1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

In my evaluation I will consider how my media product uses, develops or challenges forms and conventions of real media products. I will take into account conventions, audience feedback, the use of cohesion within my products and the use of media technologies during all stages of production. The song I chose to create a music video to was 'L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N' by Noah and the Whale. Alongside my music video I chose to create a six panel digipak and a magazine advertisement to help promote my artist. Throughout the planning and research stages I decided to change the concept of the song completely and interpret a brand new narrative. I will take the original and the new narrative into consideration and evaluate the links between the new video and the song lyrics. All of this will either be contrasted or reinforced with audience feedback.

Music Video

Original Music Video:

Genre
The genre of my song and music video is indie folk. This meant I needed to break and follow conventions. An indie genre tends to break conventions in comparison to genres such as pop, yet still follow their own genres within the sub-genres. The plus side to being able to either break or follow conventions meant I was able to play around with the narrative and make it quite different and quirky, rather than have to just follow a strict convention pattern.
I feel I have followed conventions of the indie folk genre hugely through the use of mise-en-scene, such as location, costume and props. The costumes I used portray the typical style of artists within the indie folk genre, as they're quite earthy and quirky, unlike outfits in genres such as indie rock, that tend to be items like black leather jackets. I feel the addition of the bow tie really added to the genre aspect and made clear links, as it is really reflective of the song. I used various locations around Hull (which meant I was quite limited to choice) that I felt reflected genre and followed the conventions, as it shows a sense of travel and also reflects the narrative. The main prop used was the puppet, which from audience feedback, I know was a success when creating a quirky narrative that linked to the indie folk genre. I think my actor, Ant, is really reflective of the genre as well in both his style and looks. He's quite similar to the men in the original music video, which wasn't my original intention but I feel created a successful aspect to my music video. In relation to Rick Altman's Genre Theory my music video fits into the 'emotional' aspect of the set of pleasures he claims that genre offers. This is because I attempted to follow the conventions of an unusual narrative that evokes emotion in the audience.
The song I chose to make my music video to was L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N by Noah and the Whale. The reason I did this was because I felt the song was really open to interpretation and I would have so many options for what kind of music video I could go for. The song is quite upbeat and has a positive kind of feel to it. I did a lyrics analysis of the song so I could get some ideas of what messages and values were available to use and how it fit to the indie folk genre. The image below shows an example of part of the song that I analysed. As I mentioned, the chorus has a huge sense of motivation, hence why I felt I linked the narrative to it really well.

Narrative
The original music video is mainly performance-based, with very little narrative, which is quite typical of the indie genre. I decided to create a narrative-based music video as I felt the song and it's beat would work well with that. Like the original, my video has a slight performance aspect to it as throughout the narrative the actor attempts to perform a puppet show. There is also a small amount of lip sync within my music video as that's a typical convention and I felt it might help an audience connect more to the song and video as a whole.
The idea of my narrative was to create a video that matched up to the indie folk genre and was a positive reflection of the song. I have a male actor who's dream is to become a famous puppeteer, but he is let down when he goes to certain destinations and there isn't a crowd. He begins to lose hope and starts to resent his puppet. He decides to have a final attempt at making his show a success and puts posters up. A small crowd gather to see his show, but this is where he realises he doesn't need a crowd to be happy and successful, because he has a hobby that he enjoys doing. I feel this is a really unique narrative and portrays the indie genre really well.
I created a Prezi (below) which showed the links between my own narrative and the original song. I felt doing this would help present my ideas of how I wanted my music video to be portrayed.

Textual Analysis:

I created a fast-forwarded version of my music video in Windows Movie Maker, which contains annotations of the messages behind my music video. I link to conventions and genre throughout and explain why I made certain creative decisions. I talk about how I try to make an audience connect to my music video and what would make them want to consume it, along with my ancillary texts. 

The slideshare below shows the conventions of my music video, in terms of mise-en-scene, cinematography and editing, all in relation to the indie folk genre.

The Prezi below shows the conventions of a digipak that I followed when creating my own.



Digipak: Changes I made to create a conventional product. 

I originally had a white background for my back cover, and the original digipak front cover only had one image of my artist. I changed these because I didn't feel they were very conventional of the genre and didn't look professional enough. I decided to make some last minute changes and make the background of both the front and back covers black. I changed the front cover image to the same image used for my magazine advert, as that's a typical convention used within the whole music industry, not just within the indie folk genre. I felt it made the product look a lot more professional and made it more likely to be consumed by an audience.