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

Fateh Khaled 8703

Introduction• My music promo has used, developed and challenged

forms of conventions of real life media products in various ways.

• Firstly we have developed the conventions of real life music videos this is because our music video is performance based and narrative based; these are the two most common types of music videos that are produced and are very conventional indeed.

• However instead of just going for one style (ie performance based) we decided to go for a hybrid; this is because we wanted to diversify our music video and keep the audience engaged as much as possible.

Narrative based segment

Performance based segment

Camera • In terms of camerawork; we developed the

conventions this is because close ups are conventional in music promos - close ups in our media product were used quite frequently; this helps the audience engage with the artists.

• We also used a close up on the actress – this represents Laura Mulvey’s famous term ‘male gaze’, whereby a close up on the female could attract more male members to watch the video; this ultimately mean that the video will receive more views.

• The artists in my music videos are conventional this is because our band is all male which is the gender you predominantly associate with in alternative/indie rock bands. For example, Bastille, The Script and Maroon 5 are all alternative/indie rock bands consisting of all males.

Cast (band members)

Bangladesh Bangers Maroon 5

Location

• In terms of location, our music video takes place in a house and the local town (public area) as well as a studio where the performance piece occurs. Our music video can indeed can be challenge the conventions of a regular pop promo, for example a large proportion of music videos that are performance based are usually in front of a large crowd however our group decided to take a low-key approach and have the lead singer (myself) performing in a drama studio as opposed to singing in front of a large crowd.

• In terms of props, our music video matches the key conventions; for instance the use of the microphone (performance based segments) is very stereotypical in performance based music videos as you usually see the singer holding a microphone, this gives a sense of reality and allows the audience to familiarise the voice with the singer.

• However, we also challenged the conventions at the same time, this is because in the performance based segments you only see the lead singer (me) singing which is very unconventional for a pop band as you would expect all band members to be in the performance based segments playing instruments/backing vocalists. This is unconventional as people watching the video may depict singer as a ‘one man band’.

Props

• In terms of editing, our music video is conventional this is because the majority of music videos are cut to the beat; we therefore have met that expectation and believe that cutting to the beat is essential.

• I also added a letter box in post production (which gives the video a 16:9 aspect ratio), once again this is vital and a key convention in music videos because it gives that music video ‘tone’ and ‘feel’ to it.

• The music promo was also colour corrected which once again is necessary in post production, for example natural colours in music videos are vary rare and a lot of music videos are colour corrected before they are published.

Editing

Before

The images above show the difference between editing the clips (when the 16:9 ratio has been added as well as the clips

being colour corrected)– as you can see the image on the right makes it feel like a music video just by making these

changes.

AfterEditing

• One other way we challenged the conventions of a music video is that the song does not play straight away. We see the actor putting in earphones then the song begins, this isn’t very conventional in music videos as they tend to start straight away. The song itself starts 25 seconds into the video itself; the reason why we did this is because we wanted to set a strong piece of narrative at the start which gives our music video an unconventional twist which many music directors don’t risk taking – however I believe taking risks and being unique in music promos is vital especially in contemporary society because the music industry is so competitive.

Song

Costume

• In terms of costume and make up, what our band members wear in the music video is indeed very stereotypical this is because they are wearing casual clothing which is becoming increasingly popular in music video nowadays, our members are seen wearing jeans, t-shirts, jackets and shirts. These particular clothing items are associated with young people which therefore relates to our target audience who fit under the 16-24 age range.

• Our costume relates to the genre and time period of our music video (we expressed this in our video). However, in the 80’s pop music videos consisted of men wearing suits and women wearing dresses in their music video however this is not the case anymore as casual clothing in music videos are far more popular in modern society.

Goodwins theory applied to my music video

• In terms of Andrew Goodwins theory my music video would fit under ‘amplification’ because it is a mixture of narrative based and performance based.

• Andrew Goodwin believed that it was important for an artist to be involved with the music video by performing or acting as the role of the main character or the singer, my group took this as an advantage as one of the members (myself) was the lead singer whilst the other member (Jeremy) was a main character, this enables us to get a special connection with our audience and reach out to them.

Digipak

• In terms of my digipak design I had followed various conventions; for example a digipak has either 4, 6 or 8 sides. I chose mine to have 6 sides which fits the criteria of a conventional digipak.

• I decided to use a maximum of 3 fonts in my digipak, this is a key convention as most digipaks range from 2-4 fonts, digipaks do not go beyond 4 fonts because it overcomplicates the design and makes it look unprofessional.

Digipak• We also had an interview with Ian Haughton

(branding designer), according to Ian branding is ''what someone says about you when you leave the room, its how you act, behave…”.

• Ian said that the key conventions of a digipak is that you pick a unique typeface which will suit your target audience, a wide range of colours and the correct use of grammar for your audience.

Digipak

• As Ian Haughton emphasised the fact that you must have your own font when branding your product (this is a key convention); I decided that I wanted to created my own font in order to develop the conventions.

• I created my own font using DaFont.com, the font name was ‘Rakoon’ and I gained a license to gain the rights to publish this font. I used this font consistently throughout all my media products such as the digipak, magazine poster and the music video.

•My digipak also had a specific colour scheme which was kept consistent throughout the different sides; I used four main colours (blue, red, yellow and green) to represent each band members. These four colours were shown throughout, this is conventional in digipaks as they are said to have the same colour and design to give the audience a sense of familiarity.

Digipak

• I also used a barcode and the record label logo (Warner Music Group); these are conventional within digipaks because the product is sold at shops and in order for it to be sold a barcode must be displayed and it must contain specific information such as the artist’s name, record label, the distributor etc.

• My barcode is quite unconventional in the sense that it is a custom made barcode using the words ‘Bangladesh’ I used this font by downloading it on ‘DaFont’ but it gives an extra touch to our product giving our consumers that warm feel.

Digipak

• However, one final point about my digipak is that it is quite unconventional in the sense that it has two discs – this is very uncommon for recent digipaks as they tend to be stored on one CD. Technological advancement has meant that storing music on CD’s has been better than ever before with most CD’s having the capacity to store 25 songs however both my discs hold 5 songs each.

• Although it is uncommon I believe it works effectively because it means that the album can be spit up into two which has different meanings.

Digipak

Magazine Poster• In terms of the magazine poster

(promoting the digipak), I followed the key conventions; this is because my magazine poster used similar colours (green, red, blue and yellow) and photos (which were taken on the same day) from the digipak.

• This ultimately maintains continuity and helps the target audience familiarise with the band which ties in all the products together (music video, magazine poster and the digipak).

Magazine Poster•As social media sites are become

increasingly popular it is also conventional to have a social media link on your poster.

•Therefore in order to make my poster conventional I added social network sites link at the bottom of the poster to help further attract my audience and publicise our band – as we are a new band and this is our first album it is vital to attract as many audience as we can.

Magazine Poster• I also added our record label logo (Warner Music

Group) on the magazine too which is conventional in a poster because we must display what record label we are represented from.

• I also added a ‘QR’ code onto my poster which again is conventional; QR codes are becoming increasing popular. People can scan my QR code using their smartphones and it will redirect them to our website and our iTunes page. This means that more people will become aware of our website and our album.

QR CodeRecord label logo

Intertextuality • The term intertextuality refers to the process

of creating references to any kind of media via another media text.

• In our music video we made reference to John Newman’s song ‘Love Me Again’ this is because in ‘Love Me Again’ the main theme is relationships, we also notice that John Newman is seen singing with a microphone (which we also made a reference to) as well as close ups on the female (male gaze).

• Images of these references are displayed on the next slide.

Intertextuality references

• John Newman’s: Love me again • Bangladesh Bangers: If you close your eyes