Copyright Letter

                                                                                                            La Retraite RC School

                                                                                                            Atkins Road

                                                                                                            London SW12 0AB

                                                                                                            UK

745 5th Ave

New York, NY 10151

United States

Midtown West, Midtown East

17 September 2014

Dear Copyright Holder

I am an A level student and I am writing this letter to ask for your permission to use a song for my music video which I will be creating for my practical work in Media Studies. The song that I will be using for my project will be Alicia Keys, 'You Don't Know My Name'.

I can assure you that the music video will only be shown to my Media Studies class, my teacher and the OCR exam board. Your company and the artist herself will have an opportunity to view the final video if you wish.

If possible, could you please send me a written copyright notice to be included in my coursework portfolio?

Yours faithfully,

Ashleigh Jones

Audience Profile

Mina represents a typical member of our target audience. Mina is a young adult studying at university in London.                      

• Mina listens to genres from R&B and Hip-Hop to Jazz and Soul.

• On the weekend, our target audience like to spend time with their friends going out to eat, shopping and concerts.

• Mina's favourite drink is orange juice.

• Mina uses bus, train and trams as her mode of transport.

• Her favourite restuarants to eat at are Five Guys, Nandos and Pizza Hut. 

• Mina choice of breakfast cereals would be Cheerios.

• Tv shows such as, Daria, The Simpsons, My Wife and Kids and Devious Maids are Mina's favourites.

• Her favourite vegetable would be sweetcorn.

• Mina doesn't play any sport but enjoys watching Athletics.

• When Mina goes on holiday, it is often to visit her grandparents in the Caribbean.

         

Conventions of Hip-Hop Music Videos

Jay z - 99 Problems

Jay Z's '99 Problems' video is set in an urban, poverty stricken area where there are several low angle shots showing Jay Z in front of an empowering block of flats reflecting the urbanized culture. This is a major convention of Hip-Hop videos, and many Hip-Hop artists focus on the aspects of Afro-American culture in their videos.

Used commonly in Hip-Hop videos, there are nearly always females whom may be portrayed as "sexual objects". As the two photos show, the females are dressed in hardly any clothing and there to serve male attention. However, this could be seen as an element of  realism as although not all, but in the real world many women are these images of half naked females and the life they live is portrayed in the exact same way in the video.






A lot of low angles are used to show the city and lifestyle in comparison to Jay Z. Many close ups, medium shots, long shots and canted angles are also all used. Shaky cam is present in some parts of the video adding a raw, authentic feel to the it.

Dark clothing and props such as guns, money, stereos are all common costume conventions of
Hip-Hop music videos.

Hip-Hop videos are often edited at a fast pace, '99 Problems' shows a range of different images and activities in the video and transition to the next image at a very fast pace which matches the pace and rhythm of the song.

Britney Spears - Baby One More Time

Britney Spears re-enactment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Vvk39Apsrk

Evaluation Question 5

How I attracted/addressed my audience: 

Although we stuck to certain conventions of horror films in order for our product to appeal to our audience and to ensure they recognize the genre of the film, we did however, subvert some of the conventions to keep our film unique within the genre of horror films.

Our target audience predominantly being between the ages 16-19, we wanted to guarantee our products appeal to them by developing and conforming to specific horror film conventions that we knew they could relate to and therefore resulting in them being more frightened. For example, by setting our film in a house, which is a popular horror film setting, was simply because we felt that it was a convention...... developing as it gives audiences a feeling of dread which is what they should expect and to some extent want to feel.









Setting the first part of our film in daylight, we felt was a unique point as horror films are usually set in dark, gloomy places. This isn't conventional and draws our audience in as they are peculiarly intrigued to this - weirdly frightening them. After watching the highly acclaimed horror film 'Sinister' which opened set in the daylight which we felt was very intriguingly apprehensive was the feeling we wanted to address our audience with. And this is a reason why people should see our horror film opening.

We adjusted our film to attract our target audience by having our victim characters as teenagers. This is similar to the film 'Scream' as the victims for the film were also teenagers; making the reality of the film seem much more believable resulting in our audience feeling afraid and anxious.
  
The target audience for 'Scream' evidently being teenagers/young adults and being classified as a 15 film indicates that our film will have a better chance of attracting our target audience.

We scripted and recorded a voice-over commentary where we elaborated on parts in our film that we felt were particularly unique and appealing to our audience.
Here is the link to our voice-over: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7mfyEwnqxw

Evaluation Question 4

The audience for my media product:

Our primary target audience young adults in between the age of sixteen to nineteen, any gender and any race as I obtained from my film audience survey. My initial example of how a typical person from my target audience would look like was something like this:

This is Mina, She is seventeen years old and lives in London. She enjoys watching TV, going to concerts and going to the cinema whenever there are new films out.


The kind of audience we would want to attract are courageous people willing to challenge and fear their minds. This widens our audience as Horror/Thrillers are the best genre to give this feeling to their audience and is additionally a very popular film genre.

Mina's favourite films are films like 'Insidious', 'Prisoner', 'Scream', 'Sinister', 'Gravity' and 'The Ring'. Mina went to the cinema to view all of these and then later bought them on DVD to watch domestically. Her favourite TV shows are shows such as, 'Vampire Diaries', 'Pretty Little Liars', 'Daria' and 'Skins'

The predominant audience for most of Mina's favourite TV shows and horror films are teenagers. For example, the age group that most 'Vampire Diaries' fans falls into is 13-18 (gathered from here: http://vampirediariesonline.com/polls/what-age-group-do-most-vampire-diaries-fans-fall-into/) and the target audience for the film 'Sinister' is mainly young adults which means that there is a greater chance of Mina enjoying our product as it is evident that her social group enjoyed other horror films and TV shows of the same nature.

I feel our film would appeal to Mina as she is a curious, daring teenager who enjoys and is open to going out to watch the latest films; she is especially eager to go out to watch the latest horror films as most of her favourites are essentially horror films. Our horror film has similarities to some of her favourite horror films such 'Sinister' and 'The Ring' therefore, if our film was shown at her local cinema, Mina would be attracted to it.

Target Audience Profile

From the results of my film audience survey, I was able to gather the following about my target audience:

1. They are females aged mainly between 16-19. I imagine them to look something like this:

          

     

     2.  Their favourite are films like 'Saw', 'The Ring' and 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' 

              

      

      3. The type of victims they prefer to see in a horror film are young adults or dumb blondes

           

       4. The type of scary non-diegetic sounds they would prefer to here is heartbeats. Like this: 

       5. They would like horror films to make them nervous and scared

       6.  Horror films appeal to them more when it is based on a real life event

       7.  Gruesome aspects within horror films (such as weapons, gore, and blood) "kind of" frighten them

              

        8. There is nothing they feel would be "too much" to watch in a horror film

        9. They would prefer to see horror films set in a house

             

The information I obtained from my survey results will help my group and I when thinking about the conventions and codes we want to develop or challenge whilst filming our horror film opening. It will also help us with the sort of material and visuals we will include in our opening that will be suitable for a sixteen year old to view but also developed enough for those older than the age of sixteen.

Here is a link to my survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DHCH8HJ