Promotional Music Videos MEST2

Struggling to find a good example to base your own video on? Here are a couple you might want to look at. If you choose one of these videos then check no one else in the class is doing it! Remember you need to analyse the codes and conventions of the video to make sure yours fits with this.

The brief asks you for:

A two to three minute informative promotional video that will be added to the act's Myspace and Facebook pages and be downloadable from the official website. The video should provide biographical information about the act and be focussed on defining the genre and creating a definable 'brand' for the act. The video should include information presented in a documentary/news report style. It should not be a music video for a song.

Neon Jungle - perfect for pop music! Has all of the biographical information you would need and seeks to define them as a band with a certain style. Clips used suit the documentary style.



Bastille - A little too short for the brief but does fit with the documentary style when you look at camera angles and voiceover used. It works hard to establish a definable brand with the use of the symbolic triangle and the shot overlays which fit with the indie genre.




See what you can find online. Search for the website of a new band (because they are seeking to establish their brand) and then see which videos you can find. This will usually link to Youtube. Check the video matches the brief before you analyse it. Tweet me if you need me to check beforehand!

Good luck!

MEST2 Coursework research

I don't see you now until 11th November so you need to be doing plenty of work at home to cover the lessons we don't have. Make sure you print it all off and put it into your folder so I can check where you are up to. This is what you should have done by the time I see you on 11th November:

• Analysis of three existing products similar to those you will make e.g. three magazine interviews/ full page adverts and a promotional video
• Print piece in music press - you need to look in a magazine which is appropriate for the genre you have chosen e.g Rock = NME or Kerrang
• Two page interview in magazine - you can do any magazine here which reaches more than just a youth-based audience. Your band can do an interview for the Sunday Times supplement even if they are a rock band - you just follow the conventions of that particular magazine and adapt your style to suit it.
• Look for the codes and conventions being used
• Present analysis as bullet points or a table and annotate screen shots (think about the examples we have looked at in class - try to get coloured screen shots as this looks better!)
• Use the key concepts in your analysis MIGRAIN
• Collect style models - photography examples, fonts you might use - looks for things which are typical of the established genre you have chosen.
• Moving image - watch a promotional video for a band that has been posted on their website. Take screen shots of it and annotate it. This is better done on computer so that you can fit all of your writing in. Make sure you use media terminology - diegetic and non-diegetic sound, specific camera angles and cuts etc.

If you need any colour photcopying doing then see me or get it done in the sixth form area please. I will be looking at all of this with you next lesson so make sure it is printed and ready in your folders! Neat work only! If your work is not good enough then you will be doing it again.


Images borrowed from this blog - thank you to Lauren. Y12 - you might learn plenty from reading her blog!

MEST 4 Critical Investigation

Here are your critical investigation titles:

 

Kieran – To what extent does Skyfall follow the typical conventions of an action thriller and how does it seek to appeal to a more modern audience?

 

Jack – To what extent does The Dark Knight use binary opposites to reflect issues in society and the changing needs of the audience?

Joe – ‘Reality television plays into the idea of a moral divide between classes.’ Discuss the ways in which this might apply to Geordie Shore and Made in Chelsea.

Isaac – In what ways has Breaking Bad fuelled moral panics within the media?

Alicia – In what ways does celebrity culture uphold capitalist values and influence audience lifestyle? With a focus on Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber and Rihanna

Becker - “It is no longer taboo for women to take dominant roles and assume the position of the observer.” With close reference to Cosmopolitan, how far is this true in women’s magazines today?

Susie – “Illegal drugs have moved from the subcultural to the cultural mainstream.” Discuss the ways in which this is demonstrated in music videos and the impact this may have on audiences.

 

Rebecca – Django Unchained ‘subverts or inverts the racist tropes that have defined Hollywood's -- and our culture's treatment of slavery’. How does Quentin Tarantino seek to challenge modern ideologies?

First draft of this essay is due on Monday 9th December

You should then work on improvements over the Christmas holidays and at home until the final deadline. The final deadline for both the critical investigation and the linked production is 10th March.

Use your blue booklet to keep track of mini deadlines, checklists and what should be in your essay. Remember that you need to show you have studied the media and can use critical vocabulary confidently to engage with your argument.

Theory wordles

Media effects homework

Answer the question: How might the media affect audience behaviour?

Remember that the key word is 'might'. You need to engage with media effects and how different theorists view the media. You all have an article from the lesson and there will also be several things on the blog for you to look at and help you develop your answer.
You should include:

• Hypodermic Syringe Theory
• Cultivation Theory
• Two-Step Flow Theory
• Reception Analysis
• Pluralism
• Give examples from within the media

This should be written in essay style and it should be about 2 A4 pages.

Click the links below to view a few powerpoints:

 Powerpoint 1

Powerpoint 2

Dove campaign homework

Year 12 homework -

 

Write an essay of 2 A4 pages answering the following question:

 

How does Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty try to challenge today’s stereotypical representation of beauty in the media?

Is it successful?

Compare with another advert.

 

Use your notes from the lesson, visit the Dove website and find yourself a stereotypical beauty advert to compare Dove with.

 

Here are a few reminders of what we looked at and considered:

 

          Shanel Lu: I love the thought of being a part of an ad that would potentially touch many young girls to tell them that it is all right to be unique and everyone is beautiful in their own skin.

Julie Arko: Being a woman is beautiful. Waking up every morning and living a happy, healthy life is beautiful.

Lindsey Stokes: Young girls need to see real women like themselves in print ads or on TV.

Sigrid Sutter: Truth is beauty.

Gina Crisanti: It [the campaign] encourages the viewer to let go of society's narrow fantastical idea of beauty, and embrace beautiful reality.

Staci Nadeau: It's time that all women felt beautiful in their own skin.

 

• Only two percentof women describe themselves as beautiful.

•Sixty-three percent strongly agree that society expects women to enhance their physical attractiveness. Forty-five percent of women feel women who are more beautiful have greater opportunities in life.

•More than two-thirds (68%) of women strongly agree that "the media and advertising set an unrealistic standard of beauty that most woman can't ever achieve."

•The majority (76%) wish female beauty was portrayed in the media as being made up of more than just physical attractiveness.

•Seventy-five percentwent on to say that they wish the media did a better job of portraying women of diverse physical attractiveness, including age, shape and size.

 

•Why do you think there is so much focus in our society on body image?

•Where does our notion of an "ideal" body come from?

•Why do we think we should look a certain way?

•How does the ideal image of a woman's body differ in other cultures? In other historic times? How does this compare to the ideal image of a man's body?

•Who controls what images we see?

•Do you think teenage girls are especially vulnerable to these ideas? Do teenage boys feel similar pressures?

 

A plan:

• Discuss what the current representation of women is in the beauty industry. Is this fair? Has this changed at all?
• Talk about the Dove campaign. What are Dove like as a company? What are their values? How do they present these values through their 'real beauty' campaign? What criticism have they faced?
• Analyse print Dove ads
• Analyse moving image Dove ads
• Analyse Dove website
• Compare this with your chosen advert
• Summarise by discussing the beauty industry and the values behind it. Was this campaign ground breaking? Did it change the way women are represented or do we still have a long way to go?

 

Homework is due on Friday 27th September. 

 

 

 

A2 Knowledge - you need to know this!