Evaluation and Reflection
Evaluation of the Photoshoot
Initially the photoshoot was just an idea that I was trying to decide on, I had a lot of doubts about it so I was beginning to feel like I shouldn’t do it. The doubts that I had were of my ability to produce and organise the day because it wasn’t something that I had done before and I was worried that I wouldn't be able to deliver on the concept of the shoot. I then spoke to the DJ group and discovered their interest in the idea and decided that even though it wasn’t something I had done before I would plan and organise it to the best of my ability. Even though I was confident I could organise it, I still had a lot of doubts about how the day would go as well as how the final product would turn out.
At the beginning of the planning process I did research into how a photoshoot is organised and this really helped me to think about what I could deliver in terms of professionalism and the overall organisation of the day. I knew that I would be able to deliver them a fun day but I was just unsure on how I would pull it off with only a week's notice.
I am impressed with myself on how well the planning and organisation went with the time frame that I was given to deliver a polished day, I commend myself for planning it on a day where the whole DJ group would be in and I am impressed with the DJ students for being on time to the shoot, this meant that the day could go on as planned and run smoothly as we only had to wait for the photographer to arrive but he was only 10 minutes late so this didn't affect the day. The only thing that could have been more organised was time slots for the DJs to book to have their photos taken however I think that this wouldn’t have been the best for the people involved due to too much structure sucking the fun out of the day.
I organised lighting to be put in the DJ booth because there wasn’t decent lighting originally in the room. Luckily I had a trusted contact in the lighting department who helped me to liaise with the theatre department for the lights. There is only one thing that I would fault with the lighting and that would be not using NOMAD to control the lighting, but this wasn’t a big problem and overall the lighting made the atmosphere what it was. It made the photoshoot feel more professional as well as making it fun and enjoyable for the DJ group.
Seeing the final product (the photos) made me realise that what I had planned was professional, fun and most importantly correct. The photos showed me that the group had enjoyed the day and that they also took the day seriously. I highly commend the photographer for the amazing work that he did and the way that he captured their personalities in the photos, there aren’t a lot of photographers that can work in a fast paced environment and manage to capture people the way that he managed to capture the DJ group.
Overall the photoshoot has been the biggest highlight and learning experience during my time at the college and it has shown me that i have potential to do great things, I believe that it was one of the best ways I could have proved my worth to the group as after the shoot some of them began to ask me about organising other things for them as well.
Evaluation of the Press Kit for Brandon
While I was researching press kits I found that most of them are established in an official website to represent the artist and because of this I decided to create a website for Brandon who is one of my DJ students. It has all the features needed to promote an artist, however due to it being my first try it isn’t fully up to scratch. I had hoped to have a lot more of an understanding of making a website due to my portfolio website for my college website but this was extremely different to my style of website.
First I started on the Home page and I wanted to include a professionally taken photo to present Brandon, so after the Photoshoot that I organised, I had the photos sent to me and I shared the photos to all the DJ students. I used one of these photos on the front page, I tried to find the one that captures Brandon’s personality the most and I feel this was the best photo for it.
After finally picking the photo I decided that I wanted to include a section for the latest news that was going on with him, this meant that I needed to figure out some posts that I could write for the website and I decided to include a post about the photoshoot, a post about the college gig and a post about the release livestream, as it is a website I made for Brandon I decided to get him to help with these and put his opinion in the posts. The final part of the home page was about his latest music, I did this by embedding his Soundcloud into the website and this was possible because of the WIX website having a Soundcloud web player. Overall I think that the first page is a great start to the website, it could have been a little better if I had more input from Brandon but he was extremely focused on his music for his EP release.
The next page that I began to develop was the Dates page, this is typically where tour dates are shown and its normally where you can book to see artists at the concert or the tour places they are performing at, due to COVID there isn’t any gigs going on so I haven’t been able to book Brandon into any gigs. This page has the date of his release livestream and the date of a gig that is in August where he will be performing. Unfortunately this means that the page is quite bland and this also means that I could have done better by trying to organise something more for Brandon to do even if it is in the future.
I decided to include a Media page where I was going to embed his Soundcloud, his latest videos and his photos from the shoot. His music is the main thing that I wanted to be on the website so that at any opportunity you could listen to his music. The rest of the ideas came later as I was developing the website, the photos and videos were an idea that I had to make it look more professional so I decided to add my favourite photos to a slider gallery for people to be able to look through at their own time. The videos available to view are from the livestream as well as the college gig so that there are some videos that showcase his talent as a DJ.
On the website there is a page called EPK, this stands for electronic press kit and this is where I decided to add a way to download Hi-Res photos of Brandon which would be on any type of press kit, as I found out in my research. I then added his music into the website because if there was to be a promoter or reporter they might not look through the whole website and might just go straight to the EPK page as they would expect to have all the relevant information on there, this would include a short biography which I have also included in 3rd person so that if there is a section they would like to copy and paste they had one. I also included his college gig video and his upcoming event dates. For the fans I decided to include an about page and this is because they don’t necessarily want to read the page for promoters and booking agents so this was where I gave a short musicians bio on Brandon.
Overall the press kit is something that I feel has turned out well, I wasn't entirely sure on how I would manage to do the amount that I originally planned so I did have to eventually decide on only one kit, I chose to do Brandon's press kit because I felt that it was the one I could excel at and I knew that Brandon would help me with his input. At first it didn't look like it was going to turn out right but I stuck with it and I'm glad that I did because it turned out how I wanted it to.
Livestream Evaluation
The livestream was an incredible experience to be a part of, It broadened my experience in a lot of fields. Initially I didn’t think that I was going to be majorly involved in the livestream because Brandon wanted to do it from his room and he seemed to have it figured out but when I started to think about it a lot more I found that I could really boost his confidence and his experience with this sort of thing by looking into studios and thinking of changing the setting of his stream. After we found Pirate studios we found that it was something that he really wanted to try so we went for it and we also brought 2 friends along with us so that he could feel more comfortable as well as having a little bit more fun.
Thankfully with this experience I have gained even more skills in booking a venue which is something that I haven’t been able to do during COVID so having to book this was a refresher in what I needed to be able to do in my job area. I needed to provide photo ID and I needed to pay for the room but this really worked in my favour because I now know how to approach a venue so that I can put on events over the next few years when I move onto University.
There was a technical problem with the livestream but I think that it was good for me to have a problem with this because I am able to recognise the mistake that we made of using something that none of use had experience using and this has given us an opportunity to understand what we need to do the next time that we do something like this. I will be learning how to use more software and hardware for next time as I want to really understand what I am doing.
Overall I think that it was a success even with the problem, maybe even more so with the problem because I have learnt new things and I have gained knowledge in different aspects that others might not have experience in which could give me an advantage with managing artists.
Whole project evaluation
I wanted to complete an evaluation of the whole project because I wanted to compare what I have done to my plans. I have been told many times that although I am ambitious I have a tendency to overextend myself and wear myself out with what I try to do. Even though I tried not to wear myself too thin with this project I managed to still overextend myself with what I wanted to do and I found that I haven’t managed to complete everything that I wanted to so through this evaluation and reflection on the project I will be able to explain why certain aspects of my plan haven’t happened as well as explaining my achievements throughout.
Firstly I wanted to talk about the different aspects of my planning. The first thing that I planned to do was a podcast which would teach people about things that I know, however I have found that it was not the right choice as I didn't have time to produce the episodes and edit them so I have had to leave out a vital part of my project. Unfortunately because of this I haven't been able to do any interviews with my peers either which was something that I wanted to do but they all had so much going on like I did that it wasn't fair to take up their time. I think that if I had the time I would have been able to produce something great but if I couldn't dedicate time to it I didnt want it to be done messily and unprofessionally. I think that removing this from the equation was the right thing to do because I could really focus on the students that I was working with and give, the ones who wanted it, my full attention.
The second part of my planning was making a press kit for every student that I was working with but this was probably the worst thing that I could have tried to do. When I was in the process of producing press kits I had a really hard time contacting different people and this meant that I physically couldn’t make the press kits. The only person who I could contact was Brandon so I worked on his press kit to make it the best that I could and I think that I have really gained something from doing it. In the end I found that I could really do something for Brandon and I think that I could really further his career in the future. I was really disappointed with the level of engagement of some of the DJ students so I haven’t been able to help them out but I do believe that I can further peoples careers with the experience from this project. Brandon’s press kit was then made into a website by me because as i did my research into press kits I found that a lot of them were website based so I decided to merge my plan for the press kit with my plan for the websites.
As the project developed and I was talking with the DJ students, Ethan approached me to talk about doing a music video so I did some research and factored it into my plan. We were in the middle of talking about the music video process and he decided that he didn't want to do one. I had already talked with a videographer but I had to talk to him and cancel the shoot for it. Luckily the videographer was very good about it so there wasn’t a problem with it.
The last thing on my original planning was the photoshoot which was definitely one of the best successes during the project. It was planned a little too close to the time because I didn’t realise that the Easter holidays were going to be so close and I wanted to do the shoot before the holiday. While I was organising it I decided that I wanted to get the lighting done and I was really lucky to have a contact in the theatre lighting department that could sort the lights out, this really helped the atmosphere of the day and provided a nice vibe to the day. I also think that the DJs really enjoyed the day and I got great feedback from the day. I possibly would have liked to do another one that was outside so that there was a variety of photos from different places but I unfortunately didn’t have time to get that done with the other things that I had planned. The photos turned out great and this was how I knew that the day worked out. The photos showed each of their personalities and that was the main thing that I wanted to happen because they should be able to show their personalities as the music they make ties in with them.
One thing not on my original plan was a livestream, this is because even though we had discussed this we hadn’t finalised anything so I decided to hold off on the planning until I knew what was going on. When Brandon and I finalised the idea of having a livestream event we had to figure out where to have it and how we wanted it to look, I decided that it needed to be professional and the use of pirate studios really solidified that. Unfortunately the audio didn't work and that was probably the worst thing to happen. I had hoped that it was all fine but there are always mistakes made as a learning curve. We rectified this mistake by getting Brandon to do the livestream again the way that he knew how, he did a second release stream in college but I have a lot to think about the next time that he does it and I also have a lot more experience that I can bring to other projects in the future.
Overall the whole project was a success and I feel that I have managed to gain a lot of knowledge in all of the different areas that I wanted as well as more. I think that I definitely could have achieved more if the deadline wasn’t moved forward but I am proud of what I have managed to achieve. I think that the deadline moving has helped me in a way because there was more pressure and it felt like it was similar to a workplace. I think that experiencing things I haven't before was a good type of challenging for me as when I was making the risk assessments I had to really understand what I was doing so I feel that I have really progressed in my skills this year.