Website Updates

News Page:
























We've added a new story to our news page which links in with our magazine article and front cover. We spoke about Ivory featuring on the cover of the music magazine NME as a part of their ten year anniversary publications.

Home Page:

We've added the album release date to the home page, alongside the release of the single 'Like Me'. This will allow fans to pre-order and prepare for Ivory's album release.

Page Titles:

To all of the pages we have added social media links so that our fans can constantly access our social media pages and follow our artist. 

The buttons link to Ivory's Facebook and Twitter pages and are present on every page of our website.

Final Tour Poster

After asking our class and receiving extensive feedback we have made some amendments to our first tour poster.
Here is our first draft and the changes we have made:

 



The changes we have made are:

-We changed our colour scheme from dark colours (black and purple) to lighter colours like blue and white. This was because the lighter colours were more suitable for Ivory's image and they match the synergy which is present throughout our work and her artistry.

-We made sure that the writing of the tour dates can be seen and that the dates do not cover her image.

 

Here is our final tour poster:

 

Music Video Feedback- Jake Wynne

Jake Wynne, a professional music video director, was able to give us feedback on our music videos which was amazing to receive as it helped us finalise our music videos. His criticisms and comments were invaluable to us during the final stages of this process because having someone, who has been successful in this industry, comment on our videos was incredible and a real help with our final feedback.

St. Dizier- Bang Bang: Nice framings, and interesting locations with a refreshingly different grade. However, the edit could have done with some more dynamics though to differentiate the build of the track.

Final Heidi- A good energy to the edit and a great use of the photographic technique which resolves nicely at the end of the video. Heidi's performance was consistently strong and her lip-sync was also good. It would have been nice to see a bit more this lip-sync through the video.

Love Now- Final draft: A great set up and concept with the first person perspective. Some really good  locations with amazing colours and vistas. Some more dynamics from the editing would have helped to drive this video along and give a better build to the day ending. It would have been nice to see a bit more of the lip-sync through the video.

Hypnotic Final Video- Really good use of the varying visual dynamics through different parts of the song. The edit picked out the changes in the music very well and the lip-syncing was especially strong. Good use of locations to give variety.

Rolling with Elephants- Great lip-sync, really tight with the editing and I really enjoyed the painted on digital effects. They worked especially well as outlines on the main performance.

I Don't Mind- Tori Lorente: A good filmic aesthetic to the video, with a nice use of colour. Some great framings and solid lip-sync throughout. A little more variety in the edit would have helped it build a bit more towards the end.

Final Video- Megan Thomas: A strong narrative thread that was well performed and consistent. The lip-syncing was very good and the emotion was conveyed very well. A good balance between the narrative and the lip-sync performance, with the cross cutting of both working well.

Ava Final Draft: Good use of varied locations and a strong narrative thread running through. Great lip-sync and a good balance between narrative and performance elements, resulting in a satisfying resolution.

Iuris- Something More: Innovative use of grading, and clever transition technique between shots. Strong lip-sync and some really interesting framing on the performance moments.

Ivory Final- Good strong editing, with clear definitions between verse and chorus. Interesting compositions and a clear filmic aesthetic. The lip-sync was especially good with a clear emotional drive and areas of light and shade.   

Avenue- Monday Morning (Final): A really clear beginning, middle and end. A well thought out video with endearing performances from the band with great lip-sync and fun energy. The comedy was well balanced and the view continued to develop as new scenes played out, helping to drive the story through.

Stay Draft 2: Once again, a lovely filmic aesthetic here, with very well composed shots pulling as much out of the environments as possible. The performances were well lip-synced, but at times I felt the emotions were not as clearly signposted.

Magazine Article: Ivory

After conducting magazine article research we wrote and constructed a magazine article for Ivory in the well known music magazine: NME.

Digipak Analysis

Here is a detailed analysis of our second digipak draft, which outlines the shot types and why we chose them for our album's digipak:

Filming Locations

Whilst filming we went to several different locations. Here is an evaluation of our third location:

Ivory Wins Best New Artist

Ivory has just received the Best New Artist award at the NME Music Magazine Awards after an astounding response from her newly formed fan base.
As the award was voted for by her fans this award means so much to Ivory and her whole team. Here is her acceptance speech from the award ceremony which took place in London last night:

Third Digipak Attempt

Here is our third full digipak:

Digipak Amendments

The amendments we made since the last digipak update:

• We've added Ivory's signature blue streak through her name to the front cover of the album.
• We changed the bottom left image from the image of the trees to an image of Ivory.
• The 'thank you' section of the digipak has been amended so that it is no longer just a quote and now surrounds an image of Ivory

Possible Digipak Ammendments: Signed CD

Whilst amending our digipak we played around with the idea of incorporating our artist's signature on the CD cover, here is the result:

Digipak Update

After receiving feedback on our first digipak draft we had to make a few amendments before creating and completing the final version. One of these changes was adding the institution information to the back cover. The institutional information is crucial and must be included on every digipak which is something we discovered through our digipak research.

After looking at several official digipaks including these:

We began to see similarities in their institutional and extra information. For example, both feature barcodes so this was something we added to our digipak. Secondly, both feature the artist's recording company and who distributed their album which is again something that we made sure to add to our digipak.

The institutional information we added went as followed:

Polar Republic Records Ltd.
Distributed by Sony Music Entertainment
All Rights Reserved
189 Soho Avenue, London, W1D 3AP







Here is our second digipak draft:

Polar Records Institution Logo

To complete our digipak, in particular the back cover, we had to create an institution logo for Ivory's music label- Polar Records.

 

 

Editing Techniques

Editing was invaluable to us when creating this music video because I often had to edit the original clips in different ways to help highlight the craziness/unhinged personality of Ivory during the chorus.
One example of this can be seen below. This is a gif which we made using a clip from the first chorus our music video. Here, Ivory can be seen with messy hair and a deranged look which I managed to enhance through the editing techniques used below.

1) This is a quick video which shows how I edited this sequence using Premiere Pro:





2) This is an example of a Jump Cut which is featured in our music video. Here's how we did it:

New Shot Ideas

After receiving some feedback on our music video we concluded that we urgently needed a wider variety of shots including extreme close ups, wide shots and high angle shots.
To find inspiration we looked for music videos which were similar to ours to see their variety of shots, here is what we found:

Website Update

After conducting our website research we found that female solo artist's tend to have a cover page to their website. On this cover page, the viewer can access the artist's latest music and the artist's official website via a link.
It was because of this discovery that we have created a cover page which, via a button, links to the official website.

So here is the link to our new website (featuring the cover page with a moving background):
http://ivoryofficial.wixsite.com/iamivoryofficial

Digipak First Official Draft

Here is our final, first draft of our digipak which we will be receiving feedback on very shortly. Once we have received this feedback we will begin the process of making amendments in order to complete the digipak in time for the final deadline next week.

First Draft Feedback

We received lots of feedback from different media groups which was extremely helpful as there was lots we needed to adjust  including our merchandise and our digipak.

Key Pieces of Feedback:
Good:
Some nice shots in the music video sneak peek
Our artist's image fits the genre and style of video we are trying to create
Good use of interesting locations which match your image
Good use of different social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook and Instagram
Nice, simple album cover with continuity of image from this to our music video.

Needs Work:
Need to ensure their is continuity across all band products regarding the colour of the logo; must always be the same
Need to change up the framing of the shots to have more diversity
Album digipak needs some work and needs to be completed with less focus on images
The flowery dress that can be seen in the music video sneak peek doesn't really fit in with the other outfits or the artist's image as a whole
When the beat drops at the start of the chorus, the shot needs to clearly indicate this drop and the artist needs to start going crazy
The merchandise is too male-orientated and needs more diversity
In order to appeal to a younger demographic, a non-explicit version of the song needs to be released.