4.

HOW DID YOU USE MEDIA

TECHNOLOGIES IN THE CONSTRUCTION

AND RESEARCH, PLANNING AND

EVALUATION STAGES?

We used the camera throughout the production of our media texts. The camera that we used was a DSLR Canon, something that I have used previously. We used this camera for both the photography and fi lming for our magazine advert, video and digi-pack. We decided to use this camera for both the fi lming and photography due to the qual ity of the shots and simpl icity of the use. One of the key things that we did using this piece of equipment was attach it to a tr i -pod. By combining the pieces of equipment we were able to have steady and fl at shots throughout our music video. One of the main things that I have learnt about this camera during this process is how benefi cial i t is to manual ly focus the camera. By doing this we were able to alter the focus of the camera before each shot. This al lowed us to create some blurred eff ects during the actual fi lming, as we wanted our music video to have a sense of the surreal ist ic concept. There were many advantages to fi lming digital ly, however I feel that the key one was being able to easi ly store and transport the footage easi ly. As wel l as this we were able to easi ly edit and share the images and shots. I feel that this piece of equipment was key to the success of our products .

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

A key piece of technology which was used particularly during the research stage of the project was surveymonkey.com. Having used the site in a previous project, I was

aware how to create a survey and share it with friends, however having used the website this time around, I recognised how it can be used to not only gather the

results but to collect them into graphs and charts for display. We used surveymonkey to make an online survey for our primary audience research. I found that creating the

survey online was a much more simple and easier way of structuring the questions. As the website only allows you to choose 10 questions, I found that this was somehow

an advantage when we began to design our survey. I feel that this was beneficial as we became more critical of which questions we chose and how we would get the best

results from our chosen questions. It also meant that we wereadding more detail into the answers in order to make sure that we received all of this information necessary to appeal to our audience. I found that the site was set out very clearly meaning that it wasn’t difficult to use. As well as this, I felt that a key feature to the site was the share option after creating the survey. This connected the website to all of our social network accounts such as Facebook and Twitter meaning that we were able to share our survey immediately. Another useful aspect of the site was how after the survey had been completed we were able to view the gathered results as collated pie charts and graphs. This made it very simple when displaying our information and analysing the results.

A key piece of technology that I used throughout the project was my iPad. I found that this was part icular ly useful during the planning stage of this project. I chose to take photographs of our storyboard using the ‘Scan’ app; I am pleased that I decided to do this as I found it helpful during the fi lming of music video. By having a digital copy of the storyboards i t al lowed me to access them on the go throughout the fi lming days. As wel l as this, this form of technology al lowed me to share the storyboard images on a photo stream that I was able to access on the computer and on my phone. I found this aspect part icularly useful as i t made it easy to access the plans anywhere and at anytime throughout the project. I t also meant that I was able to easi ly share these images with the other members of my group so that we could discuss and develop our ideas. Another key thing that I have learnt through the use of this equipment is how the advance in technology has made it easier to capture, develop and share my ideas. A key example of this is during the fi lming days, I was able to take photographs of our location and share them onto my blog whi lst away from the col lege site, making i t s imple to continue with the project.

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

A key piece of software that we used throughout our project was Adobe Photoshop. I chose to use this program to crop and edit

images throughout the research of this project, however our key use for Photoshop was during the production of our digi-pack and

magazine advert. As my role during the post-production stage was to edit the music video, I didn’t have the opportunity to use the program to edit the digi-pack and magazine advert. However, I

found that when I needed to add an image to my blog or presentation, I would use Photoshop to crop and alter the

brightness of any images that I needed. As I have used Photoshop in previous projects, I didn’t learn any new ski l ls as the work I was personal ly doing on the program was at a basic level. Despite this,

after having a discussion with the other members of my group, I recognised that they had learnt many ski l ls about the program. For

example, when creating the magazine advert, Kieran used an opacity tool on some of the images to blend them more into the

background. By doing this he was able to give our magazine advert a sense of the surreal ist ic concept that is present throughout our

promotional package. I feel that without the use of Photoshop, our fi nal products would not have been as successful .

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

I feel that a key program that I personally used many times during the project was Microsoft Powerpoint. One of the key times that I used this program was throughout the research aspect of the project. After carrying out our audience research, I needed to collate the results and chose to display them using graphs. I chose to do this using Powerpoint as I was able to show all of the graphs in one presentation. I found it very simple to create the graphs using the ‘chart’ bar at the top of the program. During this use of the technology I didn’t learn anything new as I have used the program many times before. However, after creating the presentation, I struggled to post it onto my blog. I was then shown the website ‘Slideshare’ where I was able to share the presentation as it was and then embed it into my blog. I found this quite easy to do and I feel that it will be a useful skill for my future work. I am pleased with how slideshare formats the presentation onto my blog, making it easy for me to quickly look through the statistic, this is soemthign that I found useful when I came to analyse the results.

I also used this program during the evaluation stage of the project. A key aspect of this was importing images onto my presentation to accompany my text. Having done this many times before, it wasn’t a new skill learnt, however I was able to use my previous skills of sharing the presentation using the slideshare site.

One of the key pieces of technology which we used wi th in our pro ject was soc ia l media s i tes . I fee l that wi thout these our audience research, feedback and project development would not have been as successful . Our group fe l t that us ing Facebook and Twitter was an easy way to share our onl ine survey and fi nal products . By doing th is , i t enabled us to quick ly and eas i ly rece ive a response on our pieces of work. After creat ing our survey us ing surveymonkey, we each shared the l ink on our Facebook wal ls and Twitter feeds. As wel l as th is we were each able to d i rect message people on the s i tes ask ing them to take part in the survey. I fee l that th is use of the technology was a success as after just 3 days of creat ing the survey, we rece ived over 60 responses. After the product ion of our media products , we shared them using many diff erent soc ia l network s i tes. I chose to share the music v ideo on Youtube due to the var iety and mass amount of people that watch v ideos through the s i te . After quick ly uploading the v ideo, we were able to use Youtube’s tagging system to give our v ideo a var iety of d iff erent tags, by doing th is i t meant that the v ideo would be eas ier to fi nd on the search engine. As wel l as th is , we were able to embed the v ideo stra ight onto our media blogs and share i t instant ly wi th people through Facebook and Twitter. A key feature of Youtube is be ing able to l ike and comment on v ideos. This s ight a l lowed us to rece ive comments about the success of our music v ideo and a lso a l lowed us to recognise that over 300 people v iewed our v ideo wi th in 4 days. I be l ieve that th is response to our v ideo is pure ly down to be ing able to tag the v ideo and share i t through other s i tes , making i t eas ier for our audience to access.

Another way in which we used soc ia l network ing s i tes was on our magazine advert . We chose to incorporate the Twitter , Youtube, Instagram and Facebook logos on the bottom of our advert as we fe l t i t would intr igue our audience. Through advances in technology, i t means that we are able to access our favour i te art ists on the go us ing many diff erent forms of soc ia l network. As our target audience is between the age of 16-24 we fe l t that th is constant interact ion wi th the i r favour i te art ist would be something that they would appeal them.

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

I persona l l y used the software Fina l Cut Pro for a long dura t ion o f the post product ion s tage of the pro jec t . I vo lunteered myse l f to ed i t the mus ic v ideo as I had used the program a few t imes be fore . Desp i te th i s , I d idn ’ t know that many fea tures o f the so ftware and there fore had to exper iment as I c rea ted the v ideo. I fe l t qu i te confi dent in my ab i l i t y o f cut t ing two shots together a t a bas ic leve l , however one o f the key cha l lenges which I had to overcome was the app l i ca t ion o f eff ects which we des i red in our mus ic v ideo. One o f the ma in eff ects which I l ea rned how to use was the b l ink eff ect . Th i s c reated the i l l us ion that the camera /eye i s b l ink ing as the shot fades to b lack a t va r ious in te rva l s throughout . I chose to use th i s eff ect on one of our po int o f v iew shots as i t enhanced the idea tha t the shot was f rom our characters perspect ive . Afte r dragging the eff ect onto the des i red shot , I was ab le to see tha t the b l ink ing happened too qu ick ly and I wanted i t to be a s lower process as i t was a fa i r l y l ong shot . I there fore dec ided to exper iment w i th the app l i ca t ion o f th i s fi l te r. I d id th i s by se lec t ing the c l ip and se lec t ing the ‘b l ink ’ eff ect tha t had been appl ied to the shot . I then had to a l te r the dura t ion and length o f the b l inks by dragging the a rrows a long the s ide bar o f the shot . I exper imented w i th d iff erent lengths o f b l inks and the d i s tance between them unt i l I fe l t tha t we had made i t rea l i s t i c enough. I am p leased tha t I l ea rnt how to use th i s eff ect , as we dec ided to repeat th i s fi l te r on another shot . Th i s t ime I a l te red i t s l i ght ly by app ly ing the fi l te r a longs ide a ‘b lur ’ eff ect . By ca rry ing out th i s exper iment , I i dent ifi ed that by combin ing two or more eff ects I was ab le to a l te r the appearance of the shot . I am ext remely p leased w i th how the fi na l v ideo looked, espec ia l l y the use o f the d iff erent eff ects .

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

One of the key ways in which my group used technology was to share work and fi ndings. Dur ing each stage of the project , we al l stored our work onto my USB st ick. We decided to do this so that we not only had a back up copy of the work, but we were al l able to transfer our plans and notes from one computer to another. Another way in which we did this was through Emai l . By creat ing a group conversat ion, we were al l able to share fi les and documents throughout the project in order to make sure that every member of the group was up to date.

Dur ing the product ion stage of the process, we stored our footage onto an SD card. By using this piece of equipment we were easi ly able to transfer the footage and images from the camera to the Macbook and the computers. I feel that by able to store our documents and other fi les onto devices such as a USB and an SD card, our group was able to successful ly ensure that we al l had the necessary documents for the project .

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

One p iece of equipment which I fee l was necessary in success of our project was a voice recorder. Despite on ly us ing th is p iece of technology at one stage dur ing the project , I fee l that i t was key for gather ing our audience research. As part of our pr imary audience research, we carr ied out qua l i tat ive interviews about our demographic and music adverts , v ideos and a lbums. We recorded these interviews us ing a voice recorder and microphone. The microphone that we used enabled us to c lear ly p ick up on the interviewee’s responses. After record ing the interviews we used a USB cable to connect the recorder into the computer. By doing th is we were s imply and eff ect ive ly able to t ransport the fi les onto the computer where we could upload them to our b logs for ana lys is . I found that the voice recorder was very easy to use therefore I d idn’t learn any new ski l ls about th is device. However , I fee l that th is was a key p iece of technology in the success of our project as i t gave us a l l of the important in format ion about our demographic .

Advances in technology has meant that we are now able to eas i ly capture, download, watch, t ransport , and share products . One of the key th ings that I have learnt throughout th is pro ject is the importance of technologies, specifi ca l ly soc ia l network ing s i tes and how they can be benefi cia l in the media.

MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES