Media Evaluation

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? My Media product, Skepta-Bad Boy is a present day representation of life as a teenage boy that sees himself as a "bad boy". From being a so called bad boy his relationship with his girlfriend suddenly goes to a end as she finds out that he has mugged someone. To get a true feel to the music video i used many conventions of real media products. The first media convention that i used was that most of my camera shots are hand held, i did this to give the audience a feel that they are with the "bad boy" in the real world. I wanted them to get a real feeling of the streets and what he does and to show him as intimidating from his body language and the actions that he is doing. The hand held camera also gave the music video the "dirty, Grime look" which is common amoungst music videos that are Grime. I didnt want the music video to look clean, the un-steady shots of the music video for example as the "bad boy" is sat down on the chair and the camera rises up the un steady camera shot shows aggression and intimidaton as he is looking straight through the camera. Another Convention of my music video is the mise on scene, the costume of my characters are all in dark clothing such as a black hooded coat with a baseball cap and black tracksuite bottoms, these items of clothing are stereotypically the desired look for criminals and in many grime videos are the costume. The black clothing of the "bad boy" doesnt just have the connection that he is dangerous but also fits in with his surroundings and where he knows most is the streets. Every shot that is in the streets is filmed at night in the darkness, his dark clothing make him seem dangerous as there is the factor of stealth and the only way you can tell that its the bad boy is with his basebal cap. The baseball cap is used to cover his face and its his idenity, in many grime videos the baseballs caps are used such as in the music Leathal bizzle - pow, which is also filmed on the streets of london. Editing and camera shots are a very main part of the music video and these are very much a important convention to real media products, Camera shots that i have used are close ups of both the main characters, the bad boy and his girlfriend. I have used close ups here to show the emotion on there faces and the differences between them and how they both react to what the "bad boy" is doing such as graffiti on walls and throwing cans down alley ways. To make these close ups more effective i have used fast paced editing to switch between each character but the shots are still long enough to see the emotion on the faces as its ment to make you feel intimidated and awkward to watch. A number of shots of jack "the bad boy" are from lower down showing that he is powerfull and is in controll throughout the music video, the shots show him looking at himself in the mirror from this angle. He is looking in the mirror to show that he is happy with his own appearance as the bad boy. Camera angles to show the opposite that the girl is weak and not happy about what the bad boy is doing show her from above looking down on her and her hands in her head, this shows that she is upset which leads to the relationship ending. One of the main parts of the music video is where jack (the bad boy) is miming the chorus, the camera angle is low and the lighting in this shot is very good as there is a lamp above him giving him the grime look. His body language during this shot is very aggressive as he is walking up towards the camera waving his arms to intimidate and show that his emotionally strong as he is singing about his girlfriends feelings. This shows that her words have no effect and he is in control of the situation. During this part of the video editing shows the victim being mugged, this links in with what his girlfriend is unhappy with and that he doesnt care about both the boys feeling that he mugs and his girlfriends feelings. During the Mugging scene editing that i have used is changing the colour and a high angled shot shows the mugging as a cctv camera shot. This gives the effect of crime and that he doesnt care that there is a camera there. With his hood up he beats the vunerable victim that is just walking on his own down the street where the badboy lives. In the making of my music video i had developed and changed the actual ideas of my music video such as the mugging was changed from fading out when he was mugged to a CCTV shot of the action. Another big part that i developed into the music video was the ending where jack the "badboy" is running away from the car which is meant to be a police car. This part of the video dissolves out into silence after the music has stopped. I did this to show that even after his relationship with his girlfriend has ended he will still be a "bad boy". How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary products? My combination of both the main product and my ancillary products to me make the music video so much more effective. My ancillary products it in very well with the music video as the design of them is very street and grime as its all graffiti with bold coulourfull texts that represent skepta on both the cd covers and the magazine article. For my CD cover i gatherd a large number of images of graffiti and used the apple firework tool to edit them all together. This gave the look of grime and street a much more realistic design and the images that are used could be described as criminal. On the front cover of my CD cover is a large graffiti image of someone in a hoody and a mask on, this could be also shown as a criminal but also goes with the theme off badboy as he has his hood up on the picture. After i had edited the Cd cover together i editied the colours to express meanings for the song. The front of the CD cover is very colour full with yellows, blues and greens which are all very bright and run along the sharpe shapes that are designed on the front cover of my CD cover. This idea was developed from my original idea of having mostly red on the front cover showing danger from the bad boy but i developed this idea as it looked quite boring. The massive use of colours and shapes are used to show confusion on behalf of both the bad boy and the girlfriend. I did this because there is no reason for the bad boy to do the criminal acts that are shown in the video and the confusion with the relationship with his girlfriend as she doesnt know where he is and is very unhappy about what he is doing. The Skepta - Bad Boy titles on the front of the CD cover are shown in Bold Orange text which is very attractive and noticable. I have made them so big and bold because this is how i want the "bad Boy" to be shown in the music video. The colours also contrast with the music video its self, the music video is very dark and most things are happening in the night time where as the cd cover and the back of the cd cover show bright colours which could be two different sides of his life. Maybe he isnt always the bad boy? this is where the confusion plays its role. The Back of the CD cover is also carried on with the theme of graffiti but the colours have changed and the title is shown in a white and blue neon title. The colour change from the cover shows that there are two sides of his life, the crime and lifestyle he chooses when being the bad boy and his relationship with his girlfriend, These differences in colour also show what happens during the music video. There is a big face on the back cover which has graffiti also designed amongst it but this image is kept as the main part of the back cover, the back is a darker blue colour which can also show the moods during the relationship between the badboy and his girlfriend as that goes cold and finishes at the end of the music video. The Magazine article is shown with the reddish darker coloured background again of graffiti which shows danger. In the middle of the A4 page is a big title of Skepta Bad Boy which is outlined with white. The White shows vunerability but a very fine line of it that there is the smallest part of him that maybe telling him to stop being the bad boy. On the magazine artcle it states when its released and some 5 star reviews from magazines that have seen the music video, the magazine names are made up but the layout are of what is expected from a review shown on the bottom of the article. The combination of my Final products all work together as they all of what is expected from a grime music video, the music video being dark and shot on the streets showing the life of the bad boy fits straight in with the culture that also comes with being on the Streets and the art from this culture is graffiti which i have expressed with in the front cover and the magazine. What have you learned from your audience feedback? I have shown the music video and the cd covers and magazine article to 5 people, from there feedback they have said that the colours work very well with the genre of the music and compared to the actual music video that the song is from that they prefer the story line to mine. the only problem that was said that i could improve my music video was some parts of the editing, mostly between the bad boys girlfriends scenes. The editing could have had more editing techniques in it and the timings could have been abit better. My ancillary products how ever have had good feedback, the people that i have shown have said that they look very professional and fit perfectly with the genre. The images, colours and fonts that i have used all compliment each other nicely. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and Evaluation stages? I used new media technologys during all off my project using an apple mac to do most off my research, evaluation and construction stages. Using blogger and the internet i searched and researched the Genre of grime such as visiting music channel websites and viewing videos of interviews with skepta and other grime artists to get ideas for my own music videos. I have used blogger to record all of my research and the evaluation is being wrote as in an essay style as i couldnt get hold of powerpoint which would have been more creative but i wouldnt be able to use this at home as it was not available on my laptop. The construction of my music video was on final cut express which had a much larger editing option than i movie and has more of a higher skill level involved with the editing as everything needs rendering before it can be viewed and levels of brightness speeds and sound tracks all need to be edited around the music video and times from my storey board. Final cut express made this possible and once i had been using it for a few hours i got the hand of the tools that i needed to use. For my Ancillary products i used fireworks which is also a programme from apple mac which has alot of editing functions which i used to design my cd cover for example. This was Quite complicated to use but became much easier with use of it. To film my music video i used a full HD camera which gave much clearer shots than a normal camera that could of been used. I had some problems with cameras as i used a standard camera and the shot quality once on the computers were awfull so i had to go out again and shoot the entire footage that had been shot before. As i was filming in the night and low lighting was i problem i brought a LED lamp to help me with lighting and we found areas that already had high lighting which made the shot quality much better. The Final cut express soiftware also played a good part in making the quality better as contrast and brightness adjustment settings were easy to use and i could get the desired effect i was looking for. In my planning stages such as the story board and shot lists i used just paper and a pen but the technology that i used with this was a scanner and i uploaded them onto my blog to show the progress that i had made. From these storey board drawings you can see that some parts of my music video have been developed from my orignal ideas but i am even happier with how it has turned out.

I Think that so far i am a hight level 3 to a low level 4 as some parts of my work are good then others are awful at the moment. The Good part of my Work which i think is level four would be the Scripting, storyboard, shot list, layouts and drafting. I spent a lot of time with this and it has resulted in a good result with this part of the coursework. The Parts of my work that i need to improve is my organization skills with actors and filming, Also my time management needs improving.