QUESTION TWO- HOW EFFECTIVE IS THE COMBINATION OF YOUR MAIN PRODUCT AND ANCILLARY TASKS?

By Hannah Hopgood

INTRODUCTION

For the combination of products there needs to be a clear link established, within the media industry this is created through the construction of brand identity. Brand identity can be defined by aspects such as the typography, house colours, photographs, design components and even logos that run across all products, linking them together through imagery used being the same. These aspects of design can also construct the star image and how it is represented to the user. For example my findings from my analysis on indie band The neighbourhood support this idea as shown below we can see that a theme runs throughout their products by logo, house colours and simplistic layout.

RESEARCHING BRAND IDENTITY On from this I wanted to expand my knowledge of brand identity so I conduct research into pre-exsitng products of key current indie artists and how they represent themselves. I conducted this research through essay analysis format, Youtube, Spotify and imagery as to gather an understanding into one of the main areas I aim to represent throughout my product therefore improving the overall quality.

MUSIC VIDEOFrom creating this initial research I then started to plan out my ideas using the song “Mind Over Matter” by PVRIS as my audio I looked into the lyrics as a way to create an illustrative music video as well as how I could apply theories to the narrative structure of my music video. Exploring theorists such as Andrew Goodwin, Maslow and Blumler and Katz.

FEEDBACK Application of Richard Dyer’s theory to the music video through the construction of star image would help to improve the music video as well as make the media text more engaging to audience by giving them an insight into the art. This led me onto the construction of the star image by research female indie artist and how they construct themselves in the forms of a star by fashion choices, for example the way in which Lady Gaga represents herself by linking to the couture fashion industry which also adds a tool appealing to her target audience of fans as well as making the star image memorable through choice of clothing being exaggerated which can also act as a form of press by having the images of her in this clothing promoted through papazzariz.

RESEARCH I then research female indie artists that were key within the genre such as Florence and the machine, Lana del ray and Marina and the diamonds. Looking into their visual aesthetics through clothing and make up choices which could be applied to my star image I aim to construct. This research led me onto re-constructing a new costume design that helped to establish the star image as such below through my poster on Easel.ly.

IMPROVEMENTS AND CHANGESAs to show the artist by their star image within the music video I inserted performance footage in to the narrative as to create a construct between reality and the star image which I feel helped to show the artist in the music video in an effective way. This also further helped to establish the identity of the artist by the repeation of her self image within the music video linking to Andrew Goodwin’s theory.

MAIN ASPECTS WITHIN THE ANCILLARY PRODUCTS Through my research I found that one main design aspect that ran throughout the indie genre and was seen as an conventional imagery item was geometric print so I felt to include this into my overall design was important as it followed design conventions of the indie genre which helped to not only establish imagery which the artist could be recognised for but also the genre in which they are identified with. As shown below is the geometric print I constructed for the achaillry products and also for the application within the music video as an overlay image on the performance aspects.

LOGO

When creating the logo I looked over aspects form past projects, I used a ripped paper idea when constructing a media magazine last year and chose to experiment with this, creating a ripped paper on which the typeface could be layered onto as well as have masking tape on the edges of the paper to make it look personal through a homemade effect. To further expand upon the homemade feel I made the typeface handwritten so that it has a personal aspect, linking to the personal narrative within the music video’s structure.

TYPOGRAPHY

I also looked into different typefaces which could be used for headings and textual aspects on the website and digipak yet link with the geometric print and indie genre, from this I expanded upon the minilistic aesthetic shown in the indie genre nowadays. I chose to use a strong yet simplistic typeface for the headings and a handwritten style of font for subheadings and the artist’s name, I chose these as to not over complicate the design with a dramatic text as this could not only make the piece look too busy but look as though it identified with a different music genre through conventional representations for example the rock genre having more bold, sharped edged typography.

HOUSE COLOURS

House colours are another key aspect which can help construct and support the brand identity and iconography of the artist throughout the products by having a set colour palette which is shown throughout their products. For the house colours I chose to have a range of blue/tutorquise, grey and purple as to link back to her being a female artist I chose purple to symbolize her as female and the colour purple meaning pride yet to make the colour palette appeal to both genders I had the gender neutral grey and blue/tutorquise.

ANCILLARY PRODUCTSFor the ancillary products I combined these elements being the logo, typography, house colours and design components together as to feature on all ancillary product establishing and support a strong idea of the brand identity throughout all the products. These can be shown within the ancillary products to the right hand side of the page as we can see clearly links throughout these promotional products.

CONCLUSION In conclusion I found the construction of the ancillary tasks were manageable as repeated patterns or typeface used could be easily copied over creating the identity of the artist through the matching aspects shown within each product, whereas the main problem was creating a clear link to the music video by using similar components. Through in-depth research I was able to fully understand the importance of establishing brand identity and how I could make the identity shown within the music video by constructing a star image that links to the ancillary product through similar house colours included into the makeup aspect. I also feel by filming with a purple colour overlay it helped to push the colours used for the ancillary product to show a clear reference throughout.I feel the brand identity could be made more effective by importing the footage into Finalcut and adding the same geometric print as an overlay through transitions adding a new element into the editing process yet making the link stronger through visual conompents seen on screen.