Final critical self reflection

 This is my final self reflection for this project

In this component 3 project, we are tasked to create a music video with a maximum duration of 5 years. We were given freedom on what genre to choose. Me and my team chose the indie genre , specifically Here With Me by D4vd as the song we want to recreate. An indie genre’s convention is that it’s low budgeted, which is very doable for us students who dont have a high budget . Hence creating concepts or getting props for the music video will be affordable and realistic. Another convention of the indie genre is that it has a romantic narrative, topics such as hardships or love relationships. Such as Here With Me, the music video talks about a man and a woman having difficulties in maintaining their love relationships , showing two sides: a romantical and happy side , a sad more miserable side .  We also felt like the song’s lyrics made it easier for us to create the music video as the idea of showing that love is filled with ups and downs , both happiness and sadness, can be visualized clearly. The way we’ll represent this dominant reading is by using an Indonesian star having a highschool relationship, showing both the happy and sad sides of the relationship. With the first half being all lovely and romantic while the second half will show all the heartbroken and miserable moments.

Other ways we can represent this dominant reading is by branding. Branding is when an identity or representation is made through multiple elements such as reputation and visual image. In this project we used our social media page and the album itself for branding. The persona that we want to create is a high school student who’s both a joyful lovable kid and depressed person  . Hence we will post accordingly towards the persona that we want to create. Such as the mis-en-scene of the posts, using colors such as dark blue and black can connote a depressing atmosphere, as well as the visual expression, an emotionless face could show his grief in facing challenges in life. While the joyful posts could be demonstrated differently using alternate mis-en-scene, such as smiling faces and brighter colors such as green and yellow that gives a more warm and welcoming feeling towards the audience . 

However before we start any development of our music video, we started off by doing multiple researches on music videos of this genre. We had to take notes of the conventions of the genre to be able to maintain the indie category. Through research we have noticed that the usual conventions of an Indie music video is that it's low-budgeted and mostly DIY . This is one of the conventions that were likely confirmed since it supports the fact that we as students dont have a high budget. We have done this by using mostly phone cameras since we weren’t able to afford cameras . Another convention we conformed is that most of the locations used in indie music videos is using a normal location, such as natural and “free” locations. Doing this project we didnt rent any places since the budget was very low, therefore we did it mostly at school hours and at a friend's house where it's free of cost. This allows us to have a more flexible time frame since a booked location would mean that we have to all agree on a certain time , added with the amount of other schoolwork we have to do. I think it's wiser to be in a more flexible state since we are all busy . We didnt subvert any conventions from the genre aside from the music itself. We didnt do it at the beach and we had a day-in-the life concept for a music video.

This also applies to digipak where we also did research before we started on the development. A convention that we have noticed from indie artists such as Joji is that it has a simple aesthetic . The artists in this genre often promotes a minimalistic visualization , such as joji’s nectar Album where not alot of elements or abstract shapes are found. Instead he uses a close up shot on his face to help develop the brand identity . Another convention is that the colors used in the digipaks reflect the overall mood of the songs. In our digipak we used the colors blue, black and white to generate the dominant reading that we want to present to the audience. These colors connote the feeling of melancholy, sadness which is the main messaage that we would like to deliver. 

Our music video can appeal to different audiences as we represent high school students who fell too deeply in love with their significant other to the point where the break-up affects the student's physical activities and mental health. Our actor spending quality time with his girlfriend represents Indonesian students who are experiencing the highs and lows of commitment at such a young age. Relationships in an Indie music video are usually portrayed as emotional and often lead to heartbreak. Our music video shows this by having our actors having fun with each other in the beginning but slowly falling out of love, highlighting both positive and negative sides to love. This can be related to the cultivation theory by George Gerbner, where the audience’s beliefs are reinforced when they see the same belief on social media. Those young audiences that have experienced these hardships can feel more connected to our music video aligning with our goal of creating a relatable narrative/storyline for young audiences that have dealt with similar experiences. This also aligns with Stuart Hall’s Reception theory, which encourages different readings. Audiences can interpret different meanings from our music video and have the option to either agree or create their meaning. 

The representation that we are trying to show in this music video is high school students who fell in love with each other though at a point they broke up due to mental health issues and relationship problems . Relationships in an Indie music video are usually portrayed as romantic narratives  and often lead to heartbreak, we have conformed to this convention . In the beginning parts of the music video we used multiple medium shots to show how close and romantical the relationship between the two highschool students was .  Added with the mis-en-scene that supports it such as the happy expressions and brightful colors to emphasise the positive atmosphere. This is our way to use media language to create a certain meaning, Stuart hall’s representation theory. Then for the other half of the video, it's more to a depressing teenage boy . This can be shown from the night setting and visual emotions that express his current mood ; being sad. Hence young audiences having the same experience can feel more connected towards the video . Thus as they feel more connected they can interact with more of our media products such as the instagram page or purchasing the album .

Our social media page consists of teaser clips, album photos and behind-the-scenes footages . These elements will make our fans more intrigued and wonder about the outcome of the music video . We used instagram because the application allows users to have a chance to interact with our star, by commenting on posts and liking it our star can directly reply to their message in the comment section or give a direct message. Since the app is free and available to all devices, it allows our branding to reach a wider audience . Aside from that adding teasers aligns with the hermeneutic code from the 5 narrative code theory by Barthes, as it creates cliffhangers that hook the audience’s attention. Finally, by adding multiple types of content will keep the audiences engaged according to the uses and gratifications theory by Blulmer and Katz, diversion, personal identity , social relationship, and surveillance. 

To conclude, the aim of this project is for us to create an indie music video to represent the ups and downs of a relationship. Because it's indie, we conform to conventions such as how its low budgeted and its use of natural locations . This is also reinforced through other media products such as our instagram page and digipak. A way that we can heavily improve this project is by managing our time better, with this we can implement better research and development since well have more time 

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