These are sketches for the magazine advert advertising Erica Shine's new album and video. The first is a cover of a magazine. These are often seen as adverts in magazines advertising another magazine with something interesting on the cover to persuade people to buy them. The magazines advertised within other magazines, like this, are usually produced by the same company. The idea for this was very simple the image of the artist looking over her shoulder, taken from the digipack, but on a white background. The artist will be wearing a colourful dress and the colour scheme will look clean and fresh, for example pink, orange, yellow and white. We are also aiming for a rather summery look. There is then the artists name and some other small article titles for the other parts of the magazine. Basically, it is a typical cover of a music magazine for pop music, but will look clean and polished.
Wednesday, 16 December 2009
Magazine Advert sketches
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:51 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
Album Cover Idea
Album Cover Idea
These are my ideas for the Album. The top two images in this design are the front and back cover for the album. I was inspired to do this design off the albums from famous artists such as Leona Lewis, Cheryl Cole and Taylor Swift. The fact that the focus on these images is the face shows that it is our attempt to introduce our new artist to the audience. And the guitar shows that the music is unique.
These are a couple of those covers:
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:20 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Adam
Ideas for digipack cover
Rough Sketch of DigipackThis is a rough sketch of my ideas for the digipack cover, the top two images are the front and back and the bottom two images are the inside of the pack.

Posted by smcmediablog at 02:52 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
Wednesday, 9 December 2009
Album cover ideas-ancillary tasks




These are the album covers that have inspired us to think of some possible designs that we can have for our artist album cover. These album covers focus on the artist only to establish who they are and what their image is. As our artist is a female solo artist too, we will be planning on making a cover that is similar to these in order to show our artist as the protagonist.
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:58 0 comments
Labels: grace and fatima
Tuesday, 8 December 2009
Monday, 7 December 2009
primary research on an existing music video-Taylor Swift, White Horse
Taylor Swift is a female American country pop artist. The song, white horse has an on-going narrative throughout about Taylors character finding out that the person that she was in love with has been with somebody else. She even suggests that she used to believe that she was his 'princess' and he was her 'prince', which is where the name 'White Horse' comes from. This narrartive also fits in with our music video as the song that we are using also relates to a female who was in love with someone and has now lost them. It even has a reference to another woman when it says "do you think of me, whenever you lie next to her?"
Lots of different shots are used to introduce taylor as an artist, such as close ups, medium and long shots all used so that the viewer doesnt get bored whilst watching the video as they dont see one shot for to long. I am hoping that we will be able to incorporate this into our video too.
In Taylor's video we can see past scenes of her and her past love. we also want to include this in our video to establish what the song is about. Low key lighting is used during the shots of her on her own, which contrasts with the high key lighting used when we see scenes from the past. This is to show to the audience that when she was in this relayionship she felt happy, but now that has gone she is on her own and is very unhappy and feels lonely. The rain through the window helps to show the sadness too as it generally create a more unhappy surrounding. In our video we want to aim at creating a noticable difference with our 'past' and 'present' scenes too, maybe a difference with the lighting like in this video, or by putting an effect on such as black and white for example. Also, we are even aiming at showing a difference in emotions at these points through the artists facial expressions and movements as Taylor does in her video,.
below is a link the video 'White Horse' on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1Xr-JFLxik
Posted by smcmediablog at 11:47 0 comments
Labels: Grace Rewaj
Institution
A music video is a short film or video that accompanies a complete piece of music/song. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. Although the origins of music videos go back much further, they came into their own in the 1980s, when MTV based their format around the medium, and later with the launch of VH1. The term "music video" first came into popular usage in the early 1980s. In Chinese entertainment, music videos are simply known as MTVs because the network was responsible for bringing music videos to popularity in that country.
Music videos use a wide range of styles of film making techniques, including animation, live action filming, documentaries, and non-narrative approaches such as abstract film. Some music videos blend different styles, such as animation and live action.
With the arrival of the sound films and talkies in 1926, many musical short films were produced. Vitaphone shorts (1926–30), which were produced by Warner Bros, featured many bands, vocalists and dancers. The series entitled Spooney Melodies was the first true musical video series. The shorts were typically about six minutes in duration, and featured art deco style animations and backgrounds combined with film of the performer singing the song. This series of shorts can arguably be considered to be the earliest music videos.
Animation artist Max Fleischer introduced a series of sing-along short cartoons called Screen Songs, which invited audiences to sing along to popular songs by "following the bouncing ball". Early 1930s cartoons featured popular musicians performing their hit songs on-camera in live-action segments during the cartoons.
The early animated films by Walt Disney, his Silly Symphonies, were built around music. The Warner Brothers cartoons, even today billed as Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, were initially fashioned around specific songs from upcoming Warner Brothers musical films. Live action musical shorts, featuring such popular performers as Cab Calloway, were also distributed to theatres.
Furthermore the first music videos of the modern era were produced by ex-Monkee Michael Nesmith who started making short musical films for 'Saturday Night Live' in 1979. In 1981, he released 'Elephant Parts', the first video album and first winner of a Grammy for music video. However now there are many videos that have evolved from this and have become more based on the recent technology. Entertainment is a big part of the music industry therefore thats what the videos are mainly based on rather than on the artists individual talent. There have been many music videos that have been animated which shows that the artist does not have to be in the video for it to be a success.
Posted by smcmediablog at 07:08 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Adam
Friday, 4 December 2009
Brand image of artist
For the brand image of our artist we want to give off a 'clean' and 'fresh' image. We want the audience to feel as though she is a 'nice' girl. Because of the lyrics to the song and the overall feel of the music is quite sad, we want the audience to feel quite sorry for her so that they understand what she is feeling. We will not have our artist in lots of make-up as this would give the wrong impression of what we are trying to put across about her as a person. Also, for this reason we will have her wearing non revealing clothes as we want to portray the artist in the right way.

Posted by smcmediablog at 07:27 0 comments
Labels: Grace Rewaj
Feedback 4/12/09
Very good group - lots of good research and planning - good case studies and analysis also - well done!
Planning
- Remember to put on your blog where you got your song from and the creative commons licence agreement also - to prove it is non copyrighted.
- Also sum up the brand image of your artists you are trying to 'push' in your products.
You can also add...
- shooting schedule
- health and safety form
- cast list
- location shots
- costume shots/ideas etc...
- keep blogging on your ideas and progress!
Miss McNulty
Posted by smcmediablog at 05:38 0 comments
Camera Angles
The term camera angle means slightly different things to different people but it always refers to the way a shot is composed. Some people use it to include all camera shot types, others use it to specifically mean the angle between the camera and the subject. The camera angle marks the specific location at which a camera is placed to take a shot. A scene may be shot from several camera angles. This will give different experience and sometimes emotion.
Eye Level - This is the most common view, being the real-world angle that we are all used to. It shows subjects as we would expect to see them in real life. It is a fairly neutral shot.
Low Angle - This shows the subject from below, giving them the impression of being more powerful or dominant.
High Angle - A high angle shows the subject from above, i.e. the camera is angled down towards the subject. This has the effect of diminishing the subject, making them appear less powerful, less significant or even submissive.
Bird's Eye - The scene is shown from directly above. This is a completely different and somewhat unnatural point of view which can be used for dramatic effect or for showing a different spatial perspective. In drama it can be used to show the positions and motions of different characters and objects, enabling the viewer to see things the characters can't.The bird's-eye view is also very useful in sports, documentaries, etc.
Slanted Angle - Also known as a dutch tilt, this is where the camera is purposely tilted to one side so the horizon is on an angle. This creates an interesting and dramatic effect.Posted by smcmediablog at 05:22 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Adam
Wednesday, 2 December 2009
Which technologies we will use
During our production of our music video, we will use various technologies
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:57 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
planning for music video-cinematography & lighting
Cinematography
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:47 0 comments
Labels: Grace Rewaj
Music Video Planning- Media Language - Sound and Mise en scene
Sound
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:09 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
Narrative
We will be creating a music video to the song 'I will Wait For You' by a singer called Erica Shine. Our plot is going to be based around the lyrics of the song, in which a boy and gils relationship has come to an end, and, whilst the girl still loves him and wants to be with him, the boy has moved on and found somebody else. Like Levi-Strauss' theory of following the binary oppositions, it brings up the conflict of the future vs the past, because whilst we will be showing that she is clinging onto the past, we are also putting across that he is moving on with his life. This shows the binary opposites.
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:54 0 comments
Labels: Grace Rewaj
Tuesday, 1 December 2009
Primary Research on an existing music video
Pixie Lott- Cry Me Out
Pixie Lott is a female British singer songwriter from Essex in London. Her birthname is Victoria Louise Lott she was given the name 'Pixie' by her mother as a nickname. Pixie Lott is currently signed with Mercury Records in the UK and Interscope Records in the U.S. Her genre of music varies from pop soul and R&B to Wonky Pop and Electropop. She started out with the single 'Mama Do' which was released to Myspace and gained over 2 million views on Youtube. It was then entered both into itunes and the UK chart at number one after 50,000 sales. It spent one week as number one and eleven weeks within the top forty. She released another single called 'Boys and Girls' which topped the UK Singles Chart on 13 September 2009. During the week in which it reached number one, the single sold just under 50,000 copies. It has so far spent nine consecutive weeks within the top seventy-five and eight consecutive weeks within the top forty of the UK Singles Chart.
On 14 September 2009, Lott's debut album, "Turn It Up" was released. The album debuted at number six on the Album Chart. The album has so far sold over 100,000 copies in the United Kingdom and was certified Gold by the British Phonographic Industry in October 2009.
Lott has written a song for Alexandra Burke's debut album, Overcome, titled "You Broke My Heart" and a song for Girls Can't Catch titled "Alone". She also has written two tracks on Lisa Hordijk - the Dutch X Factor's winners album, they are titled "No Good For Me" (1st single off of album) and "Promises, Promises".
Pixie's third single from the album was confirmed as "Cry Me Out" upon the release of the previous single and the single was later confirmed for physical release on 23 November 2009. The music video was directed by Jake Nava (director of recent videos for Beyoncé, Leona Lewis and Shakira) and was shot in Cuba. Lott won two MTV EMA Awards MTV Europe Music Awards 2009, Best UK & Ireland Act and Best Push Artist (best break through artist.)
'Cry Me Out' is Lott's most recent single which i think relates to our music video the most from the others as they are both about relationships and not being with that one person anymore. However I also believe that it is a good inspiration as to what locations should be used for our music video and the style of the video is very similar. As it is black and white throughout the video it shows how she feels. There is alot of natural editing used which shows realism therefore the audience can relate to it.
Posted by smcmediablog at 05:21 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Adam
Questionnaire Analysis
A sample questionnaire has been posted earlier. We gave out several questionnaires, approximately 10 to members of the target audience, and received the results which will help us with the rest of our planning.
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:13 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
Shooting Schedules
Call Sheet (Day 1)
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:08 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Adam
Representation
Research and Outline of the representations used in our music video, and an outline of Walter Lippmann's 4 functions of stereotypes.
Representation
The group represented in our video will be Teenagers, one boy and one girl. Our protagonist will be a teenage girl, who is in love with a teenage boy. The teenage girl will be represented as a relatively simple character who is experiencing love for the first time. She will be represented as a young, free spirited girl who is no trouble to anybody else. She will not be represented as violent or abusive, and so will reject the dominant stereotype of teenagers. The girl will also be represented as quite mature for her age, so as not to appear foolish, and to make the product appeal to the target audience, as this audience covers teenagers, but also slightly older people. The Boy will be represented as a nice, friendly boy, who like the girl is not troublesome, violent or abusive. He again, will reject the dominant stereotype of teenagers today. He will also be represented as quite mature for the same reasons as before. The two characters will take on some of the behavioral traits of teenage love, and so to some extent will follow the stereotypes for this on naïve, young and relatively foolish. We will not make our characters complex as there will be no dialect in our music video and it will be short( the length of the song) so there will not be time to explain the characters, and they will have to be portrayed by their costumes and actions.
Walter Lippmann’s Four Functions of stereotypes are:
1, A short cut – easily recognizable people / characters that the audience is already familiar with and so do not need exlaining.
2. An ordering process, an easy way to put people in order of class, socio economic status and other categories, To put people in groups, for example people will expect teenagers with hoods up and dressed like chavs to be part of the villain group.
3. A map of the world. Stereotypes can represent cultures and create one stereotype for a whole nation. For example, the Japanese will be represented by one oriental person eating sushi.
4. An expression of our values and beliefs (as a society) Stereotypes can represent a whole society’s views on different groups of people or countries. For example, an Arab represented as violent represents the dominant ideology of the violent Arab, which is a common media stereotype, even in children’s films like Aladdin.
Posted by smcmediablog at 01:33 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
Storyboard Page 1
These are the scanned images of our storyboard
Posted by smcmediablog at 01:24 0 comments
Animatic story board
This is an animatic storyboard for our Music Video. it is a rough shot to shot outline of what will be in our video. When we are filming, we may add in or take out certain shots and possibly move things to fit in better with the song. However, we feel that this storyboard would be suitable for our music video.
Posted by smcmediablog at 01:12 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Grace
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Daniel Powter- Bad Day
We were inspired to do our music video like Daniel Powters song, Bad Day in which it includes settings such as train stations workplaces and home settings.
Here is a link to the video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH476CxJxfg
We are now thinking of changing our style of video so that it consists of the artist performing and a girl and a boy acting out the story line which is about a girl who is waiting for that special someone.
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:03 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Grace
Monday, 23 November 2009
Feedback 23/11//09
Very good research group - good links and references to songs/images etc...
Also what are the conventions of the singer/songwriter music video subgenre? What makes them distinctive from general music video conventions?
Posted by smcmediablog at 02:58 0 comments
Friday, 20 November 2009
The Target Audience
For our artist and music video, our target audience will be female 15-25 year olds. We believe that our song will appeal to this age group, and possibly more people outside of this target audience, but our main focus will be on 15-25 year olds because this age group generally listens to and buys the most music. However our secondary audience would be males and older age groups. The genre of our song is acoustic rock, and sounds a little like some songs by artists such as, Alesha Dixon, Taylor Swift and Little Boots. We carried out a questionnaire, in which we asked people within our target audience, what they would like to see in our final product and what kind of music they appreciate. We also asked questions based on music videos themselves and how they appeal to them, maybe encouraging them to purchase the music. We also found out how often people watch music videos in their everyday lives.
Posted by smcmediablog at 07:29 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Grace Elizabeth
Questionnaire , to find out what the audience looks for in a music video
Questionnaire
1. How old are you?
2. Male or Female?
3. How often do you watch Music Videos?
Once/twice a week
Every few days
Every other day
Every day
4. Which music video TV channels or websites do you watch? Do you have a favourite?
5. Has a music video ever convinced you to purchase a song or album?
6. When watching Music videos/channels how long do you spend watching them?
10 minutes or less
about 30 minutes
about an hour
longer than an hour
7. Do you have a favorite music video? If so what is it?
8. What would you like to see in a music video?
9. Do you have a favourite genre of music?
Posted by smcmediablog at 07:12 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Grace
Wednesday, 18 November 2009
Research Existing Music Videos, Remedy-Little Boots
This is the British singer, Little Boots' video to her 2009 hit, Remedy. It is an electronic sounding pop song, written by the singer herself. I have chosen to look at this video as it uses some very interesting editing and effects, such as making the image look as if it is being viewed through a kaleidoscope. This video has no narrative, as the song is more of a dancing number, rather than a story, as some songs are such as Taylor Swift songs. The video works very well with the song as it matches the overall genre and mood of a glittery, electronic pop song, and looks very unique amongst other music videos. I really admire the kaleidoscope effect, which is used throughout this video. It adds interest to what would otherwise be very boring shots, the singer stood playing a keyboard and singing. Also, the shots are very short, making a lot of 'flashes' which also adds excitement and interest. I also like the mirror images used in this video. At around 50 seconds into the video, a shot of her hands playing the keyboard is used, but instead of a normal shot, a mirror image is used to make it look much more enigmatic and interesting. I like this effect and it is unique, and not used by many artists. Although the song my group has chosen is a slow song, some of these effects may still be appropriate to use.
Posted by smcmediablog at 10:41 0 comments
Labels: Elizabeth Ann Robinson
The song we will use
We have decided to use a song by a female vocalist called 'Erica shine'. The song is called 'I will wait for you'. It is a slow acoustic song with themes surrounding time and love. Here is the song and the lyrics
. I Will Wait For You Do you think of me As much as it might hurt inside Do you recall how we Said our love would never dieNever saw it coming us falling apart And now you’ve left me with nothing But pain in my heart
Chorus I will wait for you Until you come back to me I will love you till the end of time You are my destiny I will wait for you I know one day you’ll see There is nothing That could change my mind You were the only one Meant for meDo you think of me Whenever you lie next to her Or do you believe That we will never be togetherWill I ever have you back in my arms, Maybe one day you will hold me again And never let go Chorus Once in a life time A person gets to know The love of a life time They can never let go ~ oh~Chorus (Meant for me~~~~~)Posted by smcmediablog at 03:30 0 comments
Labels: Grace Elizabeth fatima
Wednesday, 11 November 2009
Branding-Kate Nash
Kate Nash is a 20 year old female British singer and songwriter. Nash was born in Dublin, to an English father and a Irish mother, on 6th July 1987, she grew up in Harrow, North West London. Nash became interested in music in childhood. She attended St. John Fisher School and moved onto the St Joan of Arc Catholic School, Rickmansworth. She was taught guitar by teaching louis Mitchell. She studied Theatre at the BRIT school for Performing Arts and Technology in SOuth London. She auditioned at the Bristol Old Vic theatre School but was rejected after falling down a flight of stairs, breaking her foot. During her recovery she was housebound and unable to move, so her mother bought her an electric guitar. Nash used this time to focus on her songwriting: she began to wrote some new songs, finished old ones and decided that she would book a gig at a local bar in Harrow called Trinity on Gayton Road for herself, to showcase her songs. Her first ever album was called Foundation this was released in 2007.

Posted by smcmediablog at 04:06 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Grace Elizabeth
Branding
Branding is about creating an image that people link to a particular type of product. It is an image and a message that will draw them over an over again to buy the particular product.
* Brand Essence - what the brand means in a sentence
* Brand Slogan - often a catchphrase linked to a logo
* Brand Personality - what kind of character does the brand have? Humanises the brand - makes it easier to relate to
* Brand Values - what does it stand for/against?
* Brand Appearance - what does it look like/sound like/taste like?
* Brand Heritage - what kind of tradition does it have?
* Emotional Benefits - what feelings does it offer consumers?
* Hard Benefits - is it cheaper or better? what 'real' quantifiable benefits does it offer the buyer?
'Brands need to provide customers with a consistent compelling experience in order not to confuse them, as confusion leads to doubt'
(Taken from mudvalley.com)
'Brands work because they offer us a form of guarantee, a set of ready made values attached to a product that we too can adopt upon purchase.'
(Taken from mediaknowall.com)
Naomi Klein, of No Logo states that "cooperation may manufacture product, but what consumers buy are the brands"
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:46 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Grace Elizabeth
Our group and brief
Our group consists of three members, Grace, Fatima and Elizabeth. We have chosen to do a music promotion brief.
Posted by smcmediablog at 03:14 0 comments
Labels: Fatima Elizabeth Grace

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