RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Age Rating - Analysis Of Other Age Rated Videos ADD PHOTO

In October 2014, a decision was made to add an age rating to online music videos. The main reason for deciding to age rate each music video that is put on online platforms such as YouTube and Vevo is due to parents wanting more of a guidance as to what their children should be watching. The age ratings are 12, 15 or 18. The age rating is based on how much unsuitable/upsetting content a music video contains. In mid 2015, research was carried out to explore if these age ratings were useful to parents within the UK. 78% of parents agreed that having an age rating was useful. A major issue with the age rating scheme is that it only applies to music videos that are produced in the UK. Therefore, music videos that are produced outside of the UK will be widely accessible to younger audiences and will not have an age rating.


Music videos such as Sia's Elastic Heart created some stir upon social media as a young girl and an older man were depicted to having an 'animalistic dance-fight mash-up in a cage'. This created a lot of noise on social media, which led to Sia tweeting this:




Personally, I think that this age rating pilot does have a effect on young children and parents. However, I don't think that the effect is enough as it needs to be introduced more widely for it to have a large impact. It has been proved by the American Physiological Association that extreme themes in media products has caused effects such as depression and eating disorders. If age ratings were widely introduced, this could reduce the impacts on young people.


In my opinion, I do not think that my music video includes any particular heavy themes. There is a brief visual of alcohol and the only unsuitable theme it includes is partying. Due to this, I think I would personally give my music video a 12 age rating. Some parents of younger people do not want their children to be exposed to themes such as drinking alcohol and partying.

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Copyright - Email For Permission to use Dodie Clark's Music

Contact details for Dodie Clark. She is not signed to a record label, so I thought the best way to contact her would be directly to her email, as seen above - info@dodieclark.com

Below, I have attached the written email to Dodie Clark, requesting permission for the use of her song, Party Tattoos.

Subject: Copyright Permission

Email Contents:

Dear Miss Dodie Clark,

For my current A Level Media Studies coursework, I am required to create a music video, digipak and magazine advert for a song of my choice. I am requesting to use the song ‘Party Tattoos’ by Dodie Clark for this task. The music will be used in an non profitable, educational way. Once I have completed making my music video, it shall only be displayed on a minor Youtube channel and my advanced portfolio blog for the purposes of examination. I fully understand the consequences of copyright infringement, therefore I decided to email you to request the permission of the song. I really hope you consider my request as I am truly a big fan of your music.

Thank you in advance,

Georgette Fischer

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Story Board - Final

Directly above, you can see the storyboard that I have digitally made with colour. I completed this storyboard with a website called 'Storyboard That'. The website was easy to use, however it did have some limitations. For example, I could not go into detail with some of the aspects of my visuals as the website did not have the facilities to allow me to do so. This storyboard follows the structure of my original storyboard, which can be seen on the 'storyboard drafts post'. However, I did have to change some scenes such as the end scene. For this particular storyboard I set the last image as a split screen with the younger and older version of the girl/lady looking at one another. My original storyboard shows the projections of tattoos on different teenagers of different race/gender and I think that I will go ahead with this idea, but perhaps insert the split screen idea else where in the video.

I also recognised that colour is important within the video. At the start, I have taken mise en scene into consideration and will be using a blue overlay. The colour blue connotes sadness, which is an emotion the character will be feeling as she is arguing with her mother and when she is generally feeling down about not fitting in (boxes two and three). However, when she is at the party the overlay colour will change to pink to reflect her feelings.

There may be a missing part of the narrative as one of the latter boxes shows a elderly woman burning a picture of her 'friend' that she made at the party. This is a gap in the narrative as the audience wonders what happened to her friend. I felt like this added a sympathetic tone to the narrative. The audience will be enlightened though as in the previous box the lady is shown to be writing a letter to her mother, showing that their broken relationship has now been mended. 

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Story Board Draft (sketches) - Party Tattoos

The following are some examples of some brief sketches that I am planning to recreate within my music video. Each box shows the type of shot that I am planning to use. In the first box, there is a shot of a clock. This will be a stop motion shot of the handles turning to incorporated artistic shots. It represents how quickly time goes and the first lyrics 'took a look at the clock only so long ago'.

Shot number 2 is the visual for 'scrubbing smooth young skin', I am planning to use a coffee scrub for this. The lyrics represent a young person almost trying to remove the shame and guilt.

Shot number 3 depicts a teenager getting ready for a party. She grabs her bottle of alcohol and her backpack before heading out the door

there is an image of the sky, I am planning to use a time lapse of the sky or a busy road with the cars speeding past as I believe it would make an interesting shot for the viewer to see and it matches up with the lyrics 'you'll see it in the morning after your kicks'. So, I could maybe shoot a time lapse of the daytime sky and then blend it in with a shot of the night time sky.

The next shot is of a clock on a rocking chair, which is a visual to match with they lyrics 'rocking good time'. This adds a bit of humour to the video as the 'time is actually rocking'. I thought that this would make an interesting concept. Again, humour is added with the next frame as it is simply a post it note with the word 'yes' on someone's head, representing the lyrics 'there's a yes, in your head'.

The next shot is of a young person dropping a bottle of alcohol, fitting in with the lyrics 'you'll lose it in the morning but ignore that'. This depicts a party sort of scene, fitting in with one of the themes. Carrying on with this aspect, the next frame is glitter, paint powder and confetti all thrown at an acrylic pane in front of the camera. I thought that this would be an interesting concept to visually see.

'Black lipstick will never be a sin' literally has the visual of black lipstick in the shape of a cross on a mirror. I felt like this had connotations of conflict between religion and partying. The character in the video will be wearing black lipstick throughout.

The video then takes a slight loop as we see a repeat of the frame of the person dropping the alcohol bottle. However, it is clearly visible that the character has now aged. It makes the audience question whether they have changed or not. This fits in with the lyrics 'we'll regret it when we're old with wrinkled up skin'.

Again, to make the lyrics literal, I decided to have a person wearing a coat walking out the door to fit in with the lyrics, 'my mummy said to always wear a coat'. Due to the shot walking out of the door, the audience will hopefully question if there is maybe some slight conflict with the teenager and the parent. To depict this further, I could film a mid shot of the teenager taking the coat of once they are out of the door. This then leads to a shot of the character shivering, portraying that she should have listened to her mum.

Then, a shot of an older version of the character is reintroduced. She is shown writing a postcard to fit in with the lyrics 'write a postcard to you at 84'. The audience could infer that she is perhaps writing to her mother, leading them to question if the conflict has now been resolved.

An interesting shot of a photo being set alight can then be seen, highlighting that the character has finally listened to her mother. To end the video, I am going to project various tattoos onto people, perhaps highlighting that words scar like permanent tattoos, portraying the conflict between the mother and daughter. Maybe the main character should have a tattoo on her wrist throughout the video, almost representing her youth.

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Music Video Pitch - Party Tattoos

Prezi
This is the pitch for my music video 'Party Tattoos'.

I was given the task of presenting my ideas for the music video to my peers. To beign with, I showed them a small snippet of the music video, giving them a small insight of what the artist's music is like and the general vibe for the video. Based off of the small snippet I showed them, I asked them to stereotype and mould a 'typical' viewer for my music video. They guessed correctly, saying that it would most likeloy be a young female student. I then confirmed this by showing them the YouGov results - a reliable source for generating a typical audience profile. I explained that I had to use a similar artist as the artist I am doing ym music video for, Dodie Clark, is not on there.

After this, I gave them the chance to look through the first verse of the lyrics. I then explained my initial ideas for each part of the lyrics. I said that I wanted the visuals to be quite symplistic to fit in with the general vibe of the song. I highlighted that the video will most likely consist of artistic shots, including time lapses, stop motion and photo montages. It was important that the party scene was highlighted. Also, I thought that the video would need some sort of narrative to move the shots along.

Also, I wanted there to be flashforwards/flashbacks of the girl in the video as an adult, looking back on her youth and debating regret of not spending more time with her family. I described in my pitch that I will be holding up an acrylic pain in front of the camera and throwing powdered paint, glitter and confetti at it to follow the party theme. At the end of the video, I want to project tattoos onto different teenages of different race/gender/etc. This could show that these could be the underlying problems of any teenager. I inferred from the lyrics that the 'tattoo' is almost like a stamp of regret from the person's youth.

In the pitch, I explained my reasons why I chose to make a music video for Party Tattoos. One of the main reasons is because it currently does not have a proper music video. The music video for it currently is just the singer singing to the camera. Therefore, I though that it would be interesting to explore how the lyrics could be displayed through a visual narrative. I also thought that there was quite a lot of themes to cover, such as relationship issues and growing up within the modern day.

I designed a clear moodboard for my pitch. I showed the audience that I wanted the colours within the music video to primarily be pastel colours as I feel like this would represent the artist well. Due to the video being filmed around Winter, I wanted it to have quite a cosy and warm feel to it. So, I will be including bokeh imagery.

I presented some basic types of shots that I am planning to use as well. I am planning to use extreme close ups of facial features such as they eyes and mouth. This will espcially becomje significant when the lyric 'black lipstick will never be a sin' is said. I will also be using a stop motion of the clock's hands at the start of the video.

The pitch was my first chance to gain audience feedback. I primarily ganed this feedback through a questionnaire that I deisgned and handed out to my peers. This helped me to develop my ideas even further. It helped me to sort out which direction I wanted my music video to go. One of the suggestions I had was to use people with actual tattoos to help depict more of a storyline. I will thoroughly consider using this idea. More feedback can be seen on the questionnaire audience feedback blogpost.


The pitch includes:

•  The potential target audience
•  Why I chose the song
•  What our cinematography plans are for the lyrics
• A questionnaire 
• A mini mood board for the video 

https://prezi.com/p/-dvdu1ktvg6n/#present

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Music Video Questionnaire - Audience Feedback

I conducted the following questionnaire to try and research what sort of music videos a young student (which is my target audience) would like. I handed this questionnaire out to several people:

Questionnaire

Are you:

• Male
• Female

How old are you?

Please state your favourite artist/song:

What sort of music videos are you interested in?

• Live footage of artist/band
• A storyline
• Clips linking to lyrics

How often do you watch music channels?

• Every week
• Every month
• Every once in awhile
• Never

What platform do you use to listen to music?

• Youtube
• Streaming from apps (Spotify, Deezer, Apple Music)
• Music channels on the TV
• CDs

If you do stream your music from apps, do you pay for premium services?

• Yes
• No

In conclusion, I found that generally a young student of around the age of 17/18 likes music videos that have a story line to it as it interests them more. I asked which gender and age the person was filling out the questionnaire so that I could have more knowledge about the target audience I was aiming for.

I asked about the type of music videos that people liked to gather what sort of music video I could possibly create for the song that I am doing. I found that clips linking to the lyrics were also popular as it helps people understand what the lyrics are trying to depict more. This fits in with the type of music video that I would like to create as the lyrics are quite literal, therefore I would like to create similar visuals to keep the audience engaged.  I have decided that I am going to use a mixture of all three types of music video. The music video will have some artistic shots which relate to the music video, representing the visuals. It will also have some sort of narrative to it as there is underlying conflict between the mother and daughter in the video. Then, there will also be some brief performance clips, similar to those featured in Sam Smiths, 'Not The Only One' music video. This will hopefully keep the audience engaged throughout.

Within the modern day, music channels are not as popular as they are before as the answer 'every once in awhile' was mostly chosen when asked 'how often do you watch music channels?'. The younger generation are more likely to stream their music from apps, such as Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube and Deezer now. This could be due to the accessibility of having millions of songs by various different artists in one place. This gave me an insight of where my music video could be published, therefore directing my music video to a particular audience.

RESEARCH AND PLANNING: Music Video Target Audience

Dodie Clark currently has a Youtube audience of about 1.2 million and has approximately 151 million views on her videos that she posts. It is estimated that 76% of her viewers are actually female. This would mean that the viewers for the music video that I create is most likely going to be viewed by a primarily female audience.  A lot of her statistics also show that the optimum video time is approximately five minutes. This is ideal as the audio is approximately five minutes long.

Due to Dodie Clark not being on the You Gov profiles, I searched artists similar to her to see if I could gain further information about what type of audience I need to target. The You Gov website presents live data from real people. It is great for market research and presents the importance of researching target audiences. To gather similar information to Dodie Clark's audience, I chose Birdy to be one of the artists to study and Troye Sivan as the other. I thought that Birdy would be a good artists as her music sounds quite similar to Dodie Clark's. The You Gov data showed me that Birdy's audience is primarily female at the age of 18-24. This was taken from a large sample of 960 people, therefore it shows that the data is pretty accurate. Judging from the 'monthly spare £' section, I gathered that this audience is likely to be young as they have little to spare per month. The entertainment section also proved that the audience is most likely to be a young teenager as they had interests of stereotypical young products such as Rihanna, Sia and Bad Neighbours 2. From this data, I can apply these demographics to Dodie Clark's audience.

Interestingly, Troye Sivan's demographics showed up a little differently. Troye Sivan is another popular Youtuber, who has approximately 4.4 million subscribers. This is four times the amount that Dodie Clark has, but I figured that they roughly have the same job - creating music and sharing it online, therefore could perhaps have a similar audience. The You Gov data showed that Troye Sivan's audience is largely male. However, this data was taken from a much smaller sample group of 140 perople in comparison with Birdy at 960. The data depicts that the same age group of 18-24 listens to Troye Sivan's music. Again, this implies that the target audience are most likely to be students. The entertainment section showed similar 'young' and 'fresh' interests, like Birdy's audience. It shows other artists and films that perhaps target young audiences such as Shawn Mendes, Major Lazer and Captain America. 

I also conducted a questionnaire and found out that the most suited audience for my music video would be a young female of about 18 years of age on average.

In conclusion, I found that my target audience for the music video is most likely to be female. However, I also found out that I should not completely rule out the male gender as they still make up quite a large proportion of the Youtube Community. The research that I have conducted also proved that my main target audience is the younger generation and primarily students. From this, I gathered that I should include quite modern and fresh ideas for the video. The research also helped me gather some thoughts about the album cover as well.