How was media technology used in the research, planning and construction stages of my music video?

During the formation of my music video, media technology was used in a number of ways. This varied from using hand held cameras alongside the tripod, which was an element of a stage of construction where media technology was a crucial aspect, to using the internet to research images which relate to our music genre, which was used for simple tasks. Overall, media technology was used through vital stages of the contruction and assembling of the music video, however at other times, media technology was used to my advantage as it was simple an option instead of something which was crucial.

Research...
In the process of researching what music genre would be most suitable for the production team and I, we all agreed that using media technology to conduct our research was very essential. For example, we analysed all the most popular genres of music in today's contemporary society. We came to the conclusion that the most listened to genres of music were Pop, Rock, Hip Hip, R'n'B, Alternative and Indie. We were able to draw this conclusion by listening to a range of radio stations, also by watching various music channels. To be able to get the widest range of music channels and radio stations we made use of 'Sky' television.
Also, the Internet was a central element which helped us to base our research upon, as the Internet gave us an idea of music genres which were available around the world such as specific Indian popular culture as well as British contemporary society. This way I was able to gain a vaster knowledge of the areas where popular music was common as this was our chosen genre.
Furthermore, the use of the Internet enabled us to research songs of our chosen genre which were not copywrited so that we were not breaking the law when using a song which the production team and I did not create. Therefore, we used the 'LGFL' website. As a result, we managed to look through lists of hundreds of songs which were categorized into many genres. Also, the mood and tempo of the songs were listed into sub-categories within the 'Pop' category, to make it easier for us to look specifically at what song would be best suited for me and the production team.

Planning...
During the planning stages of our music production, the use of media technology became much more of a central element. For example, when planning costumes for our archetypes, we used software media such as 'Microsoft Word' as a way of presenting the designs of the costumes we thought would be best harmonized with our stereotypes. Plus, during the imaginative creations of out characters costume designs, again, the use of the Internet played a major role due to the fact that further research was conducted through artists and bands music videos, such as Powder - Up Here on YouTube, as generally, music videos of the same music genre as ours tended to have exaggerated costumes which was associated with teenage stereotypes.
Another aspect where media technology played a relatively important role in the planning of our music video was the opportunity of being able to use video cameras. The use of video cameras became rather essential when contemplating on what scenes should have certain settings. Therefore, the production team and I went out and filmed certain areas where the setting could be considered as appropriate. After doing so, we uploaded our film onto the iMac computers and made decisions about what settings looked the most effective on film to appear suitable for a music video of our music genre.
Lastly, an aspect of the planning stages of our music video which made use of media technology quite dramatically was experimenting with sounds with the use of an iMac software programme called 'GarageBand'. As a group, we wanted to create sounds which could overlap in certain areas of our song so that it could add a comical effect for our target audience, as well as express our use of technology skills as media students. Therefore, we decided we wanted to have a 'kissing noise' towards the end of our music video which overlapped the ending of our song. The only way to do this would be to use the programme 'GarageBand', however, even though we decided that this would no longer be best suited as an ending to our music video, we still made use of this programme which furthered and broadened our knowledge of this software programme which could come in useful at a later date.

Construction...
The construction stages of my music video was the stage of production which media technology was made use of the most, as without the use of media technology our production would not have been such a success. The filming process consisted of using video cameras and lighting equipment, and without these, we would not have been able to record anything for our music video, which would have resulted in not having a production at all.
Another aspect of using media technology in the construction of our music video was the editing stages, as every week we made use of the software programme called 'iMovie'. By using this programme so frequently, we developed our media technology skills, also, at all times we were constantly looking for audience feedback in ways to improve our music video. In order to make an impact on the audience feedback, 'iMovie' made it simple to re-edit certain scenes for the best possible outcome. However, using this software programme did have its disadvantages at times it lacked reliability through not always saving out work appropriately. Therefore, we were given a portable hard drive which we plugged into the iMac computers to save our work on, resulting in our work being saved appropriately as in the past we dealt with the problem of some of our work not being saved and having to redo it.
Lastly, as an ancillary task I used Adobe Photoshop to create my digipak and magazine advertisement. Therefore, my picture editing skills have increased compared to before using this software programme. Also, in the process of editing my music video and ancillary tasks, I used BlogSpot throughout it all to record my stages of development.