-Web 2.0
The way that people use media technologies is changing. Before the media was incredibly inaccessible, for example music video content was expensive and difficult to produce, with few ways to distribute it relying primarily on music television channels, and music television programmes such as Top of the Pops, there was also few ways for the audience to interact and leave feedback about music videos they liked apart from writing to music magazines and newspapers, and it was very difficult for the public to release their own content as producing their own material required funds and expensive hardware or music industry connections, that simply wasn't available to them. Fast-forward to today, a range of technologies are available to the people, making content cheap and easy to produce, distribution simple, and feedback easy to give. This has given the public the option to become the producer, or for the public to become closer to the producer, making the gap between producer and consumer smaller. For example with the introduction of cheap video camera's / webcam's that can upload to the internet in high definition, normal people can create high quality content to rival videos produced by the media industry without in-depth knowledge of media. Sharing their videos on websites such as; Youtube.com, Vimeo.com, Dailymotion.com etc. These websites have comment sections in which the audience can leave feedback, communicating directly to the producer, websites like youtube.com with the help of social networking sites such as facebook.com, twitter.com, tumblr.com, and blogger.com has given music videos created independently by bands the chance go to viral, generating millions of views, garnering the attention of big record companies. There are now free softwares which can be used to create music videos; for example editions of Photoshop now being available to download free for use.Collin and Murroni (1996) state that the criteria that define new media are; information that is viewed on a screen: mobile phone screen, television, or computer screen, they can offer images, sounds, and text, and allow some form of interaction.
-Research Stage
We set up a group account on Blogger.com, in which to post research and document the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages, which allowed us to present our work in a way that is engaging and creative.
-Music Video Research
When researching for our music video we used a variety of websites. While thinking of our concept, our first idea was to centre on the lead singer of the song we chose Morrissey, originally we aimed to mimic his persona so we researched various images of him (using tumblr.com where there is a large fanbase dedicated to the Smiths) and watched music videos and interviews to get an idea of his persona (on youtube.com) , and gather what his audience thought through the comments. Last.Fm was also helpful in finding out audience opinion on songs and music videos.
(An interview with Morrissey in which he acts unresponsive and awkward. on Youtube.com)
(fan images and Smiths quotes on tumblr.com the image in screencap shows morrissey's personality as antisocial, and fan comments on the song and video 'Big Mouth Strikes Again' on Last.FM)
-Audience Research
When researching audience I went back to youtube comments, and the various fanblogs on tumblr.com, and found that the majority of the people tumblr.com who enjoyed the Smiths were between the ages of 16 and 21, and could relate to them on a personal level. Who related the lyrics, quoting them as if they referenced their own real life situations.
(Smiths fans posting quotes which they relate to on tumblr.com)
Location Research
Deciding upon a location was tricky, as originally we did not want to use a location situated within the college, as supervision could not always be guaranteed, meaning it was not always possible to film there out of ours especially if other students had decided to book whatever area we wanted. We googled areas suitable for filming asking advice of family and friends but ultimately ended up filming within the classroom.
Hardware and Software
We used different types of hardware; including digital cameras by Panasonic to capture both still images and videos, and a canon camera owned by Estelle in which we could use more readily when not on college grounds. With the memory card for the camera the photos and videos stored on the camera was portable. We learned how to use the cameras quickly. We filmed our music video on primarily these two cameras. We used iMac's for the editing of our music video, due to the wide range of software available on the college iMac's, such as adobe Photoshop, adobe After-Effects and Final Cut Pro. Adobe aftereffects allowed us to experiment with various tones and contrasts to add mood to our music video in the editing process, finding something aesthetically pleasing. Final Cut Pro allowed us to edit our footage professionally, we could edit the footage to the beat of the song making sure it all flowed well together, that it was all in sync for a clean polished looking product. When using Final Cut Pro, never using it before, it was very difficult, but the group took turns to learn. Skills progressed gradually, and I feel somewhat more confident however I do not feel I am sufficient in using it.
Stopmotion
We filmed stop-motion with children's toys, in our music video, as we thought it would portray the carefree idea of childhood we were going for. We watched music videos that included stop motion on youtube. We used a Panasonic and Canon camera for filming the stop motion in our videos. Transfering them over to a laptop, or putting them into final cut pro and manipulating them so they became stopmotion animation.
(examples of music videos looked at. CSS- Alala, and Aphex Twin - On. both with a similar childlike idea of stop motion visuals.)
Digipak Research
When it came to the digipak research and production we used Google to look at examples of digipaks to gain knowledge about the task we were about to partake in and to develop and understanding how we would construct one. We then to look at past album art for our chosen song artist the Smiths, we hoped to draw inspiration from them. In the end we decided do as they did using a film still that had a slight relation to our music video. We used Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop in the creation of our digipak, both are professional tools in which to add typography, and edit photographs with a wide variety of effects. We could experiment with various colourways to suit our liking. We ended up with a heavily contrasted black and white Digipak.
Evaluation
For the Evaluation Question 1; we all did a commentary over our music video. We used digital cameras to film ourselves, and then edited out the video and kept the audio in final cut pro, so it was commentary over the music video that we produced. Once completed we exported the music video so that we could access it, in question 3 and 4 I used Blogger to post my evaluation questions. I used Blogger because I was using an Ipad to write the evaluation due to not having computer access. I would of used some kind of online presentation software, for example Prezi or Slideshare however this was not possible as neither are compatible with the Ipad , I searched for software similar to that of Prezi and Slideshare however they were expensive, so instead I used previous screencaps from websites of I had collected and copied videos as examples onto Blogger which is free and compatible with the Ipad.
