In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop or Challenge Forms & Conventions of Real Media Products?

Having researched different videos in the hip hop genre, I picked up the conventions and stereotypes of the hip hop and r&b genre. For example, the posters used by different artists/bands always used the artist themselves as the focus point and rarely ever just used an album art on their own. Such an artist known for this is Kendrick Lamar. I chose to develop this point as I thought this would be better for a new artist rather than trying to challenge the forms and convention of real media products. This meant including the artist in almost every single digipak. As a result, I could create a recognisable image for the artist by highlighting the artist and the artist only. This has been backed by my target audience through word of mouth when I advertised the digipaks through social networking sites. 

My music video as well as the digipaks and adverts challenge common conventions and add to them further. One example of this is in my music video, the hip hop genre is notorious  for its use of money, sports cars and sexualisation of females. In contrast, I went with an alternative approach that would suit the song better. I focused the entire music video around the artist performing. This showed the artist expressing his own emotions which reflects the lyrics of the song very well. I feel like this may be a minimalistic idea for a music video however, the focus on the artist shows the artist in a 'better light' for the audience. This is through the audience seeing that the artist is down to earth and in touch with his 'previous' self before the sudden fame from his music career. My digipak again although minimalistic, stands very boldly and attracts the audiences eyes through the bold white text on the black background. Having analysed different digipaks such as 50 Cent 'get rich or die tryin', it was clear that digipaks in the hip world were gradually getting minimalistic yet they still attracted the audiences focus. I feel that my digipak works around this concept very well as the bulk of the digipak consists of only the artists face and some singing equipments. The digipak produces a humble atmosphere and makes the artist more desirable to follow by the fans. Largely, conventions of hip hop were mostly fought against which again, for me, makes the entire digipak line stand out for the audience. This works well for the artist image as well, it shows that the artist is very unique and not like the rest.






What Have You Learned From Your Audience Feedback?

To start with I surveyed a group of 20 people in the range of my target audience of 15-22.

1. Do you feel that the representation of the hip hop genre is clearly reflected in the music video and digipak?
2. What parts need to be relooked at in the music video and why?
3. What parts did you like and why?
4. Which do you feel the target audience range is? (12-17,15-22,18-22)
5. Did the digipak do its job of making you want to buy/listen to the song?

1. Answers for this varied but the answers ranged from yes it represented the hip hop genre in some ways but was not always clear in the music video. The audience largely felt that the digipak represented the hip hop genre better than the music video as the music video was not following the common convention of hip hop which is girls, alcohol, cars and so on.
2. There was one scene that was spoken about. This was the outside walking scene along the field. They felt that there was nothing wrong with the idea but that it should have been filmed with the camera facing directly at the artist. This would have given the audience more to connect with.
3. 18/20 talked about the stage scene with the different changing colours each time the verse changed. They felt that this went well and worked together with the song. The remainder 2 chose the field scene as they felt that the lyrics of the song related better to this as a lonely walk represents a broken heart nicely.
4. 15/20 voted for 15-18, 3 voted for 12-17 and 2 voted for 18-22.
5. The large majority of the audience said they were inclined to listen the song but were not tempted to buy the song but most agreed that the digipak brought the thought of buying it very quickly.


Audience feedback was at the top of my list whilst creating my digipaks, as their view is what really counts as they are the ones who the whole thing is aimed at. This means that the success of the entire digipak is depended on the audience feedback. To find out the opinions on my digipaks I used a written survey which I took round my media group and around the sixth form. I didn't want to do it online as I thought I would get a much reliable answer as it is a face to face process. I mostly recieved positive feedback, most recognised the genre (R&B/Hip Hop) and they also proceeded to say they would be interested in purchasing the album. The feedback from my media group were more concise, such as use less editing effects on the pictures, mainly the lens flare effect included in most of the digipaks. After this, I dimmed down the lens flare which made the overall picture look a bit more simple which I think captures the target audiences attention more. When I was editing my video, I got given advice from friends about small parts of the video which included to add more shots outside of the main hall which led me to add in shots of the artist outside on a bench. This means that within these crucial audience feedback, the digipaks and videos wouldn't have worked together as well as it is now. The audience feedback was focused on a red theme which was my original plan so it reinforced my choice. In most cases, I stuck with the script, as I had it with me whilst filming, but on different occasions such as adding more scences which are outside rather than inside which actually helped create a 'moody' scence as when I filmed outside it was overcast and cloudy which means that it goes well with the song.



How Effective Is The Combination Of Your Main Product & Ancilary Texts?

My digipak all runs through with a similar colour scheme (red,black,white) which creates a certain 'atmosphere' for my artist which then in the long run would create a recognisable image. All three parts of my digipak follows well with one another with the main concept of the colour black in mind. The texts in all three parts of the digipak are the same and are all in white. This shows the audience that they are indeed looking at the same artists advertisement.  Having researched the different end products from different artists and bands, I recognised that artist logos were always present and they always used the same font in order to be recognised, I then incoporated this into my digipak.

I feel that the music video, magazine advert and the CD/CD case combine together well. They flow well from each other with the common black theme. To find out what the audience thought was being represented I decided to survey them. I asked a total of 10 people to give me there insight on what they thought was being represented. The answers peaked from one side of the spectrum to the other. Some said that the genre was clouded but however looking at the genre of hip hop, one could argue that R&B,Rap,Hip Hop all bear characteristics of one anothers features. However, mostly they felt that the focus on the artist was felt to be passive and innocent. Not devoured by the media light so to speak.

During the planning period of the project, I analysed many digipaks. None of them were especially helpful looking at the fact that the artist I planned to project would not carry out acts that are natural to the hip hop genre such as the sexualisation of women or the condoning of drinking alcohol to have fun. Frank Ocean's Channel Orange gave me an inspiration of how to position the items around the digipaks and also on how to position the artist. This also shows the artist as non threatening and caring.

My genre of hip hop/r&b normally includes the artist as the main subject such as Connor Maynard. Again, the colour scheme I think reflects the mood of the songs as most if not all songs would have something to with love or anger. The white text also stands out against the red misty background giving a clear reading to the audience. The clear image of the artist though only the side profile still shows a friendly side of the artist. This is key as he is a new artist, which means that he still has to gain the respect of fans and win other audience over and from what I have researched body position plays a key role in how artists are viewed by the audience.

In comparison to the inital hand drawn planning, I think the finished product has come out looking similiar to the design which is a good result for me, although it does look plain. However, having said that this is the 'current style' if you will. Looking at magazine adverts such as London Grammer, Arctic Monkeys, ACDC and many others. The advert/poster stands out for its simplicity and bold white letters against the plain black.

In comparison to my planning, the actual inner booklet didn't turn out as I would have hoped but having said that, I feel this looks better than the actual pre planned photos as I have focused on using the music equipment which is typically found on a music set.

The CD cover didn't turn out as well as I hoped it would, although it still has got the same mysterious effects. This most resembles Plan B's Strickland Bands. Although it doesn't quite hit you, the image underlaying the artist makes you think about the overall CD. I chose to not include any words as I found it to be very distracting from the main image.

The back cover, in my eyes, turned out the best. I think what the artist is wearing challenges the common conventions, also this makes me think that it makes the artist look approachable as the lighting is soft and he looks shy as he is facing away from the camera but still showing a postive body positioning.