EVALUATION QUESTION 2

How effective is the combination of your main product with ancillary texts?

PANEL ONE

For panel one the reflection of the music video is both in the colour used and the drawings of our main protagonist. The lone protagonist was something I wanted to reference throughout the digipak, in order to engage our target audience and follow the convention of a coherent promotional package.

I decided to use blue for the front cover, throughout our video our protagonist is placed besides various blue backgrounds, during the shoot I decided to take some stills using a Lomokino film camera. The developed film came out with a slightly blue tint that nicely referenced the other shots of our character against the blue background.

The drawing again references the genre of the piece, the use of hand drawn graphics also references the cultural aspects of our music video such as the bookshop and art gallery.

Shots from my music video

PANEL ONETHE LOCATION

The use of the drawing of the location on the front panel specifically reflects the music video and again reflects the graphic style often seen on early folk albums, such as Joni Mitchell’s ‘The Hissing of the Summer Lawns’. The genre of the piece is therefore reflected and this allows for a coherent promotional piece. In having a drawing of the location, the video is explicitly referenced creating an easily recognisable motif within the promotional package the audience can pick up on. The mirror is reflected in the video, often our character’s journey was presented through the use of mirrored images in order to create a sense of time passing for the audience, the use of this on the front cover creates coherence with our video and ultimately creates an audience appeal.

Our target audience (female, aged 16-24) may find appeal in both our character being female and the aspects of finding identity or being on a personal journey.

I wanted to capture our protagonist's enjoyment in her solitude on the cover of the digipak, the use of the mirrored drawing of her surroundings creates a feeling of her being consumed in her journey and creating her own path.

PANELS TWO&THREE

I continued the reoccurring theme of the reference to my location in panels two and three, however here I altered the colour of the drawing using Photoshop. The multi-tonal yellow was chosen to reference the yellows used throughout the video, our character’s journey is reflected through each colour change and so this was something I wanted to capture in the print productions.

Visually these panels link with the front and back of the digipak and also our music video. To prevent the panels becoming too repetitive I used the yellow in order to contrast the other panels and create something visually pleasing. The links to the video and the rest of the digipak through the use of the location and the panoramic style of the drawing allows for panels two and three to be read like a book, this may reflect the narrative of the piece, the protagonists sense of self is created in the strong cultural references in locations such as the museum.

Slightly unconventionally the middle panels did not feature the artist, this is common for some panels two and three as the artist may use images that the audience can only see if they buy the album. The breaking of this convention however gives coherence to the package and, although the drawing is featured on the front panel, the colour alteration provides something new for the audience to engage with.

The colour alteration may also reflect J.M.W Turner’s landscape paintings, the use of yellows and oranges creates a significant style of art that is recognisable as Turner. Therefore the use of this in my promotional package reflects a strong sense of British culture, something the target audience can engage with.

PANEL FOUR For panel four I took the drawing for the front panel, and another still from the Lomokino film camera, and altered the colours to green. The colouration to green references the naturalistic imagery referenced in our video and used in folk albums, something often seen with album covers by Nick Drake, therefore reflecting genre of the track.

The repetition of images down the left hand side reflects the protagonist’s journey, mostly reflected throughout using the split screen narrative, this is a physical representation of split screen editing that breaks the typical “tyranny of the frame” (Willis) and therefore creates something with audience appeal defying the conventions of using just one image in the frame.

The reference to our video again being the use of colour to reflect our protagonists personal journey, the contrasting colour palette (blue, yellow and green) is completed here in the final panel creating a sense of coherence within narrative of the video and the promotional package itself.

SECTION TWO- MAGAZINE ADVERT The magazine advert again featured our protagonist although not facing the front, this creates something different from the rest of the digipak (as all the shots or drawings used are of our protagonist’s face) and creates coherence between the advert and digipak.

I decided the most effective image to have for the advert would be a hand drawing of a photograph taken on the day we filmed in the museum. This would reference the rest of the digipak and video well. The use of the interior shot however juxtaposes the rest of the digipak, each panel reference the exterior locations we used in our video, the use of the interior shot here not only adds a depth to the promotional package (all together referencing the entire video locations) but also adds a sense of closeness with our protagonist, the familiar location may be something our audience can identify with, creating appeal.

The reference to our protagonists journey and her interests is presented to reference both the video and the digipak. The notion of teenage aspiration and finding or creating identity is reflected here, the picture reflects a sense of discovering identity presenting our target audience's possible aspirations.

The use of minimal colour also juxtaposes the bright digipak, although it could be seen this breaks the coherent promotional package, I feel the minimal of colour serves to enhance both the video and cd package. The small colour placed in the picture frames also presents the idea of her aspirations, the ‘colourful journey’ she takes in finding her identity lies within her new found interests and solitude.

The representation of gender here therefore is progressive, with our female character forging her own path and presenting an independence of spirit. This reflects artists such as Beyonce, who’s work often portrays her own strong sense of independence.