30 Second Promo Evaluation

 I was asked to create a 30 second digital video to promote Gateshead College’s media facilities and what they have to offer. I undertook numerous tasks to make my video successful such as risk assessment, pitch and camera shot lists.

Risk Assessment – http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/risk-assesment.html

Pitch – http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/digital-video-pitch.html

Camera Shot List - http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/camera-shot-list.html

Pre Production:

In my pre production I had to generate ideas for my video which I chose to do a plain simple video of all the media equipment that gets used at the college. Generating my idea was hard as well as easy because this video you could do anything you wanted with it as it was your choice on how to do, create and finish it.

My target audience was around 16-18 which is the target age of students that come to the college; I wanted to show them different media departments around the college. I showed a recording studio, the arts department and the library as all of these facilities get used by the media students at the college. I think my video appealed to them because they don’t want to see boring things like the colours of the cameras or how much paint the arts dept have so I thought my video showed them what they want to see in a promotional video.

Pre production paperwork is a big part in this task as you have to prove what and how you have done things.

Risk Assessment: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/risk-assesment.html) – A risk assessment is a document that you create to show all of the risks that could occur in whatever your doing (e.g. shooting a music video or building a cruise liner) in my case its recording my video. I had to create the assessment and document the risks that could occur when I was recording.

Pitch: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/digital-video-pitch.html) – A pitch is a document/PowerPoint that you take to your client and show them what idea you have came up with for them (e.g. Metroradio pitching their advert idea to BMW) and I had to pitch my idea to the class about what was going to  happen in my video and why.

Production Diary: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/production-diary.html) –  A production diary is where you record all the details about what you are going next and have you done it or not, also the time/date/location of whatever you are producing which I am producing a diary on my video.

Storyboard: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/storyboard.html) – A storyboard is a story of events that you want to happen. I used to a storyboard to show what camera shots and angles I wanted to execute and the location.

Cast and crew list: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/cast-and-crew-list.html) – A cast and crew list shows what cast and crew you need for a project (e.g. a pantomime will need a cast and crew list for all their cast and characters for the show) I needed a list of cast and crew to show who was going to plan and record my video.

Equipment List: (http://jbinteractivemedia.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/equipment-list.html) – the equipment list shows what equipment you need for something to be successful (e.g. a gig would need a stage, microphone.pa and speakers) this list is very important so that you or your PA can get the equipment that’s needed.

The process of production of my video was:

Plan – The 1^st process of my video was to plan the whole thing, what I was going to do why, where and when. Final plan and idea where then pitched to class.

Pitch – I produced a PowerPoint with the idea and then pitched to class and tutor (Gary) for them to see what my video was going to look and sound like.

Record – recording my video was not easy as the arts location was always busy with students so had to keep going back and forwards to the location. Other than that all my recordings in all of the other locations went smoothly, then I went on to edit my footage I recorded.

The equipment I used was:

Camera

Tripod

Mac

Film/Tape

Edit – I now had to edit all the footage I recorded, I captured on laptop and edited in final cut. The things I added were the colleges contact details at the end and a song (Taio Cruz - Higher ft. Kylie Minogue) running right through my video. Video was then exported into a lossy and lossless file and uploaded onto my YouTube page (http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCl8rGsXyIpAiFD0ZaiQDMJw) and blog (https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6658800689580355564#allposts)

Lossy – (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJkgf6sP7WI)

Lossless - (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OIh9EEPVsY)

Show Class and get feedback – once I had edited and exported to blog and YouTube I showed my peers and tutor my video and handed out a feedback form for them to give me feedback for me to then evaluate my video and take on board their feedback.

The problems that I was faced with were:

Camera Battery Dying – The battery in my camera after a few shots taken ended up running out of charge so I resolved that by going back to the classroom and getting another fully charged 1.

Area for Recording Busy (Arts Dept) – The arts department corridor was always full of students so that stopped me from recording that location, i resolved this by waiting about 20-30 minutes then going back and try again.

Evaluation and feedback explanation.

The things that I have learnt from this video are:

How to use a video camera – Before I had a good idea on how to use a video camera until it actually came to doing it I realised how hard it was. I never there was so much to a video camera, I thought you could turn on press record and go but it’s not that easy! White balance is the 1^st thing you do before you record anything; you need to check white balance with a blank white sheet on paper in every location as the lighting will change in each place you go.

Edit clips on final cut – final cut is very easy to use but if you don’t know what you are doing it can be very complicated, as soon as I looked at it I thought there is no way I am going to be able to use that but in the end I nailed it. I added all my clips what I had recorded, and then start cropping and moving them around on the timeline to make sure they ran smoothly and they were in the right order for me to be able to export into lossy and lossless.

Capture footage from camera to Mac – I thought the whole capturing process was plug in the camera, open final cut and drag and drop clips to start editing. No it wasn’t that easy, you had to plug in camera and change settings on logic to make sure the camera captured correctly then pressed record on final cut and play on camera to start the footage capturing into my timeline then stop it playing wherever you wanted your footage stopped.

Self Evaluation - Overall I think my promo video was done and edited well and would still inform people about what facilities we have at Gateshead College and what we have to offer.

My feedback off my peers shows what I would need to change to make it better, in the future if I make 1 I will take those points into account.

Peer Evaluation – My promotional video was assessed by my peers and tutor.

 Few of the positive comments I received:

·       I showed relevant areas of the college.

·       Fades and movements around the college worked well.

·       Use of contact details.

·       Music was relevant.

Things that could be changed:

·       Add staff or students.

·       Change words “Gateshead College” to the college logo.

·       Give the video an opening transition.

·       Add more department shots.

 Skills developed and used – The skills I have used are:

·       Using editing software – I used editing software to edit my video and audio together, I now have more knowledge on this as I used it for a few weeks and got used to editing and using the tools provided.

·       Capturing camera footage – Camera angles and directions were important in this shoot as I needed to know what I was recording, where, when and how. This made me create a diary as to what I was going to do and how it was going to be done.

·       How to use a video camera properly – recording, checking white balance, recording/pausing and starting again was all new to me so I had to learn how to operate the camera and record in all of my locations to make my video successfull.

What could have been done to improve and why? –

The things that I could have done better were:

Add staff or students into my video and get their views on all of the different media departments in the college.

Instead of using text for “Gateshead College” I should have used a logo to show what the colleges logo looks like so people will start to recognize it wherever they go.

Opening transition could have made the video a whole lot brighter and made people focus on what was going to be happening throughout the video