Digipaks

A digipak is a patented CD or DVD packaging, it typically consists of a gatefold paperboard or card stock outer binding, with one or more plastic trays capable of holding a CD or DVD attached to the inside.They are also an eco-friendly alternative to jewel cases.

Filming Day!

This week we filmed the lip syncing shots indoors and outside. We wanted a professional look so we used a plain black screen and lights to give a 'studio feel'.

Time Lapse Painting

For our video we want to do a time lapse painting that will feature in the video in between lip syncing shots. This is the video that inspired us for this idea:
 

And this is the time lapse painting Charlotte and Shaileyee did that will be in our music video:

New song idea

We decided to change our song and therefore concept because we realised that our previous idea was too complicated and trying to get it done would take a very long time. Other the past week we have come with a concept for the new song by storyboarding and we have filmed some footage for the opening of the video. The song we have chosen in by Paramore called 'Part II', this song is better than our other song because there is a female vocalist which means anyone of us in my group can lip sync. Although Paramore is a well known band this song is not as well known and there is not music video already made for this song which is good because we will not have to live up to the expectation of the real music video. The idea for the video is about a girl who is remembering her past relationship and because we know that music videos surrounding this kind of idea are usually cliché we have decided to make our video more abstract and performance based rather than heavily narrative.

BFI Trip!

This week we visited the British Film Insitute for a conference about music video making. The day was very informative and I especially found Pete's top tips for music video making very helpful. Video director Jake Wynne also came to talk about the videos he has directed over the years and how he went from editing videos to directing them. It was inspiring and interesting to listen to his stories behind the music videos he showed us.

Vlog of us before we went in:

Real Music Video Inspirations

The opening shots of  Example's video 'Kickstarts' inspired the idea for our opening shots of our music video. The video begins with feet tapping and then more feet are included and goes into a split screen. We were also going do a split screen however we have decided that it would look better with out it.

Bastille's video for 'Pompeii' uses a range of locations and shot types such as establishing shots to show each new location. This has inspired us as we want to use different locations and lots of different shots of them as this will be a good visual aspect.

Practise Filming: Intro

We have been practising the opening shots for our video to see if our ideas work. We were successful in doing the foot tapping to the beat however we would like to perfect the compositon of the shots so we plan to re-shoot these again.

New Storyboards

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My group has come up with some new storyboards for the opening  shots of the video. We plan to shoot these sometime this week or next week.

'Star Quality Theory'

Richard Dyer presents the idea that viewers' experience of a film is heavily influenced by the perception of its stars and that stars are not real people but images. His theory is broken down into 5 parts:
1. The making of a star - Dyer insists that if a star has a lasting significances they will not be forgotten if not then they will be forgotten in a few years after raising to fame.
2. Constructions- The star is built for the audience and not the person, labels can decided which looks and style they want their artist to have which will make them appealing and popular.
3.Audience and Institutions- Stars are made for making money and instutions models the stars image around the target audience.
4. Hegemony (cultural beliefs)- The audience are able to relate to the star as they share what the star experiences i.e. through social networking sites.
5. Character and Personalities- The star starts out as a 'real' human but in institution they are transformed so they can provide an image of their time and culture.

Star example
Since the song we have chosen is by a pop/alternative rock band the band Maroon 5 is a good example as they are a band of the same genre.

Maroon 5's popular song 'Moves Like Jagger' was the debut single for their album 'Overexposed'

Their album  'Overexposed' is colourful and eyecatching which suggests that the songs on the album will be fun and energetic appealing to a lot of young audiences as well as their long term audiences.

To promote their album the group toured and performed another popular single from the album 'Payphone' on the Late Show with David Lettterman and the lead singer had an interview on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. The next day the group went on the Today Show
and performed 4 songs from their album.

2014 album  cover  - appeals to an younger audience

2008 album cover - appeals to an older audience

Adam Levine (lead singer) in the media

Magazine



                                           
Instagram

DailyMail article

Early Images and Changing Star Image

This picture of the band taken in 2002 differs from the previous picture taken in 2014 as Adam is not in the middle of this picture- giving every group member an identity however in all of their recent pictures Adam is placed in the middle because he has become the group's 'star' and the rest of the members play subordinate roles.

Maroon 5 has changed over the years in terms of interviews also in the 2002 interview the lead singer Adam is seen with another band member Jesse however in the 2014 interview he appears solo showing that he is the main and important band member that holds 'star quality' and the most popularity and therefore is the only member that needs to attend interviews. Also in the 2002 interview Adam and Jesse are asked questions mainly about their music; their sound, influences, recent music videos etc however in the 2014 interview the interviewer focuses on his personality and gets him to play a game which shows that now he has become a bigger star he is presented as an entertainer and not just a musician.


Controversy

 Recently the band have been criticised for their controversial video for their song 'Animals'.

Our band brand
Just like Maroon 5 we may adopt the idea of having  a main 'star' who is the face of the band and use them to be the brand of our band. This may be more effective as the 'favourite' band member will already be given to the audience and as Dyer's idea suggests we can construct our star to appeal to our target audience like Adam Levine.
Additionally like Maroon 5's album cover 'Overexposed' which is colourful and vibrant we may also make our album cover colourful as well because we want to appeal to young teens to young adults around the ages of 14 to 22.

Voyeurism

The idea of voyeurism comes from the neurologist Sigmund Freud and it originally refers to erotic pleasure gained by looking at a sexual object. There are many types of voyeurism such as intra-intra-diegetic gaze, this is when the person depicted watches themselves. Jhene Aiko's music video for 'Mirrors' is an example of intra-intra-diegetic gaze because the artist looks at her self in the mirror during the video and towards the end of it she looks down at herself in a broken mirror to symbolise her brokenness and perhaps confusion with who she really is. I thought this music video is really powerful in terms of using the iconography of the mirror and how that represents the person being depicted, this could be an idea my group uses in our video.

New ending for our music video

The ending we have decided to do for our video is that instead of the protagonist looking at magazines and posters that reveal his sexuality, he will have a picture of the double date and he will fold over the two girls leaving himself and the other guy in the picture. This will reveal his sexuality with him actually saying it or showing it to reflect that it is still something he tries to hide.

Slight idea change

After re-thinking and brainstorming we decided to change our original idea of the protagonist going on dates with multiple girls who are models. Instead we have decided that he will only go on a date with one girl who is not a model but just a girl he has been seeing and at the end he will go on a double date with this girl and their friends and it will subtly be revealed that the protagonist is gay.

This is part of the storyboard of our original idea:

Brainstorming Ideas for Band Brand

Today we brainstormed ideas for the name of our band by playing the random name generator game and each of us wrote down words and passed them along then revealed them to each other. This was quite useful in helping us come up with variations of possible names although a lot of them were very random. We haven't come up with a name yet but we plan to try using an online name generator as well.

Storyboarding Session

Last week we started to storyboard in detail the shots for our music video. We are still storyboarding and hope to finish by the end of this week so we can begin filming our video.

Video Inspiration: Handheld shots and Reality vs Fantasy

I was watching the music video for the song 'I Got U' by Duke Dumont and I thought that the handheld shots used to show the narrative through the protagonists point of view were very good and that is something we want to do in our video. Also the element of reality and fantasy in the video is similar to the idea we have for our music video, as we will also show our protagonist going between reality and fantasy.

Feedback from Smallpools Manager

We recently received an email from the manager of the band Smallpools granting us the permission to use their song! 

Three song choices

This was our first song choice Paramore's 'Crazy Girls'
Good points: -Female vocalist
                      -Memorable and good lyrics

Bad points : - We felt that trying to create a music video for this song would end up being very cliche and because of the very clear lyrics the narrative would be predictable to the audience.




Song 2 was the band You Me At Six 'Fresh Start Fever'
Good points: -good beat, easy to edit to the beat
                      -popular band

Band points: -male vocalist
                     - difficult lyrics to put into a concept for the video





Song 3 and our final song choice is Smallpools 'Mason Jar'
Good points: -good beat
                     - good lyrics for a concept
                     - catchy and memorable

Bad points: - male vocalist however we have found a male to lip sync

Treatment Pitch Video

This is the video of our treatment pitch for our music video. Unfortunately we had issues with the lighting whilst filming but what we were saying can still be heard. I found this task to be helpful and beneficial to our group because it gave us a chance to vocalise our ideas, plan them out proper and also get feedback so we know how to improve our ideas.

E- mail to the music producers

 

This week we emailed the music producer of Smallpools's song Mason Jar  to ask for permission to use their song. So far we haven't received any feedback yet but we hope that we will hear from them soon.

Treatment Pitch Planning

Before we did our treatment pitch we sat down as a group and planned the things we will include in the presentation. This is a picture of us planning out our ideas for the video and pitch.

Smallpools- Mason Jar Lyrics

She saw the world through a mason jar, it's foggy
She had the kids with the vicious smiles, they got me
Up on a hill with the trophy wives
She's doing all right, all, all, right (yeah)
They let her roam some tree or vine, no question
She's got a home with some shit to climb, don't mention
Been up and down like a hundred times

But I got to kill this conversation while
There is still sense in my mind
But I miss the way you feel
No one will ever know-oh-oh-oh

She wrote a film 'bout a double life, she's livin'
She had a weak co-star in mind, I give in
Mix something clear with the coffee grinds
We're shootin' all night, all, all, night (yeah)
I feel the shift of the fallen side, I'm leavin'
Nobody dares to take her side, still pleadin'
She's breakin' down tell me one more time

But I meant to kill this conversation
While there was still sense in my mind
But I miss the way you feel
No one will ever know-oh-oh-oh

Well we both know
The green will fade to gold
It wasn't that, I should've called them off
A face like stone
The pain begins to show
And it was not right, I should've called them off

But I miss the way you feel
(well we both know)
No one will ever know
(the green will fade to gold)
I miss the way you feel
It wasn't right I should've called them off
(no one will ever know)

But I miss the way you feel
(a face like stone)
No one will ever know
(the pain begins to show)
I miss the way you feel
It was not right I should've called them off
(no one will ever know)

Treatment Pitch

A treatment pitch is a document or presentation that summarises your vision for the music video using pictures and a written description including the style, concept, themes, budgets etc surrounding the video you want to make. There are many ways a treatment pitch can be done and it does not have to be formatted in a certain way.

We have brainstormed about some the shots we want to get at our chosen locations for the music video.

Mood Board for Music Video Idea

We created a mood board displaying some of the themes and locations we want to use in our music video. So far we have some footage in our first location of the mood board, which is the fair and we have planned to go to the other locations to shoot over the coming weeks.  Some of these locations are seasonal so therefore we will be going during christmas time to film in some of the locations.

Our song choice!

We have decided that our music will be for the song 'Mason Jar' by the group Smallpools. We chose this song because it has a good beat which will be good for when we edit as rock music videos tend to be edited to the beat. Although most rock music videos are performance we have decided to go with the style of narrative with two characters, a male and a female, and since the has a male vocalist we will have a male lip syncing some parts. We have brainstormed a rough idea for the concept of our video, this will be made into a detailed storyboard once we have finalised our plans for the video.

Rock Videos: Forms and Conventions

Our group has decided to do a music video for song in the rock/alternative rock genre. These are some of the forms and conventions of rock and alternative rock music videos:

In terms of cinematography, the main goal is to show of 'musicianship' of the rock band so for example close up shots will be used to show the individual artists playing their instruments; therefore showcasing their musical talent. Wide shots are also used to fully show the band and their performance as a whole band. This has been done is past times and in present day bands.





 In terms of the editing of the videos, shots are cut in beat with the drums or guitar rhythm since rock/alternative rock music is usually fast paced. 

In terms of mise-en-scene the artists usually wear casual clothing, especially the artists now and the video is usually shot in a performance setting rather than narrative. Therefore stage lighting is used as well as practical effects such as dry ice.

The rock band 'Foo Fighters' commonly have performance music videos and the song 'The Pretender' is an example of this.


                                   

Music Videos: 90s vs Today

The 90s girl group 'TLC' were known for wearing bagging clothing and portray themselves and intelligent young women who's songs positive messages were mainly directed towards young people; such as their song 'Waterfalls'. Most of the girl groups and female artists during the 90s usually did not wear revealing outfits and if some did it was out of choice and not because they felt the need to follow the stereotype of themselves.                                                                             

TLC                

'The Pussycat Dolls' heavily contrast with girl groups in in 90s, unlike the group 'TLC' they do come across as quite sexual and they portray themselves in this manner in their music videos. The attire of the artists adhere to the forms and conventions of pop videos as their clothing is used to portray them in a certain way to the audience. Also make up and hair looks were less extreme in the 90s compared to now as seen in the pictures.

Pussycat Dolls

 

Pop Videos: forms and conventions

In most pop videos the clothing of the artist or star image is very important and they are usually dressed in fashionable and mainstream attire.




Nicki Minaj- Superbass

Artists are also portrayed as happy and enjoying life, usually the lyrics are centered around love or relationships. An example of this would be the 'Baby I' video by artist Ariana Grande as she is portrayed to be having fun and enjoying her life whilst singing about love.


Pop videos also tend to follow current trends rather than being independent and unique. Dancing is also very prominent in pop videos and is usually based around a party theme of some sort.

Our possible song choice

One of our song choices for our music video we have been considering for sometime is 'One of Those Crazy Girls' by Paramore. We have discussed ideas about the concept of our video and the kind of visuals we would like to include. So far we have decided on having a female protagonist to tell the story of a girl who breaks up with her boyfriend, however we need to look into the idea a bit more to come up with a story line that won't be too predictable or cliché. Therefore my group and I will be meeting up this week to discuss our plans for the music video.

This is the audio of the song:

Prelim

This is our group prelim for the song Rockstar by Nickelback. We enjoyed filming and editing this video although we had some difficulties replicating the backgrounds to be some what similar to the original video.

Kodaline All I Want Video

                                                                                                  
I was shown the All I Want video by Kodaline and I thought that this music video was very entertaining and successful for many reasons. One reason being that the narrative pulls you in and during the course of the video you find yourself becoming attached to the main guy in the video and wanting him to get his 'happy ending'. Although the narrative is quite predictable as the audience can guess the direction the story is going in, it is still effective because you want to continue watching to see if your guess is right. This video does not quite adhere to Goodwin's theory in terms of narrative and performance as there is no lip syncing however because of the performance of the main character the audience does believe that the story is real as the video evokes emotion out of the audience through the shots.

Fish Tank (2009)

 

Fish Tank is a British film drama it was funded by BBC Films and UK Film Council.

Director

The film was directed by Andrea Arnold.

Arnold was adamant about shooting the film in chronological order, so that the journey of the film would make sense to new coming actor Katie Jarvis.

Production

Produced by Kasander Film Company and it was filmed in the Mardyke Estate in Havering, the town of Tilbury, and the A13.

Box office

Fish Tank was released domestically on 11 September 2009 taking £103,180 on its first weekend and a total of £332,488. As of 15 June 2010, the film earned $374,675 in the United States and $1,612,034 elsewhere, bringing the worldwide total to $1,986,709.

 

Our Chosen Prelim Song

The music video we have decided to replicate for our prelim is 'Rockstar' by Nickelback. The reason why we chose to do this video is because there are different people lip syncing in the original music video and so we would not have the issue of trying to match the voice with the artist's appearance because they are not in the video. Also we liked the idea that the video has a range of  different backgrounds and locations which we were able to replicate.

Prelim Ideas

Before deciding which video we wanted to do for our prelim we brainstormed some ideas and initially we thought that these videos would be good to use for our prelim however we soon realised that we did not take into account how hard these videos would be to replicate.

One of the videos we wanted to use was 'Love Story' by Taylor Swift, however because of the backgrounds and locations seen in the video, it would mean that we would have to look for places to replicate the castle and also costumes similar to the ones the artist and her male love interest are wearing.

                                                                                                                                                                                 


Another music video we thought about doing was 'This Is Gospel' by Panic At The Disco however our main problem with this song was that the singer is male which would make our video look odd since we are females. Also the lip sync would look out of place as the appearance of the artist and the voice being heard would not match.

AS Film Production Evaluation