CD Cover 2

This is another front cover of one of Nicki Minaj’s albums.
The image is again the most dominate part of the text, taking up the majority of the spaces, the main focus being on the artist as she is the most important part of the text.
Again it is very abstract and unique. Shows Nicki Minaj looking naked covered in paint, possibly expressing her personality like an explosion of bright colours.  The text also looks like it has been written in paint which follows the theme keeping it all tied into together and making it look professional. Unusual abstract image which shows Nicki Minaj’s image as different and individual doesn’t particularly follow any codes or conventions of any kind of genre, especially not RnB even though her music is from this genre, she creates her own individual and unique style which I will keep in mind when creating my own CD cover.
The conventions for this CD cover include: the album title, the artists name and a parental advisory. I will include this on my CD cover as the language for my chosen song is explicit and therefore this warning should be included on the CD cover.

CD Cover 1

This is the CD cover of the artist of the song I’m using for my music video.
The image is the most dominate part of the cover and takes up the majority of the space. The attention is drawn to the artist. The colour theme on this is pink, Nicki Minaj often uses bright colours, mainly pink in all her media texts. Everything in this media text is pink including her clothing, hair, shoes, background and the text.
The way Nicki Minaj is posed is unusual, as she is quite an abstract artist and breaks the codes and conventions of the typical RnB genre. For example more traditional RnB female artists have a more masculine image including tracksuits, caps and bling whereas Nicki Minaj mixes RnB genre with Pop creating her own individual style. The image represents her individuality and shows how unique she is as an RnB/Pop artist as she collaborates the two genres.
The conventions of this media text include the artists name, the song title and a popular hit which is included within the album.
I think this cover is quite simple but also really effective. I’d like to create a similar look on my CD cover for my subsidiary texts as this is not over crowded with text and looks really professional.
The target audience will most likely be young females, however Nicki Minaj attracts a wide spread audience and could also appeal to young males although this CD cover suggests a very feminine image her songs are RnB genre so still can appeal to a male audience. 

Post modern media

Society and culture has changed radically since 1945 but how far have the changes in technology and the ride of mass media affected peoples understanding and experience of the world around them.

Over the years technology and science has developed rapidly, this has made a big impact on our lives today as in modern day society technology is a big contribution to everyday life. This has also lead to the improvement in science and medicine which has given us greater health care and more knowledge about the universe we live in today. However not all people see the increase in technology as a good thing, it can affect the world in a negative way such as pollution and the increase in weaponry and nuclear bombs it has also had an impact on religion as more scientific theories of the world have made religion not as strong as it would have been in previous years.

Lyotard, Baudrillard and Jameson argued that recent social economic changes produced particular ‘structures of feelings’ or a ‘cultural logic.’ Cultural forms can no longer ‘hold up the mirror to reality’ since reality is a saturated by advertising, film, video games and television images. Over the years we have come to rely on technology a lot more and integrated us into social norms, expectations and values. We live in a ‘hyper reality’ this is when the media version becomes more important than the real world, we are more wrapped up in the media lifestyle than our own, therefore our perspectives on things are what the media influences and tells us to think and believe which shows how strong an impact mass media has on us in modern day society.

This has been since the enlightenment period and the development of mass media over history. Postmodernity has gone through two distinct phases, the first was in the 1950’s ending with the Cold War. This was when analogue media was limited and at the end of the Cold War with the spread of cable television and new media based on digital means of information and broadcast.

The first phase of Postmodernity overlaps with modernity and is regarded by many as part of the modern period. Television became the main source of news. When in 1967-1969 the ‘baby boom’ generation who grew up with Postmodernity as a crucial part of everyday life experiences, with this there was acts of rebellion amongst the young, leading to social policies that gave people equal rights. After the Vietnam War laws allowing or encouraging racial segregation and to laws which overtly discriminated against women and restricted access to divorce which then lead to the increase in feminism which has also impacted our society and media. These acts of rebellion lead to the youth getting involved in rock and roll pop culture which influenced a whole generation.

The 2^nd phase is digitalization which has influenced all our lifestyles with high speed internet as a source of knowledge, fax machines, television, mobile phones and machines all are digital production of information allows each individual to manipulate every aspect of the media environment. The World Wide Web has created a convergence and made people more globally aware as they have easier access to all types of information and knowledge this has created a new economy. This shows how radically things have changed since 1945 and how the media has had such a big affect on people’s lives and experience of the world around them.

DRAFT 2 OF MUSIC VIDEO

DRAFT ONE OF VIDEO

Research

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6j4f8cHBIM

I looked at this video for some ideas for my own video, it is by Nicki Minaj who is the artist for the song I am doing, I had a look at this video and saw how unique and weird Nicki Minaj can be, this video is really random and abstract it does not really relate to the lyrics but it still makes a really effective video. It gave me some good ideas for mine:

From watching this video, I have decided I should use bright colours such as in this video a bright pink and a bright blue are used a lot. Her makeup is also really bright and colourful as well as her clothing so I will apply this to my video and artist.

The effects I like from this video is the silhouette of people dancing and I would like to re-create this effect when filming, this e difficult and time consuming but I think overall it will look really effective so would like to include this.

I also like the editing and the way it flickers and fades in-between shots, I would like to research and find out how this is done so I can use it when I come to my next draft as it looks really good in this video.

Evaluation of the first draft of my music video:

For my first draft I did the filming in Pozition night club which before seemed like a good idea as it would give a real life nightclub setting and atmosphere, however once the filming was finished and I had looked over it I realised it was all slightly too dark and unclear. The reason I chose the night-club was too use strobe and colourful light however looking back at the footage I feel I could recreate this in the theatre at Wyke using their strobe lighting and smoke affects which can create the look of a nightclub even though I won’t be in an actual nightclub. This will also improve the quality of the video as it will be clearer and brighter giving a more professional look and shows identification between characters and audience so the audience can relate and interact with artists throughout video getting a clear and detailed image of the artist that they most likely admire.

In the theatre I also will be able to have the song playing whilst we are doing the filming so the lip-sync will be in time with the artists as we had some trouble with the speed which meant it did not quite match the lyrics. From my first draft I have found that there are thing that could be improved if the setting was changed, therefore I am going to be redoing my video in the theatre, some of the footage from the other location was really good and my actors managed to play the role really well so I will take the knowledge and apply it to my actual video. 

I also found that I did not have enough footage to fill the whole of the song which I thought I would so I now know to do a lot more filming to make sure that there is enough clips to cut and edit and will have more than enough to fill the entire song.  I’m glad I began filming early as I had plenty of time to edit which seemed to take up the majority of the time and I managed to finish well before the deadline. This gave me chance to look over the video and evaluate and look for improvements and now I also have the next few months to recreate a whole new improved video.

The first draft of my music video has been really helpful for me and has given me some good ideas on ways to improve and re-make a better more professional and successful looking video. It has been a good contribution to the planning process and now I have a clear idea on what needs to be done in order to achieve a better grade.