EVALUATION - Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Our Music Video



Our Digipak

Our Magazine Advertisement

Firstly, in regards to audience feedback we created a questionnaire at the beginning of our coursework in order to gain an insight into what people our age (as this is who we wanted to target people aged between 16-20) expected to see in a music video and how much they consumed music videos. Therefore, as most of our peers, people in our class were of this age group we decided to give our questionnaires to 10 people within this group. From these questionnaires it was made obvious to us that people in this age range (16-20 years) are high consumers of music and music videos and therefore it is due to this that we decided to market our products (music video, digipak and magazine advertisement) at this age group. Once we decided upon our genre and song - rock pop/pop-punk, Avril Lavigne "My Happy Ending" we  then narrowed our target audience down to females of this age as it was felt the rock pop genre and Avril being a female artist and her style would not really appeal to males, although we did not rule out males completely - overall, we wanted our products to appeal to everyone, male and female, it was just felt that the theme of the song, love and heartbreak would appeal more to a female audience.

We asked questions like:

- On a rating scale of 1 to 10, (1 being the lowest) how often do you watch/ listen to music videos?
- What do you feel is important in a music video?
- What would make a CD/DVD cover stand out to you? (insight into what people may expect in relation to our ancillary tasks)
- Do you believe that it is best to have brand identity across all media products?

From the results of these questions we were then able to make bar charts to mark the percentage of each answer given. This was good in terms of gaining an insight into the consumption of music videos and gaining a variety of different answers/results in which we were able to make a decision on what we needed to include in our music video/ancillary tasks in order to target an audience effectively.

One question which we did not include which we maybe should of was "What genre/s of music do you listen to?" From the answer we received for this question we would have then maybe took in to consideration the most popular genre/s and then deciding upon which music video to recreate may have been easier because from this information we would have been able to base our decision on popularity and what our target may have wanted instead of ultimately having to decide upon a genre ourselves. However, after much discussion of what types of genres there are, the advantages and disadvantages of each it was decided the "rock pop/pop-punk" genre would be the best. We came to this discussion as due to prior general knowledge we knew that the rock pop genre are very expressive and therefore this is the genre we felt we could excel in creativity and ideas.

In other areas of our first questionnaire I believe we took on board the feedback we received. For example, looking at our end product now I believe we took into consideration what our target audience found important in a music video. From our questionnaire results the top answers were music content and artist/band in relation to importance. Although it could be argued that these elements had to have top importance in our production as the whole brief was about promotion and the main task was to make a music video so of course music content and the person being promoted (the artist/band) are of top importance in a music video However, constant consideration of these elements resulted in us meeting the brief while meeting our target audience's needs.

Other elements of music videos which seemed to be of equal importance to our target audience were things like lighting, storyline, variety of shots of artist and dancing. I believe when observing our finished piece we also took these elements into consideration excluding dancing as this did not fit the generic conventions of the rock pop genre we decided to proceed with as our choice of genre. How we included the elements our target audience found important after the higher percentage of music content and artist/band was taken into consideration can be seen listed below.

Lighting - We took lighting into consieration in terms of the representation in our music video e.g. the puppet scene in which low-key lighting was used to make Tom, our boyfriend figure appear 'bad/evil' in comparison to Kate, our girlfriend figure/artist which I believe shows consideration of the promotion of our artist - presenting her in a positive light while at the same time conveying an idea of the heartbreak, emotion often seen within the rock pop genre. We also considered lighting in performance scenes such as the piano scenes to ensure a professional looking piece.

Although some music videos can be purely performance based most music videos nowadays have a storyline/narrative in them somewhere or another. I believe our music video was equally balanced in terms of performace and narrative. However, as we decided upon the rock pop genre which is known for it`s expression of emotions we thought it best to not only convey this emotion through the performance of our artist but also the storyline/narrative. Therefore, we decided upon a storyline/narrative which we believed would engage our audience in terms of anticipation for how the relationship would develop as the theme of love vs heartbreak drives the narrative and the music video forward as a whole.

As the brief was based on promotion of an artist a variety of shots of the artist was vital in creating an interesting view/representation of our artist in  order to keep our target audience engaged/interested. We used a variety of shots from close ups, mid shots to high shots and low shots. This was not only because of the feedback we gained from our target audience stating that a variety of shots of the artist was of importance but as we advanced in our research we discovered that a variety of shots are used in every music video production you see so therefore in order to create a music video of similar stance to a real media text (real music video) a variety of shots was not only important in terms of pleasing our target audience but also in terms of meeting the brief of promotion and creating a piece of similar standards to a real media text, if not better.

The creation of the digipak and magazine advertisement was just as impotant in terms of promotion. Therefore in our first questionnaire (knowing that the creation of the digipak and magazine advertisement had to be undertaken) we asked the question:

What make a CD/DVD cover stand out for you?

The answers which came out top were bold/bright colours and close up of the artist/band. Therefore, taking this into consideration in the creation process of our digipak and magazine advertisement we decided to have an impacting close up of our artist/girlfriend figure, Kate on the front of our digipak and as the main/only image on our magazine advertisement. This was due to the fact that we wanted to bare in mind the brief which was promotion, therefore wanting our artist to be the main focus. However, we also wanted our target audience to be innstantly drawn to our digipak and magazine advertisement due to the emotion conveyed on Kate's face due to the close up/tight framing we used as she is slumped down as a puppet. We believed not only would this use of a close up of the artist instantly catch the viewer`s eye but would also help to create a sense of "Brand Identity" as the image featured on our digipak and magazine advertisement also featured in our music video, creating a strong link/"brand indentity" between all three products.

In terms of bold/bright colours in which our target audience said would stand out for them on a CD/DVD cover ,although we did not necessarily use bold/bright colours on our digipak and magazine advertisement as we felt this did not fit the generic conventions of the dark, rock pop genre. We ensured that our colour schemes conveyed a sense of the rock pop genre with use of red, black etc.

So overall, in terms of audience feedback from our first questionnaire I believe we did take the results into consideration but once we established which genre we wanted to develop some of our target audience`s needs were slighlty developed to coencide with the rock pop genre and its generic conventions.

Posting our Music Video on to sites which are regularly used by our target audience in order to gain feedback.

Above is my finished music video and  a screen shot from my Facebook profile. As our target market are teenagers we felt it necessary to post our video onto this social networking site to gain feedback as many teenagers use this to communicate with one another and therefore we knew we could get a variety of responses from our target market in this way. The link I posted on my profile also linked to our video on YouTube. 

On YouTube so far we have gained 477 views which shows that quite a large audience have viewed our production. However, we received less comments on YouTube, which I believe demonstrates the high percentage of users on Facebook in regards to our target market.

However, it could be argued that people were not aware of our production until I posted it up on Facebook. So due to the fact they were using Facebook when they came across our music video could mean it was just simply easier for them to comment via Facebook, instead of logging in to YouTube. Below is a screen shot of our video on YouTube and the comments and views below it.

The comments which we received on Facebook and YouTube I have copied and analysed below.

YouTube

• "Love the memory shots and the slow motion they really highlight the emotion throughout the video. The guitar shots may have benefitted from a lead, and you could have used more camera movements, as most of the shots are still. The fast cuts at the beginning work great as they go with the beat and create an impact. I love the story line, puppet shots and how you've linked the lyrics to the visuals, think they all work really well. Overall I think it looks very professional, well done." - Gem5523

Although we only received two comments on YouTube this comment was very constructive and highlighted to us that we had achieved what we wanted to. Expressing emotion throughout our video through our strong use of narrative, in particular the puppet scenes which this viewer has picked up on and particularly liked as well as communicating an idea of the lyrics linking to the visuals and the pace and shots matching the beat of the song which we observed was a generic convention of the "rock pop/pop-punk" genre. Overall, I think this comment demonstrates that we engaged our audience, particularly through emotion and the excitement of the journey the narrative was going to take, resulting in viewer's being engaged through anticipation merged with the realistic representation of the rock pop genre due to the construction of our production such as: linking the lyrics to the visuals, pace and beat of the production etc.. Although there are mentions of improvements I believe these are minor and would be something to consider if we undertook this brief again.     

• "Wow this is great Sarah!!! best media vid on here! xxx" - NathanSDance

This comment is not very constructive. Although having said that, I do think it demonstrates that this viewer does think our production was a quality piece as he has obviously watched the other music videos on the account and stated that ours is the "best". However, as Nathan is my friend it could be argued that he is being bias.

Facebook

• "Some of the performance quality could be improved, like when the singer is singing loudly, the performer is just speaking the words quietly, other than that it's an enjoyable video to watch :)" - Rob Watson

Although this viewer picks up on some vocal issues. I believe we tried our best to avoid this problem by picking an actress who undertakes Theatre Studies at A-level and therefore understands that confidence is key to creating a successful piece. However, this being said Kate did say that she under a felt of pressure taking into consideration that this production would count for half of our grade - so some minor issues were bound to occur but personally the issues of vocals that this viewer has picked up on, even though I can see what is trying to say, I do not think this is an issue but may be something to take into more consideration if we were to undertake this brief again.

• "Love it Sarah!! :D x" - Nicky Selwood  

This comment is not really constructive it just states the admiration for our production but I believe it does show how successful our production has been in terms of targeting our audience and getting the response we wanted from them, a positive one.

• "oh my god how cute are you two as a couple :)" - Lucy Fox

The same can be said for this comment in terms of it not being very constructive. However, it did highlight that our decision to use Theatre Studies students, Kate and Tom was the right decision; as this comment shows that they conveyed an effective, realistic and believable relationship. This is what we was trying to achieve as our production as a whole was based around their relationship - the love and the heartbreak which they faced.

•  "Love the puppet idea synch is a problem and I'm sorry the actor has a lot to be desired but it's good" - Stephen Rendall

This viewer liked our puppet idea also which highlights that this was a successful and effective narrative element to use. However, I strongly disagree with his comment about the actor (Kate) as I believe the comment above states the sucess of the acting and the relationship, representation we was trying to convey and as mentioned earlier Kate was under alot of pressure as this brief was fundimental to our A-level grade.

• "Love the concept but few points some of the dubbing is slightly outta sync, the guitar could do with a lead so it looks plugged in or used an acoustic, and some of the time it looks like the girl is not/does'nt know how to play the instruments" - Frank Hinley

This viewer notices syncing issues. In terms of this I would say that syncing is a very hard task and I believe we did incredibly well considering it was our first attempt at syncing visuals to sound. However, in terms of the viewer I know he is very advanced in technology and therefore has plenty of knowledge in regards to this and therefore this could of resulted in him noticing syncing issues. As you can see from the screen shot/s below Avril Lavigne plugs her guitar in while in an outside location. We decided not to as we felt this would put more emphasis on the use of an outside location and as for using an acoustic, Avril uses an electric guitar in her own video and so do many artists within the rock pop genre, so although the suggestion of using an acoustic is a good idea we felt it necessary to use an electric guitar to express generic conventions and to fit the pace and beat of the song. Therefore, although this feedback is good constructively I feel we made the right decision in regards to our use of the electric guitar and the way in which it was presented. In regards to the last comment about Kate looking like she doesn`t know how to play the instruments - this is actually true. Kate did not know how to play the instruments as she is not a very musical person but I believe she "played" them to the best of her ability - especially the piano, yes I do believe that the presentation of her playing the guitar could be improved slightly.

  

• "Good concept throughout the video but the lip synching doesn't match the lyrics in parts. Like Frank said, the guitar could do with a lead to make it look like its plugged in and maybe an acoustic for the softer parts of the song. Overall, pretty good." - Nico Davidson

In regards to this comment my feelings towards this are the same as the above comment. However, maybe the consideration of an acoustic guitar for the softer parts of the song, particularly at the beginning may have been a good element to consider. However, as you can see from the screen shot below Avril uses a piano at the beginning of her song for the softer parts. We quite liked this idea and therefore took insporation from this for our own production. Therefore, although, again, the use of acoustic is a good idea we felt a piano would be more appropriate in terms of the beat and the pace of the song.

• "Really nice interpretation of the song, I like how it shows a mixture of both the literal meaning of the lyrics, and the hidden. I thought the puppet idea was excellent especially the use of height on the puppeteer. I think some of the shots could have benefitted from a panning camera instead of the direct cuts (more so where there isn't alot going on in the shot). Synch was perfect on piano, but I'm not so sure about the guitar. Also I felt the last two minutes were better than the first two, so much more emotion is conveyed which matches the build-up in the song as well :)... Really good effort though! :)" - Lawrence Howard

This is an excellent comment in regards to constructive feedback! Yet again, the puppet idea is picked up on as an effective one. In regards to the viewer`s about the puppeteer, by using low angle shots we was trying to convey Tom (the boyfriend figure) as superior while making Kate (our artist/girlfriend figure) unferior. So the fact that this viewer has picked up on this idea I believe shows that we effectively communicated to our audience. His comment about the use of direct cuts, yes, a panning camera would be something to trial if we was to do this brief again but I believe we used a variety of shots and the choice to use a lot of direct shots was due to the fact that this type of shot is seen in many rock pop videos and in fact music videos to try and emphasise a feeling of promotion, which our whole brief was based around - promotion of our artist. Again, this viewer has picked up on the syncing of the guitar which shows this could definately be improved if we were given the oppertunity again. In light of his comment about a lot more emotion being cnveyed towards the end of the production - this kind of the effect we wanted, a gradual build up to keep the viewer engaged and waiting in anticipation and then when the beat kicks in this is when we wanted all the action, the "climax" to happen.

• "I think the use of black and white and slow motion was really good as it showed the memories really well and in some of the slow motion shots you could really see the emotion! good variety of shots too :)" - Shannon Westwick 

By using the black and white/old film reel effect and slow motion, we was trying to do just what Shannon said: convey a sense of memories and emphasise emotion and to do this we felt it necessary to use a variety of shots. Therefore, this comment is particularly good in regards to highligting how effectively our representations/ideas came across to our audience and if they interpreted how would have liked them to - the answer being yes.

• "Very good well done. Some nice cutting, it take a long time to get it running with the track, some very good dim lighting shots too. Ace !! Whats next ?" - Neil Kemp

This viewer has picked up on our use of low-key lighting to try and convey a dark, rock pop feel and the dark feelings, actions that come with heartbreak. Therefore, this comment indicates that this concept was a good one. However, he has not commented on what he likes about the lighting/what idea it conveys, although it is assumed we effectively communicated this idea and the lighting stood out for this viewer.

Overall, in regards to the feedback we have gained from YouTube and Facebook it is clear that we have achieved greatly in regards to how we wanted our audience to precieve our production but this feedback has also highlighted areas for improvement.

Good Points

- Our audience seemed to understand the concept of our video and the emotion we was trying to convey throughout our music video.

-Because of their understanding they liked the ways in which we constructed our music video such as puppet scene, use of black and white etc. and the emotion conveyed throughout because of these ideas.

-The variety of shots used...which highlights our consderation towards elements our target audience consdiered important within a music video discovered in our first questionnaire at the beginning of the coursework.

- Another element which was of importance to our target audience in the first questionnaire and which was picked up on as a good point within our feedback was lighting. Highlighting to us that lighting had worked effectively, and how we wanted it to, in terms of representation and promotion (representation of characters - Kate as inferior and innocent and Tom as superior, `bad/evil' and emphasising our artist, promotion).


Bad Points/Areas for Improvement

- Syncing could be improved in places.

- More of a realistic capturing of the instruments being played, from the feedback we received it was felt that at times our artist could have "played" the instruments better to make it look more realistic, especially in terms of the electric guitar.



Gaining feedback from our Ancillary Tasks

Our Ancillary Tasks (digipak and magazine advertisement) were just as important as our music video in relation to our brief: promotion, promoting our artist. Therefore, we thought it necessary to not only gain feedback on our music video but our ancillary tasks also. To do this we created another questionnaire after we had completed our brief to gather people`s thoughts/opinions and to measure the effectiveness/success of our ancillary tasks. 

Our questionnaire asked questions like:

-If you saw our digipak and magazine advertisement in a shop would you know that it related to our music video? why?

-Do you think the colours, fonts etc we have used on our digipak and magazine advertisement effectively communicate the rock pop/pop-punk genre? why?

- Do these products look like real media products?

From this questionnaire and questions presented on it like the ones above we was trying to discover if we had been successful in our creation of our ancillary tasks - the generally concensus was yes.

Overall, the feedback we gained from our target market suggested that there was a strong link between all three products (music video, digipak and magazine advertisement) due to elements such as the image of Kate as puppet as the main image on the digipak and magazine advertisement which it was felt instantly linked the two together as well as linking to the content of the music video (the puppet scene) and also the subtle link between the use of the rose in the music video and the image on the back of the digipak of Tom holding a rose and the inside cover of the digipak which yet again was a rose. Similarities in colour scheme and fonts on our digipak and magazine advertisement were also picked up on as a successfully linking the two products together.

Some of the feedback was as follows:

"The impact of the emotional image used on the front of the digipak and magazine advertisement really helps to catch the viewer`s eye and if these products were in a shop I would definately pick them up to find out more about them as the emotional image would intrugue me. You can definately tell the products are linked due to this striking image."

[Digipak] "I like how a sense of a relationship between the two people featured on the product by placing one on the front and one on the back has been implied. Also, with Kate on the front it is clear that she is the artist."

The genre and the emotion has really been emphasised by the choice of images."

"I think these products would be comparable to real products as they have elements recongnisable on my CD/DVDs at home and the advertisements I have seen in magazines."

"The repetition of colour, fonts and images on the products has helped to link them together while suggesting the rock pop genre."

Therefore, the feedback we received suggested to us that we had been successful in terms of representing the rock-pop genre and in creating a strong "Brand Identity" towards our target market. This is just important in the promotion process as say the music video itself for example because if our target market were not able to recognise that all our products were linked then we would have failed in terms of creating a "Brand Identity and therefore our prooducts would not have resembled really media products.