Brief
While you have unprecedented creative control, you still must work from a brief. This year's brief is as follows:
- A cross-media production for a new artist or band in a genre (or sub-genre/ hybrid) of your choice.
- Create an original music video and associated print or online material to promote the same artist or band.
- You should create a cross-media production for a specialist record label (either independent eg XL Recordings or part of a large conglomerate eg Def Jam)
- The audience should be specialised or niche. Your target audience is 18 - 34 year olds.
- The song you select for your music video cannot have an official music video already
- You will create a new and exciting artist/singer/band/DJ with a clear brand identity
Task one - Create an original music video to promote your new artist or band
This will be completed after lockdown is over, but it's still important to know what you're doing so you can prepare!
Length: 3 minutes - 3 minutes 30 seconds.
- Two or more filming locations (e.g. studio, rehearsal or live venue, or other locations)
- Wide range of camera shots, angles and movement to interpret the music and lyrics of the song
- Shots of the artist or band to establish a clear identity/image
- Performance footage (rehearsal and/or live and/or lip synched)
- Representations of at least one social group
- Clear structure with an element of narrative
- Editing of original footage to the music track
- Graphics depicting the original name of artist or band and title of the track
Task two - Create a front cover and double page feature article for a new specialist music culture magazine to promote your artist or band to the target audience
You're going to make your magazine much later, but you still need to reference it in your aims and intentions!
Length: 3 pages.
Front cover:
- Original title and masthead for the magazine; strapline
- Cover price and barcode
- Main cover image to establish the identity of the new artist or band
- Main cover line relating to the new artist or band plus at least 2 further cover lines
Double page article:
- Feature article (approximately 300 words) to promote the new artist or band. The article should include an interview with the artist or band.
- Headline and stand-first, sub-headings, columns
- One main image and at least 2 smaller/minor images (all original and different from the images on the cover)
- Pull quotes and/ or sidebar
How to get an 'A' grade
- Use media language to demonstrate intertextuality and/or generic hybridity
- Convey a complex representation of a social group using media language
- Subvert and challenge typical representational stereotypes
- Present an ideological context typical to a major music label
- Create a magazine that demonstrates clear stylistic, thematic and ideological links to your music video
Aims and intentions
Make sure you complete the rest of the work book up to the aims and intentions slides before you attempt the aims and intentions essay! You can find a very long video with terrible sound explaining how to do this by clicking here.The aims and intentions essay is a short piece of written work where you demonstrate what you intend to to do in your media studies coursework and how you are going to address the brief, which you can find above. While in many ways it's short and straightforward, it's assessed as part of your overall coursework mark, which means it's definitely worth your while to complete it to the highest possible standard.