Music Video Rough Cut 3 and Feedback (Chris)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy5MUeMRM38

Music Video Rough Cut 3 and Feedback


For our 3rd rough cut we had been only given a few points which would help the final product look as good as it can be. The first piece of advice that we had been given was to change out the first shot of the actor singing. This was because it was a little blurred and we wanted to make sure that the first shot of the actor singing was clear and was a good clip to introduce the main actor.

The second piece of advice that we had been given was to swap over the clip of the actor walking to the tree and move it forward a few seconds. The reason for this is that is that it would make it more clear to have the main actor away before being introduced with the girl. 

Music Video Rough Cut 2 and Feedback (Kierann)

Music Video Rough Cut 2 and

Feedback

Music Video

What Works Well

Lovely cutting to the beat

Some beautiful shots - panning and well composed shots - Kierann between Chris and Harriet! 

Nice performance shots - just check out what is on the surrounding edges of the frame! 

Even Better If

You ditched the curtains in the performance shots - check the outside of the frame

Check the lip sync throughout

Add more notebook scenes

Ditch the shot that tilts from under the bridge up - it is weird and the pole of the bridge is in Kierann's face

I've written wonky branch on my notes - does this mean anything to you as I am struggling to remember what I meant! 

I hate the new shot of Kierann on the bench - the sun is in his face too much - either film again or go back to your previous shot

Clean up transitions a little - they can be a little jumpy at times

We want a longer shot of Kierann walking away at the end

Our group will use this feedback in an effective way which will make sure that our music video becomes better than the previous rough-cut. The first thing we will do from this feedback is watch our music video and assess the standard of the artist’s lip syncing and make sure that it is of high quality. This is because lip syncing in the performance of our music video the lip syncing is one of the main features and it is something that the audience will notice straight away if out of sequence. We are going to get rid of the tilt shot from the bridge as our teacher advised us to. To fill this empty spot as a group we will see if we are we can either use spare footage we have or if it would be better to reshoot a performance shot somewhere else as we are lacking them.

Music Video Rough Cut 1 and Feeback (Joe fisher)

THINGS WE LOST IN THE FIRE - FIRST DRAFT

What went well

Love the fact it's all set in one day - we see day into night - the journey

Some nice shots

Love the slow mo of Kierann walking

Lovely shots of them on the swing

Very steady camera movement

Really nice cutting to the beat - fire, fire, fire!

Even better If

Some of the fire shots lack focus - when he is behind the fire - shows different quality

Get rid of the first swing shot - it needs a shot of them swinging on it

Too many shots of Harriet looking at the camera

Cut from from 1.43 - you can see Kierann laughing! 

Work on transitions between shots

Feel he needs to throw more into the fire

Why does it go to first person shot - hand held?

The shot with Kierann at the fire in the dark - 3.53 is too long

Add photos of them being thrown into fire at the end

26 marks so far - Proficient

We all feel that this is some really nice feedback in which we will be able to improve upon by the time we have to present it again. However, there are some parts which will be tricky to improve upon. For example, we can easily add transitions between shots to add variety, but to also make sure they fit in the music video, but it would be harder for us to shoot more scenes of Kierann chucking more things in to the fire, and although we do agree with this, there is a chance that we wont be able to do this until the third draft just because last time it took much organisation for us to film those fire shots, and we have already used most of the "bonfire shots" that we need and have.

Final Location Scouting for all 3 products (kierann)

Final Location Scouting for all 3  products

When it came to reshooting from rough cut one and two we filmed in the same locations each time. We ether filmed in the same spot or at a different angle. This was because we really liked the places we filmed in and thought that they all fit in with the music video. E.g. we filmed in our local town as that’s where are target audience may go once or twice a week. On the third rough cut we needed to film a couple of shots as we had removed some shots from our music video as they weren’t up to our standards. This was because the shots had the sun shining so much on the actors face that you couldn’t see him lip-syncing. For this reason we had to reshoot that scene. We considered many places in which we could film. We thought about going back to the placed in which we filmed but we felt that it was too stationary. In the end we found the back of a field in a wooded area in which we filmed that scene. In the end we scraped the idea of the two bedrooms as it looked out of place with the rest of the music video. We had filmed all of the music video outside so far so by having a shot in which was set inside would seem out of place. We stuck with the location of the park. This was because we wanted the characters relationship to seem true and a place in which couples usually go is the park. With them playing in the park it made their relationship look realistic and not fake. I believe that because of this location our points were clearly represented. We filmed the bonfire scene at the end of a field. This is because it represented our idea of mystery, which all indie music videos represent. After rough cut two, we decided to add shots of the artist in the studio performing. This was because we found in rough cut one that all of the performance shots for the artist were quite stationary which made it feel quite boring. To tackle this we added the artist in the studio, but before we did this we looked at our research of our genre to make sure that it actually made sense why we added. We found that it did as filming in a studio is one of the locations that is used in indie-pop. All of our locations are relevant to our genre as we frequently looked back our research from the start of the project. This made sure that our music video was actually being presented as an indie music video.

Animatic storyboard (Joe Fisher)

The animatic storyboard gave us insight as to what how our final product may be structured. These were only basic ideas, but got the point across. We established here that we would need a lot of imagery of fire if our video was to be successful in portraying the message we needed it to. It also helped us figure out what characters we may need when shooting the video, so taking this in to account early meant that we could cast and prepare as to how these people would be presented on camera. Due to the repetition of a lot of the scenes in the storyboard, this made us plan in many ways how we would fill these gaps, and what sort of scenes we’d need to shoot when we were out filming. This actually helped us as it allowed for flexibility with our ideas and allowed all of the group members to have input as to what should be in the music video, instead of sticking to a layout that has been pre-determined.

Final Costumes information for all 3 products (Kierann)

Final Costume Ideas

Music Video

We looked at the lead singer of Bastille, Dan smith, for inspiration for the top the protagonist will wear. We found that he wears a lot of checked shirts as well as t-shirts which reference old cult films, they all have a vintage look on them. We also looked at many over Indie artists for inspiration so we could have a varied choice. I looked specifically at the band "Foster the People" as both bands share many similarities. I found that the costume choice for Indie-pop wasn't as varied as a thought it would be for a male. I found two types of costume they would either wear. It was either a t-shirt which had intertextuality to either a film, mostly cult films, or a rock band. The other type was a shirt, most of which are checked. In the end we chose the checked shirt. This was because we thought that it looked more stylish and what the viewers may actually wear. Our initial idea for the both costumes have changed quite a bit. This is, because after a period of time and more research into indie artists we found that our costumes were too mainstream. We believe that the change will benefit us as dressing like our target audience will make the music video more relatable and interesting for them. Another factor for why we chose a checked shirt was, because our actor already had one and it also looked pretty vintage. We decided in the end that the protagonist should shouldn't change clothes in any moment of the music video, however the female character will. The reason why we chose to do this is to give the idea that the artist is nostalgic towards his ex-girlfriend. So by him wearing the same clothes it connotes that he feels that he is closest to her when wearing those clothes. 

For the protagonist’s costume we have come to the conclusion that he will wear dark colours. He will wear black jeans, black converse shoes and a vintage looking shirt. The reason why we have chosen black is, because it is the usual clothing in which someone would wear to a funeral or when they are grieving over the death of a loved one. Stereotypically worn by a widow. Even though his ex-partner hasn’t died, to him she has and the only thing he wants is for her to come back. The shoes will be black converse as converses are typically worn by Dan Smith the lead singer. The shoes are also considered "edgy" and that's what vibe we are trying to pull off in costume. This is because “edgy” is a small fashion trend where people wear fashionable clothes which mostly worn by the niche audience. Indie is listened also by the niche audience so it makes it more relatable. 

We decided that the female character would wear something which is niche, a bit creative to reflect out onto the viewers. As the actress who we used is a very creative and considers herself part of the niche audience we asked her for some inspiration with the costume. She gave us some tips and we built on them. We chose a yellow jumper for the first layer. This is to connote that she is a popular girl who stands out from the crowd. To make the costume look more niche we added the fir over jacket. We chose this as its creative. This is what many of the niche audience would wear and to top it off we put sun glasses on the top of her head. This is to connote that see is a materialistic person who wants everything and when she is bored of it she replaces it, like her clothes and like her ex-boyfriend. Then blue jeans to connote that she is fashionable.

For the first costume we had her wearing a pink low dress. This is to connote that see is sweet when she wants to be. She wears a cropped fir black jacket. This is to counter the sweet side of her to show that she can also be nasty which is hinted by her leaving her ex for another guy. The scarf has been used to embrace her creative side as well as continue the theory that when see gets bored of something she gets rid of it.

Digipak + Magazine Advert + Music Video

Throughout all three of our products, the only person in it is the artist. Within all three of the products the artists is wearing the exact same clothing. This is for several reasons. The first is to create a nostalgic feel which is clearly shown in the music video. The second is to build on the relationship between all of the products so that the target audience know that it is a product of Bastille. the only person featured on the digipak and magazine advert is the artist, we have done this to draw the centre of attention to him so that all of the audiences attention is on the artist.

By doing this activity it has prepared us for when we are going to film our music video. this activity has made our group more organised which will later result in a better product. This made us realise that the custumes used in each product need to have a deeper meaning.

Casting/Audition information (Kierann)

Casting/Audition information

Our first consideration about casting was finding actors who were in the same age group as our target audience which is 17+. This is to make the music video more relatable and enjoyable for our target audience. To find these actors advertised it to our year group, To find these actors advertised it to our year group, specifically to those who have a background in acting or music. This is because we don’t wasn’t our music video looking too amateur, we want it to look as professional as possible. We auditioned three girls and four boys. There is only one female character in the music video and because of this we auditioned three girls. This was so that we had a variable choice to choose from. There is two male characters in the music video so we decided to audition four boys. This was again to give us a varied choice, all boys would audition for each role. The way we auditioned the female character and the male character (the one who doesn’t sing) is just by judging them from a photo of themselves.  This is because we only needed to see them in the music video and they wouldn’t have to sing. The way we auditioned the other male character (Artist) was by giving them a day to learn the chorus of the song and see how well they knew the song as the actor would need to sing the whole song many times over. The people we auditioned for the female role was: Harriet, Jackie and Charlie. The person who went through was Harriet. This was because we thought her looks fitted our character’s personality better; confident in front of the camera and pretty. For the male character (the one who doesn’t sing) we auditioned: Darron, Paul, Luke and Joe. We chose Darron out of the three, because he was the most charming of the four. As well as this, he is in a relationship with Harriet, the female character. We chose them together as their reactions to each other would be more realistic and true. For the other male character (Artist) we chose Luke. We chose look because out of the other four he had the most acting experience and also knew the song better than everyone else. His lip-syncing was far superior than the other three.

Shotlist for magazine (Joe Fisher

Draft magazine adverts
We have been given the task to create a Magazine advert for out chosen artist, Bastille. If we are to do this, we are to also gather our own assets to use within our advert, so that we do not get in to any legal mishaps such as copyright claims.

For the main effort, we will be using Photoshop and it's tools to our advantage, to make an effective advert which can look professional.

At the school, we have access to a white screen in which we will have to book to use. This will be an effective method of getting our own assets as this white screen will effectively function as a greenscreen. As the white colour is so bright, it will differ greatly from the clothes that our artist would be wearing in these shots, so when we import it in to Photoshop, it would be easy to crop them out of that current background. If we end up shooting on site for a main background, we will not need this.

We may need this white screen for other objects though and for the same reason, just in case we need to add more assets to our magazine advert. This is effectively my thinking method of when creating the "Young Naz" magazine advert.

If we have enough of these clean cut assets imported on to Photoshop, it will be easy to produce a professional, composed image with all the assets we have.

Next we will need ratings, for this we will, again, be using the white screen against a starkly contrasting colour for the stars, such as black, to create the "star ratings" asset we will need.

In terms of social media platform logos, we're supposed to produce our own assets, so we may need to do something with the logos so that it's okay in terms of legal precautions such as copyright.

We'll be taking several shots of the artist on a white background for sufficient asset creation, but then we will also have to take some action shots of the artist at an actual location to give the scene on the advert some composition.

We'll be wanting to add some correlation between the magazine advert and the digipak, so we'll be using some of the same image assets when creating them to make them feel as if they are part of a package. We've looked at past products that have done this effectively and we think we can do this effectively with the right tools which happen to be available to us.

If we were to do a white background, I would actually like to add some colour to it, like reds, oranges and dark yellows, all representations of a fire. I have multiple ideas for how we could add these aesthetics, but the best two that I think will fit would be

-Fine lines created in Photoshop

-Ink in water against a white background so I can crop the image

The fine lines in Photoshop would be easier to create, as the tools in Photoshop allow for multiple chosen coloured lines of given width and length to be added. Elements such as transparency can be added to the assets to make them blend with the background

The ink in the water strategy we'll need a good camera for. One of our group members does have a good camera so we could actually do this. We will need some sort of strong lighting as well, but that shouldn't be hard to organize. We could use and merge colours such as blood oranges and strong reds to represent the flame. Not only that but it spreads "like a fire" across the water, creating some really good looking patterns if done correctly. It would probably look better, but take a longer time to access.

If we do a white background I don't think we should crop out the artist, mainly so that the advert has a sense of depth, that, or we leave any shadow that the original image creates, but crop everything else.
In terms of text, we should use a bold font. Looking at several indie magazine adverts, most of them use a bold text font with a rather "high lettering scheme" to make the magazine look professional, classy, but also eye-catching and appealing to it's targeted audience, and seems as Bastille is classed as indie, I only see this to fit. I have also noticed that these same indie adverts either use just one whole image and then put text over it in related contrasting colours, or they tend to harshly separate between sections of imagery and sections of text.

Final Magazine advert
Judging by the design that we collectively thought to be the best for our group, we decided that we needed a few core assets to our imagery, these were:
A shot with Kierann in the centre of the frame
A shot with the fire in the centre of the frame
A shot with both Kierann and the fire in the frame
A shot of Kierann looking at a fire
A shot of Kierann from behind looking at a fire
A shot of Kierann sitting on a bench and looking at a fire
A shot of Kierann looking over water
On top of this, we were also going to need image assets if we were going to edit anything about the image, this would be
Flames
Smoke
Grass
Bushes
The fence in the background
The bench

Group Research Into Chosen Artist (group)

Bastille is a British indie rock band that was formed in 2011 and consists of Dan Smith (vocals), Chris Wood (percussion and backing vocals), Will Farquarson (Bass, guitar and backing vocals) and Kyle Simmons (Keyboard, backing vocals). The name comes from the 'Bastille day' which is celebrated on the 14th of July and is Dan Smith's birthday. Their first studio album 'bad blood' was released in 2013 and was in the UK chart at number 1. The band was nominated for 4 Brit awards in 2014 and have so far sold over 5 million records in the USA and over 2.5 million records in the UK. 

Bastille were formed in 2010. There origin is London, England. Bastille consists of four members, but since 2015 a new member has joined making the total five. Dan Smith the lead singer, Kyle Simmons the keyboardist, Will Farquarson the guitarist/bassist, Chris Wood the drummer and Charlie Barnes the guitar/keyboarder. They are a band known to not to be pinned down to one single genre, however they are mostly influenced by indie music. The mainly genres they play are Indie pop, Indie rock and electropop/synthpop. In their music videos only the lead singer and founder Dan Smith appears in their music videos as a protagonist in his perspective. The others group members can be seen briefly in a few music videos such as Send Them Off! and Things We Lost in The Fire. Their music videos are mostly narrative based rather than performance, however most of the music videos do include moments of Dan Smith performing.

Bastille has succeeded on promoting their band image on multiple levels. This is visible through everything they publish, from concert promotions, magazine adverts, music videos, etc. With Dan smith being the forefront member of this band and lead vocalist, he appears in a large majority of the music videos that are produced for, always for a large amount of time. Their logo for self promotion has been can be noticed by those who enjoy the band, dislike the band, or have just merely heard of them. This is because they have gone above and beyond of adding their signature "triangle instead of A" signature to their name

This is become an extremely noticeable sign for those who are fans of the indie band. For example you can see it nearly everything they produce.

Music video - Features the band name and the signature triangle with Dan Smith taking up one third of the screen - he is the star image.

EP Promotion and cover for single - The band name takes up at least one third of the screen, their triangle white against a green triangle making it stand out.

Tour promotion magazine advert and poster - The black colour against nearly a pure white background makes the Bastille name stand out. Because the viewer is used to reading an A, and the A is replaced with a triangle, 

when we have a look at how the albums have sold in the UK we can see that even though they are an indie band they have still done really well and have even been in the UK top 10. Currently Bastille have had 2 songs in the top 10. combined they had a total of around 12 weeks in the top 10. The two songs that hit in the top 10 were 'Of the Night' and 'Pompeii'. Both of these songs hit the second spot in the UK top 10 however they never hit number 1. Bastille has also had 6 songs in the UK top 40 and 7 in the top 75. Overall Bastille has had songs in the top 40 for 64 weeks and 141 weeks in the UK top 75. 

Shotlist for digipak

Our Digipak

Shotlist
For the first slide, we needed a clear shot of Kierann facing the fire, as it allowed us to link the song title back to the visuals of our ancillary product. because of this, we used the same main image on the magazine advert and the digipak. We struggled to find a good image, until we revisited the scrap footage and we found a shot of Kierann sitting on the bench where the music video is mainly set staring directly in to the bonfire we created.
For the back of the digipak, we wanted to use a picture of the bonfire dying. using this as the main shot meant the surrounding area wasn't as bright, so it was easy to put white text in the surrounding area we needed.
Here we also used
-Taurus records logo
-The movie credit text originally designed for the magazine advert, but still gives credits to the individual artists
-Virgin records
-Barcode
Using these elements gives the digipak a sense of realism, like it would actually be sold in stores, especially with the addition of a barcode.
In the third slide, i used the crop of the smoke from the fire and lowered the opacity to around 30%, so it didnt show as much. Putting this against a black box i found made a really nice effect, and allowed for a bold Bastille logo and song name underneath directly in the center of the frame.
The top three slides are are all separate, but part of the same composition. From left to right, it shows a progression of time, just like in the video. All of the shots are taken within the same setting, so it helps reinforce this comment.
I added the Bastille logo in the middle of these sections mainly because the slide on the left has white in the middle bottom portion of the image, so if i were to put it there, it would blend with the background so would lose it's value being on the slide at all. so i decided to centre it, as it looked aesthetically pleasing on both slides (especially on the darker slide in my opinion).
I kept the same middle image from the draft versions as when i shrunk the image, the pixelation would disappear, rather than me stretching and enlarging the image beyond the proportions in was shot at, making the image look blurry and pixelated. I've highlighted a section in which the CD would be placed.
This is particularly important as i composed all the shots to have Kierann centred in the frame.

Equipment information (Chris)

Equipment information

Equipment is very important when it comes to creating a music video and we need to make sure that we plan all of the equipment in advance to make sure that we don't forget anything. We also need to make sure that the equipment that we decide to bring is efficient and will help with the overall filming of the video.

The first piece of equipment that we are going to need to consider is the camera. The camera that we are going to use is the Sony HXR MC-2500E. This is a prosumer camera that we have at our disposal and there are many reasons why we are going to go for it. Firstly the camera has a lot more features compared to normal camera's. It has the power to shoot in different situations depending on the lighting and has built in features for the common ways of filming (for example it has a night shooting mode, fireworks shooting more, spot light shooting mode and landscape shooting mode). With the power of shooting in many locations with different settings means that it will reduce the amount of time that we spend shooting the video itself. The camera also shoots in full HD 1080P and has many different formats in which it can be shot in.

For the microphone (although we aren't using audio in our video) we are going to be using two shotgun microphones. The reason that we are doing this is that we are going to use it for behind the scenes footage that we can use as evidence. The first mic that we are going to use is a Rode mic go. The reason for this is that it is a strong mic that can pickup audio from a long distance and can pickup distinct noises.

We are also going to be taking a MAC laptop. We want to make sure that we take equipment that are going to help reduce the time spent filming. We are going to be taking a laptop with us so we can review the footage on site while we are filming. This means we can see the quality of the footage and if its bad we can re-shoot it then and there, rather than get home and find out the footage we took isn't good. This means we won't have to try to re-film.

Plot and Narrative work for the music video(Chris)

Plot and Narrative Work For The

Music Video

Making sure that we have planned the plot and narrative of our storyboard is one of the most important things to do. We came up with the narrative and plot of the story when we read through the lyrics and analysed them. This meant that we could come up with our own opinions on what the lyrics was saying to us and what we think the lyrics meant.

The narrative of our piece is:

A young man had just left a relationship and is singing about how their relationship had failed. we start off the piece with him being all sad and that he hadn't gotten over her. We would be showing him all on his own, and that he hadn't gotten over her. We are also going to be showing the girl - she had just gotten over him and is in a new relationship. We are going to be showing her as happy and that she is doing all of these great things however the man is stuck alone and not doing anything. In the middle of the song we are going to have it as he is getting over her slowly. You are going to see that he is slowly going out and doing more - which is starting to have an effect on the girl. You are going to start to see her doing less and less and her looking a lot less happy. We want to show the audience that she rushed in to a new relationship thinking that she had moved on from the last however she hasn't and it will get clearer and clearer as the video progresses. Eventually we are going to show it at the end with him going out and him really happy that he has gotten over her and it ending with her not over him and missing him a lot. We feel as if our target audience (16-24) would have gone through the same sort of thing.

Draft Shotlist (Kierann Hills)

Draft Shotlist

Location	Shots	Time
Fire (field location)	Long Shot – on campfire (2) (4 seconds each). Close up – on artist (8) (4 shots 2 seconds and 4 shots 4 seconds long). Close up – on fire (4) (2-3 seconds long each). Close up - on notes being thrown in (5 seconds long each).	Arrive at Field at 3. Setup camera for 3:10. Setup fire for 4. Shoot at 4 till 6 so it gets dark. Put fire out 6:01. Clean up and take down camera 6:10. Leave for 6:20
Town	Close up – couple (8) (2-3 seconds long each). Close up - on artist (8) (4 shots 2-3 seconds long each 4 shots 4 seconds long each).	Arrive for 11 Setup camera 11:10. Film 2 hours for 1:10 Take down camera and leave for 1:20.
Park	Close up – couple (8) (2-3 seconds long each). Close up – on artist (4) (4 seconds long each).	Arrive for 2:30 Setup camera 2:45 Film 1 hour for 3:45 Take down camera and leave for 3:55

Lighting notes (Joe French)

Our music video starts in the morning and as it progresses, the sky darkens and goes into night time. At the end of the music video it is pitch black which shows progression of time as we wanted to show that he is stuck in the moment and only thinks about his ex relationship. He feels as if he isn't changing but everything around him is, which suggests that he is not ready to get over the relationship.

The light from the fire is also a representation of the relationships relevance to the two people. It is very bright and vibrant in the beginning but as the music video progresses, the light starts to get dimmer until it completely goes out. This is telling us that the relationship is the light and as the light gets darker, the relationship is weakening until there is nothing left. This applies to the main character (played by kierann) because he is the one having the light from the fire shine on him so therefore, he is the one still holding on and the relationship still shines on him. As the music video progresses it shows that he is coming to grips more and more with the fact that he will no longer have this relationship so in the scenes when it is darker and the night is covering up the fire and its getting dimmer, it shows his ability to comprehend the end of the relationship and have an easier time understanding why and moving on. 

 

For the digipak we are using the lighing from the picture rather than making any post production editing because we think that would take away the natural side of the music video. This can then mean that the idea of love and going through breakups is a natural and expected thing to happen to people in their lifetimes, much like fire is a natural thing too that burns and goes out eventually and the light coming from the fire will soon die down.