Album Advert

Audience Feedback

We gave out questionnaires for people to fill in so we could get feedback on what other people thought of our video. One of the questions was a mark out of 10, 10 being the highest. We took an average of the marks and out of 10 it was 7.83 – which rounded up to 8.
A vital point we really wanted people to grasp was the narrative as we really took time trying to subtly getting across the narrative. Most of the feedback said they understood the narrative – however we could have made it clearer. A comment we were pleased with is that all the responses said we followed the conventions of the genre well. A lot of time went into finding our inspirations of the genre and we idolised a lot of people from the genre so we were pleased to find out other people agreed we fitted well into that niche. Peers commented saying it could have been improved by toning it down a bit and using more lip syncing. However the feedback said we didn’t have any syncing issues and they agreed that the editing was fitting with the video and was cut in time to the music. We were pleased with this as one of the key points is the lip syncing and how well it is cut with the music and being in time with the music so to have achieved this was a big success. People commented that after watching it they felt, entertained, randy, scared, excited and confused.

Freakshow - Funhouse

Above is our final edit of our music video "Funhouse".

Digipak Research

When looking into creating my digipak, I chose to study Paramore's second album "RIOT!". 

The front cover of the album is sketchbook like. It features scribbles of the word "RIOT!" in the background. However on closer inspection it is evident that the writing is credits for the album.

The album title, "RIOT!" stands out the most on the cover, it’s one of the few bits of text written in colour and in this case the chosen font colour of orange takes a very central position on the cover. An image of the band is located directly below the album title in black and white and has been edited to give it a sketch-like look which fits in with the rest of the cover.

It isn't possible to see the whole of the album cover as a promotional sticker has been added at some stage in the production process. However I found another more generic picture of the album cover.

I noticed that the band’s name (Paramore) is not in the album artwork as a main title. The band’s name is instead on the area by the hinge of the album. It is also featured in the top right hand corner where it says "Paramore is..." and goes to list the band members and their roles. This is perhaps because its their second album, their image has been developed and is well known enough for them to be known simply through a picture and the name "Paramore" was no longer necessary on the cover for them to be identified. However, the sticker may have been added as it was confusing and in turn hindering sales.

 

The "RIOT!" scribble theme is present on the back cover of the album with the word "RIOT!" written in black with some information written in orange. The back cover features a track listing in orange above another black and white image of the band with a sketch like effect applied. The band look very close together and this gives an impression that they all get on and are happy. The image takes a central position on the lower half of the cover with the band looking directly at the "listener" who is looking at the cover. The band and their record label’s web addresses are also featured on the back cover along  with the barcode and copyright information.

The album’s insert, pictured above, further cements the notebook theme. All the font is in a scribbly style and looks childlike. Images of the band are again present and in the same style as with the rest of the panels. The insert includes the lyrics to four of their most well known songs with extra notes and doodles alongside. It feels quite personal and as though they are sharing intimate details with their fans. The whole album package with it’s notebook theme gives the sense of envy, anger and frustration with the constant doodles and almost rigid font. This angst is reflected in the songs on the album, for instance in the songs "Misery Business" and "That's What You Get". It’s clear to the listener that the theme of the album as a whole is reflected not only through the music but also through the album packaging. From the black and white contrasted with the orange, to the way the band are dressed in the album’s photographs is reflective of the pop-punk genre and conforms exactly to it. This is something that a lot of the band's audience can relate to as the band are pictured wearing fashionable items of clothing and the font used is very reflective of the emo style which some of their listeners choose to take up.

I feel that the cover for "RIOT!" is one of the best I have seen and going through this analysis process has made me realise just how good it is and the amount of hard work and thought that has gone into creating it.

1st Draft Storyboard

Research - Questionnaire Feedback

 These are a set of questions we asked our peers just after we had decided which song we wanted to use for the project. This gave us an idea of what was popular and what the views were on receiving music in the medium of video.  

A fundamental part of the project was satisfied when this was the feedback we gained for this question. Over 3/4s of the group watch music videos, proving it is a hugely popular tool and a way artists can express themselves, to a massive audience.  

The majority of the group watch music videos on YouTube and a small proportion do so on a television. The Internet plays host to a captive audience, and many videos go 'viral' when they shared on various social networks. Starts such as Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber's music videos have been watched by over 2 billion people!

The feedback was quite split with this question, many people hadn't bought a CD in the last 2 years, whereas others were still buying CDs fairly regularly.

 3/4s of the people we asked about when they had last downloaded music had done so in the space of a week, be it 2 days ago, last night or a week ago. Showing this is an extremely popular way of accessing music.

Such a wide spectrum of music genres are available, this is represented here in the graph above, with 9 different genres of music coming from a small group, this shows how diverse music is becoming.

iTunes and HMV are the big suppliers of music and this is represented here, many people answered this question with them as the place they recently bought music from.

Planning - Initial Brainstorming

Above is our mood board, this is where we came up with our first ideas, and what we thought the lyrics meant & how we would want to portray them in our video.

We liked the combination of freaky, evil, scary clowns and monsters to represent the issue of domestic abuse.

Above is our first attempt of annotating the lyrics and thinking through what we would like to do for our video. The pink is locations and the blue represents the ideas and what we would film. The first session of brainstorming was very useful and gave us an idea of what route we wanted to take with the video.