My Finished Music Video!

So obviously I finished a while back! But I thought it was about time I uploaded my completed music video for you all to watch! I hope you all enjoy it, I certainly enjoyed filming it and putting it all together! 🙂

 

The Modern Age & Homosexuality and Gender Identity

It’s now 2012. And even in the last 50 or so years, things have changed incredibly whether it be through technological development or through society. Through the recent study of Collective Identity in our A2 Media Studies area, one of the main things to discuss is homosexuality, and an insight into how this is represented in cinema, television or just within its cultural acceptance.

It is clear to see that we, universally, have become a more acceptant of races, gender and sexuality, etc… But it would be ignorant to say that everything is fine now, and that nothing is a problem, because there are still people out there that have very strong and negative views on homosexuality in particular.

There are tonnes and tonnes of shows on tv, or films which depict a stereotypical character of a gay or lesbian orientation, and with this stereotypical image comes judgement and prejudice. If you had to sum up in general an average gay guy, I’m pretty sure you’d describe them as camp, feminine, maybe a girly voice that uses words like ‘oh fabulous!’, likes musicals and shopping. And if you had to sum up a general lesbian female, you may say they’d be quite butch, short boyish hair, piercings, camoflauge jeans and a tank top. However, there is also the male fantasy of the lesbian which is completely different, which would consist of a tanned, slim, ‘hot’ female with big boobs, which is mostly been depicted from pornography.

 It is a common theme to know that homosexuality is a sin within many religions and there has been a huge uproar recently when same-sex marriages have been happening. It becomes evident that people have very different views on the matter entirely, some people are totally against it, some people don’t particularly mind it but don’t want it flashed in their face all the time, and some are just completely fine about it and love and embrace the homosexual culture. However, this opinion isn’t just taken from heterosexual people, it is a known issue that many gay or lesbian people themselves, actually hate their sexuality and feel ‘dirty and unnatural’. And this problem comes from the stereotypical depiction placed on homosexuals and the way that the world conceives them. On the other hand, there are many homosexuals who are so open about their sexuality that it can often seem like they’re conforming to the stereotype as an act. Take for example, Alan Carr, now obviously I don’t personally know him so I can’t say whether he is actually like that behind closed doors or it is just for the media, but he acts very verrry camp, makes innuendos about other men, has a high pitched voice and uses sentences like ‘oh you go girlfriend!’, all of which are very loud statements which can create either a positive/happy or a negative/annoying persona.

However it’s not just homosexuality that has been creating a stir in recent media years. Lately, there has been much talk about gender identity disorder, and with much relation to a particular 4 year old boy, Zach Avery, who wants to be a girl so much after becoming obsessed with Dora The Explorer, that when he was 3 he tried to cut his own privates off and wore all girls clothing and insists on being called Zachy. This particular story provoked a lot of controversy, and after reading many news articles and reports, it’s clear to see that there are very split concerns on the case. Zach is the youngest person to ever be diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder, but I can’t help but think that… it must be remembered that this little boy is 4 years old. I remember being 4 and believing I was genuinely a fairy after watching Peter Pan. I know this is a completely different example but at the age of 4, our brains are by no means fully or even partly developed in terms of understanding our surroundings and discovering the boundaries of our curiousity. Of course a lot of research and analysing went into decided if Zach had GID afterall, and he may well wish to be a girl his whole life, but right now, it may be too young to place such a disorder on a child. Perhaps this child has been given too much rein and free will, which has led his disorder to become so extreme. It’s such a vast area to talk about. I suppose if the situation was a little different and the child was a teenager, then it would be understandable and acceptable. This links well with another report on parents who have been bringing up their child completely gender-neutral, not telling anybody if they are a girl or boy and letting their own child decide what gender they wish to be when they are ready, despite their genitalia. Now, I know that we should be allowed to wear what we want, believe in whatever we wish and live life to what we are in accordance with, but this child has been given no discipline or guidance whatsoever. To give a 2 year old complete rein of their life and their own moral decisions when they can’t even read or write is absurd. Again, if this person was older and decided they didn’t want to conform to a stereotypical gender, then fair enough. But it’s the fact that this child is only a toddler and has no idea about life other than what the mother is placing on him/her.

In class we’ve also been discussing the stereotypical gender roles that we naturally and unconsciously take on. For example, a typical stereotypical girl? Loves shopping, looking pretty with her hair and make-up, loves fashion, loves cute things like kittens and puppies, talks about crushes and love and girl problems and watches chick-flicks and cleans and cooks. And a stereotypical guy? Well he’d burp and fart, laze around watching football, love drinking beer, talk about sex constantly, talk about music and violence and farts and burps and the size of their willy. It’s madness that these stereotypes have been put on typical genders! But it’d be ignorant to intentionally NOT conform to a gender just to rebel against society, it’s political correctness gone way too far. Because at the end of the day, you know if you’re a male or a female. There is a difference, no matter what anybody says. Take it back to caveman times, as simple as it is, men would be very egotistic, strive to be the dominant male and be the leader of a group and hunt, whereas the woman would be more gentle, more nurturing, carry children etc… So whether you believe that it’s only media and society today that has put stereotypes on gender, you have to realise that in the beginnings of time, with NO invention of media etc etc, male and female had very different strengths and qualities which defines the difference. But I don’t think this is a bad thing. Of course it depends on the individuals personality too, but on a general level, if you look at a womans body, it is softer, more gentle, curvier, whereas a males is built more stronger, more defined in terms of muscle and just bigger than a female. And if a man decided to wear a dress, then of course I don’t see why that should really be a problem, it’s just a bit of material, but this should be done if that really is genuinely how the person wants to be perceived, and not just to intentionally rebel against society and cause problems, and make a headline story in the OK! Magazine for a bit of money. In my opinion, putting aside the cases of the toddlers with gender confusion, you should be whoever you want to be if that’s what you want to do. Regardless of what anybody thinks and says.

My Summer Of Love NOTES

Recently, in Media, we watched a 2004 film called ‘My Summer of Love’, directed by Pawel Pawlikowski. I have made the following notes on the film and will be discussing and writing an essay on the representation of gender and sexuality in the near future.

 

Evaluation: Question ONE

Taking my choice of song, ‘Keeping On Without You’ in a lyrical sense, it is clear to see that this song represents a relationship and after effects of a break-up, however in more depth it could be said that it perhaps could represent the death of a partner and their struggle to continue life without them. Either way, it is all about a male getting over his once girlfriend. Therefore, when considering and deciding on the structure of the narrative, in some way I was constrained to relating the plot in ordinance with a relationship element, so for the audience to make sense of the music video. However, personally I wanted to add in a diverse representation throughout the music video in order to challenge forms and conventions of other ‘love’ music videos. So, I added in the representation of youth, fashion and the idea of friendship coming through a relationship.

I used the conventional shots of a ‘love’ video, by showing a boy and a girl doing stereotypical relationship things, such as holding hands, smiling and laughing with each other, stroking their hair, etc, and all of these things were used as pointers for the plot for the audience to relate to and make sense of. I took inspiration from a few films in terms of intertextuality, so I tried to re-create the final scene from Cloverfield where the couple die together then there is a past clip from camera footage where they seem happy. This begins at 1:39 in the video below:

I also wanted to intertextualise the ending from Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging where they go off holding hands walking along Eastbourne Pier. This begins at 2:34 in the video below:

These are all iconic scene to represent relationship in slightly unconventional sense. But I also made sure that I challenged the ‘norm’ by creating sub-plots to add depth into the narrative. I did this by not concentrating too much on the relationship side, and showed an equal amount of friendship shots in sort of a ‘hoes over bro’s’ kind of way. And also expressing the fashion side of it, by including shots of converse shoes, beaded necklaces, leopard print coats, union jack knitwear, all of these shots accentuated youthfulness and sparred away from creating too much of a ‘heartbreak and lovey duvey’ music video, which I particularly wanted to reference but limit at the same time.

In terms of costume, I was inspired originally by Jack Wills Photoshoots. These all took place outside in natural forest surroundings which hosts a great similarity to my music video. I particularly wanted to present a patriotic addition to the piece, showing union jack cushions and flags also, but this didn’t quite go to plan because of filming days and prop limitations. However, I did host a union jack jumper, that can be seen here:

This was inspired by this fashion promotion photograph:

Since I also wanted to create an autumnal effect and the filming was actually in production in a very cold spell of November, I was important to include various fashion items such as, knitwear, scarves, hats, etc… And the colours of these pieces had to compliment the music video, so I used red’s and grey’s as a sub-colour to the forestry colour scheme. Leopard Print coats and knitwear cardigans were also at a high trend at the time, and so I featured this too:

I also included shots of fashionable footwear and this definitely accentuated the difference between the frontman band member and the cast representing friendship:

I also included a close-up of the lead singer’s beaded necklace:

In terms of camera shots and movements, other music videos of the same genre and meaning contain various amounts of shots and movements, but I made sure I included more shots that the ‘norm’ that you’d expect in a professional music video. I noticed that a lot of official music videos, tend to go for a simplistic approach in terms of camera use, not only to maintain the budget but also to be easy for the audience of all ages to understand and relate to too. However, in order to challenge these conventions, I went for a detailed approach in terms of shots and movements, not over complicating things, but still being creative and using lots of different shots, and not repeating anything. I decided to look at the original video by This Providence for ‘Keeping On Without You’, and noted down all of the camera shots and movements. They used very minimal and repetitive shots which consisted of: long shot, mid shot, worm shot, birds eye shot, panning shots, zoom in and out shots, blurred in and out of focus shots. Whereas I used all of these features and a lot more. And here are the list of my included camera shots and movements and their placement in my music video:

LONG SHOT

I used a long shot to introduce the friend characters and to also show the entire outfit, in terms of the fashion representation and also establish the setting.

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MID SHOT

I used a mid shot to introduce Rob has a character to focus in on him lip-synching but still showing what he is wearing.

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CLOSE-UP

I used this close-up shot of jess to show the expression of happiness and fun on her face as she spins round with the camera.

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EXTREME CLOSE-UP

I used this extreme shot of Rob’s features to mix up the pace and shot types and also to show the emotion of heartbreak he is feeling at the beginning of the song.

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WORM SHOT

I used this worm shot as continuinty from where the friend group throw leaves up in the air. This shot shows the leaves falling back down again and expresses the autumnal season and setting.

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CRANE SHOT

I used this crane shot to imitate that other characters were filming their friends whilst climing a tree. This was also another way of getting all the female characters in the shot.

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CRAB SHOT

This shot is a still of the crab shot as it pans across Rob whilst he is lip-synching. It happens just as the verse ends to bring movement into the chorus.

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ZOOM SHOT

This is a still of the zoom shot where Rob is in the tree and the camera zooms in. I used this shot as it shows the different levels of ground, eg: ground, tree, sky. And also focuses in on what Rob is saying.

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ARC SHOT

This is a fast paced arc shot where all of the friends are holding hands spinning round with the camera in the centre. It is fast paced to go with the pace of the song and also represents fun and freedom.

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POINT OF VIEW SHOT

I used this point of view shot from Rob’s view to give the audience an insight into what he would be seeing on his day with Daisy. It was also inspired by Cloverfield, in the home recording ending scene.

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TILT SHOT

I used this tilt shot from the ground up to the sky to establish the setting and the autumnal wear of the trees.

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TWO SHOT

As well as being a tracking shot, this is also a two shot where 2 characters are together in a frame. This is in the bridge where Rob walks away from Daisy, showing he has moved on.

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TRACKING SHOT

I used this tracking shot by using a camera in the back of a car. It follows as the characters ride their bikes to the woods. And shows the friends coming together to joing Daisy.

On the school equipment camera, I didn’t focus in and out blur shots very well since I wasn’t completely sure on how to do it, but I used it on some tree shots whilst panning up from a worm view. One thing that I noticed in the beginning of the music video, is that a lot of the filming was done by hand held, giving quite an amateur but personal take to the video. And this was inspiration for one of the scenes I did where it had a ‘shakey cam’ effect. Another thing that inspired me, was in the original music video also, there was a lot of ‘lens flare’ usage, in which I decided to include on some of my shots as well:

LENS FLARE

This adds more depth into the shot and accentuate and signify the warmth of the weather. These are areas where I have used media conventions in accordance with this product.

Another shot I particularly enjoyed producing was the ‘ghost shot’. This is where the song states, ‘I need you more than ever, all I have is your holy ghost’, and Daisy is stood as a ghost character beside Rob and slowly fades away. I believe this gives a great effect and creating a direct translation of the song but also suggesting the relationship slipping away. I did this by putting in a shot of Rob lip syncing the part of the song with Daisy IN the shot, then repeated the same one with her OUT of the shot. I then kept the frame without Daisy in it. Then with the shot WITH Daisy in it, I cropped the shot so it was just Daisy in it, then put it as an overlay on the shot WITHOUT Daisy. I then changed the opacity to make her look ghost-like. And voila!

GHOST SHOT

However, my original storyboards and plan doesn’t quite match up with my final product because the casting was difficult with people being busy, and I couldn’t get some props due to the weather, location and lighting issues. So I couldn’t do some of the things I originally intended, and obviously since we’re only media students, we didn’t have professional equipment like famous bands have. In ‘Keeping On Without You’, a smoke machine was used, and although it’d be great to include this effect, it simply wasn’t available to re-create. Of course, I made sure I included a performance element to make it seem more like an actual ‘music video’. However, due to the difficulty of the availability of cast members, where I originally planned a whole band set-up at a band-stand, it ended up just being Rob (the main male character) miming along with the song, and in comparison with most music videos out there, this definitely challenges most conventions of music videos which host the whole band performing. Much like the original music video though, I made sure I made the most of outside surroundings in my area, luckily where I live in Lincolnshire, all around are fields, lakes, forests and a couple of beaches too. So in similar ways of conventional music videos, I filmed in various locations with perfect scenery.

Casting was another decision that had to be made as it is fairly obvious that to create a perfect music video, meeting the right criteria, you need the character listing to ‘fit’ perfectly with the brief and genre of music. And I believe I achieved this very well! For the lead singer, I needed someone to look stereotypical for the type of song, and that would give emotion and confidence to portray the songs lyrical meaning, which is why I chose Rob Corrin for this role. As for the main female character, I had to think of a person suitable which is why I picked Daisy Richards. I didn’t want a girl who was a stereotypical pageant queen type, with blonde hair and orange skin. I wanted a girl who looked beautiful but in a natural way. And I think as a couple, the two look perfect together within shots, and so I believe they were flawless characters for the job.

In conclusion, I would say it’s a little mix and match with my music video using and developing and also challenging the conventions of other real media products, being music videos. In some ways my music video does follow certain ‘rules’ of being a music video, simply because it has to be distinguished of a music video, of this genre, and style in relation to the choice of song. But in other areas, I think I challenged the ‘norm’ conventions of music video, by representing different areas of youth in a positive light, and creating a warm, charming product, about being strong and being able to be happy in the end.

Evaluation: Question TWO

It is very important to make sure that the main product, being the music video, matches and has an effective combination with the ancillary texts, which consists of the album sleeve and magazine advertisement. And it is also important to create a marriage between the style of the music and the ancillary texts too. The style of music of the song ‘Keeping On Without You’ is soft alternative Rock, yet the lyrics represent heartbreak but strength. However, within my music video, I represented youth, relationships/friendships and fashion, and therefore I had to make sure that my ancillary texts matched this well. After thinking about what I could possibly do for my artwork, I researched into similar artists and bands and browsed at what they had produced for their individual original albums. ‘The Maine’, a highly similar band to This Providence have several album covers, and they all centred on bright colours and people in a particular setting. Another band called ‘Every Avenue’, of also high similarity to This Providence, focused more on a photography and polaroid element of the album sleeve. Being inspired by both of these areas, I came across a website called Dear Photograph. This particular site is fairly explanatory: you take a picture from the past, perhaps your childhood, you go to the location where the picture was taken, line it up, then take another picture. I thought this looked charming but so meaningful and definitely distinguished the difference of time, which I was indeed portraying through my own music video through the flashbacks of the relationship. But I decided that I would use this element for the lyric sleeve as you fold open the album covers. So I decided I would print out some stills from my actual music video, apply an effect on them so they look like vintage polaroids, then took them to the location they were first shot in, lined them up correctly then took another picture. I then edited the images by putting the different song titles that actually are on the ‘Who Are You Now?’ by This Providence, along with the lyrics. I then used the brush tool on Photoshop to add leaf decoration to seem very autumnal, and this too matched with my music video and highlighted a warmth atmosphere. This is an example of the finished piece:

I think it is very effective in terms of the combination from the main product of the music video, to the album sleeve. I think it matches the feel of the video and gives a personal effect to the album as photographs are seen as a personal and valued thing. I find lots of areas effective: I love the fact that the polaroids look very orangey and warm and autumnal, but where I re-took them, it is wintery and snowy, this definitely highlights the use of time and flashbacks. I also love the use of fonts and their appearance and positioning among each page. I did hours of research into finding the perfect font for the job, and applying lining and glows to the track titles and lyrics to accentuate their importance and represent the album cover in a real artistic and creative way. I think my album art folds of lyric pages, are definitely individual and original ideas, as I have not seen another design like it, so I feel that they give a great style for promotion yet still match the main product related to it.

The front and back cover to the album which are obviously the first thing I customer is drawn to if they do not recognise the band, or may be a real interest to a fan of the band if they enjoy the album work. Therefore it was important to create an interesting cover that was still relevant to the artist and music video. Since the lyric sleeves were quite bold and busy, the front and back covers should really be quite simplistic but still creative. During research, I was really interested in the Girl With The Red Balloon by Banksy. Although this is a very urban/street piece of artwork, I thought I could be inspired by this and produce a different take on it. So I took two photographs, both in related locations to my music videos (on meadows in forests). In one, Daisy is facing one direction with her arm stretched out as if to reach out to something, and in the other, Rob is facing the opposite direction with his arm slightly stretched out but as if he is holding something. I then edited the images and pasted in a red heart shaped balloon; in the photograph of Daisy, I made it look like the balloon was floating away from her, and in the photograph of Rob, I made it look like he was holding onto it. This represents Rob holding onto love, but Daisy letting go, which is what the song lyrically represents. In the spaces left, I edited in the logo I produced of the band name and song title, that looks like this:

I believe that they are both effective in terms of combination through the main product and ancillary text, as they show aspects through the characters of the music video but also represent the music in a lyrical sense. I did a lot of research also into finding the perfect font for the band title. Through looking at similar artists, I needed a bold font and hosted it in black to show a basic but professional format. I wanted quite a flowing almost handwritten font for the song title, and hosted this in orange to represent the colours in the music video.

I also had to create a poster to act as a magazine promotional advertisement, where I featured a page spread including an individual picture of Rob looking up at the titles, with information on the promotion such as: band name, album title, tour dates, critic ratings, links to their own website/facebook/myspace. I made sure that I linked the posters design with previous ancillary texts such as the album sleeve and even the music video, but I did not feature any specific details from the music video like stills or snapshots as I wanted to concentrate more on the sale aspect than the video product as I featured this in the album art. I kept all the colours very orangey, black, grey, white and red, to give an autumnal feel. And I kept all the same fonts as my album art to create a combining link between them all. And I also applied a leaf decoration like I did on my album art to add an extra warmth and season accentuation.

As a poster for an advertisement to promote the album, I believe it includes all the vital information needed to enlighten the audience of what is being sold and when it can be bought. It also presents extra information such as links to their own website if they might perhaps want to find out more, and there are tour dates featured too for any fans to be interested in. Putting critic ratings mean it gives the audience a sense of how talented the band are and how good that particular album will sound, being worthy of listening to it themselves. I realised creating a single page spread gets the point across more as a promotional advertising device rather than creating a double page spread featuring ‘the making of…’ and interviews where it goes away from the promotional side of things. Although it will only be featured on one page, I have crammed in enough information for the audience to know exactly what is on offer and still have it presented in an interesting and creative way.

In conclusion, I believe all of my ancillary texts are very effective as a combination as they all are related with colour schemes and font usage and present a decorative collection of artwork whilst still remaining consistance with the genre of music in mind, along with similar artists research.

Evaluation: Question THREE

After I completed my music video, one important and fundamental thing to do was to show my finished product to an audience and receive their constructive criticism and feedback. I presented my music video to a group of about 200 16-18 year old students, therefore not only is this the target audience age group of This Providence, but being a late teenager, means they are media literate and in touch with lots of platforms of media and will naturally view various music videos and listen to music pretty much all the time. I created a questionnaire before playing my music video to the large audience; it consisted of 7 simple tick questions with one concluding question asking for any other comments or feedback.

After my music video was shown, I collected back the questionnaires and recorded the results in a pie chart, as this presents easy viewing as to what was the most popular answer. Click this link below to view the results:

Questionnaire Results

 Although the majority of the votes prove successful and show that the majority of people enjoyed my music video and understood the narrative clearly and the representation was evident. However, there were a few votes that were against certain aspects of my music video, such as they disagreed any representation of youth, relationship or fashion was present in my work, even though most of the signifiers were pretty obvious, and that also I didn’t use many shots, even though I used 20 different types of camera shots and camera movements. The only reason I can think I had this response is perhaps those few people weren’t viewing my music video intently, or they were just a little ignorant and rushed the questionnaire with no thought. As I did receive immature comments too, which prove that for some people my questionnaire wasn’t taken seriously. And since these results accounted for 3 or 4 people out of 200, these can’t really be taken into consideration. However, I have learnt a lot from my questionnaire and the set of results. I have learnt that I perhaps should’ve chosen a better casting, who were used to acting and used to being in front of a camera, as perhaps using the average person doesn’t quite get across the point of the music video with enough passion and meaning. I have also learnt that I should try to find cast members that have a completely free schedule when I will be filming, therefore I could’ve stuck with my original plan to have a full band performance, and I feel this would’ve worked a lot more effectively in the music video. I also think I should’ve included more close-up shots of different fashion garments to represent youthful fashion a little more, as I don’t think the audience fully picked up on this. On the first chorus of the song, I feel I used fast shots to match the beat of the song adequately, but I didn’t follow this up on the second chorus as I used quite slow-motion clips, so this may not have matched the progression and pace of the song, and I have learnt from this that fitting the shots with the beat of the song is very important. Also, I had a couple of comments on how the friendship scenes looked quite ‘forced’, therefore I should’ve perhaps not had a script for set movements they had to perform, I should’ve just recorded clips from a natural environment, doing friend activities and added those in instead, so it didn’t look as ‘scripted’.

I have also learnt that 16-year-old girl’s liked my music video a lot more than males and 18 year old’s. This suggests that the relationship/friendship/fashion side of the music video is quite female orientated and aimed, even though it is a 4 piece male Rock band originally producing the song, and there is an equal split between female and male fans. Perhaps being a girl myself, I made the music video a little too sugar sweet, and perhaps this is where the criticism came from. So if I was to re-create my music video again, I would make sure I featured more rocky male shots including the band performing with their instruments, to interest a male audience along with the females already.

Evaluation: Question FOUR

 In the music industry, it would be impossibly to avoid new media technologies during the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages. This is because media is universally huge in all of our lives, and effects all of us in different ways every single day. When it comes to music, from the very beginning of writing the song, to releasing a music video and seeing the album on sale in the high street, none of that would’ve been possible without various platforms of media technology giving a helping hand to producing and completing music and video production and concluding promotional devices. Of course, as a Media A2 Level student, all that was part of the plan was researching into making the music video, the actual production and making of the music video, creating the album art and poster advertisement and receiving feedback through a questionnaire.

Through the RESEARCH process, I used lots of areas of media technology. Firstly, whilst I was picking what song to actually do, I looked through my iTunes library for any of my favourite songs that I thought would be appropriate for creating a music video to, and also one that would be accessible to contact the manager to receive permission to use. Once I chose ‘Keeping On Without You’ by This Providence and got permission to use it from the General Manager, Josh Terry from A-Squared Management. I then looked into the band in detail on Wikipedia to find out more about what they label their genre of music as, and any information that would necessarily help me through planning. Then I went to YouTube and searched for the original music video to that particular song. I watched it through many times, making notes about certain areas of the music video such as camera shots, representation, mise en scene, editing, etc… This way, I could discover what I needed to do for my own music video that would be suitable for that type of music and to represent the band well. I also used a website called Last.fm and looked at their specific tool, called Similar Artists, and researched into high similarity artists and bands to This Providence and saw what their music videos featured, so I knew during planning I would be on the right track. Once I had all my research done, it was time to move onto the next aspect.

It was now onto the PLANNING process. Since all the research was completed, I had lots of inspiration and ideas spinning around in my head, so it was about getting them out there and drafted and seeing which one would work best. Firstly, I had to present a pitch of two ideas to the class, and receive feedback from everyone in the class and my media teachers, and see which one would be the better. Once I knew what particular idea I would be going with, it was time to create various research tasks to gain a complete set of plans to take forward with me through production. Firstly, I had to create a Storyboard. A Storyboard consists of parallel squares among a big piece of paper, in these squares you sketch out exactly how the plot of the music video is going to go, every shot, every scene, everything, draw exactly what you envision. Then underneath each box, you put a small description of the type of camera shot or movement, and what piece of sound in the song this will be going to. My Storyboard changed quite drastically once I realised the time constraints and how I had to be realistic with the equipment, weather, and casting arrangements. Then it was time to create a Timeline, which was a set timed order of the music video, without any sketches, just the time of the video and the particular shot and it’s duration. A Location Plan had to then be made. Since I live in Lincolnshire, we are completely surrounded in fields, forests, lakes, beaches and just beautiful natural landscape so it was definitely a must to make the most of the surroundings around me. After thinking about what sort of landscape locations are generally used in other music videos, I realised a forest, meadow or road would be perfect. Living in a village called Woodhall Spa, there are so many picturesque places around, so I decided I would use a cycle path to represent ‘walking down memory lane’, and forest scenes to create the divide between past and present. It was then important to think about Costume and Props. Since I wanted my music video to have quite a warm and charming atmosphere to it, and since also I was representing youth, relationships and fashion in particular, the costume was very important to get right. I used to be an art student at AS Level, and I remember although hating Jack Wills, really enjoying JW Photography during fashion photoshoots, and I definitely wanted to recreate this as I felt it depicted youth and fashion in a real positive light. But obviously, with it being winter when I was filming, outside, it was important to make the clothes suitable, as some of the times we were filming it was -2°C! So I decided that anything warm with bold prints would be perfect, for example, leopard print coats, tartan knitwear, union jack jumpers, etc… At first, my choice of props was meant to be fairy lights, blankets and cushions, along with band equipment, but this soon changed when I realised that some people couldn’t be filmed on certain days, and with the weather raining or snowing on me most of the time, I couldn’t set up some of the decorations effectively and so this didn’t work out, and I avoided any extra props entirely. Casting is very, very important, and so this needed to be thought through and decided carefully. In the beginning, I was going to have a band performance, so I picked 4 males to represent This Providence; I picked musicians so that when miming the song it would look natural and effortless, but this plan didn’t go ahead as they were busy during filming days. So I went with Rob Corrin who would be miming the lyrics as the lead singer/front man of the band. He is a very talented musician so I felt he would look natural miming the song and still put passion into getting the message across. I also needed friendship shots, this was quite easy as I just used myself and my friends, because since we have all been best friends for years, I felt it would look natural and really show friendship in a positive and fun light. Finally, a Shooting Script had to be made, this was a plan of what will be filmed, when, how many quantity of shots, and who will be casted.

After everything was planned, it was now onto the CONSTRUCTION of the music video. The most important area of construction is obviously equipment. For making my music video, I used a SONY CX100E HandyCam 3.0. These are great camera as not only do the shots come out clear and crisp, but it can create smooth hand held shots too which I envisioned to include. I also used a TRIPOD, this was to attach the camera onto to create still and sweeping shots for the most part of my music video. I experimented with an ORBIT DOLLY, but I felt it still produced quite bumpy shots that weren’t completely smooth in terms of timing (as it is moved by hand, it would be moved at different paces), so I decided to put the camera on the parcel shelf in the boot of a car, and have the car drive off whilst filming whatever was happening behind it, I used this effect during the cycling scenes and also when Rob is running and miming down the path. I also experimented with a STAGE LIGHT BEAM, but I since my shots were filmed during the day, it didn’t produce a natural autumnal feel, so I decided just to use natural light to accentuate the colours of nature. In terms of camera shots and movements, I followed a guideline of what I picked up from my research tasks when I looked at what other music videos of the same genre and even the original music video in question use, and took inspiration from this. However, I did find that most of the shots used by professionals in the music video production industry are kept quite simple in order for the audience to have a clear narrative and relate to easily. Although, I made sure I created and featured a varied amount of shots and movements and didn’t become repetitive in my approach. I used ESTABLISHING SHOT, LONG SHOT, MID SHOT, TWO SHOT, CLOSE-UP SHOT, POINT OF VIEW SHOT, EXTREME CLOSE UP, TRACKING SHOT, CRAB SHOT, TILT SHOT, ZOOM SHOT, CRANE SHOT and PANNING SHOT.

After I created my music video and got all the footage I wanted and needed, it was time to import the film onto the computer. I used an iMac as my computer as not only does it have lots of programmes that aren’t available on a typical windows computer, but it is great for video/photo and editing software. I imported all of my clips with MPEG STREAMCLIP, and exported them to DV. I then opened up a program called FINAL CUT PRO, where I imported all of the converted DV shots and began the editing process. Firstly, import the track you are using into the timeline then select which clips you want to insert (following the storyboard), use the cut tool to trim down the bits you don’t want, and do this until your film is complete. However, there are lots of effects I used to improve the appearance and flow of the music video. I used CROSS FADE effects which give an overlapping fade into each shot without a definite cut between the two. I also used COLOUR CORRECTOR, which can change the hue and concentrate on accentuating one specific colour. I chose a red/orange because I wanted to highlight the autumnal feel through my music video. And you could also change the brightness, contrast, tones, shadows, etc, to bring a lighter effect to each shot. I also added an artificial LENS FLARE, to several shots where the sun is prominent, and this brought a sparkle and colour depth to some of the shots. Once I felt all was edited and looking professional, I then exported it to QUICKTIME, so it could be played on a final professional video program.

Once the music video was completed, it was then onto PRINT PRODUCTION ANCILLARY TEXTS. This consists of producing an advertisement for a magazine that would promote the album, and a full album sleeve. For this I first had to think of an initial idea for what to do, whilst still remaining to stick with the combination of matching the album art with the poster with the music video and still being relevant to that style of music. So after looking at similar artists’ album art, I knew I had to present the band title in a block black colour, but still have a fun and vibrant background. I was thinking of certain ideas I could present on an album and I wanted to do something very original and creative. I remember looking at a website called Dear Photograph, and really loving how it represents memories and how it distinguishes the past and present. I also used the GENIUS BAR on iTunes, which shows similar artists and their album art, and most similar artists have some element of photography and polaroids, so therefore, I re-created this idea, by taking stills from my music video, opening them in ADOBE PHOTOSHOP, applying a polaroid effect frame around them, and then printing them off. I then went to the location of where the still was filmed, lined them up in place, and took another picture. Since this was for the inner folds of the sleeve where the lyrics and song titles are presented, once the images were took, I imported them to my computer at home, and went on a website called Picnik. The site is closing in April but it means that they’ve made all the premium features for free, so I edited and applied effects to the images such as changing the contrast and exposure, and added effects such as VIGNETTE (which adds a black faded border to the image), and CROSS PROCESS (which adds a vintage, rustic effect to the image).  I then used a program called MACROMEDIA FIREWORKS. I also went onto a website called DaFont, where I downloaded tonnes of fonts that I thought were appropriate for titles and lyrics. After narrowing down my choice to Simply Gorgeous, Learning Curve, RIOT!, Rainyhearts, Birth Of A Hero and Sweetie Pie, on Macromedia Fireworks I than began writing out the track name and lyrics among the picture. I then also used ADOBE PHOTOSHOP, to add a brush effect of leaves among the photo as an autumnal decoration. For the front and back cover of my album art, I decided I wanted to create a Banksy sort of artwork, changing it from very urban/street to pure and natural. I was really inspired by The Girl With The Red Balloon, and so I took some pictures of Daisy (the main girl in my music video) with her arms stretched out in a field, then Rob (the main boy in my music video) with his arm slightly stretch out but clenching his fist as though he is holding something. I then edited in a red heart shaped balloon on string on ADOBE PHOTOSHOP to act as though Daisy is letting the balloon go (letting love go) and Rob holding onto the balloon (holding onto love). Then I had to create a poster for a magazine promotional advertisement, after looking at several different page spreads for Alternative Rock bands, I knew what was needed of me to create a perfect advertisement. Not a lot of detail was detail, just the band name, album title, any links to other media such as their website, facebook or myspace, critic ratings, the release date of the album and perhaps any tour dates. I kept to the same colour scheme as my album art and music video to match up and create a collection of artwork. I created fake critic reports from Rock magazine companies such as KERRANG!, SCUZZ and NME as this shows to the audience and costumer that it is professional and worth hearing.

Lastly, comes the EVALUATION stage. I created QUESTIONNAIRES to give to a group of 200 16-18 year olds during an assembly where they were watching my music video. When I received the results, I used MICROSOFT WORD and MICROSOFT POWERPOINT to present my results and create pie-charts, this way my results are easy to read and simple to receive a majority vote appearance. I also presented every step of my research, planning, construction and evaluation on WORDPRESS. This way all of my coursework for the whole of the year is all in one place, seperated into categories and organised through tags for easy and accessible viewing.

Magazine Promotion Advertisement FINISHED

Here is my finished product of a magazine promotion advertisement, I was originally going to produce a two page spread, but also researching, experimenting and developing designs, layouts and displays, I realised that a normal one page spread is easily enough to promote the album and be as clear to the audience but still drawing attention to the advertisement. I decided to feature an image of Rob on the page as he is the ‘lead singer’ of the band in my music video, and I still related the colours and fonts to the rest of my album art ancillary texts as well as the music video. Here it is!

Questionnaire RESULTS

After a group of 200ish 16-18 year olds watched my finished music video during an assembly whilst filling out my questionnaire, I am able to see their anonymous replies to the questions. Here are the results:

Obviously the music video isn’t going to be everybody’s taste! But atleast no one said they didn’t like it at all! Which is a good thing 🙂 It was evident that the majority of the people who answered yes, were females, and I suppose the relationship plot is probably appreciated more by females.

It seems like a fairly split decision! I’m really pleased with this because I concentrated on all aspects of the music video in accordance with the plot, the camera shots and the use of colour. So I’m really pleased that all of them were evident and the audience could see these elements.

Obviously at some point, some people are going to disagree and I completely understand this as it’s not perfect! I think the verses match in time with the music video, and I used foot tapping in accordance with the drums, and I made sure the cycles entered the shot at the particular slide in the bass riff, but in the second chorus, where it should be up beat, it was all put into slow motion to distinguish the flashbacks, but I suppose this could’ve been improved.

At least no one said ‘not at all’ so at least the narrative was coming across partly or mostly to everyone! Obviously my whole storyboarding plot and narrative changed completely, and due to time constraints and being realistic in terms of filming certain things, so my beginning idea would’ve made so much more sense if I went through with it. But I tried my hardest to make the plot clearer by dividing the scenes between friendship and relationships and not crossing them.

It was fairly split that there was either a partly or yes, with a few not at alls. But I definitely understand this. Although I feel I definitely represented youth and relationships, I think I lacked a little on the fashion shots. I did show, leather boots, converse boots, leopard print coat, beaded necklace, tartan knitwear and union jack jumpers, but perhaps it wasn’t evident enough throughout the whole video, only very subtle.

Again, I understand this because perhaps I shouldn’t have put some shots in slow motion when the chorus is quite up-beat.

This… I completely disagree with. I know the majority said I did include plenty of shots, but the ‘could’ve been a little more’, I don’t think is fair. I actually concentrated on using EVERY possible shot in the history of media, with what equipment we had… I featured 30 different types of shot and movement, so perhaps they weren’t focusing too much and missed that aspect…

Although it is important to take constructive criticism, I must say I think some of the comments and answers are completely false, and this is because they aren’t media students and possibly won’t understand, I apply this to when a few people said there weren’t many camera shots or variety of surroundings, when in fact, I used about 20 different shots and in 3 different locations. It was fairly a split decision between ‘yes’ and ‘partly’ answers. And I noticed that the partly section were mostly 16 year old males, whereas 17-18 year old males and definitely all females tended to love the music video. The comment about the lip-synching is completely false, because not only did everyone else agree that it was definitely in synch but I spent hours making sure it was all lined up in time. I agree that perhaps the friendship shots looked a little OTT and forced, but we were all trying really hard to get across that we were having a great time, and Rob may have looked a little less enthusiastic because I wanted to make him look heartbroken, but obviously none of us are actors or actresses but we tried our best to get the point across! And on the most part, people enjoyed it and got the point of the music video 🙂

Album Lyrics Insert FINISHED!

Okay, so I went out yesterday afternoon and took pictures of the polaroids all lined up in location, and what I liked most is the fact that it’s been snowing recently and all the present locations are covered in snow, so in relation with the stills of the music video, it distinguishes the past and present. So here they all are in order of the set original tracklist!

Sure As Hell

Letdown

Waste Myself

This Is The Real Thing

Keeping On Without You

Squeaking Wheels and White Lights

My Beautiful Rescue

That Girl’s A Trick

Selfish

Chasing The Wind

Playing The Villain

Sand In Your Shoes

Somebody To Talk To