Construction of the advert
This is a photograph that I have taken and I felt that it would fit in well with the styling of the music video and fit in with an image used on the CD cover; therefore this could be a brand identity for the overall campaign. I edited this image on photoshop by changing the levels of brightness in certain areas of the image; using the magnetic lasso tool. This allowed me to select the areas that I wanted to change. The reason why I wanted to change the darkness is because we wanted the text to be in white; therefore the image couldn’t be too bright otherwise the text wouldn’t stand out; something which it should do.
The next step I took was to find a font that would work well with the overall styling of the advert and the brand identity of their name. I chose to put the band’s name at the top of the advert, in a large size because I wanted it to be noticeable; something that you would notice straight away. I double spaced the letters so that it would give the impression of a larger font and it would spread across the entire top of the advert therefore making it more structured. I chose this font for the advert because we felt that it was very similar to the font I had designed for the album cover and so to keep the styling the same throughout, it would be more effective to use a similar font. This font works well because it isn’t too overpowering and is a simplistic font which fits in with the styling.
I then positioned the other words onto the advert, in the same way as I had planned, in the same order. I gradually decreased the size of the writing which would mean that you would have to read into the advert to find out more about the album. I felt that ‘debut album’ was something that should be important with this being the band’s first album, so positioned this first; followed by the title of the album and the date it would be released.
From my research, it was evident that a lot of the adverts used a quote on their advert, from a radio station or magazine, something that would influence the viewer to buy the album. I started by deciding to position stars on the advert, which is the rating for the album. This is something that the viewer would instantly notice and then they would read further down and read the actual quote. I created the star using Microsoft word, changing the size and the colour. I then copied this several times and positioned them equal distances apart on the advert, so that it looked almost symmetrical.
My next step was to think of a quote that I could put on the advert. I didn’t want it to be too long, just to get to the point straight away but something that could influence you to buy the album. I chose ‘One word; outstanding’. Underneath this quote, again in a smaller sized font, I wrote who the quote was by, NME. I chose to use NME because this magazine shows bands of a similar genre and therefore would be somewhere that this advert would be likely to appear in. NME have the use of multiplatform, with a magazine, music channel and website, therefore if you are into this kind of music you would know they are very influential and therefore more likely to listen to it.
A vital piece of information, which is a generic convention on most album adverts, is the band’s website, my space or twitter page because nowadays social networking plays a big part. I have chosen to use the band’s website and their my space account. I positioned them in the bottom right hand corner because they aren’t the most important parts of the advert but need to appear on the advert so that people can find out more about the band or album if they wanted to.
The final aspect I added to complete the advert was somewhere the album would be available to buy and download. This would have to be something that my target audience would know and be instantly recognisable. From my audience research, from one of the questions, it was evident that most people used itunes to download their music; therefore it was obvious that that should be the icon I displayed on the advert. I positioned this is the bottom left hand corner which meant that it evened out the whole advert.
I think that the final advert fits in well with the target audience we were aiming at and this is mainly because of the research that we did previous to creating it. Mainly because of social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace we were able to look at other bands and their products and therefore create similar styles. Our target audience are a similar age to ourselves, this meant that we could easily find out what they would expect to see and the aspects that would make the advert or digi pack stand out. I think by doing previous research into other bands and artists of a similar style, it made us more aware of our target audience and made us link our work to that of real media products.
Construction of the Digi Pack
Hannah constructed the digiphotoshop to make it a bold, blocked colour. She decided that she would position the song titles on the actual tree to challenge the conventions. Also, keeping in with the typical conventions, she added a bar code and a logo for the record company.
After looking at the first design we had, where the lyrics were positioned in the tree we decided that we should position them on the left hand side and the tree on the opposite side. This was because it made them clearer and easier for people to read; it also made the tree stand out more on it's own. This follows the generic convention of not only this genre but for most as it defines the whole cover, however often there can be a change in layout or a change in the picture used as a background, for example.
Following the generic conventions of almost all digi packs, she added a spine. On this, she added the name of the album and the name of the band, the two most important aspects and the two aspects which are generic to an album. Keeping in with the same theme, we decided to keep the same colour scheme; the use of black and white, so that the aspects we wanted to stand out, did. From looking at some other digi packs, of a similar style and genre, it was obvious that they kept their colouring to a minimum or only ever used a small selection of colour.
This wasn't the original image we had chosen, but after showing the two images to both the band and our audience, the feedback we received was positive for both designs we had done, but this one more than the other. Therefore, Hannah edited this image on photoshop changing the levels of lighting to make certain aspects stand out. Using the line tool, she made sure that 'THE NOTICE', which I drew in a similar design to that used on the album, was straight and that it looked professional. .
She then re sized the image, making sure all the proportions stayed the same, so that it fitted correctly. Another important aspect which we decided to add was a website and a Myspace account for the band. These are both vital factors, especially for our target audience as multi platform is becoming an extremely successful way of promoting a product. As our target audience is young, they are more likely to go onto the website to find out more about the band which could encourage them to buy any more albums that they produce. It is important for our band because they are new and unknown so they would need as much publicity as possible.
We had to design another image to go in the next panel, which would fit in with the overall theme and the other images that were already on the digi pack. Therefore, so that Hannah knew the positioning of this image, she put a white background in the panel and left it blank, until I had finished the image. This would then make things easier for her when creating the rest because she could clearly see the layout.
As I had already designed an image for the front cover, the one we decided not to use, but it had good feedback from our audience, therefore Hannah decided that we should use it in the digi pack; but we didn't think it was strong enough to work on it's own therefore we decided to create a mosaic of this image. Hannah re sized the image so that she could get an equal amount of pictures horizontal and vertical and then positioned them onto the frame. We took inspiration from a couple of similar albums we had already researched.
After desiging the picture for the plain white panel, Hannah then edited it on photoshop by adjusting the darkness and lighting to make it a solid block figure. We linked the panels together by including the same tree as we had used on the back cover, but a smaller version of it in the corner; almost making it look like she was looking at it from a distance. It creates an enigma for the viewer and it adds to the overall feel of not only the digi pack, but the advert and video. 
We thought that because they are a new band and people would not only be unfamiliar with their music, but their image, we thought we should include some picture of the band. We still made it fit with the overall design because Hannah adjusted the saturation of the photo, therefore making it black and white. She used the magnetic lasso on photoshop to cut around the three guitarists featured in this photo and made the background white to fit in with the others.
We thought that as we had already included a picture of the guitarists, we should include a picture of the whole band, but in a natural position because that is what most bands of this genre are shown like. Hannah then edited the photograph on photoshop, making the image black and white to fit in with every other panel on the digi pack and the overall styling. It was important to show the band because it is their music we are promoting and it is important to show them as they are a new band.
The final digi pack shows clear links to all other aspects of the construction and I think that that is one of the reasons why it works well. From previous research into bands of a similar genre, we were able to see clear patterns in the layout and the types of pictures and photographs that were used, therefore this gave us an advantage when creating the digi pack itself. I think that because we were able to get feedback from the band themselves, this allowed us to create a digi pack which would be unique to them, show exactly what they are about and link in, not only to the song we had created a video for, but all the other songs that featured on the album. We were able to show them the two pictures that I had designed for the album cover and we asked them which one they would prefer to see on the cover. Overall, I think it fits in with our target audience of people between the ages of 16-25 because we closely linked it to other bands of a similar genre that we are aware people in the age range like.
Rough Cut- Music Video
Rebecca Lambert on Vimeo.
This is the rough cut of our music video, it shows our intial ideas and was created so that we could receive audience feedback. This was the initial video after we had filmed all the storyline scenes for the video, therefore we positioned the clips together to show an idea of what our final music video would be. Unfortunatley, at this stage in the process we hadn't been able to film any band footage, because of the schedule of the band. So, we left blank where the band footgae would go and when we uploaded it to receive audience feedback, we explained that this was the reason. Even though this is only a rough cut and we will perfect the editing and add in the rest of the footage, we still stuck to the original plans we had and therefore I think that the storyline runs well through the video and leaves quite a lot up to a personal view; as it creates an enigma for the viewer.
Final Music Video
After I had received feedback from my teacher, my target audience and from the band themselves, we edited the video further by making sure the footage fitted in with the lyrics, the lip syncing matched and the beats in the music fitted in with the editing of each clip. To make the video flow together more we added in some transitions or in some cases to make sure the clips fitted with the beat of the music, we added a sharp transition in; so they matched. I think by adding in the transitions, the performace and the narrative worked together as one and therefore the link between the lyrics and the visuals became clearer. I think that our video was successful because of the contrast between the narrative and the performance because it added another dimension to it and made the song clearer to the audience and also because they are an unknown band, it was important to show them in the video so that people would understand more about their personalities and their appearance. I think that the narrative was a successful part of our music video because it could have been interpreted in a number of different ways by the audience depending on their previous exposure to other media texts; for example other films or videos. This means that although we created our music video with one specific storyline in mind, it could be understood in a number of different ways and this is what makes music videos successful because they would want to watch it again and again and therefore the band would become more well known and this is the most important part of a music video.
