Audience Essay Question

'Media texts will never be successful unless they are carefully constructed to target pre-established audience needs or desires.' Evaluate the ways that you constructed a media text to target a specific audience.

     In the research stage before we started to create our music video we spent time viewing existing music videos from the rock and rock/pop genre including 'My Immortal' by Evanescence, 'Sorrow' by Flyleaf and 'Jar of Hearts' by Christina Perri. This helped us to become aware of the conventions used within this style of music video. The main thing that we noticed was the costume and make up. The females in these videos had a feminine grunge style, usually pairing dresses with boots and eyeliner. This look definitely lends itself to the rock style and could be something that the audience can relate to or look up to. In our music video we developed this idea and the costume was a leather jacket over a black lace dress and docs. The styling was more focused on the female, meaning that the female audience would probably be more interested. Viewing existing music videos also helped us to decide to use both a narrative and performance shots because most of the other rock genre music videos did both. The story was basically about finding salvation in music and our audience would be able to relate to this because we are targeting big music fans and people that are involved in music themselves. Rock music fans tend to be very loyal and it is often more than
music to them, it's more about a lifestyle. Also, the feelings and emotion we tried to portray could also be something that the audience could relate to. If you think about the stereotype of rock fans as 'emos' and the connotations this has then the tone of the video very much fits.

     We thought it was important to have performance shots, not only for the narrative, but because a lot of other rock genre videos do and it is a convention that our target audience would enjoy and probably relate to. Rock music fans are the ones that spend a lot of time at concerts, gigs and festivals and are very into the live music scene. They may also play or sing themselves, whether it be in a band as a solo artist, meaning that the quality of live and 'real' music is very important. Therefore, we wanted to portray the live music aspect of the band within the video, making sure to give them an image as a 'real' band.

     We also created an audience profile which helped us to think about the shops that the audience would be likely to shop at which gave us ideas about what clothes they might wear. We looked at local shops such as Voodoo in Leicester, only stores like Disturbia and well known high street shops like New Look and River Island. During the research and planning stage I looked on Lookbook for some styling and aesthetic ideas too. The aesthetic is obviously very important for a music video and it is important that the artist is portrayed in a way that the audience can both relate and look up to. We wanted a strong female but not someone intimidating, meaning that the mixture of feminine and grunge worked well as well as being quite conventional for the genre of music.



 

G235: Critical Perspectives in Media - Theoretical Evaluation of Production: Representation (Music Video)

'All representations therefore have ideologies behind them. Certain paradigms are encoded into texts and others are left out in order to give a preferred representation' Levi Strauss (1958)
The main overall ideology for the music video was the feeling that music is a kind of 'salvation'. It portrayed the idea that music could give hope and the character prevailed because of music. The character therefore, was initially represented as vulnerable but gained hope and power throughout the video.

Richard Dyer (1983) posed a few question when analysing media representations in general:
1. What does it imply? Is it typical of the world or deviant?
The video gives a sense of the world as a slightly darker and unhappier place than perhaps most people see it. This is because it is from a personal point of view; from the eyes of one specific person, using their feelings (which are expressed in the song).
2. Who is it speaking to? For whom? To whom? What does it represent to us and why? How do we respond to the representation?
Literally, it is to the audience of the music video; people who are into rock music and that will relate to the feeling and lyrics of the song. The character in the video, however, is speaking to anyone who will listen while it also being like an internal monologue. You could argue that it speaks for the genre specific audience and therefore represents them in a slightly negative light.

Laura Mulvey (1975) argues that the dominant point of view is masculine. The female body is displayed for the male gaze in order to provide erotic pleasure for the male (voyeurism). Women are therefore objectified by the camera lens and whatever gender the spectator/audience is is positioned to accept the masculine POV. 
John Berger (1972) 'Men act and women appear'. 'Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at.' 'Women are aware of being seen by a male spectator.'
The audience for the music video isn't gender specific and the character is female so you could expect there to be some aspect of the male gaze theory coming into it. However, the costume is not revealing and does not fit the typical style that can be seen in pop videos, because we were working to a rock genre. The way the character acts is nothing to do with being seen as a 'sex icon' and instead is to do with portraying emotion.

Audience

A2 Audience Presentation

Theories

John Hartley (1987)

• Create a relationship with the audience
• Know exactly what the audience want

Magazine - I created a questionnaire to gain feedback from my audience, therefore understanding what they wanted and applying it.
Music Video - Created an audience profile based on real people that were our target audience and used their ideas.

Julian Mcdougal (2009)

• Difficult to define a specific audience

Magazine and music video - With other genres moving into the mainstream our audience may be larger than it would have been before but there will still be a loyal 'rock' audience.

Ien Ang (1991)

• More sub categories
• Be very specific to your audience

I think that my audience is very specific and though anyone could read the magazine it is specifically geared towards females that are involved in rock music themselves, as well as just listening to it.

Hypodermic Theory

• Inject ideas into an audience

Pluralist (active) theory

• Our own interpretation

My audience can pick and choose which parts of the magazine they may read as well as whether they want to read it at all.

Uses and gratifications theory

• Escapism, relationships and surveillance

Magazine - I think my magazine fits with creating a personal relationship because the information about bands could become a talking point. It also identifies with the audience, aesthetically it would be appealing to the audience and may influence them. It definitely fits with the surveillance because it is giving information throughout.
Music Video - Music videos are used for entertainment as a form of escapism and they also may become a talking point between friends.

G235: Critical Perspectives in Media Theoretical Evaluation of Production - Magazine

Detail the target audience for your product.

My audience would be mainly made up of females because the magazine focuses on the females within rock music. They would probably be quite young; teenagers or young adults and they would be heavily into rock music, perhaps even playing themselves in some way.

Detail what the audience might identify with in your product?

The audience would recognise and probably like the music of the bands and artists I cover. The fact that it is focused on females means that female readers can identify with the artists they see in the magazine. My magazine also had a focus on how the music is made and this would be interesting for any composers that are reading.

What meanings/uses they might make from consuming/interacting with the product?

They may learn about composing and they will gain information about the bands/artists.    

Is your text popular for a mass audience?

I feel that because of the genre of my magazine my audience would be more likely to be a niche and alternative audience. Taking the term 'popular' into account I don't feel that my audience would fit with either the high or low culture in the fact that their style wouldn't be associated with the 'mass' culture. The other definition of popular meaning 'for the people' probably would fit my audience because they are a minority group that have gained popularity and still stay true to the values and are loyal to rock music.

Ien Ang (1991)
'Audiencehood is becoming an ever more multifaceted, fragmented and diversified repertoire of practises and experiences.'
Do you agree with Ang?
Yes, I think people are becoming a lot more open minded and are more willing to take on new things. I think a lot of this is to do with developments in technology.
Detail the social demographic of your target audience.
Mainly I think my audience would be female, around the age of 18 and working class.

John Hartley (1987)
'Institutions are obliged not only to speak about an audience, but - crucially, for them - to talk to one as well; they need not only to represent audiences but to enter into relation with them.'
To what extent do you agree with this?
I agree, I think that the audience needs to feel like they are gaining something and that they are being represented. They also want to know that there are likeminded people both producing and reading the magazine.
Hartley also suggests that institutions must produce 'invisible fictions of the audience which allow the institutions to get a sense of who they must enter into relations with.' (They must know their audience so that they can target them effectively.)
How did you do this with your magazine?
I created an audience profile based on people that I had talked to, these people were the kind of consumers I was targetting (female, teenager, liked rock music).

Audience Feedback
In order to gain feedback I read all the comments left by both teachers and students but in order to gain feedback from a different group I created a questionnaire and gave it to friends that are into rock music.

Can your coursework be linked in any way to the passive audience theory?
I suppose that the language used in the magazine articles could have an effect on the audience but most of the magazine is just informative.

How can your target audience be seen as active?  
My audience can pick and choose which parts of the magazine they may read as well as whether they want to read it at all.

McQuail's uses and gratifications theory.
I think my magazine fits with creating a personal relationship because the information about bands could become a talking point. It also identifies with the audience, aesthetically it would be appealing to the audience and may influence them. It definitely fits with the surveillance because it is giving information throughout.

Discuss the ways that you have used media language to create meanings in one of your media products (Music Video)

     For the music video we thought a lot about what camera angles and shots we would use and what effect these would have. We ended up using quite a large variety of camera angles and shots to portray different things. The long shots that show the character walking through the field and used with a straight angle and panning. This shows desolation which links with both the song and the band name and it makes the character seem small compared to her surroundings.  The close ups were used to show the emotion of the song and we used the camera at an eye level angle to make the emotion even more obvious. The mid shots used with a straight angle were used mainly for performance purposes; to capture any gesturing as well as body language and emotion. The other mid shots used with a high angle were used to show the character as vulnerable while also capturing body language, costume and emotion.

     The editing of the video was kept quite simple with mainly straight cuts between scenes and shots to keep the pace and to make the cuts clean. We did, however, use a dissolve cut between two of the scenes when the band shots are first introduced to differenciate them from each other. 

      The lighting was also simple because we wanted it to be natural because of the situation. All of the external shots used natural lighting to create realism and the internal shots use low key lighting to keep it looking natural and realistic. Because it was a highly narrative video realism was important and it wasn't apprporaite to use a lot of light and colours that may be used in more pop videos.

     All of the sound used was non-diegetic because the only sound used is the music track. When editing this was put in as a seperate audio line and the video was placed on top.

     We wanted the external setting of the field to connotes a sense of lonliness and desolation because this  fits with the song and the band name so there is a strong theme throughout. We used Barthes code for this which talks about the connotations that can be attributed to denotations, the denotation being the field. In these scenes there were no props used and this created a contrast between these shots and the internal shots where quite a few props were used. The letter in the internal scenes was a vital prop because it laced the narrative of the video together. We also used some props to dress the scene and make the internal set look realistic. The costume e for the external shots was a black lacy dress paired with docs and leather jacket, this meant that a mixture of feminine and grunge was used which is quite conventional for the genre of music and the style of the song. The make up was also very conventional and typical of a female rock genre artist. On the internal flshback shots the costume and make up was different because it was a different scene and they weren't 'performance' shots.

     We used some special effects during editing such as the 'cold steel' colour effect for the flashback scenes. This acted as a black and white kind of effect and was another way of differenciating the scenes from each other. This is a convention seen in films and music videos used for the same purpose. We sped up and slowed down some of the shots meaning the timings of the shots were changed to fit them with the pace of the music as well as to create atmosphere.

Analyse media language in one of your coursework productions - Music video plan

Camera:

• Varied  use of shots
• Long shot with a straight angle and panning used to show desolation
• Close ups with eye level angle used for capturing emotion
• Mid shots with a staright angle used mainly for performance purposes - to capture gesturing, body language and emotion
• Mid shots with high angle to show character as vulnerable while capturing body language, costume and emotion

Editing:

• Mainly used straight cuts to keep pace and to make the cuts clean
• Used a dissolve cut between scenes

Lighting:

• All external shots used natural lighting - realism
• Internal shots use low key lighting to keep it looking natural and realistic

Sound:

•  All sound is non-diegetic, the only sound used is the music track

Mise en scene (setting, costume, colour, props):

• Setting - External field shots connotes a sense of lonliness and desolation which fits with the song and the band name so there is a strong theme throughout.
•  Props - Using a field for the external shots also meant that no props were used in these scenes which creates a contrast between these shots and the internal shots where quite a few props were used. The letter was a vital prop because it laced the narrative of the video together. Props were used to make the internal set to make it look realistic.
• Costume - black lacy dress, docs and leather jacket - a mixture of feminine and grunge was used, conventional for the genre of music and the style of the song. The make up was also very conventional and typical of a female rock genre artist.

 Special Effects (visual, sound and lighting):

• Speeding up/slowing down shots - The timings of the shots are changed to fit them with the pace of the music as well as to create atmosphere.
• Colour - The 'cold steel' effect used for the flashback scenes differenciates the scenes from each other. It is a convention that is sometimes seen in films for the same purpose.