New Skills in Photoshop

There weren’t many new things I learnt on my own in photoshop, as I was already vaguely familiar with the software. However I did use tutorials on the internet to discover more about the programme. For example this video about frequency separation showed me how to airbrush an image without losing the picture’s texture, which I think makes a significant difference in how natural the image looked.

 Then I used this website to understand how to crop an image into a disk shape, therefore creating my digipak’s disk.

New Skills in Premiere Pro CC

As Premiere was completely new to me, all of my skills were new. However some things were trickier to pick up. For example I found it very tricky to match up the lip syncing, however after discovering how to zoom into a clip I found it much easier to be more specific.

I also worked out how to effectively lighten my shots. I first tried adjusting the brightness, however this looked washed out and unnatural. Then I discovered how to add a directional light effect, and by reducing the opacity of a mask I could control how much lighter the shot looked. I also used tints in a very similar way- using a coloured mask over the clip and then increasing its transparency.  

 

 

Software Used

Premiere Pro
To edit my music video I used Adobe Premiere Pro CC. This was really helpful as it gave me far more advanced options that software such as Windows Movie Maker. At first I struggled a bit to understand how to use Premiere, however by now I think my knowledge is quite advanced. With this software I could cut shots in time to the beat fairly well, and could edit the visual appearance of each scene. I found this really helpful as my footage was fairly dark.

Photoshop
While I have used Adobe Photoshop CC before, there were some aspects of using the software which I found difficult; for example remembering to select different layers. However I think that by using Photoshop to produce the digipak and magazine advert, I have a wide range of options when it came to editing. One thing which I found really useful was being able to increase the vividness of certain aspects of the image while leaving the rest natural looking. I did this for my artist’s hair and headpiece to make the colours stand out more, and I think the end result is really effective.  

Websites Used

Blogger

Blogger is probably the media technology which I have used the most often throughout the entire process. I have used it to record my initial research into music videos, my planning, the development of my production and my evaluation. I found it easy to use as I was previously familiar blogger, and I think that it is a really good way to visually record ideas. I could also easily go back and find work from months before and refer to it later.

Facebook

I used Facebook in my production stage to ask for advice in producing the back cover of my digipak. I also used it in the evaluation process to gather audience feedback. I think it is a really easy way to contact people, and found that group messages were really good for communicating to a large number of people. Furthermore people usually replied really quickly, as most of the people I talked to are usually with a smartphone, laptop or tablet.

PicMonkey

This site has been fantastic throughout the entire process for simple photo editing. It has simple tools such as crop, collage and brightness adjustments. I used it most often if I had taken a screenshot and needed to crop this down to post onto my blog. I addition most of the collages on my blogs have been created on PicMonkey.

YouTube

I used YouTube the most during the research stage of pre-production as I was analysing other videos to learn more about conventions. YouTube made this really easy as I could search for a specific video or simply browse. I continued to watch videos on YouTube for inspiration, especially since new videos are added constantly. I also uploaded my music video to YouTube as a way of presenting the final product.

Google

Google was the main search engine I used throughout the process. This mostly involved searching Google Images for example of digipaks and magazine adverts in order to analyse them. When searching for images I tried to keep on the large size tool in order to find the highest quality images. I found google really helpful, however if I struggled to find images I sometimes visited Tumblr or WeHeartIt as they often feature very aesthetically pleasing pictures.

 

 

 

Equipment Used

Sony DCR-SX 21 Videocamera

I used this camera in the production on my music video. I found it really simple to use, especially since I had used it before. I had no issues when filming, however I did find when editing that the camera was slightly blurry. This especially occurred when the set was slightly darker.


Canon DS 126 151

I was fortunate enough to have access to this camera during the production of the photoshoots. I am really pleased with how the images turned out because the high resolution gives a really nice quality finish. Unlike the video camera I had not used this before, so it took a little getting used to; for example learning how to focus the camera took a little time. However once I understood the basics of the camera I found it really user-friendly.

 
 Tripod

I used a tripod during the production to keep both camera steady. For my work this was essential and made a huge difference. It meant that I could keep the camera steady for a long time while filming long takes, or repeating the same takes over and over. The only issue I had with the tripod was that the Canon camera was a little too heavy, so I had to make sure that I slightly supported the camera at all times just in case.

Development of the Texts

Just a few quick videos to show the evolution of my products

 

 

Audience Feedback

I showed a group of ten teenage girls my completed music video and digipak, and then asked them seven open questions in relation to them. I have picked out the most useful comments, taken out any duplicate answers and made a short video to present my findings.

I think that this feedback is really positive because it suggests that I was successful in my aims. However my audience all agreed that the lighting in the video was too dark, however this was because I didn’t have access to professional equipment.