Our music video is very much in line with the rest of the Rock Genre, a performance video, preferably in an interesting location.
It follows the example of bands such as Metallica and U2 in their locations, with their songs I Disappear and Vertigo, and with the relatively simple, up close and personal camera work which is common throughout the genre.
Helena & Frazer
Showing posts with label Frazer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Frazer. Show all posts
Representation
Representation would be constructions of reality which represent the 'real' world to the viewers.
The one-man band, attempts to fulfill all the roles of the stereotypical band within our music video;
- Using the appropriate instruments, and the typical band layout.
- Giving each member a unique costume, all in the style of "rock stars"
- We related the locations to the lyrics, with the song starting within the desert, and transitioning through the lyrics to Vegas at the end.
- Using Butch's Walkers location in the USA as a basis of our location. With the video based in Arizona.
This is a shot from Stuart and Stephen's thriller project. In this shot we wanted to represent the character as a "Bad Boy", and the cigarette is symbolic with criminals in other films.
The one-man band, attempts to fulfill all the roles of the stereotypical band within our music video;
- Using the appropriate instruments, and the typical band layout.
- Giving each member a unique costume, all in the style of "rock stars"
- We related the locations to the lyrics, with the song starting within the desert, and transitioning through the lyrics to Vegas at the end.
- Using Butch's Walkers location in the USA as a basis of our location. With the video based in Arizona.
This is a shot from Stuart and Stephen's thriller project. In this shot we wanted to represent the character as a "Bad Boy", and the cigarette is symbolic with criminals in other films.
Friday, 11 December 2009
Frazer Cowell - Evaluation
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In our Music Video, we created links between the lyrics and the visuals. An example of this is with the backgrounds we made for use with the Green Screen; the lyric “Summer Desert Night” – And the verse it is in – has a background of a desert at night time.
Record Companies dealing with music form the Rock Genre often want the performers to look the part – look “Rocky”. To fit this, we made the band members wear certain items of clothing. For example, the guitarist wore black gloves and a head scarf.
Rock Videos often show the full band multiple times. In the chorus sections of our song we had all four band members on show. The song is also part of the “Indie” genre; full band shots are often part of music videos for songs in the Indie genre.
In our Digipak we made reference to the famous Abbey Road album cover, by The Beatles. We used this parody for the Back cover of the Digipak.
When filming, because we needed to shoot the same angles and shots for all four band members, we used multiple cameras that were all recording at the same time. This reduced the time needed to shoot as we could get three shots with one take.
Good Mise-En-Scene was necessary to create a clear difference between each of the four band members, since we had the same one performer acting all four roles. Although the use of a microphone and instruments played a big part in showing this difference in character, the use of costume was also important. Because of this, we made all of the band members wear different shirts and jackets. For example, the bassist wore a blue shirt with white text on it whereas the Guitarist wore a cream coloured shirt.
We watched existing music videos to gain inspiration and ideas for our own video. “The Masterplan” by Oasis (Released October 1995) sparked our idea about 3D backgrounds. The song “Vertigo” by U2 (Released 8th November 2004) is in a wide desert setting - we wanted to create a desert scene similar to the one in this U2 video. Sections from the Rick Astley video “Take Me to Your Heart” (Released 1988) uses handheld shots well and gave us the idea to try out these kinds of shots ourselves. The same Rick Astley video also has clips of Astley operating a camera and miming a few lines sang by female backing singers. This gave us the idea of having the same performer for all four band members.
The Album cover to various Wet Wet Wet albums, Queen’s Greatest Hits, as well as numerous other album covers, features all of the band members on the front. With our Album cover we, too, had all of the band members on show. We also parodied the Abbey Road cover, as mentioned earlier.
With our Magazine Advert, we tried to relate it to our digipak design to create brand identity. We did this by using the same image on the Magazine Advert as we did for our Digipak, just with a few alterations – moving the position of the band members is an example of an alteration. We also added the typical details on a Magazine Advert: Album summary, review and the “Out Now” text.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
When making our Digipak design we wanted it to link in with the video itself. We did this by making sure the four band members, in their costumes, we visible multiple times; Front, Back and on the inside. We also used the 3D backgrounds we made.
Every panel in our Digipak is different to the others because we wanted to create a sense of individuality, but keeping with the four band member concept used in the video.
The front cover itself uses a 3D background used in the video with the four band members, in costume, in the scenery. The Abbey Road parody, used as the back cover of our Digipak, also shows all four band members while paying homage to what can be considered, by many, to be one of the best album covers of all time.
The use of a 3D background on the track list references the “Summer Desert Night” scene from the video.
The panel which consists of the four band members silhouetted was used in our final Digipak design because it is another way to show the difference between the band members without the use of colours.
The two panels behind the two disc spaces are from a screenshot of our final video.
What have you learned from your audience feedback?
Feedback from both our Class and the Teacher about the Roughcut mostly stated that the Green Screen effects needed to be put in place, since our Rough Cut did not include this. Although, we were praised about Stu, our performer, giving a very strong performance.
In response to this feedback we continued to work on the effects, in particular the Green Screening, while also trying to focus on some of Stu’s stronger performances.
The Class Feedback for the final video continues to praise the strong performance from Stu. We have also been told that we have used a good range of camera shots & angles, which help to maintain internet in the video, and that the 3D backgrounds are well made.
Although them being well made, Feedback from our teacher mentioned that the 3D backgrounds may have worked to a greater extent if they had a major dynamic form about them – if they all had little movements and animations to avoid static backgrounds.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
We used Facebook for feedback purposes, as well as easy communication between each member of the group. Facebook, Myspace and Twitter were all used to contact Butch Walker. However, we never got any responses, unfortunately.
The website “Youtube” was used by us so we could watch other music videos and to gain inspiration and spark ideas.
We filmed our footage, for both the Music Video and the Documentary Video, using a Canon MD205 camera with this footage then being uploaded to the Apple Mac computer after filming sessions.
For editing, the program Final Cut Express was used, with Photoshop being used for the Digipak and Magazine advert. The Chroma Key effect is the tool used in Final Cut Express to cut out the GreenScreen backdrop.
In our Music Video, we created links between the lyrics and the visuals. An example of this is with the backgrounds we made for use with the Green Screen; the lyric “Summer Desert Night” – And the verse it is in – has a background of a desert at night time.
Record Companies dealing with music form the Rock Genre often want the performers to look the part – look “Rocky”. To fit this, we made the band members wear certain items of clothing. For example, the guitarist wore black gloves and a head scarf.
Rock Videos often show the full band multiple times. In the chorus sections of our song we had all four band members on show. The song is also part of the “Indie” genre; full band shots are often part of music videos for songs in the Indie genre.
In our Digipak we made reference to the famous Abbey Road album cover, by The Beatles. We used this parody for the Back cover of the Digipak.
When filming, because we needed to shoot the same angles and shots for all four band members, we used multiple cameras that were all recording at the same time. This reduced the time needed to shoot as we could get three shots with one take.
Good Mise-En-Scene was necessary to create a clear difference between each of the four band members, since we had the same one performer acting all four roles. Although the use of a microphone and instruments played a big part in showing this difference in character, the use of costume was also important. Because of this, we made all of the band members wear different shirts and jackets. For example, the bassist wore a blue shirt with white text on it whereas the Guitarist wore a cream coloured shirt.
We watched existing music videos to gain inspiration and ideas for our own video. “The Masterplan” by Oasis (Released October 1995) sparked our idea about 3D backgrounds. The song “Vertigo” by U2 (Released 8th November 2004) is in a wide desert setting - we wanted to create a desert scene similar to the one in this U2 video. Sections from the Rick Astley video “Take Me to Your Heart” (Released 1988) uses handheld shots well and gave us the idea to try out these kinds of shots ourselves. The same Rick Astley video also has clips of Astley operating a camera and miming a few lines sang by female backing singers. This gave us the idea of having the same performer for all four band members.
The Album cover to various Wet Wet Wet albums, Queen’s Greatest Hits, as well as numerous other album covers, features all of the band members on the front. With our Album cover we, too, had all of the band members on show. We also parodied the Abbey Road cover, as mentioned earlier.
With our Magazine Advert, we tried to relate it to our digipak design to create brand identity. We did this by using the same image on the Magazine Advert as we did for our Digipak, just with a few alterations – moving the position of the band members is an example of an alteration. We also added the typical details on a Magazine Advert: Album summary, review and the “Out Now” text.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
When making our Digipak design we wanted it to link in with the video itself. We did this by making sure the four band members, in their costumes, we visible multiple times; Front, Back and on the inside. We also used the 3D backgrounds we made.
Every panel in our Digipak is different to the others because we wanted to create a sense of individuality, but keeping with the four band member concept used in the video.
The front cover itself uses a 3D background used in the video with the four band members, in costume, in the scenery. The Abbey Road parody, used as the back cover of our Digipak, also shows all four band members while paying homage to what can be considered, by many, to be one of the best album covers of all time.
The use of a 3D background on the track list references the “Summer Desert Night” scene from the video.
The panel which consists of the four band members silhouetted was used in our final Digipak design because it is another way to show the difference between the band members without the use of colours.
The two panels behind the two disc spaces are from a screenshot of our final video.
What have you learned from your audience feedback?
Feedback from both our Class and the Teacher about the Roughcut mostly stated that the Green Screen effects needed to be put in place, since our Rough Cut did not include this. Although, we were praised about Stu, our performer, giving a very strong performance.
In response to this feedback we continued to work on the effects, in particular the Green Screening, while also trying to focus on some of Stu’s stronger performances.
The Class Feedback for the final video continues to praise the strong performance from Stu. We have also been told that we have used a good range of camera shots & angles, which help to maintain internet in the video, and that the 3D backgrounds are well made.
Although them being well made, Feedback from our teacher mentioned that the 3D backgrounds may have worked to a greater extent if they had a major dynamic form about them – if they all had little movements and animations to avoid static backgrounds.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
We used Facebook for feedback purposes, as well as easy communication between each member of the group. Facebook, Myspace and Twitter were all used to contact Butch Walker. However, we never got any responses, unfortunately.
The website “Youtube” was used by us so we could watch other music videos and to gain inspiration and spark ideas.
We filmed our footage, for both the Music Video and the Documentary Video, using a Canon MD205 camera with this footage then being uploaded to the Apple Mac computer after filming sessions.
For editing, the program Final Cut Express was used, with Photoshop being used for the Digipak and Magazine advert. The Chroma Key effect is the tool used in Final Cut Express to cut out the GreenScreen backdrop.
Monday, 30 November 2009
Editing
The two images on the left show the program "Final Cut Express" with our video project file open.As you can see, we had many video tracks to edit. This is because of the multiple takes of every "Band Member" we took. Although this meant we had a lot of editing to do, it did give us a lot of flexibility with camera shots.
The image on the left here is a screenshot of the image manipulation software "Photoshop". This screenshot shows our Abbey Road parody image along with a cut-out Band Member.
Thursday, 26 November 2009
Finished Digipak Design
Above is the design for our Digipak. Our front cover shows the title of the Digipak - Butch Walker; Paid to Get Excited - as well as clearly showing our four band members and the record company "Briefcase Records".
With our back cover, we wanted it to act - in a way - as a second cover. This is why we did not place any text it. We also chose to stick with the idea of making an Abbey Road parody when it came to this final design.
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
Digipak Template
This is the template we gathered from the internet for our Digipak. It contains spaces for six panels.
(In Lesson, write a brief paragraph about where each of the six panels are in "real space")
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Abbey Road Parody
For our Abbey Road Parody shot, we needed a shot of a Zebra crossing. Our original shot (shown on the left) is of Luard Road in Cambridge. As well as a lack of a Zebra Crossing on the shot the weather was dingy and dull.
Here is the edited version of the photo. It now contains a Zebra Crossing and we have made the image look much nicer and appealing.
Photo shoot for Digipack and Magazine Advert
For our Digipack and Magazine Advert we needed to get photos of the band members in the poses we required.
To get these photos we decided to hold a short photo shoot. Below are the raw photos we took and approved for possible use.
To get these photos we decided to hold a short photo shoot. Below are the raw photos we took and approved for possible use.
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Initial Ideas for Magazine Advert and Digipack Design
DIGIPACK
FRONT COVER IDEA
Our idea for the front cover of the digipack is to use the image displayed on the left with the four band members positioned on the right on a diagonal, with one in front of the band member behind.
On the right is a pencil sketch of this idea.
On the right is a pencil sketch of this idea.
INSIDE-FRONT COVER IDEA
For the inside cover of our Digipack, we intend to use a screenshot from our finish video. The screenshot is the same as the one shown on the left here. We decided on this freezeframe because it contains all four band members during the song's chorus.The left of this screenshot will contain a track list.
BACK COVER IDEA
Our idea for the Back Cover was inspired by The Beatles album "Abbey Road". We plan on getting the four band members walking across a zebra crossing in the same way The Beatles have.MAGAZINE ADVERT IDEA
We plan, for the Magazine advert, to use the same idea we have used for our Front Cover, but to do a few alterations to it so it contains the relevant information for a Magazine advert as well as changing the aspect ratio to fit a magazine advert.Tuesday, 17 November 2009
Feedback for Final Music Video
CLASS FEEDBACK
The feedback we got from the class greatly praised the performance from Stuart, saying the lip-syncing was done well and the act was very believable.
We were told that despite the few technical problems with the Chroma Keying effect in the final video the backgrounds worked well and fitted the lyrics nicely.
TEACHER FEEDBACK
One of the main pieces of feedback that we got from the teacher was about the 3D backgrounds. Although he commented on the advanced look of these backgrounds he said that he imagined them having more animation in them - for example, a car driving past in the Vegas background.
He also commented on the strong performance from Stuart, as well.
The feedback we got from the class greatly praised the performance from Stuart, saying the lip-syncing was done well and the act was very believable.
We were told that despite the few technical problems with the Chroma Keying effect in the final video the backgrounds worked well and fitted the lyrics nicely.
TEACHER FEEDBACK
One of the main pieces of feedback that we got from the teacher was about the 3D backgrounds. Although he commented on the advanced look of these backgrounds he said that he imagined them having more animation in them - for example, a car driving past in the Vegas background.
He also commented on the strong performance from Stuart, as well.
Tuesday, 10 November 2009
3D Background Test Render
Over the past month or so, Stephen has been creating 3D backgrounds that will be used for the GreenScreen effect in our Music Video.
To the left is a screenshot of the program Modo of an in-progress 3D model.
Below is a test render of the "Desert" scene that has been created. It consists of 240 frames and is still in progress - rendered as a test to make sure it would all render correctly.
To the left is a screenshot of the program Modo of an in-progress 3D model.
Below is a test render of the "Desert" scene that has been created. It consists of 240 frames and is still in progress - rendered as a test to make sure it would all render correctly.
Wednesday, 4 November 2009
Time Plan for Last Two Weeks
Across the next two weeks, before the deadline date for the project, we have a lot of opportunity for editing and final filming during our free time. This means that we have a set time to do particular tasks, but we have set aside spare time should the task be a tad more time consuming than first thought.Today (Wednesday 4th November 2009), we are continuing to edit our footage - Chroma Keying and Cropping, mostly.
We have an hour or so later on in the day, should we need to continue on and finish up this task.
On Thursday 5th November 2009, we will be planning on the weekend filming session of Stu. We will be filming "The Drummer", "The Bass Player" and any last bit of footage required for "The Guitarist".
Saturday 7th November 2009 is the date we will be filming the sections we planned on the Thursday before. Because of the lack of college Over-Weekend Camera Bookings, we will be using Stephen's camera and the GreenScreen sheet we bought.
During Monday's (9th November 2009) our main task will be to get all of our footage uploaded to the computer and commence the editing on this footage.
Tuesday 10th November 2009 will be the continuation of this task. From 4:10pm until 8pm Tuesday we will be staying in college for extra editing time. During this time, the 3D backdrops Stephen has been creating will be finalised.
The last two lessons we have before the deadline, Wednesday 11th/Monday 16th November 2009, we will be completing the editing stage and rendering the final project, in time for the 3:25pm deadline on the Monday.
Monday, 2 November 2009
Class Feedback
Our rough cut Music Video garnered praise for various features, such as shot variety, and Stuart's performance and lip-syncing.
However, in it's rough form we appear to have peoples main criticism as being the unfinished state, with the Green screen incomplete and backgrounds missing. As well as a lack of other band members, seeing as we intend to composite the band together from various green screen shots of Stuart as the separate band members, as well as focusing on the ancillary details such as people walking past out of shot which will be cropped out. However they do criticize the close-ups of Stuart and a shot in the college grounds.
However, in it's rough form we appear to have peoples main criticism as being the unfinished state, with the Green screen incomplete and backgrounds missing. As well as a lack of other band members, seeing as we intend to composite the band together from various green screen shots of Stuart as the separate band members, as well as focusing on the ancillary details such as people walking past out of shot which will be cropped out. However they do criticize the close-ups of Stuart and a shot in the college grounds.
Monday, 26 October 2009
Our New GreenScreen
We all chipped in to buy a green piece of fabric which we will use our own green screen instead of borrowing the college's one.Unfortunately we couldn't get a single piece that would meet our needs. Instead we bought two pieces of fabric, and sewed them together, creating an adequately sized screen.
This fabric, along with the thread used to sew it together, cost just under £15.00 in total - Coming to £3.75 per group member.
Thursday, 22 October 2009
ROUGHCUT MUSIC VIDEO
This is our Roughcut video, uploaded to Vimeo.
It consists of the camera angles we plan on using at the particular moments of the song. However, we have not yet Chroma Keyed out the Green from the Greenscreen and composited the other band members onto the video.
We plan on getting more filming done between now and final editing to ensure we have exactly what footage we would like in our music video.
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
Filming
So far, we have filmed successfully 3 times.1. Conference room
This was our first greenscreen session that produced useful footage. We used a greenscreen cloth borrowed from another student, and filmed more Singing footage, as well as some of the Guitar footage. Half of one shot was lost, as the tape reached the end. 3 cameras were used, a college camera, Steve's and Helena's cameras, and this session is where the core of our filming took place.
2. Field
This was a in-lesson shoot, on the college playing field. We did this as we were asked if we had any other shots in our video other than greenscreen. Two shots were taken, A handheld shot folling the singer, and another handheld shot, held by Stu while he was singing. These shots are unsteady, and so it is likely little of these shots will be used.
3. Music Room
This was our most recent shoot, and focused on the drums. Still greenscreened, most of this shoot was used to film cutaways of the drums, as we were limited by music lessons in other rooms.
Also, we have attempted to film 2 unsuccessfully.
1. Outside
This shoot, although giving us footage, was unsuccessful as although it was goodfootage, it was difficult to cut out and chromakey as wind meant ripples in the greenscreen. This was our first shoot.
2. Tuesday
We attempted to shoot on tuesday, but we were limited as the conference room was unavailable and the greenscreen was in use.
Thursday, 15 October 2009
Green Screen Testing and Set Up
Originally, we tried having the green screen sheet secured outside. We found this problematic for a few reasons.The first of these problems being lighting issues, mainly the weather/position of the sun. To get good light on Stu, this meant that a shadow was cast on the greenscreen which meant the Chroma Key made it difficult to cut out.
The other problem was the wind. This meant the Green Screen was being blown a little and therefore the creases were obvious and hard to Chroma Key out.
Our second setup was inside (Using a different Green Screen Sheet). We found this to be a much better set up due to the matte lighting and on casting shadow.
After Chroma Keying out the Green we found that the inside set up worked much better.
Tuesday, 6 October 2009
Visit from Ed Lovelace on 7th October 2009
Former Long Road Media student Ed Lovelace gave a talk to the media students on Wednesday the 7th of October, he talked about his music videos and career path into the film industry.
After Long Road he went to study Video Production at Bournemouth University (2003-2005). After he finished his university degree he went to work for a production company in London named Pulse.
Now he has a production company called Daryl.
With the company Pulse, Ed Lovelace has produced a numerous amount of videos, including the ones below
'Ain't No Rest For The Wicked' - Cage The Elephant
'In One Ear' - Cage The Elephant
Both Cage The Elephant videos were filmed on a £40,000 budget.
'Abandon Ship' - Gallows
'Laser Hannon' - Cutting Pink With Knives
This video was filmed in just 2 hours! In someone's friend's basement, it was made to look like it was filmed all in one shot, however it was a "faked" one shot - with the use of pillars and walls as places for the shot changes to take place.
Monday, 5 October 2009
Contacting Butch Walker via Myspace
This is a screenshot of our message to Butch Walker through Myspace. The message is as follows;"Hi, my name is Stuart Lowe and i am part of a A2 Media group studying at Long Road in Cambridge, UK. for our assessed piece we are presented a series of music tracks and asked to make a video. We chose your track "Paid To Get Excited", and as part of our task, we have been asked to contact the artist, with regards to ideas about the song. Any information on the song, such as inspirations or ideas regarding the video would be welcome.
Saturday, 3 October 2009
Contacting Butch Walker Via Facebook
Along with our attempts to contact the artist of our song choice through Twitter, we have posted a comment on Butch Walker's Facebook page.To the left is a screenshot of Butch Walker's profile page on Facebook, with Helena's post, which reads:
"Hello there! I'm a student at Long Road 6th Form College in Cambridge, and for our Media coursework we have to make a music video, and we picked one of your songs "Paid To Get Excited" and we would like to ask if you've got any tips or anything for us. I hope to hear from you soon. thanks :)"
"Hello there! I'm a student at Long Road 6th Form College in Cambridge, and for our Media coursework we have to make a music video, and we picked one of your songs "Paid To Get Excited" and we would like to ask if you've got any tips or anything for us. I hope to hear from you soon. thanks :)"