Shoot Day: 12th November - Publicity Shots

Also on the 12th November, we took publicity shots of the band to use across our marketing, as well as on our digi-pak album cover.

Juliette was the photographer for these shots, as the rest of us were all meant to be included in them, but all of us contributed ideas as to what we'd be doing in the shots.

For this, we used the band clothing to help create a consistent band identity across our media products, as these would be used to promote the album on the website, as well as for the inside cover of the digi-pak.

We tried to take group photos that connoted the band as fun and energetic, similar to the ones we researched previously:

(Above: Three examples of our group publicity shots)

(Below: Examples of our influences, which all show the band as a quite fun, upbeat group of individuals, while maintaining an element of youthfulness)

5SOS

San Cisco

Walk The Moon

These fun, 'messing around' publicity shots also helped to create a sense of youthfulness for our band characters, which would appeal to our audience as they would find it more relatable, while it would perhaps be reminiscent for the older indie-pop fans. It also makes the shots seem less constructed, more like real, down-to-earth people, who are just in the business to make music and enjoy it, fitting with the indie-pop genre.

We also tried to take some serious shots of the band:

For these shots, we took inspiration more from the influences outlined in my publicity shots research, most of which made the bands seem more moody and intense.

Individual shots were taken of every band member, in order to establish the personalities of the individuals. This would appeal to the audience more, as they would again see that the band is a group of individuals, real people who are doing what they love, and it also gives more personalities that different groups of people can relate/aspire to. For example:

Audrey:
Audrey's character is quite upbeat and happy, but not as eccentric as mine, so this was shown by having her smile while standing in a quite relaxed pose, while the pink top also helps to connote this. We also took a shot of her with the guitar (left) in order to establish her role as the guitarist.

Chrystal:
Chrystal's character is calm, cool and collected, while also being slightly more serious, exerting a 'feminine power' image. This would be aspirational for females of our target audience, as she is made to seem quite powerful by the contrasts of the reds, blacks and white background.

(Left) This shot was done to establish Chrystal's role in the band, and show her passion/dedication to music, which is why she's looking at her guitar rather than at the camera.
(Right) Here we had Chrystal directly address the camera, with a straight face, to show her more serious side, and the direct address with the serious expression helps to show her power.

Jacob:

Jacob's character is meant to be quite quirky and cute, but also essentially the hear-throb figure. This is why we got him to do the shots below:

Having Jacob with his hands in his pockets, shoulders up and smiling directly into the camera helped to make him seem very cute and quirky, connoting the indie pop genre as well as creating his individual identity.

This shot establishes Jacob as the lead singer, with the direct address, head tilted down slightly, and  slight smirk, all creating the heart-throb image that would appeal to many of our fan-base, who would enjoy the voyeurism of seeing Jacob like this (predominantly females, but also males).

Myself:
My character is supposed to be quite happy, upbeat, and eccentric, so we decided to take the following photos:

 (Left) Me behind the drums, establishing my role as the drummer. The direct address while smiling also helps to connote my happy personality, while my pose also does the same.

(Right) This pose shows my character's more eccentric side, with the kick towards the camera, and the exaggerated smile/laugh.


All of the above personalities would have their own individual appeal with different segments of our target audience, allowing us to target indie-pop fans more effectively, as we give them different characters that they can relate/aspire to.

In order to ensure they look professional, Juliette edited the ones which we have decided will go on the website, editing out the cyclorama in the shot below for example:

Before editing

After editing