How effective is the combination of your main and ancillary tasks?

How effective is the combination of your main from HWillcocks

'Dirty Heart' Final Product.

This is the final draft of 'Dirty Heart' by The Machine Ate Florence. I cannot say that I am entirely unhappy with it because whenever you finish a media product, no matter how stressful it's been, you can't help but be proud of what you've done. And I am. If speaking from a non-biased point of view I would still say that it is a successful piece. There are still moments that now that I have been looking back through the music video should have been changed but we have no time to change. Things that I probably should have looked at earlier on such as the artificial lighting during Sarah's scene with Ben. The orange-y glow of their skin does not fit the tone of the scene though it could be argued (which I have in my 1st Evaluation Question) that the artificial lighting is to represent the lights turning on in Sarah's mind about Ben's suspicious ways.

I may have also have considered changing the black frame around the entire piece. For me personally it does not take on the effect I had hoped it would but this may only be because I have spent months of editing it together. The mise-en-scene works really well within the scenes. I especially love Livvy's use of the chocolate rose. Roland Barthes idea of Signs and Signifiers works nicely here. As well as Claude-Levi-Strauss's binary oppositions and Ferdinand Saussure's mythologies (mythology of roses being symbols of love and beauty which clearly this scene is not but it is representative of fairy tales and this fairy tale is being shattered). 

I think the performances shots being indispersed with 'playful' shots was a nice touch and will be satisfying for our demographic. This will remind them that although the narrative is quite serious, there is still a fun side to the band or 'youthful' side which will not only appeal to Pop genre fans but younger audiences as well. It also gives more symbolism in regards to the weather (happier weather, happier band members).

The editing of the phone sequence is professional looking. It took so long to edit each individual clip during that sequence so that they went in time with the song so I am ridiculously happy with how it has turned out. The fact that we managed to capture Sarah just after she had her individual shot of typing out the numbers is also, in my opinion, very good. I also like that each girl was filmed from a different angle.

All the text shots are clear and visible which was a a problem we were having during production as the camera kept blurring out the words. This is a success for me to see as it means we filmed at appropriate angles with the appropriate camera. Ralph of course is who we owe all of our success to.



Overall I am so chuffed with the final outcome. I hope you are too examiner and I really hope that you can forgive me for any slip ups you may find you notice. I don't see any but I know you, the examiner, are supposed to pick up on them. I look forward to receiving a grade from you.

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

This is the first evaluation question out of the four. The need to state this comes with the fact that I somehow managed to jumble all four of them up and post them in a strange order. So I am very sorry for that. In this question I am risking repeating a lot of the things that you, examiner, have already seen on my blog so apologies for that as well. This question will be focusing on the conventions of Pop music videos and how as a team (Sarah and I) we conformed or subverted these conventions.

Lighting

Throughout the course of the music video there is a variation of lighting used however the convention in regards to this for Pop music videos is that the music video consists of high key lighting. High key lighting is shown in the following scenes of our music video: 

1. Ben and I (Hannah) watching a film
2. Sarah and Ben fighting
3. The phone sequence
4. The performance shots
5. The conceptual shots

 
Instances where we have subverted the convention by using low key lighting is shown in the following:

1. The photobooth scene 
2. The confrontation
3. Livvy and Ben walking down the street
    

This is partially due to the fact that the scenes involving high key lighting were shot outside but also to represent how Ben (the boyfriend) is the (tacky as it sounds) light of the three girl's lives. He is the only thing that makes them happy. It is when he is gone and they realise what he is doing to them that the lighting goes from bright to dark as they have seen his true nature of being 'a monster'. 

The dark shots could also be reference to the lyrics of 'daddy i'm falling for a monster' as a monster has the archetype of being a 'baddie' or an 'evil' character and thus in most television programs/films/books etc monsters are shown in the dark or surrounded by darkness. As Ben's role in the music video is to be 'the baddie' he too brings with him a darkness. 

Even shots that I have listed within the high key lighting section could be used to establish Ben as a 'dark' character. One in particular would be the scene where Ben and Sarah are arguing. While filming these shots Sarah and I chose to use artificial lighting as the darkness outside (due to it being Winter) was making the original shots blurry but this could also be a representation of Sarah's eyes being opened to Ben's deceiving or the light being turned on in her head about Ben's suspicious behaviour. It is only when he leaves that the shot becomes slightly darker because Sarah he has left her with his betrayal.

Weather

As mentioned in a previous post you will have noticed that the weather changes quite drastically from shot to shot. This is because our music video was filmed over a long period of time (it took around 4 months) and during those 4 months the weather could not decide between whether it wanted to snow, to rain or to be sunny. The shots that were filmed most recently were the performance shots that are set in the sun. It is now approaching Summer so this was to be expected. However we have found that the change in weather works quite well during our music video as it conforms to (much like our lighting) the conventions of narrative based pop music videos.

In the first scene where Livvy and Ben are walking down the street we can see behind them that it has been snowing. This could be symbolising how cold Ben is towards Livvy or the coldness of his heart as he is 'Black Heart'. This cold weather is then shown twice more. Once during Ben's date with my character and once during his fight with Sarah. Another way in which we can safely establish that it is Winter during these scenes is the use of mise-en-scene. In both shots there are glimpses of Christmas trees in the room. Christmas trees = Winter = Cold. So not only is it symbolic of Ben's disloyalty to Livvy but it is symbolic of Ben's disloyalty to all three of the girl's. 

During the performance shots (shown during the chorus) the weather has gone from being dark and gloomy to being sunny and bright. This is conforming to the conventions of Pop music videos as it has the same effect on the au

dience as the lighting would have. The bright lighting also represents how much brighter (happier) they feel without Ben and when they are together. This could also subvert the convention of Pop music videos as it may show the girl's as co-dependent of each other and of Ben rather than independent which is what girl bands tend to represent for their audience.

Trend aware (?)

I have no idea how to word this point so do bear with me while I come to grips with it. As most pop artists of this generation are of a young age they tend to wear what is considered as 'fashionable' clothing. Now this may sound like i'm bragging about how trendy we are and I would like to clarify here that I really am not however I wouldn't say that we were dressed ghastly at all. We did choose clothes that we felt were appropriate for our age that were contemporary (modern). 

Clothing worn by the band: 

• 2 dresses (Sarah and I)
• 2 graphic t shirts (Livvy)
• 4 skirts (Livvy, Sarah and I)
• 1 plaid shirt (Sarah)
• 3 pairs of jeans (Livvy and Sarah)
• 1 blouse (Myself)
• 1 vest top (Livvy)

Clothing worn by Ben:

• 5 jeans
• 1 black jacket
• 3 shirts
• 1 blouse

These are all fairly fashionable items of clothing. Especially skater skirts as these are currently seen as the 'in thing' and we wore plenty of them between the three of us. Ben is obviously going to be dressed as stylish as he is the 'adonis' figure of the music video. Potentially used voyeuristically in order to reel the female audience in but there is no instances of Ben not wearing a shirt so I may be exaggerating.

Young actors

As the Pop music genre is dominated by young artists it would only make sense for the actors/models that they use within their music videos are young as well. This is a convention that we conformed to through our use of the actor Ben. Ben is 18 years old and therefore he classifies as a young male. The band themselves (Sarah, Livvy and I) are also classified as young females as two of us are 18 and one of us is 17. GUESS WHO?

Love Narratives (Or Narrative in general)

The narrative of our music video is very self explanatory but it does conform to this convention as it involves love. Three girls all in love with a boy who is cheating on all three of them. The cheating aspect of our music video is also commonly seen in music videos of the Pop genre as the artist's songs often involve some kind of heartbreak. An example of this would be the actual music video to 'Black Heart' by 'Stooshe' where one of the members is being cheated on during a production of a music video. Similarly all three members of our band are being cheated on.

The narrative is established without the need of speech. Shots that we used to establish the storyline are:

• Two shots
•  Over-the-shoulder shots
• Tracking shots
• Side shots
• Cut in (of the texts)

 

Other examples of Pop music videos that conform to this convention are Taylor Swift - Love Story and Carly Rae Jepsen - Gettin' over you.

Reference to the Artist's name or Song Title.

Now this was one of the only conventions within Pop that we chose not to conform to. This is partially due to the fact that we needed something to talk about during the exam that we had subverted rather than conformed but also due to the fact that we found it less attractive and more tacky. However we do understand why it is used in music videos. It is used to establish how 'big' an artist is in the music industry as their name becomes something of a 'signifier' for good music. An example being Olly Murs - Troublemaker and/or Maroon 5 - Moves like Jagger. This is to attract more people into their fanbase and to also inform their current fanbase that they have released a new song without their needing to be a big publicity stunt.

Performance

We chose to conform to this convention during the greenery/sunny shots (where you see us running around with sticks) because not only did the lyrics go with the narrative of the piece but it also meant that we could bring more aspects into our music video than simply a narrative. We wanted to use narrative and conceptual (which we did end up doing) but found that performance would tie the whole piece together quite nicely and so ended up filming some last minute performance shots. This is seen in many Pop music videos including Destiny's Child - Say My Name and One Direction - That's what makes you beautiful.

Synchronised Dancing

Another subverted convention in our music video is that of synchronised dancing. We did originally intend to come up with a small dance in order to conform to this convention but it soon became apparent that this was a bad idea as none of us can dance and we looked ridiculous. I would screencap but i'd rather be serious thankyou very much. It also would have made our music video seem a bit jumbled as we do have many aspects to it as it already is. With playful shots, performance, narrative and conceptual it would have seemed out of place. This is however a convention many pop videos conform to such as One way or Another - One Direction.

Analysis of my poster and digipak!

Theories in relation to my coursework

If you have seen my AS blog from last year you will have seen that a majority of my theorists consisted of people such as Claude Levi-Strauss, Vladimir Propp and Ferdinand DeSaussure. And though these theories can be applied to my A2 coursework there are plenty of other theorists who as of yet have not been mentioned or have been mentioned in quite a lot of detail but shall be reiterated during this post.

Andrew Goodwin

Andrew Goodwin, who will henceforth be known as Goodwin, is one of the main theorists I have been focusing on. He identified 6 conventions that apply to all music videos. These are also known as conventions. These conventions consist of a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals, a relationship between the music and the visuals, genre-related conventions/iconography present, multiple close up shots of the artist in order to satisfy the needs of the institutions, voyeurism of the male or female form and intertextual references to other media texts are present. The conventions I conformed to are as follows:

Moments in which I conformed to these 5 conventions are:

• Links between lyrics and visuals: The narrative of the music video is based on the lyrics of the song. 'Daddy i'm falling for a monster. Somehow he's scaring me to death' The three girls are all in love with a 'player' who represents the 'monster' and they're all terrified that he's been cheating on them. 'Figure, figure there's no working you out whatsoever.' The girl (myself) stares at Ben curiously as he is hiding his phone. 'You got a black heart.' Ben looks down at his phone and see's a text saying: 'You got a black heart' etc.
• Links between the music and visuals: There are instances in which the clips needed to be timed properly in order to fit in with the music. Examples of this would be when the chorus starts, the beat changes and so does the shot. 'Figure, figure there's no working you out whatsoever. Only one way I can sum you up all together. You got a black heart!' The shot then rapidly cuts to a performance shot of the three girls standing in a field. The chorus commences.
• Genre related conventions: Our chosen genre was pop and therefore we had to conform to the conventions of pop. These conventions include things such as - bright lighting, costume on trend with the fashion hype, young artists, an element of love included in the narrative, references to the artist's song title and there tends to be intervals of synchronised dance routines.
  
• Multiple close ups of the artist: Throughout the course of our music video there are many close ups of the artists involved to satisfy the needs of the audience/institutions. These shots are included predominantly during the performance shots (The first chorus), the 'big reveal' scene (The final chorus) and during the photobooth sequence (The opening seconds).
• Intertextuality: Now the intertextuality in our music video isn't as noticeable as it should have been. These were subtle hints towards certain famous films. These three films were 'Lord of the Rings', 'Harry Potter' and 'Star Wars'. These all come together during one of the performance shots where Livvy and I were demonstrating the youthful side of pop by having a 'stick fight'. My character waves her stick as if it were a wand (Harry Potter), Livvy's character swings her stick as if it were a light saber (Star Wars) and Sarah chases us both us with her stick as a staff (Lord of the Rings).

Roland Barthes

Roland Barthes, who exactly like his neighbour Goodwin shall henceforth be referred to as Barthes, may strike you as familiar if you have viewed my blog last year. Roland Barthes was not only a media theorist but also a french literary theorist and philosopher. Barthes developed an idea on symbolism within all forms of visual media known as 'Signs and Signifiers'. In our music video we put a lot of emphasis on this idea of 'Signs and Signifiers' and made sure there was more than once shot that included symbolism.

Here are some of the signs and signifiers included within our music video:

• The cardboard figurines of the three girls holding matches in front of the house to indicate that later on in the music video they were going to set alight to Ben's house. Ben's house being symbolic of his 'black heart' in which he has kept them all trapped in. Although we have left the use of fire down to the audience's interpretation it could be argued that the use of fire is to represent the anger of which they all feel due to his actions (the colours in fire are often related to anger. Red being the colour of blood and therefore rage is related to being blood thisty a.k.a angry). It could also be argued that it is a clever way of linking the lyrics and the visuals together as in most fairytales the only way to destroy or kill a monster is to use fire. This is also shown in television programs such as Supernatural where in order to kill a ghost you must salt and burn the bones of the body in which the ghost once inhabited.
• The photos coming out of the photobooth. The most obvious point i'm about to make would be that this sequence of shots is representative of the nature of Ben's relationship with all three of these girls (essentially establishing Ben as the villain from the beginning) due to the closeness of each couple. Ben is leaning forward in the shot, taking up more of the room and therefore becoming the more dominant character in the shot. Again this establishes him as the 'oppressive male'. Another point I can make is that the photos that come out of the photobooth are foreshadowing Sarah's character's impending discovery of Ben having more than one girlfriend. It is through the use of the photo of my character and Ben's character that the argument between Sarah and Ben commences and the reveal of his real nature is made.
• The zooming in shots of Ben's/Hannah's phones could be to signify the phone conversation between the three girls that happens later. Ben's phone is one of the most important aspects of mise-en-scene within the music video as it is through the use of the phone that Ben communicates with all three of the girls, that Sarah then discovers the truth about him that she then passes on to the two others and provides links between the lyrics and the visuals. ('You got a black heart' text mentioned earlier).
• The weather changes between the narrative shots and the performance shots. Admittedly this is due to the fact that our music video was filmed during a long period of time so that three seasons passed (Winter, Spring and Summer.)but this can also be related back to symbolism. This is demonstrated during the first verse as Livvy and Ben are shown walking down the street with snow in the background so we can safely assume that it is Winter (this is then re-established through use of the Christmas tree in both the argument shots between Ben and Sarah and the date shots between Ben and myself) however when we watch the performance shots of all three of the girls it is bright and sunny so the audience knows that it's Summer. This is symbolic of how cold Ben is towards the girls during their lone scenes with him or in general. The cold weather is to show the misery that each girl feels in their relationship with Ben despite the fact that they 'love' him whereas when the girls are together performing the weather is summery because they are more confident without him and that the colour of their lives has been brought back so that they're happy.
• The black clothing worn in the performance shots. This is to symbolise Ben's lasting effect on them even though he is out of their lives. He who has the 'black heart' has now infected them and they wear black to show that they too now hold 'black hearts'. It could be interpreted by the audience as them taking on Ben's characteristics of being 'black hearted' and that the girl's will now go and repeat his actions within their next relationships because of the influence he had on their lives.
• The green clothing Livvy wears. The colour of Livvy's shirt in her lone shot with Ben is green to signify the emotion of jealousy as Livvy's character represents that emotion. She may not necessarily be an actual character but a personified emotion being played out during the music video coming from one girl. This is why Livvy's character is shown getting mad at Ben for 'checking out' Jess (the girl who walks past) as she is jealous of his behaviour.
• The red clothing Sarah wears. The colour of Sarah's plaid shirt is predominantly red and that is to signify the emotion of anger as Sarah's character represents that emotion. Again she may be a personification of one girl's emotions about her relationship with Ben but it is not established within the music video. This is why Sarah's character storms into the room screaming at Ben as she is angry at him for taking a picture with another girl. This is closely linked to jealousy.
• The blue clothing I myself wear. The colour of my dress is blue and that is to signify the emotion of sadness as my character represents that emotion. It has already been mentioned twice that we may be personifying these emotions within these shots of one girl in particular but it is not made clear. We could also be representing the stage of emotions that this 'one girl' is going through from jealousy to anger to sadness. This is why my character looks so distressed when she receives the phone call from Sarah about Ben's deceit. All three emotions are closely linked together.

Sven E Carlsson (Similar theories to Claude Levi-Strauss)

Sven E Carlsson, though I am tempted to call him Claude Levi-Strauss as their theories are very similar, is this man right here. I am going to assume he is a media theorist as his theory is mentioned on other slideshares so. There he is. With a fine looking beard. Don't say I didn't choose the best photos for you examiner because I did. He has been quoted saying: "That once you put everything into black and white boxes (in regards to film and music videos) then everything becomes the opposite of one another." This is, as mentioned above, almost symetrical to Claude Levi-Strauss's theory on binary opposites. Essentially he is saying that in music videos, television programes and films there is examples of opposites during the whole production.

Does this theory apply to our music video?

Yes, yes it does as shown above with some examples of the binary opposites that are included in our music video. One column represents Ben's character and the other represents the characters of the three girls. The seasons are on there to show when these characters are most dominant i.e Ben is more dominant in the Winter than in the Summer. Primarily because he isn't featured during the Summer shots but he is featured during the Winter shots and that is where he has the most influence over the girls.

The binary opposites in our music video is to show contrast between the characters and the situations. However there are moments of us subverting this theory. Obviously there are many opposites but there are also conventions of these opposites that we have subverted. As Ben is portraying 'the oppressive male' it would make sense for Ben to be featured more noticeably than the girls throughout the entire music video but as the music video's purpose is to show off the artists of the song we would have to show them more often. So symbolically it could be said that Ben is not more dominant and in that sense he is oppressed.

Another point you could make is that we subverted the theory by having our own characters wear dull colours later on and in that sense we have now gone against the binary oppositions as we did not maintain the opposite colours. 

Stuart Hall

Stuart Hall, we shall call him Hall (didn't you see that coming?), is the earliest link to the theory called 'Reception Theory'. This theory focuses around what audiences do to the media - the influence they hold and how they effect institutions decisions.  This is a media theory despite the fact that Hall himself is a sociologist. The two subjects do crossover quite often as demonstrated within this theory. How does this relate to my coursework?

During the pre-production process of our music video we had to undergo a few months of gathering research from our potential target audiences. I had planned for my demographic to consist of females within the age ranges of 10 - 25 so I collected all my research through social media networking sites such as facebook, twitter and tumblr. Later on I resorted to handing out questionnaires around the sixth form common room but only received 8 questions back. Originally I had intended to make a music video within the indie rock genre but unfortunately all the answers I received back seemed to indicate that my audience's preferred choice of genre was Pop. So, much like the theory, I had to put the needs of the audiences above my own. If this were a professional music video it would have been created by an institution with an audience that pander to Pop music videos. If they were to go against their research then they would risk dropping their numbers and losing money rather than gaining a profit.

So it was down to my research that 'Dirty Heart' by 'The Machine Ate Florence' was created.

Questionnaire answers on 'Black Heart' by 'Stooshe' - 

1. Do you like the song?

People who answered yes - 5

People who answered no - 3

2. If you answered yes please state why below.

1. It's quite happy and it makes me want to dance.

2. I love Stooshe. They're one of my faviroute bands.

3. I don't know. I just really like it.

4. It's not boring like rap is.

5. It's upbeat and peppy. (The music) I like the lyrics. I can relate.

3. If you answered no please state below why.

1. It's not my kind of music at all.

2. I prefer rock to pop.

3. It sounds like they're whining throughout.

4. What kind of music video would you expect of this song either:

a) A narrative (storyline) based music video?

b) A conceptual (symbolism) based music video?

c) A performance based music video? 

People who answered A - 4

People who answered B - 3

People who answered C - 1

These answers meant I had to make a Pop music video based on a narrative. 

As for theorists I think that's it. I hope this has been a very big eye opener for you examiner to the amount of work I put behind my research and such.

Evaluation Question 1.

Evaluation Question 4.