How Did You Use Media Technologies in the Research,

Planning, Construction and Evaluation Stages?

Evaluation

These are the technologies that we used at certain stages within our project:

The Use of Them

All of these different technologies have assisted us in the production of our promotional package through the research, planning, construction and/or evaluation stages. Some of the technologies (such as Microsoft Outlook) had only the purpose to help us keep in contact and plan out events – for example, filming. Where as, other technologies served a much wider purpose in the entirety of the package – for example; Slideshare, Word, PowerPoint, Blogger and search engines (such as Google).

Through a combination of these technologies at different stages within the process, we were able to create our promotional package. Without the technologies, we would not have been able to create the final package to the same standard that we have now and it would have been much more difficult for us to work efficiently as a group without the use of them.

ResearchIn the research stage, we worked to look into multiple different genres and see which suited the group. It also gave us the chance to receive further information on our chosen genre and how it is portrayed in different medias. To ensure that we got the best amount of research that we could on the genre, the group used many different forms of hardware and software to gather and display the information we found.

The group used a mixture of hardware’s both inside and outside of college. Whilst we were in college, we used the college computers in the library and media rooms as well as the printers and scanners available in the college library. When working from home, we would use our personal laptops or computers and communicate through applications software such as Microsoft Outlook and Facebook as well as by texting and calling each other on our mobile phones.

The group messages that we had set up on Facebook came in very helpful as we could contact all of the members of the group very quickly and with very little trouble as we all had access to it. It also allowed us to share resources and information that we found which assisted in the research into the band so that we all had as much information as possible. We also found that it was very helpful in later stages when some things went wrong in the planning of our music video as we could come together as a group to fix the situation easily.

Screenshots of Facebook Conversations

ResearchMicrosoft Word and PowerPoint were the two main pieces of applications software that we used in our research, alongside Slideshare and Scribd. The reason these were used so regularly is because we could use them to type up the analysis of music videos, digipaks and magazine adverts easily and in a well presented format. We would then use Slideshare or Scribd to upload the documents onto Blogger. Through this, we were able to display our work in a variety of formats and in a way that is easy to read and clearly presents what we have learnt.

Slideshare and Scribd were very important to our research as well. This is because, Blogger would not allow you to directly upload a Word or PowerPoint file. Due to this, we had to find an external piece of software that would convert it into a format that could be embedded into the Blogger post.

ResearchFor the magazine advert and digipak, search engines like Google were vital. This is because, it allowed us to see a large range of different advert and digipaks that the group did not otherwise have access to. For this reason, it made it much easier to find out about the conventions used both within the genre and for the product as a whole. This also meant that, we did not have to spend large amount of time trying to find adverts and digipaks to analyse and could look at them immediately after finding them.

Another reason the search engines helped out with the research stage is that, we could easily find out information about the band. Instead of having to search through multiple webpage's, it allowed us to search for the band and find the best websites to give us the information we needed. This saved a lot of time as well and gave us more in-depth and important information that we needed for this project.

ResearchAnother piece of software that we used a lot was YouTube. This was very important as it gave us a chance to look into pre-existing music videos and observe the common conventions within them. Through using this software, it helped us to understand clearly the components included in the genre as well as what we should look into when designing our own music video for the promotional package. Without the use of YouTube, we would not have been able to do as in-depth research as what we have done and the final product was unlikely to be of the same quality and authenticity as that of which it is now.

YouTube also assisted with the research as it broadcasts many interviews with bands (our chosen band, Paramore, included) as well as concert footage. This gave us the chance to learn more about our chosen band and how it would be best to represent them in our promotional package.

ResearchSurvey Monkey assisted us in the research into our audience. This allowed us to find out who the target audience for our promotional package would be and how we should appeal to them. We were able to post this on social media sites which allowed us to receive a wider range of responses as well which gave us a better chance of creating a successful promotional package.

This helped us to save large amounts of time as it was done online. Because of this, we did not have to print off and give many people questions and we did not have to analyse the results ourselves. This is because, anybody could access the questionnaire online and the site would automatically analyse the data that we collected.

PlanningAfter gathering all of the research that we needed, the group needed to contact the record label to ask for permission to use Paramore’s song Crushcrushcrush. To do this, one member of our group emailed the record label and put a screenshot of the email into the group message on Facebook.

By doing this through e-mail, it gave us the chance to clearly explain what we were doing in a well organised, professional looking format. If we had used a different form of contact, these same conditions would not be available as they would be too informal or casual. Also, if it were on a social networking site, there are generally character limits which would have limited the amount to which we could have included.

PlanningPlanning what our final products would look like involved, doing pencil designs first and then using Photoshop and Paint.NET to draw out more complex designs. This helped to show how it would look and the colours that would be used. As we all needed to have a copy of these, we shared them via the Facebook group chat so we could all access them easily.

Through using digital software to design the products, we could easily edit them so that we could have a clear outline for what we wanted. It also allowed us to upload them onto our blogs without the use of a secondary piece of software as they could be saved as images and directly put onto our blogs.

PlanningThe making of the storyboards was done slightly differently though to how the plans for the digipak and magazine advert worked. They were done through doing rough pencil designs with very few details and then redone for the final storyboards clearly with more details included.

After that, the college scanners were then used to create an image file of the storyboards that could be shared through social media and uploaded onto our blogs.

Through using a scanner, it allowed us to get a clear image of the completed storyboards without having to redraw them on a piece of software – such as Photoshop or Paint.NET.

PlanningThe final stage in planning involves creating the shot lists, shooting schedules, risk assessments. As we all needed copies, we all worked together on one computer to create the documents and then shared them with each other over social media (which we had found to be the most efficient method for sharing documents). Because each of the documents were created on Word documents, we had to use Scribd to be able to embed them into our blogs.

Very few of our groups members had used Scribd before which meant that we had to research how to use it and embed the documents into our work. However, this gave us the chance to learn more about another piece of technology that became very helpful in the way of presenting our work throughout the project.

ConstructionFor the construction of the magazine advert and digipak, we took multiple photos throughout the days that we were shooting the video. These photos were taken on a Cannon DSLR camera and a tripod to ensure a high quality, steady shot.

To create the final advert and digipak, we used Adobe Photoshop. From our AS year, we were all familiar with how to use Photoshop and what we were able to do on it. Through the use of Photoshop, it helped us to create a professional looking advert and digipak that related to both the band and the genre that we were trying to be a part of. We found that Photoshop had many additional features that were extremely helpful in the making of our products – for example; layers and filters – which assisted in adding a professional quality to the product whilst remaining within our desired genre, as well as making it much easier for us to create the final products.

We also used features specific to Photoshop to create a unique main logo design for the digipak. This included multiple images that we had taken throughout the shoot being turned black and white (through the use of filters) and put together in the design of the bands logo (through the use of layers).

Construction

ConstructionThe area of construction that required the most diverse use of technology was the filming and editing of the music video. This involved using a Cannon DSLR camera and a tripod to film the shots as well as our phones to play the music aloud for the band to perform to.

Though we used these cameras in our AS year to take photos for our magazine, the group as a whole had very little experience in using these cameras to film with. Because of this, it took slightly longer to ensure that we got the correct shots at a good quality – as well as having to go back and re-shoot several of the shots due to them being out of focus. Even though this reduced the amount of time that we could spend editing, we had allowed for some extra time for if anything had to be redone or something happened. Through this planning we were able to re-shoot and finish editing the music video within the time we were given.

ConstructionThe software we used to edit the video with was Adobe Premiere Pro. No one in our group had used this software before so we had to do some extra research into how to use it. This meant that we spent slightly more time editing than we wanted to as we had to look up how to perform multiple different commands within the program.

After spending some time getting used to the program, we were able to use it effectively to create the music video. Through using a piece of software that we were unfamiliar with, it did occasionally limit us as to what we could do with the video. However, this helped us to come together further as a group as we could each help out through trying to edit different areas and doing extra research to help perform specific commands – such as turning a clip black and white or adjusting the length of the clip.

Once the video was finished, we created a Google account that we could upload the video to. All of the group members then shared the video on different social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) which allowed us to reach a wider audience and make people more aware of the video being up. This also meant that we could easily gather responses easily from the viewers as they could tell us what they thought on all of the social media that we used.

Construction

EvaluationFor the evaluation, we needed to refer back through our coursework which was easy for our group to do as we had uploaded everything onto our blogs from the start. This made it much easier to find the information that we needed to answer the questions easily and appropriately.

I used Blogger to keep track of my coursework throughout the time producing it as, through my AS coursework, I was familiar with how Blogger worked and the best way to make the most out of the blogging platform. As you can automatically add images and text into a blog post and embed other files, such as a video, Word document or PowerPoint, I found that it was the easiest option for keeping track of and displaying my coursework.

To answer the evaluation questions I also used different formats – a video, Word document and PowerPoint – which allowed for a wider variety of technology to be used to show how I have used different types of technology throughout each stage of the coursework.

Through doing a video, we had to use YouTube again to upload the video and to be able to embed it into our blogs. We also used Premiere to edit the video so that it clearly showed each topic that we were discussing.