Evaluation Question 3

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

Media technologies played a significant role in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages.

1. In the research and planning stages of creating my main product and ancillary texts one of the main technologies that allowed me to order, organise and present all the ideas that formed the final products was Blogger. The main way in which I used blogger was as the 'mindmap' that all of our ideas and final decisions could be added too. Blogger allowed us to post the very basics of our ideas and publish them, and then come back and edit and extend them further.

2. I also used many apps and websites in conjunction with blogger, in order to present my ideas visually. The apps that proved to be most useful in displaying my work were EMAZE and PREZI. Both sites allowed me to create presentations, and this allowed me to provide the viewer a step by step explanation of the ideas I was trying to develop. I found that these apps and websites were very useful in the presentation of the pitch therefore, they were utilised to present our audience profile and various other pitch related posts. 

3. The internet has been a significant source of information in the planning and research process. Youtube allowed us to find videos made by similar artists and screenshot specific moments that we felt would be effective in our products. I also found using YouTube useful as it suggests similar music when you listen to a video and I used this feature a lot when trying to create a shot list of shots that were appropriate for videos of this genre. This was helpful as it meant we were exposed to a never ending stream of similar songs with different music videos. Because of this, we had a varied idea of the possible shot types and visual styles that would be effective in relation to our song. Finally, internet sites such as YouTube were very useful in aiding my understanding of theoretical approaches to music videos. Having constant access to millions of music videos meant that I was able to quickly and easily identify these codes and conventions of videos, and begin to incorporate them into my own productions.

4. As a group we used social media as a way to display our production progress. Sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram allowed us to post images and videos during the period of production and label them with exactly what we were doing and what we wanted to achieve by the end of that session. We also created these social media accounts as we were aware that it is a general convention to have links to the artists social networking sites on their websites. 

 5. Video cameras were one of the most significant technologies that we used during the whole production process. I used the camera to collect all of the base tracks that were needed to produce the video. There simply would not be a main product without the use of the JVC Camera as this is the way in which all the footage was collected. In order to store and save all of our footage we used SD cards and a video drive. Once footage was recorded onto the SD card we would then move it over to the video drive where all images and videos would remain. We would then wipe the SD cards so there was enough storage to use them again.

Close ups pic.twitter.com/KinYOZHALF

— S.Dot (@Sam_Dot1) November 11, 2015

Filming in front of the green screen today pic.twitter.com/MlJUeIITdj

— S.Dot (@Sam_Dot1) November 11, 2015

 6. I used Premiere Pro in the construction stage of the production of our music video. Premiere Pro allowed me to collaborate all of the base tracks, order and organise these clips, and then cut between them. I mostly used the basic tools such as the cut tool and rate stretch tool. I also used After Effects in this part of the editing process. A dynamic link between Premiere Pro and After Effects meant that the clips that would actually be used could be selected and the green screen removed. In the After Effects programme the only tool that i used was the ChromaKey. This allowed me to removed the green background and place the artists onto a white background.

7.Photoshop and Wix were the two apps used to create my ancillary products. Before beginning construction of any of the products, photoshop was essential in editing the images. As one of our synergetic devices was the black and white colour scheme, all the images I planned to use had to have the Hue and Saturation changed in order to all achieve the same black and white effect. When this stage of the construction process was complete, I then continued to use photoshop for the production of the digipak. At this stage, mainly the magic wand, quick selection tool, crop tool and other basic tools were used. I also used the gradient tool to create the background that all of the text and images would sit on.

 I formed some practice panels where I looked at how the images looked in different positions and with different edits before I began constructing my final digipak.

 In the production of my website, I used the site Wix. As I was creating the website for a UK Rap artist, I felt it was appropriate to use use the basic template for a musician that the website provided. This meant that there was allocated space for music videos, social network links and tour information to be posted. The basic template still allowed me to adapt and develop the website in terms of how it would be arranged and the colour schemes that would be included. Once again, I tried to stick to the black and white colour scheme, but at some point had to change the colour of internal and external links in order for the audience to notice them.