1. Evaluation 4, 5 and 62
The first thing I had to look at before I even started any of the project was the client brief, the brief is
there to make sure we stuck to the correct form, and ultimately made a video which both ourselves
and the client could be proud of. The brief was as follows:
“Produce a promotional video for a department within the college which can then be used on the college
website, be produced as a DVD to send to potential students and also be uploaded to the college YouTube site
and Facebook site.”
I felt this was a clear and concise brief which gave us a lot of room to provide our own thoughts and
creative abilities, which is always nice. From what I had completed I feel I had met the brief, and
followed all of the guidelines presented to me. However, there were a few aspects which I felt I did
not do to the highest standard. Although the video was nearly 2 minutes long, (which is within the 2-
3 minute guideline) I felt that the content within the actual video was not to the highest standard,
and could definitely be improved. I had also managed to upload the video to YouTube where I got
feedback. I will also show the video to some of my friends where I will gain feedback, if it is slightly
bias. Looking at the guidelines provided by the client I feel I had met every condition.
Overall, and regrettably, I was fairy unhappy with the way my promotional video turned out. I feel
the root of this problem was the raw footage we took before I started editing the video. There was
not enough footage for me to properly edit into a 2 minute video, which meant I had to stretch and
extend clips in order to fill out time and meet the brief. I also feel the quality of the shots were not
what I would’ve liked, the majority of them had bad angles and poor lighting, something that
could’ve been avoided. I feel the platform I released it on was perfect, however. The internet is a
fantastic way to spread things very quickly; this meant it was easy for me to show the video to the
maximum number of people, without even leaving the classroom. As previously stated, I feel
compared to other promotional videos online that mine did not have the desired effect, and looked
rather sloppy compared to other ones.
I feel that my promotional video definitely reached the correct target audience, it was fun and quirky
which meant that people of a younger age were able to access it and hopefully get something useful
or worthwhile from it, whilst I don’t feel it was professional enough to attract anyone, I do feel
people at the age to join college would’ve gotten something out of it. We were able to find out who
the target audience was by conducting research into the type of people that would consider doing
the Creative Media course, we found that:
“The type of person who would consider this course would be interested in the media industry and the practices and the
creative processes involved in creating such products. This may include things such as Photography, videography,
animation, typography ordigital animation because these things are relevant to all of the units in the course and a higher
knowledge of these subjects will give participants a head start when doing the course. The ideal student will have prior
knowledge of programs such as Photoshop, Flash, Movie Maker, Director etc... Students should also find it enjoyable and
rewarding to create products from these programs. If areas such as Movies, Games or Animations are found enjoyable by
the person then they would be the perfect student.”

2. When looking for similar content online we looked at mainly college and university promotional videos, in
which we could get an idea for the types of shots and music used, along with the kind of editing that would
typically be associatedwith them. We concluded that a fast paced friendly atmosphere is what we wantedto
do, and I feel this is present in my video.
I feel the technical qualities associatedwith my video are by far the weakest aspect of my promotional video.
There was not enough verity in shots, and the ones we took were not to the standard I would’ve liked. We
took maybe 10 different shots, which is definitely not enough. I would’ve really liked to have 20+ shots in
order to create a diverse andinteresting video. From the different shots we usedwe tried to create a sense
that youwere traveling around the college and actually felt part of the classes. We also wanted it to be a
showcase of some work, anddifferent activities in the college. Whilst the shots were rather uninventive, I
feel they were steady as we always employed the use of a tripod, which meant that we alleviated any
camera shake. The whole culminationof the shots, music and editing create a decent promotional video. Not
something I was completely proud of, but something I was moderately happy with. If I was to change
anything no the promotional video, it would be the fact that we did not gain enough shots before we started
filming. I feel if we were to do this again we should gain many more shots before we started editing, as they
are very important.
The technical aspects of the filming involved with the promotional video were fairly aliento me, as I tend to
focus on the still image side of editing and production, I don’t usually make videos. However, the Adobe
elements program made it easy to set up and create videos to a decent standard. When importing and
setting up the video, I just used to native resolutionwhich was 720 x 576. This was a quality that could be
played by enough people online to make it accessible by everyone. I wanted the video to appear clean, this
meant dulling down the number of fancy affects and transitions, and instead reverting to clean wipes and
fades. I feel I stuck to this in the production of the video. I did not have any technical involvement when
exporting the video, as the program managed to completely automate this process and meant I did not have
to set the custom resolution, bitrate and video quality.
Before starting the video I had written and drawn out a number of different storyboards, however, as we
were working as a team these we not used as someone else in the group did superior storyboards which
meant we decided to go for theirs. We created a number of pre-production documents such as mood
boards, storyboards, shot logs, video sequences, technical considerations and a reviewof the target audience
I felt that the video editing, pre-production and post-production went very smoothly. I managed to do all of
my work quickly and efficiently to a standard I was happy to end on. I think this was partly down to the ease
of the video editing software. It was very intuitive whichmeant I could do things quickly. There was a
constant nagging problem however which meant the video editing program constantlylost a single video clip
and I had to restore it every time I reopened the video in Elements. However this wasn’t a problem and was
fairly easy to rectify.
I has used a number of different sources in order to gather the feedback required for my DVD, onthe whole I
was surprised that so many people actually liked the video, as I myself wasn’t overly happy with it. I will now
go over the points raised andexplain how I could improve upon the points if I was to improve or redo the
video.

3. The first question I asked was “Do you think the video suits the style of the college?” A question which I
felt was necessary as it is one of the most important aspects when making a video for an
organization. It must fit the theme, and mustn’t look contrived or made up, something which I tried
not to do.
Some of the feedback I got was:
“Yes, the song and the content within puts the college in a good light.”
“Not really, I felt it wasn’t modern enough.”
In general I felt as if people thought that the video did fit the style of the college, and was quite well
matched, although there were a few comments which said that it wasn’t. If I was to redo this in the
future I would definitely add some of the college colours and add the font and styles used on posters
made by the organization.
The next question I posed was to find out if people felt that the production was original, another
thing which I try to put at the top of the list of importance whenever I’m making something. In this
case I asked: “Did you think the video was original?“ To which I got a mixed result.
“I think most aspects of the video were, but there are also things which were not. “
“Not entirely, there was nothing I hadn’t seen before.”
“Some original parts, such as the time-lapse at the start.”
I managed to gather from this that people felt there were parts that they hadn’t seen before, but
there were also things which were common place in videos, this is something I knew would happen
as I didn’t want to reinvent the video, I just wanted to create something unique. I think perhaps I
could’ve reworded this question to make it more relevant.
The next question was simply: “Did you feel the shots worked?” This is not a question I was
expecting too longer answers from, and instead just one or two word responses which went directly
to the point.
I got from the array asked:
“The majority, yes.“
“Most of them.”
“Yes, all of the shots worked together, although I felt there could have been more.”
Although none of the respondents actually explained which shots they did not like I did get a feel
that some of the shots were weak, so I can only assume they were targeting those ones.
The next question was “Is the information within the video true and factual?” I don’t feel this had
much place on the questionnaire as I already knew the answer, as I did not make any of the
information up, and it was all fact. I probably should not have included this on the form.

4. The next question addressed what the respondents would change in the video. This was an
important question if I was to ever create another promotional video again, as I would be able to see
what the audience thought of all the shots and aspects of the video, and it would also mean I’d be
able to see what they would change. From the census I got:
“Make it slightly longer and add more shots.”
“Make it slightly longer and add more shots.”
“Make it a bit longer. “
Ironically all of the respondents answered the question pretty much exactly how I would. They felt
that there was not enough variation of shots, and that the video was not long enough. Both of these
things were shared with me, as I did not think the video was to the desired length due to the fact we
did not have enough shots to make it coherent.
The next question was “Do you think the music used fits the theme?”I found it very hard choosing a
sing to include in the video, as the majority of the royalty free ones I had found were not suitable,
and did not feet the style I desired, and instead made the video seem quite silly and playful, when I
wanted it to be taken seriously. Some of the comments I received for the music were:
“Yes, I liked how the music was upbeat and happy, this meant that I saw the college in a similar
way.”
“Yes, very much so. “
“Yes very well.”
The general thoughts were that the music did in-fact fit very well, and added to the whole
experience.
The next question was about the length of the video, something which everyone who answered the
questionnaire answered previously.
The very last section was to do with the questions asked in the interview section, I asked: “Do you
think the questions used in the interview section were relevant?” This was to make sure that what I
asked was relevant, and what someone would want to know. The comments I received were:
“Yes, they meant that we knew what the students had learnt.”
“Yes.”
“Definitely.”
This was exactly what I wanted to hear, as I too felt that the questions we had derived were
absolutely relevant to what people who were beginning college would like to hear, and the response
to my questionnaire echoed these thoughts, which I was happy to hear.

5. As there was nothing in my video that would be considered an infringement of copyright I did not
have to see any copyright permission in order to use anything. Fortunately this was the case with the
music I used too. It was a royalty free track from http://incompetech.com/ which means I do not
need permission to use it in any case.
The management of my projects is a place in which I constantly fall down, and is usually the weakest
point in anything I do, and I feel this one was no exception. We did not assign a leader to the project,
which I do not feel was the problem as we all worked together to combine all our ideas to create a
bigger idea. I was responsible for the camera operation which I feel I did well. The weakest part in
the whole production was the lack of communication we had with the client which meant we
weren’t able to improve specific aspects of the video in order to cater to the client better. I do feel
however that communication within the group was easy and everyone got their say as to what
direction they would like the project to go, and any other ideas they may have had. We did not have
any negotiation with the client; this meant we could not have gotten any ideas he may have had
before we completed the project.
I feel in the grand scheme of things I had executed what the client had asked me to do, there was
nothing particularly bad about the work I had done, but there wasn’t anything good about it. I think
that the project was mediocre, which I wasn’t really happy about. The project met the entire
criterion what were set out initially, besides the fact we did not meet with the client regularly
enough, which I stated as the possible downfall in the group. The major concern I had when
completing the project was the fact that we did not have enough raw footage to make a proper
length video, this could’ve been alleviated by just getting some more footage. There were no
difficulties besides the fact I had to splice and dice the footage in order to properly fit into the
desired time length. Overall, and although I wasn’t happy with the finished result, I think that the
project went OK.