Evaluation

I chose the Durex brief because it was a brief that I felt I could best utilize my photography skills. My photo collection meets the majority of points expressed in the client brief. I say mostly because my photos do not use ‘alternative imagery’ however my photos look unfiltered and realistic, which is referenced in the brief as something that Durex stands for. My work has met the main point of the brief which is to get across the idea of making ‘carrying, and using, a condom the norm’. I did this by photographing condoms next to everyday items, especially things like keys and bags to portray the action of carrying condoms on you when you leave the house. Also, with my radio advert I was able to tackle the part of the brief that is concerned with STIs by featuring statistics. My collection does not feature any fearmongering or clichés like the brief requested. I chose a twitter hashtag to promote interactivity with the campaign because I know twitter is widely used by the same demographic the campaign has and using a twitter hashtag is very accessable and easy making people more inclined to use it and take part. Another interactivity feature was that the campaign would be on instagram as sponsored posts, I do not feel this in any way negatively effected the quality of my final product.

Some negatives of my photos are that they are quite grainy. To amend this, I could have lowered the ISO, however on the camera I was using changing things like aperture, shutter speed and ISO was not possible so next time I should use a DSLR. Also, the lighting needs to be more intense as there are a lot of shadows. This is because I took the pictures at home and only had a small ring light (white light) and main house light (yellow light) to use for light sources. Next time I may try and scale down my idea so I can use the studio’s camera and lighting set up. I fixed a lot of the lighting problems in post-production through editing by brightening, cropping shadows and upping the contrast. One positive is the composition of the photos showcase the brand logo very well. I feel that being able to recognise the brand that is behind the advert is a necessity. Also, the colour of the condoms highly contrasts the backgrounds, this would allow the photos to stand out on Instagram making for an effective campaign. Finally, all of my photos fit with the brands aim of making condoms part of 16 – 24 year olds daily routine.

My radio advert is ‘fairly basic’ (feedback from tutor) with only three layers of audio, this may affect the impact slightly as it isn’t very attention grabbing. Also, the advert is 33 seconds long which is not typical for a radio advert, but because the advert is not my main project this doesn’t matter as much. However, it completes its function as an advert as; the brand name is repeated many times, a statistic related to the focus of the campaign is mentioned and the listener is directed to the campaigns multimedia features (the twitter hashtag). Despite it being basic the sound effects and dialogue recorded are very clear (feedback from tutor). I feel the audio format of a narrator was the most effective way to tell a story whilst also getting information across.

As well a self-assessment I got group feedback on all 6 of my photos. From this I got 3 main pieces of feedback; the advert isn’t gender specific, it tells a story and clearly promotes the idea of making condom a normal everyday item. All of this feedback was positive and complied with my personal aims. I was also commended on the composition of the photos, due to the Durex logo being so clear in each photo.