Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms of real media products?

Music Video:
The advanced production was to promote a two minute music video for an unsigned band/artist and successfully generate the genre. The genre of my artist is a combination of folk, alternative and acoustic. In order to successfully present these genres I amalgamated all three. It was essential that I researched each of the genres into great depth. One of my main focuses while I was researching and planning was Finley Quaye, a contemporary acoustic folk/reggae artist. I was interested in his contemporary style and his presentation. I was intrigued how Finley Quaye referenced to his cultural backgrounds in his videos he exposes African families and men in their habitats; this influenced me to come up with the idea about making my music video relate to Norfolk, which is where my artist is from. I used the costumes that the audience could identify with; I utilized a casual/trendy style to my artist who also follows the trend of successful mainstream musicians such as, Finley Quaye and Jason Mraz. My artist wears a costume the audience demographic (16-20 year old males) can identify with. Laurence Parkin wears: this fashion style is easily attainable from high street stores such as, ‘TK Maxx’ or ‘H&M’.
Throughout the music video I created a motif for my artist where he plays with devil sticks, this links with Goodwin’s theory where it says ‘the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work’, I also included skateboarders in the mise-en-scene which can be depicted as another motif and should appeal to the more punk/ska audiences. By utilising the devil sticks it immediately developed a generic convention of the folk scene.
The music video reflects fashion of the folk, alternative, acoustic genre for example: grey O’Neill t-shirt (distinctively associated with youthful surfers and skaters), green jean trousers, skate shoes and a flat cap hat which develops references to the folk genre. I used generic signifiers when choosing the locations to amplify the Norfolk roots of the Norfolk artist in order to give the artist a strong regional identity.The Norfolk coastal landscapes, the images of hay bales and the low angle images of East Anglia skies raises that the artist is from Norfolk.
The representation of youth in my music video connotes that young people are quirky and enjoy the freedom of the outdoors. I haven’t used rebellion or mischief in my video whatsoever; this is simply because the genre doesn’t appeal to that type of demographic.
Thus, my music video challenges the urban imagery which artists such as Bob Dylan utilises in his video ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ and Blur in ‘Parklife’. I also looked into the artist Jason Mraz in some depth too. His music videos closely resemble mine in the way that he uses the bright summer landscapes to unfold a world of quirky, fun and down to earth youths, just like in my own music video. The use of a series of silhouette shots of my artist is to anticipate Laurence Parkin’s iconic status and to strengthen the promotion of this unsigned artist.
The mise-en-scene in my video includes contemporary collective identity because it shows male, youthful activities for example: skateboarding; also the artist is relatively young this is appealing to the skater and is subconsciously associated with Britain’s current tribal groups. The theory of genre follows from the idea that audiences feel comfortable when visiting a favoured generic text; Gunther Kress defines genre as ‘a kind of text that derives its form from the structure of a (frequently repeatedly) social occasion, with its characteristic participants and their purposes’ Thus, forms of the folk genre will identify with the focus on landscapes which evoke England’s natural landscapes. The Gaze Theory did not apply to my advanced production because it was irrelevant as there are no lyrics which implicate any sort of voyeurism so I did not want to include any sort of objectifications. My artist is a young male and I wanted audiences to view him as an individual with no attachments this reinforces Lacans mirror stage theory where it suggests that audiences are subconsciously looking for themselves, their own mirror image within the media, I took this into account while filming and editing and featured my artist for the niche audiences of primarily young 16-20 males and females.
My music video is performance based with a montage of close ups, low angle and long distance shots of Parkin in various Norfolk locations, thus indicating that his music and lyrics are culturally inspired. This montage can also connote a journey and the music video as a place to take time out and escape the city life.

Print Productions

My print productions re not generic to a specific genre this is because my artist is a blend of acoustic, folk and alternative so to begin with it was difficult to communicate generic style for my digipak

Whislt I was researching various album covers such as Jack Johnson, Neil Young, Bob Marley etc, I realised that most cover art feature a strong image of the artist for example and is heavily focussed on the image however with small generic motifs to utilise the genre. The Bob Marley cover art shows an overwhelming, iconic image of himself, in most

of Bob Marley's cover art the motif is him smoking. This is why I chose to have a collage of many images of my artist spread out acr

oss the front panel of my digipak to communicate that my artist is a ‘one man band’ I al

so wanted to promote my artist as this is the first album cover he is featured on. As this is a debut album the front panel focuses on the artist so that a possible fan base can recognise him.

I gained the idea of my front panel from ‘A Tribe Called Quest’ album cover ‘Midnight Marauders’. Midnight Marauders utilised lots of faces of hip-hop artists on the front and the back of their album covers, this was to show respect to these certain artists. This album cover can be found in green, red and black.

The two inside panels of my digipak show two screen shots of my artist in the same locations as those in the music video. I deliberately used two very bright images to catch the eye of the audience in addition to that I wanted the bright colours to connote the artists personality. The back panel includes a silhouette shot of my artist, this reflects the research and planning I did on Jason Mraz’s work. The silhouette shot demonstrates and connotes the poetry of Parkin’s lyrics.

The track listing on the back panel is in white writing this is so it looks as if the text is glowing out of the sky. The text is in a font which suggests the folk genre, I developed this idea from artists such as Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and Neil Young where the fonts on their album covers are bold and simple.