Critical Creative Reflection Questions Blog
1. How does your product use or challenge conventions AND how does it represent social groups or issues?
My product engaged in conventions, and used specific camera angles, shots, and elements to create the desired result, that went along with the genre the song belonged to. This genre was R&B/Soul/Contemporary, with Pop and Rap. The ambient sound was important, because it intensifies the mood of the music video. The project also included non-diegetic sound, which was imported by the editing software, CapCut. This gave the music video a more authentic feel, because my group and I added this element to the intro of our video. This assisted in the seamless transition from silence to the beginning of when the audio plays. The park/tennis scenes used a low angle, pan, canted shot, and long shot, while the beach scene included a tracking shot, and medium/long shot. The beginning of the video included an over the shoulder shot, as well as a medium shot, featuring all our faces. The application of many diverse shots and angles helped create the unique product my group and I created.
This music video did not have a specific social issue per say, but it did center around the social topic of friend groups, and how a sense of nostalgia can be felt, when looking back onto memories. This was important, because this is something that is relevant in my group mate’s lives, as well as my own. Each person felt this topic was something they were interested in making a film project from. Additionally, many new ideas arose about where to film, what to film and how we were going to film, when working with this social topic. This topic will also be understood and appreciated by our target audience, which is centered around individuals in the younger generation.
2. How does your product engage with audiences AND how would it be distributed as a real media text?
My product engages well with audiences, because the music video is done to a popular song from my current generation. The content my group and I filmed is also relevant to the interests of what people my age enjoys doing. This may include going to the beach, shopping, going to a coffee shop, or just hanging out with friends in general. These types of activities were all displayed in the music video, which would most likely engage a wide audience. I think it is important for media products to appeal to what is current, and “trending”, and I do think that my Music Video does this, by having scenes that people my age can relate to, an appreciated song, and advanced editing. This editing is specific to the transitions between each scene, the filters, where the scenes start and cut, and finally the text in the video. The idea was to make this product interesting to this generation, and I think it did just that.
This product would be distributed as a real media text by posting it on platforms that are created to share these types of media. This may include YouTube, Facebook, Instagram or TikTok. Some media texts may be newspapers or radio recordings, but I think the most effective way of promoting my product would be something that would be seen most by the target audience. Since my generation and the people around my age, and even older are on these social media platforms the most, then distributing my product this way would certainly be most successful.
3. How did your production skills develop throughout this project?
Throughout the process of completing this project, my production skills improved quite a lot. In the beginning of the project, I was not familiar with how to edit quite anything, much less use a software such as CatCut. Working on this software allowed me to gain further knowledge of production. This project gave me lots of experience with editing. I also learned how to efficiently participate in an extensive group project. For example, I have been in plenty of group projects in school, but I have never been in one that was as detailed as this. My group and I had to plan, organize, and execute the filming process. Then, it was time to gather the clips we captured and put them together. The advantage of this being a group project was that my group mates could enlighten me on different parts of editing and filming. Everyone, including myself, could share their talents to contribute to the benefit of the project. This way, the teamwork paid off. Two of my groupmates had more talents in editing, while myself and my other group mate were strongest at filming, and costumes/makeup. I feel that working in a group made all the difference, when it came to letting all our talents shine. This was definitely where most of the skills I picked up came from. Learning what all the AICE Media Studies terminology meant, and seeing what they looked like helped me understand more about production and filming. I learned that costumes, makeup and organizing the locations of filming were equally as important as the filming itself. My perspective on how movies and films are made changed a lot. Overall, my production skills improved through the teamwork of all my groupmates, the software I used and the things I learned, working through this project.
4. How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project?
I integrated technologies such as CapCut into my project. Using this app came with many learning curves such as figuring out how to import content, cut content, add effects and export. These learning curves added to the experience I gained during this project. The software enhanced the music video by leaps and bounds. It was the main factor that gave this product its individuality. By adding texts with fonts, special effects, filters and more, my group and I could take our project to the next level. The reason for why my group and I used CapCut was because it was the most accessible, for it was free and allowed us to each edit on our own devices, export the content, and combine it together. Instead of purchasing any type of software, we felt that CapCut was by far the most ethically efficient for the purpose of this project. The device the music video was filmed on was an iPhone. None of my groupmates owned a fancy camera to film on, but we decided to use one of our iPhones, which was an iPhone 14, so the camera quality was stellar. The brightness adjusted, as well as the focus. The iPhone could zoom in and out, just like a professional camera could. A printer was also needed to print out the photos that were used in the photobook prop. This was a crucial step for the intro and outro of the music video. Technology such as an iPhone, printer, and CapCut were all used to create this music video.
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