Question 4 (Construction)

How did you use media technologies in the construction?

Wordpress

• Similarly to research and planning, I found Wordpress helpful for the construction of my media products. It was great for the evidence of how I was getting on with my products and allowed me to get feedback throughout. Therefore I knew I was heading in a good direction. The blog allowed me to share my thoughts and worries as well as the success for my media products.

• Wordpress made it easy to edit posts that I had previously posted, it was clear how to work it and easy for the construction.

• I had to post the development of my trailer as I was working on it, so I also found the embedding of the trailer from Youtube was really easy and the video always worked.

YouTube

• For the construction of my media products YouTube helped alot. It was used to upload my videos of different shots and the process of the trailer.

• I found YouTube was good as it allowed me to see the amount of views my videos were receiving and allowed people to comment if they wanted to.

• However I found that after my videos were uploaded, the file wasn’t exported as the best quality, the video wasn’t wide enough for YouTube, however it was in Premier Pro. Therefore I had to waste time re-exporting all of files for YouTube.

Adobe Premier pro CS5

• Through the construction of my trailer this programme was used the most. I uploaded all of the individual clips and cut placed them on the timeline. I included audio clips to play over the clips that were taken from YouTube and converted it.

• For the voiceover I just used the audio version of the clip, deleting the video part of the clip.

• As I went on using the programme to edit my trailer I became more familiar with the video effects and transitions. In my trailer I used a cross dissolve and a lot of fade to and from black. The use of these effects helped to add suspense to the trailer and make it look more professional.

• However, sometimes I did find that files went missing from my trailer, so I’d have to re find them and upload them again.

Nikon camera

• I used my Nikon camera to film all of my trailer. It is a decent camera that includes HD video settings. The camera also helps reduce the background noise present. This helped to make my trailer appear more professional.

• It’s been helpful that my this is my own camera, as other people had to book out the cameras available from media.

• The only disadvantage is that I didn’t have a tripod so some of the shots were quite shaky, this reduces the professional look of the trailer

After effects

• I used after effects to create my ident that I made by following a Youtubetutorial.

• After effects was a confusing programme to use, it had lots of different aspects that needed to be used. I tried to have a motion background, of the sea underwater and had the text move in from the centre.

• After effects allowed me to also change the speed duration of my identand include a fade in effect.

• I then exported the ident and inserted it into the trailer on Premier Pro CS5. The programme was used throughout the development of my trailer as I frequently changed the name of the company and the background music.

Adobe Photoshop CS5

• Photoshop was another programme that I used towards the end of the project. It was for designing the ancillary texts.

• Photoshop was great for designing the two because it was relatively easy to use and it gave a professional feel.

• The image I used for the poster was edited, changing the hue and saturation. The text on the magazine was all edited, allowing it to seem more textured, adding ‘drop shadow’ and ‘inner shadow.’

• Overall, Photoshop was useful for the ancillary texts and even though it took a while to get the magazine looking professional I think overall it was successful.