To present our video we used FinalCut to put all of our shots and footage together to make our final product. We decided to use this programme because we were familiar with it from AS level, and by using this platform again we were able to discover new transitions and effects that we have used within our video, for example the split screen. By using this programme we feel that we were able to create our video to the best of our ability, whilst also learning new editing techniques for future projects that we may carry out. We used a lot of fast cuts throughout our entire video, but we done this in order for the footage to go with the beat of the song. We felt was effective because not only does this create quite a dramatic effect it also creates flow within the video rather than the shots not going with the song at all or them being out of sync. With the fast cuts we are also able to put as many different shots and settings in as possible, which shows that we have thought about how we could make our video more appealing to the audience by using the different shot types and not just one setting. We have also used a lot of close ups, whether it was of the actresses or when we filmed the balloons popping. The close ups of the popping balloons shows the impact of the powder paint escaping the balloon, again to create dramatic effect, and the close up of the actresses allows the audience to see that the lip syncing was on point and this shows that we wanted the video to look as professional as possible. 
To add to this for our ancillary texts we used Photoshop through out to create our entire digipak, including the CD front cover and back cover, lyric page, artist fact file and promotional poster. Again with the use of Photoshop we were able to make sure our digipak worked well with the genre we had chosen for our video and that it linked with the artist that we were trying to portray, which was a teenage girl band. We went against the typical convention of using a group image for the CD cover and promotional poster as we felt that the images we had taken of the powder paint splattered across the ground looked quite effective, particularly with our video. So we took those images and played around with the colours, saturation and contrast until we were happy with what it looked like, so this made our main image, and the colour choices of pink, blue, green and purple created a feminine look to the cover which we felt represented our artists personalities and image. Comparisons to real videos...
Pop music videos are usually performance based through choreographed dance or in a narrative storyline which connotes the song lyrics. Pop music videos tend to be quite fun and lively, depending on the pop song the video will most likely fit in with the beat/tempo of the song at hand. The artists will usually wear mainstream/popular trended clothing in the videos and if it is a pop group in a video they will show each member individually when it comes to their part of the song, and a group shot when they sing together. A real life example could be Little Mix or of course Neon Jungle (original singers of Louder), which could be compared to our own artist within our music video.
Within Little Mix's Little Me video they use a lot of close ups of the group members, to portray the drama of the song as it is slow tempo and has a deep meaning behind it. Although our song choice does not have an equally deep meaning to it, we have still used a lot of close ups to show the intensity of the song and the actresses/singers facial expressions. Close ups are typical conventions within pop genre videos, especially if the song is a slow one because it shows the meaning behind the lyrics or the mood of the song as a whole.
We have used a similar group shot to Little Mix as well. Girl bands tend to use a lot of group shots when they harmonizing together in a song, and you can usually see the setting around the group as well. Their video is completely black and white through out, whereas our video has colour as well as various black and white shots, but we have done this in order to create more of an impact when we use the powder paints and use fast cuts.
Looking at another Little Mix video, we saw similarities in their Change You Life one. Both this video and our own video are performance based videos, not showing an kind of narrative. Pop videos sometimes use an element of flashbacks in videos, whether it is a narrative or performance based one. Little Mix's video shows flashbacks of the group on tour, portraying an element of friendship and reminiscence, and this is similar to the beginning of our video where it cuts between the glow stick shots and the flashback shots of the actresses laughing and joking around when we were filming. This allows the audience to see snippets of an artists life behind the camera as you can see them as their natural selves, even though they're in a music video.
In relation to costume, the typical convention for this in pop genre is that the artist would usually wear casual clothes and tight dressy clothes. Tight dressy clothes are used within Neon Jungles 'Louder' video which allows Mulvey's theory of 'male gaze' to be suggested. Males would see the group members as sexual objects and women would think 'I wish I looked like that', but most pop artists will wear tight dressy clothes in order to look trendy or to be a sex icon if they wish to do so. We decided to challenge this convention as our actresses have worn casual clothes within our entire music video, but still look trendy at the same time. We took the idea of wearing dark clothing from Neon Jungles costumes, but then decided to include fluffy, hooded coats because we were filming outside in the woods and we wanted quite a cosy feel to that particular setting. When it came to the powder paint and black/white background settings we decided on monochrome colours, but wearing more skimpy tops in order to fit in with the natural/plain setting.
Forms-Ancillary Texts...
We have challenged a lot of the conventions of a pop genre CD/album, the first convention being that we have not used an image of the artist as our main front cover image, we have used a powder paint image which will link in with our music video. However we have used quite feminine colours on this image to portray the femininity of our create group. The font used for both album back covers are however quite similar, they're in all caps which allows the song names to stand out to an audience in a shop or website.
Another typical convention is the font used for the album title and artist. Most pop artists have their own signature font that is present on all of their music products, so they're recognisable to an audience. We chose a font that we wanted to be our 'signature font' and have place this boldly on the front cover to attract the audiences eye so they know who our group is. Neon Jungle's album cover also uses this as you can see their group name is written in their signature font.
We have then included the convention of a barcode, record label logo and copyright message to ensure that the album can easily be purchased/scanned in shops and that the record label and group own all rights to the album and it should not be used for copyright purposes.
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