During the construction and evaluation of the media project, the student used various online tools and software. Research was conducted online using Google, YouTube, blogs and music videos. Planning was done using Blogger to compile work and track progress. Microsoft Excel and Word were used to organize tasks, provide feedback, and draft documents. Video footage was captured using a camera and edited in Final Cut Pro. Photoshop was used to design posters and packaging. Some issues arose like software updates causing footage to be unrecognized, but overall a range of media technologies supported the different stages of the project.

1. How did you use media technologies in the
construction and evaluation stages?
During planning and research a range of different media sources were
used such as:
 Blogger
 Youtube
 Word
 Powerpoint
 Slideshare
 Prezi
 Emaze
 Google
 Final cut pro
Research:
When conducting initial research for similar products I mostly used
the internet and search enginces via the apple mac. I used google
and youtube to collate images and information about the artists that I
researched such as The 1975, Aluna George and Lewis Watson. Search
engines also helped significantly when dealing with problems and
issues – searching the problem would generate a solution meaning I

2. could resolve the issue. Similarly, to begin with I was uncertain on
some parts of the project, such as what made up a digipack.
Therefore to resolve and understand this I used Google to search for
similar products and templates.
My
phone internet also aided in spontaneous, quick research when acess
to a computer was unavailable. The was especially helpful during
filming as we were on set, which was outdoors, therefore we used our
phones to stream the song to help the actor with lyrics and
performance.
Out of school hours when I was at home, music channels also helped
my research as I watched different music videos of different genres.
This allowed me to recognise features of different genres and apply
this to my product. Similarly, this helped me to gain an understanding
of different shots types, locations and narrative ideas.

3. Blogger – research and planning:
Blogger is our main source of collating all of our work. This was
useful as it allows us to create different sources of media and then
present them all in one document. We could also keep track of our
progress thoroughly throughout as both our teachers also had access
to the blog to give us any feedback or recommendations. Blogger
also has the ability to embed pictures and videos, allowing us to
exhibit where our different sources of inspiration come from. Blogger
was used as our diary throughout this project as I constantly updated
it was ideas and progess after filming shoots and editing.
Microsoft office – research and planning:
Microsoft Excel was a key programme which kept me organised
throughout the project. On excel a tracking document was created by

4. our teachers which had each task of the project in a chart which we
could fill in when completed. As well as this, it contained a
percentage feature which would update when you filled in work, this
enabled me to recognise how much of the project I had completed,
and what was left to be completed. Furthermore, this document also
contained a feedback page where I could record feedback I received
from my teachers and targets which I set myself. This was especially
useful as the comments were saved and easily referenced in future
lessons. This also allows me to reflect back easily at the end of the
project to review strengths and weaknesses that I faced.

5. Microsoft word was used continually during the project to write up
most forms of research, planning and evaluation before presenting
them in a more creative way. This was useful as it meant the
documents could be transferred via email from different computers
which I would use such as the mac, school computer and home
laptop. Similarly, the drafting process meant that ii could proof read
and edit tasks before they were finalised.
Icloud, mobile phone, laptop, imac – research and planning:
My iphone also came in useful during the planning stage of our
production as it was used to plan and organise meeting up with my
partner for work planning and filming as well as to contact our actors.
During several stages of the project, I
took pictures on my phone of different
things such as feedback on post- it notes.
This meant that I could create

6. audience feedback posts which helped to improve my work. Also
during the filming stage, I took pictures on my phone and sent them
to the computer via icloud – this was useful to easily and quickly
transfer images.
Construction –
During the construction stage, the mac was used to operate various
software and editing programmes. The Sony Handycam HDR-CX280E
camera was used to film our music video. We specifically planned to
film during the day time so that we had the best possible lighting for
filming as inside light often causes grainy footage. Along with this we
used a tripod to keep our camera stable. After this, we uploaded our
footage to the mac using a firewire and uploaded it to final cut pro.
Here, we created a shot decisions list of footage that would make up

7. the video, included it in our timeline and edited the video. Adobe
Photoshop was also used in the project to create the album poster
and to edit the images for the digipack. I also used a still Nikon
camera to conduct a photoshoot with the artist which was used for
the digipack imagery.
Editing –
To edit the video I used Final Cut Pro 10 which is a timeline based
video editing software application. Final Cut pro is good because it
contains built in transitions and sounds which could be used in our
video. However, some problems did occur. After a software update,
the programme began to
reject and not recognise our
footage. This means that final cut
will not allow us to export the
video to other destinations such

8. as YouTube.