CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION

QUESTION 1, 

How do your products represent social groups or issues?

My music video is about a girl who has just broken up with her boyfriend, throughout the video she shows how she is getting over him and how she is realising that she is better without him while the boyfriend keeps going after her. During the video the protagonist (Katia) appears with her friends as they are the ones who are supporting her during this difficult stage of her life and it makes sense with the lyrics of the song as it says that her friends didn’t like the guy for her. In this case the music video represents how after breaking up with him, the protagonist (Katia) is represented with a sense of superiority. The way in which the ex-boyfriend grovels so much makes him look inferior as it is showing how he still loves her  while she shows that she doesn't care, to the point in which she doesn’t answer his calls. By watching the music video, the audience can interpret that the girl represents superiority as all the scenes that appear throughout the video are classified as feminine whereas the boy only focuses on coming back with her. The gender performativity theory, created by Judith Butler argued that our gender is not innate but it is in fact constructed through the repetition of rituals. This theory has a specific link with my music video since by the way each character acts, we directly identify which gender they are. The way in which the protagonist is with her friends getting ready to go out represents a feminine gender while the boy is only calling her and seems confused which represents a masculine gender, therefore depending on their actions they will be identified as a specific gender. In my digipak the protagonist Katia appears in all the covers which means that is just hers and gives a feminine touch to the album. On the social media page it happens exactly the same, as the account is just of Katia and therefore only has pictures of her, it represents her as superior as no one else appears in the account. 

 

QUESTION 2, 

How do the elements of your production work together to create a sense of branding?

Throughout this project I have been working on three different tasks which have been a music video, a digipak and a social media page. Although each task was different,  the artist was the same for each and that’s why I had to create a specific design in which the tasks complemented each other. My music video is considered pop music, so this is why the colours I have used during the video are very striking. The colour that represents my artist is the maroon and this is why in my music video the artist Katia is wearing a grey t-shirt with maroon lettering. In order to link my music video with my digipak I decided that the main colour of the digipak was going to be the maroon and this is why each cover of the digipak contains the colour maroon in some way. Also the left cover of the digipak consists of a picture of the artist and on top of it her signature in a maroon colour, in order to create a link between the music video and the digipak. The artist's social media page we can see a post where she has published her digipak as a way of promoting it and she has also uploaded a picture of the artist in the car which is the same one that appears in one of the covers of the digipak. Although it wasn't mandatory, I decided to create a website for my artist Katia and to make it more accessible I included the link of the website into her instagram account. The fonts I’ve used in each task are practically the same as I wanted everything to be linked in some way. 

 

QUESTION 3, 

How do your products engage with the audience?

For my target audience I have considered that people between the age of 15 - 30 are the ones who fit perfectly with the song and narrative I have done. In order to decide my target audience  I created a google form where I asked about their musical taste and age. When I analysed the results I found out that most people between 10 - 30 listen to pop music,  but when deciding the most suitable one for my music video I decided to change it from 15 - 30 as the audience needs to be mature enough to be able to understand the lyrics of the song and the situation. When choosing the most suitable gender I also focused on the google form, most of the results  for the pop genre were girls and that’s why I decided it was aimed towards a more feminine audience. However, the song can be listened to by anyone as it has a very catchy rhythm. The song is aimed towards a young audience as older people don’t usually listen to this type of songs. My music video includes many different scenes in order to keep the audience engaged and with the desire to keep watching. As pop music videos tend to have many changes in the location and clothing of the characters I decided to do this in mine so it follows the traditional conventions of pop music videos. By having a protagonist in the music video  it makes the audience emphasise with her as maybe they identify with what has happened to her.  

​

QUESTION 4, 

How did your research inform your products and the way they use or challenge conventions?

During the project I have been doing research on music videos, digipaks and social media pages of other artists that had similar characteristics to what I was aiming to achieve. To help me out with the music video I analysed three music videos (Party In The USA, 22, New Rules) as they had a similar idea to mine. The research helped me to get inspired in many ways that I later on adopted on my music video.  In the three videos I analysed there is always a scene where all the girls are getting ready to go out therefore as it linked with the lyrics of my music video I decided to use it but in my own way. I had to also analyse two digipaks and I chose Taylor Swift and Katy Perry as they do pop music which is the same genre as mine. Both helped me to get inspired during the development of my digipak as they had similar ideas to what I was aiming to produce. Therefore, in my digipak we can see how I have been inspired by the layout of Taylor Swift’s digipak and I have also used some features of Katy Perry’s one. Finally, I analysed the instagram accounts of Taylor Swift and Dua Lipa in order to get ideas for my social media page. From Dua Lipa I used her idea of adding the link of the artist website into the instagram account. I decided to upload a photo of the tour dates as a way of promoting the tour and I got this idea from the account of Taylor Swift. Both artists upload photos of their personal life, not only about music and this is an aspect that I also adopted in my social media page as fans want to know what the artists do in their day to day rather than all the time about their music.