Advanced Portfolio

Critical Reflection

Name:Hannah King

1. How do your products represent social groups or issues?

Representing the star with the use of conventional mise en scene in laid back casual, Boy next door attire such as a beanie, jeans and jacket throughout the DP, conveys the general convention of my genre, indie, where people feel outside of society and and don’t feel the need to dress to impress, he is portrayed as ordinary which is conventional for indie music. The star is also represented as both ordinary and extraordinary. The star is shown being  extraordinary through editing and effects which make him look unearthly and cartoon-like. In order to connect with audiences and be desirable, his caregiving attitude is shown through his choice of pose; the audience will then decode this message and see him as a relaxed, welcoming personality.

He’s reaching out to the audience to create a sense of personal connection, this would be what Barthes would call a symbolic code as the symbolism signifies darkness inside the objects on the two inside panes.It conveys loneliness and the importance of friendship, both of which are valued strongly by the band. It also is symbolic of the meaning behind the music video which portrays friendship and loneliness.

2. How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of ‘branding’?

I aimed to create an integrated advertising campaign that sells the narrative of two best friends coming together and creating a friendship. In addition, In the band’s mission statement I talk about how important it is to them to release songs that can help people by relating to them and then feeling heard. i set about conveying that through different platforms and using appropriate media language depending on the plattform to represent and or communicate that. For example  by, live videos conducted with fans as well as interactive polls on my social media pageto gain as much of a connection to their fans as possible. In the music video the narrative is about two lonely guys coming together to create a friendship, not only is this relatable to the fans, as I know from past research they are introverts and some most likely experience a degree of loneliness. This narrative is also carried through to my social media page whereby I created merchandise that illustrates friendship. In the digipak I also tried to encode the idea of friendship and loneliness through my choice of colours; pink/purple and grean, which was coherent with the music video. In the music video we edited so that the lonely scences in the narritve were dark and digy where as the light in the happy sections where bright and colourfull. This colour palette and juxtaposition continued in my digipak. For example the 1st and 4th pane contain bright colours, showcasing the brightly lit shots in the music video, whereas my middle 2 panes show darkness and black and white which illustrates the dark and dingy shots of loneliness in the music video, this helps give a coherent feel to my brand. These are symbolic codes that would be decoded for a preferred readingby the audience of a band of of two sides; light and dark; happy. 

3. How do your products engage with the audience?

According to Blumler and katz audiences will seek out specific media to engage with based on theirtheir needs for example, entertainment. Through past reserch in my blog posts looking at yougov, i know that my audience demographics are genz and millennials. My audience psycographics show that they are also emotional and independant and are introverts. In my social media page, The audience can gain information through awareness posts that talk about black lives matter, which will engage with  my audience due to the young demographic, genz are the ones pushing for movements such as BLM, meaning they are likely tto engage witht hat media. They can also gain information on my artist like upcoming music releases. The audience can further their social interaction through live videos where they will be able to interact with the star online, whcih is appealing to introverts as they can chat to their idol from there on bedroom . They can reinforce their personal identity through a poll which is one of the final posts whereby fans can vote one what outfit the artist should wear to their album release. This also promotes social interaction and discussion between fans. This also allows the audience to feel closer to the star. The audience can seek out media for entertainment by tuning into live interactive videos done by my artist as well as gaining entertainment through posts that include behind the scenes of the music video starting again.

4. How did your research inform your products and the way they use or challenge conventions?

Before creating the music video we as lacey would say, researched the genre’s repertoire of elements, I decided to use and develop some of the indie genre conventions . For example we developed conventions by having a 50/50 narrative and performance when usually indie songs are mainly performance, secondly we used the band in both the performance and narrative when usually they would be different people. However this would have allowed the audience to decode the performance and see them as more ordinary and relatable and less iconic which is unconventional but builds a connection between the star and audience. We decided to develop the blueprint as altman would say, that indie music is relatable, meaningful and emotional and less mass produced, by having the video be filmed on a beach with laid back clothing for example vintage, second hand relaxed open shirts and a quirky military jacket and the small 2 man band helped portray the same laid back meaningful and relatable fee, however ours was not a romantic almost cringy video, which some videos are as it was a friendship story talking about problems such as loneliness instead of a love or breakup storl.  We followed generic conventions of a general music video by lip syncing and editing to the beat, use of film rules such as the 180 degree wall.