centred image of the performer/artist shows he is the main focus and relation towards the production itself

·         The colours portray the overall genre of the artist – bright colours suggest the song is fun and well as eye catching due to the ancillary tasks

·         The information is clear and easy to read

·         Key information showing tour dates and background information about the artist – something the audience would want to know

·         Having the lyrics placed on the back of the digipak gives a connection to the audience – also having the track titles would be something the audience would like to see