Evaluation- Question 1

Media Evaluation Question 1:

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

I believe that my media products being an album advert, a Digipak and a music video meet a number of conventions. my chosen genre for my products is pop. I have carried out and completed a great amount of research of the conventions of my chosen genre in order to ensure that my final products meet the conventions of the genre the and the given brief. my products meet the conventions of real media products to a great extent.

Digipak:

I have researched into the codes and conventions of real media products by analysing a number of digipak before heading on to creating my own products, this has informed me of the particular codes and conventions of digipaks and has enabled me to understand how I could apply them to my own media product.

One of the ways in which my Digipak use the conventions of real media products is through the use a consistent colour scheme throughout the digipak pages. I have chosen a near strict colour scheme which is followed through the different digipak. During my research and planning process I have looked at and analysed a number of digipak which have all followed da certain colour scheme. I believe that this brings the different pages of the digipak together and allows it to bring them all as one product. In relation to this convention, my media product has challenged the conventions of the pop genre of using bright and bold colours. The colour scheme which I’ve chosen to use throughout my digipak and album cover contradicts the expected colours to be used for a pop artist digipak.

Album advert:

My album advert uses the majority of the product conventions as they are very minimal and can easily be met as they are the main components of the product itself. One of the ways in which my media product uses the conventions or real media products is by having the release date of the album. This is one of the main bits of information which is expected to be seen by the consumers on the album advert, and in one of the core aims of the album advert itself. This provides the consumer with relevant information of the release date of the album. Therefore, this is one of the ways in which my product uses the conventions of real media products.

Secondly, I have chosen to layout my album advert in a way which makes it meet the conventions of real media products to a great extent. For example, like the majority of album adverts which are published, the name of the artist followed by the name of the releasing album is featured at the stop of the page and therefore is the first thing which the consumer sees. This can be seen as a clever aspect of the layout as the consumer is prone to recognise what the album advert is about when the first thing that they see is the name of the artist. Furthermore, the artist name and album name is followed by a main image of the artist. (developed through the use of many different images which focus on the artist)? Lastly, relevant information such as the release date of the album is invluded in a large font, in order to inform the consumer of when the album is coming out, this is followed by other informative information towards the consumer such as where the album can be purchased and ways in which the consumer can interact further with the artist and his/her products for example social media platforms. This leads to another convention of real media procuts which my album advert successfully meets being featured hits.

The layout of the album advert is kept simple and relatively plain as there isn’t much going on, which enables to consumer to concentrate on the important aspects of the advert rather than over crowing the album advert with a lot of information which would not be effective in any way.

Another convention of real media products which was used on my album advert is press reviews. I believe that this is a very influential aspect of the album advert towards the consumer as when someone sees that a high authority figure/ body has recommend or given a good review about a product, they would immediately be convinced that this is something that is worth purchasing or in this case listening to. Due to the success of this convention I have chosen to use it on my media product which successfully meets one of the conventions of real media products.

This question can also be answered by a detailed analysis of how I have applied Goodwin’s theory to my media product. Goodwin’s theory consists of the idea that a music video product contains one of the following aspects:

1.     Have a link between the lyrics and visuals.

(compliment, contradict or amplify)

2.     Have a link between visuals and music.

(compliment, contradict or amplify)

3.     Have a certain genre characteristic.

4.     Have intertextual references.

5.     Contain notions of looking.

6.     Show voyeurism (sexual pleasure from watching others)

7.     Include demands of the record label

8.     Whether the video is performance, narrative or conceptual.

My main product meets some of the aspects of Goodwin’s theory such as it being a performance and narrative based video, q1this is shown very clearly and the music and the cuts between he two are made very obvious. When the video follows the performance concept the protagonist is deliberately ‘performing’ to the camera/ audience, whereas when the video follows a narrative concept the shots within the video show an on- going story.