One of the improvements we began to include into our next draft of our music video is the use of the Green screen, in our original storyboard our green shots were to include block colors which the singers would stand in front of, however whilst experimenting with the settings in Premiere Pro we are able to play video footage over the green screen and thus gives the green screen shots a more intresting approach to including multiple images onto the same shot.
Another technique we used during the editing process is the use of dissolves, as the narrative of our music video is based upon graphic matches, and to transition between shot to shot we decided a dissolve would be the most effective, as it allows the viewer to grasp the idea that the shot is in the same position and time has passed on in the next shot.
We planned to use this shot during our music video, whilst the effect of the animation is good, and the depth of feild is also effective, the shot was poorly lit, giving the lighting a strobe-like effect and not enough of the detail was directly seen, in our next shoot we will use multiple cameras and a studio light to ensure this does not happen again.
This worksheet shows us our plan for our album cover which will be used when planning and photographic images for our promotional Cd cover. Listed on the plan includes the date for each photo along with a description of the image and the locations, performers, props and costumes involved with each image.
This talent release form is needed to allow permission to perform on camera in the music video, on the form it states the consent to use any audio/visual material of me throughout the music video, promotional art and blog work.
Our Track permission letter is needed to allow the publishers and respectful owners to allow and give us consent to use their music in our music video without claiming any copyright strikes to our video.
With the locations scheduled into our plans, we needed to gain approval from the local council in order to make sure the locations are confirmed, to do this we e-mailed the council on their enquiry line and asked them if we could potentially film in the series of locations, the two being Sutton high street and Carshalton Ponds.
In my advert design I wanted to create a simple and eye-catching design which reflected towards the theme of the album, the choice of colour allows the colours to compliment and stand out towards one another which is a feature which will be included in the green screen shots of our music video.
With my ideas regarding to the Cd Cover of our work, I began to experiment with the idea of dual personalities, and instead of the album sleeve consisting of various images for each side of the cd jewelcase, the cover should be of one image spread out across the whole album, which represents that there is more to the theme of the song and album than to be expected.
The costume for my part in the music video is included here. As I'm only in the performance of the music video, and part of the supporting band, I decided that my costume should be far more casual in comparison to the lead singers, to allow the viewers to remain focused on the performers.
One of the more creative aspects of our music video is the idea of growing apart into a social group, in the narrative we see two friends growing apart, one of our ideas seen in this test shot is a stop-motion animation of a tattoo growing onto one of the performers arm, this first test proved a vast success and will be incorporated into the final product.
In our animatic, we created a basic plan for our music video, this will later help us with editing the music video together, and also help us plan shots to do with the performance and narrative.
These location shots of London were taken from a cable car, In our original plan for our music video we planned to shoot the narrative in London, we hoped to look for industrial locations with low key lighting, similar to those found in pop rock music videos, this idea was later scrapped as it would be impractical to film the narrative primarily in London.
These were our original concept ideas. In this series of ideas we began creating the foundations and conventions seen in a pop rock music video.
These are our final concept ideas. Dual personality is the main theme as there is two singers, we hope this will make the music video a much more artistic and expressive example compared to others.
When looking at an image to present myself as in a pop rock band I looked at some of the earlier examples of fashion in rock music and attempted to mordernise it for our target audience. Flannel Shirts and have been a staple of modern rock fashion since the early 90's, they are commonly paired with a long sleeve shirt. Kurt Cobain added the Army jacket to the apparell of modern rock and has been shown as an example of fashion since the appearance of Nirvana in the early 90's. Rolled up Jeans/Trousers paired with boots such as Doc Martens have been a staple of pulp culture since the late 60's and add some context to the appearance of the artist.
When annotating the details of the song we focused on the feelings we got from listening to Did Ya' Think by the Veronicas. Considering this song is part of the pop rock genre, the song itself is upbeat and fast paced, which will be helpful when it comes to editing our music video.
To help gain a more clarified view towards the theme of the song, we began to annotate the lyrics towards the song, this helps us to create a theme for the narrative and the music video as a whole, we found that rejection was one of the main themes in the song, although this is a fairly straight forward theme in itself, my group plans to amplify the meaning of the song to make the music video more appealing to audiences.
In our group our task is to take each of the various roles and divide them between each other, this will later help us with orginisation towards setting up locations, lighting and equipment which will in return get each member of the group fairly involved. As we are all performers in the music video, we will all help with the camerawork for example, but the director and camerawork will look over and be the deciding role in that area of production.
In our music video we plan to create a conventional pop punk song, in it our band members will be dressed in punk oriented clothing and have various colourful accessories like artists such as Avril Lavigne. We want our music video to be set in a dark, urban and industrial area as this is conventional to the genre, The song we have chosen is 'Do Ya' Think?' By the Veronicas.
Video 1: Avril Lavigne - Here's To Never Growing Up.
In The music video to Avril Lavigne's Here's to never growing up, we see a variety of conventions which are provided throughout this video.
The first conventions are seen through the establishing shot of the video, this long shot shows three musicians on what looks like a high school band stage, the band members on the stage are not part of Avril's band and are given an overall negetive image. This shows the audience that Avril's music is far superior in comparison to other examples of music, which is a convention in various rock music videos.
The second series of shots seen are a variety of extreme close ups of the artists jewellery and clothes, these along with the establishing shot give the audience an idea to what type of genre Avril's music is along with showcasing some of the traits of the artist and the subculture and audiences which follows the pop rock genre.
A long shot of one of the pupils turning to the camera cuts to a shot of a sihlouette of the artist singing into a megaphone, the shot of the pupil turning his head is to show that the audience is expected to pay attention, much like the characters shown throughout the music video. The megaphone emhisises this as most artists use a microphone, whereas a megaphone indicates that the artist is far more important and requires more attention than the common artist or musician.
Another interesting element seen in this section of the music video is the editing and camerawork, in which each time the musician moves her knee down in a stomping motion, the camera quickly zooms in and out rapidlly, this is cut to the beat of the song and also creates a more powerful impact upon each beat, that the music is part of the video rather than just a track placed over the video.
When the artist is present and lipsyncing as expected, a lot of conventions are apparent. In the long shots of the artist and the band, the camera is only focused onto the artist and the band members do not fit into the frame, and throughout the music video we see the artist lipsync directly to the camera in a variety of shot sizes, the one thing that stays the same is that the artist is the center of attention inthis music video.
Intercut between the shots of the artist performing to the camera are shots of the narrative, the narrative is set in a school prom in a school hallway and follows the various members and students of the prom cheering and dancing to the artist's music. The narrative promotes the artists music and also links to the title of the song 'Here's To Never Growing Up', the use of a narrative to protray the themes of a song is a major convention to any music video.
In our mood board my group have showcased the various conventions and things to expect in our pop rock music video. Many Bands and groups such as Paramore and All Time Low have exotic hairstyles and fashion trends in order to appear individual and to stand out amongst the crowd, this will be seen in our music video as our costume designs will be allocated to the target audience and the conventions seen in the pop rock music genre. Expressive colors and poses are present throughout the Pop rock genre, these showcase the expressive and aggressive conventions of the rock genre whilst the light colours and casual appearance of some artists help reinforce the pop conventions in the genre, in our group's music video, there will be a strong focus on keeping the balance on pop and rock music videos. Most pop rock groups are band, and all play a variety of instruments, this is to show that the content in their song follows the conventions of a rock band and not of a manufactured pop artist. This also shows a sign of creativity in the pop rock genre of music. In our groups music video we will have a strong focus on what the bands appearance is on and off stage.
Varnallis' theory identifies the differences between a Music Video and through Hollywood Films.
An example shown in this is seen through David Bowie's Life On Mars? This particular music video showcases a series of points which are seen in Vernaillis' Theories.
In Vernallis' Theory, The structure of the music video is at random and thus montage editing is a popular and recurring convention seen throughout music videos. In David Bowie's Life On Mars? music video, There is no sense of continuity as the video is littered with multiple fade to white transitions which give the audience a vague impression of the passage of time.
Continuity Editing like in most hollywood films is also a part of some music videos, for example in Jason Derulo's The Other Side we see continuity editing in the narrative, which is most conventional music videos, the narrative stays in continuity editing whilst the performance is in montage editing, as this creates a fine division between the two. At the begging of this clip we see the beginning of the narrative cut between a series of shots of the performance which then cuts back to the narrative of the video where it plays just where the last clip left off, it also helps to define between the performance and narrative due to the different colours between the lighting (ie, gold and blue/black).
In a studio there is no sense of space nor time, considering most music video performances are shot in a studio or stage, the editing in these areas of the video are jumbled and there is no sense of space or time, this was also apparent in David Bowie's music video and is also a figure seen in N'Sync's Pop music video. As in this clip the viewer has no idea of the location, time or setting of the music video.
The other part to Vernallis' Theory was the Phantasmagorical body, a theory seen that in many pop videos, women are portrayed through their body and proportions, objectifying the women as an object of desire. Many examples of this are critisised due to their sexist views.
In Kylie's 'Spinning Around' Music video, this is present as various close ups of her legs and bust are seen throughout the music video.
In Goodwin's study, we see three types of music videos seen throughout the pop industry.
Illustration. One of the examples of illustration comes from the music video for 'Lovefool' by The Cardigans, in this music video the lyrics and theme is clearly represented in the music video about the lead singer performing a song about her partner cheating on her illustrating her pleas for him to come back.
Amplification. One of the more creative examples of amplification comes in the shape of The Avalanches 'Frontier Psychiatrist'Which experients with the theory of illustration in a music video as the music video visually represents every single lyric of the song.
Distuncture. A music video which has very little meaning and concept towards the video, Nirvana's 'Heart Shaped Box' is a music video which never really connects to either the lyrics or the artists in general, the band themselves are portayed in various ways throughout this music video.
This music video is a 0 budget music video, it has showcased the basics of how to shoot a exceptional music video buy using lighting, basic editing and camera techuniques and the conventions of a music video.
The Establishing shot allows the viewer to be introduced to the narration of the video before the main focus becomes the song.
An extensive use of tracking is common in many music videos, in which the singers walk towards the camera, slow motion is also a trait of music videos as it makes the on screen action seem more dramatic.
Music Videos cut between two consecutive scenarios, as shown here. We also get our first clues to the theme of the song, video and lyrics.
Here we see our first examples of cutting to the beat, listening to the song closely, the camera seems to cut during the beat of the snare drum, or the back beat.
Camerawork: The Camerawork throughout the music video follows the general conventions of any other music video by placing a variety of establishing shots though the intro of the song, this is to give the viewer a glance at the various locations seen in the music video, it also gives the audience a first look at the various situations the musicians are seen in.
In addition there is a variety of mid shots, close ups with very few long shots of the singers (it's also an interesting point to add that none of the composers of the instrumental are seen in this music video, only the two singers), these shots normally show the artist's lip syncing to the song, especially during the hook/chorus. The Camera tends to be a bigger shot when the two singers are in one of the many cutaways seen throughout the song.
The Movement of the camera is vivid and represents the fast paced editing a life which the two singers seem to live (as far as the music video tells us) as the shaky camera is constantly moving along with the edit cutting, in addition the camera's movement around the singers always holds them as the point of focus.
Mise' en scene: As any other conventional pop song uses mise en scene, I love it's music video uses several locations and the musicians change their costumes with each scene, which links in the rest of the erratic direction. These include an empty street in what seems to be London in which the two singers are dressed in a series of smart dresses garnished with ribbons in contrasting colors. In another the scenery and clothing is completely different, in which the two singers are now in a small hotel room in more casual clothing.
Editing: The editing like in the majority of conventional music video's is montage, the music video cuts between scenes, lip sync's and cutaways at an almost random pace, and as previously said, keeps into the theme. Filters and color correction have also been used through the music video (again, at a random variation)
