Week 1 - Research and Thoughts on the A2 Media Studies Course
Grace Watson 2 February 2021 Media Studies Week 1 - Research and Thoughts on the A2 Media Studies Course
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Hi there, I'm Grace. An eighteen year old A2 Media Studies student passionate about all things media. I am so energised by the exciting world of presenting, filming and directing, and photography and journalism, and it's because of this reason that I am so engrossed by Media Studies as a subject. Whilst completing my AS level of Media Studies last year (2020), I learnt many lessons and acquired countless new skills. From learning to work well with team members who are different to me, some slightly lazy and uninterested, to learning all about navigating my way through the Adobe Premier Pro software to create three products of excellence, I seriously loved all that media entailed at the AS level. I specifically enjoyed filming days where, as a team, we'd have a great time shooting and manipulating the camera to get the desired shots. This being said, there were definitely very stressful moments on shoot days where I felt very overwhelmed - all emotions part of the filming process after all.
Additionally, I loved the essay-writing side of things. Being a lover of languages, writing and journalism, I loved the freedom of expressing my thoughts on different productions as I put pen to paper.
With all the positives, I did however find that I didn't always enjoy the parts of the filming process where we, as a team, had to brainstorm thriller plot ideas for our productions. I do not watch thrillers or horrors at all, and so coming up with scary and dark plotlines was not always the easiest, although we definitely improved as the year progressed.
Leaping into a new year of media studies, now at an A2 level, I am so energised and enthusiastic to reach new levels and produce an excellent, interesting and vibrant final music video, digi pak etc, all of an impressing high-standard.
This year, I am most excited above creating a social media page for the band/artist and to shoot the photos for the digipak front and back covers. Loving photography, I can already tell that I'm going to have so much fun with these two tasks especially.
Below are links, thoughts and observations I've made whilst researching and sifting through the blogs and final products of past A2 Media Studies students in preparation for the successful year ahead. One of achieving an A* and continuing to expand my skills within this field.
I love Paola's opening message to the readers of her blog. It's sweet, welcoming and simply understood, providing a warm introduction and very clear sense of clarity to new readers. Her blog is easy to follow, it's well structured and I love the personal flare she added to her name by using the '|" (line) in her blog's name. I plan on adding my own personal introduction to my blog, as I think it adds an exciting and unique dynamic to my page.
Paola's first project of her preliminary work consists of some really interesting shots and angles, with an effective lighting transition from dark and gloomy lighting at the beginning of the video, to a more brightly coloured ending.
I love the font used for the 'ROOTS' credit. It's bright yellow colour contrasts to the dark green leaves revealed on screen by the *panning of the camera, and together these elements create a captivating atmosphere to the video's opening. While I'm not really a fan of the twisty white light that rotates around the screen (pictured below), I love Paola's evident creativity, and will definitely use the quick cuts as an inspiration to my end product. Additionally, I may play around with lighting transitions as well to create a similar effect on the viewer as the lighting lightens or darkens as the video progresses.
Paola's movement and locations video linked below is also very interesting. I love the quick cuts of the red-haired girl standing below the arch - something I'm going to consider adding to my final product. The staggered feel, paired with the continuous, on-going music is effective in creating a dynamic atmosphere and interesting feel.
In both videos, Paola's locations are effective and engaging, unique and not at all typical. This year, I aim to really think about choosing effective, one-of-a-kind and exciting non-typical shoot locations. As we were taught at AS level, the location of a product is in itself like it's own character and so choosing a great location is an important part of the process.
Whilst Anthony's final music video is now unavailable to watch, his digipak and magazine adverts look absolutely awesome! So creative and professional. My only one reservation with Anthony's digipak is the font used for the song names at the back of the cover. I would personally have gone for a more professional font. With that being said though, the font chosen is effective in clearly revealing the song names and matches/works well with the rest of the advert, which in terms of marketing and advertising is very important. When designing my digipak, I'm really going to take into consideration the font I use to ensure that it is both clear and easily-readable, yet still fun and interesting.
The photos used are highly professional, and I love how colourful and vibrant the magazine advert is. It's photoshopped look is captivating and really very convincing. I'll use Anthony's digipak as an inspiration for my digipak, aiming to look into photoshopping the photos I shoot for the cover as well, to perhaps create that more professional, dynamic look. As mentioned above, I really love photography, and so I am so excited about shooting the photos for my digipak cover.
A2 MEDIA STUDIES COURSE + MY THOUGHTS ON IT:
In Media Studies over the span of 2021, I'll be creating my own music promotion package. This will include a music video, an official social media page and a digipak for the albums release. Teacher Bianca, our teacher, informed us that Cambridge markers seem to be quite big on branding. In order to truly excel, I'll need to know my chosen genre well, know what to and what not to include into my production etc. My branding needs to be strong and effective.
Below is a video (found on YouTube) on how to make a music video in such a way that it looks professional. Todd Wolfe, the creator of this video, has filmed numerous music videos and so his opinions and tip on this topic are highly useful.
Todd Wolfe suggests playing the music track out loud whilst the actors are being filmed, so that they can sing along with the song whilst being filmed, so that when the music track is added to the filmed footage, the two speeds match up perfectly.
MUSIC GENRES:
Rock, punk rock, funk, disco, jazz, pop music, techno, easy listening, psychedelic, hardcore, drum and bass music etc.
The six MAIN genres of music (most popular genres as well) are:
- Funk
- Classical
- Pop
- Techno
- Country
- Rock
According to this website, rap has overtaken rock in popularity, being a very popular genre of music especially amongst teens. I am personally not a fan of rap, and so I doubt that I'll choose a rap song for my music video, however it's interesting to see how many people really are interested in that style of music.
I have a friend Audrey who sings and performs. I plan on perhaps asking her to act in my music video as the singer, as she already sings professionally so won't feel awkward to perform for the camera in the recording/filming stages. I plan on asking Audrey what her favourite music genre is/what types of songs she really enjoys and take this into account when choosing a song to use in my music video - I want her to feel comfortable and relaxed acting to a song she is familiar with so that the final product is convincing and professional.
Linked below is a jazz song.
I haven't discussed yet with Audrey, but I think she does quite enjoy the jazz genre. The positives with jazz music is that the footage I film can be quite romantic, peaceful and maybe even nostalgic. We could play around with gradients in the post-production editing stages to create a vintage look and feel to generate a warm and homely atmosphere to the song. This can also be done by including warm, brown and yellow lighting hues.
- elements of African-American gospel music, rhythm and blues and jazz.
Soul music seems to be quite similar to jazz music, and while both genres seem quite fun to work with, I'm thinking of rather going for a song that is more pop and vibrant this year.
One of my favourite songs at the moment is 'The Greatest' by Sia, a pop song. I love how bubbly, bright, exciting and 'hype' this song is. In terms of filming, we could really shoot some fun shots, incorporate lots of camera movements and quick cuts between shots (similar to what Paola did in her video as discussed above).
Conventions of a pop music video:
- lots of dancing
- bright lighting
- make-up and accessories
- filters and gradients to really brighten up the shots
- close-up shots of the artists’ faces
- photo-shopped artists in effort of making them appear spotless
This genre provides us with a large scope of possibilities and opportunities to really tap into our creative sides.
Another option is hip hop, a genre that is relatively similar to pop. According to a source, rap actually grew out of hip hop. Like I mentioned above though, I'm not the greatest fan of rap and so if we were to choose a hip hop song, I would make sure to choose one that is not too similar to a rap song.
Possible group members for the year ahead, Levi Wijohn and Kayla Lockington, mentioned that they’d quite like to create a music video within the hip hop genre, explaining that because the music isn’t as fast-paced and loud as what rap is, and that because often these songs have deeper, more meaningful backstories, we can really shoot some creative and interesting shots for our music videos. I so agree, and for this reason I think that we, if we do end up working in a group, will go with either this genre or pop for our music videos.
I spoke to Audrey today as well, and she mentioned that she does quite like the hip hop genre, so it's definitely an option.
Conventions of a hip hop song include:
- a catchy chorus
- a steady beat
- loud music
- upbeat tempo
Although, my slight reservation here is the fact that the music in hip hop songs can often be quite fast-paced and punchy, not really my style. This is something I'll keep in consideration and thought when finalising ideas, as I really want to ensure that the song we choose to film a music video to is one that I have some sort of interest in. This will mean a really great, successful time working with the song and designing and shooting really unique footage to pair with it.
Over the next week or so, I'll continue thinking about options and finalise an idea for my music video.
Today is the 10th of February, a few days since I last added to this blog post, and during my Media Studies lesson I rediscovered Meghan Trainor's music video from 2015 of her single "Dear Future Husband", another example of a pop song.
I love the bright and vibrant colours evident in the music video, as well as the use of mostly natural lighting. The bright colours and lighting evoke happy emotions within viewers. The colours yellow and orange representing warmth and red representing love. The artists outfits are all unique and creative. Whenever doing housework, Meghan wears black. One could say that this is meant to challenge the typical stereotype of women belonging in the kitchen, perhaps implying that woman are not always happy only doing the housework. I may play around with stereotypes in my music video to encourage the viewers to think - creating a more captivating viewer experience.
The opening credits are also bold and colourful. The clever editing of having the credits leave the screen as the girl rides passed on her bicycle is effective in telling a story, as if we are now, as the viewers, following the girl to her picnic spot. Here, the relationship between the editing in post-production and the actual shots is captivating and interesting. I love this idea - it's refreshing and it's fun.
There are countless close up shots throughout the music video, as well as numerous mid shots and wide shots. The marrying of these different kinds of shots and angles adds to the exciting and unique atmosphere and dynamic of this video which I quite enjoy.
Additionally, there is a lot of jump cutting and almost parallel editing throughout the video where, as an audience, we are shown different shots like the ones of the little girl meeting a boy at a garden tea-date of some sort (one can assume that perhaps this is Meghan as a young girl?), and the shots of Meghan on various dates.
"Dear Future Husband" is a typical pop song - consisting of most of the conventions typical of a pop song - lots of make-up, bright and loud music, countless props (in this video there is the sponge, gloves and bucket of soapy water for washing the 'kitchen' floor, the aprons, the presents in gift boxes etc etc), and additionally there are numerous shots of Meghan dancing - very typical of a pop music video. If we as a group decided to shoot a pop song, we'd have to think of and choreograph a dance for our actors to act out in order to really conform to those pop conventions.
Here are a few additional notes:
- I love the idea of having sound effects of the diegetic sound of tweeting birds and wind blowing through the leaves of the trees at the very beginning of the video before any of the actual music begins.
- I love how the video goes full circle, starting and ending with close ups of the artists face as she sings, personalising and enlivening the song.
- Love the forward and backward, hand-held movement of the camera - adds dynamic and movement which looks great on screen!
The video as a whole has a very wholesome, bubbly and fun vibe to it which I love.
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