Group digipak - Miss Miller

As a group we all agreed on creating a new group digipak that used elements from each of our individual digipaks, we did this because we believed each different side on our digipaks had useful and conventional elements of the genre that allowed us to create the most effective ancillary text. It was easier for us as a group to evaluate and reconstruct a better quality digipak with a contribution of all our ideas combined. Each of us have different and creative ideas as to how it should look however having actually carried out producing the digipak we can see which elements from look the most effective and are best to use, we also identified improvements that we needed to make.

Shaun's digipak was very simplistic and portrayed the theme of love and passion through the colour red and the iconography of roses. However because of the lack of personal insight into the artist, we decided not to use the images he had chose within his digipak for example the roses or kiss mark, we believed an image of the artist would be more suitable for this ancillary text, to allow the audience to become further connected to the artist. We felt that Shaun's song list was too subverted from the soul genre as well, because the dark colours and simple font were not conventional to our target audience, the use of a forest as a setting portrayed the genre rock rather than soul. Although we did believe that the CD layout was very conventional and appropriate for out artist's image, therefore we did use it but in order to stick to a theme we changed the colour to light pink to match the writing and image on the front of the digipak.

Sophie's digipak used a theme of toned down colours to represent the soul genre as deep and meaningful, black and white images were used on both the front and on the CD with a red font to allow it to stand out. From this digipak we used the image from her front cover, however we left it in colour and added an effect to follow the theme, we chose this image because it shows a close up of emotion from our artist. Within the image the artist is wearing very conventional clothing to the genre as she is wearing a black floppy hat and a pink fluffy jacket, these represent her as unusual and trendy which is how we chose her to be. 

From my digipak we decided to keep the image used on the message to fans as well as the font, however we added an effect so that it would match the effect used within the front image, we also bolded the font by adding a black outer glow so that the writing would be easier to read for the audience. We kept the image of our artist leaning against a brick wall as it is conventional the our genre as it portrays our artist as quirky and individualistic, we also decided to reflect the image in order to convey the album title 'A True Reflection'. From my individual digipak we also decided to use the same image in the background of the the song list, this is because it is an image that has not been used before for the audience to see, therefore offers them an extra insight into the artist, it also follows the conventions of the soul genre as she is standing in front of a graffiti wall, which is a very vintage and trendy setting. Finally from my individual digipak we used the image of the perfume and lipstick on the side, we decided to use this image to portray the feminine side of our artist, to show how cosmetics are used to cover up the pain experienced due to heartbreak. 

I believe the images within our final digipak are conventional to the soul genre as it represents our artist as sad and hurt which is the message throughout all of her songs and stereotypically all soul material, she is represented as this through her body language, clothing and the settings. The colours used within our final digipak are also conventional to the genre as they each represent an emotion or personality trait of the artist that is typically associated with soul, for example the pink represents love. I believe our digipak appeals to our target audience as we have created a trademarked font which will allow the artist to be recognised and she looks very approachable and relatable which will allow the audience to connect with her. Having created our own individual digipak I feel much more confident that my group have produced a digipak that will be most effective and successful as through combining ideas each element within the digipak is creative and conventional.

Rough cut - Miss Georgiou

Audience feedback is crucial within any production, therefore a rough copy is carried out. This allows us to find out the opinions of our target audience, which will inform us how we can make changes to improve our work so that it is more conventional and appealing to who we are aiming our music video towards. Audience feedback also allows us to discover new ways in which we can reach other audiences and for example different genres, this will then result in a wider audience base which in turn would improve the success of a music video. Having different individuals perspectives on the music video will show up any errors or poor quality editing, lighting etc that we as a group have possibly overlooked. Therefore a rough copy is essential to use when creating any production for it to be most effective. We received audience feedback by screening our production in front of a class of media students and then collected sheets that they filled out regarding strengths and weaknesses in their opinion of our music video. This will benefit our production as within the individuals we asked there was students who have been researching both soul and other music genres, therefore their feedback would be both applicable and useful to improving our music video. This process will also benefit the music industry as it makes it easier to merge genres and allows artists to connect with the majority of individuals from most genres as it has elements and appealing factors from each one.

From the feedback we received both positive and negative comments, which included;

•  Good use of location
•  Good narrative
•  Conventional to the soul genre
•  More angles need to be used
•  Lip singing parts need to be improved
•  Repetitive camera shots

From the three positive comments we were given we realised that we used mise-en-scene correctly to portray the soul genre and appeal to the audience, for example the settings. We used settings such as a graffiti wall, bathroom and bedroom, these settings were chosen because of their personal meaning which is relatable to the soul genre as they are normally represented by real experience. We also used costume and iconography which is conventional to the soul genre as we gave our artist a very vintage and quirky image. We also portrayed the narrative successfully through using many different clips of the characters happy and then unhappy to show their breakup to the audience, the feedback confirmed that what we felt went positively we did successfully carry out.

From the three negative comments we received we found that our weaknesses revolved around the filming of the music video, we failed to use a variety of camera angles such as high/low angle and stuck to the mid and establishing shots. We also did not film enough footage to make the music video engaging enough, we used the same/similar shots continuously which may be perceived as annoying and the audience may lose interest. From this feedback we can now work on improving our music video by using our strengths to fix our weaknesses, we can use our successful narrative to assist us in creating more shots to extend our narrative. Through re-filming the lip singing scenes we will also be able to use more angles and create new shots that we can add into the music video to make the changes that need to be made from the comments that we received.     

Group magazine advert - Miss Miller

 As a group we all agreed on creating a new group magazine advert that used elements from each of our individual adverts, we did this because we believed each one had useful and conventional elements of the genre that allowed us to create the most effective advert. It was easier for us as a group to evaluate and reconstruct a better quality magazine advert with a contribution of all our ideas combined. Each of us have different and creative ideas as to how our advert should look however having actually carried out producing the advert we can see which elements from look the most effective and are best to use, we also identified improvements that we needed to make.

From Sophie's individual magazine advert we decided to use the black and white theme for the background to follow the conventions from the soul genre. The black and white background represents how the artist is in a very dark and lonely place, which conveys her sad emotions. The audience can then relate to her situation and this can encourage the relationship built between them, as heartbreak is a very common experience people go through. We also decided to use the layout of the font from Sophie's advert, we agreed to put the artists name at the top of the advert so that fans attention would be grabbed and other viewers would be able to associate the advert with her identity. The artists name is also in the largest font as it represents her character as the most important piece of information within the advert.

From my individual advert we decided to use the image of our artist looking down against a brick wall, we chose this image because we believed it was conventional to the genre as it represents her as regretful and upset. This will help build a relationship with the audience as they will be aware of how much pain the artist is in and can therefore understand this through the lyrics within the songs on the album. We also decided to use the font from my advert as we believe it represented our artists personality as it it quite quirky and different and allows the audience to see what kind of artist 'Sophie Mae' is. However it does subvert from the conventional font used within the soul genre, as normally a more traditional and elegant handwriting font would be used to represent the vintage and personal tone of the music.

We decided not to use any features from Lucy's or Shaun's individual magazine adverts because each four adverts are so unique and different we believed incorporating ideas from every single one would make the final advert to diverse and subvert away from the conventional. As within Lucy's advert the image chosen does not represent the heartbreak and innocence of the artist, which is the main focus and moral of the songs within the album. Therefore viewers would be confused as to what the message of the lyrics is, however we did consider the reflected image to represent the name of the album as we believed this was a creative idea that would attract the audiences attention. 

Within Shaun's advert the font used subverts from the conventional soul genre as it is more appropriate to a heavier and darker genre of music, it would contradict the message conveyed throughout the lyrics of the songs. However we believed that the editing skills used to reflect the album name was very creative and considered adding it into our final magazine advert, we then chose not too as we wanted to keep it as simple as possible to avoid out staging the rest of the advert and drawing attention away from the other elements used.

We then decided on the rest of the elements for our group magazine advert through research into other existing soul genre artists magazine album adverts. Through this we chose to add boarders around the title of the album name, we believe this gave the advert a more professional and organised look, which will grab the attention of viewers. We also decided to add in a star rating from reviewers, having a five star rating would increase the chances of people purchasing the album as it shows how well produced the music is. The colour schemes of the writing stick to the colours used within the image; white, black and pink. Using these three colours avoids any clashing or confusion from the viewers as well as sticking to the conventions of the soul genre. The black colour represents the depressed and negative feelings that the artist is singing about and feels, the white represents the truth and honesty within her music and the pink represents the femininity of her soul and connotes love. 

I believe the image within our final advert is conventional to the soul genre as it represents our artist as sad and hurt which is the message throughout all of her songs and stereotypically all soul material, she is represented as this through her body language and the inability to see her facial expressions. The colours used within our final advert are also conventional to the genre as they each represent an emotion or personality trait of the artist that is typically associated with soul. I believe our advert appeals to our target audience as we have created a trademarked font which will allow the artist to be recognised and she looks very approachable and relatable which will allow the audience to connect with her. Having created our own individual magazine advert I feel much more confident that my group have produced an advert that will be most effective and successful as through combining ideas each element within the advert is creative and conventional.

Individual digipak analysis - Miss Miller

A digipak is a type of packaging for CDs or DVDs, typically made from cardboard with an internal plastic holder for one or more discs, and we created an individual digipak in order to plan for what our group digipak would look like. Having created them individually we are able to combine ideas in order to create the most conventionally and effective digipak that will attract our target audience, as each of us had different and creative ideas.

Within my digipak I had decided to use an image of the artist looking into a mirror to represent the album title 'A True Reflection', as her reflection is also in the image. Lipstick was used to spell the album name out and this is relevant because throughout the music video we recreated numerous amounts of clips are used to show her applying lipstick. The artists name 'Sophie Mae' is placed underneath in large font so that it stands out against the background, however I used a white colour so that it did not take too much attention away from the image. The colour of the lipstick is red to represent the love and passion that is portrayed within her music, which is inspired by her break up experience with her ex boyfriend. This appeals to the target audience as within the soul genre a lot of past events are sung about and the fans enjoy listening and experiencing them through the songs.

For the CD I decided not to use an image of the artist and keep it plain, as within the soul genre there is a theme of simplicity. The kiss mark is used to link back to the reoccurring appearance of red lipstick and lips within the music video as well on the cover of the digipak, the repetitiveness of the lips concept is to allow the audience to connect to the artist as they have a sense of familiarity. The black colour of the actual CD was to encourage the kiss mark to stand out and also represents the deep and emotional side of the music. This represents the artist as very relatable to the audience as it shows how she experiences relevant situations that ordinary people do as well, the simple layout also conveys how her successful career has kept her grounded as she choses not to promote her money and fame.

The song list side of the digipak has the background of an image of our artist standing in front of a graffiti wall, I chose this image as it represents our artist as quirky, vintage and bold, which will attract the target audience. The graffiti wall conveys how our artist has a very creative and free spirited personality, which allows the audience to connect with the artist as they can see an insight into her on a personal level as well as her sticking to the conventions of the soul genre. The font used is the same as used on the front of the digipak, to match the colour and style themes, it also stands out the most against a colourful background. The song list is placed within the centre of the page so that it is the main focus and it is the most professional style used within CDs/Digipaks.

The two images used within the back are both still images from the music video we produced, I used these images so that the audience would feel familiarised to work that the artist has already broadcasted. The image of the flowers dying on the floor represent the concept that love can come to an unhappy, unexpected end which you cannot control and the perfume and lipstick image represents how females turn to beauty to help cheer themselves up and move on. I used a negative effect on both images to make them look more unique and quirky like the style of our artist, I believe this also follows the conventions of the genre as it persuades the audience to see the image through a different view.
For the personal message page I decided to use an image of the artist that I edited to represent the album, 'A True Reflection' as I reflected an image of the artist of her leaning against a brick wall. This image was chosen because I believe it offers the audience an image that they have not previously seen and digipaks are meant to give the audience a deeper insight into the artist. The font is once again in white to follow the colour theme, however the font is different as I decided to chose a font that was easier to read.

While using photoshop I struggled adjusting the colours of images in order for them to all look similar and fit the theme I had arranged, however after many attempts at tweaking the contrast and brightness I decided to let each image have its own purpose and effect. Therefore I used subtle changes that were easy to undo and replicate on other images I was using.
I found adding new layers into the images such as; wrtiting, easy to apply as it mainly required organisation, I believe this helped my overall digipak as it meant I could align the messages and titles in an effective way to attract the target audience.

I believe my digipak conforms to the conventions of the soul genre as the images represent similar emotions that the artist is portraying through her lyrics and music, which are pain and despair as they represent heartbreak. The colour scheme diverts slightly from the conventional colours used within the soul genre however they represent our artists personality, which is quirky and vintage. My digipak appeals to my target audience as it uses bright colours to attract their attention and offers an extension of personal knowledge about my artist which is what they will find intuitively appealing, such as the personal message and extra images. Creating an individual digipak will help ensure my group will produce a successful final digipak as it means we can combine ideas that will result in our digipak being most effective and conventional.

Individual magazine advert - Miss Miller

We each created an individual magazine advert because it will make it easier for us as a group to evaluate and reconstruct a better quality magazine advert with a contribution of all our ideas combined. Each of us have different and creative ideas as to how our advert should look however having actually carried out producing the advert we can see which elements from look the most effective and are best to use, we can also identify any improvements we can make.

Within my magazine advert for the font I have used colours that match the ones used within the image, I decided to apply this because I believe they are bold enough colours to stand out and be seen however they also blend in enough so that they do not steal any focus from the image itself. The green used represents the down to earth, relatable personality of our artist and the white is used to symbolise her purity and innocence, therefore the audience can connect with our artist knowing that she is an ordinary person like themselves. The font of the artists name is written in very quirky and authentic writing to match her identity, I chose this font to also create her a recognisable trademark that people will associate with her image. The font used for the album name is slightly more simple as I decided to reflect it so that it would match the message of the name, 'A True Reflection'.

 I chose this image because it makes our artist look very relatable, she is in a very common setting wearing very conventional clothing for the soul genre for example the big bold hat, which conveys a trendy traditional image. Her body language is also very relaxed yet composed although as she is looking away from the camera and down towards the ground it represents her as gloomy and upset, which is conventional to the soul genre. The name of the album is placed at the top of the advert to allow the audience to be aware of what they have to remember in order to purchase the product, as the artist may have many other albums which they could possibly become confused with. The name of the song featured on the album is directly above the name of the artist so that they can recollect the song through association with the artists identity. 

Throughout using photoshop I did struggle with specific tasks such as reflecting the album name and changing shadowing of the font however having investigated certain areas of editing I came across many other techniques which I found useful to me. For example from trying to change the shadowing of the artist name, I discovered how to change the thickness of the lettering and therefore managed to make the font stand out more which in result attracted the audiences attention more effectively. My strength within using photoshop would have to be editing the image in terms of brightness, contrast and highlighting as I believe my image has improved from the original because it has much more attractiveness and life to it, which will grab the audiences attention for a lot longer.  

I believe this advert is appealing to my target audience as the image of the artist used portrays her as hurt and innocent, which means the audience would want to listen to the music to find out why. The colours used also grab their attention and they are bright and emphasise the setting of the image, which  represents my artist as trendy and urban, this is the same style and image in which the target audiences have. I believe the image within my advert is conventional to the soul genre as it represents my artist as sad and hurt which is the message throughout all of her songs and stereotypically all soul material, she is represented as this through her body language and the inability to see her facial expressions. However I do believe the colours used within my advert do subvert from the conventional colours used within the soul genre as typically they are dull and dark to represent the emotions of the artist. I believe my advert appeals to my target audience as I have created a trademarked font which will allow them to be recognised by her and she looks very approachable and relatable which will allow them to connect with her. Having created my own individual magazine advert I do feel much more confident that my group will produce an advert that will be most effective and successful as through combining ideas each element within the advert will be creative and conventional. 

Photo shoot - Miss Miller

We took several pictures of our artist, locations or objects that we came across whilst we were carrying out our filming. The pictures that we took will be used for both our album magazine advert and our digipak, therefore it was important to take variety of different images also using different camera angles so that we had more choice. The digipak includes four images itself therefore we needed a wide range of images so that we did not become repetitive or boring, using different angles also added a professional effect to show that we know the different influences each angle represents. 

 We took this image because we agreed that using an image within the bath setting represented our artists vulnerability as well as showing her in a voyeuristic manor. As she is naked the male viewers will be enticed as it portrays her as promiscuous, however as not much skin is showing we are keeping a classy theme to it. I believe this is a conventional image to use for the soul genre as the water represents her tears and the bath represents her to be trying to wash away from her past relationship. This setting has also been used in many previous, existing music videos from the soul genre because of gloomy atmosphere it sets within the music video. We intended to use this image in our digipak as we felt it would be effective to use to show, audiences that buy the digipak, a more personal side to the artist. However we did not feel that it had strong enough potential to be used as the cover of the album magazine cover as it may be too controversial seeing as our artist is naked and therefore may be inappropriate for our younger audiences.

We chose to take this image because we believed the flowers represent love and having them on the floor crushed portrays how the love had been destroyed especially from using a high angle, as it conveys how love makes people weak and vulnerable. We intended to use this on our digipak as we feel using this particular image informs the audience of the past experience and emotions the artist has felt, which allows them to connect to her indirectly. I believe this image is conventional to the soul genre as many love related objects are used to emphasise the true meaning of the song and lyrics, flowers are one of these many conventionally used objects. The audience are all aware of the true connotations of the flowers therefore they can most likely relate to having received or given flowers to someone they love.

We chose to take this image as we feel it perfectly represents not only our single but our album, which is called 'A True Reflection' by having the album name being written on a mirror in red lipstick and our artist looking at her own reflection in the mirror. The lipstick used to write the album name was used to give the image a more personal incentive so that the audience can tell how deeply in love she was, the red colour connotes the love and passion our artist had for her previous relationship. Having our artist in the image was used because we felt she could assist the audience into finding the connection the mirror has towards the word 'reflection'. We chose to use this image as our album cover advert as it conveys what each song within it represents, we also feel it was the most conventional to the genre, as it shows creativity and is relatable to the audience. 

This image was taken as we believe it is conventional to the genre because the artist is not directly looking into the camera which represents her being wounded and too hurt to show her face, hiding her face from the audience conveys how she is trying to hide her broken heart. Her body language shows how she is leaning on the wall, which connotes that she is looking for support which she no longer has now she is single. We intended to use this image for our album magazine advert as we feel it is a simple yet effective image that represents our artist, we also feel it helps build a relationship with the audience as she looks like an ordinary girl in a very relatable location. The extra background also fits in with our layout for our advert as it gives us space to add in the album title, artist name and single title. 

Group storyboards - Miss Georgiou

The purpose of creating a group storyboard is to collaborate ideas between group members so that we can produce a plan step by step of what we will include in each shot that will be as effective as possible. An image is drawn as to what we think our shot will look like as well information such as; the camera angle, duration, iconography, characters, lighting, setting etc. From this we will know how to set up each shot in chronological order, which will be very time efficient for us, we will know what we need to organise for the next scene which hopefully allows us to be ahead of schedule.

We used primary research from the questionnaires we created and received results from, using the statistics we came to the conclusion on many different areas as to how we would create our music video, for example the setting, inspiration, the themes and the presence of the artist/characters. The secondary research that assisted us in planing our music video was from existing music video within the genre we chose which was soul. Using the
 information we gained once analysing them we made decisions on technical areas such as; the camera shots, lighting and editing, this was useful as it allows us to think of creative yet conventional ways to attract our target audience.

Within our group we decided to share the responsibility by establishing what each member had the best ability in, Shaun and Lucy are the creative two therefore they was in control of drawing the scenes. This meant that they could express how they felt each scene should look in terms of positioning and costume, which was very useful to us as they came up with innovative ideas as well as including suggestions from the rest of the group. Myself and Sophie were in charge of filling out the details of the technical information as we had very clear ideas of how we would carry out Shaun and Lucy's visions, we decided on the camera angles, order of scenes and most of the mise-en-scene. Having created this story board we can begin filming with confidence because we are aware of how and what we will be filming, this allows us to focus on other aspects of the filming.