Draft Evaluation Question 1

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

For my music video I chose to use the style performance. This follows conventions of similar music videos in the genre. Examples of similar bands/ artists that have made performance videos are; Kings of Leon – Supersoaker, Kasabian – Club Foot, Nirvana – Smells Like Teen Spirit. All of these music videos use the band performing as the main content of their video, with the main focus of the performance on the lead singer. My video follows similar conventions to the Kings of Leon video in that there are more shots of the lead singer than anyone else in the video. Much the same as Supersoaker I have chosen to use a variety of different shots of the lead singer, ranging from extreme close ups to long shots.

The lighting I chose to use also follows conventions of similar genre music videos. I chose to use low lighting which creates an eerie feel on stage. I used this in my music video to add to the vibe given by the transgressive lyrics which are a key part of the genre. The low lighting made the dark stage look powerful which I thought added well to the effect I wanted to give.

The band itself follows some forms, whilst challenging others, in that they have been styled to dress like a rock band. Rock bands tend to dress in dark clothes, dark shirt and dark jeans etc… They follow the forms in the way they are dressed, but they don’t have the right image in the face or hair. Common rock bands have long dark hair and beards, and are styled to look like a rock band. The chosen members of my band all have different images and different looks about them. They look more like a band called Weezer, which is a band of the same genre. Each individual in the band looks different, so in a way yes they follow some conventions and yes they challenge some conventions, but so do real professional bands.

When doing my research and planning for my music video we looked at a theory by Andrew Goodwin. We looked at 7 different key aspects, that an audience should be aware of in music videos. I used a grid to make comments and show evidence of these aspects in music videos I analysed. When completing my music videos I had to take these into account and work out which were the best to follow.  I used 2 of the ideas in my music video, which were close-ups and central focus on the star, (in my case the star was the lead singer) and I tried to follow genre characteristics with the low lighting. I found when looking at similar videos to mine, analysing and finding out what key aspects they used helped. I feel that I could have incorporated more of the 7 key aspects by doing a narrative video. Most of the videos I researched used 4 or more of the 7 aspects of Goodwins theory, so in the sense that I used only 2 my video challenges conventions of real media products.

My magazine advert strongly follows conventions of real media products. From my posts on my blog you can see that I have recreated a professional advert. Things I have included that follow conventions is: The front cover picture from the digipack, the bands twitter, the record company logo, the record company website and the album release date. There are several magazine articles I have seen that use these in their own professional magazines. I used the style from on magazine as well as the conventions from others, which highlights the fact that my magazine strongly follows conventions.

My digipack also follows conventions, which I have illustrated throughout my research and planning blog posts. There are many examples on my digipack of conventions used in different media products. I have taken several conventions and put them all together in one digipack. I used the black and white idea that has been used on several digipacks, examples include: Kasabian, Linkin Park, Arctic Monkeys, Example etc… This also proves that I am using conventions from real media products. As well as the black and white, I also had the text on the front in a bright colour and in the centre. This follows conventions also as there are examples of artists on my blog that have used the same conventions, again Example and Kasabian have done this. There are also several bands that put their song lyrics on the digipack; I chose to do the same. The conventions are that they have all the lyrics to every song. This means that the letters have to be in a small font as to fit them all on the page. I followed this convention and explained why in my blog posts. I feel it adds to the overall effect of my digipack and adds professionalism as well. Examples of bands that have used the small lyrics on the digipack are The Avalanches and The Beasty Boys.

Another convention I followed with both the magazine advert and the digipack was using the minimalist style. This creates a simple, readable and easy to understand magazine advert as well as creates a simple but well thought out digipack. Overall I feel that using this style was key, as it made sure I didn’t over complicate my work or make it not achievable.