Lip Sync

Steal-O-Matic

Group Pitch

Star Profile

Prelim Evaluation

Banana Phone

Process and Effects:
The first scene of the video is titles introducing what the music video is and who it is made by. I used the titles tool on Adobe Premier. I then added the 'Twirl in' and 'Twirl out' effects so that the titles aren't boring, the effects draw attention to the titles and so it isn't just a boring black screen with white text.

The next scene is a recording of Aaron singing banana phone through the display of a camera, to get this shot I had to line up another camera with the display of the first camera. However after looking back at the footage during editing Aaron's head was visible over the top of the display, therefore that is an improvement to consider when I undertake my next project. It has taught me to check my footage to see if anything needs to be re-filmed before leaving a location and moving on to the next scene.

The next scene is me rolling past on a skateboard, singing banana phone. I decided that this scene would be too boring and mundane if we didn't do anything to it. Therefore I shot this clip in reverse, where I had to say the lyrics backwards, I then reversed the clip on Premier so it looked like I was singing the lyrics the correct way. This gave a music video feel to the video as often many artists include something going backwards in their videos, where they have to shot the scene in reverse and later edit it to play forwards. This taught me a new shooting and new editing technique to keep my footage fresh and stop it from getting too boring or similar.

The scene after that is a stop motion using lego. It gives the video a very indie feel, and is something new that I have never done before. It taught me how long each snapshot should be to make the movements look fluid and realistic. To create the stop motion effect I put the images in order on the Premier stage and left them to play for 0.15 of a second each, this gave a fluid movement and created a successful, good looking stop motion scene. I have learnt this technique and how to ensure it looks good and works well, therefore I could use stop motion in my next project, if I choose to.

Next is another new technique I learnt when editing this task. We kept the camera still in the same location, and filmed 3 different shots, one of my doing push ups, one of me on a chair, and one of me on a skateboard all of which I was singing Banana Phone. When I edited this scene I used the 'Clone' technique, and the 'Crop' tool. This allowed me to layer all 3 shots on top of each other on the Premier stage and then crop out the edges that overlap to create one scene. Because the camera wasn't moved throughout the filming of all 3 it looked as if I was in 3 places at once. I feel this scene is the most professional looking of the video and I would definitely use this new technique the I have learnt in my next project.

We then shot a scene for depth of field. Here we put a bottle close up to the camera and had Aaron stand far away from the camera to make is look as if Aaron and the bottle are the same size. I didn't alter this clip during editing other than some colour correction.

The next scene is the same scene of me rolling past on a skateboard, but it is edited so that everything is black and white other than my skin, which is effective at drawing the audiences attention to the artist and stops them from getting distracted by the background. To do this I used a tool called 'Leave Colour' which focuses on only one colour and turns all others to black and white. It gives a very mellow and indie effect, which would suit my music video very well. Therefore this new technique I have learned will be very useful for my next project.

Following on from that I created a scene for some fun when I was editing, I wanted to try some new techniques and tools that weren't included on the task, so I made lots of small cuts in the clip and added different coloured overlays to the clip. I used Andrew Goodwin's theory of thought beats to match the changing colours to the beat of the song I used. I wanted to apply this theory as I am considering using it in my music video project, and therefore I used this task to practise and see how I could edit my music video to include thought beats. I learnt from the mistake of my prelim that when I try and use time consuming or difficult techniques I should practise them before I try to use them, and so I used this task to do so.

After that the next scene was also filmed in reverse and then reversed to play forwards when I edited the clip. I had to say the lyrics backwards again, and jump over the bin backwards, we did check the footage after we filmed this scene, unlike before, to ensure it looked correct and fluid. I feel that recording two scenes in reverse and editing them to play forwards gave me amply practise and allowed me to learn this technique well enough that I could use it effectively in my final project.

The final scene is a very cinematic scene, which I wanted to practise as I will be using it in my final project, it gives the clip a very indie feel which will suit the genre of my music video very well. Therefore this scene allowed me to gain some practise and to see and learn the different techniques I could use to film a cinematic shot in my music video. I also used a new editing technique when I edited this clip. I used the 'Stabiliser' effect to make the clip more smooth and less bumpy, as we were pushing a wheelchair over very bumpy ground. The effect worked very well at stabilising the clip and therefore I feel I will use this effect in my final project to ensure all my clips are smooth and look professional.

To conclude I feel I have made a huge improvement with filming and editing music videos since my prelim task. I have learnt from my mistakes and applied them during the filming and editing of this task, for example getting practise with some of the harder, more time consuming techniques before I commit to using them. I also applied an Andrew Goodwin theory to my video, and feel that this is good practise for when I film and edit my final piece. This will allow me to apply the theories much easier as I have some practise of them from this task. Overall I feel the filming and editing techniques I used during this music gave the video a much more professional look compared to my prelim task. This shows that I have taken the criticism from my prelim task onboard to further improve my filming and editing skills, and shows I myself have improved at filming, editing, and applying theories to my music video to ensure it is the best quality and most professional video I could create.

Marking student videos

Today in class we looked at some student videos and were asked to mark them to a mark scheme we were given. The first video we watched was:

I decided that the video was quite good and matched the genre of the song very well. However it did have a very 'edgy teen' feel, and had a very clique storyline, which explored typical teenage issues e.g bullying. There is a large variety of shots used, and the video is high quality, with smooth camerawork. Therefore I marked the video at a mid level 4.

The shooting material was appropriate to the task set, and fit the genre of the music quite well, therefore I gave them a level 4 for this.
They also used very good framing and shots which looked professional and I gave them a level 5 for this and also varied shot distances that worked well with the genre. The filming was also steady where appropriate and therefore they gained a level 5 for this also.
Mise-En-Scene was at a level 3 for this piece, as they chose very 'school boy' costumes and themes, and I feel that the school boy look and school boy issues didn't really work with the genre. However the lighting and dark atmosphere matched the narrative of the video well.



The next video we watched was called Insomnia.


This video fit the convention

Cross Media Synergy

Keeping a consistent brand image to promote an artists album or single.

I chose to study ScHoolboy Q for Cross Media Synergy. He released his album 'Oxymoron' on February 25th 2014. It is his most popular album to date, being majorly successful is the US and UK. 

His album has a very dark theme with the lyrics talking about life in the hood, killings and growing up in the hood with guns and drugs.

The album art is very dark, which reflect the lyrics, and also features a face covered by a balaclava. This creates a dark feel towards the album before you have even heard the songs. 

Marking sudent videos

Today in class we looked at some student videos and were asked to mark them to a mark scheme we were given. The first video we watched was:

I decided that the video was quite good and matched the genre of the song very well. However it did have a very 'edgy teen' feel, and had a very clique storyline, which explored typical teenage issues e.g bullying. There is a large variety of shots used, and the video is high quality, with smooth camerawork. Therefore I marked the video at a mid level 4.

The shooting material was appropriate to the task set, and fit the genre of the music quite well, therefore I gave them a level 4 for this.
They also used very good framing and shots which looked professional and I gave them a level 5 for this and also varied shot distances that worked well with the genre. The filming was also steady where appropriate and therefore they gained a level 5 for this also.
Mise-En-Scene was at a level 3 for this piece, as they chose very 'school boy' costumes and themes, and I feel that the school boy look and school boy issues didn't really work with the genre. However the lighting and dark atmosphere matched the narrative of the video well.



The next video we watched was called Insomnia.


This video fit the genre very well. It seemed to reflect the dark and gloomy nature of the genre it was portraying. There was a nice repeating shot of the man in bed, which worked very well with the genre and was a very unique shot. The video was high quality, with smooth camerawork. However the narrative didn't seem to make much sense. Therefore I gave this piece a low level 4.

Prop List

Props Needed  0-4 Bouncer/ Snap-back/ hoodie/ Curtain
4-45 Club clothing/ High neck top/ Beanie/ Glass/ Pill/ Ralph top/ Bucket hat/
36-38 DJ/ Hoop Earings

Settings
0-4 outside high street- We used p17 outside the classroom
0-19 2 people outside club/ then walks into club. In p17 there is a door with a curtain behind it which we needed and looked exactly the same as the video so this was the perfect location
19-24 in club. The room of p17 could be made all black with nothing in the background therefore was easy to use and recreate for our video. As most of the music video is in heatsensor we didnt have to get the exact same background.
24-27- walking about club. We used p17 again for this shooting    

Prelim Story Board

Preliminary Task

Route 94- My Love. This is the music video that my group voted to recreate for our preliminary task. We all agreed that at first look the video would be quite difficult to recreate but we wanted to test ourselves. But when we broke down the video and looked at all of the scene components it didn't look overly difficult to direct and film. The only difficult part we all agreed on was the editing. The only real problem with this video would be trying to get the extras to dance and be in the correct place like in the Route 94 video. We wanted a preliminary task that would test us so we could improve our skills, this is why we wanted to try and use Adobe AfterEffects.

Prelim Shooting Schedule // Production Diary

Schedule
Day 1 - We went to p17 which is a drama room to shot our first shots. We found a place outside this room to shot the first 4 seconds which is the only part not in heat sensor effect. then we had to get some of our class mates to fill in, in the background. This had to be all one shot from 4 to 19 seconds which was hard to do hand held but it looked similar. We also shot the close up of a girl the girl taking a pill. All we needed was a black back ground. This was shot in the same room.

Day 2 - The second day of filming we went to the same room. This day we shot the scene with a girl in a bucket hat, which had people in the background. This was a hard part to film due to a cut straight to the same girls lips so we had to try and stay in exactly the same place. We also had to shoot the front of the main character in the video. He was walking through the club but in a different part so we didn't need the same characters in the background as day 1. It was a hand held moving shot again flowing the main character forward so it was difficult to keep steady.

Day 3 - We had to reshot the lips of the girl as it did not match. We watched the footage we had and then lined up the actor perfectly. All the other videos we had were usable. We also shot extra footage of the girls to make sure we had enough footage as we didn't know if the other shots were the exact same as the real music video in terms of timings and length.

Editing - Harrison and I had trouble editing as they had to use after effects to add in the heat censor. This proved very difficult and took a long time to complete. The start was heat censored where it wasn't meant to be and the colours had changed in the final piece.