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

The blog format that we used throughout our practical task helped me to significantly structure my ideas and keep my planing stages organised through the constant updating and thinking process. The internet as a whole played a big part in the initial planning process as it helped build a vision in my head through research tasks. Through using google, I found various images which inspired my choice of location and effectively became more precise in my ideas and as a result I came to a clarified vision in my mind. 

With regards to researching other musical artists and their ways of branding themselves, the internet was a huge help. I was able to look carefully into the creative means such as album covers and advertisements, through analysing these I was able to gain the key conventional knowledge I would need to successfully create my own branding for the artist 'Melissa Hill'.

The technological approach to the practical aspects of this project made the overall construction process of the video more efficient. I was able to build my ideas quickly with the use of final cut as everything is set out so clearly yet extremely precisely so the smallest change could be made possible. Being able to cut clips with a click of a button was key to working efficiently with my time and progressively moving forward with my project. I also became more confident this year with my editing as I created a variety of opacity levels within the clips in order to portray the gentle, soft theme explored throughout the main product and ancillary tasks.

Photoshop was also extremely significant in order to create the branding for 'Melissa Hill'. I was able to take a still from the footage and transform it in to a strong, sharp and engaging image that as a result I used for both the album cover and as the central image for the advertisement.  This programme was new to me this year but I managed to familiarise myself with it through experimenting with layers, colours, opacity etc. The camera equipment I used was fairly basic but allowed me to get all the shots I intended too, I used a dolly for tracking shots but due to the nature of the rural landscape I was filming in it came across shaky and jolty.
There is no doubt that the media technologies available to me had significant impact on the final product but also a huge factor towards the research,planning and evaluation stages of my project.