Genre

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

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.

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.

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.

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")

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.

Digipak Research

This is the opened up digipak for Nuit et Brouillard's album, Flutwacht. This includes the cd of the album, as well as a artworl boklet, complete with lyrics. However, this design is very plain, and we intend to make our digipak more interesting to the eye.



This is the complete digipak from the band Muse. This is their most recent alum, The Resistance. The boxset costs £59.99, And comes with a hard outer case, the original album artwork, a booklet of artwork of the band, the CD, 2 12" vinyls, and a 2GB thumb drive. The pack appears plain at first, but upon opening the artwork is evident and the finished product is impressive.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Contacting Butch Walker via Myspace/Twitter 2

As of Wednesday, 21 October 2009, we have no response from Butch Walker on Myspace. However, we now know that he has read the message.

We also have had no response from Butch Walker on Twitter, although he has been tweeting since our message to him so there is every chance that he has read that tweet, also.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Thanks,
Stuart."

Stuart's Favourite Music Video

This is my favourite music video. I like it as it brings together band both a band performance with a video that tells a story. The video was inspired by all of the bands favourite films, including farmers and cowboys. The video is filmed in one long continuous take, progressing along the story on a guided camera track.