Final Promotional Package

 This blog consists of my groups final music video, digipak, and social media page. 

MUSIC VIDEO

This is our digipak

Front Cover:

Back Cover:

Inside Left:

Inside Right:

Social Media:

https://www.instagram.com/thefreaky_vros?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet&igsh=ZDNlZDc0MzIxNw==

Final Self Reflections

This is my critical self reflections 
COMPONENT 3 SELF REFLECTIONS HARESHA

For our Component 3, my team was assigned to create a promotional package which included an album or digipak, an original music video made by us, and also an original social media page for our band to promote the new album. My team shifted from RnB, but we switched to Indie genre as we think that Indie need cheaper budget and known for it’s live performance, which is what we need for a music video, so we choose Telephones by Vacations since it does not have a music video, we can create and visualise whatever we want as long as we follow the atmosphere/visuals. Our star would be Ata, having a persona of a depressed teenage boy.

A brand usually describes a person’s unique identity. In the case of Media Studies, the brand highlights how a person/a group of people would be perceived in the media industry by the audiences. This perception can appear due to the involvement of stereotyped, cultural code, or as simple as mise-en-scene. By having a clear-defined branding, it will be easier for the Prosumer to shape their desired star’s persona and what kind of vibes/visuals/themes the audience are expecting. Branding is important because it is directly related to the star and persona, as people would recognise you through something that only you personally have, and that applies to Ata’s persona. Brand of a subject can be defined through the visual representations, atmosphere, and/or emotions. Representation doesn’t solely reflect one’s true identity/persona, but it may create a new representation or even new meaning based on what and how that person is currently being perceived through cultural codes, mise-en-scene, and language publicly. In the case of Ata, he is represented as a depressed teenage boy throughout the music video through the usage of low-exposure of lighting, which can indicate solitude emotions.This should be kept consistent to create and reinforce Ata’s reel persona.

In the case of indie genre conventions, our music video conforms and follows some of the general conventions that distinguish the indie genre from the others. This is done to keep our genre similar to the other indie media products, so that audiences can recognise our media product right away as soon as they see a slight indie convention in our product. In the case of our music video, we conform to some aspects such as investing more on expression and feelings compared to narration or performance. This can be seen or proven by how the camera always prioritises to highlight the actors facial expression, this is done in order to deeply capture the natural human expression which strengthens the feeling of sadness, happiness, and joy in the clips.Not only that, for a sad indie music video we also subvert some elements in order to keep our media content fresh or doesn’t follow the averages. One major thing that we subverted is that we’re presenting happy scenes of Ata playing around the arcade and the mall with his friend, to which if this was a sad-theme music video we should’ve gone for sadder clips. Instead here, we present some happy scenes as an implicit meaning for the causes that makes Ata to be a depressed teenage boy; a cause why he became his REEL persona.

In the case of our digipak, our digipak was inspired by some references from other indie albums, which the purpose is to be the same, as well as subverting other elements to keep it new and fresh. What we try to conform to this convention is that we implemented the static-styled/grainy-style retroish album cover visuals, which reminds me of the retro era. Additionally, our band pictures were printed on the very front of the album. This is important so that our audiences, fans or anyone interested with our bands immediately knows that they’re currently choosing the right album. In the back of the album, we already printed the playlist of the song that is included inside of the CD. This information is important to the audiences as they know what songs they are expecting to play later on as the CD goes by. 

In the case of representing specific social groups and current issues, we decided to represent teenagers, especially Indonesian teenagers who like to have fun with their friends by spending their time outside hanging out with their beloved friends and loved ones. This is where they create new memories every second they hang out with each other in the mall as they couldn’t experience the same things again because they’re separated into their separate ways. The issues we’re trying to raise is the problem of Isolation/Solitude, where we depict it as something  as an issue or something that needs to be evaded. Here in our music video, we try to picture a bad-image about it through the actor’s expression. There are some scenes that parallel each other in the music videos, one is some scenes where Ata looks happy when his friends are around, while joining him into the arcade. In contrast, there is where his expression would be clear to appear gloomy, this is supported by how his friends, which is implied as his source of his happiness throughout the video, and when his friends are not there he will be depressed as if his longing for the same experience to happen again. This is one of our main ways to represent loneliness or solitude as a “problem” within the teenager demographics trend. 

Since we know who our target audience is, which is a young teenage boy, keeping them engaged by giving light jokes or keeping them up to date with the band information can be a way to engage with the audiences. We want our band to be joyful as well as being a little bit goofy which would eliminate the tenses of the title celebrities between fans, where our goal is to remain humble. To achieve that goofy and joyful image, we have posted some memes and our daily activity that acts as an update for our fans as normal people living their life, which we’ve done while also keeping the quality consistently to be high in order to differentiate us from average-social media users. We also try new things such as uploading our behind-the-scenes clips, which honestly we rarely see any bands do before, so we think that this is a good idea to keep the humble and down-to-earth real persona we want to established.

To conclude, the purpose of digipak, social media pages, and the song to be connected is to act as the reflectors of our band’s reputation. A message we want to deliver is to be humble and stay happy all the time for as long as you can before it is taken away from you; before you regret not living to the fullest 

hERE IS the link: 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yB68FPge6m474hYZ2EWALcTpx8U68K5f-O58s0XQ0M8/edit?tab=t.0

Screen Test: Audience Feedback

This post explains how we showed a rough draft of our music video, album cover, and social media page to some members of our target audience in order to receive helpful feedback. 

MUSIC VIDEO FEEDBACK

The purpose of a screen test is to gain audience feedback about our work and see if their are any improvements that can be made. We decided to use google forms to create a survey to share with our audience because we are trying to find out whether we're reaching the right target audience and try to improve on our music video. Here are our questions: 

1. Age

2. Gender

3. How often do you watch music videos?

4. How can you relate with the protagonist?

5. What words would you use to describe the emotions felt in the sample video?

6. How good was the overall quality, writing & message of the music video?

7. How well do you think the visuals matched the mood and message of the song? Please explain your thoughts.

8. What do you think the story or message the sample video is trying to convey?

9. What were your favorite parts of the sample video?

10. How would you improve on the scenes in the sample video?

Here are the results from the audience feedback:

From the feedback we learned that our video is somewhat relatable with teenage 17 year old audiences and that they seem to grasp the story of the music video quite well. We also noticed that some aspects of the video are a little blurry

We are going to change some closeups to be less blurry by reshooting some scenes so that it can be clearer in the final outcome. We're also going to reshoot some performance scenes, as I feel they look a little bland and too stationary.

This screen test was a useful part of our process because it helps us grow towards are target audience and make us to create a proper artist with realistic aims and views. This also allows us to better connect with the target audience and make our product tick the right boxes to appeal to the target audience

Here are the results from the audience feedback:

From the feedback we learned that our social media page should be a little bit more refined or make it a little more formal. Although we want to be known for the humble imagery and casual atmosphere, but we also not forgetting our status as an idol; an influencer who influenced a lot of people in the future. 

We are going to change some pictures here, as this is our first draft maybe we can take out some pictures so that we have some "music or a band" vibes in this social page. And also, maybe we could make a tour poster which we hope will reinforce our group to be an actual band in our social media page; in other words, we don't want our social media page to heavily appear like some average personal-Instagram users posts.

This screen test was a useful part of our process because we can get testimonies from real life music enjoyer. From those testimonies, opinions, critics, and tips, we can improve and add something to our music video, social media, and digipak/album.

SOCIAL MEDIA and DIGIPAK FEEDBACK'

The purpose of a screen test is to gain audience feedback about our work and see if their are any improvements that can be made. We decided to use google forms to create a survey to share with our audience because we are trying to find out whether we're reaching the right target audience and try to improve on our music video. Here are our questions

1. Age
2. Gender
3. How often do you listen to Indie genre music?
4. If you were a part of our band, what would you do to make our social page more engaging?
5. do you think our band's social media page is engaging?
6. What's your opinion on our first digipak sketch? is it understandable?
7. How does our artist's persona relate to you?

Here's our first digipak rough sketch

Here's the result of the questionnaires

From the feedback, we learned that for our first digipak sketch is quite vague, but it is still understandable by the audiences, which is why we keep it simple to be understandable and digestible, so that people understand the bigger picture.

For our digipak, we're planning to make something that can "represent" the band; either we put the band's member faces or something that identify as our brand. We also don't want our social media page to heavily appear like some average personal-Instagram users posts, so we will try to make it as polished as possible; to distinct ourselves from your average instagram user's posts/

This questionnaires is very helpful for us to receive a third-party/gathering opinions from others on what can and should be improve in our digipak later on. Asking our targeted audience should be prioritized to get an accurate preferences for our digipak and social media in the future, so that we understand what our audiences what.

 

Self Reflection: This screentest helps us receive some feedbacks directly from our targeted audience. These feedbacks are useful as an indicator if whether our music video editing, song, and meaning has reach or understandable to our targeted audiences. 

Editing

 

Editing

This post was made by me and outlines the editing process for the final music video

Most of this post was made by Nathan.

Final Timeline:

using tricks I learnt from the teacher such as syncing the performance clips to the song, then setting their opacity to 0 for scenes where they're unused, it has saved me some time during editing

Color grading

Scene with friends (warm):

Scene without friends (cool)

For the scenes where the main character is alone, I've decided to edit it to be bluer than the scenes where he has somebody along with him, the blue tone was chosen as it is often associated with loneliness, solitude and coldness. That coldness I wanted to convey as I wanted to portray being alone as that uncomfortable coldness

The process of color grading was quite rushed as I was used to editing single photos at this point and often times it takes me 5 minutes more or less to edit one photo, furthermore, the color grading settings on the editing software I used was quite different to the app I often use so it was a little bit of a learning curve. 

Aspect ratio

I didn't use a traditional 16:9 aspect ratio common to many screens and chose to use 2.35:1, also known as the cinemascope aspect ratio or resolution, the reason for this is due to my genre conventions often having black bars displayed in their music videos, furthermore I wanted to mimic an anamorphic lens' stretch in order to try and capture the music video in a way that mimics the gear of usual indie music videos which often also use anamorphic lenses

Lastly, by having a wider aspect ratio, it allows for the focus of the viewer to be less on the top and bottom where in our music video nothing happens and instead focuses on the center third of the screen, giving an easier viewing.

Self Reflections: Nathan were in charge of this editing section. But overall, he did a very great job while doing it in a short span of time and with limited clips of stockshoots. I think in the future, I have to dived in into this section in order to expand my skills tree.

Digipak : Research and Development

 This is the Digipak Research & Development of our group, Most of this was made by Louis

In this blogpost, I will show the album covers and digipak backsides that I've looked at as inspiration for my front cover and back cover digipak, as well as my progress in creating the digipak.

Here are some indie album that I've taken a look at for my digipak

These Indie album covers seem to follow a convention of having grainy imagery of an abstract photo that may have meaning behind it, sometimes being poorly lit. Some album covers also feature duo-toned imagery. The typeface used for all of these covers seem to be sans serif typefaces. These are the visuals that I will attempt to replicate in order to conform to Indie album cover conventions.

Instead of putting all the sides of the digipak in one file, I decided that I'll do it in sections, front cover, back cover, spine, etc.

I will be using the template above that I've found from the internet as a sort of reference to measurements that will be needed for my digipak. Once I've completed the different each section, I will then combine them all in one file according to the measurements and orientation of the reference above.

  

Here are my first batch of drafts

I used these images as they reflect the sad story covered in the music video. For all of these images, I've followed the abstract hidden meaning convention, where each image has more to it when not taken at face value. 

For my 1st draft (top left) I chose the image, as it used an extreme long shot and some neon lights being shown. I've done this to show isolation and loneliness done by the extreme long shot, and a hint of happiness represented by the minimal colorful neon light, to reflect how the music video's story is how the star has become lonely and lost his friends. The hint of happiness is also shown in the music video when the star was reminiscing the fun memories with his friends.

For my 2nd draft (top right) I also chose this image since it shows someone being alone which explicitly tells the viewer themes of isolation. This is done through the long shot showing no-one around the area except for 1 person in the middle of the screen. However, The hint of happiness isn't represented by the neon light but instead with the yellow-orange street lamp since the colour yellow connotes joy and happiness, though, I think that it's a little too prominent to only show a hint of joy.

My 3rd draft (bottom) was chosen since it shows both the extreme long shot for isolation, and the neon light for a little bit of cheerfulness. The most prominent reason for choosing that image was because it had both those technical elements as well as a sign facing away from the camera. I liked this since it connotes that there is hidden meaning that the viewer isn't able to tell right away, but is present in the cover. Though this could also connect to the hidden reason on why the star had lost his friends, since it wasn't explicitly explained in the music video.

I was unhappy with these drafts as to me they weren't appealing enough for a general audience. I also noticed that I failed to follow the convention of sans serif fonts, so I decided to make a few more drafts for the front cover digipak. I also later realised that the measurements were not the same as the reference.

Here are my second batch of drafts

I used these images since the main song of the album and the album name is "TELEPHONES", and these images feature a telephone. I've done this so that the audience can make a quicker connection to the music video so that they wouldn't need to look to hard to look at hidden meaning so that they'll quickly be able to realise and make connections through the branding.

My fourth draft (top left) had the name of the album on a bit of a corner to explicitly make the audience create connections. I've tried to use a yellow tint to represent the happiness this time, however, I think that the yellow was shown too prominently so it was no longer just a hint and is excessive. Later on the typeface to me seemed too aggressive for a much slower paced song, so I decided to lessen the intensity of it in later drafts.

My fifth draft (top left) I realised that I loosely followed the conventions in the first draft, so I continued with the sans serif typeface that indie covers have, however I added a bit of texture to the title so that It would look too boring. I also got rid of the yellow tint since, it was too excessive in the first one, however I did not find a way to show the small bit of happiness in this draft. even though the serif typface was already used to conform to conventions, I've tried to use another cursive typeface for the band name in order to slightly subvert from Indie cover conventions.

For my sixth draft (bottom) I've changed the serif typeface to be a little skinnier and get rid of the texture since it was it looked too distracting and out of place for me, everything else remained the same, however I've added more texture to make the cover seem a lot more messy and noisy to conform to conventions.

These drafts to me still felt too bland, since the image looked like it was barely touched and I failed to conform to the duotone convention. I've also realised that the latest draft looked to messy for my liking and could be changed to make it still look appealing while it not being to noisy.

These are my third batch of drafts

For my third batch, I've used the same image as the last batch, however this time, I've implemented the duotone convention.

for my seventh draft, I haven't implemented the duotone effect, however I tried to change the placements of the title and band name to make it look more appealing for the audience and less boring. The title colour has also been changed so that it uses the colour blue, to show sadness and connect it with the depressing themes of the song and music video. I've also dimmed down the amount of messy white highlights on the cover since it looked to messy in the previous draft. I've also added a bit of noise and grain to conform to the textured grainy look to Indie covers.

For my Eight draft, I've repositioned the texts so that they were in the original spot, however this time I've added the duotone effect, with the two colours being blue & yellow, in order to show both the happy and sad feelings that the music video connotes. The telephone is mostly the yellow part since the happiest moments of the star was when he could call back to memories with his friends.

For my ninth and final draft, the only thing I've changed is the position of the texts, to make it the same as my sevent draft, while having the duotone colours from my eight draft. Everything else is kept the same.

I feel satisfied with with ninth draft and will probably use it as the front cover of my digipak. I'm beginning to see the theme and visual for my digipak, so I will continue to follow the visuals from the front cover and bring it over to the back cover as well.

Here are some back covers and spine digipaks that I've taken a look at for my digipak

The back of digipaks often give have a track list on the left hand side of the back cover, featuring the songs that are inside of the disc in the digipak. The back cover also shows a bar code on either corners of the back, as well as some legal infringement commonly done near the bottom of the backside. The spines are also included in some of these, where it features mainly only the artist name as well as the album name.

Here are some of my back cover and spine drafts

Here are the first couple drafts of my backside digipak. Since, I've already have a theme and a visual I can follow, it made it easier for me to create the next sections since I've already have an idea for what I need to follow. For my back cover, I used the main song as the first song on the track list, with the rest being lesser non-important songs. I've followed the duotone and grainy visuals I had with the front cover, and I've also included the band's name on the back of the digipak. I've also put the band's name and album name on the spine of the digipak.. I Since these drafts are very similar with the only difference being the placement of the band name and barcode, I think I'll go with the second draft (left) as the official back cover and my spine draft as the official spine.

Here is an example that I found of the inside of an Indie digipak

The inside of Indie digipaks often show the entire band, meaning all the band members in one frame and shot on the inside of their digipaks. Continuing to follow the conventions of the digipak's cover, duotone, grainy,
etc.

These are my drafts for the inside of the digipak, I think they look alright as they follow the conventions and look good enough for the audience. Since showing the members is part of the conventions, audiences also get to see the band members.

Here is the final Digipak in the form of the reference

Self Reflections: In my opinion Louis did a very good job in designing the digipak. He has shown the step by step progresses as well as what little changes he did and adjusted. For me, the album cover has already represent our group persona, which represent and targeted the demographic of a young teenagers at the age of 17+. 

Social Media: Research & Development

In this blogpost, my group decided on the social media presence for our star to be reflected in our products (social media posts, music video, etc)

RESEARCH #1: VACATIONS

What do they post on their social media page? Can you group the different posts into categories (eg Personal, promotional etc)

Just like other bands, the Vacations share updates and activities for their fans to keep them informed about the band's current state, endeavors, and other aspects related to the band. What adds a personal touch to their account is their sharing of daily behind-the-scenes activities. They also frequently post memes that are mostly related about themselves, which adds a more relaxed and playful vibe to the band. This contributes to the development of their image as a fun and laid-back band on their social media pages, contrasting to their musical persona that they've shown in the music (composed). In addition to sharing personal insights, they also create promotional content, primarily focused on their tour schedules that include dates and locations for their concerts.

Does it feel personal or is someone else creating content for them?

Their social media profiles come across as more personal instead of being managed by a team or a corporate that filters the content of their post for the sake of their official accounts. It seems that their goal is to connect with the audience by presenting themselves as relatable, choosing to be seen as a humble, and fun band rather than as glamorous or formal superstars.

Do fans have the chance to interact and engage with a. The artist b. Other fans

Fans of VACATIONS is possible to interact with the artist (a) through the instagram comment sections, but it seems that the band choose did not make any interaction with the fans throughout their social pages. It seems that instagram acts as an update of what are they up to and an announcement of tours; basically, an update of their activity in general. But, fans can still interact with the other fans (b) through the comment sections, and it is most likely to discuss and share their thoughts about the band's posts.

How does the artist promote their music?

They promote their music/bands through their social media pages while posting memes to maintain a relaxed engagement of the band between their audiences. They're the most actives in Instagram and Tiktok, as they got the most engagement on those social media platform.

How has this soc media influenced you?

We would like to conform the meme posting contents that they did in their social media pages, as we want our band to be known the same way as them, which is a playful and easy-going persona that we show in social media. The reason why this is necessary is because we want

RESEARCH #2: REALITY CLUBS

What do they post on their social media page? Can you group the different posts into categories (eg Personal, promotional etc)

On their social media platforms, they post updates about the band’s activities and share information regarding their current situation to keep their fans in the loop. Furthermore, they have recently uploaded mini-vlogs showcasing the city they are visiting for their latest concert series, known as the BUZZ Tour, which they refer to as "stage journal." They also seem to be promoting their merchandise through their social media channels. Overall, their social media posts are mostly well-polished and professionally edited.

Does it feel personal or is someone else creating content for them?

For Reality Clubs it looks like a team of social media sections and photographers are behind the band while developing, creating, and filtering contents that are allowed to be posted to the band's social media page.

Do fans have the chance to interact and engage with a. The artist b. Other fans

In the majority of their social media updates, there is no indication that the band replies to or engages with comments from their fans. The comments section is consistently filled with fans sharing their support and motivational messages for the band. When the post pertains to an upcoming concert, attendees express their enthusiasm about the band performing in their cities, which boosts engagement and excitement among fans. While they may not communicate on social media, they do connect with their audience during live performances.

How does the artist promote their music?

Reality Club promotes their music through social media, such as Instagrams as the main platform. Other than that, they also promote their music through live performances and world tours (e.g. BUZZ Tour) in order to increase the awareness for their new music amongst their loyal fans. Not only that, they feature they're new released on their social media bio.

How has this soc media influenced you?

The vibrant neon colors on some posts inspired us to assign a unique color theme to each member of our band. For example, the neon color associated with Louis would be red. When he is the spotlight/at least present in a post, ambiance of that post will closely reflect the color red as well. This color will be symbolising the personality of the respective member.

1st drafts

This is our first social media draft, where we tried to visualise what will our band's social media post looks like at first.

2nd draft

Here is our official instagram account after we posts some pictures.

Self Reflection: This social media research and development is useful for us to get to know the visual appearance and how does an ideal social media post from our celebrity looks like? and what meaning does it conjures? In addition, the research also helps us in developing an ideal social media posts for it to be accepted by our targeted demographic audiences.