A Thank You

I'd like to take the time to thank the moderator for the time that they will spend assessing my AS Media Studies blog, following the music magazine brief. I hope you enjoy it!

Double Page Spread: Final Draft

Contents Page: Final Draft

Front Cover: Final Draft

Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Question 6: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Hitfilm 3 Express

I'd already had experience with Hitfilm before, using it recreationally, which is why I chose to use it over something such as Windows Movie Maker. I knew its capabilities, and it was far superior and more powerful--but yet easy to use.

Freemake Video Converter

This program was a necessity, as the videos which were recorded by the following program could only be exported to AVI, which wasn't compatible with the editing software I was using.

VSDC Screen Recorder

I'd used this program occasionally, but this was the first time I'd used it properly. It came in useful for this video and for the Photoshop videos.

Handbrake

This was the first time I'd used Handbrake. I had to use it in order to compress some of the longer videos so that they'd upload to YouTube efficiently and easily.

Adobe Photoshop

Previous to this coursework, I was already acquainted with Photoshop, but I expanded my knowledge of it via tutorials. For example, I learned about the more obscure blending modes and effects, and applied these skills in my work.

Blogger and Pinterest

I'm no stranger to blogging: I run several blogs on Tumblr. However, I'd never used Blogger, because I found Tumblr to be more socially-orientated. I think I'll be using Blogger more in the future, more as a log than social media.

Slideshare, Emaze and Prezi

I found Slideshare simple to use; I just had to upload a Microsoft PowerPoint document in order to be able to share presentations online. Emaze and Prezi were similar in the regard that they're more interactive and dynamic ways of displaying a presentation, though I'd never found a use for them before this coursework.

YouTube

Like most people, I've had experience with YouTube, using it most days. However, it was my first time embedding my own videos into an actual site using HTML.

Audacity

As a musician, Audacity has been a useful program for a long time when it comes to cutting and mixing audio. Throughout this piece of coursework, I've grown more efficient in the use of this software, able to complete tasks quicker and with more ease.

Animaker

This was a completely new site for me. I had never given much thought to animated infographics, thinking that they were made inside something such as Adobe After Effects. So, of course, this is on the list of sites I have learnt to use.

Questions 4 and 5

Question 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

As I have previously mentioned, the target audience is those between 15 and 25 with an established musical interest. I attracted this audience by including inducements which would help to further this interest, such as the recording opportunity, and including artists who were similar to the target audience themselves in the regard that they too were aspiring musicians or newly-discovered ones.

Question 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Question 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

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

Technique List

• (Pattern) fill
• Levels
• Layer Modes (exclusion, multiply, hard light)
• Posterise
• Selection tools (Magic Wand, Lasso, Magnetic Lasso, Polygonal Lasso, Marquee, Select by Colour Range)
• Effects (Stroke, Outer Glow, Inner Glow, Drop Shadow, Gradient Overlay)
• Shear
• Cropping and resizing
• Layer Mask
• Clipping Mask
• Step and Repeat
• Shapes
• Paths
• Text
• Clone Stamp
• Gaussian Blur

Photoshoot

View post on imgur.com

Jus Drein Jus Daun Update

I decided to go for a double exposure effect, and added a blurred tree overlay to break up the white of the background,

Creating Jus Drein Jus Daun

Clone Stamp Tool - Removing Man-Made Structures

2nd Album Cover Shoot

Jus Drein Jus Daun

FIRST DRAFT

Object Shoots

I took this photo at a recording studio, using a slightly shallow focus. I ended up cropping the image so that only the mixing desk was visible.

I didn't use this image because of the wooden background. I decided to fill the entire image with CD cases.

I took this photo as part of the TOP 50 OF 2015 feature. I didn't use any lighting because there would have been a glare on the CD cases. Therefore I had to brighten the image in Photoshop.

Photoshoot -- Profiles

I asked Christine to wear red and black, as red and blue is the colour scheme of the duo, and the background of the double-page spread is black.

Foundation was used, along with an eyebrow pencil and light mascara.

Photoshoot 1.1

View post on imgur.com

Layout Drafts

Models

Christine, 16

Maja, 17

I chose these two as the main indie duo. Some of the reasons why I chose them are as follows:

Maja's dyed hair (though it will be a blue colour instead of red) has an indie vibe to it.

The two are comfortable around each other, so the photos will look more natural and less forced.

They are of different heights, so the contrast in the image will be greater.

Costumes and Make-Up

---

I have chosen to have the models dress in a light winter theme for the shoot (seeing as this is the February issue, and in a real magazine, the photos would have been taken in late December or January. The boots and jeans combo is typical of the indie style—especially of indie folk:

Make-up is used to preserve the models' natural skin tone and appearance. Without make-up, the models may appear flawed due to some photographic techniques.
I've chosen to stay with basic make-up, as natural light is the main source of light in the photographs. This includes:

• Foundation
• Mascara
• Lip gloss

Locations

Filming Schedule

Props

• Headphones and musical products will feature in the magazine, as not only are they music-related, but music videos and magazines often feature product placement in order to gain a financial boost:

Shot List

IN STEP -- Where My Armour Ends Album Cover

See the creation video here

For the album cover, I decided to go with an old VHS-type style. I drew inspiration from Halsey's Room 93 cover, using the idea of distorting the image. I chose to use TV scan lines as the background, because it has a low amount of detail and would be good for creating a simple textured background. Images with a plain-coloured background seem too neat, and I wanted to go for a messy, more grungy feel. I used a custom pattern to fill the image with lines, and then used a noise generator which was built into Photoshop to add the noise overlay.

The retro distortion effect was accomplished by changing the outputs of the red, green and blue channels of the text and misaligning the copies slightly. I then sheared the bottom half of the text to make it look even more distorted.

Another example of the retro distortion effect
(http://image.shutterstock.com/z/stock-vector-color-distortion-alphabet-vector-339694445.jpg)

 

Making the Album Cover (Video)

In this video, I speedpaint the album cover for IN STEP's Where My Armour Ends.

IN STEP LET THEIR ARMOUR DOWN—Article First Draft

Set to make their studio debut in 2016, alternative duo IN STEP, Reyna Castellan and Anja Gudmund talk to ЯEFLECT magazine about their first studio album, WHERE MY ARMOUR ENDS.

So, guys, welcome to ЯEFLECT magazine.
R: Thanks. We’re glad to be here.

Can we start off with you both telling us a little bit about yourselves?
A: I’m Anja, I’m twenty years old, and I’m the guitarist.
R: And I’m Reyna, twenty-one, and the vocalist and pianist. And what kind of music do you two produce? A: Mainly electropop, but there’s the odd acoustic thrown in. Anja, where’s your accent from? A: I’m asked that a lot. [Laughs] I come from a place in Sweden called Örnsköldsvik. I moved to London when I was fourteen. That’s when I met Reyna in school. R: We started playing together in school, and it just kind of grew from there.
It didn’t just grow. You two exploded. R: We started a [YouTube] channel, uploaded a few covers. We had no idea that people would respond in the way that they did. It was crazy. What’s the craziest thing that’s happened to you so far? A: For me it has to be VidCon last July. R: Oh, right. Going to a YouTube convention and seeing all the people turn up to our signing. We gave away little demo CDs of our 2014 EP, [which was] EMPIRE. It was so surreal meeting all these fans who made the effort to come to California to see us.
A: And then, through the viewers, we got the opportunity to meet Sam. R: One of the music giants on YouTube. A: We recorded one of the songs on the EP with him and Kurt [Schneider], Empty Horizons.
R: And when the single was released, it resonated not just with our fans, but with his and Kurt’s.

So much so that you two have been optioned for a few songs on a TV soundtrack. Can you tell us a little about that?
A: We can’t really say much about it at this stage, because the soundtrack’s still in its early stages.
R: It’s a paranormal show called The Raven Cycle.
A: It’s supposed to air [in] October 2017, so there’s still a long way to go.

If you had to pick two artists to describe yourselves, which would you pick?
R: I’d say one of them has to be Meg Myers.
A: Of Monsters And Men. A fellow Nordic band. Or maybe twenty øne piløts. Though my favourite band is always going to be Nirvana.

What's your favourite 90s jam?
R: [Laughs] Baby One More Time by the one and only Britney.
A: I'm gonna go with My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion.

Pepsi or Coke?
Simultaneously: Coke. [Laughter]

Favourite lyric you’ve ever written?
A: Mine’s probably from Skin. Show me where my armour ends / And I’ll show you the skin underneath. And I didn’t even write the line! Reyna did.
R: I really like one of the ones from EMPIRE. The art of losing yourself is the finest one there is / I wish I could master it.

So where can the readers get your album?
R: It’s available to pre-order on iTunes and Amazon February 8th.

A: And if you pre-order it, you get two tracks straight off the bat, and you don’t have to wait until March 4th to hear it!

Time Inc.

Bauer Media

Bauer Media from Dan_Goddard