Eval question 4

Eval question 4

• 1.
  How did youuse new media technologies in the construction stage?
• 2.
  Final Cut Expresswas the software we used to edit our music video footage together. Using a highly advanced piece of software like this was much more beneficial to us than using a run of the mill video editor such a Window’s Movie Maker, which would only have allowed us to put footage beside each other and use novice transitions. Meanwhile, Final Cut allowed us to use:  Multi-Timeline Editing – This allowed us to quickly cut between multiple clips using the Razor tool and lowering the opacity of shots. This was highly useful during the climax of the video, as the beat dropped and the editing pace picked up drastically, I was able to interchange between clips quickly without having to add in a new clip every time. I did not use this feature much during the rest of the video editing however, as most of our shots were narrative based and build up over time, meaning that there were specific clips I had to use at specific points in the video.  Colour Correction, Effects and Adjustments – As our video was an indie folk/trance video, some editing was in order to ensure that the raw footage met up to the genre’s conventions. As such, I used the colour correction tool to desaturate the narrative shots to my liking, draining the vibrancy. I also experimented with the RGB balance tool to tint the shots certain colours, however decided against using this in the final product as my audience feedback had advised me not to overdo effects. Instead, I heightened.
• 3.
  Wix was thesite used to construct our website from templates provided by the site. Using Wix ensured that we didn’t have to start coding our website from scratch. The site is user-friendly and simple in layout, but comes with many complex and interesting functions, so even complete novice’s such as ourselves could create a professional looking website. Certain functions of the site were especially valuable when designing our website, such as:  Image Manipulation – Wix allows its users to insert images onto web pages as edit them as they please, allowing us to take creative liberties and fool around with the tool before deciding on what looked best. We used this to adjust saturation levels to match them to the aesthetic of our other products and to ensure they blended well with the web page. As such, the website images were adjusted to fit with the digipak’s colour scheme.  On-site Blog Creation – This feature allowed us to integrate a blog onto our News page which would update as we posted to the blog. This feature was highly useful, as it was relatively simple to use and saved us the trouble of creating a blog on a different site and having to embed it into the website, or attempt to create a blog like structure on Wix from scratch.  Store Feature – Wix comes with a software features that allows it’s users to create and customize an online store to their liking. We were able to use this to add pricing, product titles, descriptions and refund agreements to the faux merchandise that we designed in Photoshop, which were used as the product avatars.
• 4.
  Photoshop CS6 isthe image editing software we used to put together our digipack. Highly advanced, it is a regularly used piece of software used through professionals throughout the media industry, and was indispensable when creating out product.  Image Color Correction – This is just one of the many features we used to edit the photos we had taken, but it was highly effective. We raised the exposure of the images first, to create an almost dreamlike air to the photos, which we then perfected by adding field blurs using the Filters option, to make the image softer and less harsh on the eyes. Originally, we tried out a black and white aesthetic, but decided against it as we believed it was aesthetically unpleasing and more alternative rock than indie folk. By using the colour adjustment tool, we were able to tint the photo with a colour scheme of browns and other light, muted colours, creating the overall aesthetic of an old photograph.  Using Custom Fonts – Photoshop also allows use of custom fonts that the users can download online, which we did from a site called Da Font, which provided access to millions of custom made fonts which were simple to download. We decided on the King font to use for our band’s logo, and used this font in other areas such as the website’s heading for continuity purposes.  Layer Editing – Photoshop’s ability to support multiple layers was absolutely vital in the production of our digipack. It allowed us to separate images so that adjusting one would not adjust them all, and in doing so create copies that could be saved. This way, we were able to take creative liberties and try out different things on images without being worried about editing any other images accidentally. Similarly, Photoshop’s Undo feature allows its users to do this without worrying about losing the original image or messing things up permanently, as you can always return to what the image looked like before the edit.
• 5.
  This was usedto add certain effects and editing techniques to shots that we couldn’t access in Final Cut Express. For instance, the brief whiteboard shot in which the word ‘love’ is written on the board and then wiped out to be replaced with ‘hate’ was made in After Effects by layering the love layer on top of the hate layer and animating a wipe effect to move with the movement of the eraser. After Effects also allows for layer manipulation such as feathering, which makes the edges softer and hard lines less noticeable, ensuring that the effect flows more smoothly and avoids audience attention, seeming more professional.
• 6.
  During the constructionphase we used a digital camera recorder to shoot all of our main footage, and a stills camera to take photographs which we would later edit in Photoshop to use on the website, digipack, and any faux social media we were using to promote the band. Like in my first year coursework, we used a tripod to steady all of the camera’s shots whilst it was recording, and it was because of my prior experience with the technology and hardware that I was able to determine the best possible shots to be used, and knew to take each shot from several different angles to ensure that we had a wide range to select from when it came time to edit the footage into a video.