Creative Critical Reflection

 Name: Daniel Markov______________

 

Creative Critical Reflection

1.     How does your product use or challenge conventions AND how does it represent social groups or issues? 

I feel that my commercial doesn’t necessarily challenge the typical conventions used in toy commercials, but it definitely uses those conventions. For example, I used multiple product sin my commercial. Often times, toy commercials contain a main product, and some separate products. this is meant to tease the audience about separate toys or accessories that may connect to the main product that you are selling. In my commercial, I used the baby yoda toy as my main product, while the Darth Vader toy was my secondary product. I even said at the end of my commercial that “Darth Vader is sold separately. Toy commercials often say at the end of  the commercial what is and isn’t sold separately. As an addditional convention, I deliberately chose to show my hands in the commercial, as if i am playing with the toys. Toy commercials often love deliberately showing kids playing with the product that is being sold. By doing this, the product may relate to kids in a more significant way. If you couldn’t already tell, the social group my commercial is meant to relate to is kids. Seeing as my product relates to Disney, which is a company that is targeted towards kids, and seeing that Star Wars toys are also most famous towards children, I think it makes sense that my product relates to kids.  

2. How does your product engage with audiences AND how would it be distributed as a real media text? 

  My product engages with kids because it openly shows that elements of my commercial are handmade. I purposely tried to make my commercial look like its made by kids, who are playing and role playing with there toys. As I stated in the previous question, this should directly relate to my intended audience, because these are common conventions that are found in kids commercials. As a real media text I would expect it to be distributed as a toy commercial on kids channels. I can very much see this commercial being distributed on channels such as: Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and of course, Disney channel. It would most idly be distributed on Disney channel  because the brand that my product relates to is owned by Disney, so it would make sense for Disney to have a commercial that advertises a Disney product, a Disney app (Disney Plus), and a Disney show (The Mandalorian). By doing this, Disney would be providing multiple advertisements from a single commercial. It’s less likely that this commercial would be distributed on a channel like Cartoon Network or Nickelodeon because channels like these don’t fit with the brand of baby yoda.

 

3.                     How did your production skills develop throughout this project?  

 When beginning my project, I had absolute no idea what type of a set piece and props I could use that would relate to my product. Once I really forced myself to come with ideas for a set piece with my set piece, that’s when i really began thinking outside the box. I began thinking about how I can pull up images an my tablet to create different backgrounds. This is a production technique  that is actually used on the tv show: “The Mandalorian”. I then realized that on camera, the pixels on the screen would be way to visible. I then began thinking about using construction paper for my background. I then realized that on camera, any folds, crumbs, or imperfections on the paper were very visible due to it’s bright colors. As a result, I began looking for backdrops with darker colors, because dark colors make imperfections less visible. that’s when I began using 6 black canvas’s as my backdrop. What I’m trying to say is that through the process of trial and error, I have learned how to perfect my production process. It was when I ran into a roadblock, or a failure, that I was able to force myself to think outside the box and come up with a solution. If i had not had a clear due date, I probably would not have been able to come up with a solution. To summarize, throughout the process through the process of trial and error, i learned how to improve my production skills when under pressure. 

4. How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project? 

When beginning the filming process I knew i was going to use phone to record my footage. in comparison to my iPad, my phone is much smaller making it easier to handle and easier to use. after multiple takes, I uploaded the takes that I was happy with to my iPad. I then uploaded these takes to the app: iMovie to do my editing. During my editing process, I realized that I needed clips from outside sources. So I searched fro specific clips and scenes on YouTube that would relate to my commercial. I would play that clip while also doing a screen recording. That screen recording would also then be uploaded to iMovie. Once I was finished editing my scenes into sequential order, I then began recording my audio. I chose to record my audio after I edited my scenes because I figured it would be easier if  Im narrating the audio of my commercial  while actually playing my commercial. I would basically be talking at a certain speed to accommodate my footage. I then used the app Autodesk Sketchbook to create an image of my product in its packaging, with different store brand png’s and show title png from google within the image. I then uploaded that into iMovie as the scene in my commercial. It was supposed to be a scene that shows the audience were the product is being sold and for what price. In summary the hardware I used was an iPad and iPhone, and the software I used was iMovie, Autodesk Sketchbook, and google.