Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time.

Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time. 

Paragraph 1: what I produced and what I looked at for each project
Paragraph 2: AS - limited to music magazines - researched mainstream magazines - what I was interested in - helped my own project as I could really understand the conventions - bright colours - mainstream artists. Mastheads at the top - similar to what I researched
Paragraph 3: A2 - producing a music video - really important - cheryl cole + niki minaj influenced us - dance scene, fast editing
Paragraph 4: A2 even more research - still what I was interested in - video, digipak and magazine advert of the same artists - whole picture + see how they link - colour schemes, font etc - could also see how and artists 
Paragraph 5: Short conclusion

For our AS coursework we had to produce a music magazine front cover, contents page and double page spread where we had to research music magazines for this. Then in our second year for our Advanced Portfolio we could research music videos, digipaks and magazine adverts in order to produce it.

Our research for our AS coursework was limited to music magazines and we looked at front covers, contents pages and double page spreads. I looked primarily at mainstream magazines as they were what I was really interested in and looking at them really helped me to produce my own products as I could really understand and apply the conventions. For example, mainstream magazines like Q, NME and Rolling Stone had a bright colour scheme of red, white and black. I found that red was especially prominent as it was a colour that appealed to both genders, so I used it a lot in mine, such as for the flash and the headers. My own colour scheme was thus red, white and blue with black writing as it was bright and bold to reflect the mainstream, popular genre and would attract a wide audience.

For A2, we had even more to research as we had to research music videos, digipaks and magazines. Again, it was still what I was interested in so I researched pop/ R'n'B music videos and artists like Cheryl Cole's Call My Name and Niki Minaj's Moment For Life which really influenced my music video as it involved bright colours, such as for the setting and mise-en-scene, dance scenes and fast editing, which I included in my own video. Also, in Minaj's video there were lots of two-shots with her and Drake, which I made sure to include in my own video, such as when my couple run side by side.

Also, through researching artists digipaks, magazine adverts and videos I was able to see how all the products work together and see how they link . For example, Ed Sheeran used a lot of black, orange and white, while Katy Perry used a lot of pink and candy colours, which influenced my own as I used a lot of pink, purple, red and blue in my digipak and magazine advert.I also found that both the digipaks and magazine adverts used similar images, for example, Rihanna used a lot of close-up shots with her looking at the camera, which I included in my own work, where my magazine advert involved a close up shot of my artists in a similar pose. Also, by being able to research a wider range of texts I was able to really understand an artists image and how it can change through time, thus reflecting on their own sound of the album and I think that it really helped my product because I could easily make the products link through colours and fonts like those i had researched.

In conclusion, my production work was heavily informed by research into real media texts as I could easily research and understand firstly magazine conventions in the first year, which I then used to apply to my own product and then use this knowledge, along with the sheer amount of research that I did in my second year, to apply it to my three products.