Evaluation question 4

Q4- What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constucting this product?


During the making of our music videos this year. we have used lots of different digital technologies, equipment and software that has helped us to construct this mediated text. However some of these have been very difficult to use correctly. Therefore i spent alot of time trying to work out how to use the equipment and software which was highly complex. thus delaying us as a group drastically in meeting the deadline for our coursework.

If i was to re-do the whole project or was to advice someone starting there A2 coursework. i would tell them it is vital for them to get their head around final cut the progam used to edit the music videos, as it is highly complex and is much harder to use then I movie (standard mac programe) which the AS opening sequences are edited on. As on final cut there are alot more tools that can be used to add validilty to your music video such as two way shots, and mirror effects which you can not do on I movie. making the music video look like a real life music video. To be able to use final cut properly there was a online tutorial which after looking over is very helpfull and breaks down final cut in to understandable steps, it would be vital for someone creating their own music video to use this as final cut is a big jump up from I movie which is quite a simple programe to use. However i did not use the tutorial and this made it very hard for me to edit ceratin areas of the footage, as i could not get on with the editing of the video without a memebr of a group or a teacher helping me with specific conventions we wanted to add to our music video such as some transitions.

Although this did allow me to use my time constructivley as i was able to oragnise the schedule of the filming dates, contacting the cast and creating a cast. i could not of carried these tasks out if it wasnt for digital technologies. As due to my blackberry i was able to contact certain peers and also local actors/actresess over the phone.

Also over facebook which is blocked on the school macs but can be acessed through my phone, this also allowed me and the rest of the group to stay in touch with one and other  keep up to date with what stage we where at, with the project if not all memebers of the group where present in planning/editing lessons. . The use of social networking sites also were highly helpfull when updating the freddy and the let downs twitter/facebook pages as we did not create a band website.

I movie was very usefull once we had our initial storyboard as due to the software being very simple. we where bale to constuct an animatic using basic cut aways and taking still shots of each frame of the story board. we where bale to make an illustrated shot sequence. However the problems we faced last year with uploading footage to I movie re-accured when trying to up load the still images, making the process very time consuming which we did not need due to the cancelation of our first choice Freddy which also delayed us.

We also suffered problems with lighting when it came to filming the sex scene. as the filming took place in my room, and we needed the room to be dark to maintain the contunity of the narrative. However sam believed we did not need to rent out any lighting as we all ready planned to use a blue UV light to create an atmosphere within the scene. when we looked back at some of the footage the camera did not pick up enoguh light and the scence looked really dark and dull. thus being delayed again during a scheduled filming session. luckily i had a work (DIY) light in my shed therefore the room could be brightend up enough so the main light would still be blue.

As the bulk of our footage was filmed on streets as we had our artist walking around perfroming it was very hard for us to bring all the needed equipment as we were on foot and could only carry a certain amount each. Therefore we made sure that most of our shots were done in the day so we could use naturtal lighting, that way we would not have to carry around lighting. allowing us to be alot more portable.

The use of the tri-pod was also very limited as not all the tri-pods fitted our camera due to us using a HD sony camera which is used in the media industry. thereofre it was very hard to get a still shot as the camera was not fixed on a tri-pod and most of the scences contained tracking shots.

Compared to last year i believe the group did not function as well. However the delays where not caused by us not being on track but were cause by external problems such as weather and cast mebers not being flexiable with dates of filming. But on the whole i am very happy with our music video. and belive that we took the coursework very seriously as we conscousley gave each other indvidual tasks to carry out much like a real production company.