Q1.

How do your products use or challenge conventions and how do they

represent social groups or issues?
Ans. For our Advance Portfolio we made a Music Promotion Package for a Sufi
Rock Artist – Noor Ul Ain. The Music Promotion Package included a music video, a
digi-pak and a website for the artist. A hybrid music video was produced which
includes performance, concept and narrative, followed by a non-linear narrative.
For the digi-pak, we created a CD Cover, Inlay, CD and Back. As for the website,
we used WIX, an online website generator. The website included separate pages
namely Home, music, Contact, Store, Gallery and Bio.
Sufi rock is a common genre in Pakistan’s music industry, it’s a sub genre of rock.
This genre is a mixture of classic Islamic Sufi Traditions and of Rock. Songs of this
genre are sung in Pakistan’s national language, known as Urdu and regional
languages sindhi and Punjabi. Sufi Rock video’s include tradition and culture as
two very important roles. Traditional clothing and jewelry of various cultures can
be seen worn by the main artist/actor and often these music video’s are preferred
to be shot in a real location (outdoors) with nature adding to the beauty of the
music video, such as green fields, barren lands, birds and trees etc. Music video’s
of this genre are shot in daylight in order to get good lighting. Conventions such
as mosque, sufi dance and praying den notate a connection with God. Musical
instruments such as tabla and sitar are used by actors of these music video’s to
give the traditional effect and they reflect on our culture. One of the main aspects
of this genre is that sufi rock music vibrantly highlights the cultural codes of
Pakistan, which was one our main motives while making this music video, digipack
and website. Our aim was to portray the artist through the cultural and traditional
means, which includes traditional clothing, traditional jewelry and rural setting.
Most of the Sufi Rock artists in Pakistan also follow the same convention such as
Qurat Ul Ain Baloch, Ali Azmat etc, which show mid close up and close up shots in
their music videos, which we have also followed.
To understand the genre the genre even better, we researched a number of
different respected Sufi Rock artists and music video’s such as Shukar Allah, Sajda
and Maula Mere Maula. We decided collectively how our music promotion
package would portray these conventions and how we will challenge our genre
and break these conventions. One of the main conventions Darvesh Dance (an
energetic dancing) of Sufi’s is followed by almost every Sufi rock artist we
researched.
Our music video follows the same conventions since the lead protagonist is shown
seeking Gods help by dancing in white traditional clothes. The color white
symbolizes goodness, innocence, purity and light, which is the outcome of our
music video.
We have also broken a convention of Sufi Rock as in such videos the main actress
and the actor live together in harmony ending with them being together.
However for our music video we decided to break this convention, as in this music
video the girl finally finds her happiness once she escaped from her husband.
With our Music Video we wanted to highlight a specific social issue in Pakistan
and therefore target a specific social group. Women do not have enough power in
the society we are living in. This convention is broken down, by showing the lead
protagonist fighting for her right to seek education after being a victim of
domestic violence, by running away from her husband and seeking God for help.
This way, our music video highlights women empowerment, which currently our
society lacks.

By showing this we are addressing major social issues of Pakistan, such as

domestic violence, child marriage and the importance of education for a female
shouldn’t be any less important than of a male. The group carried out research
and we found that 21% of girls in Pakistan are married before they turn 18 years
of age. Child marriage is connected with culture and tradition. This is a big issue in
Pakistan and has to be stopped. We agree that our music video doesn’t have a
huge impact on the issue, but it is a step forward to raise awareness and get the
youth of Pakistan to tackle this issue. Due to early marriages, young girls are
victims of domestic violence and are unable to speak out. This also effects their
education, as 53.7 % of married girls between the ages of 15 and 19 years didn’t
go to school.
Consequently, our music video brings about these issues, as the lead
protagonist is initially shown covered with bruises. Then some shots show the
protagonist secretly trying to seek education, but after being caught by her
husband, she becomes a victim of domestic violence. The feelings which almost
every other girl in the rural area holds in herself is being portrayed in this music
video where instead of seeking education, they are forced to get married to
someone twice their age.
Through our research we got to know that these issues are mostly found in rural
areas therefore we decided to target people from rural areas who are victims of
such activities. We have given importance to women empowerment and how
important it is for them to get freedom and to escape such horrible lives. Through
our music video we hope we have given them a chance to raise their voice and
fight for themselves.
Q2. How do the elements of your products work together to create a sense of
branding?
Ans. Promotion and branding are two very important elements when it comes to
promoting an artist as it helps create a distinct identity and a great image of the
artist.
We came up with the name “Noor ul Ain” for our artists name, which is a Persian
name deriving the meaning the light of the eye. This holds great significance as
the name itself gives guidance. So we chose this name and with the meaning
derive a tagline from it, that we used it for our website. “Let the music be your
guiding light”. Secondly we wrote this name in a calligraphy style font in Urdu, in
order to give it a culturally feel as Urdu is the Mother tongue of Pakistan and one
of the main languages.
 The website is the second element branding our artist, on the first image we
placed a close up shot in order to give the audience a feel that they are close to
the artist. In hope to create a better relationship of the artist with the audience
we added her biography, in which we mentioned things about her early life
before coming into the music industry. We also added a tab of Gallery, consisting
of pictures of our artist at different events. We believed it would allow the
Audience to get to know the artist and are made aware of her personal life, which
enhances her image. A merchandise was created for her fans which includes t-
shirts, caps, mugs and headphones. These help creating her brand identity as
once she is famous they will be considered very valuable amongst the audience.
Lastly through social media and our website we are engaging the audience for
interactivity, as fans can easily know what our Star “Noor Ul Ain” is up to. We
have also given the option for subscribing for updates on the website which will
allow the audience to participate and know about all her events and public
activities.
Digipack also plays a very vital role, as it the medium in which the cd is sold, so it
is very important to make it visually interesting with hidden codes and
conventions so the audience is willing and curious to buy it. For our digipack we
used earthy tones and cracks as our theme as we believed this connotes the
“Mitti” of Pakistan, which reflects our cultural. Secondly the
cracks also reflect the broken “personality” of a woman when she
goes through difficult times. On the front cover we have a close
up of the artist looking directly into the camera for a Direct Mode
of Address with the audience.
Our record label also is considered very important, as the name
Aatish means fire which is an element of nature, it symbolizes
passion, and compulsion .It is also referred as our “inner light” .It
has a very indie feel.
Overall, we used orange and brown colors throughout as they
represent culture and is a common color palette, which is used in
many Sufi rock cd covers in Pakistan.
Q3.How do your products engage with the audience and how would they be
distributed as real media text?

It is useless to make a media product if there is no audience engagement.

Therefore audience engagement is an essential element, which determines the
success of any media product. Before making the media product we did a survey
using Google Forms on what the people of Pakistan prefer to watch in a music
video. After the survey we figured out that our target age group was between 18-
25.Moreover, we got to know that sufi rock was one of the most popular genres
that people preferred. More than 80% of the people who took the survey
declared that they watched most of the videos Online and on Television.
We learnt that the audience preferred narrative as well as performance, by
adding this we engaged the audience. Through the Sufism concept we had the
aim of educating people living in rural areas. This product was not only for
entertainment but also to educate the rural population. The importance of a
relationship with God and love is shown to spread awareness and promote our
religion.
For the distribution of our media product, our record label company “Aaatish”
plays a very crucial role as it will make the product reach out to the audience. It is
an independent music record label company that will promote the artist. The
agenda of the company is to promote media products for entertainment purposes
as well as address social issues and help reach out to people.
The music video will be uploaded on YouTube and Vimeo. The music video will be
available on all social media platforms on the artists pages and as well as the
pages of the record label company. We will also release on other media mediums
such as Television on music channels such as ARY Music and Indus music and on
the radio, so we can spread the reach of the audience. We all also contribute in
print media, as we will publish posters in newspapers and music magazines for
her new album release. Lastly the digipack will be available in all cd stores
nationwide. We also have the website where we not only have the music video
but also the facility of getting audience feedback and news all about her
upcoming concert and tours.
Q4.How did you integrate technologies-software, hardware and online in this
project?
Ans. Digital technologies are developed once technological
convergence starting taking place. They are higher in quality as
well as cheaper and make production very easy. It has allowed
us to make a very well converged media product that includes a
music video which is video, digipack which is print and website
which is online. These are three different media forms, which
we made in one project.
Camera has played a very crucial role for all three media forms,
it allowed us to do photography which we initially learnt while
we made our foundation portfolio. The camera we used in the
project is Nikon D5200, and Nikon D7200.We used it to make a
High definition video so our audience can enjoy the good
quality. For shooting our music video we used two cameras along with tripods to
get steady shots without any jerks, we used two cameras to save us time as we
easily shot the same scenes using different angles and shots. We also got to
know about White Balance and color temperatures, which we used and tried to
maintained throughout the music video.

Throughout the project we needed to use computers, laptops, cellphones, as

they were very handy .We used them for extensive research, communication, for
updating our blogs and writing about our entire journey behind our media
project.
Software’s were also used which helped us with compiling our
stuff, as well as uploading it. We used software’s such as Adobe
Premier which was used to help make us a music video and join
it all together, we had to make two cuts of the music video, first
was the rough draft and then after the jury and feedback we
made our final music video. Secondly we used Adobe Photoshop
for the production of our digipack in which we did editing added
features and different filters to our pictures.
Our Blogging platform was Weebly, where we wrote about
everything from the start of our music promotion package till
the very end. Weebly allowed us to write all our experience
along with evidences in form of images, videos and links and
included many features such as slideshows, links, button etc.
To make our digipack and website look more appealing we used
various fonts which we downloaded from the website called
Dafont which gave us multiple fonts to play around and become creative. To
create logos we used Adobe Illustrator, which allowed us to play with letters
differently and finally coming up with a beautiful calligraphy style logo.
For the making of our website we used the website “WIX” which is an online
website builder which had multiple features to play around with and had many
templates which we could use for our artists website. The website was very
flexible as it had many options.
YouTube was another platform, which we used for uploading our videos and
linking it to our blog and reviewing real media text. It was a platform, which made
both viewing and uploading very easy. It was one of the platforms where our
audience mostly sees music videos. We used YouTube not only to upload our
videos but also to view other music videos with similar genres and artists so we
could find the common codes and conventions. We then used these codes and
conventions in our music videos once we saw videos on YouTube.
Social Media platforms such as Facebook and snap chat really helped us as there
we got to reach out to our audience, got the surveys filled and also got a feedback
from the audience on our music video. To make surveys we used Google forms,
which really helped us reaching out to the right audience
Furthermore, we used presentation software’s such as Prezi, Powtoon, Vizme,
and Microsoft PowerPoint to make presentations so that our blog looks creative
and doesn’t get too monotonous. Making presentations on different platforms
really helped enhanced the quality of our work.
Lastly, Google was used as our search engine, without it finding secondary data
would have been possible, as because of it we got various ideas and inspiration.