Pre Production Preliminary Research

This is my preliminary Research for my Music Video Project 

Copy of Genre Research - Music Video by Jeremy Arnold

Weekly Progress

 Week 1

This week we got put In our group decided by Mr Nick, I think it’s better than choosing our own group because it helps us to work with people we are unfamiliar with. We also delved into media ecology which is the study of the effect of media n technology and how it shapes society and culture, we also learned about the 5 pillars of media ecology which are the big main understanding for media ecology.

The problem we encountered this week is that we have not yet decided what song we’re going to use for our music project which is stressful because we have to find a pop song released within the last 5 years.

We will collectively partake in deciding what song to use for our media project and make sure that we have the song by the end of this week.

We will need to find and decide the song we are going to be using for our music video by the end of this week, My personal goal for this week is to finish at least half of my music research.

Week 2:

We pitched our ideas with our group, and also gave suggestions on which song we ought to pick for our music video project. We evaluated the pros n cons of the music video suggestion and continue to look for the one we all collectively can agree upon.

We faced difficulties researching Pop Songs in the last 5 years. Since most of the popular pop songs are from the 2010s, making it hard for us to pick a relevant good pop song. Our team can solve this issue by 

doing more research and maybe searching social media for songs that are relevant nowadays and is easy for us to use for our music video project. Our main priority now is deciding which song we are going to use.

Week 3: 

We continue on our genre research

Week 4: This week our group started working on the statement of intent. We talked about the ideas for our music video and what type of vibe we are going for as well as our main storyline.

Week 5:

This week, we began doing another task, the location scout and risk assessment. These tasks were very easy for us to complete as they required less work than the other tasks. The difficulty was deciding which location we were going to shoot, but we managed to come up with interesting places.

The problem we had this week was that I was not finished with the storyboard and the moodboard.

The solution was that one of the group members tried assisting me, which proved to be very helpful and effective as we finished half of the plan. 

My goal for this week is to finish the moodboard and the storyboard.

Week 6

This was our final week to finish everything before finishing semester 1 of our academic year. Our teacher gave us chances to do our Comp 3 during the media studies period for this week. Thanks to our kind teacher's decision, all the tasks were accomplished. However, we did miss out on 1 task, which was the classwork about media theories.

The problem we had this week was that we didn't have a proper schedule, so we missed one task.

The solution we had was to do the task during the weekends and do double checks in our blog post in case we missed other things.

My goal for this week is to make sure all my group members have the proper format for their blog posts.

Reflection: Weekly Progress is not something I enjoy doing, however a weekly progress blog allows me to track the progress me and my team have made, allowing us to take the next course of action and be in sync of what we must do to get things dome

My Team

Brief

Final Documentary & Thumbnail

 This is our final documentary and our final thumbnail, thumbnail was made by Max and approved by the group

Final Documentary Opening

Critical Reflection

This is my critical reflection for my documentary term 1 project

 CR 1 - How do your products represent social groups or issues?

CR 2 - How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of ‘branding’?

CR 3 - How do your products engage with the audience?

CR 4 - How did your research inform your products and the way they use or challenge conventions?

Me and my group made a documentary opening about poison murder, this is targeted towards audience who are into crime documentary.

We wanted the whole thing to look like it belongs together so we planned a clear style. We made the colors grading dark and a bit dull, we added soft grain on the video so it’ll look like an old gritty footage taken from a vintage camera. There is a burnt looking transition that shows hidden danger and links each scene. The thumbnail shows the same coffee mug as the opening shot, it acts like a small logo. These choices help it look like a true crime show you might see on Netflix but it still feels like our own work. We gave her a tidy social media page and a nice style so she seems normal at first and that makes it more shocking when her dark side shows. We also picked a coffee mug as the weapon because it’s something people see every day and dont think is dangerous. We can apply Stuart Hall’s representation theory here because people can see Ava different ways. For example some feel sorry for her, while some think it goes too far. The title also connotates a Shakespearean tragedy of some sort. As if it is a theatrical murder act.

Our targeted audience are people who enjoy real life crime documentary which could leave them guessing leaning towards the young audiences. To keep people watching we mixed normal documentary style with stuff younger viewers know. We used slow cuts and a detective style voice and creepy music so younger people becomes more attached and curious, we also made a fake Instagram page, used teen actors and some slang. Blumler and Katz uses and gratifications theory explains why this works, people watch to get info about risks, for fun, to think about their own relationships or to talk with friends. Gerbner’s cultivation theory also fits cause using crime features tells the audience what kind of story it is.

Research helped a lot before we filmed. I watched Lover Stalker Killer and American Murder: The Family Next Door with my group and took notes on narration, old clips and music. This gave me ideas for the detective voice and the creepy sound so viewers know it is a crime story. We also changed some things to make it ours. We used a young couple instead of adults and layered Ava’s lines instead of using one flat narrator, which subverts from the convention of adults being the killer. Turning a normal coffee cup into a deadly symbol gave a small twist on how something so normal can turn into something deadly instead of conforming into the convention of deadly weapons . David Gauntlett’s theory of identity fits because Ava is not simple and viewers can decide what they think about her.

The film also shows how controlling behaviour can hide in plain sight. This is shown through Ava’s Instagram bio hints at her need for control and her perfect posts make it seem normal. This shows how toxic behaviour can blend in with online life. By making Ava the one who plans the harm we show that obsession and control can come from anyone not just men which is common in today’s society where men do the harm. Different viewers will react differently. Some will see it as a clear warning about toxic love, others might think it is too much or not real. Some might feel both. 

the film uses dark visuals, sound and small details to tell a story that feels familiar but still a bit different. Our research, the way we kept the brand across the thumbnail and film and the changes we made to normal crime conventions all help it attract the young audience while still fitting the crime documentary type.

Thumbnail

 This is the thumbnail research done by me

The thumbnail above is half an image of a child in black and white and half an image of a grown man with the title “Making a Murderer” in bold. I think the title and the image works together to imply how a seemingly innocent child, could turn into a ruthless maniacal murderer. I think my team could take the mirroring contrasting image idea and input it into one of our sketches.

The thumbnail above shows a feminine sillouhete with a masculine figure overlaying her head alongside the thumbnail “Worst EX Ever”. I think this implies how the male figure presumably her ex boyfriend, invaded her life in a bad way and made it hard for her to escape him since he is always in her head. I think the gothic, gritty, disturbing tone of this thumbnail could be implemented in our thumbnail since it 

The thumbnail above shows a mirrored image contrasting between two person whom I believe is the same person, the other half of the image is a woman overlayed with red tint which connotates evil, paired with the ominous title “what Jennifer did” it leaves the audience wondering if she aka “Jennifer” did something bad. I think we could take inspiration from the title and how the image is set up

Edit

 This edit was done by Maxine, however she needed a second eye and I helped her with the lighting

Media Studies Editing by Max

Behind the scenes

 This is the behind the scenes done by Max.

BTS media doc by Max

Filming Schedule

 This is our team's filming schedule for this documentary project. This is made by Max, using the app "Notion".

Location Scout & Risk Assessement

 This is the Location Scout & Risk assessment done by me

Script/Screenplay

 This is the script made by Kellie

Storyboard

 This is my storyboard made by Kelly

Statement of intent

 This is the statement of intent done by collective group work

Classwork

 These are the classwork and case studies we went through in term 1

Presentasi by Jeremy Arnold