Group: Concept Development update

After todays lesson we realised that we did not really have enough footage to fill the whole chorus section of the song. We thought that this actually wasn't such a bad thing because after our pitch the general view was that we needed to use some more visually interesting techniques and we will now be able to fill these gaps with our most recent ideas.

We have come to the conclusion after viewing various videos that we want to include at least some stop motion in our video. We have also come up with what we think is a solid idea to incorporate it effectively and smoothly into the video. Our idea is that we are going to have the performer pull out a photograph during the video and when the camera focusses in on this photograph this is when the stop motion starts. The photograph changes to other photographs to tell a story while still in the performers hand as he is looking at the series of stop motion photographs one after the other as if telling the story.

The idea for the actual story being told in the stop motion photographs is that the story is showing images of the couple walking together, happy and spending time together, however at the end of the chorus the photo is ripped in half by the performer to bring the romance to an end which is a portrayal of the lyrics of the song.

This video is one of the stop motion ideas we looked at and we liked the idea of the story of a couple being told through just a series of still images, we also liked the idea of the bed acting as a blank canvas to almost tell the story on.

This video also helped to inform our decision about the stop motion and the idea of this is that the story is told through a different means other than physically having the acting the story out, the idea is that it is almost like a story within a story or a screen within a screen.

Group : Lesson Review

This lesson I completed the animatic using test shots and storyboards we already had. We realised we had some huge gaps in the chorus part of the song and have decided to incorporate some stop motion into our chorus part, however we need to think further into how we are going to do this and explore stop motion techniques as none of us are experienced animators.

Mrs Fernandez - planning feedback

Well done boys, the blog demonstrates that you have carried out significant primary and secondary research to work towards your pitch which was well organised and a useful dialogue about your concept. 

Aspects of your research are L4, particularly the use of recce to support your pitch and time management /  organisation.  However, to secure this level, I would like to see you reflecting on your posts as to how each aspect of research is informing your concept - particularly the video analysis, technical analysis and audience research.   Can you also ensure that your print analysis has explicit use of semiotics to deconstruct the meaning conveyed, as well as reflections on how an audience might read the text.

Also, can you please post photos / recce with your 'artist' asap to support concept development.

Group : Concept Development

 Our storyboard so far consists of 34 frames in total. 15 of these frames consist of close up shots, which make up the meat of the music video, we have 9 varied angle shots and also 9 movement shots within the storyboard.

It is important in terms of our production that we incorperate a rangle of angles, distances and movements, due to the fact that we want out music video to be interesting, as well as having a number of creative aspects within the production. The variation in terms of the shots used will help us to create more of an artistic and innovative music video for our performance so it is significant that we ensure we have a good variety of shots within the production so that we can achieve a good grade overall.

 

These are the storyboards we have created for our production so far.
They consist of the main shots which are going to feature the artist for example the use of close ups and mid shots in order to show the artist lip singing, the narrative parts of the music production, as well as the 'filler shots' we are going to use in the music video. The 'filler shots' consist of aspects which are going to be used in a way that helps to amplify the lyrics on screen. For example when the lyrics reference a record we will reflect this on screen by showing a picture of a record playing.

This is a very useful aspects of our production and is vital in terms of planning. These storyboards are very useful as it gives us a good idea to what shots we are going to use within our production in order to cover the length of our track, so that when we do go out and start filming we will have significant information about what we are doing for each part of the song, and when it comes to editing, when putting our footage onto premier elements we will know which parts go where in terms of chronological order for the production on the timeline. Therefore in terms of filming and editing it is a very important aspects of preparation for our music video.

 Furthermore, this helps us to test our concept in terms of the outcome. For example storyboarding our ideas will give a good idea to what shots we can use in an effective way within our production. We can therefore consider how we are going to edit the footage for each shot in terms of the post production effects we may want to incorporate with them. Also an idea of what A grade shots we can film within our production to make them to the best of our ability and consider every shot in order to achieve more precision in our final outcome.

In terms of our group co operation, we decided to map out our storyboard very carefully considering each shot in detail to what camera movements we include, how the shots are frame and the angle of each of them. After discussing we did manage to agree that this is significant, due to the fact that in our previous experience of creating storyboards we did not spend as much time making them and using as many frames, so therefore this time it will allow us to have more structure and knowledge of our own concept.

Group : Progress update

Aspects that we still need to do after completing our pitch to the class, in order to develop our concept better are:

• Take some indoor location reccies so that we know what aspects we will have to consider when filming our actual music video
• Draw out a story board of a shot by shot representation of our music video so that we know exactly we need to fim for each part of the track
• Film an animatic of the storyboard
• Film some shots of how we will construct the star image in the actual music video, so that when lip syncing we can test what shots will work effectively.

We have decided after completing our pitch that the narrative in which we first wanted to include would not work as well as we had hoped, so therefore now we have changed it slightly. The narrative will feature the artist and it will consist of a break up still, however only focuses on him after the break up as opposed to a boy and a girl. We have decided that the narrative will look at the characters life after the break up, as therefore we can create some sort of binary opposition in terms of how the lyrics are represented, where parts of the song focus on the positive side of a break up for example him meeting his friends and having a good time, where as other parts focus on negative aspects, for example him ripping up old pictures etc...

Group: Pitch review

We presented our pitch to our class and to the teachers last week, and the general feedback was good. People thought that our idea was very well suited to both the artists style of his videos and also the genre of the music. In particular it was thought that our research into the mis-en-scene was very good particularly the costume and locations to shoot in.

The overall decision for our audience research was good, it was thought to be a good idea that we conducted our research via social networking sites for ease of answers and also to gain more detailed and open questions.

The only real questioning point as a result of our pitch was that we had not been able to explain the narrative part of our video as we did with the performance area. This is because we did not have a reccie prepared for the narrative like we did for the performance part. Because of this the people that viewed our pitch were not able to fully understand the aesthetic that would be promoted in the narrative part of our story, however it was apparent from the pitch and from our audience research that having the juxtaposing performance and narrative parts would probably be the best way to go forward as the song is really two songs put together and the audience should be able to distinguish between them in the video.

As a result of this pitch we will now ensure we created a reccie of at least part of our narrative including the locations and specific shots to a high standard and in a similar format to our previous reccie which was sort of like a montage of our favourite shots. Hopefully once this is done it will be more obvious and easier to explain how our narrative version of the song is going to be portrayed.

 



SH: My questionnaire results

I used the same questionnaire and format as Alex so here are the results I found:

What genre of music most appeals to you?
Finn	Hip-hop
Cam	Indie, rap, house
Chris L	Rap/hip hop
Gareth	Rap/Hip-hop
Shrimal	Rap

 

 

Do you play close attention to the details of music videos?
Finn	I wouldn’t say I really pay close attention, not that ive noticed anyway
Cam	Yeah I suppose I do, I normally am quite interested in videos when there is new ones out. Its not really all about the music in my opinion
Chris L	It really depends what the video is like, if it is an interesting video then yeah but if its really simple and mainstream then i'm not that bothered to be honest.
Gareth	No not really, I just listen to the music and if the videos there then I might watch it.
Shrimal	Yes, I find I can enjoy the song more if the video has some sort of meaning to it in terms of the song that goes with it.

 

Do you enjoy a music video more when it includes the artist singing or when there is a storyline separate to the music?
Finn	I would say probably yeah, but I think most of the sort of music I watch is mostly about the artist
Cam	It kind of depends on the type of song really
Chris L	I find it just as good either way really, I think it depends on what the artist is like as an actor I suppose
Gareth	'well if im honest I don’t really care that much about the video but I would say it probably does look better with the artist in it or maybe a bit of both
Shrimal	I think both probably looks best

 

(After listening to Mikill Pane's Remix of Gotye's somebody I used to know) what are your general feelings about the track after you've listened?
Finn	Ive heard some of his music before but don’t think ive heard this one. It’s a good song, I like the feeling it gives off and I think all of Mikill panes rapping is very clever and quite funny
Cam	I quite like the original but I think this version just has a bit more to it with the rapping verses, it does make it a bit more ‘feel good; I think
Chris L	Yeah its alright, better than the original by far, that was so boring.
Gareth	Im a big fan of him, I think ive seen some of his videos as well and ive heard this song loads of times, really like it, you could probably make quite a good video out of it coz its kind of got the two different parts to it hasn’t it.
Shrimal	Not a bad song, its kind of like an indie rap sort of isn’t it? Not really my style, I like more gangster rap but for this type of music its pretty decent to be honest

 How has this added to our concept development?

• It enhanced our idea of having a strong performance
• but also we decided we should make our narrative more visually interesting to make the audience enjoy it more rather than it just being a video.