Question 4 - Text format

How did you use media technologies in the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages?

Internet

Blogger - Blogger has been a great tool in documenting the creation of my products from start to beginning. By being able to post a wide range of formats and its easy embedding it has allowed me to demonstrate all four stages of creation in my course effectively and clearly. The use of labels and dated posts also allows for easy navigation to older posts for myself or any peers and examiners making it a key tool in the course.

Prezi - Prezi as demonstrated here is an effective presentation tool which is completely different to all others in its field. Unlike powerpoint which has set slides prezi allows you to work on one canvas zooming in and out of information, pictures and videos. This gives a great affect that is eye catching and exciting.

Vimeo - Vimeo whilst not being the only or leading video hosting site around it is by far my favorite. One reason for this is it is genre specific to creation pieces such as short films, documentaries and music videos making it a great site to host my short film on rather than sites like Youtube or Dailymotion which host a vast and obscure range of footage. Vimeo is was also the first and leading video sharing site in hosting HD videos. All videos are encoded into H.264 for HTML5 support and have a higher bitrate than any other competing site.

Software

Sony Vegas - Sony Vegas is a form of video editing software and the one I used to edit and create my music video in post production. I decided to use this brand over others such as Premiere, as the effects and ability to manipulate are greater and simpler. For example in the scenes in which I had to do multiple cuts in very quick succession I was able to zoom in to edit my clip per 0.1 of a second and simply press the "S" key to separate the clip where I needed. However the best effect Vegas was able to offer me was the ease of applying effects to clips by simply dragging and dropping a preset on to all the clips which I wanted to look the same. This allowed me to change the storyline and allow it to look darker and more ominous in seconds. This effect was very useful and played upon the theme of my music video excellently. This saved me having to use after effects which could become complex using multiple forms of software on the same project. The best thing about Sony Vegas is the simplicity, I found that being able to edit on such a minute scale, cutting my clips by 0.01 seconds in order to get the timing perfect, was an obvious upside. 

Adobe Photoshop - Adobe Photoshop is a great tool for any image editing I wanted to do throughout the course. This was especially helpful in creating my magazine advert and my digipak, both of which were done purely on Photoshop. I was able to cut out my models and change the effects e.g lighting and contrast. When using black and white settings as well it enables you to have more free reign in the hues to get the perfect picture. Another way in which Photoshop was very helpful was in my production posts on my blog. After doing a photo shoot I would need to upload all my photo's to the blog. I was able to create contact sheets for all my photo shoots with ease.  However individually uploading every single photo was time consuming and would clutter up my blog. Therefor Photoshop was the clear choice.

Equipment

Canon 550D DSLR - To film my music video there was only one choice from the beginning and that was the Canon 550D DSLR. The Canon allowed me to film in 25 frames a second rather than the typical 24, this extra frame was used in order to give my music video a more real life effect rather than cinematic. The fact it is digital is another key benefit rather than in the past where film was needed. This is beneficial as instant playback is possible after filming and doesn't need to be developed. Digital cameras also have a vast memory capacity compared to film which allowed me to capture more footage, in better quality, and for free. It also makes post production a lot simpler as in Vegas I can cut, speed up, reverse, slow down and generally mould any clips I have taken into the way I desire. This camera was also used to take the photos for my poster and magazine article. This is because the camera is equipped with a cinematic shutter speed and with a 1.8 aperture lens I could take detailed and artistic photos of my models.