Further Development

Today we met with Jacob, Sam and fin. Jacob is the main character, he's managed too learn half of the song which is great, his appearance and vibe really works with the voice and looks authentic which is very important. He also is confident but not to confident that it comes across as exaggerated which is good. He's going to learn the rest of the song for next week. With sam he's going to rap a few lines which are in the song which is a featured artist on the song. This was the first time sam had looked at the lyrics but we feel he will be perfect in the video and is now learning his part of the song. We then will have fin who's going to play the keyboard in the video, we didn't manage to get a video of this today but in the next few days we will be able to. He can play the keyboard which is very useful as its always very obvious if someone can't play the instrument and can make the video not look very authentic.

We have also changed the idea of our video one again, we have decided to start the video with a see through box with a microphone and a piano, drum set. As the song starts the pitch black room will slowly light up, the first light on the piano then when the drumming in the music comes in the light will go on the drums and then when the lyrics start the microphone box will light up. The camera will then pan around the main character in the booth rapping. We will get several shots off this as we can use it later on in the video. We aren't sure yet if around this we will have a set which the artist will then start to interact with and we will get more shots here.

Feedback From Luke

On Friday we talked through with Luke our new idea using the song "You don't Know" by Loyle Carner. He really liked the song and liked how we could incorporate a band into this idea as this means we can get more shots rather than having one character throughout the video. He liked the idea of having the main character walking around one house exploring different scenes as well as having a performance in the video. We previously decided to use a recording studio but Luke said we could make most rooms look like the atmosphere and vibe of a rustic recording studio.
Luke did say tho that we need some more narrative scenes in the video as if we don't we could risk the video being like lots of other performance based videos which is not what we want.
Luke liked the cast which we had picked and felt that the character looked the part but said we needed to make sure that the character can perform the part to the correct standard.

Further development of our idea

Today we managed to find a drummer for our video, we are going to get photos of him tomorrow and watch him playing the drums but he was very confident that he would be able to play the drums in a music video. He also fits the perfect character for the role.
Today we also managed to get our main character to rap a few of the lines from the song of his phone. Considering it was his first time ever hearing the song he performed very well. We are going to get a longer video tomorrow as he's learning's the full song tonight so he can perform the song with more confidence. He fits the perfect image and it looked very convincing when he was rapping the lyrics.

via GIPHY

Final idea

Last night our group had a conversation on the phone browsing through potential songs which we could use. We then came across a song called "you don't Know" which is by Loyle Carner. This song features a band throughout the video and also has a relatively slow beat. After listening to the song several times we came to the conclusion that the song would be perfect for us to make a video too.
The idea for the video is to have the majority of the video inside a recording studio, we need too research any recording studios which are close to school which aren't as modern as the recording studio at school. In the recording studio we would want a band with the character performing the song, getting lots of different shots of the guitarist and drummer and the artist in the video. The characters in the video will interact with each others. We also could also incorporate different shots of the main artist sitting in a messy room with cigarette buts everywhere and then the artist leaves the room and walks up a staircase in the room which leads him to an attic which a guitarist is playing and a drummer is playing with coloured lights. Throughout the video we can switch between each three sets which would give us a very interesting video.



The costume for the characters would be a relaxed outfit, being a baggy shirt and a pair of jeans or dickies trousers. We want to keep the costume relaxed as that's the vibe of the song and the artist in general.

We have found a cast for the video which we feel will be perfect for the video. The lead singer(rapper) is a year below called Jacob. He fits the perfect image for our character and also is relatively confident which is very helpful. He has committed to being in our video and later today we are going to get him to practice singing part of the song so we can just make sure it looks conniving that its him singing the song.
The other rapper which features in a small part of the song, we are going to cast sam as he is a singer/rapper and very confident and the voice is v very similar to his so it will work well.
For the band we have asked fin to be the guitarist and he's committed to being in the video.
For the band we have to cast people who actually play the instrument as the band will be a large focus in the video so it has to look convincing. We have an idea of who we want for the drummer and just need too ask if he's happy to be in the video.

Further development

After talking through with my group we have come to the conclusion that a fast beat rap video is going to be so hard to execute at a high standard. We would risk making the video look like its been made at a school in the country side which is defiently not the look which we are trying to achieve. As well the character which we will need is very hard to find out school, even tho we had found the right character, having one character in the whole video could get slightly repetitive. Lastly as the song is so fast we would need to constantly change shots and sets which would be very hard to achieve in the 6 hours which we have to film the video.

Last night our group had a phone call discussing which genre of music we would want to choose as we feel rap is going to be so hard to achieve. We came across a song called You by TCTS which we feel could work however it does fall in the genre EDM which is hard to make a video to and most EDM artist rarely have music videos because of this reason. We are going to carry on looking for some more songs exploring different genres trying to find the perfect song.

We started to research into slow beat English rap, this genre we wouldn't need such extravagant sets and so many different shots. If the song had any features of a band in the song we could feature a performance in the video of a band with the artist in maybe a recording studio. Similar to the image seen below in a older recording studio.

Phil Tidy

In the session with Phil Tidy today I picked up on some very I important advice which im sure will defineltly help me. Firstly he was talking about always starting with the performance for the video if going down the performance line as this is the most important shot and if everything else fails you still have someone performing the whole song. It also breaks up the video meaning that its not boring and stretched out. As well as this he said in the morning everyone looks the best and aren't so tired but later on in the day makeup might be messed up.

He also talked about how important YouTube is for watching music videos as there majority of people watch music videos on this platform. Advertiser's will pay youtube to sponsor the certain video and youtube will then take a share of the money produced from the video. The record label will then take the money and pay those who performed or contributed to the video.

For very successful videos they will sometimes make they're money back from the revenue which has been generated will provide enough to cover the whole music video making it very beneficial for the record label. However YouTube do take a large percentage of the revenue which arguably effects the music industry as it should all go towards the music industry.

Sticking to the particular contract is very important, staying organised is defiantly beneficial. The record label and production company has to stick to the contract e.g. how the video will look when finished, how much the video will cost and the delivery date of when the video has to be finished for.


Music videos aren't just made to create revenue from advertisement on the particular video. They also are made to build the name of the artist star image in a beneficial way for the artist. Also to show the talent of the artist, they're voice and maybe even ability to act in a video. Lastly it will obviously increase the sales of the song and from this tours will occur which raises revenue for the artist and merchandise can come from successful videos.
A record label can also generate a large revenue through selling the rights to play the certain song in television, radios, advertising and also through video games.

Phil showed us several videos one of which really got my attention which was set all in a supermarket. This particular video has lots going on even tho it was all in one set. The video kept coming back to a performance behind loo roll which broke the video up.

via GIPHY

Lighting Workshop

Today we had a workshop on lighting. For all of us this was completely new as last year we didn't focus on lighting, however this year its much more important. Firstly matt told us about the director of photography, they are in charge off the camera shots and the certain lighting if these shots.

The camera and the lights work together, the lights to the bare eye might look extremely bright or not look great but when you bring the camera into the picture the lights will make the shot look great.

the first lighting setup which matt showed us was using three lights. We used two lights which are called a blonde. We placed one blonde in front of the model and then one blonde behind the model.
We then used a light called a redhead, this goes on the side of the shot and it evens out the shadow which might be present in the shot. The front light we placed treated trace over the light which breaks up the light which makes the light slightly softer giving a nicer effect. The Blonde light at the back off the shot is present to give the model in the shot a slight edge and it brings them out of the background.

The next setup which matt showed us he called Beauty lighting, This consists of a very large panel seen below, you then place a blonde behind this large panel. This breaks top the light making it less harsh. We then got a large sheet of polystyrene which we placed behind the model. This reflects the light and removes and shadows and also looks very natural. If the picture is to bright lower the exposure which will make the image more focused. Also adjust the white balance which will remove any orange picture which might be present in the shot.

The next light setup which matt showed us he called the Blade runner, as this lighting setup is used in lots of the movie Blade Runner. With this setup its using just one light which is the blonde light. The light goes behind the model and the light goes on full beam. The polystyrene sheet is at the front of the shot which reflects the light and removes any shadows. If the character isn't exposed enough, lowering the light beam will make the character more apparent.

Matt then showed us the different shots which you can achieve with coloured lights. We used two long lights one blue and one pink, this contrast of colours gives a very nice effect on the camera. As they can be easily m over around it allowed you to get lots of different shots as each time you move the lights in a different variation it gives a different lighting effect.

Meeting with Luke

We pitched both new ideas to Luke, firstly talking about "told her" idea which is the idea based around teleporting. He really liked this idea and liked the fact that the original artist of the song would be able to come in and perform the song as this hasn't happened before. He did say that are location idea wouldn't suit the video idea and the vibe of the video as its cool and relaxed but did like the changing between set. He did comment on the order of the video saying that if you have a particular order and make a mistake when videoing or run out of footage that the whole video could be ruined so he heavily advised us if we were to use this idea to have three different sets and constantly changing between the three sets. This also makes the video more interesting.

We then briefly pitched the second idea which was using the song "Childs play" this idea was based around the change of set and playing on the child theme of the song having lots of childish features throughout the video. He also liked this idea but did point out a very true point that it will very likely look like a school rather than multiple sets in California. We also could risk rushing the video as it would require lots of different shots and sets which would be very hard to achieve in the particular time frame which we have been allocated.

Developing Idea two

The second idea which is using the Song "Childs Play", in this video we had originally had in mind to  film several shots at my grandparents house as the house has several secret doors which would have made a good shot but as the interior of the house definitely doesn't fit the character we have decided to remove these scenes from the music video.
We have now decided to open with the character walking into this bedroom. The idea for the bedroom will be all one colour with one item hanging down all over the room.
An artist who makes similar artwork is defineltly an inspiration for us.

The character will walk around the room inspecting all of the object while rapping at the same time, Interacting with the room.
The character will then pick up two suitcases the same colour of the whole set and then leave the set. It will then cut to a chauffeur placing these bags in the back of a car from a side view, at the same time the character will continue to break the fourth wall and continue rapping.
The rapper will then walk to the boot and look at the bags and then shut the boot.

The shot will then go black and change to the rapper lying on a mountain of cookies eating a burger. This shot will require lots of cookies but we feel that we will be able to achieve a successful shot for this. We will need to get as much shot time out of this.

The person who we will use fits the character very well, he is very confident and loves being behind the camera which is very useful. We have already asked him and he has committed to being in our video and has already started to learn the lyric to the song.

The costume inspiration which we are going to base the style of our character on is, Lil Yatchty, ASAP rocky, lil tecca and Tyler the creator.

Further Development of Idea One

After several thoughts and constructive criticism, we have decided to change the format of our video. As the initial video idea was linear, almost telling a story. This meant it would be very difficult to get enough shots in the amount of time which we have been allocated. We can still keep the aspects of walking through a door which acts as a portal and having the character waking up in a confused state on the sofa, however we will need to break this up by going back and forward from the live performance throughout the video.

A good example of this is "can't stop" by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

As you can see in the video its constantly changing from live performance to something completely different. This entices the viewers as it doesn't get repetitive or boring. 

Also the location which we had in mind which is my grandparents house might not fit the image of the character and he might look out of place in the house. We are going to go around the house and see what we could do to make it look less like this or if we could use specific shots which don't show the whole interior off the house. 

developing Idea one.

The character wakes up on a sofa in a very confused state on the sofa, beer bottles and cigarette buts are covering the floor and coffee table. He slowly sits up on the sofa looking into the camera and starts singing the song. He takes a sip of beer and then lights a cigarette. He slowly walks towards a door in the room opening the door and walks through the door. The door acts as a portal and takes the character to a corn field or a green field. The artist walks around the field and is singing the song as he walks around. He then goes back through this door but this time it take him onto a stage.

The majority of the video will be this section. 

On the stage a band is there playing the rhythm of the song, the artist starts performing the song on the stage with passion towards the audience. 

We will need around 15 people to act as the audience and use certain shots to mimic this making it look like they're more people than there actually are. 

At the end of the video I want the camera to take a close up of the artist and when the camera comes out of the focus and the audience has disappeared and the band has disappeared only leavening the drum set and the guitars lying on the floor. 

As we want the actual singer of the song to come and perform in the video we want to keep the costume to be as authentic as we can to the actual artist. His style is usually a baggy t-shirt or a football top or a dark outfit. This is simple but it fits his character perfectly. 

The door which in some way acts as a portal will be very similar to the scene in the "lion the witch the wardrobe" 

We could use instead a book case which opens up as this would also look very effective. 

When the artist walks through the portal door we have in mind that they walk into a field or maybe a recording studio but we feel the field will add that element of surprise more than the recording studio.

When the artist walks onto the stage we feel the layout similar to this which Is a live performance from an artist who is similar to the artist. We would have a drummer and a guitarist behind the rapper wearing very similar costume to the artist. 

Camera Workshop filming with prime lenses

 The other day we had our first workshop session of the year. In this session we were recapping on how to set up the camera. As it has been a while since we have all been behind the camera, it took us all a few minutes to get back to the hang of it. We started by opening the tripod bag and setting up the tripod. We all made the same mistake of setting up the tripod from the top of the tripod and then working our way down. Matt then showed us that its actually much easier to pull the tripod up if you start from the bottom, this allows each tripod leg to be on the exact same level which when we did it, it wasn't.

We then went on to place the camera on the tripod, when placing the camera on the tripod we had to remember to press the side button which would allow the camera to slide onto the tripod and then from there to twist the lever on the other side of the tripod which secures the camera.

After this we loosened the screw under the top of the tripod, this allows us to make sure the camera is sitting on the tripod completely level. When the bubble on the spirit level on the tripod is inside the circle, you turn the screw back to secure the level.

Matt then showed us some new features on the camera which we hadn't used last year.
Matt showed us how to change the shutter speed on the camera. On the touchpad on the camera pressing the icons for shutter speed gives you several different options. 90 degrees looks faster than usual which gives a really cool effect. 180 is the normal default setting and then 360 which slows movements down by blunting the image. My personal favourite was the faster 90 which I felt gave a very cool effect. The cameras usually film at 25 frames per second but these cameras can film at 50 frames per second to film slow motion.

As we are filming music videos this year matt showed us the prime lenses which we will be using which give the film a better quality and an overall better finish for the music videos however you can't zoom in using these lenses. There were several lenses which all had different numbers. The lower the number the more you can see in the shot and the higher the number the less you can see in the shot.

Shortlisting two concepts for further development

Today my class was placed into three groups, I am beyond happy with my group as its with two of besets friends, not just the but as a group I feel we are going to work very well with each other. All three of us have at least one or two very strong ideas and we all have different aspects to bring to the group.
In the lesson today we sat down in our groups and we talked briefly through all our ideas just recapping the main aspects of the idea and made a list of a very brief description of all our ideas.
My ideas;
1. rapper has a confusing journey though different sets
2. Gang of drill rappers riding in a car around an estate
3. A aspiring guitarist busking around lots of different locations

Cams Ideas;
1. rapper in dark room in a bathtub with water spilling out covering the floor
2. a character walking through several different rooms almost like a dolls house

Laras ideas;
1. a character behind a green screen riding a bike and having a date, done to look obviously fake.
2. focussing on a girls eyes then moving towards a band performance.

We have decided to narrow our idea down to two ideas. These two ideas we feel have the most potential and we feel that both these ideas would be very successful.

The first idea which we have chosen to use is cams idea about a character in a very dark location with water covering the floor.
The second idea which are choosing is my idea about the rapper who is in a confused state travelling around different locations.

Promotional music campaigns

A promotional music campaign is a group of different products which all come together and released at once to advertise an artist or band.
A campaign should make it clear of the genre of the band, it should have some form of branding of the artist, the specific audience should be made very clear e.g. younger audience of teenage girls and also it should give some form of social media to be able to follow the artist life as this will create a stronger fan base.

Billie Eilish is a young artist which will naturally appeal to a younger fanbase, the album 'When we fall asleep where do we go" is very dark/dull colours which suggests her songs aren't mainstream, even tho they are very popular the songs and music video goes against the typical mainstream, this could bring moire attention to her. The album cover also has no writing with not big text of her name which is unusual which will attract more attention. The album cover also doesn't focus on her face which suggests the focus of her as an artist is completely towards her songs.

Sum 41 album cover has no picture of the group which may make audiences feel less connected however there music isn't sold because off there image its sold because of the talent of the band, we also know its a band as there's not an artists name just a name of a band. The target audience would be the older audience as their album cover has no image of the band which makes it seem as the band has been around for a while and they don't see the need to place their faces on the cover.

Presenting my ideas to my class

What have I done?

Today I presented my three ideas for my music video, to my class. I started by playing the song before presenting my first idea so my class could get a greater understanding for my idea. I also told my class why I chose this particular artist as he's a friend of mine. The first idea which I pitched which was "Told Her". This was my favourite idea and I felt I could do the most with this idea however I wanted to see what my class thought.
My class all had a very similar response to this idea, everyone said that out of my three ideas this idea was my strongest idea. Everyone said very positive comments about the idea commenting about how it was an original idea and that if possible it would be very interesting if I should be able to get the actual artist to come and perform in the video.
My class did pick out a few very important points which I am going to have to put in some consideration and try and overcome.
Firstly it was brought up that having three different sets could be a problem as you need to fill three minutes worth of film in and it could get slightly boring.
Secondly it was brought up that recreating a stage and having a full audience will be very hard to achieve and the certain location to pick.
Lastly it was brought up that the shots could be very difficult to achieve.
This was so helpful for me as some of these points I wouldn't have considered and from these points its enabled me to think of ways around these problems.
I intend for the performance in the music video to take up most of the video which I previously hadn't intended on doing. I feel this will fix the problem of the video being boring and will also give me much more shots.
My first idea for the filming studio as the location I have know realised would not be big enough and it would be very obvious that it was just simply a set. The dance studio behind the theatre is a very dark room which has not furniture in, this would be perfect for a small stage which I feel would be achievable. I will need around 20 people to be extras in part of the video which I know is a lot of people, but I do feel it's achievable.
Im still trying to work out how I will be able to do the transition from the living room door into the middle of a forest, and then from the forest onto a stage. I feel I can overcome this when I edit the video and by getting the correct shots. I will need to find a door to bring to the forest. This will be fairly hard but I know it would turn out looking great.

My second video which is using a song called "spot the difference" which is a group. This was my least faviroute idea. After telling my class about this idea, not many were very fond of the idea. Most people thought it would be fun to film.
My class brought up some very important comments which I had not thought about which I'm very happy they brought up.
Firstly as we are in a fairly remote location and the nearest town is Cranleigh portraying this gang image would be very hard to achieve.
Secondly finding the right cast would be hard as I would need at least 8 large guys who look fairly old which would be very hard to find here.
Lastly the point was raised that it might not be very politically correct as out could offend certain people and it would not be very authentic which could cause certain problems.
After pitching this idea to my class I have come to the conclusion that this idea will be not achievable. I did like the idea but I do see that it would be very hard to portray this idea.

My last idea which I pitched to my class using the song "tie me down". I do really like this idea and feel it could be fun filming this and explained my idea to the class.
Lots of the class liked this idea but they did prefer my first idea as they fealt the first idea was more original.
Important comments were brought up again about this idea which I hadn't thought about.
Firstly it was brought up that it could be hard to get the point across in the video that a young boy was growing up overtime.
Secondly it was brought up that time lapses often can be very hard to do successfully in a music video.
Thirdly it was brought up that it could be an issue finding the the characters and finding a young kid who looks similar to an older character.
Lastly it was brought up that the concept could get slightly boring over time as it would be only one charter in a shot at a time and the only thing changing would be the set.
I feel I could overcome these issues, firstly If I do use this idea I feel I would remove the idea of a young boy and just keep the same character throughout the whole video, this would also make the video less dramatic and "cheesy". I feel I could also place a performance in this idea and it could be very affective and would really break the video up.

From going through my ideas with mom class it has hugely benefited me as its helped me improve my ideas and also its helped me to decide which idea I should use if my group decides to use my idea. I have come to the conclusion that I'm going to use my first idea as feel this idea is the most original and overall its my favourite idea. Going through this idea with my class helped so much and made me consider issues which I hadn't previously thought off and I have know been able to overcome the problems and improved the idea of this video.

Task 2: Idea 2

My second idea for a music video is using the song spot the difference by One Four.
An artist which I feel is relatively similar and has the same themes in his songs is Bugzy Malone.

His homepage is excellent, it's very visual and as you move the mouse down different visuals will appear and different headlines will appear. As seen above he very clearly shows his merchandise, contact, videos and his biography. The font is simple yet the colour of the font brings attention to the merchandise. He also displays his new album very clearly with the video to the song playing as soon as you click on the website. I feel that this is a very nice touch as its clear and enticing.
However I do feel with this homepage there is almost to much going on in one page which is slightly overwhelming and this could discourage people from properly exploring the website.
With my homepage I think grey would be a good background as the genre of the group one four is drill and there persona is aggressive, son a dark colour like grey would work but still bring the images and writing on the homepage out. I do like this effect that the homepage changes as you scroll down but I don't want all the content to be presented with this effect because I feel this could be slightly to much.
With a digi pack I tried making my own with the appp which is similar to photoshop on my phone. Im happy with how the digi pack showed out as its simple but yet lots of meanings in the imagery and a play on the title to the song.

I researched into a few of Bugzy Malones new and old album covers to see if they were similar in any way to the digi pack which Ive made. They do follow a similar theme, using dark colours and using the black and white contrast. They both show imagery which attracts the consumer and brings attention the them which is similar to the digi pack which I created.