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Critical Reflection- 4 Questions 1000 words

QUESTION 1

How do your products represent social groups or issues?

Across my three products, I have focused on representing a middle class teenage couple. They represent the theme of romantic relationships as they portray common situations that many young people experience.  A break-up. This links to Levi Strauss’s ‘Binary Opposite’ theory, as I have decided to depict the narrative of the song and the issue through opposing genre characters because it creates conflict, drama and it makes things more entertaining. Therefore, I have not used a specific genre as I believe including binary opposites has helped to thicken the plot and further the narrative as well as introduce contrast. In the music video, the issue that could be portrayed is the new generation of youth and the downward spiral of young love. Both the social groups and issues are represented as well through the social media and digipak. The choices of the artist and images and designs have helped with this. I have followed and challenged some conventions in order to represent what I intended to, for example, through the costume. The characters and the artist can be seen wearing very casual outfits, once again reflecting the social group they belong to. It is common that teenagers wear little clothing in order to look provocative in some way, rejecting Laura Mulve’s ‘Male Gaze’ belief that “Women  are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact”.  

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QUESTION 2

How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of branding?

It  is extremely important to have a brand identity when creating multiple media products in order to attract the audience instantly. Considering this, I have worked in order to build a sense of branding across my production work for it to stand out and be easily recognized by my target audience. I designed both my digipak and social media page in order to complement my music video. A pattern in the style, colour and font can be certainly seen, as I purposely did this to establish a brand identity for my artist, since it is the visible elements of a brand that identify and distinguish the brand in consumers mind. For example, when designing the digipak I decided to use a recognizable scene from my music video as the main image in the front cover. I believe this will be an effective way of advertising and furthermore selling my product to consumers. In addition to this, I named the album ‘For You, For Me’ in order to encourage the audience to buy the product as I make them believe that it will somehow enhance their lifestyle. In relation to this, across the social media page of my artist I advertise the release of both the music video and album with similar colours and font, with the objective of having a brand identity which will increase trust, loyalty and awareness. The genre of the music video is communicated through many ways through my production work. From the location, to the font, to the colour and to the background of my social media and digipak, it can be clearly seen that the major theme will be love. This is  common in chamber pop and R&B/ soul songs. Overall, I purposely established a trend to maximise the popularity and profitability and to create a realistic sense of branding. 

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QUESTION 3

How do your products engage with the audience?

For my target audience, I considered young adults between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five to be the most suitable, when considering both the genre and narrative of the song. Both females and males of middle or upper class who enjoy listening to calm and emotive music are very likely to engage with my products. I believe this as I have asked various people about their opinion on my music video. Those with similar interests as my target audience think that the narrative fits very well with the song and is therefore very engaging. Audiences are in charge of choosing the media to meet their needs and they use it to fulfil some of their gratifications. Through some comments made by peers I concluded that my music video engages with those who may feel identified with the lyrics of the song or those who want to escape from routines. Furthermore, I produced and edited my music video in a way it allows audiences to be actively involved and therefore engage with it to a greater extent, meaning they can form an opinion on what they think about it. From the feedback I received, I believe I managed to achieve my target audience to be fully engaged as well by the social media page of my artist and digipak as it has links and direct references to the music video.

QUESTION 4

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

In every music video, meaning is constructed through the lighting, camera, sound and mise en scene. All aspects are extremely significant as they communicate something to the audience. Focusing on narrative-based music videos, I discovered that it is necessary to tell a story, which can either mirror exactly the meaning of the lyrics, not at all or a mix of both. Taking this into consideration, I built a new theme through the video that was still related to the lyrics of ‘To Build a Home’. It is very common to see many music videos featuring teenagers, representing themes of young love and relationships, often portraying the ups and downs of teenage romance. I followed this convention and created a music video which shows the before and after of the love relationship between the characters. I also considered that I followed common conventions when creating both my digipak and social media as I looked at a lot of examples of other artists to inspire myself. I designed my digipak so it matches the genre of the song as well as its style, and it includes a front, back and inside cover with elements such as a barcode, record label name, artist logo and name, and many more. For the social media page, I included many photos of the artist, links to tickets and the album, as well as merchandise and magazines. Overall, I followed conventions to attract my target audience, instead of challenging them, as I consider will be the most engaging and appealing to them.

Before break-up

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After break-up

Ester Dios Vidal
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