Evaluation: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Transcript:

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

With regards to my music video, I feel that the technical skills used were very contributory towards its success, aesthetically, emotively and creatively. Understanding that my music video would essentially appeal to young girls within the ages of 12-24, I adapted different ideas along the way to ensure that it would both attract and appeal to this target audience, and match their exact expectations of what's considered a 'good' Pop music video. Firstly, the concept of my video was well-thought out. I didn't just want to make a 'cliché love story', but a story of a girl who is lost in her own entrapment of heartbreak, allowing the audience to actually follow her journey as she is constantly reminded of props that trigger flashbacks in her mind. The audience are actually shown these flashbacks, and they are not just random flash backs either. Each prop she discovers along her journey is actually a figure of her imagination, and not only this, but each flashback is a stage of her past relationship with her ex, Matt. I planned out the stages before I began filming, and these were: Stage 1. Just-met/dating stage Stage 2. Comfortable/in love stage Stage 3. Distrust/arguments stage Stage 4. Break-up stage Stage 5. Acceptance/moving-on stage. I decided that the total five stages would allow an actual simple structure for my audience to understand, giving it depth, and an equilibrium/resolution. I felt this was successful because I knew that most young females would be able to relate with the concept of being cheated on or arguing with a guy they held 'close to their heart'. Therefore, they would be able to empathise with her and understand my video on a much deeper, emotional level, which I believe is important. This is amplified even more by the technical aspects of my video, where I have used short shots that I matched specifically to each beat of the song so that it flows fluently to the rhythm. I kept the pace of the shots at a consistent rhythm until the climax of the song, where I flicked back and forth from many shots of Matt and Georgina arguing, to amplify the pain and anger experienced in this stage of their relationship through extremely fast-paced shots. I felt that this would suitably capture the reckless emotion portrayed not just in the song, but aesthetically too. I believe that this is another successful aspect of my music video because I think it has the ability to actually affect the audience emotively, as we (as the audience) are taken on a nostalgic journey, almost witnessing the couple's happy moments together first hand, for it all to suddenly break apart in front of us. Furthermore,
throughout the music video I kept Goodwin's theory of 'relationship between visuals and lyrics' strongly in mind, by using replicating visuals at the exact time of a lyric, so that the audience could familiarise with it and there is a sense of irony. For example, when the lyrics state 'I left my house, left my clothes', Georgina puts on her jacket and leaves her house. Simple features like this signify that the artist is actually telling a story/song from experience, and the audience's ability to recognise this would amplify the video for them and make it more realistic, in my eyes. I also made sure that I was creative in many ways throughout my video, to ensure that there is depth and thought behind its aspects in different levels. I didn't just want a superficial pop video, so I decided to take footage of my friend doing gymnastics in a field with a ribbon, and I placed this on the timeline. I cut particular parts, changed them into a light pink colour, and added a slow motion effect to them one by one. In my video, there are only about 5 short shots of Jess performing her gymnastics, and each shot signifies something different. For example, when Georgina is about to step into freedom by beginning to date Matt, I carefully place a shot of Jessica leaping into the air with her ribbon to signify freedom and adventure. I also like to think that the ribbon signifies the flowing of Georgina's emotion. In ways like this, you can see I have put thought behind my motives and hopefully it would be successful. I have used other ways of conveying emotion too, for example through lighting. The lighting on the “happy” shots of the couple’s first date and their comfortable/in love stage are high key, to represent happiness and lightheartedness which is what many pop music videos replicate. However, when things start to go wrong and Georgina gets rejected, the lighting instantly becomes low key and shots fasten up to represent her frustration and overwhelming emotion. Additionally, I know that fashion is a key aspect in pop videos, and females tend to look up to female fashion icons, therefore I wanted to ensure that the pop fashion iconography was replicated with Georgina. Georgina wore a white, ‘flowy’ dress with simple black pumps and a small denim jacket. I planned out her costume carefully, as I knew that the colour white connotes innocence and purity, yet it is fashionable too. I did not want her to look too glamorous, as the aim of my music video was to encourage sympathy from the audience for Georgina, and victimise her. Lastly, another aspect featured in my music video that I felt made it successful was my challenging of Laura Mulvey's 'The Male Gaze' theory. I felt I did not want Georgina to be viewed in specifically a heterosexual male's point of view, because if I presented her in such a sexual way, she would become merely a seductive object, not a representation of a normal, typical teenage female. I want my teenage target audience to be able to relate with her, not feel intimidated by her or envious of her. My music video has the purpose to entertain its audience and also, to create a character that fans of Ellie can personally identify with, therefore feel sympathy for when observing the ending of my music video. 

When creating my music video, digipak and magazine advert, I ensured to make a recognisable house style so that the theme would be identified easily by my target audience. In result of this, the house theme would essentially work together to promote the album. The consistent feature throughout all three of my products was: familiarity and 'sameage'. I wanted the idea and look of all three products to be similar, in order for the audience to familiarise with them and feel that Georgina has not changed greatly. I will go on to explain this within the next few paragraphs. Furthermore, the extended metaphor that runs through all three of my products is the feeling of nostalgia and innocence. Also, the slight moral message that too much pressure is placed on teenage relationships, which is also reinforced within the lyrics of my song choice.

The purpose of the magazine advert is to promote the album and contribute tot he style and image of the artist. My magazine successfully represents this, as I chose to design it using the consistent house colours: red, green and black - which would appeal to the target audience of my artist as she is a natural girl, which the naturistic green colour would replicate, yet she is quirky, adding to the pop convention, which is replicated by the red house colour, as well as her red hair. I felt I wanted a main image of Georgina purely walking through the woods as it sets not only a tone of mystery, where the audience may think "where is she going, what's she doing?", but a tone of familiarity. For those of the audience who had seen the music video, they will recognise this scenery and it may make them feel that Georgina is innocent; she hasn't changed. This is exactly the sort of feeling I wanted to replicate throughout my three products and this is how they all combine, because familiarity is a consistent theme and I feel it is important to make products successful. If the album advert differs too much from the music video, the audience may almost be put-off as they may have originally liked what they saw in the video, which is completely different to the advert and digipak. I feel consistency is key. Furthermore, I feel that the title 'LIGHTS' really fits in with the main image because I used my creativity through capturing a photo of Georgina walking through a pathway arched by a tree above her; this almost highlights the quote 'light at the end of a tunnel', suggesting that good things are ahead. As well as this, the mention of there being a 'limited edition vinyl' will appeal to more enthusiastic fans of Ellie, as they will be able to buy a high quality product that includes all of her tracks, and they are getting something special, worthy of their money.

Additionally, the digipak I created maintains a house style extremely similar to my advert and music video with the red and white colours, except it is darker and does not use green. I did this to display that I familiarity is still the consistent theme throughout, but that Georgina is versatile and does have another side to her which is yet to be discovered by the audience. This may make the audience feel like the digipak is worth their money because it is special, 'out of the ordinary' and there is more to be found out yet. This is portrayed by the simple black background and large white script font stating 'LIGHTS' which is placed sideways, up the side of the digipak front cover. Again, quirkiness here is another theme I have replicated. Aswell as this, I felt the script font brought out the feminity and elegance Georgina possessed in my music video. I wanted to make sure I combined my digipak with both the video and advert in terms of the almost dreamy, 'Alice in Wonderland' theme so I added a blue glowing filter to Georgina's face to highlight this. In the photo she is looking upwards at something unknown - I tried to create an air of mystery about her, and this will attract the younger target audience I am aiming for, as well as reflecting the magical and enchanting style of my music video. I matched the 'Ellie Goulding' title with Georgina's hair in terms of colour, so that this was consistent and did not look tacky and inappropriate. As this is one of the artist’s first 'big' albums she has created, I felt featuring a wide selection of photos of the artist was necessary, in order to get her known and recognised by her potential fans. This why I decided to create a 6-paged digipak instead of a four page one. Yet again I captured the familiarity linking back to my music video through the CD holder photos of the trees in the sky and leaves, which represent nature and are faded out slightly, as well as a photo of Georgina looking at the Horse-riding ribbons in an inquisitive way. This image actually captures the exact moment in the music video that Georgina discovers the ribbons, and I did this because I wanted the audience to look at it and recognise it straight away. I feel that replicating what happened in the music video constantly, increases Georgina's likability as a star, because it makes her seem as if she 'remembers her roots' and doesn't forget where she has come from. The theme of nature/the woods is also replicated in the last track listing part, where there is a close up image of Georgina's hand trailing across a piece of bark.