Evaluation Question 4: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

I used several areas of media technologies, including:

• Blogger
• Pinterest
• Video Camera
• Tripod
• Final Cut
• Photoshop
• Youtube
• Prezi
• Emaze
• Slideshare
• Storyboard that
• Projector
• Microsoft

I used different media technologies to present my work in an efficient way and research endless relative things to help me in the creation of my product.  First of all, I used a variety of cameras – the best one being a Canon DSLR. The Canon camera was of great quality; however, I was unable to use it consistently throughout the creation of my product as it was often unavailable.  This left me having to use a camcorder, which did its job but didn’t pay out as well as the Canon in terms of quality. The cameras both had many different settings on them in case you were filming close ups, outdoor shots etc. which I took full advantage of when filming. There was also an option to have the rule of thirds grid on the screen of the cameras, which I used as it ensured that my product was more symmetrical, accurate and aesthetically pleasing. Getting used to the different options and effects available on the camera was fairly straight forwards and probably took about 10 minutes overall; which isn’t bad. I also used a tripod occasionally to stabilise my shots and create clips using a variety of cinematography techniques, such as pans, zooms and tilts. The tripod also helped with creating shots that last for a long period of time as the camera would stay still and film what I wanted while I prepare other things. A negative of the tripod would be how inefficient it was given my chosen filming locations; as I filmed on rocky beaches and unlevelled ground. This made it more difficult to get a straight shot and I often took up a lot of time trying to adjust the shot with only a few hours of sunlight left as it was Winter.  Tripods are a great necessity to have when filming as they can make a difference from your video looking unprofessional and looking professional. When I filmed my preliminary task I used a tripod on flat, solid ground and the end result looked like the already existing music video – which is what I was aiming for. I also filmed with the cameras as a handheld which created a very natural look and it was very easy. This was my preferred method as I felt the look brought more to my video than the still shots with the tripod; however, the tripod was a lot more useful when using it in the projector scenes.

When making my preliminary task I used Adobe Premier Pro to edit the clips together. I liked this programme, as it was much like Photoshop (which I’m already familiar with after using it a great amount for my AS Level coursework). It was very unreliable at times as the video had to process often and sometimes it wouldn’t process which created a problem and wasted time. The effects were also more difficult to create in comparison to the current programme we use, Final Cut. Final Cut is very complex and I found it very difficult to understand at first. I made a lot of early mistakes but when I got used to the software and its features I found it much easier and quicker than Adobe Premier. However, I did have many problems with the Mac computer which had the software on. The Macs would sometimes not save work properly or refuse to save work and on many occasions my internet wouldn’t work. This created a vast amount of delays for me in both research and construction of my products. When creating my preliminary task, I used a PC instead of a MAC and I had virtually no problems with this.

Photoshop was another programme used during research, planning and construction. Photoshop has been the most prominently used programme in this course. I got used to Photoshop fairly quick in my AS year as I was already familiar with the basics; although I still find new ways to use it every day. I used photoshop to edit images used for my ancillary text as well as create my ancillary text. I found this to be very similar to the magazine created in my first year; however, my skills have developed since then and I found a lot of different techniques to use; in particular the selective colour tool which I found very helpful when toning images. Google Mock ups of a digipak were also created on photoshop and I even used it to help me tweak the images used for my storyboard. Photoshop provides its user with endless possibilities and I think it is one of the most important and prevalent products used on my coursework.

YouTube was a commonly visited website during construction, research and planning. I used youtube a lot to watch tutorials on how to create special effects in final cut pro and even on how to do small techniques when I was completely new to the programme. I would also use it to watch clips from music videos, adverts, tv programmes and films to get inspiration in terms of cinematography and mise-en-scene. Youtube was important during research as I used it to view videos of the same genre as my chosen song. Documentaries about my favourite cinematographers and directors were also on there, which I watched for inspiration, tips and techniques. The images shot on the projector in my final video were also found on youtube.  I also used youtube to upload my work in video form.

Prezi, Emaze and Slideshare were all used to present my work. I was already familiar with Prezi and slideshare from my first year of studies, however emaze was very new to me. At first I found it very confusing but I quickly got the hang of the layout and thought it was a very modern and aesthetically pleasing way to present my work. It was easier to get a larger amount of writing on the emaze slides than on prezi slides or powerpoint slides. Emaze also had easy options to add decals and images to the slides, which Prezi also has but it is much easier to add these effects on emaze. However, when embedded to my blog emaze doesn’t compare to the quality of prezi. Prezi’s look very professional and attractive on my blog, whereas emaze presentations are the wrong size (which I had to edit in the code as it was taking up the majority of my blog) and the writing was difficult to read unless zoomed right in.

This year I found storyboard that which is an online website for creating storyboards. I found the website to be okay as a platform as it didn’t have many effects I would’ve liked to present in my storyboard due to my narrative being abstract and quite hard to represent without the addition of special effects/editing techniques. I found the website to be very good and had everything anyone would need to create a basic storyboard without having to spend a long amount of time drawing it out by hand. I created a basic storyboard which I then saved as images and later tweaked in photoshop to get my desired effect.

Another helpful website I used was Pinterest. I used pinterest to create storyboards during my research whenever I found something that inspired me. When watching films and looking at art, if I ever saw anything that inspired me I would simply attach the image/video to pinterest and create a board to keep my inspiration on. I referred back to this board a lot when creating my storyboard and final product. This is probably one of the most important things I did during research and planning as it really helped my ideas come together without it being messy or confusing while keeping it all in the same place.

I also used a projector to project youtube videos over my actress.  The first projector I used was in the theatre and projected onto a much larger screen which initially sounded great but in reality wasn’t. My actress was too short for the screen and we only managed to get close ups. After this we switched to a much smaller screen and the projector turned out to be a great idea and the final product looked professional and aesthetically pleasing.

I used blogger to post my work onto a blog which kept it all in the same place in an organised, reliable and clean manner. I found blogger very straight foreward and effective as the posts are easy to edit in case you make a mistake and you can embed almost anything on to your blog which looks crisp and professional and also makes it easier to share your work from different websites/apps/software. It is also incredibly easy to upload your own images and videos.

I used Microsoft programmes such as powerpoint, word and publisher to write up my research in order to post it on my blog and make it more memorable. For example, I would put a collection of fonts I had found onto a powerpoint then post it on my blog. It also made it easy to analyse the fonts at the same time and see what they look like next to each other. I have used Microsoft software for as long as I can remember and it’s very simple, straight forward and easy to use.