After creating our final draft for the music video we needed to collect a variety of feedback styles from a range of different people (some including our target audience) via social networking sites but also word of mouth. I was surprised at the high percentage of positive comments we received back because as a group there are parts of the video that we would re shoot and change if we had time, so because no one picked up on the smaller scenes that could have let us down it shows that they are not as problematic as assumed. The reason we decided to use the selection of social networking sites is because they have such a large amount of the population accessing them everyday and we thought that instead of just asking close friends to give opinions, opening it up for the general public to leave comments meant we would get truthful and reliable answers from different age ranges and also different genders, this shows we are not being biast by just collecting results from people we know who could only give us successful points because we know them, as a group we were open to any feedback (positive or negative) as it made us think about how things could be changed in the future if we had chance to re do this piece of coursework but also realistically how other people see our video, because some of the feedback we may agree with to an extent but the negative feedback we don’t understand can be used as a useful resource for us to give our own personal evaluation about. Using the Stuart Hall theory to help me comment on each individual feedback comment we received using media conventions and language will show that I have tried to express this specific evaluation analysis at the highest level and as well as using my own personal analysis I hope it’s put into a high grade boundary.
The first comment we received was from YouTube, the reason we posted our video onto this program is because we believed that anyone could view it and make their honest suggestions about the video as a whole. The first comment was from a male who said, “Pros – Lip syncing is good, mise en scene is also very good keeps the audience interested. Good use of props and costumes”
“Cons – One of the main scenes goes on for quite awhile (man running)” I agree with the fact that the lip syncing was successful as when filming each scene we took a copy of the track for our main character to mime with to make sure when editing every part would be in time. It shows that we kept the audience interested, which relates to the Goodwin theory as we created a different narrative with each of the outfits for example the tea party scene the main character looks very classy however the scene where she is positioned behind the metal bars she looks very casual and also quite rugged due to the holes in the clothes. The reason we created a large amount of scenes is because we wanted to show the audience how her personality changes through different characters and locations and it seemed to interest quite a lot of people we found through the positive feedback we also changed her outfits often to appeal to the male gaze theory and this is definitely a point that has been successful as many people have commented on her being exposed, however it was intentional. The con that he gave us is an element where I can see where he is coming from because when watching the video although there are a lot of cuts of him running up and down the long path it does keep running for some time however because we ran out of time filming the rest of the video we didn’t have any other clips to replace it with, however this criticism is useful as it links to some of my negative outlooks on the video.
The next comment was from a female who also commented through YouTube and because she is a current media student we believed she would pick up on what idea we were going with through the video. Her comment was “Very good lasses, looks very professional. Good job playing the part Emily!” although it’s a short comment it’s positive and I really appreciate the professional part because it means by using existing media conventions and following plans from our research we have created a similar type of video. I believe the main elements that relate to why it looks so professional is how confident our main character was as she took on the personality and cannibal type of character we wanted her portray perfectly but also the variety of shots we captured and the thought beats we have encountered which included a shot cut on each fast beat, this would make it more interesting to watch and could have been a point she was regarding too when she said professional.
The next piece of feedback was from a male who I didn’t know, whereas I knew the other two people who give us feedback I still wouldn’t class them as close friends so they are still being truthful without us influencing their judgements, however this unknown male said “This is pretty well done, good job! Great editing” our editing skills are being talked about once again here, although the previous comment only said “professional” the only reason it was seen in that light was due to the amount of editing we did to our video. When it came down to editing each clip we knew we wanted to make the layout exciting to keep the viewers interested and filters from the editing program brought out the technical side to me especially the superimposing part as I learnt how to lower and increase the opacity over one clip to make the level equal for the reveal of both clips through the first verse. Giving compliments like good job! and well done make me feel really proud that I have achieved such a strong final outcome and people appreciate the work that I have put in.
This comment is from a fellow media student who is in the year below us but personally sent me a direct message letting me know how good the video was so I asked her to leave her own comment on the video so we could use it as another use of feedback, to make it easier for her I also told her to post it on the YouTube account as Emily had only added a number of people to our Facebook page so she wouldn’t have been able to access that. Her comment was “This is such a good video! I really like the effort put into the costumes and the variety of different camera shots and angles. I like the speeded up parts that you have edited in too!” Overall I think this is another positive piece of feedback and she was one of the only people to pick up on the camera angles and shots, when filming the different scenes for this we made sure we took a couple of takes to the side of the characters in front of the characters, behind the characters, up close just to make sure we had alot of footage to work with when putting it all together just so the same angle of one clip was played continuously as attention would be lost. The reason we added the speeded up parts of the main character doing jolter head movements and weird body positions was to reflect on her “cannibalism” as she was hiding behind a normal teenage girl’s body and meant she couldn’t be the person she really hoped to be and through the video you can see how the anger builds up right until she lets go and “transforms” in the tea party scene, but adding a high level of speed to some clips would make the audience look again and again.
This feedback comment came from someone with the name Instant Win which meant it’s hard to determine which sex they are from, but that’s the interesting thing about feedback you don’t know who is going to comment. However they said the following “I liked the effects used when editing especially the superimposing, the lip syncing looks professional and the shots are cut to the beat of the music” The reason we added a superimposed part to our video is the fact that the main character wanted to eat the male character and he was running away from her down a long path but we slowed the running speed down so we could put a clip of her laughing at the entrance of the path so viewers may think she has already caught him and this fades in and out so you can see both characters clearly, however the chorus kicks in and you see him moving at normal speed the technique was used for editing purposes. I talked about the lip syncing previously as our character is a performing arts student she knows her rhythms and sense of beats through a song so she timed exactly when to come in, this was also important when cutting the clips to the beats as it meant fast paced editing hence the reason why we did lots of takes in one location because we knew most of them would get used at least once. Again a positive comment but what I have found out when analysing most of this feedback is it’s all very similar and about the same topics; Editing, Lip Sync and Mise En Scene.
We then went onto posting the video on Facebook in a private group and we received 3 different comments. Because the group was set to private it meant that we only added a certain number of people so chances are we would know them however we wanted the truth so we had something to work with. The first comment read “I like the way that different editing techniques have been used for example when you speed parts up”
The second read “Lip – Syncing is all on time so it looks professional. Some good transitions between shots like the fade one including the slow motion laugh. It’s an interesting video; it wouldn’t get boring after a few watches. Also it’s really scary, I like that.”
Finally the last comment read “I like the use of the fast paced editing and how it gives the video a greater effect overall, also how you used real life locations so that it is more realistic, however there are a few shaky hand movements ( but I didn’t think that was important because the video is so good!)”
The reason I have just quoted all of these comments rather than write about each one of them individually is because they all have similar meanings and I think each point can be spoken about as a whole. Editing is talked about alot they all seem to appreciate the speeded up parts which is good to know as there parts of the storyline which hopefully they have considered why we added them in because as well as entertaining viewers we want each of them to understand the storyline we have created. The fact someone commented on the fact that it wouldn’t get boring after a while brings in again Goodwin’s theory about keeping people interested at all times because I believe when watching it more and more the actual story unfolds. Although I am grateful for all the positive feedback getting criticism is more interesting as I get to give my own feedback on it. One person said the camera movements where shaky at times and this is a point that I 100% agree with and if we could go back and re shoot some scenes I would because it’s distracting but also lacks the professional quality of an actual music video.
I went onto ask people to comment on what they believe the storyline is behind our music video and exactly what they see when they are watching it. The reason I did this was to get more detailed explanations but also to link each of the comments I receive to the Stuart Hall theory. The first comment I received was via Facebook; “I believe that Emily has physiological issues throughout the video and she likes to eat people” this male does have some of the correct perceptions of the video as we wanted the audience to notice a change in her personality from looking and acting like a young girl to bringing out her vicious side and attacking the male characters and I think the reason he has mention physiological is because she is going mad through the video as she just wants to be a cannibal and doesn’t want to hide her identity any longer and she does transform in one of the end scenes, however the fact she likes eating people could be known just by the song title so I think that most people would notice that, linking this comment back to the Stuart Hall theory I think this comment links to the storyline to an extent which in he’s theory is called “Negotiated” Where the audience accepts, rejects, or refines elements of the text in light of previously held views, example neither agreeing or disagreeing with the political speech or being disinterested. The reason I believe this point is true is because he touches on her issues but doesn’t explain what about and how she confronts them, our aim is to make each viewer come up with a storyline and hope it’s the one that we created.
The second comment was given by a fellow media student who we believed would have the ability to use media terminology to a high standard. We again asked him what he thought the storyline behind the music video was he said, "I really enjoyed this piece of work as you can clearly see the storyline is about a young, attractive female who goes around eating boys. This shows you in the lyrics "i eat boys up" Lip syncing is consistent throughout the full music video. I really liked the effects used when editing, especially the superimposing. Overall I find the full video looks highly professional and very entertaining :)". The storyline that he believes to be true is that our main character likes to eat boys, also referring to her as being "attractive" means he has picked up on the "male gaze" theory which shows her wearing revealing outfits to attract the attention of male viewers. He believes that we have illustrated a link between the clips in our video and the lyrics in the song. The reason for this is because we wanted to make sure our music video was keeping in with the media conventions linked to a usual Ke$ha videos e.g revealing costumes, outrageous personality and confident about the characters she is playing, which are some of the elements included in our own video. Linking this into the Stuart Hall theory it shows that the male got our "preferred" reading of the video, which meant he interpreted it in the correct way. Because we wanted to show viewers that our main character had two personalities, one being a normal teenage girl but the other showing her "secret alter ego" which is someone who enjoys attacking attractive looking males to get their blood to feed on. So judging by he's comment this is the exact story line he understood. He also picked up on the entertainment side of the video, this is needed in any sort of video for the viewers to keep interested and because of our variety of locations and shots we knew the viewers would be surprised by some parts.
Overall from the two detailed comments we received, the results where different in some respects but they both linked to the Stuart Hall theory and meant I had a lot to discuss regarding each of them and how they linked back.
Below is a chart/graph showing how many people have watched our video and what programs they have accessed it by.
You can see the graph at the top of the image with letters which are shown underneath and explain exactly what each of them stands for. I believe this is a useful way to look deeper into where the feedback has come from and when I go onto presenting this specific question I will go into more detail about how many people used the different programs and also analyse the graph to try and estimate the age range for each separate “letter” and also in the bottom corner you can also see where in the world our video is being watched the most and least, this will also be an element I can look deeper into when presenting this question in greater detail.
Overall the comments we received from the feedback have all been positive and any other points where constructive criticism and nothing to harsh, the reason I believe that is because most of the people watching have only picked up on the negative parts that we also agree with so we haven’t been offended or annoyed as we would change each of them parts ourselves with extra time. Now I just need to think exactly how I am going to present this question it’s either going to be through a video where I will talk about each comment in detail why it is shown behind me through the green screen along with our video to link to each comment as this might mean I add elements in that I maybe didn’t think about when writing this, or my other option is to create a prezi and talk about the comments in detail and what my overall opinion is on each of them, clips can be shown on this too but I just need to think about whether the prezi would be entertaining enough for the audiences to look at.
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