sketch of magazine advert

This is the sketch for our magazine advert. We used the examples to help create a suitable image to fit with the conventions of our genre. This advert will have several parts to it. Firstly, the Background Image will be blue lightning, this is to make the cover look more appealing. Secondly, an image of The lead singer. we have already taken the picture and will apply it to the poster with darkening effects and some distortion techniques. Next is the logo, the blue Circle with an 'M' in the centre. Malaney records. Then the Titles and slogans for example "out now" and " available from Amazon.co.uk". All of these will make our cover look different and appeal to the target market. Whilst giving the information they need and conforming to the genre.

examples of existing magazine adverts

These are examples of other album magazine adverts. We needed to see what everyone else had done so we could figure out how to structure our own piece.


Our three product bands..

We wanted to keep to one colour theme as made evident by our digi packs. The reason we decided to do this was because it exemplified the product as a whole and as a brand. In terms of the iconographic, we stuck to the genres conventions where by illustrating the instruments and the bands.

Audience Feedback

We showed our music video to our class for some feedback, which would enable us to explore the positives and negatives and apply them in any future projects. Therefore, giving us the opportunity to learn and most importantly to improve.

"Good video with good fluent transitions between shots. one slightly out of synch line. good effect to outline storyline within video, slightly blurred on certain shots. like the changes from band to storyline."

' It was a really good video, although the lip sync was a bit out of time at the beginning. However the video was overall very well thought through and highly entertaining'

"I really like the location, lighting and acting. however, some parts were out of sync."

"Great use of cutting and different shots as it was very coherent with the lyrics"

"well edited. very professional as the ending was very well edited. lip sync was 95% of the time."

" The video was really good. I thought there were a really good wide range of shots with added edge to the video. The narrative was easy to follow and go along with. In particular I liked the lighting effects and the timing of the bands movement with the music."


Referring back to the feedback, we are happy with the comments and do agree that the lip sync was out on one small bit during the start. However, the majority was in sync through out the video. The editing process was extremely good as made evident from the statements above from the audiences. overall a very satisfied piece of work.

from bears to cartoons...

Our original idea was to create an imaginary friend in the image of a bear.
However when it came to editing and creating the interactive bear we realised how difficult it would be. Firstly we would need to animate the bear on top of the footage with Jasmine. secondly the bear would change positions and it's actions would vary. The most difficult thing of all was keeping the bear in the right place, with every tiny movement of the camera the bear that we put over the footage would move inches. So instead, we decided to leave out the bear and leave it up to the imagination of our audience. Which we actually prefered, because it's more imaginary then.
After watching it several times we discussed if there was something else we could do instead, and decided to turn all of the parts with jasmine (the narrative) into a cartoon like picture. This would simply involve adding the cartoon effect to the video. Using the software after effects we imported the footage and attempted to add the cartoon effect. However this was not easy, the rendering took over an hour and then didn't work.
So then our plan was to use Sony Vegas to try and create the cartoon effect, it still didn't work the way we wanted. So we attempted one final try with after affects. It finally managed to render so we exported the file and swapped it with the original files finally giving it a look like this.

The pair of us are very pleased with the final result.

Researching the theories...

To what extent are voyeurism and the male gaze still relevant to a music video?

Laura Mulvey, a theorist, who in 1975 constructed the argument around mainstream cinema. The male gaze is structured by the concepts of voyeurism; to look at someone beauty and fetishistic; to look at someone sexually, a constitution towards scopophilia– visual pleasure provided for men. Mulvey argues how women have objectified themselves to such a greater level, becoming fragmented into culture. She suggests whether or not a woman welcomes the ‘gaze’ they are merely conforming to the hegemonic norms established to benefit the interests of men.

As Laura Mulvey argues that men look at women in a festishistic way, Ariel levy echoes this however, demands woman recognise how they are in fact objectifying themselves in the attempt to being notice. For example; Fergie, from the Black Eye Pea’s sings ‘My Humps’ seeking to gain the ‘male gaze’. It seems to be the more attention we, as woman receive from different men, the more successful we become, therefore the rise of insecurities in woman is much greater, as described in the ‘ beauty myth’ by Naomi Wolf. She argues how the male gaze is alive, however hegemonic and woman are being exploited into thinking that they need to objectify themselves for popularity, as clearly shown in music videos to this very day and age. Furthermore, as there are only 7% of directors in which are females; the control of the industry lies within the hands of men, linking to patriarchy.

In addition, using a narrative freeze also shows the ‘objectifying’ of women in a music video. On the other hand, in the music industry artist’s like Katie Melua and Adele are just a few of many representatives, who actually go against the idea to ‘objectify’ themselves for the short cut easy fame. But yet it seems, it does come to a disadvantage as their popularity in the industry isn’t as recognised, such as artists like Beyonce.

Having researched this theory, we believe that 'the male gaze' doesn't conform to the goo goo dolls. Many reasons to suggest this for example, the band itself doesn't perhaps feel the need to replicate other genres sterotypical style, of objectifying woman in music videos. Through our research, we have found that pop and rnb tend to project woman in the way Mulvey argues. Whereas the Goo goo dolls are alternative rock. This genre does not really project women in this way as it would not conform to the ideas of the genre. In our music video our central character was a young girl (a child) so we felt that constructing her in a voyeuristic way would be highly inappropriate. This would cross boundaries that would not conform to our song or artist.

Analysing music videos...

One of the music videos we have chosen to analyse is "an honest mistake" by the bravery.
we have picked it because we really enjoy there music, and think it's really different and the music video is stunning. It is so clever and the sort of video you can watch again and again. The bravery are a punk rock band from America, very similar to the goo goo dolls. So this video is set in a studio. The band perform the song whilst all around them a domino effect is taking place. An inventive idea where one thing hits into the next causing something new to happen. And it's also a very clever metaphor for the message i think they are trying to get across. One small mistake can turn into another and it can get worse and worse, just like the video, it starts off with dominoes knocking each other over but then things are destroyed, there is fire, decapitation and other consequences.

This is the link to the music video " an honest mistake"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8vzbezVru4


The band is from an independent record label, which gives them a lot more freedom to do what they want. They don't have to conform to a formula or specific expectations. The video is all in black and white however by using a colour splashing effect they've kept the golden yellow colour from some of the objects. This makes it look very arty and so cool as an effect.

It begins with the domino bouncing in rhythm with the music, this is used throughout the video and all of the editing cuts work with the music. The visuals will cut to a new shot in time with the rhythm of the music, this is fundamental with a music video and without doing this the video doesn't work as well with the song. It sounds simple enough but without the synchronisation it will not give as good of a feel to the video. I think the video also uses sex appeal to attract the specific audience of this genre. The intention is to draw in the women of the audience, and show off the lead singer. This works well because it fit's with the band however when it comes to making our film I don't think we will do the same.

This shot also draws attention to the coloured belt. In the video the golden yellow colours are kept whilst everything else is black and white. And the camera zooms in on the belt to show this colour effect.

I think the reason the band decided to use the domino effect in their song is to create a unique and inventive style to their music videos. Such as "fearless" where they play on boats or "time wont let me go" where they build a world out of playing cards. The inventive ideas are what the target audience are looking for. it will also help to sell the video through viral advertising. People will see it and send a link or email to their friends. The band members also where the expected cloths for this genre. Leather jackets, dark clothing and extreme hair styles.

The themes and style complement the genre and song it self. It is quite dark, black and white but it is perfect for the song. The rest of the song continues in the same way, domino's hit things which hits bigger things and the consequences get more destructive. The editing and smashing of things work in time with the music and truly makes this video superb and one of the best in it's genre.

We want to apply this kind of rock and roll theme but soften it a bit, as we both have different tastes in music we had to compromise.

Discussion of progress...

How do you feel your production has been processing?

We as a pair feel very positive towards our progress as we have been producng good quality work throughout the working project. We feel that by the time we reach the deadline given we will have all of the work completed along with supplementary tasks to support our ideas.

What are the challenges you have faced?

during the early stages we have initial planned to create an animation of a teddy bear character to interact with jasmine. however, when it came to editing and animating the character, logistically we would have struggled to construct the animation in the time we had. The bear moved when the screen moved meaning that pulling him in sync would have taken many hours of editing which we did not feel was justified for the look created.

Have you made changes to your ideas?

yes. we did decide to make a few changes as stated above to why we did this. we decided instead of creating the animation bear we would take the Jasmine bits and apply a cartoon effect. one the reasons we did this was too create a more story look form. we also made the band scenes more darker as we wanted to create a more 'rock n roll' look.

What have you still got left to do? how are you going to make sure this achieved?

within the next two final weeks we will finish any other unfinished work for our project. we will also screen our music video for audience feedback. we will also do a few extra tasks that we feel will enable us to achieve a higher grade. we will set our self personal dealines amongst the two final weeks in order to achieve or aims.