The student created a music video for the song "Freshmen" by The Verve Pipe. They researched existing music videos in the soft rock genre and took influence from videos such as "Someday" by Nickelback and "What Hurts the Most" by Rascal Flatts. The student's music video featured a ghost reminiscing about past memories with a girlfriend to challenge conventions. Audience feedback was positive and understood the narrative. The student used various technologies for research, planning, production and evaluation including YouTube, Photoshop, and iMovie.

1. THE VERVE PIPE - FRESHMEN
EVALUATION QUESTIONS
Danielle McGlynn
Candidate Number: 4607
Centre Number: 33435

2. QUESTION 1
1. IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT
USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND
CONVENTIONS OF EXISTING MEDIA PRODUCTS?

3. The song I chose to create a music video for fits into the genre of soft rock.
After researching, I discovered that the majority of videos in this genre
feature a boy and girl and the video tells the audience a story of their
relationship.
For my music video I decided to stick to this classic convention but put my
own stamp on it, instead of having a boy and girl meeting, or building a
relationship as most music videos show, I chose to have a ghost of an old
man singing and reminiscing on the memories he had with a girlfriend.
I wanted to create a music video which matched well with the song, rather
than have an unsuitable video with no relevance to the lyrics of the song.
I spent a lot of time researching music videos in my chosen genre to
influence my final music video, I was particularly interested in the music
video for Someday by Nickelback as it was similar to some ideas I had
already drafted. I have used many different conventions in my music video
such as Camera shots and movements, editing, lighting and props

4. A screen shot from the video „what hurts A screen shot from the video „someday‟ by
the most‟ by Rascal flatts Nickelback
The use of extreme close ups and long shots are often very popular
in the rock/soft rock genre so I was sure to include many in my music
video
A screen shot from my music video

5. Using someday by Nickelback as my influence, I tried to incorporate
many shots which had been included in that video, into mine, such as
ECU, EST shot, LS, MS (video of each in background)
I also took some influence from Rascal flatts - what hurts the most, for
example the mise en scene, as I planned to involve the organic/natural
feel in my video.
Screen shot from „what hurts the most‟ by Screen shot from my music video, taking
rascal Flatts influence from the rascal flatts.

6. I have used fourth wall to help engage the
audience, so it will look as though he is
singing to them. Both videos I took
influence from used this technique.
A screen shot from my music video
A screen shot from the video „someday‟ by A screen shot from the video „what hurts
Nickelback the most‟ by Rascal flatts

7. Both videos I took influence from involved a lot of editing such as
jump cuts, which allow a quick change in scene, similarly, both
videos also use transitions such as dissolve and fade, which are
very common to create a cleaner more tidy cut. I used both of
these conventions in my music video in appropriate places to
give a more traditional feel.
The song I had original intended to use was hell yeah by
zebrahead, I liked how upbeat and catchy it was, I also had quite
a lot of ideas for a music video to that song, but after long
consideration I chose to use Freshmen, as I didn't think I would
be able to get permissions to film where and what I wanted for
the zebrahead song.
The main way that my music video doesn't meet typical
conventions for this genre is that the band aren't shown playing
at all, I just have the main character from the video singing.

8. QUESTION 2
HOW EFFECTIVE IS THE COMBINATION OF YOUR
MAIN PRODUCT AND ANCILLARY TEXTS?

9. DIGIPAK
Does it fulfill its purpose?
The digipak i created include the conventions of a typical digipak,
meaning its included artists name, song/album name, images. my
digipak is suitable for my production and fulfils its purpose as it is to
promote my music video, and to advertise the CD.
Is it suitable for your target audience?
Our target audience was young people aged 17 - 21, who enjoy the soft
rock genre. It is appropriate as it is easy to relate to and people like
being able to put themselves into the situation of the actors. Also for
feedback my audience gave positive feedback on the digipak as they
thought it tied it very well with the music video.

10. As I had included a large amount of candles in my music video, I
wanted to link this theme between both my main product and my
ancillary products. I thought it would be important to do this as then the
audience will then be able to establish and recognise the theme, and
other products relating will be familiar.
I did a lot of research on album covers and found that the most
conventional image is of a person, after long consideration I decided
not to use a person on my album cover as I didn‟t think it would look as
effective.
Shots of candles from my music video, which link
to the front cover of my album.

11. ALBUM COVER
For my album cover I decided to use a
simple picture of a lit Zippo lighter, as the
audience would recognise the candles in
the video being lit. I used Photoshop to edit
the image of the lighter to give it a more
'rough' effect, as I thought it was too tidy
and didn‟t suit my video just as it was.
Although I was making an album cover and
they video didn't have to link with the art on
the album, I felt that it was a nice image to
use anyway, it just happened to link back
to the theme of my music video. I also think
that the image relates well to a selection of
the other songs on the album, which I also
took the time to research and listen too.

12. CENTRAL PAGES
for the inside of my CD case I used a picture of the
candles I used in my music video, I thought it
worked quite nicely as the audience would go from
looking at the album cover or a lighter to the inside
pages of lit candles, It created a nice link back to
the music video as well.
Original image
Final inside design.

13. BACK COVER
For the back cover I researched the album that the song
freshmen was from and added the rest of the songs from the
album. For the image on the back, I used one of the distorted
pictures I took from werneth low which I was going to discard,
and found that it gave a nice effect to the album, I then went
out and took a picture of the main character in my music video
from behind and used Photoshop to distort and blur it, overall I Original images
think it worked well and again it all links back to the other
ancillary products and the music video
Final back cover design

14. MAGAZINE ADVERT
Does it fulfil its purpose?
The main purpose of a magazine advert it to advertise the band and the
new single/album. My magazine advert does exactly this, it tells the
audience who the band are, what the album is called, when it is on sale
and what big companies think about it.
What would you change?
There isn't anything major I would change about the ancillary, as the
feedback I have received it very positive, I would just spend more time
perfecting what I already had and possibly experiment with different
colour schemes.

15. For my magazine advertisement, I didn‟t want an
over powering image, I wanted it to be subtle, yet
effective. When I went out filming on the first day I
took some stills of the view from werneth low, it
turns out that this made an excellent background
image for my magazine advert as the colours of the
lights resemble flame, which links to both the
album cover and the actual music video.
Like my album cover I wanted to create a simple
magazine advert which looks nice and does its job.
I decided to have the picture I took at werneth low
to take up the whole of the page and put my text
over the top. I used the band‟s name and the album
name at the top of the page in big bold lettering to
make it feel like a heading, and included a release
date underneath the main focus point of the image;
I also included a review from a music magazine to
attract buyers. I then centre aligned all the text to
keep it neat and formal

16. QUESTION 3
What have you have learned from
AUDIENCE FEEDBACK?

17. To find my audience I carried out a lot of research, I looked at different
age groups, stereotypes and genders. Using the two videos that I took
influence from in creating my music video, I found that the main people
who listened to them were teenagers in which fit into the „indie‟ stereo
type
From the member of my target audience that I questioned, the majority
of the really liked the song I was going to use, therefore I didn‟t have to
reconsider.

18. MY TARGET AUDIENCE

19. I made a questionnaire and asked 25 randomly picked people to fill
it out, This enables me to establish my target audience, as all the
people who enjoyed the song I was intending to use, were
teenagers and also enjoyed the videos/songs that I am taking
influence from.

20. AUDIENCE FEEDBACK

21. From the audience feedback I found that my final product successfully fitted to
my target audience.
100% of the people I asked said that they fully understood the narrative in the
video, and that it fitted in with the lyrics and mood of the song.
75% of the people I asked said they would definitely watch the video again as
they thought it was „very imaginative‟. The other 25% who were not members
of my target audience said that they wouldn‟t watch it again as it wasn't their
type of music, however they said that would recommend it to many friends.

22. TARGET AUDIENCE RESPONSES.
“Great video, but not my type of music”
“Very imaginative”
“the video fits really well with the song”
“this band have a new fan”
“Not my sort of song but a lot of my friends would like
it!”
“I like it. It‟s conventional.”
“That‟s mint, thumbs up.”

23. QUESTION 4
How did you use MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES in the
CONSTRUCTION and RESEARCH, PLANNING and
EVALUATION stages?

24. Throughout the process of my
production I have used a wide range
of technology which massively
impact the final products, without
these technologies it would have
been difficult to produce products of
such high quality and detail.
during the research phase of
creating my music video.

25. SEARCH ENGINES
I heavily relied on the internet to carry out
my research, I used search engines such
as Google and bing which helped me find
the information I needed, such as typical
conventions of music videos and ancillary
products.

26. YOUTUBE
I also spend a lot of time on YouTube taking influence
from existing music videos, which helped me come up
with my music video ideas. From the research on
YouTube I decided to take influence from two songs;
what hurts the most by rascal flatts and someday by
nickelback

27. BLOGGER
I made a recorded of all my planning and
research on my 'blogger' account, which is
an online blog. I also uploaded the videos I
have taken influence from, my final music
video and my ancillary products.

28. PRELIMINARY TASK
I had to complete a preliminary task to introduce me to the
project as a whole, in which I had to recreate a scene from
a soap. During this task I used a digital camcorder to
capture the footage which I then uploaded to an apple Mac
and edited using I movie. Once I had finished editing my
preliminary task, I added it to my blog, to do this I first had to
upload it to my YouTube account. When it was complete, I
was then able to take the embed code and post it onto my
blogger account.
Taking the embed code from YouTube
And creating a new post on
blogger with the video in it

29. when it came to make my music video I used a digital camcorder
then uploaded it onto an apple Mac on which I could edit the clips
and chose which ones would work best. As I have used editing
software before I found it very easy to use imovie of the apple
Mac. I navigated through the programme, inserting different
transitions and cuts, I also used the effects to turn certain scenes
sepia or black and white. when it came to editing the clips
together, I found that in some of the shots, the camera shook
quite violently, therefore I had to go out and reshoot those
scenes.
Whilst I was creating my ancillary products, I used a large amount
of technology to help my achieve the results I was after. I started
by using a digital camera to take some images which I thought
would work effectively as part of my ancillary, I then uploaded the
images onto a computer.

30. PHOTOSHOP CS4
I mainly created my ancillary
product on adobe Photoshop cs4
as I was familiar with the
programme and thought it would
achieve better quality than if I used
a simpler programme such as
paint or Microsoft publisher. using
Photoshop was a great advantage
as it allows you to layer the images
and add different effects onto
separate part so the image, this is
how I produced my album cover.

31. ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR
I also used adobe illustrator to
create my ancillary products, as it
had a large range of fonts than
Photoshop did.
To end the project I had to
complete a number of evaluation
questions and present them, I
decided to create a PowerPoint
presentation as it is a more formal
ending to a not so formal project.
I decided to present these in a
video, which I will again create on
Imovie, I will insert text over the top
of specific clips to engage the
audience, so the don‟t get bored.