The Final Music Video - Anna Hester, Izzy Kelly, Catriona Morgan, Martha Ellison

Final Digipack design (update) - Anna Hester, Izzy Kelly, Catriona Morgan, Martha Ellison

Here is our finalised Digipack design that we think best suits the genre of music and fits the criteria best. 

The front, back and spine were designed by Anna and Izzy on Fotor :  

Front

We decided to go with this design for the front of the case because we believe that it really captures what drum and bass is all about. The bright and bold title 'URBAN CONCEPT' shouts the upbeat loud music especially on top of the black and white urban background. Whereas the name of the drum and bass group is featured below the title of the album in a more low key font and colour. We did this to create a contrast.

Back

For the back of the case we wanted to keep the same theme as the front, creating an aesthetic flow. We kept the same colour schemes and font, we also added the record label and a bar-code to help make it look more professional.

Side

For the spine of the case we have kept the same theme as the front and back. The name of the group is written in the same font as the front, but is in white to stand out from the darker background. At the bottom is the logo for the record label.

The insides have been designed by Martha and Catriona using Fotor : 
We chose to use the boom box as it is a common association with the Drum and Bass genre. The speaker on the right also (almost) creates the perfect place for the CD to sit when you open the Digi-pack. Fotor was beneficial as we were able to edit it to be black and white, matching the front, and making the inside link more to the outside (which is feedback we received from some audience members.) We also continued the theme of yellow font from the front to the inside (when writing the thank you's) to create a continuity. I think the updated CD Design and Mag Ad are good as they fit the genre much better than what we had previously created.

Final magazine design (update) - Anna Hester

Here is our new magazine ad design. We think that the advertisement best suits the genre of music, we also linked it to the Digipack. This helps to create a flow between the product and advertisement, giving the group an image which can be identified by the target audience.  

The AD features the name of the album and the artists names in the biggest and boldest font, and smaller information like were you can purchase the album is less visible. The record label logo is also featured.There is also a review of 3 stars from both Itunes and the Guardian.

Final Interim Evaluation

Overall I am very happy with the outcome of our ancillary products and music video. We changed and edit, and followed audience feedback to create our end result, which not only challenges, but acknowledges the genre, and is influenced by other music videos also in its genre. Our ancillary products work well, linking to our music video and making the artist's identity easily recognizable.  The effects and colours used in fonts and shot types displays our music video is influenced by others in the drum and bass genre, yet creates a unique style which is carried out among our products. Although at the start of the project we had a clear idea of what we were aiming for, the changes made along the way have helped us to keep improving our end project, with ideas incorporated from the whole group, and feedback from the audience taken on board, and distributed into our final pieces.
I am happy with the end aesthetics of all three products. Our music video represents our genre well, whilst creating our own identity, and linking to our ancillary products, making it identifiable to audiences who have seen our music video, are interested in drum and bass or who like the style.

Audience Feedback from Twitter- Catriona Morgan

In order to gain some more audience feedback, I uploaded our final music video to Twitter (as our potential target audience members tend to use Twitter.)

This is some of the feedback I received:

 As well as:

And finally:

These were very nice comments to receive as they were all positive and our audience members became active (following Bulmer and Katz's theory) by liking the conventions we purposefully added. For example the changing from fast to slow motion in time with the music and the varying locations.   

How Effective our Ideas Were

When storyboarding, we decided to use a studio with a white background so that the focus was on the artist and the lip-syncing. I think this was effective as not only does it contrast well with the other shots in our video (of Paris and the beach) but is also typical of the Drum and Bass genre when there are featuring artists on the track. I discovered this convention after doing some research into music videos of the Drum and Bass genre, finding that the focus in the videos was on the featuring artist, rather than the Drum and Bass artists themselves. (E.g. Zedd ft. Haley Williams- Stay the Night.) This could be considered as being successful as from receiving some audience feedback, it was said that they liked the focus on the artist, as you were able to concentrate on the meaning of the lyrics.

(Studio shot)

We also decided before doing much research that the video will be edited to be black and white, which we became more confident in doing after finding videos in our genre, also in black and white. However, there are some bursts of colour throughout, particularly when the beat drops and the chorus picks up, as well as when the clips of projections are used. I feel this is effective as the editing then matches the pace of the music, which is what is expected amongst our target audience. Additionally, the length of shots vary, from long length shots at the beginning when the music is slower, to shorter length shots when the beat picks up.

(Long length shot at the beginning- black and white)

(Shorter length shot- colour)

(Shorter length shot- colour)
I think the fact it's edited to be black and white is also effective because as the lyrics are: 'One day I'll bring you something more,' suggests the singer is reminiscing and thinking of the past, which could be why it's in black and white as she's thinking of memories from the past.

Even though we had initially planned to film in London, I believe the shots of Paris were effective as we were able to edit the visuals to match the lyrics. For example, when 'busy streets' is sung, the audience see a time-lapse of the busy streets of Paris, as well as 'never need the signs', with varying shots of different signs. 

Obviously we could have got these shots from anywhere, and to begin with we did record signs near and around our school as that is all that was available to us at the time. However, I feel that the shots of the city help to match the genre as it's an urban area and helps increase the quality of our video. (As well as the fact that it relates to our album title 'Urban Concepts'.) 

I additionally feel like the projections were very successful as, to begin with, we were very excited to use them, however struggled to find a way to get them to match what we'd already created. That's when we came up with the idea of using Anna's footage from Paris to project onto Izzy, as a way of making the projections link with the rest of the video, creating a continuity and incorporating everyone's ideas.

Audience Feedback from our Final Products

I showed our final music video to target audiences members and got some feedback of what their opinions were, attached below.

Audience Feedback on our Music Video from Catriona Morgan on Vimeo.

 This was nice feedback to receive because, as she said, she liked the fact it was in black and white as 'you could focus more on what the song was about', which is good because it means our audience members are following Blumler and Katz' theory and becoming active audience members as she may be able to personally identify with the lyrics.


Audience Feedback on our Music Video (2) from Catriona Morgan on Vimeo.

This was the second piece of feedback I received, which again was nice, as she liked the fact that we had varying locations. This shows that not only were we successful in meeting our audience's expectations, (which we received from our Survey Monkey, finding that there were more yes's than no for 'expecting a variety of locations' ) but that our audience acknowledged the convention that we added. This confirms the fact that a variety of locations is a typical convention of Drum and Bass music videos that we achieved, therefore meeting audience's expectations.
Additionally, both members liked the fact that it was edited to the beat of the music, again showing that we were not only able to meet audience's expectations, but also conform to another typical convention of the Drum and Bass genre.
I also asked an audience member their opinion on the ancillary products we created, attached below.


Audience Feedback on our Magazine Advert from Catriona Morgan on Vimeo.
The fact that she liked the way the colours contrast and that the yellow stands out was nice to hear as this is exactly what we were aiming to achieve.


Audience Feedback on our Digi-Pack from Catriona Morgan on Vimeo.
Again, she noticed/liked everything we were aiming to achieve with the Digi-pack, from the radio linking to the genre, to the use of contrasting colours between the image and the text and the continuity between the CD and the Mag Ad. Even though this is only the opinion of three audience members, I think it shows that our final products have the potential to be a success among our target audience.