Group - Audience Research

We sent our questionnaires out to 30 of our fellow class mates, this was done as they are the ideal age range for both our genre of song and the key themes throughout such as friendship, youthfulness and happiness. The email was sent out with both an attachment of the questionnaire and a link to the song on YouTube. Here's an example of one of the emails we sent out:

• For question 1, the question states, "Do you believe that the narrative is compatible with the track?". The audience were given the option of either yes or no, and the feedback was that 28 said that it was and 2 said that it wasn't. Unfortunately we cannot ask these two why they don't think it is compatible, but its clear that there is an overriding majority for yes.
• Question 2 asks, "Which of the following locations do you believe are most suitable to the track?". We asked this question as we wanted a main location for the video and the question would allow us to pin down a day to do this. The options were South Bank, Brick Lane, Brighton Pier and Trafalgar Square. Overall the majority fell to Brighton lanes and Southbank which both received 8 votes with brick lane coming close with 6 votes, then Trafalgar Square with 5 votes and Brighton Pier in last with 3 votes. From this we had a discussion as a group and we came to the conclusion that out of the two most popular locations Brighton lanes and Southbank that we would use the Southbank. However depending on the quality of the shots when we get to the Southbank we may need to film in the Brighton lanes as well.
• Question 3 is, "After listening to the song which of the following would be an appropriate cutting rate?". The answers were either Slow (every 10 seconds), Intermediate (every 5 seconds), Fast (every 3 seconds) and Very Fast (every two seconds). The majority votes went to fast with 22 votes, then very fast with 5, intermediate got 2 and slow got only 1 vote. On the back of this feedback it was clear that a cut rate of around 3 seconds will be vital for our piece, if we want to please our target audience and match the beat of our song.
• Question 4 asked, "What props do you believe would suit the theme of youth and happiness?". The response was left open for ideas and after collating the responses we have come up with a short list that we would like to use in our production. This includes trendy clothing, bubbles, powder paint (for the opening) and the possibility of using signs which the characters can hold up to the camera top show their emotions as they don't get any dialogue.
• In question 5 the audience was asked, "Which of the following would be the most appropriate for filler shots?". The possible options were time lapses, panoramas and then the option to add anything else. Time lapses got a total of 22 votes and panoramas received 8 votes. Where as we didn't receive many other ideas and the most common idea was a slowed down shot, which we were already considering for our piece so its just consolidated the idea that we will now use that. As well as that, its clear that we will now also use the time lapse shots as they were the outright favourite on the back of the research.
• Question 6 was, "do you think that visual effects such as colour grading are appropriate in our video? if so why?". They were given the option of yes and no and if yes they had to explain why. We actually got 100% of the replies saying that they would agree that visual effects such as colour grading would be a good idea. However not all of them wrote why but a few examples included, "it would help emphasise the themes present in the piece" and "it would be aesthetically pleasing, if you were to get the right level of colour grading". So on the back of that question its clear that we will now use colour grading.

Group - Concept development

Shot ideas

• We will use a large majority of close up's to maintain interest throughout the video, showing the characters facial expression to various events.
• We will be shooting at 50 fps when we want to create the slowed down shots.
• There is a possibility that we may be able to achieve technical excellence through the use of a drone which we have. We will place the camera on this, to achieve successful Birdseye shots and extreme long shots of the city.  

Cast

• We have reduced the size of the cast because our shoots will be more efficient as we could bring the cast together on more than one occasion if need be in case we had to do another shoot. We also felt the size of the cast was inappropriate to achieve our narrative.

The mask

• We have come to the conclusion that the 'motionless' character which is being resurrected by Brad will be wearing a plain white mask. Brad will resurrect the character with a slow swipe across the characters head which causes the mask to disappear. This will be done through the use of continuity editing.
• We decided to use the mask to add an extra element to the video and make it clear how the character is clearly coming to life. The mask also highlights death and a soul with no energy.

Ending

• We have come to a clear conclusion as to how we plan to finish the video.
• The 3 characters will enter a party with a spotlight purely on them. They will then be blacked out and the light will show the surrounding people at the party who are all masked. As the lights come back on, the entire room will be lit and the masks will no longer be evident. Everyone will be enjoying themselves and having a good time.
• The ending supports the narrative throughout that Brad has the ability to influence people and bring them to life. This shows connotations of positive youthful representation as everyone is shown to be having a good time at a party in a sensible manor.

Group - Responding to pitch feedback

Things people liked:

• The running themes of colour and youth throughout the video.
• The idea of using a prop like a tennis ball to aid in the location transitions.
• The illustrative nature of our concept and the positive way in which we hope to represent youth.
• The synergy between the video and digipak ideas and mock ups.

Things people didn't like:

• The lack of organisation in terms of shooting dates and exact locations.
• Because of the loose concept people thought the video could become repetitive and potentially boring.
• Another factor was that some of the narrative concepts we'd included were questioned in terms of why they are relevant to our song.
• Another factor was that people felt as if with out a proper culmination the video would lack purpose so several

How our concept has developed as a result of our feedback:

• We have decided to develop our concept further by incorporating masks as costume for all the main characters excluding Brad. the masks add another element to our video in terms of costume as well as making it clearly visibly evident which characters are yet to be resurrected.
• Our ending to the video has now changed because we felt that without a different ending the narrative would lack purpose. our ending will now feature a party scene with colourful lighting. all the people in shot will be wearing masks and these will be removed at the end. We will shoot this in the drama studio.  
• Further more we have decided that colour will be the main theme of our video because this idea was well received in the feedback we received.

FC - Digipak Analysis

Front cover.

The use of the two Helmets on the front cover is iconic of the group. These helmets are part of the artist's star constructs and commercial appeal to the audience. Dyer's theory shows that having something like a helmet becoming synonymous can help construct a star image as well as creating intrigue. an enigma code is created because the audience and fans are left wondering who the two people in the helmets are, this unconventional costume choice therefor helps create revenue and media attention. another point relating to Dyer's theory is that the use of helmets makes the group seem very distant and unrelatable as against present, this could be seen as a negative, however because the genre of music is dance/techno it suits their sound and makes them stand out as a duo. The way the helmets have been split down the middle also creates a symmetrical effect reinforcing that they are a duo.  The robotic helmets have also become symbolic of Daft Punk so most people will know whose album it is just by seeing the helmets. Following on from this the album cover makes it easily to figure out what genre of music the album is because the use of futuristic costume is conventional of the dance genre. the colour of the cover is also quite minimal using only a few different yet bold colours, this emphasises the black on gold contrast and makes the album stand out. the plain black background creates negative space meaning that attention is automatically focussed on the helmets primarily and the writing secondarily.





back cover.

The back cover stays with the simplistic black background theme and features similar retro 80's style writing to the front. This font is the same font that was used for the track list on Michael Jacksons album "Thriller" reinforcing the 80's theme. negative space is again utilised to draw the readers attention to the track list. The implication of the rule of thirds is evident as the back cover has clearly been designed so that the track list is the most prominent feature taking up the centre of the cover. The silver text contrasts heavily with the back ground, constructing nuance, meaning that the songs stand out even further, this shows the use of linguistic effects. The 80's style font references popular culture because it is a through back to an era when techno music. was considered cutting edge and was very much the centre of dance and rave culture.

inner covers. 

The left side of the inner cover continues to focus on the helmets. The sci-fi helmet blueprint is aesthetically rustic but the diagrams are futuristic, this reflects their music which is modern yet inspired by retro dance music. Furthermore the metanarrative of the artist is developed as the sci-fi helmet design helps build enigma and mystery around the artist, this helps create revenue. The helmet blue print is an unusual thing to feature on a digipak, however this helps it stand out and thus contributes to further revenue the sci-fi element also references popular culture in terms of sci-fi being a popular genre. the right side of the inner cover uses a different font from the back cover, however similarly to the back cover it features white font on a black background. It is designed to look like the closing credits of a film, this implies that the album is more than just an album, but more of an interactive experience. minor musicians are credited on the right inside cover, this constructs the artists star image in a progressive way because most artists digipaks centre around little more than the artist concerned, however this shows Daft Punk crediting everyone who was involved in the production of the album.

Disk.

Its bright red, the reasoning being that it is a throwback to the Columbia records labels early record designs, as can be seen in the picture below. in Terms of being retro this disc is consistent with the rest of the album, however aesthetically the disks red colour is massively different to the rest of the album. The contrast of the front cover and the disk there for ultimately reflect the retro yet futuristic sound of the music on the album. 


This old Miles Davis Columbia records vinyl is similar to the Random Access Memories disk.



Group - Lyrics of our song and reflection on concept.

 I just came back from the other side,
From the black wild world, all colours run dry
and all my demons feels like they've disappeared tonight
Like I just broke in to the morning light,
You-uuu bring me to life
You-uuu bring me to life
You-uuu,
Now the world looks so die for
and you've opened up my eyes
Bring me to life,
You-uuu

I just came out of the darkest night
Where strangers got me hypnotized
Oh oh, no one gets out of here alive
But today's not the day, not the day that I die
You-uuu bring me to life
You-uuu bring me to life
You-uuu,
Now the world looks so die for
and you've opened up my eyes
Bring me to life,
You-uuu,
and all my demons feels like they've disappeared tonight
No, no today's not the day, not the day that I die
Bring me to life,
You-uuu,
Bring me to life,
You-uuu,
Now the world looks so die for
and you've opened up my eyes
Bring me to life,
You-uuu

After looking at the lyrics of our song we have decided that we want to do a very illustrative and narrative based video. This is because our concept links to the main song lyric "bring me to life". The other lyrics talk a lot about colour so we have decided to incorporate a wide range of colours in our video so that there is contrast. This will also make the video aesthetically pleasing.