1. Q4 – HOW DID YOU USE MEDIA
TECHNOLOGIES IN THE
CONSTRUCTION AND RESEARCH,
PLANNING AND EVALUATION
STAGES?

2. RESEARCH STAGE
 In the research stage I used...
 Blogger.com – this is a blogging website that I have been
using to blog about my A2 Media work. I used blogger in
the first year of the course and decided to use it again this
year as it is relatively easy to use. However there are
some limitations to this site; it is often difficult to move
images around on a blog post and the site can be very
slow at times. I also used blogger in the planning,
construction and evaluation stages by blogging about
everything I was doing.
 Web 2.0 – the internet was used religiously throughout the
whole of the course in all stages!!

3. RESEARCH STAGE
 YouTube – I used YouTube to watch other music videos in order to
create textual analysis’, as well as to gain an understanding of
conventions and features of a Indie music video. Additionally I
created a textual analysis on YouTube by annotating a music video
– this proved difficult at first but became easier with time. However
YouTube removed the video due to unknown circumstances. I like
this method of textual analysis as it’s more interesting than reading
a blog post etc.
 Prezi and Slideshare – I used these websites to create textual
analysis’ and other research tasks like industry research. I have
used Prezi many times throughout my research as I think it’s very
simple to use. I also think it’s good to use as it has an element of
interaction, as well as looking more interesting than a normal
powerpoint. Additionally I used Slideshare which is a website that
allows you to upload PowerPoint's. I had a small problem with the
site as it wouldn’t allow me to embed the slideshow onto a blog
post; so I had to print screen each individual slide.

4. PLANNING STAGE
 Bubbl.us - I used this to create an online mind map of the
idea for the music video. Molly introduced me to the
website as I hadn’t used it before she recommended it to
me. The site allows you to make a mind map which is
intractable, additionally you can change the colours etc to
make it look more visually interesting

5. CONSTRUCTION STAGE
 We used 2 cameras to film our music video, these were a Panasonic
Camera (school camera) and the Nikon D3200(Molly’s camera). We
opted to use two as we only had a limited number of time to shoot the
performance shots (in the recording studio) so we thought it’d be
quicker to use two to gain different angles of the same action. However
we did have some problems.. The school camera we used was new so
we were the first to use it. After we had filmed the footage we were told
that we’d filmed it in the lowest quality setting (accidentally), and in
comparison to the good quality of Molly’s camera we considered re-
filming as we didn’t want the music video to look bad. However it
wasn’t possible to re-film as the recording studio was fully booked and
we didn’t have time to wait to edit the footage.
 Wix – used this to create the website. I had never used it before
and was pleased to find it is very easy to use! Wix allows you to make a
website that looks sophisticated and professional, it has many
templates to choose from that are split into different categories.

6. CONSTRUCTION STAGE
 Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 – we used this software to edit our
music video (and also to create a lip-syncing practice and an
audience feedback video). We had used the software in AS
so we were very familiar with it. However we did have some
problems with it e.g. – it would often crash for no reason, and
the music video would lag/look out of time. However these
problems were mainly due to the school computers that can
be quite slow!
 Photoshop – before this year I had never used this
programme. I found it very difficult to work, and still do. We
originally wanted to make the CD digipack on Photoshop but
found it too challenging and time consuming. However we
managed to use the software to edit the picture on the front
cover.

7. CONSTRUCTION STAGE
 Microsoft word/publisher/powerpoint – I used a mixture
of all 3 of these programmes in the
planning/research/construction/evaluation stages e.g. –
to create research on the music industry, to plan ideas
etc. In the construction stage we used publisher to
create the CD cover/digipack. We wanted to use
Photoshop at first as we thought it would help to make
the digipack look more professional. However we found
it very difficult to work so we chose to use publisher
instead. This programme was ok to create the digipack
on, although it does lack many varied fonts which wasn’t
ideal for us.

8. EVALUATION STAGE
 GIFs – I used the website makeagif.com to make moving
pictures/short video snippets to put into some of my
evaluation questions. I’d never used GIFs before this, and
was surprised with how quick/easy it is to make them! I
like using GIFs rather than pictures as it looks a lot better
(than a still picture on blogger), as well as making it easier
to explain evaluation points
 Mixbook – I used the website Mixbook for the first time
during the evaluation stage. At first I found it difficult to use
however I overcame this quickly. This site is great as it
makes text look more interesting by putting it into a
moving photobook/storybook