Due to some complications I have had to change the link name for my website.
Please click on the following website link to view my final website http://www.myurbandex.info/
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
Friday, 11 May 2012
Evaluation
For coursework this year my task was to create 3 media products in terms of advertising. The challenge was to launch a new television channel based on a target audience with a specific genre. I chose to aim my channel at a teenage audience as I am at this age and can relate to what they want. I have also decided to base my television channel on a genre that I enjoy and will enjoy researching in general. The theme of my channel is Urban music and also Urban dance. I decided to go for this theme because there are no music and dance channels, and I know from being a teenager that this genre of music is becoming increasingly popular. Urban music includes, dub-step, electro, rap and hip hop. Dance styles that follow this genre of music include, shuffle, breakdance and street dance. Another reason I chose this genre is because I have experience in this genre being a dancer myself, I know for fact that it is becoming popular and will have a niche market and also I know there are no Urban music channels. Following from this I had to create 3 products to advertise the launch. One newspaper advert, A5 in size, a double page spread for a magazine and finally a website. All of these products had to work well together as they were the link to the launch. I had to create typical codes and conventions such as a logo for my channel so people would relate and recognize my channels image. We create all of this using software's like (PSE) Photoshop Elements and Kompozer. The creating process was long and hard work but eventually we put all the work together and got the job done.
In what ways does your media product use, develop and challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In order to understand the codes and conventions of media products I had to research a range of websites within my chosen genre. I also had to understand the codes and conventions of double page spread and newspaper adverts. To begin my task I looked at a number of websites with a music genre to collect information on how they work and what they look like. I needed to please my audience. I looked at MTV's website because I know the website is based mainly at a teenage audience and it has a music genre. From looking at this website I was inspired to how my website was going to look in terms of the layout. I particularly liked the layout of this website because it was different and unique to the typical codes and conventions. As you can see from my two screen shots, I followed this website design greatly. One reason due to the easy navigation system and this appeals to my aimed target audience.
I have used the typical conventional navigational bar at the top of the pages of my website as it is an easy way of navigating my website. Also this is used on nearly every real website so I think if I was to release my website onto the real market, it would fit in with real media products. This type of navigation also goes well with my target audience as it is simple and effortless. I followed a lot of typical codes and conventions when creating my coursework. When researching and planning my website I had to look at real media products and get inspired which I did. One of the websites that inspired was MTV. The main thing on MTV's website that inspired me was the layout. I liked the idea of being able to view a small sized sample of the each page on the homepage, I also liked that you could click on the sample to view the actual page. These small samples are technically called thumbnails. I took this useful and modern system when creating my website. I feel that adding this will give my website a modern edge and help fit in more on the real market. This layout of the sections is being in a table format which helps to structure each page and give continuity. The layout of my website was inspired for the MTV's layout. Another inspiration i gained for MTV's website was to embed a moving image or a video to my homepage. I included this because it brought my homepage to life and it also makes the page a lot more attractive to look at. It also fits in well with my target audience and I found out for my researching when i sent out a survey. It is very modern and included the use of multimedia techniques. The video I embedded was of myself and other friends dancing in various locations. This meant that the video fully linked up with the theme I chose to work on 'Urban Dance and Music'. This multimedia in my opinion now follows the codes and conventions of websites as most website are now trying to go for this multimedia approach to viewing.
As for the colour scheme of my website, this was decided by myself but had slight inspiration from my research. I chose the black and white colour scheme because I feel that they are quite urban colours, These colours are very representative of 80's culture and pop. Also I took inspiration from my own experiences of break dance. Break dancers are known to dance on black and white checked vinyl flooring and I see this form of dance to be urban and fit in well with the theme of my channel. I also found of from research that black, white and red are the best colours in terms of advertising, this is because the bold colours allowed my images to be illustrated clearly. I created a survey on newspaper adverts, double page spreads and websites to find opinion on what people want and what to do. I found out that most people prefer to look at images and videos rather than read text so I included this throughout my website. I also included all my own images to reduce the risk of copy right on my website and to make it more unique and interesting. One of the main tasks I had to do to fulfill my coursework was to create a logo for my channel. Logo's are used to attract and give your audience something to recognize. For example, the M for McDonalds or the tick for Nike.
I came up with the name 'UrbanDex' for my channel because my channel is based on Urban music and dance. I felt the name fitted in well with the theme perfectly. Urban being the genre of music and Dex meaning decks for Dj'ing. Changing decks to Dex then gave the channel name an modern teenage edge.
I needed my logo to be memorable so that when people see it they can relate back to the genre and theme. I searched on a free font website www.dafont.com and searched under graffiti fonts and modern fonts to find the one suitable for my channels logo. Thanks to this website my logo was created, I feel that my logo is simple but effective and you can clearly see the theme in the logo.
Here is the first logo I came up with, I did like this logo but I found when I put it onto my website it blended into the background to much and the lines underneath the text made it quite difficult to read.
This was the final version of my logo and this featured on all my coursework pieces. Double page spread, newspaper advert and the website. I placed this on all my pieces to link them all together so that my target audience will relate to it when they see it. I also added images to my logo as you can, these images of music records, headphones and a cassette tape all link in with the genre of my channel.
As well as following typical codes and conventions for websites I did the same for my other two media products. I followed the typical codes and conventions when creating my double page spread for a magazine in terms of the layout and media. I followed examples of double page spreads presented on a powerpoint by my media teach to gain my inspirations for my own. I learned about the positioning of images on the spread and how to present them best for advertising. I learned that the less text the better and the positioning of prominent words like 'Launch' are really important. I learnt that positioning images on the right hand page on the side of the page is a great place to advertise and gain your audiences interest because it is the first place they will see when the open the page. I used this technique when creating my double page spread. I also stuck with the same colour scheme on my website and newspaper ad. I stuck with the red, black and white because I feel the colours work well together and create a bold image. I later learned after finishing all my tasks that these three colours are the most popular chosen colours and the best in terms of advertising. When finishing my double page spread for this first time it was mentioned that it looked very neat and tidy, this was taking as a compliment but also improvement as teenagers are more about the mess and angles, therefore I then rotated my text and pictures to make it look more modern. I then did the same on my newspaper advert. My newspaper advert was similar to my double page spread in terms of images, logo and colours because I need them all to link together as one company channel.
How effective is the combination of your main media product to your ancillary task?
The main task I had was to create my website for a teenage audience to advertise my TV channel 'Urban Dex' and the ancillary tasks were to create a newspaper advert and a double page spread for a TV listings magazine. To create a successful Tv channel I needed to link all three together which I feel I did really well by using up to date media products. In order for my audience to relate to my channel I added my logo not only on my website but on both newspaper advert and double page spread. this is one of the ways I have linked all my adverts together and another way was through the colour scheme. I have stuck to the black and white colour scheme because one of the reasons is that I feel it is rather urban looking and another is because the stand out together. The white and black contrast each other. I used a white background so that when writing in different colours and black the font will be seen clearly. Another thing I used to link all my adverts together is an image. I used my own image so that copy right wont be an issue and the image I used clearly linked to the genre and theme of my channel. Audiences relate more to images so by adding the same image of a breakdancer the audience will be attracted and relate to the theme.
By adding this image I have giving the audience an immediate picture as to what the channel is about. When creating my double page spread I felt that I needed more images to make it completely clear to what my channel is about. I then decided to add a picture of an 80's retro television and a boom box. Instantly they are going to get an inclining that my channel is on Tv and has a music genre. These images help with the representation of my channel.
Another comment made on my images was that they were all original images on my website, all of the photos were taken myself or by someone I knew. I used original images to avoid copyright issues.
I have also linked my ancillary tasks together through the language and fonts. I have used on both ancillary tasks a small paragraph telling the audience what they are reading and what they are going to expect on my channel. I chose to make it small and simple as I am aiming my channel at teenagers and they don't want to spend their time reading. I have also written in a teenage style of text to attract this my target audience and I have also used attractive colours.
Here is a use of both attractive images and fonts. I
added some bold attractive text to this image to make it more attractive and appealing to my target teenage audience. The image itself fits in strongly with my dancing theme of my channel so by adding the writing to the picture it then makes you look at it in more detail. This image is located on my entertainments page. It is the image I have used for the viewers to follow on to a video if they wish to learn an easy dance routine.
As well as having clear easy to read font styles, I have also kept the language easy to read. I have stuck to short paragraphs which can be read in a matter of seconds. This fits in well with my target audience as no teenagers like to read for a long period of time.
As you can see from the image above on the right, the font I have used is the same colour blue/purple that is on my websites logo. I have done this to try and keep the colour schemes the same through the website. The font itself is attractive to teenagers as it is thick and bubble like writing. This could also be related to graffiti style writing which also links to my teenage audience and in with my urban theme. If I had used plan a font like times new roman it would not appeal to the eye as much. Also the colour stands out really well on the background it is on.
I added this font via photoshop elements by simply writing on the image.
Another important way I have linked all my tasks together was through the information on each on ancillary tasks. The main task was to show the launch of a new TV channel. Mine was called Urban Dex and the main source of advertisement I had was my website, so another way I linked together all my ancillary tasks was by having the websites link on each on. If people wanted to find out more information on my channel they could simply go to the website.
In my opinion all three of my ancillary tasks compliment each other very well through the proper codes and conventions of texts. Although my newspaper advert is very simple, I feel it is simple but effective. Keeping the same colour scheme and font style and texts, they all help to promote my channel. Although I have got to think about whether teenagers read the newspaper, most teenagers responded on my survey to not reading the actually newspaper but they do notice interesting adverts.
Overall I believe that the main task and ancillary tasks are effectively combined together in terms of colour scheme, logo text, images and other codes and conventions therefore my channel will be fully advertised. However these are not the best ways of attracting my audience and there are more effective ways of distributing channels e.g TV, radio and podcast.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Throughout the course I have learnt a lot from feedback and I have learnt that all feedback is valuable in some sort of form. The first form of feedback I encountered was through my research. I created a survey to find out what people like and dislike about newspaper ads, double page spreads and websites. This is an effective primary source of information. I needed this feedback before constructing my coursework so I know what codes and conventions would be most useful in terms of advertising. I aimed my survey at the general public because this was before I had even decided the genre of my website and channel. These results helped me greatly in terms of what to do and what not to include on my media project.
One positive I gained from my products was the link and how they compliment each other. My audience could easily see that all my ancilary tasks and website link together to advertise my channel. They also compliment on the use of my logo, colours and images and how professional they looked. By clearly using all these on all tasks it made the link clear for all to see. One person said "they all work well together, you can tell it's a good TV channel." The main positive I took from all the feedback was gaining the interest of my target audience, fellow pupils could clearly see that my channel was aimed at a predominantly teenage audience. They also complimented me on my chosen theme. They said that the theme of urban dance and music was clear through my entire website from the very start. Thanks to the use of photos taken professionally, my images of urban dancers and singers kept the theme strong throughout. These were also a key part of my accilarry tasks. You could see my love for this genre from the moment you looked at them.
As well as gaining strengths on my website and advertising task, my target audience also picked out my weaknesses. One of the weaknesses that was mentioned was that they thought my double page spread was more like a poster. I think that was partly because my double page spread was just displayed as a sheet of paper not actually in a magazine. They also thought this was because the page seemed very neat and tidy. They commented on a small paragraph of writing in the center of my page. They gave me the idea of angling the text slightly to fill the page more and also make the page slightly more modern.
This was the first version of my final drafted double page spread. As you can see the straight edges and the straight angled text in the centre made it look very neat and tidy. I then went back to edit this version to create the revised final draft and the one that will be marked for coursework.
The image below is what I did to my double page spread from receiving feedback.
This is the final version of my double page spread. As you can see from receiving feedback I then went back to edit my work and make the useful changes to my work to make it look more modern and urban looking. I roughly trimmed along all the straight edges to make them more wavy and un tidy and this did add to great effect in my opinion. Also the centre text I then angled more to make it appeal more to my target audience and make it more urban modern looking.
Another commented made was on how I showed more great PSE skills in editing the music notes coming out of the retro record player. Those were two separate images which I carefully edited together using the layers on PSE. I think this added to the whole piece and made it look a lot better. I was very pleased with my final version.
Another weakness I had was the video I embedded onto my entertainment page. Due to the soft wear 'Kompozer' that I was using, I was unable to move the video to the exact spot I wanted, so my video is slightly over to the left rather than the central position where I wanted it.
Here is a screen shot of what the overlarge video did to my layout. The big blank section in the centre of the website is where the video is located. This then meant all my other cells altered in sizes. This then lead to a number of problems which I had to deal with myself as my media teacher at this time was no longer with us.
Below is the video's URL to Youtube. This is the actual video I embedded onto my website. The video was to large for my site as you can see by viewing it is a very high tech video and around 3minutes in length. I was not going to give in with this video as it fitted in with the theme and genre of my website perfectly. This was a key component to my website my media teacher said as the video adds great depth to the page, and it gives my target audience something to look at and the main feature is that it shows what sort of programmes you can expect on my website. This wasn't the only video I embedded onto my website, I also embedded another video onto my entertainments page to get the audience involved with the website. The video on my entertainments page was an easy to follow dance routine in an Urban style again linking to the genre of my channel. My target audience really liked this feature and said the routine was easy to follow and view on the site. Another feature they commented with my video was the fact it was me on the video. It also kept up the theme of urban music as well as dance as the video had urban music on it. They said it was clear how passionate I take the subject and the theme I have chosen to base my channel on.
http://www.youtube.com/embed/qyK9BESrTeM
I was also criticised on the layout of my pages. The website I took inspiration on for my layout was MTV. I followed their website to create the layout of my website. I gained positive and negative feedback on this, it is simply down to a matter of opinion whether you like the layout or not, however with more time I would rectify the layout.
One of the most positive pieces of feedback I gained was on my navigation. They commented on how easy my site was to navigate, the links between the pages were very clear and easy to follow. They also commented on the use of a navigation bar at the top of the page. This is a very modern and simple way of getting around on a website. They also commented on how well my linking pages worked together and how easy it was to get onto other pages.
This is my navigation bar which is located on the top of each page. This is a modern way of navigation, and it also follows the typical codes and conventions of real media products.
Overall I am very pleased with the reaction I had from my target audience, and I have also learnt a lot from their positive and negative comments.
The video bellow is of some younger pupils looking on my website Urban Dex. I was hoping to use their feedback to alter my website to make it better than it already is but unfortunately it was to late into the course to do so. I am very pleased with their comments and I received some really good feedback from them.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research planning and evaluation stages?
The first stage of my coursework was research and planning. My main source for my research and planning was the internet so that I could research the codes and conventions of other websites, newspaper adverts and double page spreads with similar themes to what I am going to base mine on. I also used the internet to store my work. Blogger is a very easy way of storing information I use this site last year for film and I have again for A level. I simply posted up all my work I researched so planning and constructing my site will be simple. The site allows others to comment on my work and suggest improvements. I can also get ideas from other blogs and use them to inspire my own work. Blogger also allows me to edit older post so you can continuously add to your work, making improvements as you go along. For the construction of my site I was dependent on media technology, I constructed my website using a software called 'Kompozer'. I used this software to develop my site and construct through the use of cells, tables, embedding videos and images. I developed my skills through ICT massively, I learnt how to use code to adjust my work effectively and add images/ embed videos and how to hyperlink my work together.
Here is an example of what the source coding looks like and what I had to work through to find the location of where to place my videos, images and other features.
I found this rather challenging when creating my website as by making a slight error on this can alter the entire website as I discovered when embedding the video from youtube. This is also a source of hosting as Youtube is hosting my video.
I found using Kompozer very challenging through the construction process. Kompozer is simply a blank canvas from which we then had to create and build our websites. I found it challenging because there we no example templates to start you off or even give you any ideas of how to use the software. I also found it difficult because I had to link up all my pages manually and seperatly. This was very time consumming when building as I also had to work on a newspaper advert and a double page spread. I do feel though as the time on constrution went by I did progress in terms of the construction and using the site. I began to work alot faster and after alot of practise and work on the site I also began to find it alot easier to guide and use. There were some reason issues with Kompozer along with everything else that I was under pressure about. I embedded a video to my site which was then to large for the page cells. Due to my video being to large for the cells it then altered the entire homepage's cells and the entire size of my homepage. This one small problem then dominoed into a number of issues. The first was that Kompozer was then unabling me to change the sizes of my cells, leaving me with two options. The first option was to delete my entire homepage and reconstruct the entire page or delete the video and embedd it again into the code but alter the size in the coding. Thankfully I did manage to resolve this issue in another way. The issue I had was the I had all my cells in one table meaning that if I changed the size of any cell it would then alter the others to try and make them even in size. So I resolved the problem by seperating all the cells on the page and then embedding the video into a single cell with I then made the size of the video I was embedding. This work perfectly and my themed video was embedded onto my site.
Here is an example of me using PSE to create my newspaper advert. As you can see I am currently moving the image of myself breakdancing into the place on the advert where I think it would be most useful and appealing to the eye of my audience. I used PSE for all of my coursework tasks for a number of different things.
The great thing with PSE is that you can also move around the layers if you make a mistake and you can also delete layers all together if you no longer want a layer. This was a great feature to have when I was creating my ancillary tasks as I was constantly changing around the layout of them and adding new things.
I used this to create my ancillary tasks. Photoshop Elements allows me to create images using layers. By using layers I could experiment when making my newspaper advert and double page spread. An example of using layers is placing an image on one layer and then adding text onto another layer then merging the two layers together to create one solid layer. As well as creating my ancillary tasks I also created some images for my gallery page on my website 'Urban Dex'. www.kazoa.com is a free slideshow making website which allows you to place images in one long slide flowing with different animations and effects. Though this didn't all go to plan. After creating my slideshow I then discovered I was unable to place it on Kompozer. This was due to Kazoa not allowing you to take the code and embed it into Kompozer. This meant I had to find another way of displaying my images in my gallery page. I then referred back to my research and planning to look at more gallery pages on real media websites. I then found an inspiring gallery page on www.mtv.com. Their pictures were displayed in files. This meant you would see a file on the page then open the file to view the pictures. This is now a problem I am tackling as Kompozer is saying my images are to big so at the moment my gallery page is closed due to construction. Overall I would say that MTV's website was a huge influence on my website in the research, planning and construction process.
Finally I have my evaluation. New media terminology helped me with this process as I am posting my evaluation on the world wide web. This blog is where I am posting all my research, planning, construction and evaluation aspects. This is again showing I can use new media terminology to post my work. Also I am including multi media into my evaluation such as videos and images.
Conclusion
Overall I feel that I have worked extremely hard this year to complete my coursework. I feel that I have yet again progressed in terms of understanding media and editing techniques as the course developed. The development of my products got stronger and stronger throughout the course in all stages. I think I have coped well with the use of unfamiliar softwares. I needed to understand all of these unfamiliar softwares as they all linked together to create my final products. Real media companies creating products use convergence today and this was the same for me with my products. I had to combine of different softwares and use different websites etc to create my products. I needed to get to grips with all the media products I was using as the media is constantly developing and I need to keep up with the existing media products if I want mine to do well on the market. An example of this would be using blogger. When I was in the middle of updating my blog, blogger then decided to update changing around the whole layout of the website to make it more modern. I then had to quickly learn how to use this new format if I wanted to complete my coursework. Also doing this coursework has improved a number of my skills from last year. My ICT skills have improved massively in terms of blogging my post and in general using the Apple Macs. Another skill I have improved on is the ability to research and plan. Last year I did well on my research and planning but this year I feel I have gone into a lot more detail in order to fully understand the tasks I had to take.
In terms of how I approached my coursework I do feel my time management skills did need to be altered if I did the task again. In terms of my time management I can honestly say I could have done a lot better. I did not manage my time very well as I did have to rush to complete my website and my evaluation due to other subjects having deadlines also. If I was to approach the tasks again I would manage my time more wisely in order to achieve everything I want. One major example is my Gallery page on website. Due to all the deadlines in other subjects and the constant faults with different softwares I was un able to post my gallery page meaning I had to post is as Under Construction. This was not the only thing that I was unable to achieve. I was also unable to add some more multi media features onto my blog such as a video response to my website but I was able to add a number of images to my evaluation to gain some more marks.
In what ways does your media product use, develop and challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In order to understand the codes and conventions of media products I had to research a range of websites within my chosen genre. I also had to understand the codes and conventions of double page spread and newspaper adverts. To begin my task I looked at a number of websites with a music genre to collect information on how they work and what they look like. I needed to please my audience. I looked at MTV's website because I know the website is based mainly at a teenage audience and it has a music genre. From looking at this website I was inspired to how my website was going to look in terms of the layout. I particularly liked the layout of this website because it was different and unique to the typical codes and conventions. As you can see from my two screen shots, I followed this website design greatly. One reason due to the easy navigation system and this appeals to my aimed target audience.
I have used the typical conventional navigational bar at the top of the pages of my website as it is an easy way of navigating my website. Also this is used on nearly every real website so I think if I was to release my website onto the real market, it would fit in with real media products. This type of navigation also goes well with my target audience as it is simple and effortless. I followed a lot of typical codes and conventions when creating my coursework. When researching and planning my website I had to look at real media products and get inspired which I did. One of the websites that inspired was MTV. The main thing on MTV's website that inspired me was the layout. I liked the idea of being able to view a small sized sample of the each page on the homepage, I also liked that you could click on the sample to view the actual page. These small samples are technically called thumbnails. I took this useful and modern system when creating my website. I feel that adding this will give my website a modern edge and help fit in more on the real market. This layout of the sections is being in a table format which helps to structure each page and give continuity. The layout of my website was inspired for the MTV's layout. Another inspiration i gained for MTV's website was to embed a moving image or a video to my homepage. I included this because it brought my homepage to life and it also makes the page a lot more attractive to look at. It also fits in well with my target audience and I found out for my researching when i sent out a survey. It is very modern and included the use of multimedia techniques. The video I embedded was of myself and other friends dancing in various locations. This meant that the video fully linked up with the theme I chose to work on 'Urban Dance and Music'. This multimedia in my opinion now follows the codes and conventions of websites as most website are now trying to go for this multimedia approach to viewing.
As for the colour scheme of my website, this was decided by myself but had slight inspiration from my research. I chose the black and white colour scheme because I feel that they are quite urban colours, These colours are very representative of 80's culture and pop. Also I took inspiration from my own experiences of break dance. Break dancers are known to dance on black and white checked vinyl flooring and I see this form of dance to be urban and fit in well with the theme of my channel. I also found of from research that black, white and red are the best colours in terms of advertising, this is because the bold colours allowed my images to be illustrated clearly. I created a survey on newspaper adverts, double page spreads and websites to find opinion on what people want and what to do. I found out that most people prefer to look at images and videos rather than read text so I included this throughout my website. I also included all my own images to reduce the risk of copy right on my website and to make it more unique and interesting. One of the main tasks I had to do to fulfill my coursework was to create a logo for my channel. Logo's are used to attract and give your audience something to recognize. For example, the M for McDonalds or the tick for Nike.
I came up with the name 'UrbanDex' for my channel because my channel is based on Urban music and dance. I felt the name fitted in well with the theme perfectly. Urban being the genre of music and Dex meaning decks for Dj'ing. Changing decks to Dex then gave the channel name an modern teenage edge.
I needed my logo to be memorable so that when people see it they can relate back to the genre and theme. I searched on a free font website www.dafont.com and searched under graffiti fonts and modern fonts to find the one suitable for my channels logo. Thanks to this website my logo was created, I feel that my logo is simple but effective and you can clearly see the theme in the logo.
Here is the first logo I came up with, I did like this logo but I found when I put it onto my website it blended into the background to much and the lines underneath the text made it quite difficult to read.
This was the final version of my logo and this featured on all my coursework pieces. Double page spread, newspaper advert and the website. I placed this on all my pieces to link them all together so that my target audience will relate to it when they see it. I also added images to my logo as you can, these images of music records, headphones and a cassette tape all link in with the genre of my channel.
As well as following typical codes and conventions for websites I did the same for my other two media products. I followed the typical codes and conventions when creating my double page spread for a magazine in terms of the layout and media. I followed examples of double page spreads presented on a powerpoint by my media teach to gain my inspirations for my own. I learned about the positioning of images on the spread and how to present them best for advertising. I learned that the less text the better and the positioning of prominent words like 'Launch' are really important. I learnt that positioning images on the right hand page on the side of the page is a great place to advertise and gain your audiences interest because it is the first place they will see when the open the page. I used this technique when creating my double page spread. I also stuck with the same colour scheme on my website and newspaper ad. I stuck with the red, black and white because I feel the colours work well together and create a bold image. I later learned after finishing all my tasks that these three colours are the most popular chosen colours and the best in terms of advertising. When finishing my double page spread for this first time it was mentioned that it looked very neat and tidy, this was taking as a compliment but also improvement as teenagers are more about the mess and angles, therefore I then rotated my text and pictures to make it look more modern. I then did the same on my newspaper advert. My newspaper advert was similar to my double page spread in terms of images, logo and colours because I need them all to link together as one company channel.
NEWSPAPER ADVERT ABOVE, DOUBLE PAGE SPREAD BELOW.
How effective is the combination of your main media product to your ancillary task?
The main task I had was to create my website for a teenage audience to advertise my TV channel 'Urban Dex' and the ancillary tasks were to create a newspaper advert and a double page spread for a TV listings magazine. To create a successful Tv channel I needed to link all three together which I feel I did really well by using up to date media products. In order for my audience to relate to my channel I added my logo not only on my website but on both newspaper advert and double page spread. this is one of the ways I have linked all my adverts together and another way was through the colour scheme. I have stuck to the black and white colour scheme because one of the reasons is that I feel it is rather urban looking and another is because the stand out together. The white and black contrast each other. I used a white background so that when writing in different colours and black the font will be seen clearly. Another thing I used to link all my adverts together is an image. I used my own image so that copy right wont be an issue and the image I used clearly linked to the genre and theme of my channel. Audiences relate more to images so by adding the same image of a breakdancer the audience will be attracted and relate to the theme.
By adding this image I have giving the audience an immediate picture as to what the channel is about. When creating my double page spread I felt that I needed more images to make it completely clear to what my channel is about. I then decided to add a picture of an 80's retro television and a boom box. Instantly they are going to get an inclining that my channel is on Tv and has a music genre. These images help with the representation of my channel.
Another comment made on my images was that they were all original images on my website, all of the photos were taken myself or by someone I knew. I used original images to avoid copyright issues.
I have also linked my ancillary tasks together through the language and fonts. I have used on both ancillary tasks a small paragraph telling the audience what they are reading and what they are going to expect on my channel. I chose to make it small and simple as I am aiming my channel at teenagers and they don't want to spend their time reading. I have also written in a teenage style of text to attract this my target audience and I have also used attractive colours.
added some bold attractive text to this image to make it more attractive and appealing to my target teenage audience. The image itself fits in strongly with my dancing theme of my channel so by adding the writing to the picture it then makes you look at it in more detail. This image is located on my entertainments page. It is the image I have used for the viewers to follow on to a video if they wish to learn an easy dance routine.
As well as having clear easy to read font styles, I have also kept the language easy to read. I have stuck to short paragraphs which can be read in a matter of seconds. This fits in well with my target audience as no teenagers like to read for a long period of time.
As you can see from the image above on the right, the font I have used is the same colour blue/purple that is on my websites logo. I have done this to try and keep the colour schemes the same through the website. The font itself is attractive to teenagers as it is thick and bubble like writing. This could also be related to graffiti style writing which also links to my teenage audience and in with my urban theme. If I had used plan a font like times new roman it would not appeal to the eye as much. Also the colour stands out really well on the background it is on.
I added this font via photoshop elements by simply writing on the image.
Another important way I have linked all my tasks together was through the information on each on ancillary tasks. The main task was to show the launch of a new TV channel. Mine was called Urban Dex and the main source of advertisement I had was my website, so another way I linked together all my ancillary tasks was by having the websites link on each on. If people wanted to find out more information on my channel they could simply go to the website.
In my opinion all three of my ancillary tasks compliment each other very well through the proper codes and conventions of texts. Although my newspaper advert is very simple, I feel it is simple but effective. Keeping the same colour scheme and font style and texts, they all help to promote my channel. Although I have got to think about whether teenagers read the newspaper, most teenagers responded on my survey to not reading the actually newspaper but they do notice interesting adverts.
Overall I believe that the main task and ancillary tasks are effectively combined together in terms of colour scheme, logo text, images and other codes and conventions therefore my channel will be fully advertised. However these are not the best ways of attracting my audience and there are more effective ways of distributing channels e.g TV, radio and podcast.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Throughout the course I have learnt a lot from feedback and I have learnt that all feedback is valuable in some sort of form. The first form of feedback I encountered was through my research. I created a survey to find out what people like and dislike about newspaper ads, double page spreads and websites. This is an effective primary source of information. I needed this feedback before constructing my coursework so I know what codes and conventions would be most useful in terms of advertising. I aimed my survey at the general public because this was before I had even decided the genre of my website and channel. These results helped me greatly in terms of what to do and what not to include on my media project.
One positive I gained from my products was the link and how they compliment each other. My audience could easily see that all my ancilary tasks and website link together to advertise my channel. They also compliment on the use of my logo, colours and images and how professional they looked. By clearly using all these on all tasks it made the link clear for all to see. One person said "they all work well together, you can tell it's a good TV channel." The main positive I took from all the feedback was gaining the interest of my target audience, fellow pupils could clearly see that my channel was aimed at a predominantly teenage audience. They also complimented me on my chosen theme. They said that the theme of urban dance and music was clear through my entire website from the very start. Thanks to the use of photos taken professionally, my images of urban dancers and singers kept the theme strong throughout. These were also a key part of my accilarry tasks. You could see my love for this genre from the moment you looked at them.
As well as gaining strengths on my website and advertising task, my target audience also picked out my weaknesses. One of the weaknesses that was mentioned was that they thought my double page spread was more like a poster. I think that was partly because my double page spread was just displayed as a sheet of paper not actually in a magazine. They also thought this was because the page seemed very neat and tidy. They commented on a small paragraph of writing in the center of my page. They gave me the idea of angling the text slightly to fill the page more and also make the page slightly more modern.
This was the first version of my final drafted double page spread. As you can see the straight edges and the straight angled text in the centre made it look very neat and tidy. I then went back to edit this version to create the revised final draft and the one that will be marked for coursework.
The image below is what I did to my double page spread from receiving feedback.
Another commented made was on how I showed more great PSE skills in editing the music notes coming out of the retro record player. Those were two separate images which I carefully edited together using the layers on PSE. I think this added to the whole piece and made it look a lot better. I was very pleased with my final version.
Another weakness I had was the video I embedded onto my entertainment page. Due to the soft wear 'Kompozer' that I was using, I was unable to move the video to the exact spot I wanted, so my video is slightly over to the left rather than the central position where I wanted it.
Below is the video's URL to Youtube. This is the actual video I embedded onto my website. The video was to large for my site as you can see by viewing it is a very high tech video and around 3minutes in length. I was not going to give in with this video as it fitted in with the theme and genre of my website perfectly. This was a key component to my website my media teacher said as the video adds great depth to the page, and it gives my target audience something to look at and the main feature is that it shows what sort of programmes you can expect on my website. This wasn't the only video I embedded onto my website, I also embedded another video onto my entertainments page to get the audience involved with the website. The video on my entertainments page was an easy to follow dance routine in an Urban style again linking to the genre of my channel. My target audience really liked this feature and said the routine was easy to follow and view on the site. Another feature they commented with my video was the fact it was me on the video. It also kept up the theme of urban music as well as dance as the video had urban music on it. They said it was clear how passionate I take the subject and the theme I have chosen to base my channel on.
http://www.youtube.com/embed/qyK9BESrTeM
I was also criticised on the layout of my pages. The website I took inspiration on for my layout was MTV. I followed their website to create the layout of my website. I gained positive and negative feedback on this, it is simply down to a matter of opinion whether you like the layout or not, however with more time I would rectify the layout.
One of the most positive pieces of feedback I gained was on my navigation. They commented on how easy my site was to navigate, the links between the pages were very clear and easy to follow. They also commented on the use of a navigation bar at the top of the page. This is a very modern and simple way of getting around on a website. They also commented on how well my linking pages worked together and how easy it was to get onto other pages.
The video bellow is of some younger pupils looking on my website Urban Dex. I was hoping to use their feedback to alter my website to make it better than it already is but unfortunately it was to late into the course to do so. I am very pleased with their comments and I received some really good feedback from them.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research planning and evaluation stages?
The first stage of my coursework was research and planning. My main source for my research and planning was the internet so that I could research the codes and conventions of other websites, newspaper adverts and double page spreads with similar themes to what I am going to base mine on. I also used the internet to store my work. Blogger is a very easy way of storing information I use this site last year for film and I have again for A level. I simply posted up all my work I researched so planning and constructing my site will be simple. The site allows others to comment on my work and suggest improvements. I can also get ideas from other blogs and use them to inspire my own work. Blogger also allows me to edit older post so you can continuously add to your work, making improvements as you go along. For the construction of my site I was dependent on media technology, I constructed my website using a software called 'Kompozer'. I used this software to develop my site and construct through the use of cells, tables, embedding videos and images. I developed my skills through ICT massively, I learnt how to use code to adjust my work effectively and add images/ embed videos and how to hyperlink my work together.
I found this rather challenging when creating my website as by making a slight error on this can alter the entire website as I discovered when embedding the video from youtube. This is also a source of hosting as Youtube is hosting my video.
I found using Kompozer very challenging through the construction process. Kompozer is simply a blank canvas from which we then had to create and build our websites. I found it challenging because there we no example templates to start you off or even give you any ideas of how to use the software. I also found it difficult because I had to link up all my pages manually and seperatly. This was very time consumming when building as I also had to work on a newspaper advert and a double page spread. I do feel though as the time on constrution went by I did progress in terms of the construction and using the site. I began to work alot faster and after alot of practise and work on the site I also began to find it alot easier to guide and use. There were some reason issues with Kompozer along with everything else that I was under pressure about. I embedded a video to my site which was then to large for the page cells. Due to my video being to large for the cells it then altered the entire homepage's cells and the entire size of my homepage. This one small problem then dominoed into a number of issues. The first was that Kompozer was then unabling me to change the sizes of my cells, leaving me with two options. The first option was to delete my entire homepage and reconstruct the entire page or delete the video and embedd it again into the code but alter the size in the coding. Thankfully I did manage to resolve this issue in another way. The issue I had was the I had all my cells in one table meaning that if I changed the size of any cell it would then alter the others to try and make them even in size. So I resolved the problem by seperating all the cells on the page and then embedding the video into a single cell with I then made the size of the video I was embedding. This work perfectly and my themed video was embedded onto my site.
Another issue I had with my website construction was with my Gallery Page. I constructed my gallery page but then had major issues with placing the images in the places I wanted. I created a slide show of images which I was then going to embed onto the page simular to the video. Kompozer then decided it was going to except the software of my slide show. I then created a powerpoint presentation in Microsoft Powerpoint. Again Kompozer was not excepting the format of the slide show. I then had to make the decision to post on the Gallery page 'Under Construction'. This lets my audience know that my websites page is under construction and will be posted up soon.
Here is an example of me using PSE to create my newspaper advert. As you can see I am currently moving the image of myself breakdancing into the place on the advert where I think it would be most useful and appealing to the eye of my audience. I used PSE for all of my coursework tasks for a number of different things.
The great thing with PSE is that you can also move around the layers if you make a mistake and you can also delete layers all together if you no longer want a layer. This was a great feature to have when I was creating my ancillary tasks as I was constantly changing around the layout of them and adding new things.
I used this to create my ancillary tasks. Photoshop Elements allows me to create images using layers. By using layers I could experiment when making my newspaper advert and double page spread. An example of using layers is placing an image on one layer and then adding text onto another layer then merging the two layers together to create one solid layer. As well as creating my ancillary tasks I also created some images for my gallery page on my website 'Urban Dex'. www.kazoa.com is a free slideshow making website which allows you to place images in one long slide flowing with different animations and effects. Though this didn't all go to plan. After creating my slideshow I then discovered I was unable to place it on Kompozer. This was due to Kazoa not allowing you to take the code and embed it into Kompozer. This meant I had to find another way of displaying my images in my gallery page. I then referred back to my research and planning to look at more gallery pages on real media websites. I then found an inspiring gallery page on www.mtv.com. Their pictures were displayed in files. This meant you would see a file on the page then open the file to view the pictures. This is now a problem I am tackling as Kompozer is saying my images are to big so at the moment my gallery page is closed due to construction. Overall I would say that MTV's website was a huge influence on my website in the research, planning and construction process.
Finally I have my evaluation. New media terminology helped me with this process as I am posting my evaluation on the world wide web. This blog is where I am posting all my research, planning, construction and evaluation aspects. This is again showing I can use new media terminology to post my work. Also I am including multi media into my evaluation such as videos and images.
Conclusion
Overall I feel that I have worked extremely hard this year to complete my coursework. I feel that I have yet again progressed in terms of understanding media and editing techniques as the course developed. The development of my products got stronger and stronger throughout the course in all stages. I think I have coped well with the use of unfamiliar softwares. I needed to understand all of these unfamiliar softwares as they all linked together to create my final products. Real media companies creating products use convergence today and this was the same for me with my products. I had to combine of different softwares and use different websites etc to create my products. I needed to get to grips with all the media products I was using as the media is constantly developing and I need to keep up with the existing media products if I want mine to do well on the market. An example of this would be using blogger. When I was in the middle of updating my blog, blogger then decided to update changing around the whole layout of the website to make it more modern. I then had to quickly learn how to use this new format if I wanted to complete my coursework. Also doing this coursework has improved a number of my skills from last year. My ICT skills have improved massively in terms of blogging my post and in general using the Apple Macs. Another skill I have improved on is the ability to research and plan. Last year I did well on my research and planning but this year I feel I have gone into a lot more detail in order to fully understand the tasks I had to take.
In terms of how I approached my coursework I do feel my time management skills did need to be altered if I did the task again. In terms of my time management I can honestly say I could have done a lot better. I did not manage my time very well as I did have to rush to complete my website and my evaluation due to other subjects having deadlines also. If I was to approach the tasks again I would manage my time more wisely in order to achieve everything I want. One major example is my Gallery page on website. Due to all the deadlines in other subjects and the constant faults with different softwares I was un able to post my gallery page meaning I had to post is as Under Construction. This was not the only thing that I was unable to achieve. I was also unable to add some more multi media features onto my blog such as a video response to my website but I was able to add a number of images to my evaluation to gain some more marks.
Wednesday, 9 May 2012
Final Double Page Spread
This is my final double page spread. This is my second ancillary task which I have created for my coursework. This works alongside with my newspaper advertisement and my website with convergence to advertise the launch of my TV channel 'Urban Dex'. I chose a similar colour scheme because I wanted to keep the theme strong and have a clear link with all my tasks. The tasks all needed to link together to attract the audience into viewing my channel and also keep the convergence clear. The colour scheme I have chosen works really well in my opinion as it links in with the genre of my channel and website of Urban Dance and Music. The black and white chequred flooring is meant to resemble a retro break-dance flooring. This adds a little bit of historical content of my TV channel and shows I am very passionate about my chosen genre. Another comment made was that good use of layers in PSE, it clear on this double page spread that layers have been use to a high skill level. Also the strong use of images have been used in my double page spread to attract my teenage audience. Teenagers much prefer to look at images rather than read a lot of text. Also you will notice that all my images link in with the genre of my website. The picture in the opening corner is the same one you will find on my newspaper add. This is a good example of convergence in my task to link them all together so that the audience can relate to them all and possible want to look into my channel in more detail. My media teacher at current also loved how I edited the TV channel numbers onto a retro television in the top left corner. She said this showed great technicality and thought it was a very clever idea. It also shows the audience a little clear what exactly I am advertising. Another commented made was on how I showed more great PSE skills in editing the music notes coming out of the retro record player. Those were two separate images which I carefully edited together using the layers on PSE. Unlike my newspaper advert I remembered to add the actually launch date on this task and this was placed in my opinion in the best place. The word launch is one of the first things you see when you open magazine as its on the right hand side, then if you look in more detail you can see the launch date underneath. One the left hand side I have given an example of the Tv channels programmes listing as this will be in a TV listings magazine. Before receiving feedback that was a straight edged box also like my logo in the topvright hand corner. But from receiving feedback on how it looked to neat and tidy I then roughly erased the edges to make them sink more into the background. In my opinion this feedback was very helpful as I totally agree with the rough edge look. This now makes the double page look more modern and more retro. It also fits in better with target audience as they are more messy and prefer the urban modern look compared to a neat and tidy look.
Final Newspaper Advert
This is my final newspaper advert. Overall I am very pleased with the outcome as this was the first time I had ever created a piece of work on PSE. I do think it is very basic but I think it is simple yet effective. The newspaper advert clearly shows the theme of my new TV channel and is attractive to the target audience my channel is aimed at which is teenagers. I have used the image of myself doing a breakdancing handstand in the corner to attract the audiences attention and used my own original images to avoid copyright. At the top of the advert I have my channels logo which is also on my double page spread and my website to use convergence and link them all together. The logo also gives my audience the title of my channel which is 'Urban Dex'. The use of images really makes this advert stand out to the target audience as they are so clear. In the centre of the advert I have a small paragraph simply telling the teenage audience what my channel is about. I have used basic language which is easy to follow and understand. This works well with my teenage audience as most teenagers prefer to look at pictures anyway rather than read information. I did take this into consideration when doing this but I wanted to make it clear what my channel is about to attract as many people as possible. I also did this by using and attractive font style and a bright colour to make it stand out. By angling the words it also gives the text a more modern edge and shows good use of PSE skills. One important feature I did miss on my newspaper advert was the launch date. It is clear to the audience this is a new TV channel as it says in the centre of the page and I have also added the channel numbers to the advert. But I did not add the actual launch date to the tv channel. The final feature I added to this simple but effective newspaper advert was the URL of my website. This then gives my target audience another way of viewing what my channel is about but thought the world wide web. This was added on after gathering feedback as I wanted to gather a big an audience as possible. By adding this I am then gained convergence with my website and newspaper advert.
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