Evaluation Activity 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Peer assessment of the rough cut of our music video:

We asked 15 media students in our class to evaluate our music video’s rough cut by completing a form and writing down positive and negative feedback.

We learnt that we needed to tighten up on the lip syncing and that there were too many long shots and barely any close-ups of the artists. We also learnt that we needed to add more special effects and transitions that could fit in our RnB genre. We also needed to edit and improve the brightness and contrast, especially in the night time scene, so that the artists’ lip syncing and movements could be clearly seen.

Peer assessment on the rough first draft of our digipak:

We asked the same media student to evaluate and give us feedback on our digipack and magazine advert. We learnt that we needed to get rid of unnecessary sections such as the barcode because although our group though it was a creative and original idea, people found it really confusing. Our group created the barcode as the artist’s logo, representing that he was becoming more recognized. We decided to remove it as we didn’t want it to cause unnecessary confusion.

 We were also told that the font of the writing inside the booklet was very hard to read as people could not see the punctuation clearly, and the artists’ signature was too small and illegible.

Everyone liked the photographs used for our digipack and thought that the editing was good and appropriate and that it linked well with our music video.  

There weren´t any bad comments or feedback on our magazine advert as everyone thought it was very effective and looked really professional.

Thanks to this feedback, we were able to make some necessary adjustments and get a more successful and effective music video and professional-looking ancillary products.

(Prezi done as a group)

What have you learnt from your audience feedback? on Prezi

AS a group, we created the following Questionaires to get feedback from people from our music video and ancillary products. People wrote down improvements we could possibly make if we had more time to edit our media products. The last page shows good comments and feedback from different people (The last comment  is from someone studying Film at university).

EVALUATION ACTIVITY 2 (done as a group)

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

-     How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
-     Our main product and ancillary text link well with each other.

-     Why do you think that?
-     Our group started by discussing and brainstorming different ideas into existing RnB products. From this discussion, we learnt that RnB artists image is important as they want to promote themselves, and to be recognised. We took this into account and made our music video and ancillary products with the artist's image as the main focus.

-     What features have you placed in your products that are effective?
-     One of the features we included was the blue colour scheme we carried throughout our products. The colour blue symbolises optimism which relates to the main single of the album this implies that the artist is determined to reach his ambitions. The colour blue also symbolises wealth and business which also links to our products. Another feature we used was the close-up of the artist. We used this on our music video and ancillary products as this is important to promoting the artist as well as showing his authority and personality. 



-     Finally, we carried a modern theme for our music video and ancillary product by our choice in mise-en-scene, location, costume and editing. This is important because it relates to our music genre, R&B as it reflects the continuous growth of the modern society and the music industry. 


-     What was the idea behind the album cover?
-     We researched into existing album covers and found that the artist's image is the main focus as this is important to up and coming artists. This builds their image and promotes the artist and his music. We chose the album title, 'TakeOver' because it relates to the album's theme of being determined to reach recognition. This is supported by the effective use of font that fit our music genre and the modern theme. 


-     What was the idea behind the magazine advert?
-     We analysed existing magazine adverts from different genre and see the difference between. For our inspiration, we chose Rolling Stone, XXLMag and RWD as they promotes our music genre well to the target audience. We presented a close mid-shot of the artist as we want to attract the audience's attention to the image to promote the artist and his music. 



-     This is also effective as the artist is only starting and the artist needs recognition. The white background is effective as it makes the artist stand out, and it symbolises strength, wholeness and completion. 


-     Are you happy with the final outcome?
As a group, we feel that we have done a great job and we have achieved our initial aim of creating product to fit with our music genre whilst making it look professional. Our products are eye-catching and interesting from the ideas our group had. 

Final Music Video :)

Music video analysis - " What's my name" Rihanna ft. Drake

Music video Analysis - "What's my name" on Prezi

R&B/Hip-Hop music video conventions

After choosing our track for the music video, we dicide to do some research on R&B and HipHop music video Conventions:

Genre conventions:

R&B/HipHop artists tend to use Narrative and Performance as their music video genres:

Performance videos focus on showing footage of the artist.

In an R&B/HipHop music video, performance is quite important. Many solo artitst use choreographed dance routines to make the video more interesting (upbeat songs are more likely to have more movement). They also try to engage the viewers through the camera by using many close-up shots and gesturing. Also the use of fashionable cothing or more explicit clothing is an important way of appealing to their audience. An example of this is Pussycat Dolls - 'When I Grow Up' (it's a well-known song because of its video).

Narrative is used in this type of videos so the audience wants to know what happens next in the video. It can also create a story that the audience can relate or aspire to.

R&B female artists or groups cover a large range of emotions in their music videos. That's why thay tend to have more of a narrative perspective instead of performance.

If the video is a hybrid between performance and narrative then the solo artist often becomes part of the narrative story, acting as the narrator and the main character of the story at the same time. An example of this is Beyonce's music video 'If i were a boy'.

Target audience conventions:
R&B fans are usually  between the ages of 13-25 and a majority of this age group are females. This is because female R&B artists stereotypically make soungs about being in love/heartbroken, which appeals greatly to teenage girls. R&B songs also involve a lot of FAshion wich also attracts females.
In both R&B aand HipHop music videos, females are portrayed in a very sexual way through their outfits, dance moves and lyrics. This is something that attracts males. Men tend to be more attracted to the jewellery and depiction of wealth shown in this videos than females.
Females might find HipHop appealing because they are physically attracted to te male artists.

Conventions:
Money - References to wealth or money in R&B/HipHop music videos are very common. It tends to be rappers that have a stronger reference to money in their videos. This is a way of showing the artist's power. Money can also be shown through their possessions, such as jewellery (usually gold) and expensive sun glasses. They also use 'fast & flash' cars in their music videos as part of their image. Expensive objects make them look good to the target audience.

Women - Women are used as voyeurs in majority of R&B/HipHop music videos to add appeal to the video (ussually occurs in male artists' videos). They wear provocative outfits and have sexy dance moves.
A good example of this two conventions is Mann ft. 50 cent. - 'Buzzin'.

Men - Male artists are usually portrayed as powerful and wealthy people. However, when women use them in their music videos it tends to be in a negative way. They often use their men to express their feelings (e.g. man cheating in a relationship, how males use and abuse women, etc) as we can see in Beyonce - 'If i were a boy'. However, they are sometimes shown as positive, as shown in romantic songs.