Now you must find a digipack cover from the same genre as your music video (not your actual artist – find another artist from the same genre) and annotate it for the forms and generic conventions. This must be uploaded to your blog. Make it detailed and use the terms from the sheets below. Try and find the back of it too, that would be great for some of the technical forms i.e. bar code, publisher logo etc.
You should focus on: images, graphics, illustrations, font, colour, technical conventions (bar-code, parental advisory, album title on spine, tracks on the back), register of copy, mise-en-scene, composition, intertextual references, how does the cover communicate meaning, denotations and connotations, image manipulation, filters, generic conventions, how can it be ‘read/interpreted’ by an audience, star image, meta-narrative, representation?
A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music video (major task), together with a social media page for the band and a digipak for the album’s release (minor tasks).
It is important to note from the beginning that you are not making a digipack and social media page to advertise your music video! You are launching a new album, which contains that song, but which also contains a number of other tracks.
So before you start planning the print and web elements of this promotional package. You need to be clear about the mission statement for the whole campaign. You must think more holistically about the album and create an integrated advertising campaign…
Your Marketing Strategy & Mission Statement
Who is your Audience? Revisit your audience profile from the music video.
Who they are (demographics)
What other media they consume and participate in.
What their values attitudes and beliefs (ideology / psychographics)
A Call to Action
How do you want the audience to engage with your star / album
How will they invest time and money in your star / album
Who are the competition?
Name three similar bands / artists.
What are the trends in album designs of similar stars / bands?
What does their website look like?
Your USP (Unique Selling Point)
Is your star already established or are trying to establish a new presence in the market?
What is your star image & how are you trying to innovate / develop that image?
Are you mixing up elements of different genres?
Are you trying to re-brand your star?
Are you emphasising the ordinary or extraordinary?
Remember according to Dyer meta narratives include both.
Your Mission Statement.
In 50 words or fewer write an agreed mission statement that includes the central idea that will unify your brand.
This will include ideas represented in your music video, but must also bring in a wider range of ideas that you will develop as you make a 3D Moodboard.
TASK.
As a group, create a google slide (example) that addresses the various aspects and complete brief notes in response to the questions.
Then, complete the mission statement in production groups and copy it into your blog.
This blog post is essential for when you come to complete Creative Critical Reflection and have to address how ‘do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of ‘branding’?’
TWO EXAMPLES:
One
Sunnies puts the vibe into indie rock. Influenced by the best of Poland’s underground punk scene and the top tenners of UK Brit Pop, the Sunnies aim to go ‘where no man has gone before’. Combining a musical landscape of hard rock rifs, abrasive punk lyrics and indiistic themes, the band will satisfy the hardest of new wave critics. The new album, DON’T RAIN ON MY WELLIES, is destined for a Grammy – making it number 3 on their mantelpiece of success.
Two
Skye is this decade’s rising moon. Mixing indie folk and Appalachian A Capella, Skye’s haunting acoustic tones and her quirky and experimental performance style, combines the best of festival fantasy, giving her fans a visual and auditory kaleidoscope. The new album, SKYE HIGH, features the hit song, ‘SIGH NO MORE’ and will tease the socks off the best of British female artists including Kate Bush and Florence and the Machine.
Aim to get at least 2 other media aware students to watch it with you. Film yourselves watching it and have a conversation about it. Stop and ask them for feedback on certain aspects – do they like the filter and if not why not? Does the narrative make sense? What about the star image?
Then edit it together and up load it as your last piece of feedback.
The final version for the home page, has to be uploaded within the month so you can tweak it if the 4th draft feedback throws up any issues.
You should focus on: images, graphics, illustrations, font, colour, technical conventions (bar-code, parental advisory, album title on spine, tracks on the back), register of copy, mise-en-scene, composition, intertextual references, how does the cover communicate meaning, denotations and connotations, image manipulation, filters, generic conventions, how can it be ‘read/interpreted’ by an audience, star image, meta-narrative, representation?
