Jemma's Evaluation

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

Ÿ  I think our media product is typical to the forms and conventions of other Pop Rock videos. This is because it includes lip syncing of the main female role who shows emotion which is also shown in music videos of the same genre including Pink and Miley Cyrus. We took inspiration from both of the artists and their music videos. For example the direct address from Miley Cyrus’s video ‘7 Things’ and the flashbacks from various music videos, including Pink – Perfect. Another convention that we have followed that also appears in music videos is the idea of flashbacks showing past memories. We saw this flashback element appear in music videos such as Perfect by Pink. The flashbacks would show a previous happy relationship between a couple. We liked this concept as we could change the colouring of the shots in order to show they were in the past. We also thought this idea would perhaps tell the story of our song a little better as there would be visuals confirming that the happy times were in the past.

We also applied some of Goodwin’s points. This included linking lyrics with visuals. We did this throughout our music video. For example with the lyric ‘there’s a ring around my finger, but will you change your mind?’ we showed the shot of a female taking off a ring. Another lyrics and visuals we used was by having the flashboard with the lyrics on, whilst they were being sung. By linking the lyrics with the visuals, this allows the audience to connect with the song and lyrics. We also covered genre characteristics as many of the elements we used can also be seen in other typical Pop Rock videos. For example, the shots of the lead female singing can also be found in most of Pink’s videos. Also showing musical instruments in the video is another element that is common in Pop Rock videos including Pink, Miley Cyrus and Maroon 5. We also looked at demands on the label as Pink has a recurring theme of being the dominant female role. We tried to portray this by getting the female singer to show emotion whilst singing. Another of Goodwin’s points that we looked at was the structure of the music video. We decided to create a fragmented music video as we would tell a story of ‘heartbreak’ but in different sections and not in a linear order. We told the story by showing flashbacks of a couple in between the lip syncing and flashboards with the lyrics on. By using Goodwin’s points, we were able to clearly plan our music video and cover the criteria needed.

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

·    I think the combination of our main product and ancillary texts are effective as there is a consistent link between them. Certain elements are carried through the music video and ancillary texts. These features include the use of the prominent colour pink. We used this idea as the artists name is Pink as well as it being a good link between all of the tasks. In our music video the colour pink is shown on the lead singer’s top and eye shadow as well as on the nails of the girls holding the flashboard. On our DigiPak, this idea is shown by the image being in black and white and only the singer’s eye shadow and texts being in pink. This makes the writing stand out more and gives the image a more edgy look.

    Another element we have kept consistent throughout the tasks is the image of the main female singer. She appears in the music video lip syncing as well as on the DigiPak and magazine advert. We have also kept the idea of “heartbreak” a common theme throughout. This obviously appears in the music video as lyrics are sung about it. However, we have also incorporated this idea into the visuals of our music video by showing scenes such as teenage girls tearing flashboards with the lyrics on. We have shown the title “Heartbreaker” onto our DigiPak and magazine advert as well which keeps in with the theme. We decided to keep these themes consistent as it allows the audience to make a clear link between all three products, making it easier to see that they are all from the same artist.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Ÿ  We first received feedback on our initial music video idea presentation. For this task we pitched our initial ideas to the rest of the class. We received mainly positive feedback including that we had clear initial ideas, good audience review and a good idea of linking the lyrics with the visuals. This allowed us to gain constructive feedback on positive points and also how we could improve our ideas.

We also got some initial feedback from our first rough cut we produced. From this we gained information on what the audience liked, didn’t like and what we could improve on. Points that the audience liked included that we had good links between the music/lyrics and visuals. For example, the clip of the eye fitted in with the lyrics and the guitar playing went well with the music. However, the guitar was out of time with the music itself. People also commented that our camera work was steady and clear. Negative points about our initial rough cut included that the shot of the guitar being played was out of time with the music. Also, we needed to use a more diverse range of camera shots and angles. They also thought that the guitar scene went on for too long. We agreed with most of the negative points given to us and we took these on board. We tried to change these aspects of our music video but adding other clips in between the guitar scene as well as playing around with the guitar scenes to put them in time with the music. We also slowed down the blinking of the eye in order to make it not look as rushed as before. We incorporated the feedback we were given and carried on putting our music video together.

We also asked some of our friends to have a look at our final music video and asked for some feedback. This allowed us to get a clearer view on how the target audience portray our music video. Overall, the feedback was generally good. However, they all said that they would like to see more effects on the video to make it look more professional and of a higher quality. Therefore, we went back to Final Cut and added in more techniques such as editing the lighting on the guitar scenes and slowing down the blink of the eye.

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

Ÿ  We have used various media technologies including posting all of our research and planning work onto a blog. This enabled us to keep of our work and planning in one place, as well as sharing it with our class mates and teachers. The blog was a good tool in which we can put across the ideas and preparation for our music video coursework. During the research into our music video, we used basic technologies such as the internet in order to find images to analyse and research our chosen artist. We used YouTube to watch and analyse music videos of the same and different genres.

 We also used key equipment such as the camera and tripod to film our actually music video. The more high tech camera allowed us to be able to film shots that we had planned, in a better quality. By doing this, our overall music video would be of a higher standard. The tripod again helped us to film better shots as it held the camera in a secure position. We also used the Apple Macs and software called Final Cut. Final cut ensured we could produce a music video of a higher quality by giving us the tools to be able to cut and edit shots to produce a video we were happy with. The tools on Final Cut included cropping the shots we had filmed, editing to black and white and slow motion. These various tools helped us to make a music video to our chosen song and genre. We also used QuickTime to convert our music video from FinalCut onto a format that was compatible with YouTube.

In order to produce our ancillary tasks, we used PhotoShop. PhotoShop enabled us to create a DigiPak and magazine advert. We were able to edit the pictures we had taken whilst filming to suit our chosen genre and theme we were aiming to achieve. PhotoShop gave us the tools to be able to change the images into black and white, add text and depict a certain colour we wanted to stand out, while the rest of the image was in black and white. By using this software we could create and DigiPak and magazine advert that fitted in with our genre of music - Pop Rock.

Magazine Advert

This is our final magazine advert for our artist's album. We used the colour pink again as the main colour in order to continue the theme of pink we have chosen. We have chosen to have bold text to make the information stand out.

In order to produce our magazine advert, we firstly started off with the main background. We used the same image of our singer as the DigiPak cover. We decided to do this as we think having the same image would keep the DigiPak and magazine advert consistent. However, unlike our DigiPak cover, we chose to keep the image on the magazine advert in colour. We then played around with the effects of the image and decided that the chosen effect looked best. This was the brush strokes tool which makes the image look slightly cartoon like. This links back with our initial advert research as we found that Gwen Stefani, also in the Pop Rock genre, used a similar effect on the advert for her album 'Love. Angel. Music. Baby.' where the main image is slightly blurred and looks cartoon like.

In order to create the artist's name 'P!NK" we used the basic text tool and changed the font to Impact to keep the font consistent with our DigiPak. We then played around the colours of the text and found that having the text in pink would make the advert too over powering with the colour of pink. Therefore, we changed the text to white and added a ink outline by using the stroke tool. We also used the bevel and emboss tool in order to make the text stand out and appeared slightly 3D.

We decided to have the album title 'Heartbreaker' running down the right hand side. This allowed us to fill the gap down the side as it was just background on the main image. Again, we used bevel and emboss in order to make the text stand out. We also used the stroke tool again to create a pink outline on the black text.

We added the infomation at the bottom by using the basic text tool. We chose to use the colour pink for this writing as black or white text wouldn't stand out as much on the image as her coat is black and white. We decide to again have a black outline around the text to enhance the information. We changed the colour of the text "OUT NOW!" to white in order to help it stand out from the rest of the information. This is because this piece of infomation is more likely to catch people's eyes when they see the advert.

Finally, we incorporated our album cover we had created into the bottom right hand corner. This is because we found many artists do this on their magazine adverts and we thought it looked more professional. We wanted to include the album cover to link our product together and also give the audience more information on the product being advertised. We used the drop shadow tool on the image of our album cover to create darkness around the image to help it stand out more. Again, we used the bevel and emboss tool on the image to make it more prominant and stand out.

We think the overall product is eye catching and would be appealing to our target audience due to the colour scheme and the appearance of the advert. We also think that the advert is consistent with our music video and DigiPak due to themes such as the images used, the font and the colour pink.

Final DigiPak

Part 2 of digipak on photoshop

In this hour we decided to give photoshop another go and we were more successful this time as we had help from our media teacher. We wanted to try and make the image that we had black and white and we were successful up to a certain point as we wanted part of the image to remain the original colour. We achieved this by some help from our media teacher and when our media teacher had left us we had continued to make the picture black and white and saved the image we then decided we wanted to make the whole image black and white but before we could do that there was an unexpected virus on the computer shutting down all the previous work we had done.

Once we had uploaded the saved image on photoshop again we couldn't remember what tools we had use to make the image black and white and after a while we found what we were looking for but instead not the image turning black and white it began turning black and we had to undo the image a couple of times. By the end of this session we had still not figured out how to turn the rest of the image black and white and had decided that on the next lesson we would take notes from our media\ teacher on how to use photoshop and the tools.

Part 1 of digipak on photoshop

In this hour we decided to choose an image on one of our main actress for our magazine cover. We had already had an image of what we wanted the magazine cover to look like the problem was how we could put it down on photoshop.

We first decided to get ourselves reacquainted with photoshop as our first time on photoshop was a couple of weeks before and we had already forgotten the basics of photoshop. As a group we tried to figure out how to upload an image as a background and how we could get a layer added to the picture; we had finally managed this but unfortunately nothing would happen when we wanted to add or take out a specific part of the image. We then decided to start from afresh and try again this was probably the third time we were trying this and we finally uploaded an image and were able to cut out a certain piece of the image but unfortunately we were unable to add another image on top of the background image.

Intial Sketch Ideas For Magazine Ad

 For our ideas regarding the magazine ad we had decided that we wanted the image to be subtle but eye catching to our target audience. By doing this we decided to use one image which was easy as well as simple this was easy to photoshop and change the image.

We decided to put a picture of the main lip syncer as our magazine advert and we decided to put it in black and white. With this we had used the theme of p!nk through out of it.

Intial Sketch Ideas For Digi Pak

Our initial ideas for our digipak were very simple as we knew what we wanted and how we wanted it to come across to our target audience.

As a group we decided to go for a very subtle but eye-catching picture which portrayed emotion that could be related to from our target audience. Below is the image that we started to go on and from there we wanted to start developing it by adding small colour changes etc.

Feedback Of Final Music Video

As we had to re do our music video because there were some scenes were we had to re film because it did not look that good. We then got a few people to look at the music video and we came back with some positive and negative feedback.

Positive feedback
they were able to understand the concept
they liked the flashbacks
the flash boards were a great idea and in time with the music

Negative feedback
The lip synced needed more emotion to be portrayed
If you had more time there should be more camera angle and shots.

Timeline for Production

03/10/2011 - Started shot list
05/10/2011 - Completed shot list
10/10/2011 - Planned when we were going to film. Filmed test shots
11/10/2011 - Filmed the flashboard scenes for our music video
12/10/2011 - Cut test shots, uploaded flashboard shots to final cut
14/10/2011 - Filmed burning of the photo and lip syncing for our music video
17/10/2011 - Cut and edited the test shots, filmed the petals falling and uploaded the lip syncing scenes to the Mac

16/11/2011 - refilmed the lip sycning scenes

Re-editing of Lip Syncing

Once we had re-filmed all of the lip syncing scenes, we all sat down and started to re-edit our music video again. As we deleted each of the old lip syncing scenes from our completed music video, the remaining clips seemed to move to the right slightly causing our entire music video to be out of time with the audio. We spent a couple of hours editing the whole thing and trying to get it all back in time however this was proving quite difficult, so we decided to go back to our original complete music video and insert a few of the new lip syncing scenes where the old lip syncing scenes were. 


As we already knew, editing is a long process and we managed to finish editing our music video completely for the second time, within two hours.


From day one, we have all experienced some difficulty with an element of making a music video. Every time we had difficulty we managed to sort it out and correct our mistakes. We have all learnt a lot more about the process of producing and editing a music video and feel as though we have created our music video to the best of our ability. 

Re-filming of Lip Syncing

After watching our final video, we received some feedback. We weren't too happy with the predicted grade that we were given so we decided to re-film our main character Evalene lip syncing. As soon as we had all made the decision to re-film, we all sat down together and wrote a list specifying what it was we wanted to achieve whilst re-filming. We found that writing a list of what we specifically wanted to have within our music video made it a lot easier when it came to re-editing our video.

The next day we all went back to the location where we originally filmed the lip syncing scenes and we got Evalene to lip sync to the entire song 3 times from different angles. Using different camera angles will add variety to our music video. 

We all found it quite difficult the second time round, especially as the weather was different so we were worried that when it came to re-editing, it wouldn't make sense. First time around it was sunny and warm, and we re-filmed it was extremely windy and cold. In order to get a decent camera angle from above, Henley held the camera on the tripod whilst standing on top of a log. We found it hard to keep the camera steady due to strong winds...and standing on top of a log! 

We also got Evalene to climb into a tree and sit on a branch so that we could get a shot of her from below. This proved quite difficult too as we couldn't always see what she was singing. Luckily we managed to film everything we needed to within an hour. 

DigiPak Analysis Of Pop Rock Genre

I am going to analyse the DigiPak for Pink's  Pop Rock album 'Funhouse'. On the front of the DigiPak there is an image of Pink on a merry-go-round horse which fits in with the album name

'Funhouse'. The name of the album and artist is in smaller writing, diagonally in the center of the album cover. Also, in the corner of the cover, there's a sticker which says 'The new album from P!NK includes the #1 hit "So What" plus "Sober" and "I Don't Believe You"'. This gives the audience some information on what the album contains. The colours scheme on the front is mainly gold and red which also fits in with the theme of a funfair.

On the back of the album cover we can see another image of the artist Pink. The main piece of information on the back cover is the song titles that are included on the album. The different fonts of the song titles also have the same theme as the rest of the album which is the idea of a funhouse/funfair/circus. The colour scheme is more subtle than the front cover, showing different emotions as the front of the album is quite energetic where as the back of the album shows a more calmer side. This may imply that that there are different types of songs on the album, some fast and up tempo and some more slow and emotional.

The barcode is featured on the top left corner on the back cover. Information on the production of the album is also shown on the back of the album.

The idea of the funhouse is carried on throughout the album DigiPak. On the actual CD there's another image of Pink on a funfair horse with balloons which all keeps in theme with the album. Her styling also ties in with the rest of the album. Pink's outfit on the actual CD is quite childlike and bright which adds a fun element as well. On the opposite side (the back of the pull out booklet) we can see Pink dressed in a more formal outfit, showing a serious element. There's also images of clowns which again ties in the fun, circus idea.

Above are some images from the album booklet. The booklet includes lyrics of the songs and images of Pink. Again, the booklet also continues the theme of the fairground/circus. Most of the pages include an element of colour and all portray the idea of the Pop Rock genre of music.

Magazine Advert Analysis Of Pop Rock Genre

This is a magazine advert for Gwen Stefani’s album ‘Love. Angel. Music. Baby.’ This artist and album comes under the same genre of music as our chosen song and music video - Pop Rock. The artist’s name features in big letters in the centre of the advert under a picture of her. Under her name is the album’s name ‘Love. Angel. Music. Baby.’ At the bottom of the poster it states that the album is “in stores now” which tells the audience that the album is currently available for purchase. The poster also includes information on featuring songs that include ‘What You Waiting For?’ and ‘Rich Girl’ featuring Eve. It’s hard to tell from the image of the advert whether it states what form of release the album is available in. At the very bottom of the advert we can see Gwen Stefani’s official website ‘www.gwenstefani.com’. This advertises her website which will allow fans to access more information on the artist. Above the website address is details on the production crew who worked on the album. This again gives more information on the album that is being advertised.

The main image we can see on the advert is a distorted photo of Gwen Stefani. The image is slightly blurred. This image instantly tells the audience that that advert is advertising her. Underneath her picture is her name and album title. This then explains what the advert is advertising. In the bottom left corner of the advertisement we can see an image of the album that is being advertised. We can see that the main image on the advert is similar to the image on the album cover. This keeps the theme the same. The colours of the advert seem to be quite luxurious and royal with the golds, reds and silvers. Gwen Stefani also appears to be posing on a thrown and with a crown in her hand. This again ties in with the royal theme. One of her songs that features on the advert is entitled ‘Rich Girl’ which again fits in with the idea of money, royalty and luxury. This theme also ties in with Gwen Stefani’s style represented in her songs, photos and music videos.

Final - Actors

Our final music video features five actors altogether. These are the actors and our reasons for choosing these actors.


Our lead role was the main lip syncing female. This part was played by Evalene. We decided to use her as our lip syncing role as she was willing to do this role. We thought her appearance would also fit in with our genre of music and lyrics that were sung. 

Our couples used in the flashback scenes were made up of Nikki and Daniel. This was a good pair to use as they are currently a couple so they would have a natural connection. Again, their appearance fitted in with our genre of music. They were also willing to play these roles and to do what was asked of them.


We also used two members from our group in our music video in the flashboard scenes. Jemma and Henley were the two teenagers holding and ripping the flashboards. We used them due to the fact they were able to film when we needed and were willing to do what was required for the music video. They also both fit in with the genre of music and the general story line of female heartbreak for the music video.

Final - Shots

The music for our music video genre is pop and listening to our music the first time we realised that the music is upbeat fast but aslo the lyrics to the song has a lot of emotion parts, so we need to have some shots that that can show a heartbreak and  shots that can portray a romantic time.

The shots we have decided on are : -

1. Close Up
2. Wide Shot
3. Long Shot
4. Mid Shot
5. Extreme Close Up
6. Two Shot

The Reasons behind the shots above is that we can show a part of a break up and some flashbacks of what it was like when there was a couple in love. Abovw is an image from our music video of a two shot as below is an image of a mid shot.

Final Ideas - Make Up

When we all sat down and discussed how we wanted the make-up to look in the music video we all had a clear idea of focusing on the theme pink. The first time we filmed our lip syncing scenes Evalene was wearing purple eyeshadow and a purple hoodie under her coat. We didnt mind that she wasnt wearing pink, as we knew that we would include the colour pink somewhere else within our music video. Once we'd received our feedback for our music video, and we'd made a list of the elements we specifically wanted whilst filming the second time round, for example the different camera angles, we decided to have Evalene wearing a pink top with pink eyeshadow.

Henley and Jemma also appeared in the music video as the two girls ripping the flashboards. We decided, as they werent the main characters, for them to just have basic natural make-up so that the focus was just on the ripping of the flashboards and the emotions in which they portrayed through their emotions and facial expresions. Another thing that we did to fit within our pink theme, was have Jemma and Henley to have pink nails. It's small things like this that we feel emphasise our pink theme.

Final Ideas - Colour Pink

For the whole of our music video the theme and colour is based around the colour pink. In our shot list we knew that there were 21 different shots and we knew that a majority of the shots would need the colour pink in them. Our main portrayal of the colour pink is when we have lip syncing in our music video. As you can see below the actress in the image is wearing pink eye shadow and is also wearing a pink top. The reason for having such a vibrant colour was due to the fact that in the artist P!nk's music video her reoccurring theme is the colour pink so we had to following this theme for the audience to recognise that this is P!nk's music video.

Final Mise En Scene

Our location for our music video was split into to 4 parts of our music video; the first part of us filming our music video was in Windsor Great Park this is where we decided to film the scenes of ripping the flashboards in half. This took approximately 3 hours to film to perfection we had to make sure the timing was right as we did not have access to the song for our music video.


Our second location for our music video is the small park outside of Windsor Girls School; this is where we decided to film the 'couple scenes' and we took a few hours to film these scenes as we wanted these scenes to longer than we expected to film as we wanted the scenes to have a natural and real feel for them.


The third location for our music video was filming inside of the school grounds and this was to film the burning scenes of a picture. This took roughly about an hour as the day that we decided to film this scene, it was quite windy, and this made it quite difficult to light the photo and keep it alight!


The fourth location for our music video was filmed inside of the school grounds where we could film the lip syncing scenes. This took longer than we imagined as when we first got the filming done and uploaded this to our music video we had some feedback and were advised that in order to get a better grade, we should re-film the lip syncing parts of our music video. We then re filmed our lip syncing scenes for our music video in the same location but in different angles.

Final Props

The main prop we needed for our music video was the camera and the tripod without either of the above ww would not be able to film therefore not be able to produce a music video.

There were many small props that we needed whilst filming the music video and those were lighter and a photo to burn. The reason behind that was that in our music there were a few words about burning and we wanted to match the image to the lyrics; the scene was of an actor setting fire to the image using the lighter whilst the audience could see the individual flames coming from the burning. This meant in our music video that wehad an match on action to the lyrics where the visuals match the lyrics.

We also needed red rose petals for the middle of the music video as roses are usually used for romance and we wanted to portray some kind of roomance throughout our music video. We used plastic red roses and our reasonbehind this was that they are cheap to buy but, also if we loose some we can always buy new ones as they are cheap and easy replacable. But we had some difficulty in purchasing them as the season for roses has passed so many shops did not have them in stock. So we had to ask around and a teacher volunteered to lend us hers.

Final Costumes

Our costume for the lead lyp syncer, as you can see above she is wearing a pink coloured t-shirt and black skinny jeans to an audience this will look a casual as we were going for the girly but chic look. The lead lip syncer is also wearing a black and white coat which is very eye catching ecspeacially in the scenes where there is a long or wide shot.

The costumes of our couple in this image you can see that the male wearing skinny jeans and a t shirt we wanted to portray the cool but down to earth guy and we wanted the male actor to feel as comfortable as he can be so the couple scene would seem natural. The image of the actress in this image shows that she is also wearing skinny jeans with small boots with a coat. Because it was very cold on the day that we filmed we decided that it would be best if she wore her coat to make her as comfortable as possible. To portray the girly look across in our music video we decided it would be best if she had her hair open as she also has a very photogenic look.

The image is of the heartbreaking scenes; the costumes that we used on the day was casual but comfortable at the same time as the main focus of the scenes would not be on the actors but on the peices of paper that they held therefore we didn't think much about the costumes.