Digi-Pac Cover (Fig 2.a)

I created my digi-pac on Photoshop, I took my photos myself using an actor, I wanted to take photos of the actor from my music video but he wasn’t available so I requested the help of another actor. I took the photos of him around the drill hall, the hardest shot to take was the one I used for the front cover, this is because the shots were taken on the road and I had to take them quickly. Apart from this there were no problems in the photo shoot. After taking the photos I uploaded them into Photoshop. I based the shots on the ones I was going to use from the film, however I couldn’t use shots from the film as turning them into images made them too low quality to work with.

I opened up the template, which separated each section of the cover, and started with the front cover. I took the photo and cropped it to show what I wanted it too I then resized the image to fill the section group. I then darkened the image so that it would look more like a folk CD cover, I then brought out his hands using the skin highlighter tool, I also lightened his hair slightly to bring it out. I removed the colour from a man in the backgrounds hoody using the colour correction tool, it was bright blue and stood out too much from the back ground. Next I created the back cover, again I started by darkening the image, this time I think it worked really well as it brought the grass out. next I used the skin corrector to bring out the skin, I had a slight problem in the fact that the face and hands wouldn’t go to the same level of colour, one would look bleached out or far too red whenever I tried to use the tool, so I separated the face and hands before correcting the colour. I finished off this picture by brining the hair out slightly, by selecting it then bighting the area.

Next I moved on to the inside images, I started by making the image that will appear behind the CD, I took a image taken on location when filming the musician of his arm playing the guitar. Once again I cropped and resized this image to make it fit the needed area. I then duplicated the image and made the top layer black and white, leaving the one beneath in colour, I then removed the guitar from the top image so that the colour version showed through; I then touched up any areas I had gone in to around the guitar making them black and white again. I then had to rotate the image so that it was the right way round so when folded it was the right way up. Next I found another photo I had taken of the musician at a earlier date, he was standing on a plain back ground, I cropped the image to be very close around the singer to remove a picture frame that was in the photo. I used the colour selection tool to take the background colour, and make a square the size and shape of the area I was placing the image. I flipped the image of the singer and positioned it before reducing the opacity on the photo to make him appear ghostly on the image.

With all the images created I moved on to editing the text. I decided that the main text would be in font style Garamond, I chose this font because it is the font that has been on many of the oxford companion book covers, to this extent I also used the layer out the title “oxford companion” out in the same way as it is on the oxford companion of music for the front cover and spine. On the back cover I have two titles one for the song and one for the video these being the two things that where appearing in the CD. The one bit of text I had a problem with where the lyrics, the entail way I placed them went over the photo of the singer in the inside cover, I easily repositioned the lyrics and the two lines that where going over his face had a brake in the middle so I was able to cut these lines in half. I used the font Pristina for the artists name on the front cover and spine.

After I had done all this I had to create my company logo and the copywriter text. I started by using the shape tool to make a banner then I made a white circle with the shape tool and added some black splotches to make it look like cow hide, finally I added the name of the company, Livestock records, I then used the skew tool to alter the shape of the text and the banner to make them fit together. I used Arial to create the official text as this is the font used to for the official text on other CD covers.

Here is the finished product:

Digi-pac Advert planing (Fig 1.H)

Rolling Stone Magazine Ad of a Elvis record.

Mise on scene

The advert contains information on certain songs on the album, highlighting the Smash hit, the never before released and the classics, at the bottom we see the CD covers for the two CD in the range and the same image from the new CD is at the top of the advert beneath a tagline.

Use of conventions of lay out

They follow a very straight forward convention of layout this being the rule of thirds, the large image take up one third of the page and the information and smaller images take up two thirds.

Variety of the font and text size

There are two fonts used one is a strait forward font used for the information text, this is usual for most adverts as is the fancy font used for the title, this font has been used as it gives the impression that Elvis’ name is up in lights, this font has obviously been chosen to have links to the name.

Framing of shots including or excluding elements

The shot of Elvis’ face is a close up that has been cropped to show two thirds of his face, this is so it is still recognisable as Elvis.

Lighting

The lighting on Elvis’ face is from the right, this is strange as this is the side that has been cropped. The is also a hint of back lighting as part of his hair on the left hand side is whited out suggesting backlighting.

Audience effect

The audience will see his face and maybe just at first glance at the font it’s self will allow the reader to recognise that this is for Elvis, the text is effective as the different colours daw the readers attention to the important parts.

Mise on scene

This advert is for a Queen absolute greatest collection. It informs the reader about the items included with them and gives some information about what they are. At the bottom of the page it gives the websites that give more information and where you can buy it.

Use of conventions of lay out

There is a rule of three present on this page it is split up though the middle information takes up two thirds whilst the word “queen” and Absolute greatest each take up a sixth of the page, this way of laying it out makes the page very interesting to look at.

Variety of the font and text size

They use one basic serif font for the entire page, the title and the subheadings are in red to make them stand out whilst the information and absolute greatest are in white. The red text has been used to show the important bits that someone quickly scanning the advert would read, they also draw the attention of people just flicking through.

Framing of shots including or excluding elements

The shots have been cropped down to only show the products, they have then been put on to a gray gradient background. On the book and Record cover there is long shot of the band.

Lighting

The lighting on this advert is coming from the left hand of the advert on the gradient. This is the same on the smaller images of the book and Record cover; they both have the same gradient.

Audience effect

The audience this aiming at is collectors of music memorabilia more than the band as the images of the band are rather small and on the products being advertised.

Mise on scene

The advert is meant to look like a worn and battered speaker, which has connotations to the bands age and time they have been playing, the top of the advert has the control panels for the speaker, in the middle is the amplifier part of the speaker, this has all the relevant information on about the Digi-Pac as well as a place of purchase, at the bottom of the page there is some small print giving more information on what the product is and the record company.

Use of conventions of lay out

There is a rule of three being used the information takes up two thirds and the top third has the control panel in. this helps focus the readers eye on to the text.

Variety of the font and text size

Again the band has a definitive text used for it, this is the text that the band’s name is always written in, it also looks like the maker of the speaker, the word band tracks is written in a faded text to go with the idea of the speaker being old and worn out. Again the information has gone for an easy to read font so that the information can be easily given to the reader.

Audience effect

The audience will recognise this as a ACDC Digi-Pac and they will appreciate that the album is there back catalogue of tracks from the fact that the “speaker” is worn out and old.

Before I start talking about my plans I would like to say that I have completed my CD cover before I finished my planning for my adverts.

This is my first design it is meant to go with one of my CD cover designs, the design had a man dressed in a trench coat with a large hat pulled over his eyes and a scarf wrapped around his face, he also has a guitar cases hanging over one of his shoulder, the text would be in the top left corner. I discarded this idea as I didn’t take the corresponding idea as my final idea for my CD cover.

This was the design that I had to go with the CD cover, the image is form the music video one of the shots, I would have Photoshoped the CD cover in to the box being held by the character. I didn’t go with this design as I had already taken the photos at this time so I didn’t take this idea any further. The text is on the bottom left.

This is the design I went with for my final project, I planed this after I had taken the photos from my CD cover. This image is of an actor walking in to a church door, the church is run down and has weeds growing around it. The text will be in the lower right hand corner I will use the same effects as on the CD cover of darkening the image to make it look moodier.

CD Planing (Fig 1.G)

This is my mind map for my CD/digipac cover. I looked at already existing Folk/indie CD covers, I analysed these covers (below) before creating the above mind map.

Mise on scene

The image is of a chicken which has been made of old metals welded together, it is a low angle shot showing a row of house in the back ground. The chicken refers in two parts to a folk ideal, firstly is the idea that the singers work or worked on farms or came from a rural area of the world, secondly the idea of art made from welding metal together is something done by many fans of folk music.

Use of conventions of lay out

In this cover it is obviously that they have used the rule of thirds with the chicken taking up two thirds and the text one.

Variety of the font and text size

The Font on this cover fits into the design by having a western feel to it, this style of text would have appeared in old cowboy movies. There are three fonts used the main font and two smaller ones that again fit the overall style of the cover but they are not the same, these two bit are also smaller to make the main body of the text stand out.

Framing of shots including or excluding elements

They have framed the shot well as it shows all of the chicken and at first glance makes it look like the chicken is towering above small houses, which on second look reveals this to be a low angle shot of the chicken with houses in the background.

Use of variety of shots distances

On the cover there is only one shot. The back may have more but I can’t find any record of it.

Lighting

They have used natural lighting to help make the shot appear more natural and realistic.

Audience effect

As I previously stated the chicken will appeal to fans of the music but the row of houses is a lot more of a overall appeal to people as they appear to be a normal row of houses.

Use of ICT

There doesn’t appear to be much use of ICT as it appears to have been one shot set up the text was obviously put in afterwards on a computer.

Mise En Scene

The front cover shows a picture of the singer, this is because he is a well known person, the back cover shows a abstract picture featuring a face in a shape that could be a house. The back has Japanese text on it that is because I could only find a reference image of the Japanese back cover.

Image manipulation

The image has had a filter put over it to make the image appear to have been painted, it also slightly obstructs the singer’s face as if he has been pixelated out and the filter appears very natural and makes the cover look like a portrait of Dylan.

Use of conventions of lay out

On both the front and the back there is a rule of thirds, on the front the image takes up two thirds whilst the text one, on the back the text appears to take up two thirds with the image and the space around taking up one third. This allows you to know which bit is important on which

Verities of font, text size, language and register

The text on the front is larger than the text on the back but they both use the same font, even the bits in Japanese is in the same font. This is obviously used to make the text easy to read especially as the language used is very clear proper English.

Framing of shots

The one photo is clearly shows a profile shot of Dylan, this shot is a close up and it has obviously been set up with the rule of thirds, Dylan takes up two thirds and empty space takes up one.

Lighting

The lighting in the picture is coming from the bottom left and shining up on Dylan, leaving his back in shadows to help show his face.

Audience effect

The effect on the audience would be a positive one as even though slightly distorted the picture of Dylan is still recognisable and would appeal to his fans, the otherwise plainness of the cover makes the CD look quite amateur and might discourage potential buyers.

Mise en scene

On the front cover there is a picture of five hands toughing each other, the whole image has a sepia tone and two of the hands are wearing bracelets, these look like there representing different races and cultures from the types of bracelets. On the back there is a picture of the side of a house which has been used as a back ground, there are also lots of photos of the band giving the idea that they are famous enough that they don’t have to have their photos on the front cover.

Image manipulation

The image on the front has had a sepia tone placed over it the back has had a darker sepia tone put over it and the photos of the band have also had sepia recolor, this gives the cover the feeling of being old.

Verities of font, text size, language and register

They use three fonts. The first is on the name Bon Jovi use this font on the cover of many of their articles so this keeps to their house style and makes the audience recognise them. The title of the band is in a hind written font to make it stand out on the cover. On the back they use a default font for CD’s this is the font that normally appears on the back of most CDs and is used for the song titles. All of the songs titles are in Proper English no slang terms are used.

Framing of shots

The photos on the back clearly show the band and are ether long or mid group shots of the band.

Audience effect

The fact the band isn’t on the front cover means that the band is well known enough that people can recognise them just from their names.

From this research I found out the usual things that appear on the covers and then created my mind map (above). After my mind map I did these initial sketches.

This was my first design I decided that I wouldn’t use this one as it doesn’t really relate to any thing in the song or video.

These where my second and third designs, I decided not to use either of them. The third design shows a oxford companion, which would be the title of the song. I decided not to use either of these

This was my fourth design it uses shots from the music video I have created, this is the design that I chose, neither of these images are of the singer they are all of the actor they used, I used this one as it ties into the video.

Story Board (Fig 1.f)

These are my Story boards for the video. Caroline and Isplit the work on these evenly.

Movie Planing (Fig 1.e)

This work is the same for my group partner Caroline Smalley as we worked together on these tasks.

Chosen Music Genre: Indie/Folk

The music video which we decided to do is Indie/Folk music. We searched for unsigned bands and artists on the internet, but did not find any songs which really matched the Indie/Folk category.In the end I contacted my uncle Phil Russell, a singer/songwriter who is not a signed musician.

Email

Dear Mr. Russell,We are A level Media students creating a music video for our course work. We would like to use your song "oxford companion" for this work.
Yours sincerely
J. Watkins-Groves
C. Smalley

This is what he replied to our enquiry about using his song:

Dear Mr. Russell,We are A level Media students creating a music video for our course work. We would like to use your song "oxford companion" for this work.Yours sincerelyJ. Watkins-GrovesC. SmalleyHe replied with this email:Dear Mr Watkins-Grove and Ms Smalley, Thanks you for you interest in my song "Oxford Companion". Yes, do please feel free to use this song for your project and let me know if you require any further help. I look forward to seeing the results.
Regards,
Phil RussellCEO,
Hoot
http://www.hootmusic.co.uk/

Ideas For The Final Music Video - Mindmap


The video will be a narrative style with bits of a performance style. The instrumental and chorus pieces will be performance style whilst the verses will have a narrative structure to them. Performances parts will show the singer playing a guitar whilst sinning the song, this as I have previously stated would be mainly used for the courses and instrumental parts. The verses will have a story of a guy on a quest to resolve a matter of the hart we will see him acting out the events of the verses, including reading the Quran and talking to the various people in the song.

Target Audience

The target audience for the music video is around the age of 16 to 45, this being because of the theme and genre of the music. The genre being Indie/Folk and people of around the age of 16 may want to listen to this type of music and also the older listeners may not want to listen to the hip hop, hard-core, head-banging music of today’s charts, but something a little slower and something with less beat.

Lyrics

Oxford companion
I got to talking to my Oxford companion
He was wiser than me, because he told me so
So I asked his opinion on a matter of the heart
But he didn’t seem to know where I was coming from
There you go. What do you know?
Maybe something more mystical would get me out of this fix
Maybe a verse of the Koran, something less familiar
You know the teachings of Lao Tze I’m sure have got a lot to say
But the wisdom of the dead passes me by
I’m not a murderer, I’m not an angel
I’m not a prophet or a priest
I’m only acting like a common human fool does
What else would you want from me?
My best friend told me that people don’t get smarter
Without they take a trip down in the gutter
So I’m down there on my knees and the bastard ups and leaves
Says he likes me better the way I was before
And I’m talking to my doctor and I’m spilling with my shrink
And I’m sucking up my girlfriends and my bleeding wife
And they offer me prescriptions, good advice and things to eat
But when it all goes quiet, you’re on your own in there

Heres what images we initially planed to go with the Lyrics:

· I got to talking to my Oxford companion

o People talking in a pub¹.

· He was wiser than me, because he told me so

o Shot of the companion – holding a diploma?

· So I asked his opinion on a matter of the heart

o Shot of the Jim. Over OC’s shoulder

o OC shot over Jim’s shoulder

· But he didn’t seem to know where I was coming from

o Oxford companion looking confused

· There you go. What do you know?

o Singer singing²

· Maybe something more mystical would get me out of this fix

o Extreme close up of eyes³

· Maybe a verse of the Koran, something less familiar

o Long short of him on a bench reading in a park piles of books around him

· You know the teachings of Lao Tze I’m sure have got a lot to say

o Close up of book with Chinese characters on the front

· But the wisdom of the dead passes me by

o Long shot again with superimposed people walking in front of him.

· I’m not a murderer, I’m not an angel

· I’m not a prophet or a priest

· I’m only acting like a common human fool does

· What else would you want from me?

o Long shot with Jim walking past a door⁴ in different costumes to express the different types of characters that are sung about

· My best friend told me that people don’t get smarter

o Walking down a street past the collage

· Without they take a trip down in the gutter

o High angle shot of the two with the gutter in the background

· So I’m down there on my knees and the bastard ups and leaves

o Low angle of Jim sitting on the curb with other one leaving

· Says he likes me better the way I was before

o Travailing shot of friend as he walks away.

· And I’m talking to my doctor and I’m spilling with my shrink

o Scene in a doctor’s room laying on bed

· And I’m sucking up my girlfriends and my bleeding wife

o Shot in living room on a sofa

· And they offer me prescriptions, good advice and things to eat

o Close up of doctors hand handing over a pill bottle quick cut to a plate of food

· But when it all goes quiet, you’re on your own in there

o Main character sitting there all alone fade to the singer in the same position

What is the music video about?

The music video is about a man who is depressed. His friend (Oxford Companion) does not understand him and so leaves. An Oxford Companion is a book, however, in the music video we refer to the companion as a person. The only help he is getting is drugs and food offered, which he refuses.

Representation in music videos (fig1.d)

Laura Mulvey “Gaze Theory”

· Essay – visual pleasure and narrative cinema

· The male gaze – men control media so always from their point of view

· The male gaze when the audience is put in the perspective of a heterosexual man

o May linger on the curves of a woman’s body

· Denise women human agency – removes free thought

o Relating to them as objects

· Media effects

o Hypodermic syringe – women are changed by ideas given to them

o Cultivation theory – slower effect –Passive audience

o Two step flow – passing information from people

o Use of gratification - active audience – one of the four reasons

§ Servalience

§ Identification

§ Socialisation

§ Entertainment or escapism

· visual pleasure and narrative cinema – expands on the theory

o says that people are using the idea of women as sexual objects even when they don’t have to

o causes effects on people in real life

· sidelining women

· the videos are saying that this is exemptible

· “The cinema satisfies a primordial wish fir pleasurable looking.”

· Patriarchal

· The three looks

o The first perspective of the male character on screen and how he perceives the female character

o The second is the perspective of the spectator as they see the female character on screen

o The third look joins the first two looks together: it is the male audience member’s perspective of the male character in the film this their perspective allows the male audience to take the female character as his own personal sex object because he can relate himself through looking to the male character in the film

· Sexy chick – David Guettila

o Women in swim suits

o Close ups of there curves

o Up shots of them

o Girls dancing provocatively in the back ground

o Cuts to shots of girls

o Photos of the girls

o Shows him controlling you

o Men looking at women

· Hotel room service by Pittbull

o Stars straight way focusing on women curves

o Low cut, tight or skimpy outfits

o Has women going for him

o Has lots of women pawing at him

o He has the power

o Girl brakes in to confront him but he pushes him out

§ Breaks the fourth wall

Anlysing music videos (fig1.c)

http://musicbox.sonybmg.com/video/bob_dylan/?bcpid=187832446&bclid=187743874&bctid=1178857421

The first music video that I’m analysing is Bob Dylan’s “Tangled up in blue.” The entire song was shot in close up showing Bob Dylan singing at a microphone and we can see that he is wearing a Stetson styled hat and the harmonica that he plays to words the end of the song. The lyrics and the music don’t relate to the song as it is solely a performance video, shot at a live show, it is just done in the one shot, which moves to keep the his face in shot as he moves about and to this extent there is no editing. This video clearly fits to Goodwin’s theory that a Artist creates a motif or style for themselves, Bob Dylan, as I previously stated, is wearing a Stetson styled hat, he wears this style of hat a lot on album covers so the hat can be seen as part of his motif, the other part of his motif is his harmonica, many of his songs feature harmonica songs he is well known for playing a harmonica. I like the idea of a performance being shot in one shot and might try to use this idea in my final video for any performance sections.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1nxmt_the-pogues-a-fairytale-of-new-york_music

The second music video I am looking at is “Fairytale in new York” by Kristy McColl and the Poguse. This video is a mixture of performances and narrative. The lyrics fit to the video, when the lyrics are slower and more sentimental the images are as well, there is one section when the two singers are having a call and response fight and the images in the video is of them fighting, a more recurring images is showing the NYPC choir when the song sings about them. The images also fit up to the music as when it is slower the images are slower, for example the start which is a piano solo has a series of slow images and when the band starts playing the music picks up the editing becomes faster. The tempo of the video is related to the speed of the song when the song speeds up so dose the editing. The camera pans and moves slowly for most of the video showing the band playing or images corresponding to the lyrics, it tends to focus on longer shots and doesn’t really show many close ups or mid shots apart from showing the band playing, the video seems to like wide angle shots to show a lot of the band or in the narrative sections to show a lot of New York. The main editing technique in this video is fading between shots, this happens on many of the shots to create a fantasy feel to the whole piece. The other editing effect is that the video is in black and white to make it fit the fifty’s theme that the costumes are trying to create. The intertextuality is fifties films mainly the ones about a girl going to New York to find fame and fortune and not succeeding films like “A star is born” (1954). The genre stereotypes of this type of video, a duet video, are mainly held up as the couple sing over a piano, but some of the conventions are broken, for example the couple have a fight.

http://musicbox.sonybmg.com/video/bob_dylan/?bcpid=187832446&bclid=187743874&bctid=1184457364

My third video is “Most Likely You Go You” again by Bob Dylan. The video is a very interesting one as it is a autobiographical narrative video, the video follows a number of men dressed differently walking through different time periods, these men represent how Dylan changed as his corer went on, for example we see Dylan filming “Subterranean home sick blues” at the end of the scene he walks off screen and after a few shots of people standing around a motorcycle crash, we see a bed and Dylan dressed in his hype stage walking on. Some of the lyrics match up with the images, for example when the song goes “Telling stories that you know I believe are true.” The video moves in to the scene of a church. The music is drives the video as the music gets more complicated we are shown more men in the band playing instruments. The camera work is very clever as we are shown enough of each of the Dylan’s so that we can recognise him, normally focusing on his guitar, but apart from some extreme close ups of sunglasses at one point most of the shots of Dylan are mid to long shots. There is good intertextuality in this video linking back to other music videos that Dylan has done most obviously “Subterranean home sick blues” but it also has links in to the film “I’m not there” a film based on Dylan’s life. The editing is quite slow as is stereotypical for this style of the video but the most prominent part of the editing is the add on off effects and filters to make the film appear to be from deferent decades, for example the video starts in sepia and then moves to black and white, for “Subterranean home sick blues,” before evolving through many different colour formats before ending up at modern day film styles.