Planning Essay:
In my foundation portfolio task I managed my time and equipment by using micro decision such as flat planning how I will present my magazine front cover, contents page and my double spread, this enabled me to save time when producing my products and it also developed my ideas in creating new ways that would benefit in matching it for my target audience. This aspect was very effective in my planning as it showed how I had changed my ideas for example the fonts I was going to use and then when producing my product I changed it in order to follow my brand identity. In creating my brand identity it was helped by analysing other magazines, which enabled me to decide what factors I need to consider in the making of my magazine. However, in my advanced portfolio for making my music video, I was able to increase the amount of organisation and plan the equipment I needed for example I created a shooting schedule which explained when I was filming, the equipment and people I needed, this enabled me to see the sequence of shots I needed to film for and what I need for each of those days, and from this I was able to check off the footage I have made so I was not repeating scenes. I showed my progression through A2 portfolio due to the amount of time I put into making of my music video as I had to consider the different factors I needed such as props or locations for example I had to take still location shots before I started to begin filming so I could eliminate any problems like lighting that could occur.
At AS I used a macro decision as I organised a photo shoot of my chosen artist The Ghost Of Samantha, which I used for my main article in my magazine. I made choice of the props and clothing I wanted to her look like, as I wanted the artist’s appearance to be unique and different as it was to promote an unsigned artist so she needed to stand out and be eye catching. A problem I encountered was that I did not plan on a specific location and was not able to solve any lighting problems that occurred, this would have been improved if I organised where I planned and from this I ensured myself that would do this before filming or taking photos at A2.
When organising the props, actors and settings for my advanced portfolio I was able to plan in detail when I was analysing my lyrics this was so that I would be able to match visuals to lyrics for example the picnic scene and therefore it enabled me to plan in advanced the type of props I would need and what will be a suitable location and also if I needed any extra characters in my footage. This shows my progressions as I have learnt that by planning locations, equipment it saves time and developed my ideas as I was come across different locations and props that made my ideas grow and be more creative with them.
In foundation I used very little storyboarding in the making of my magazine, which effected the time spent on creating of my magazine, as I did not plan in detail the factors I wanted to present in my music magazine, which may have affected the outcome as I could have missed key features out. In addition I did do a draft layout of my pages this enabled me to know where text and images could be positioned which benefited me when taking photos as I could use my artist in different positions. However, I used storyboarding in my A2 coursework to create a sequence of scenes I wanted to portray in my music video this enabled to over come restrictions I may have wanted to use and to develop my ideas in to more creative ways, which I felt benefited me as it helped me to produce ideas where I would know which scene started and which scene ended. Also from looking back at my storyboard compared to my final product it shows how dramatically ideas can develop or change. This show my progression from my foundation portfolio as I used detailed planning in order to over come problems that may have occurred and how I have addressed them for example my initial idea for my beginning scene was for my artist to disappear in front of a house and after I did this I felt it was not strong enough to grab the audience attention, however I addressed this by the artist coming out of a ‘dolls house’ which lead me to the Alice and wonderland reference which followed Goodwin’s theory of Intertextuality.
I used primary research using questionnaires to find my target audience for my foundation portfolio I found this really effective as it was easy to give to a range of different ages and genders and enabled me to establish what target audience my magazine would relate to and what factors I would need to consider to maintain their interest such as the type of music I will be promoting. However, I would improve on the type of question I used in my questionnaires, as they were more quantitative data rather than qualitative as I think it would have benefited my research if there were more detailed answers giving me a range of opinions and response’s. In my advanced portfolio I again used questionnaires as I felt they were more useful in finding information and easy to replicate, for example when showcasing my music video I gave out questionnaire feedback sheets to give to my focus group where by I could evaluate and see which factors of my music video they liked or suggest ways of improvement. For this specific research I used more qualitative questions to enable me to assess more in detail with the suggestions my target audience gave me. I also used survey monkey as I felt I needed more people to watch and write there suggestions from this I was able to get a range of different genders and ages which enabled me to write an effective evaluation. This shows progression as I have adapted in to new ways of software to develop my research.
In my foundation portfolio I used media practice in analysing different genres of music magazine to compare different conventions and then again when I chose my genre of music magazine I was creating. I analysed similar products such as NME magazine, this enabled me to see the various factors I needed to consider to follow my target audience. This was effective as it taught me how to analyse in more detail in to why a specific colour or a type of text was added to create a meaning for the front cover. I used this in my advanced portfolio where by I used this to analyse real music videos to explain why I did not like certain parts for example in the Camus and cat video they used limited locations and props and how I was inspired by Daisy dares you video of her Alice and wonderland reference. I used secondary in my advanced portfolio for example following Goodwin’s theory such as genre characteristics, Intertextuality etc. this enabled me to help me see the conventions of a music video and what I needed to follow in order to make my music video successful and by pervious planning of my lyrics I could match visual to lyrics to create eye catching scenes. This shows my progression of detail in analysing similar products and how it can benefit your work in terms of creating similar ideas that I could use for my own music video.
