Tropes of my genre

A music video trope used in my own video is the use of animation. Although this feature isn't largely used in acoustic/pop music videos it is featured in a few such as Valentine by Kina Grannis and Take On Me by Aha. In both of these videos I feel that animation adds a lot to the story line but more so in Valentine as it shows how the girl at the end might be more suitable as she is visually compared to be a lot nicer.

My video also uses the the trope of having a Concept. Video Killed the Radio Star: Literal version I find is very funny and is, in a way, like my own. I listened to the lyrics of my chosen song and found literal meanings in a lot of them. For example, 'Taking blood and making art' where I had the Heart paint a picture using paint to symbolise blood. Although I feel I used this trope of having a concept, in some ways I think I took it a bit far by looking for literal meanings of the lyrics meant I was restricted to staying close to them otherwise it could've looked out of place. 

I don't believe I have subverted any tropes on my genre. As I have followed a lot of the conventions of my genre, I think that I have then followed the tropes in the same way. I don't believe this has hindered my work in any way but it may have helped it if I had looked at new tropes that I could've subtly placed in my work.

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

Also in my media work, I have used technical and symbolic codes in my work.
Some of the technical codes that I used were mise-en-scene and camerawork.
My location was an ordinary house but I asked to use the house of one of my talent because, she lived on a quiet road and so we were less likely to have dangers on traffic but on a more code reason, I wanted the location identifiable to the audience as a 'cosy' home and the base of the video. I chose camera work, such as the close up of the Girl singing the lines, to show that this was a literal message in the song from her heart and I believe I show this by showing the letter read out. I also used certain camerawork to help the audience focus on the story line and lyrics. For example, where the animated heart fills with red and the shots of the two girls are shown. I hope the use of mainly Mid or Long shots helps the consumer to concentrate more on what's going on and being a spectator rather than becoming emotionally involved with the characters.
I also used symbolic codes such as the colour red on the clothing of the Heart and a blue top of the Girl. I decided to use the red to symbolise the heart and love. As the meaning of my song is to love who you are I thought having this symbolic code would be appropriate and enhance the idea that the Heart is representing the Girl's heart and inner feelings. I asked the Girl to dress in Blue and light colours to convey the genre as happy and uplifting as well as being a intertexual link between the video and the ancillary tasks backgrounds.

Evaluation: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

In these 4 stages I used many programs and websites to complete my coursework tasks, which include Final Cut Pro, Paint, MyPaint, Picmonkey.com, Pixlr.com and Windows Live Movie Maker. My philosophy of technology is that it makes simple tasks a lot easier compared to have it would've been making films in the past, where they had to actually cut parts of film. In a lot of ways these programs helped me in my work but in other ways hindered.

Research
When I was in the research stage of my coursework I used Google and Youtube to find out conventions of music videos, digipaks and magazine adverts for music albums. I used Google to look at images of real life, professional digipaks and magazine adverts, which allowed my to learn the codes and conventions of how certain genres are promoted as well as portrayed in digipak design. I then used Youtube to look at music videos and find the typical conventions in certain genres to then decide what genre I would like to make.

Planning
Blogger was the only media technology that I used in my planning stage. I used it to note when I would film, my initial ideas and plot out the story line of my music video. I found it was good to use as I could see all of my posts and so all of my ideas together, which helped me to construct my work.

Construction
Final Cut Pro was used to create my main task as I was able to cut video clips and add on effects easily. For example, once I uploaded my footage it was easy to just brag and drop the parts that I wanted onto my video. It was also good as it had a lot of effects on it that enhance my video, such as Colour Correction which made the shots brighter. However, Final Cut Pro did hinder me in the editing process slightly. Sometimes the video would start before the sound when I was playing it and so I would think that the sound was out, edit it so that it wasn't, and then find that the music was out again when I played it a second time. I did manage to fix this issue but it made the editing process longer than it should've been.
When I used Paint it was for copying and pasting my Hearts ready for Animation. By pasting them onto Paint it meant that I could save them as a JPEG and could save the images to my computer whereas MyPaint wouldn't allow it to be saved as a JPEG. Paint also allowed me to highlight aspects of the individual image and move them into the correct position, eg the White Heart towards the other to make the illusion of the Red Heart walking to the White Heart. Paint was helpful in creating the movement in the animation but hindered me by not allowing me to flip highlighted parts of the picture properly. It would erase some of the image wanted and so I had to redraw the arms of the White Heart, after 'recycling' the legs from the Red Heart. To redraw the legs I used MyPaint, although this was annoying as I had to redraw them, MyPaint was very easy to use and allowed me to make my Hearts look as though they were hand drawn, which was an effect that I wanted to use since watching Take on Me by Aha. The tools on MyPaint also allowed me to erase any mistakes I made easily. However, as I couldn't save my images as JPEGs, it made it a lot longer to edit and make the animation because I had to copy and paste the whole screen onto Paint using Print Screen and the cut out the bits I didn't need.
A site that I used to edit my images for my ancillary tasks was Picmonkey.com. I had used this site before for my AS work and to edit my own images and so for me I found it easy to use and had good effects to add on top of my images, for example Boken Shapes which made small, faded hearts shapes on the digipak outside. I found the font that I wanted to use on Picmonkey and so downloaded it to a mac to then use on my final work. I had to download the font because the site saves the images as JPEGs and so I could not edit any aspects of the image after coming off of the site. I found Picmonkey useful in adding effects to my images but not so when I had to add writing.
Another editing site that I used was Pixlr.com. I didn't find anything about Pixlr hindering and used it mainly for editing the inside of my digipak. I used an effect to make the inside have a rainbow effect which was exactly what I'd hoped to find as it wasn't available on Picmonkey and tied in with my house style of bright colours. Overall Pixlr was very helpful in the construction on my digipak.
As well as using Youtube for my research stage, I used it to upload my music video drafts and final video. I thought it was useful in presenting my videos but when my Final Video was uploaded it lagged at certain points which I was unable to fix.

Evaluation
To make my evaluation I used Prezi, Blogger and Windows Live Media Maker. I used Prezi to make one of my evaluations as I wanted to make my blocks of writing look more interesting, I also liked the designs. I had never used Prezi before and so it did make the evaluation process a bit longer, however I do feel it enhances the visual aspect of my evaluation.
As I am right now, I used Blogger for my evaluation stage because it is easy to use and I can write as much as I need to and erase any wrong information I might have included. Whilst logged into Blogger, making my evaluation, I can also look back at my work and see what else I can include which is very helpful but not very interesting to look at.
Finally, I used Windows Live Media Maker to show specific examples of my work and to create one of my evaluations. I decided to use this to vary the forms of media technology used in my evaluation and entertain my lovely examiner with something different to look at compared to just blocks of writing.

I feel as though as I was most dependent on technology during the construction stage of my coursework as I wouldn't have been able to edit my video together or create my ancillary tasks without the use of technology, or at least not as well done, as they were all completed on a Mac using Final Cut Pro and Pages. I was least dependent on technology in my planning stage as I was writing down a filming schedule and thinking of an idea for my video. I mainly planned the post production filming and photos using pen and paper so that I could write down the best day for my talent and I to work.
I have learnt that to create a piece of media a lot of different technology has to be used, such as cameras, computer programs and online sites. All of the skills that I have learnt from making my tasks can be applied to the future, even if it's just making a poster for an event or editing a picture to look better than the orginal, I know how to use technology to make it. 

Post-Modernism in my work

My coursework has been pretty conventional for all parts, my main and my ancillary tasks. I believe this is because of the research that I conducted before starting my work as I found it inspiring. However, I do believe that there is elements of Post-Modernism in my work such as Hyper reality and a factor of randomness.

I used Hyper Reality in my work from the use of Colour Correction on Final Cut Pro. When filming for my music video the colours weren't as bright as I'd hoped and so I used Colour Correction to increase the saturation and and brightness of the shots that needed a boost, such as scenes that were inside and those outside that needed to have brighter sunlight. I feel this is a use of hyperreal because it made the shots look more real and glossier.

If the lyrics are not listened to or thought about, much the contents of my music video would seem random to the consumer, for example, the panning shot in the bedroom where the Heart is playing a video game. As the lyrics are 'Pounding away into the dark' I thought that having the Heart playing a loud game or instrument whilst the Girl trying to get ready for bed would be funny and connect with the lyrics. However, this could be misinterpreted as randomness, and so Post-modern, because it has no relation to the story line.

Reading of my text

I believe that my music video can be interpretated in more than one way depending on the consumers age and perspective. For example the younger age range of my target audience found the fact that the Heart was chasing the Girl and didn't get straight away the intended meaning. Some of the older individuals thought that the meaning was what I intended, to love yourself and accept who you are, whereas others came to a similar conclusion, such as 'You can't run away from who you are.'
My preferred reading would be to 'accept and love yourself' however I believe that some, perhaps outside my target audience, would misread or dislike my text. An example of oppositional reading I found from interviews where that they didn't understand who the Heart was supposed to represent and so didn't understand the meaning of the video, or have any idea towards it.
I am glad that most of my target audience understood the preferred reading of my text but disappointed that it wasn't widely understood by all individuals.

Evaluation: What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

Completed Music Video