Self-reflection

This is the critical self-reflection of my Component 3 Music Video production project. 
(word count: 1689 words including intro) 

Cambridge gave the variety of briefs that I could do, I chose to create a music video since I never involved in making a music video and this is my first experience in creating a music video. The brief given to me said that I needed to create a music video from the music that me and my teammate chose, a digipak and social media page that represents the fictional artist we created "LUNA". I decided to choose the genre of alternative/indie music because after discussing with my team, we found out that creating a music video for this kind of genre is easier compare to other genre that we analyzed during our research. In this project, I worked as a group of 3, my other teammates were Satria and Theo. You can find links to their blogs in my blog. 

For this MV project, we decided to choose "Oceans & Engines" by Niki Zefanya as our song. We decided to choose this song because we had the similar music taste and the meaning of this song is likely align with nowadays young teenagers that mostly are facing problem in their romantic relationship with their partner. The social group that we represent in our music video is the youngsters who are facing broke up in their relationship as the social issue. While in our digipak and social media, we decided to use our real footage from the photoshoots we've done that matches the vibes of the actor we chose to be our fictional artist and the song itself. It has been represented both positively and negatively since it shows that most of the teenagers are simply happier when they are with their partner and this was shown through the outfit that were used by the main actors (the female artist) which is bright yellow color where yellow color symbolize happiness and sunshine. This shows that she was happy with her boyfriend which were shown from the many activities they did and the smile that are always on their face when they are together. Furthermore, the white dress that were used in the middle of the video was to show that their relationship are pure. We decided to use filter that shows dreamy vibes in these scenes to convey that it was her dream. However, the outfit that she wore changed when she woke up from her dream and realized that what was happening before are just her dream with enjoying her life with her ex-boyfriend and it shows that she has to continue her life without her boyfriend anymore with her. However, from this part, we decided dark outfits to be used my our main actor which was all black outfit that connotes strong feelings of sadness and this were supported by the acting of the actor that was very different when she was with her ex-boyfriend. While she was with her friend, she still thought that her ex-boyfriend and her facial expression immediately changes from sad to happy when she was having delusion of her ex and it changes back to confusion and no expression when she realized that it was just her delusion. Continuing to the last part of the music video, we decided to do the shooting at Pantai Nyanyi which was pretty far for the city. Here, we decided to shows that the main actor was still having difficulty in forgetting her ex and she went to the exact same location which reminds her of the memories with her ex. This was also supported by the whether that was about to rain which makes the atmosphere more dramatic and we also decided to use a polaroid picture of them when they are still together. We made a slowmotion when she threw out the polaroid picture from the window to make it look more dramatic and when she starts to drive the car away for the beach, it shows that she's ready to start her new life without any memories with her ex. The reason why most of the scenes are on the beach, even some parts of the lipsync and photoshoots were also using beach as our background is because this song has a strong relation with beach and we want to show that beach has a strong connection with their relationship. Additionally considering that most of the teenagers loves to go for dating and having fun at the beach where beach has the stereotypes as a romantic place for couple to spend their time together but at the same time it also being the place for many people to go when they are not in a good mood knowing that beach is the best place for having and for those people who wants calm atmosphere at the same time. 

For our branding towards our fictional artist, we decided to create a social media page in Instagram in order for the audience to have interactions with the artist as well as a place to promote the song, MV, and the digipak. In the social media itself, I decided to use real footage from the photoshoots we had and I'm the one who's in charge for the social media page. I decided to make the social media page more organized and more or less adopting the similar ideas from the research I did because having a more organized social media page seems more appealing and interesting instead of making it look like a personal account which won't make the posts not so organized and structure. In the social media page, it contains all of the informations regarding the production of the music video we made and the digipak. There will be an information about the release date of the music video itself, the digipak design, music video teaser to make the audience more interested into the product that we made which is the music video. It also includes some concept images that are related to the music video and the personal branding of the artist. The branding we created for our artist are charming and the innocence of teenagers who just started to explore the world. This is shown through the outfits style that she used which is mostly very casual and not very revealing and also shown through her makeup since we don't want to create a wild character branding for her which doesn't matches the personality of the song. The ideology is also supported by her where she still maintain to have social life by gathering with her friends and not keeping herself away from the society even after she broke up with her partner and when she decided she still need to continue and have a better life by leaving all the memories with her ex-boyfriend in the music video. 

Some ways we did to connect with the audiences are by creating a social media page which will be an interactive place for the artist and fans to interact. Furthermore, there is also a barcode in the digipak which will directly link us to the social media page and we will also promote the link of music video in YouTube through the link that will be in our social media page that will connect the audience into the music video that will be posted in YouTube. The audience will be having an easier access to link towards the social media, digipak, and music video just by scanning trough the barcode and link towards MV that were provided in our digipak and social media page. This MV fulfill most of the whole theory of Uses and Gratification by Blumler and Katz. Where personal identity shows how the audiences relates with the situation happening in the music video where there are many youngsters out there struggling to continue their life after broke up that are mostly very different when they were with their partner back then. Diversion is used where audiences watch and engage with this music in order to be distracted for a while from their real life difficulties and surveillance where people always wants to be updated about what's going on around this world. 

In order to be focus on this project, I did so many research about the same or similar genre and concepts to explore more that are related with our project and focus the effort in specific areas. The research itself helped me in gathering and exploring various concepts that we want to use for our music video. By looking further into more products that are similar to the genre of song that we want to use in our MV, it helps us in focusing the mise-en-scene with the concept itself and having more options in creating the mise-en-scene for our music video project. Moreover, by doing in depth research about other genres and artists helped me in determining what image that will be good for our artist and how we will build the branding for the whole product. I did not do research about non-music videos since I was just planning to focus on what is essential in our project and what is slightly needed for us to implement into our final product. The genre conventions of other genres of songs and music videos I did research was that other genres mostly are more colorful with upbeat music and it has more crowded scenes in it, however, some other genres has very dark vibes with upbeat music and it is not very crowded since it was done in indoor studio/setting. In this case for this Component 3 project, me and my group, we subvert these conventions and decided to go with different genre and create our own meaning from our perceptions as teenagers that can slightly relate with this kind of situation. We did more research after deciding what type of music genre we want to do before we finalize "Oceans & Engines" as the song we will use and create a music video based on that song. We also discuss and gather more information about products with similar genre and we change a bit of the branding of the artist we use with the real artist which is Niki Zefanya.