3rd Music Video Draft Attempt Feedback

From gaining feedback from peers within the class and our media teachers, myself and Sammy were told that our video holds a lot of potential in which we have not reached it as fully as we can. The feedback comments we gained from showing our class and teachers was that:

1.The lighting was not good, however when we were filming the video it seemed to us in person and on the camera as clear and bright however when importing the clips onto iMovie we began to understand and see that it was not clear atall and we were really let down by this. By possibly filming again we will be able to make sure that we have the studio to ourselves this time and that we stick with the natural lighting. The studio did have high tech lighting facilityies but as we were unsure of how these worked and time we had to film we decided that it would be too much hassle to mess around with.

2.Use of a high definition camera was suggested as well. As you can see from our 3rd attempt at filming it is clear that the camera quality was very low and the majority of our shots were blurred. A way to overcome this when refilming is to make sure that myself and Sammy find and borrow a high definition camera to correct this issue.

3.Outfit change to suit our artist better. The video below wedecided to dress our artist in a blue dress which did make her stand out out as it was a bright blue. However comments from peers were that we could use a different outfit that would suit our genre and artist better. Suggestions made from our peers and teachers were that something that stands out such as a bright patterned dress to add more iunterest rather than a plain blue dress against a plain white background. To overcome this myself and Sammy have both searched through our wardrobes and the drama department at our college to see if there was anything we could borrow from there. In the end I have a polka dot blue bodycon dress which we believed would suit the new video and make our artist stand out more.

3rd Alfie Music Video Draft

Props

Due to filming in a plain white studio we need to use eye catching and fun props that fit with the narrative. Today we have spoken to the drama department for their ideas and to see if they have any props we could use, but due to the pantomime that is taken place this week we have confirmed to have a look through the props next tuesday. Here are a few ideas of what we could use in our video. We thought by stripping everything back in the video to just the artist and the puppet, it would look effective if we only use one interesting prop. But for it not to look boring we need to add a lot of different types of props as well as different costumes.

Miley Cyrus - 7 Thing Analysis

We have chosen to analyse this music video because we wanted to look into the different types of pop and in this case it is rock-pop. One of the characteristics of rock pop artists is usually the artists are playing instruments and putting emphasis into their movements. There is a clear relationship between the lyrics and the visuals as Miley is singing about the 7 things she hates/like and the camera movements adjust quickly showing her emotion and feelings towards them. Looking at this video and seeing that it uses a plain white background has inspired us as it still looks interesting even though their is no setting however since there is a band playing throughout her video it has something there for us to look at other than just her. Therefore when we film in a white studio we need to make sure that we have replacements and something which will keep then audience interested such as big props. Furthermore there are many interesting camera shots that also fit with the lyrics such as low angle shots which have been used to represent Miley as dominant and strong. The other long shots and close up shots have been very creatively done to make the video look interesting and lively. The editing shows reference to the genre of rock-pop seeing that there are a lot of camera quick and sharp movements reflecting the fast pace of the song. The use of this white background makes the different colour in the outfits chosen to be worn stand out as well as making Miley, the star stand outby wearing a muticoloured long waistecoat.

Shot List For New Video

1. Long shots which shows a great deal of background, be it the set, the landscape or the venue. Long shots are essential to establish the scene for the viewer and to put the rest of the music video into context. (full body length, far away distances)
2. Mid shots showing some part of the subject in more detail while still giving an impression of the whole subject. (half body shots of our artist 'Milly Evans')
3. Close ups which is a certain feature or part of the subject takes up the whole frame. (face close ups to show bold strong facial features and eye makeup, may use prop zooms possibly to add camera movement within our music video)
4. Extreme close ups which gets right in and shows extreme detail. (bright coloured eyes to show a strong feature in the video emphasising 'Milly' her as she is the only artist member)

5. May use low angle where the camera looks up at the subject. Use these shots when you want to make your subject appear larger, imposing, or more important to the viewer. (use when 'Milly' is acting like the boss telling 'Alfie' what to do) 6. May use high angle where the camera looks down on the subject making it appear smaller and less important. High angle shots are often used to make a person appear vulnerable. (putting into our video we would use these when showing 'Alfie' as he is the teenager e.g. that needs to get a job and feel really small and useless as he doesn't have one)

Studio Update

After researching a variety of different places and getting feedback from them weither we are allowed to borrow their studios or not our final outcome has been successful after asking many different places we got a positive reply from Leicester Colleges 'Paul O'Leary' who is their 'Programme Leader FD Photography & Video' he managed to supply us with a date to borrow his studio and we have yet to confirm this date with our artist to check she is able to do this date. If not we will dicuss a time with Paul in order for us to move the dates around, enabling our artist to make it. Below is 2 images of the different studios that are at Leicester College and that we will be using to complete our video.

Finding A Studio

To use this new idea of a plain white studio, like Jessie J's video 'Price Tag' and Miley Cyrus' video '7 Things I Hate About You' we both need to find an appropriate studio that is nearby so that we can easily get there. We have therefore emailed photography studios in Lutterworth/ Rugby and Leicester. So far we have emailed 7 photographers asking to use their studio, 2 have replied saying they are fully booked and too busy up to Christmas so we are now waiting on replies from the 5 others. Using a white studio will completely strip back the video and will make it look more simplistic. As the basic narrative has already been done in a house (Lilly Allen's video) we thought that using a plain background would work well and would emphasise the bright bold colours used and would give it more of a ‘pop’ look.

Location Change Idea

From looking at our new ideas we have came to a conclusion on the basis of a studio giving us access and permission we will use their facilities. The new idea is to film our 'Alfie' song as normal and instead of location shots, setting and what is in the shots being the 'mood' and theme maker, we are now instead going to use a white studio. Below is a video called 'Price Tag' by Jessie J that has inspired us to do this.
 
We think that by doing this it will make us able to use bright colors better in what 'Milly' wears and the props that we decide to use and involve with the video. These will play a big part within the video as the setting/white background will be very boring therefore everything else within the video needs to stand out and get a clear idea through of the pop feel we want to get.

New Ideas For Re-Making The Video

From recieving feedback of our music video we have been advised to change a fair few parts of our video such as creating and coming up with a better way to use our 'Alfie' puppet or having different scenes and locations. After having conversations and discussing what ways we are able to do this, we managed to come up with some ideas, these ideas are as followed.

1. We could use a young boy around age 9 which would completly change our idea of the puppet however would still create a good effect which would tie in with the video and the puppet scenes as we wouldnt have used someone older, which could hold the potential of taking the comedy effect away as it wouldn't portrait a realistic sense within the video of a young boy needing a job etc. An example of this which inspired us with this idea is

2. Take off the puppets head and replace it with another real life boys head which would mean that our video would still include the puppet sense, just have another comedy side to it by using another head which could potentially be really good as it would enable us to give the puppet real facial expressions rather than just the same face which it does now. This could also add to our video maintaing a comedy feel. An example of this which has inspired us is this

3. Change the location and use more of a 'doll house' which would emphasise the bright colours and 'plastic' look of everything. This therefore would mean that we still would hold a strong looking video that would stand out the puppet and add a clearer effect of what style our video which is mean't to be 'puppet like' and 'fake'. An example of this idea that has inspired us is this

4. Use the idea of having a puppet set up such as red/black curtains and act out pupet scenes through that during the video to emphasise and develop the idea of using the puppet in the first place to make it clear of the idea and portrait a strong theme throughout the video making it interesting and different.

Film Progression

When fiming our video we had some difficulties as our location which was my house, we had the cleaner come to the house and we had to hurry up with some of our clips in order to get out of her way this unfortunately happened coninidently on both the days we decided to film. With better organisation we could have re-arranged a day where the cleaner was not there. Aswell as this when we did our first filming session the lightint from outside was a lot darker than the second time we filmed this therefore mean't that in some of the clips the lighting may appear different to other clips.  Also our choice of character became really hard to be able to get Meg (our artist) again to be able to film without her being busy, at college or unable to get to the location. Therefore to overcome this I had to pick her up and bring her back to the location in order to be able to film. With all of these factors combined we had slightly fallen behind with our schedule and missed out some filming of clips meaning we had gaps in our draft which we still need to film. For our final one I think we will refilm certain clips of the video to get our ideal lighting and do the bits we have missed out.

Progress With Digipak

As the digipack deadline is now on Friday it seems that I am slightly behind on track to getting my final digipack in for the deadline. After being given feedback from my first draft, I have started to make these changes and continue with putting it together. I have made changes which surrounds font sizes, texts, logos and image editing. Lastly, all I have left to complete is to complete one of the inside pages of the digipack. I have scheduled today to complete this inside page and fill it with text such as 'credits' or infomation about the album.. Once I have chose to put there, I will then be able to go ahead and start planning how to present and what font/sizes etc I will use into the pack. Similar to how I had done for my draft. Overall, everything seems to be coming in place nicely surrounding the completion of the digipack and advert.

Props

The props and equipment that we need to be able to use and
have access to whilst filming our music video is

- Themed cups and kettle (Vintage)
- Ironing board
- Male suit
- Alfie puppet
- Camera
- Tripod
- Kitchen utensils
- Play station
- Alcohol bottles
- Breakfast items such as milk, bread and jam
- Table
- Chairs
- American Fridge

Draft Magazine Advert

2nd Alfie Music Video Draft

Improvements

After making our draft video we have noticed that there are many ways that we can improve on. We have therefore made a list of what needs to be changed when re shooting bits of our video.

List of things we need to improve:

·         Lighting needs to be altered – The left hand side is a lot brighter

·         Mise-en-scene – we can make the house look a lot tidier

·         More interesting angles can be used on our artist.  A lot of it seems to be repetitive and standard shots are used

·         We need to be more careful when filming the puppet- there were shots where our arms were visible

Today we have decided to reshoot parts of our video as there are parts that are missing and some that didn’t turn out very well. We will make sure that each of the points listed above are achieved.

Editing Our Video

When editing our video we had a couple of difficulties, one being that we couldn’t upload the footage onto the school computers easily which resulted in us taking a little longer to make the video. We eventually got the clips working on Livs mac which made it simpler for us as the software that was provided (iMovie) was very straightforward. The other being that we had realised that we had missed some shots and therefore had to add in the spoofs to fill in the missing shots. The shots of our artist worked okay but we both feel that they could have turned out a lot better so we will therefore have to reshoot certain parts. This makes it more difficult for us both as we have to make sure our artist is dressed exactly the same and will have to make her hair and makeup identical to how it was when we filmed it the first time.
As our video is based on a narrative, Milly is singing and acting out the words throughout. This made it very difficult to get the lip syncing accurate. There are parts in the draft where it is clear than it needs to be re-edited. Despite this we feel that we have developed our skills and are quite proud of our draft.

Alfie Animatic

1st Alfie Music Video Draft

Filming Update

Today we have filmed the majority of our music video. We had filmed everything that was required on our story board along with additional shots just in case certain shots don’t work out when editing due to our limited skills of filming. Despite this I feel that we have progressed and have developed our skills using the equipment and producing the correct shots that were necessary.   However there are a few shots of the puppet dancing that will need shooting ASAP so that we can start editing.  

Plan For Friday

 On Friday our aim is to film the majority of the shots that are required from our story board. As the video is of a single artist is shouldn’t be too difficult to film everything in the same day. But to make sure the filming runs smoothly we need to ensure that everything that we need is sorted and planned in advanced such as costumes, the puppet arriving on time, props and making sure we have all our filming equipment. We know that there’s nothing stopping us to get the majority of our filming done as the filming which means we don’t have to worry about the weather or lighting. We will need to be constantly referring back to our shot list to make sure we do not miss any shots and to make sure we have everything we need to edit our video. It doesn’t matter as such if we don’t get all our shots of the puppet as we can do that another day but as its difficult to plan another day with our artist, Milly Evans, we need to make sure all her shots are filmed.    

Track List

I have chosen the album name to be called 'Wake up Darling' as it follows the same style as similar artists such as Lily Allen, Lenka and Pink.  For the back cover of my digipak it will follow a conventual style displaying the track list, barcode, music label and copyrights. Here I have chosen the track list by researching artist's songs with the same genre and then using similar words as theres.

MILLY EVANS____WAKE UP DARLING

DON’T BE SHY

ALFIE

LITTLE THINGS

WAKE UP DARLING

ON MY OWN

SECRET DOOR

EVERYTHING YOUR NOT

SACRIFICE

Our Location

We have decided to film our music video in Liv's house as its perfect for the cute doll house look. Most of the shots will be filmed in the kitchen as it will go with the narrative. Filming inside makes it a lot easier for us as we wont have to worry about the weather/lighting and will be able to film at any time. 

Styling

We have decided to dress our artist in this Lazy Oaf t-shirt as it’s very casual and appropriate to wear around the house. Originally we were going to use Lily Allen’s style as our inspiration but because she wears a dress and heels in her video me and liv came to an agreement that it would look too ‘dressy’ to wear around the house. This t-shirt also runs with the same cartoon feel due to the image of the ice-cream and will make our artist, Milly Evans, play more of the part in our video.

To Do List

Here is a list of the things we need to do before we can shoot our music video:
1) Buy puppet (Alfie)
2) Organise costumes and make-up - (if necessary buy a dress)
3) Bring props together such as brightly coloured house accessories
4) Organise a shot list - categorise into the correct scenes
5) Rent out a camera