Research and planning essay practice

In year one of my media A-level i created a film opening which followed the teen drama genre. My film opening focuses on a mentally ill teenager struggling to cope with her every day life. There is conflict shown with her peers and teachers whilst at school. In year two of my A-level, i created a cross-media promotional package which included making a music video for the club song 'Hypnotic'. A website and digi-pak for our artist 'Stellato'. The artist for the video portrayed a psychotic nature, therefore we made our camera work and editing highlight this.
Research and planning were key elements over the two years of my media a-level, they helped me to create professional productions that were well thought out. In year one i researched into genre, i learnt about the key conventions of a teen drama for my film opening. My production group and i were inspired by the film 'Kidulthood' when it came to locations and costumes. In my film opening 'Impact' i used the setting of a school as one of my locations and casual clothes for the characters costumes which is very similar to the locations and costumes used in 'Kidulthood'. I also researched into titles using the 'Art of titles' website, i took inspiration from the titles in 'The last of us' and incorporated the order of the titles in that film opening into my film opening 'Impact'. I researched further when looking at existing products such as 'Girl,interuptted' and 'It's kind of a funny story' to learn more about teen dramas.
My research skills improved immensely when it came to year two of my media a-level when i had to create a cross-media promotional package as i researched into the club genre of a music video in my depth. I did this by looking at conventions of a music video and by learning about what happens in a music video of the genre 'rap' for example. I researched into different types of music videos, these are concept for example 'Running' by Beyonce, narrative for example 'Shake it off' by Taylor Swift, and performance such as 'Mockingbird' by Eminem. I took inspiration from these videos and many more when creating my music video, i had to ensure that i had incorporated the conventions of a club genre as this was much more important in year two. 'Somebody that i used to know' by Gotye was heavily influential for my music video 'Hypnotic'. My research skills developed as i didn't copy from what i had found, i challenged my findings to create a unique, original music video. It was important for there to be synergy across all three of my productions in year two, so i also researched into the ancillary tasks such as the website and digi-pak in greater depth. So, it is clear that in year one i copied conventions and and ideas from my research, but in year two i challenged my findings and was more creative as i had researched in further depth allowing me to understand better. 
In year one i briefly researched into my film opening audience of teenagers, whereas in year two my productions were based upon the target audience teenagers and young adults.In year two the audience were considered much more than in year one, as when making decisions about the music video, the website and digi[ak, my production group thought about whether this would appeal to the audience. But in year one when making a film opening, we simply just made the film opening with no thought process into whether it would appeal to the target audience. 
Planning was another key element which made a tremendous difference to the outcome of my products over the two years. My production group made a story board to plan for all shots in the film opening in year one, which was about 25 shots. A storyboard was also made in year two for the music video which consisted of around 100 shots, this shows the complexity of the music video in comparison to the film opening. This also highlights how much more my production group planned in year two. 
My production group also planned by making a shot list and shooting schedule. These were design briefly in year one as i didn't know how to plan very well. But in year two the shot list and shooting schedule were planned in greater detail as my planning skills had developed. For example, in year two i researched into unique locations such as the mirror maze at Ripley's 'Believe it or not' Museum in London and planned for the complexities of this location.
In year two my production group also made a stealomatic - which is a collection of music videos put together in an order showing how we want our music video to be like. This widened my creativity when it came to producing the music video, i didn't have this level of creativity in year one when planning for my film opening. 
My production group also received a lot more feedback in year two which influenced us to remove footage from Hyde Park in London as feedback suggested that this didn't match the song 'Hypnotic'. In year two i created questionnaires and surveys to get feedback, but in year one i didn't pay as much attention to the feedback process. 
I planned using presentational tools such as emaze and slideshare in year one. In year two i advanced by researching different presentational tools to be more creative when planning for the productions and posting it on my blog. For example when researching i came across Canva.
To conclude it is clear that my research and planning skills have developed and improved over the two years and were much better in year two than in year one. Due to research and planning being approached to in greater depth.