1.

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

Our task was to create a music video and promotional digi-pack including CD cover and
website homepage. This differs from the production of or Film Noir opening sequence as
it requires more industry knowledge in order to produce an industry standard media
product. In order to develop our understanding of the conventions of music videos we
researched into relevant theorists. The most relevant was Andrew Goodwin.

Andrew Goodwin is a recognised media theorist. His book ‘Dancing in the Distraction
Factory’ published by the University of Minnesota Press (31 Dec 1992) encompasses six
points identifying the forms and conventions of real media products with regards to
music videos. In the planning and construction of our media product we considered these
six points throughout in order to obtain an industry standard structure, although with
regards to some points there are cases where we have challenged or developed these
identified forms and conventions.

Below are five of his six forms and conventions that I will discuss with relation to my
own media product:

1. Genre-related style and iconography

We constructed our artist – Dana, using common conventions amongst female artists. We
identified artists to use as inspiration for the construction of our artist such as Beyonce,
and Katy Perry. Both these female artists have an individual sense of style, a unique
personality, aspirational beauty and independence, yet are still accessible to their wide
fan base. These are all aspects that we aimed to achieve from our artist, and therefore
researched closely into the factors that contribute to these characteristics, such as
wardrobe choice, body language, and with regards to the CD cover – photograph
composition, in order to appeal to a particular audience.

In order to create a unique sense of style we aimed to dress Dana in clothing that
expressed her personality – we felt that the leopard print dress suggested a vibrancy that
reflected her eccentricity, whilst also appealing to the male gaze - a common
consideration amongst female pop artists - with its off shoulder cut.

We challenged anti feminist ideologies that are often present amongst female pop artist
videos - that women are ‘inferior’ to men, by encouraging Dana’s feisty attitude to reflect
in her facial expressions and body language, suggesting her strength as an individual and
emphasising the idea of equality.

2. A relationship between the lyrics and the visuals

Our media product uses conventions of real media products as there is a narrative to the
music video, therefore a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals. An example of
this relationship is with regards to the chorus ‘Who does little missy think she is?’ –
Dana’s dancing and facial expressions are in correspondence with these lyrics and
demonstrate her frustration, her feisty movements and screwed up face suggest her
unwillingness to be pushed around by this ‘Little Missy’.

3. A relationship between the music and the visuals

There is a consistent relationship between music and visuals throughout our media
product, therefore following forms and conventions of real media products.

One example of this relationship is present in our opening sequence, where we have cut
scene shots on the opening beats, in order to set the scene for the rest of the music video.
The cuts set the pace for the video and help to reiterate the narrative.

The video provides visual enhancement in demonstrating the narrative, the cuts in time
with the music also help to enforce the modern nature of the video and keep the pace.

4. Multiple close-ups of the main artist

When constructing our media product we considered the importance of close up shots of
the artist, as with regards to industry products it is the demands of the record label to
include close ups of the artist in order to encourage artist recognition with regards to the
link to a CD cover for example. We therefore used this convention and included a series
of close ups and extreme close ups of Dana throughout the music video.

We felt that an extreme close up allowed for a connection to her audience whilst
expressing emotion, something that due to the nature of the song ‘Little Missy’, we felt
was important to capture with our CD cover.

Many female pop artists have aspirational beauty, attractive to their female and male
consumers. This is a convention that we used with our own media product by producing a
close-up image of our artist for the CD cover. The image is of Dana blowing a kiss, we
used Photoshop to enhance the beauty of the image, therefore conforming to the
aspirational beauty and appeal common amongst female pop artists with close-ups.

Screen shots of close up shots of Dana from our music video.

5. Voyeurism

Our aim in the general representation of our artist Dana was to portray her as an
independent feisty independent female rather than conform to common representations of
innocence amongst female pop artists such as Britney Spears who’s songs often relate to
heartbreak and weakness. Although I feel that we were successful in our general
representation of Dana and our challenging of particular forms and conventions of female
pop artists, there are contrasting aspects of our music video such as minor objectification
of the female form that suggest voyeurism. In order to appeal to the male gaze – Laura
Mulvey’s theory that suggests the camera is from a male point of view, 1973 - we
objectified Dana through her wardrobe as her dress was off the shoulder and short in
order to demonstrate her feminine figure. We also used fragmentation of the female form
- shots that isolated parts of her body, such as her legs, and her torso, this can be seen as
further objectifying her female figure and adding to the voyeurism in the video.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
Screen shot examples of fragmentation of the female form from our music video.
Alongside our music video, our task was to create a promotional digi-pack including
working homepage for our artist’s website, a CD cover, case, and sticker.

We felt that a website is a means for communication between an artist and their fan base,
and that with advancements in technologies artist websites will be increasing in
importance with the decreasing demand for CD’s, and therefore CD retailers. We
therefore considered making this a clear and accessible page important in order to engage
with our target consumers. In response to this we aimed to achieve a MySpace like
layout, as this is a familiar format amongst our target age group of 16-25 – previously
identified in our audience research questionnaire. As well as identifying the age group,
the audience research also suggested that Dana would appeal to a mass audience,
although female dominated. We added a blog on the homepage to increase interactivity
and provided active links to pages that would be included on the website, for example
merchandise, videos, pictures and events. We used hot pink and grey backgrounds for
different sections; we felt that the contrast in colours would suggest the animated side to
Dana’s personality whilst maintaining a subtlety and professional tone to the website.
 Screen shot of our ‘Myspace like layout’ homepage.

Having considered feedback from our focus group I feel that we achieved accessibility
whilst maintaining the character and individuality that we had aimed for in producing our
homepage.

From our feedback it is clear to see that our CD cover is appealing to the audience,
having been described as ‘simple and feminine, really good link to the music video’ – the
link to the music video is something that we felt important as it helps to create a
memorable media product, we therefore created a leopard print sticker for the CD itself
that has a link to the dress worn by Dana in the music video, the vibrant pattern is easily
identifiable and is an easy link to make between the CD cover and the music video itself.

The front cover of the CD is a close up picture of Dana. We researched CD covers from
the likes of Beyonce, Leona Lewis, and Katy Perry and decided that a close up image was
the most engaging and allowed for the greatest level of accessibility to consumers,
something that we considered
important in the construction of our
artist concept. We used Photoshop
to create an image that would be
aspirational to female fans - we
ensured that it was a close up
image in order to emphasise
Dana’s feminine features - and
appeal to the male gaze for the
other side of Dana’s fan base.
 Screen shot of our aspirational CD cover.

Taking into account our audience feedback, I would say that the combination of our main
product and ancillary texts was effective as our focus group identified aspects that we had
hoped to achieve from the production, such as strong links to the music video, and a
website accessible to our target age group.

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

We held two focus groups on our media product, one audience questionnaire pre
production, in order to identify aspects important amongst our target consumers, and one
post production screening of our music video with a questionnaire alongside, in order to
identify how our target consumers perceived our media product.

The post production focus group enabled us to more clearly identify the strengths and
weaknesses of our media product from the point of view of members of our target
consumers.

When asked ‘Would you buy this CD and why?’ – our feedback indicated a general
consensus that our audience would buy the song as it was ‘catchy’ with a ‘good beat’.
The CD cover appealed to the male members of the group as they said that the ‘attractive
picture’ encouraged them to look twice, it was eye catching for the females also as the
close up image is ‘engaging’. The feedback suggests our success in appealing to our
target consumers as our focus group represented our target audience on a micro scale, a
group of both sexes, yet female dominated, aged 16 – 25.
Our question ‘What do you think are the strengths in our music video?’ - provided a
general idea that our main performer – Sophie as Dana, our performance shots in Powers
Bar, and our website.

Members of the focus group expressed their opinion that Sophie fitted the representation
created for our artist, that she was a ‘diva’ yet girly at the same time, she was compared
to artists such as Katy Perry, Pixie Lott and Lady GaGa – artists that Sam and I had
researched in order to create the representation that we finally achieved, we therefore feel
that our desired artist concept was a success and Sophie was well suited to the roll we had
assigned her in both our opinion and our audience’s.

Our website in particular was identified as a strength. Our focus group agreed that the
website ‘met and provided for the needs of the target consumers’. All feedback with
regards to the website was positive, our focus group liked the ‘MySpace like layout’,
describing it as ‘accessible to the younger members of our target consumers as well as
the older end’. Consumers also suggested that the website was simple and easy to use,
they also liked the contrast between the hot pink and the grey, describing the colour
scheme as ‘interesting’, yet ‘not too overpowering’. The interactivity available on the
website is something that consumers identified as an appealing aspect, as it makes the
website ‘more engaging and therefore creates a feeling of accessibility to the artist’.

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

Media technologies were an important part of the construction, research, planning and
evaluation of our media product. There are media technologies necessary at each stage,
including our live blog that we updated throughout our project.

All our research was consistently uploaded onto our live blog which we created with the
website www.blogspot.com, with constant analysis with regards to each post, for
example CD cover analysis of current artists can be found on our live blog page. The
blog format allowed for us to constantly track our progress, submit our thoughts and
ideas and acted as an interactive visual medium.

The construction of our media product and ancillary texts included the use of cameras,
final cut pro and Photoshop. Media technologies such as final cut pro – technology used
in the editing of industry standard music videos - allowed for us to extract the diagetic
sound and insert the Little Missy soundtrack. We were able to move our images in order
to perfect our lip syncing as well as adding in effects and transitions between scenes, such
as fades.

With regard to the construction of our promotional digi-pack, we used www.wix.com to

create our live homepage. The website consists of simple software that allowed us to
bring our desired designs to the website, for example the leopard print effect on button
hovering was a subtle connection to our music video and CD cover that we felt added to
the suggestion of her personality through the website.

Prior to the construction of our media product and ancillary texts we researched into
music videos, digi-packs and similar artists in order to help plan and construct our own.
We used YouTube to identify a particular music video and then created a PowerPoint
presentation analysis with regards to Goodwin’s six points. I created my presentation on
Lady GaGa’s Poker Face, watching the video on YouTube allowed me to pause, play and
rewind as I pleased, enabling me to analyse each scene in more detail than if I were to
watch the video on a music channel. The format of a power point presentation allowed
me to present my information clearly, and I was able to change my work in response to
critique.

Our post production focus group allowed us to gather information for our evaluation. In
this focus group we were able to use YouTube in order to screen our music video for
group analysis; media technologies for the evaluation stage also include Microsoft word -
used to produce questionnaires for this focus group. Uploading our music video onto
YouTube also allowed for consumer comments, and for us to monitor the number of hits
that we receive – currently our video has received 53 views.