Evaluation Question 4

Throughout the production process of creating our music video i have gained many skills within the world of media technology. These skills made it a lot easier for me to complete and aid my blog. 

The technologies i used were;

-Blogger
-Facebook
-YouTube
-Camera and recorder
-Smart phone
-Slide share
-Photoshop
-Apple Macs
-iMovie

Blogger

I used blogger to keep a visual log of everything i completed throughout my coursework for Media Studies A2. In AS studies i used blogger to keep a blog so was already pretty familiar with how to use the software which gave me a big advantage when producing my blog for this year. On my blog is everything i have done this year including the planning and research stage, ancillary tasks, evaluation questions and the actual music video.

Facebook

I used the social networking website 'Facebook' to share my survey to improve audience research, by using Facebook it was aimed at a large audience so i was able to gain my results quickly. I also used Facebook to keep in contact with our group using a chat. During outside of school sometimes we were not able to see each other so would have to wait until a school day, however we worked around this and Facebook made this possible.

YouTube

YouTube was a very important technology i used while doing this years coursework. It allowed me to research existing video to understand them better, to get a feel into what type of music video we wanted to create and give me more ideas. I also used YouTube to upload the final version of the music video also the audience feedback interviews. YouTube also helped us showcase the video as know it is online it will receive more attention pick up more views and promote itself. This creates synergy by using many different social networks which will help to increase sales and for it to be more successful.

Camera and recorder

The camera was one of the most important part of our video. Without a camera it would not have been possible to film the music video, take pictures of locations, audience feedback and the showcase. Our group decided to use my camera because we wanted to use its 720hp video quality rather than borrowing one from the school, which would of been harder to obtain, whereas mine was freely available at anytime.

Smart phone

Using my mobile phone throughout the project gave me a big advantage as it had many of the applications i used installed on it, such as YouTube, Facebook and Blogger. I also used my phone to contact my group at anytime. Having blogger on my phone was helpful as i could blog from anywhere at anytime which helped when the Macs would unexpectedly freeze. My mobile was also very useful to research any information i needed to find out. If i needed to use my phone to take photos of any locations or story boarding etc.

Photoshop

I had some previous experience of using Photoshop from when i created the poster for my AS Media Studies project last year. I used Photoshop to create all parts of my ancillary task including my Digipak and my magazine advert. There was many effects to use in Photoshop to create the best designs i could. Also there was a lot of fonts to use when creating the titles 'Lego House'. 

Apple Macs

The Applemac computers are the most vital part of the project as they provided important software such as iMovie and Photoshop in which we used to complete the music video, audience feedback and ancillary tasks. There was some technical errors due to the Macs freezing at the most inconvenient times another problem we encountered was the sever delaying the editing process. I also used the Macs to complete most of my initial research and most of my blog.

iMovie

iMovie was another important piece of technology used within my coursework. It was used by all members of our group when editing the music video. It was also used in the editing of the audience feedback. i find the iMovie software relatively easy to use with clear instructions so was a good application to edit out video with, also other members of our group are very talented at using it. the video took a lot of playing around with, re-arranging clips, using different effects and matching different visuals with the lyrics but eventually we had a finished video we are happy with as it looks rather professional.

Slideshare

I had some brief knowledge of slideshare from last year, but i had never properly used it previously. It is a very useful website as you can upload power-point presentations from Microsoft or browse other students slideshares to gain vital research. I used slideshare to complete question 1 of my evaluation, I then embedded the slideshare into my blog so it can be viewed on my blog without going onto the main website.