4

How did you use new media technologies in the

construction, research, planning, and evaluation stages?

I found it important and useful to use different media technologies in the development of my tasks. By using the multiple platforms I was able to learn how to use them and know what to do if I chose to use them in future tasks. I used media technologies including.

Photoshop

www.picmonkey.com

Microsoft PowerPoint

Microsoft Word

www.blogger.com

www.webeden.co.uk

www.slideshare.net

Adobe Photoshopwww.youtube.com

www.muzu.tv

I used Microsoft Word to create questionnaire documents as I found this the easiest media technology to do so. I know how to use this document and its features so it didn’t take me long to create a questionnaire which I then printed out to give to m audience. The features Microsoft Word has makes it easy for me to layout the questionnaire and use tools such as a tick box and numbers for the questions. Here is the tool bar at the top of Microsoft Word and shows the features I used to create the documents.

Bold

Underline

Numbering

Centre text

Colour text

Font

Font size

Examples of how I have used Microsoft Word

I used Microsoft PowerPoint to create the evaluations, mood boards, spider diagrams and to set out the questionnaire feedback. The PowerPoint document enables me to move images easily and place exactly where I want them, to create the layout I want. I inserted a table so I could easily set out the results from the questionnaire which helped me with decisions. I already knew how to use Microsoft PowerPoint before the task, however now I can use it fluidly and know what else I can use the document for. Here is the tool bar at the top of Microsoft PowerPoint which features the controls I used to create the document.

Text box

ArrowsText size

Bold

Font

Underline

Centre text

I inserted a table to set out the feedback from the questionnaires by going to Insert on the tool bar, then Table, then click on Insert table and this small box appears. I then chose the number of columns and rows I needed and pressed ok, which then the table appeared on the document.

Examples of how I have used Microsoft PowerPoint

Youtube was the main research source for my music video as I watched numerous music videos via this website and it has every music video I needed. I was able to watch and pause the music videos to gather information from them to give me inspiration for my music video. However, at school Youtube isn’t accessible as that website is blocked so I used muzu.tv to put links onto my blog so I could see them at school. I can view the same things I want to on both websites so choosing one or the other was not a problem. I found that using these websites to watch music videos enabled me to pick up on camera angles, editing techniques and how the challenge the forms and conventions of other music videos, which helped me with my own.

Browse

Pause/Play

Timing

Full screen

Section finder

Artist/Song title

Music video

My blog is the most important thing to get right as this is what all my work is put onto. Using blogger wasn’t a problem as I used this website on last years tasks so I was able to get straight in to it this time. The functions of the blog allowed me to post as man times as I needed to and edit the posts in case I found mistakes after publishing them.

Here shows that I have added a link to the website ancillary task. This made it easy for me to get onto the website quickly and it also is connected with the blog and what I mention in the blog.

I also added links to other peoples blogs so I can gather inspiration and research from them. I have the teacher as she sometimes posts work for us to be getting on with on her blog so we know what to do and also a student who has already done this task. I found it useful to have her blog as I could check I was on the right lines with my own blog. Having m classes blogs on here helped me to realise if I was behind on any of the tasks seeing how ahead they were. I named these links Useful People so I know what they are.

The Blog Archive is automatically on the blog and sets out all my posts in this small diary like links. It tells me how many posts I have done in what months and allows me to click on a previous post instead of scrolling through all the posts which can take up lots of time doing so. I checked this blog archive regularly to check I have posted enough times on the current month and if I realised I posted very little I would do some research or more work I can post about to keep my blog updated and running. Overall I have done 156 blog posts which are all relevant to the research, planning and creation of my media products.

I could write as much as I wanted in the text box and this is what posts to the blog.

I could add links onto a word I put, however I didn’t use this button as before I just copied and pasted the link onto the post.

I put in bold pieces of text was more important or to add bold headings to bits of text so the whole post made sense.

I added a relevant title to every post I did so I knew what each specific post was about if I needed to find the post on the blog archive.

This button is to publish the post I had just written for it to go onto my blog where everyone can view it.

I previewed some of the posts before publishing them to see how they looked before I published them. It was mostly posts including images so I could decide if they were too small or too big for the post.

I added a lot of images to my blog so the images button was very useful to me. All I had to do was click on the button, chose the image file, pick the appropriate size for the image, chose where I wanted it to be placed then click on upload and it shows up on our post when you publish it.

Slideshare was a very useful website which I used to upload PowerPoint presentations and Word documents to my blog. I used this website last ear so I already knew how to use this website before obtaining the task.

To upload a document to slideshare I clicked on the orange upload button or if I needed to uploaded more than one document to slideshare then I could click the blue upload button. I then chose the file/s I wanted uploading and they started uploading which took them just a few minutes each.

Then to find the uploaded document I went to my account on the toolbar and clicked on My Uploads and chose the document I wanted to upload to m blog.

On top of the document I’d chose and clicked on there are buttons like this. To embed the document to my blog I clicked embed, then copy, and then right clicked and pasted on my blog post. I previewed the blog post before I published it to make sure the document was embedded and if it had I published the post.

I used Adobe Photoshop to complete my main task which is the music video. I used this to create and edit my footage into the music video I wanted to make. The functions of Adobe Photoshop allowed me to use many editing techniques and develop skills and knowledge about the media technology. It helped me plan the story boards as I knew what this media technolog can do therefore I can work around m shots to use the multiple features it offers. I realised it offers a black and white selection, so to emphasise the past I edited those shots to black and white. Also knowing I can include fades into the editing gave me much confidence that the narrative I wanted to portray would make sense.

Photoshop enabled me to create the digi pack. I was able to chose the size which I worked out by measuring the CD case as 126mm by 121mm using International paper. I placed the image I was using onto the editing space and added the text to the image. It was simple to do and it helped me plan to the dimensions of the images and text.

M video footage storage space

The effects storage space

Video footage placed to create the music video

Sound

The video footage plays here

Using picmonkey.com I was able to edit the images I took for the digi pack and website. I found out that too much editing looks too fake and too little editing can result in a boring image. I found the balance and the editing I did to the images became the image I used overall. This website helped towards planning the layout of the digi pack as the features on the website include cropping and using colours. Here is the image before editing.

Here is the image after editing.

As you can see the difference between the two images is massive. I cropped the image so the feature of the image was in line with the rule of thirds. The website helped me plan the layout of the digi pack as I placed around with the cropping tool and finally it came to a layout using the rule of thirds which came effective in the final media product.

Webeden.net is a website to create a website. I used this media technology in the construction of the website I had to make as one of the ancillary tasks. I had never been on this website before the start of this task, however, I easily found my way around the website and discovered its features I could use.

I used the website to add images on to as I was able to upload from m files I chose some images of the artist and relevant images to be shown on the website to the audience.

I also used the website to create a layout which I new was the forms and conventions of real media websites. Columns were easy to put into place and the editing of the website was simple. It enabled me to chose colours and font styles which I was happy with and created a website which was functional for the audience to use as a real media product.

Media technologies are vital when it comes to constructing, researching, planning and evaluating media products. There would be no media without the media technologies so the many ones today have helped me with doing everything right up to now, as I wouldn’t be writing this evaluation without the Microsoft PowerPoint technology. The numerous media technology I have used has varied my imagination and broadened my knowledge and understanding of constructing, researching, planning and evaluating media products.