Summer Work; Initial idea 1...

IDEA 1

Band:    Tilly & the Wall
Genre:  Indie Pop
Track:    Beat control  (2:46)

Star image:

As a band they represent youthfulness, originality, creativity and success against the odds.

It is formed out of 5 people, Kianna (vocals), Nick (keyboards), Neely (vocals), Derek (guitar/vocals) and Jamie (tap dancer/percussionist). One of their unique aspects is the use of a tap dancer as opposed to a drummer.

They belong to 3 indie labels, Moshi Moshi, Team Love and Dew Process.

Music Video Concept:

Setting: An empty theatre
Establishing shot: Empty stage with a cassette player on it, with a sticker that reads ‘play me’.

A girl walks in slowly, looking up and around. She sees the cassette player, is intrigued, bends down and reads the sticker, subsequently pressing the play button.
As the track starts the girl slowly starts dancing. As the verse progresses there are cuts from the dancing girl to singers/band which speed up to reveal a wide shot of band performing the song in the theatre.

This pattern continues for 2 verses. Then the 2 realities start to blur as an audience fills the theatre, with the dancer then the band on stage. There are shots of the audience dancing, with cameras within the audience.

In the next verse there is a cut from a close up of the dancers face to a mid/wide shot of her dancing with the band on stage with an audience (potentially a costume change for the dancer at this point, something more pop-y and colourful to match the band, so she fits into this reality)
This switches to shots of different dancers free styling with a semi circle of audience around them cheering them on, cutting between the dancers.

On the line ‘aaaaallll the people gather ‘round now.’ Cut back to the singer and follow her hand, which she raises to the ceiling, flaired by lights.

The 2 realities are fully mixed and the party/concert continues, peaking with confetti/streamers/balloons being released by the band, with shots of the dancer being spinning around within this setting.

The final 4 lines ‘The Beat! The Beat! The Beat! The Beat!’ have quick cuts of the setting/band/singer. When the music stops there are a few shots of the dancer, revealing an empty theatre, and that the whole experience was in her head. She stops the cassette and leaves the theatre empty again.

Final shot of the empty theatre. (some confetti could be released/a few balloons fall down, leaving the audience unsure of the what was really real) 

The shots often pull focus and lose focus as a style choice, with pans and handheld used where appropriate. Potentially shot on an SLR camera for the effect this gives the image.

Song Lyrics

Let the beat control you.
Let the beat control you.
Let the beat control you.
Let the beat control you.

All these people talkin’ ’bout you now,
they don’t make no difference no.
We always have the rhythm here,
in our blood and in our souls.

So let the beat control you now,
there’s nothing here to care about.
Just you and me let’s break it down,
so follow me I’ll show you how.

All these people talkin’ ’bout you now,
they don’t make no difference no.
We always have the rhythm here,
in our blood and in our souls.

So let the beat control you now,
there’s nothing here to care about.
Just you and me let’s break it down,
so follow me I’ll show you how.

The beat! The beat!
The beat! The beat!
The beat! The beat!
The beat! The beat!

Let the beat control your body,
you and me there’s no one watching.
C’mon we can rock this party
all night long believe me.

Let the beat control your body,
you and me there’s no one watching.
C’mon we can rock this party
all night long believe me.

There is nothing stopping you,
there is nothing stopping me.
So let that beat control your body baby.

There is nothing stopping you,
there is nothing stopping me.
So let the beat control your body baby.

All these people talkin’ ’bout you now,
they don’t make no difference no.
We always have the rhythm here,
in our blood and in our souls.

So let the beat control you now,
there’s nothing here to care about.
Just you and me let’s break it down,
so follow me I’ll show you how.

Aaaallllllll the people gather ’round now.
Aaaallllllll the people break it down now.

There is nothing stopping you,
there is nothing stopping me.
So let the beat control your body baby.

There is nothing stopping you,
there is nothing stopping me.
So let the beat control your body baby.

Aaaallllllll the people gather ’round now.
So let the beat control your body baby.
Aaaallllllll the people break it down now.
So let the beat control your body baby.

The beat! The beat!
The beat! The beat!

Preliminary Task Video

Here is the final product from our Preliminary task, all cut together. Although it's only a performance video, I think the video accurately portrays the bands image. The setting whilst basic is grungy which compliments the heavy guitar sound the band has. The fast cuts reflect the energy of the song and keep up with the pace of it as well. The shots are similar to those we saw in real media products to crete a much more proffesional look to our video.

Account of the Prelim Task.

To prepare us for our music video task in September we carried out a Preliminary Task with an unsigned band called ‘Acres of Life’.  We were split up into groups of 4 or 5 and assigned a 30 second excerpt from the track, which is called ‘I like to make the pretty girls smile’.
The group I was put in was assigned the first 30 seconds of the song, it had a count in of 4 beats and stopped after our allotted time. After looking at other bands and music videos (see previous blog) we constructed a basic timeline and storyboard to support us on the day.
We arrived in the studio on Monday morning to find the set built and the band waiting to begin the shoot. Each group was given 25 minutes in which to shoot a minimum of 4 shots. Our group was up filming first and we took it in turns to play the part of the director, assistant, playback and cameraman. Our team worked well together and there weren't any major clashes between the members.

To cover our bases we shot wide, mid, close up and instrument shots, which didn't leave us much time to get our specific ideas. We set each shot up with the tripod and moved it between shots. The majority of the shots were basic but composed through the lens, however we did manage to get a shot up the neck of the bass which looked really efffective as the focus moved from the basists hand to the strings of the bass. I think in the real project we will have to be more realistic with timings. However we managed a good few to work with and after our 25 minutes were up we headed up to the editing suite to compile them all together.

We found that when editing music videos there are certain things you need to consider which aren’t so important with the thrillers. For example editing on the beat creates a much more flowing video and makes the cuts much less obvious.
The song we were filming was rocky with heavy guitar and drums and was quite fast paced. This meant that standard shots cutting at an average pace didn’t reflect the energy of the song, so we chopped up our original edit to make it a more upbeat.
To sync the music up with the video clips we set a marker on the second beat of the count in. All the videos were lined up above each other with the marker locking them into place, which meant that in general the instruments and vocals were roughly in sync. 

The target audience are teenage girls and boys who listen to bands like greenday and metro station, and we tried to reflect this with the fast cuts because we felt that it fits to the current trend of videos aimed at this target audience. The video was set in a grungy warehouse environment intended to appeal to the target audience as the grungy, grimy setting is used frequently in this rock/indie/punk genre of music.

Having seen the final video I think this task was carried off quite well. Whilst there are some minor style differences between the sections I think the overall effect is authentic and true to an actual media product.

In preparation for our Preliminary task we were given the track and some information about the band, and then split off into our groups to research similar bands and techniques they used in their videos. This allowed us to become more familiar with the genre and observe different styles of filming. Since we are filming a straight up performance video there was no need to think about narratives, which I may have to think more about in september.

Hey Monday - How You Love Me Now

Whilst this is not specific to the genre of our video, there were certain elements which we think would work really well within the video. In this video they use a lot of focus pulls as a style choice. I think this is a really interesting idea and could make our video look more proffesional and thought out. This video also takes into account active band members and dealing with people moving in and out of frame which is something we need to take into consideration on Monday.

Metro Station - Seventeen Forever

This video reinforces the idea of fast cuts which is a trend we noticed whilst doing our research. Some of the shots in this video olny last for a second or two, and I think people don't realise how quickly our brain understands the picture, so they don't need to be longer that a second for us to understand the image. So again we will take this into consideration when editing our video together.

A2 - Music Industry: Advanced Production Brief

In this second year of Media Studies, I will create a promotion package for the release of an album of a new artist, including...

• a music video to his or hers first single
• the cover for its release as part of a digipak (CD package)
• a magazine advertisement for the digipak (CD package).

Questionnaire...

One Audience Feedback Questionnaire

Name:
Age:
Nationality:


What was your overall reaction to the film?

What do you think would happen in the rest of the film?

Were the titles clear? Yes / No

What did you think about the use of sound?

What do you think of the actor's performance?

What do you understand the story to be (briefly)?

What genre would you classify it as?

Would you go see the film at the cinema?

Evaluation Task 7: Looking back on your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Over the course of the last year I feel I have learnt a lot about filmmaking. I realised this after looking back at my preliminary task, and comparing it to my thriller.
We had to plan much more to get our thriller off the ground compared to our preliminary task, which only took about an hour to plan and shoot. There was a lot to juggle around, and problems which had to be worked around, as we couldn't necessarily get access to items that we wanted.

Storyboards:
·         Prelim – We were given the storyboards, so no planning was required there.
·         Thriller – We had to create our own storyboards and fill in the details, which took over a week. to complete.

Location/Props/Actors:

·         Prelim – Used the studio to film, no travel required, no permission needed.
                        No specific props needed, used objects we found in the studio.
                        We chose our actors from random people, no target audience to think of.
·         Thriller – Had to find the locations, get permission for them, get transport sorted.
                         Had to sort out list of props including cars and a cot.
                         Had to think about actor to suit story and target audience.

Making the storyboards and creating a narrative...

I found that when you become responsible for creating the storyboards, there is a lot to think about in every individual shot. You have to compose each shot and create a pleasing image to watch, whilst getting all the information and detail that you need to tell the story with without creating a cluttered and busy image.
However, unlike photography, you have to take movement into account and think about what the picture will look like at the end of the shot, and if it still works. When you cut between shots, you can’t break the 180 degree and 30 degree rules as the sequence will lose its fluidity and seem jumpy.



Changes and Improvements in composition...
Looking back at the Prelim Task I can see a noticeable difference in shot composition. The first thing I noticed was the use of space within the shots. In the Preliminary task we had quite a few shots with seemingly unnecessary and excessive amounts of space. The focus of the shots is stuck in a corner of the image. We have obviously used space and wide shots in the Thriller task, but only to frame the image.  The Thriller is on the left, and the Prelim on the right.
                           

I found this was the same for the close up shots. I think it was a fear to crop into the image, which a lot of people suffer from when taking photos. They are scared to fill the frame and feel the need to use excess space.  I think that as we had gained confidence from the prelim we managed to zoom into objects better. The Prelim is on the left, and the Thriller on the right.

Working with sound...

In the Preliminary task we didn't add any sound to the sequence, we just used what was on the video cameras. However in our Thriller sequence we relied on the various different layers of sound to create the atmosphere we wanted.
The majority of the sounds featured in our sequence were added in seperately in order to allow us to change the volume levels individually to give us the scene we wanted. We found them in the final cut pro and school server banks of sounds. These sounds included the both of the alarms, the car engine and the wind in the final shot.
Other sounds where recorded seperately on the day as they had the sound we wanted, but we wanted them to be brought forwards in the scene. This was used for the baby music and the shower. This allowed us to draw the audiences attention onwards in the scene as they followed both the action and the sounds as a narrative.

Working with Final Cut Pro and After Effects...

I had very little experience with either of programmes before I started this course, but have found them both very useful with this process. With this Thriller product we were a lot more careful where we placed our cuts and for how long shots lasted, as this can completely change the mood of a scene.
We created the ending title in After Effects to reinforce the idea that everything is disappearing. I am not extremely happy with the outcome, as I think it went down a slightly different route than the one I was taking. However I still think it works for this sequence.
We have annotated our youtube video outlining what processes we used in this video which can be found If you click here.