Media studies: Evaluation.

Question 2: How Effective is the Combination of Your Main Product and Ancillary Texts?
The combination of my main products and other texts is that of an effective on because a lot of the same features from these texts are chosen correctly for the purposes of cross media production in order to effectively portray the artist well and inserted into the main video. Perhaps the greatest example of a combination used in both my main music video and ancillary texts would be the use of emotional display provided by the combination. As already explained in question 1, the Digipak and poster display the featured artist as a depressed, angry figure in front of a brick wall with barbed wire featured above it. This combines with the element in the video of the man being in a state of emotional depression, and he is out of place with the other half of the video, this being the anachronism put in place to remove interaction between him and the girl. These properties creating the combination in place efficiently portray the character of the artist as youthful, somewhat troubled, and this makes him a fitting artist choice for that of the music video. Another significant way in which the ancillary texts combine with the main music video is via the usage of cross media production. This has been achieved in so many minor, but nonetheless effective ways. An example is the previous paragraph. An example is the use of clothing. The clothing worn on the front cover of the Digipak and the clothes worn in the main video are almost identical, which is a form of how cross media production has been used in use of similar appearance of the featured artist throughout all products. The use of the clothing provides the youthful, troubled character stereotype of the artist which is what supplied realisation of his inclusion in the music video product being fitting. The products combine in what they represent via their use of imagery. While the typography used is simple and straight, the font does represent a sense of hidden sophistication within the artist, a useful contrast to how the imagery in terms of the lighting, scenery and clothing portrays the artist in the ancillary products as well as the character played by the artist in the video. This use of typography contrasting with the rest of the products properties demonstrates a character complex within the artist that shows his range, as well as depth and hidden depth of his emotions. The story of the video itself further uses this to its advantage, as the narrative is based on the man having an emotionless face with hidden emotions underneath. Some properties were not included in my products ultimately. One of these being the seemingly fitting use of sketch drawings for my Digipak and poster. This was what originally appeared in my draft but was removed later. The sketches were criticised for being too simple and poor. These were removed despite the media convention that their use would have conformed to being that soft rock genre products tend to feature classical designs such as sketch drawings and colours without such large quantities of brightness. Another feature not included was the use of a traditional narrative in which the series of shots tell a story while music plays. This was attempted for the draft music video. A 17 shot video which contained a narrative progression that focused on me experiencing a path from depression to

emotional redemption while reflecting on the previous relationship with my ex-girlfriend character. While such a storyline conforms to the convention that the hero seeks something and eventually achieves it, as well as the use of interesting shots throughout; the fact remains that the camera used was terrible, and a lot of the narrative seemed ambiguous to the less knowledgeable member of the target audience. (E.g. why is he going upstairs? This was a comment from teacher feedback.) This idea was scrapped and was replaced with the idea of the single shot video. I ultimately decided that instead of the use of the houses for the inside panels of the Digipak, I would use the brick walls in the inside panels for reasons already explained, these being how the combination of the entrapment of the character appears in the music video as well in terms of an emotional imprisonment existing in him. The shot was supposed to be a panorama shot, but it turned out worse than I hoped. Based on the DIKW hierarchy, the problem may have been my lack of wisdom at the time, as I seemed to understand the media convention of used panorama shots for Digipak CD albums, but I did not possess the necessary experience to realise how it is used properly. Later on, this needed change was made. Overall, the change made to leave out these house shots supplied a better combination to my final set of media products that successfully portrayed the artist well.