Artefact 2

ARTEFACT 2 – An investigation to see whether Audio factors over power the visual factors in presence making the visuals appear less effective than they actually are.

Plan:

Gather a small focus group of 5 people and ask them to watch a commercial, promo and a music video. All 3 videos are to be watched in silence without audio. After watching each video the group will be asked to feedback there thoughts relating to what they perceive as being the story, message and emotions associated with each video based on what they see visually. Once discussion has concluded the videos will be played back again this time with audio. The focus group will be asked once more to feedback their thoughts, this time taking into account the value of the presence of audio.

COMMERCIAL: FIAT 500 ABRATH – Seduction

PROMO: SKY SPORTS SUPER LEAGUE - Your Home Of Super League

MUSIC VIDEO: JEREMIH – Imma Star

Results:

Prior to the focus group I was hoping that through showing people the visuals without the distraction of Audio they would discover themselves that Visual Factors are more important in the efforts to portray emotions then they maybe first realised. I thought that when I played the videos for a second time with Audio the focus group would decide that actually they already knew the emotional content and story of each video.

The focus group were noticeably able to speak amongst themselves with more confidence after hearing the videos accompanied with audio. Any previous hesitance from watching with no audio was lost. It felt as though audio added a definitive clarity in the attempt to portray emotion. ALEX LEA-HAYES who took part in the focus group described the Visuals as being the context and the Audio as the Emotion. It was an interesting point of view and one that seemed to be backed up by the discussion. Three members of the group of five actually felt the Audio was more important than the Visuals. Despite visuals actually physically showing you something the emotional message was still unclear and confusing in some circumstances until the inclusion of audio.

The findings from this Artefact firmly identified any hesitance I had regarding the strong results relating to audio factors from my first Artefact’s results.

Interestingly the focus group were unable to identify what the SKY promotional video was for. They knew it was for SKY SPORT because of the logo but couldn’t clearly identify the sport. They also said that without the Text and logo appearance the promo could have been for anything and would of left them feeling completely confused.

Another Interesting point was made when the group described still photography as being capable of portraying emotions effectively through visuals. It’s an interesting point because a sequence of still images (frames) played consecutively like in video appears to require audio in order to do the same.

The group also pointed out when asked that they felt the audio from the Fiat commercial could have been extracted and used as radio ad to equal effect as the TV ad in terms of delivering the required message.