The Dance Fanatic

Scans of image about target audience will appear here.

Student Digipack & Magazine Advert #2: The New York Fund

Here is another example of a digipack and magazine advert from a previous student that used a song from band "The New York Fund" called "Nobody's Home".
*Image*


Use of colour on the front cover is very good in my opinion. It is dynamic, and appeals to the teenagers and youngsters of today. The colourful lines against the black background really stand out well and the artist and track name text on top of the colour bars is the easy to notice. Despite the quirky nature of the text, I don't think it is as clear as it could be - I certainly had to give it a second glance to read what was on the front cover. This however might work in their favour, as the casual passer by in the shop might have to go back to read the cover in more detail...

Student Digipack & Magazine Advert: Blighters

A digipack is an essential marketing tool that comes along with a CD purchase. They commonly have a front cover that attracts the attention of the audience and offer more information about the tracks on the album, as well as including other features such as lyrics.

A past student example is this, from "blighters/".

*Image*

The colour contrast on the front cover has been tastefully done and works well. An image of a guy and a girl walking away from the camera is the most predominant part of the cover. You could say that the image and the colours involved of blue and green highlight the intended mood of the image, as they are quite melocholly colours and may be trying to communicate to the audience that the track may be rather emotional and of a rocky, industrial manner. The colour gradient usage and the predominant feature of a sole photograph is something that I will potentially be using on my own piece, with careful thought about the colours used so it fits the dance genre I am doing (potentially darker colours as it is a darker drum&bass/dance song, but this will be investigated during the design phase). The simple text of just "blighters/" on the front cover is to the point, and does not detract away from the effectiveness of the image - whereas if there was too much text, it may detract from the effectiveness of the image and its colour correction.

Past A2 Media Video - Blur: Boys and Girls

First things first. I've been looking for this song for ages - because it is actually brilliant! This is a music video produced by a A2 Media Student... and I think it's actually quite good.



Strengths

• The whole idea of the "gender swap" is one that has been executed really quite well. 2:36-2:52 is a good example of what the opposite sex would conventionally do. The 1st shot is something convenionlly associated with the ladish behaviour of a guy. The pouting and checking your appearence is something typically females do more than males as they worry about their appearence more.
• Lyrics/Video link is something that is common place throughout the entire video. The "streets like a jungle" lyrics links to the image of the 2 guys going across the road. "Take your chance" lyric links to a picture of someone filling in lottery tickets.
• The practice of on the beat editing is strong and correctly used in time with the music around 75% of the time.
• Use of visual effects was good as we had the guy running in front of the animals @ 0:40 (if not abit random with the colour adaption @ 0:47/2:14). The dancing arms at 0:25 were quite cool too!
• Lip-sync (1:52) is strong and well edited

CD Covers: Personal Analysis

Question 10 of my questionnaire I sent round to gather audience research, related to the design of 3 CD album covers and which design those questioned preferred. To guide them, I instructed them to focus on aspects such as color, layout and use of props. The 3 covers were chosen very carefully, as I wanted 3 very different designs that people could choose from, so I could have a clear idea of which design style most people prefer.

Cover A comes from Muse album "Black Holes and Revelations." My audience research showed this as the 2nd most popular CD cover. The main feature of this cover relates to the use of props, colour and where it looks like it is located. The idea of 4 men sitting round a table playing cards (?) in a location very similar to the Grand Canyon is very "out there" and random - thus leading us to the "concept" based design element.

A comment I had from 1 of the people I questioned called Pippa was that the use of the images were "unusual but relevant" and that it "thinks outside the box" which is an element of design I hope to deal with in my design. The contrasting colours of the blue sky against the orange canyon also suit well, as well as the simplistic and sleek black Muse logo and album name in capitals. I personally would rate this as my 2nd favorite out of the 3 covers, mainly due to colour contrasts, and the random concept portrayed in the design.

Ideas for My Video!

To get the ball rolling, I came up with 3 different ideas for what I could do in my music video. I included some basic shot composition techniques and plot line information to give a clearer vision of what my ideas were like.

I will jointly decide alongside input from my team of 4 Further Research participants which idea will be the most effective to do - and then a detailed plan will be developed. Click to enlarge my ideas for my info (shot types/locations/timings etc.)

Idea 1: Girl is lonely after being alienated by her friends. A guy friend then invites her up town to join with a group of friends. They have a great time, but the girl starts to worry about how late it is… the guy convinces her in the end that things will be fine.

Audience Research: The Findings...

In order to understand what teenagers want from a music video, I asked 20 teenagers (10 males and 10 females between 16-18 years old) a series of 10 questions on various aspects of music and music video production.

Question 2: How many different music videos do you conventionally watch per week?

I asked this question to gauge an understanding of how knowledgeable my audience would typically be about music videos. I thought that if people watched more videos, they would have stronger opinions and expectations of the content. Also, typically the females questioned watch more music videos than males. There are several males that watch fewer than 1 a week!

My Track...

After much deliberation I have chosen the track I will be doing my music video too...

*epic drum roll*

My music track will be Pendulum - Watercolour. To watch the official music video - press play below :)



Now. Time to get STUCK IN! xD

Music Video Planning: Questionnaire

Here is my finished questionnaire, which I'll be handing out to 20 people over the next few days.

The results will help me determine what my audience expects from a decent music video - and I hope to take the findings onboard in the production of my own music video.

To enlarge press the images! 

Goodwin's 7: 3 Video Review

In 1992, Andrew Goodwin published a book called “Dancing in the Destruction Factory”. This book was the result of many years research into music videos, and common conventions between them.

Goodwin came up with a variety of codes and conventions that can be expected in the typical music video. In this blog post I will be discussing 3 videos and comparing them to the codes and conventions that Goodwin has outlined.

Music Video #1: Stanton Warriors: Turn Me Up Some

Copyright: Punks Records (2011)

#1: Music videos demonstrate certain genre characteristics.
The typical dance video will often feature a lot of dancing and you might see the track artist to showcase their producing or DJ talent. Dance videos are often either narrative or performance based, and sometimes a fusion of both.

This video features a wide degree of dancing, from street dancing to ballet dancing (interestingly in a urban backdrop) as is conventional in dance music videos. The video doesn’t show the DJ showcasing his “talent”, but the 3 dancers in the video are showcasing their talent through dance.

Find Your Tribe

Something we looked at in class on Tuesday, was the Find Your Tribe website. We were asked a series of questions about our lives (like favourite radio stations, tv channels, magazines etc.) and I came out as... a TOWNIE?!?! Not sure I totally agree...



"You are a Townie! Your job might be a bit boring but it brings home the bacon and helps you save up for those two weeks away to Spain. Your weekends are set in stone – trip to the shops in town, buy yourself something nice, head to the All Bar One with friends, have a laff, maybe go for a club, as long as there’s none of the indie weirdo music. Keep it straight, you say."

I also showed signs of being a clubber apparently... I'm a bit more like this "tribe"...

76 Video Collage

Here's a challenge for you blog readers.

Over the last 2 nights I've made a collage of still shots from various music videos for the front page of my media folder (inspired by Olivia's blog background). There are 76 videos in this collage... how many artists or songs can you name? The person who names the most in the comment box by Christmas... just make sure you put a brief description of the picture, then the artist/song. The winner may get a small present. :)

A2 Media Past Video: Puretone - Addicted To Bass

Now, call me a critic or a hard-task master, but there is really only one video I have been blown away with when shown it in class. All the rest, just don't have that certain special "aspect" that make them appeal to me. They need to be interesting from start to finish... and the amazing Puretone - Addicted To Bass remake from a few years ago, which rather unsurprisingly got full marks, is one such example.



It might be my love of the dance genre, but I was seriously impressed by this music video when I first watched this back in Year 10.

Andrew Goodwin: Do music videos demonstrate genre characteristics?

Andrew Goodwin states that music videos will often demonstrate characteristics that are specific to certain genres. As my videos are mostly based in the dance genre, I will be comparing them to what can typically be expected of that genre.

First off, let’s have a look at what is expected of the “typical” dance genre music video. LOTS of them are set in clubs and showcase the artist’s talent. This is usually because most dance tracks are created by well-known club DJ’s and producers – and therefore, they’d want to showcase their production qualities through the music and (usually) showcase their DJ’ing abilities through footage taken from club nights or special events. You’ll also typically get lots of male/female eye-candy with an awful amount of clothes missing.

Copyright: Ultra Records (2008)

Music Video of The Week (w/b 12/09/11) : Justice - Audio, Video, Disco

I'm back for Year 13! Another year of Media Studies awaits, so I thought I'd get back to blogging! To kick off, here's a relatively new tune from French electronic music producers Justice...


Copyright: Ed Banger Records (2011)

Representations In Music Videos: Wolfgang Gartner - Illmerica

For my video analysis I chose one of the hottest electro hits currently around on the radio at the moment, Wolfgang Gartner's Illmerica.

Very concept based this one, why not have a watch? :)


Copyright: Ultra Records - 2010

Music Video of The Week (w/b 11/07/11) : Noisia & Mayhem ft. KRS One - Exodus

This week's video of the week is simply monumental. The track is pretty average but video producer Alexander Lehmann really has taken the limits of visual effects and CGI in music videos to another level.

The insaine level of detail on the graphics is something which I have not seen before. It's second to none.

Lehmann took around 3 years to produce this video. Even if I'm not able to replicate the level of detail we have here, on my own video, it's certainly got me thinking about what sorts of visual effects I could use, and where, in my music video.


Copyright: Vision Recordings - 2007

Video Focus: The Chemical Brothers - Hey Boy Hey Girl

Nothing like an intriguing music video to liven up a Thursday night! Here's a 90's dance anthem from The Chemical Brothers with a suitably psychedelic video. First off, I'd suggest watching the video in it's entirety.


Copyright: Astralwerks/Virgin Records/EMI (1999)

Director Study: Sophie Muller

Why do a bog-standard blogpost, when you can embed a Powerpoint!

(Download the whole powerpoint with the videos embedded HERE > Note the file is 51.7MB and may take awhile to download... but the videos will work even when you don't have internet access. The embedded videos do not work on the powerpoint below...)



Copyright: Food Records/EMI - 1997


Copyright: Fascination Records/Universal Music Group/Polydor (2006)


Copyright: Polydor (2011)

Music Video of The Week (w/b 04/07/11) : OK Go! - This Too Shall Pass (Rube Goldberg Machine version)

I thought that every week, I would choose a interesting music video to showcase here, and get some ideas from.

Most of us will be aware of the OK Go! Treadmill video after being shown it in class, but after being told about this video recently, it blew my mind!

Very, very concept based and something I couldn't recreate in it's entirety - I don't have piles of cash! I suppose I can use the aspect of being "creatively random" and think outside the box for my video...


Copyright Capitol Records/EMI 2010

Edit: 10/09/11 > While looking round the internet... I found a "making of" video with the directors/producers of this music video!

Year 12 AS Level Media Blog Posts

All of my work for AS Level Year 12 Media Studies can be found here: http://imaginarybeardproductions.blogspot.com/