Lesson update; editing

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We've started editing!

At last we've been able to start editing!
Today Ruby and I decided that we wanted to just start putting all the clips in order and making them the correct lengths instead of editing colours and adding effects etc.
I've made a little comic strip for you to look at instead of reading it off the page, unfortunately it wont link straight into the page so i've had to link it :(

my comic strip!

I'm so happy with what we did today and we can carry on with editing every lesson from now on, when we learn some more final cut techniques I think we will be able to work a lot faster and so get through the editing stage a lot quicker!!

Starrt of editing!!

So today we began filming with our new best buddy, final cut! me and Carla aren't particularly familiar with final cut as we've only edited on imovie before, but we managed to get the hang of it fairly quickly!

We decided to just to a draft version without colour editing, transitions etc, we just wanted to cut our footage in time to make sure that the shots flow and that they work properly when running together. We managed to edit together about a minute of footage and all in all we are pretty pleased! We found a mistake in one of the shots, where Max begins to walk but he is standing still at the beginning of the shot, making the running look un-continuous.

After editing we've also realised how much work is going to need to go into the editing to get it correctly in time with the song. As the song is quite fast, we have needed to have some really quick shots, but so far they work perfectly, however we are sceptical as to the rest of the video. 

All in all we are very happy with our progress so far, and we plan to finish this draft, have Miss Hill and a few students watch it and then get some feedback. Next lesson I think I will play around with some of the colour correction on the footage just to see how I can change the colours and adapt them to fit into the music video. Overall, we are both very happy, and getting on very well with final cut...(so far...)

More to follow :)

Filming update

Yesterday was possibly the most stressful day of my entire life.

We came across possibly all the things that could have gone wrong apart from terrible weather!

Firstly an extra said he 'didn't realise we were filming today' which was aggravating as we had clearly told everyone when we were going to be filming again, he then said he needed to be somewhere for a certain time which was about 30 minutes into our filming time.

Then we had issues with transport as one of our mains hadn't organised transport again which wasn't really ideal.

So what we decided to do, was as soon as our main arrived, we got to filming the shots that had the extra in that was so he could leave and go where he needed to go! Then we went back to Max's first shots and began filming from the beginning.

Also it was extremely sunny yesterday...and on Monday it wasn't sunny ARGGHHH!! So thats going to look slightly strange on the video!

The next hurdle we came across was that it was beginning to get dark a lot sooner than we first expected, thus meaning we had to rush filming everything to ensure that the lighting levels look similar. 

ALSO, we'd filmed a number of shots and then Ruby suddenly pointed out that Max had his sleeves rolled up and she didn't think he'd had them rolled for all of the shots. So we had to look back through the shots and figure out exactly when he'd rolled them up, and then re-film these shots.

One more thing that happened was that we filmed the final shot first as one of the extras had to leave, we had to hurry as he needed to leave, and also we couldn't do our original idea as we only had a few extras in the end due to people cancelling etc. So Ruby and I had to quickly rethink of something that fit with our initial idea, and had to film it quickly. After filming it I realised Max wasn't singing along with the song however our extra had already left and so had Amber as she had an appointment so we had no way of refilming this - I found this extremely aggravating and am disappointed that it wont fit in with the rest of the video due to no singing.

AANNNYWWWAAYY, we got all our filming done which is absolutely fantastic!! Although some parts are rushed and we had to compromise some shots - we have done it all! We now need to really get going with editing and our ancillary tasks!

Lesson update; filming!

I've been really unwell for the last few days, however I still attended filming yaaaay!

So we didn't get off to a brilliant start, but once we got started we were up and running!

Ruby has already done a group post on our filming however I thought i'd just add one of my own to add anything.

Working with extras and numerous cast is always difficult as you have to organize them however trying to organize our extras today was very difficult and we had a lot less extras than we initially wanted too. This wasn't a massive problem as we were able to reuse extras for shots due to the fact that the extras aren't certain characters.

Also it was slightly aggravating that both the extras and main didn't wear the agreed costume which is every so slightly annoying but these are things that aren't crucial to the end product. 

We also didn't get as much filming done as we initially wanted - we thought we would be able to get everything that we needed filmed however we only got half done. Unfortunately this means that we'll have to film on another day on which we cannot guarantee that the weather will be the same. This is obviously really aggravating for us but at the end of the day theres nothing we can do!

We're filming again on Thursday and so hopefully we will be able to finish all filming.

Filming update!

Sp yesterday we filmed pretty much all day! There were some massive complications at the start of the day because we only were able to get a few of our actors assembled, and had to wait for an hour to gain access to our location! We were slightly worried because of the continuity in terms of light and the time of day. We were worried that if we started filming certain shots with certain extras and actors, then the shots would be getting lighter and lighter then there would be a really dark shot, and the continuity wouldn't flow, so we decided to wait to gain access to our location so that we could film all of the shots in sequence. Max was due to turn up in an hour so we started with Amber's shots and filming all of those in sequence. We started off at a decent pace because we needed to get everything done! We managed tog et all of the shots involving Amber finished. We then started on Max's shots but had to finish as we all had to be back at school! However we got some fantastic shots, and made changes to a few which I'm going to tell you about now.

Firstly, the shot where Amber clicks the laptop on and the song begins to play, I caught sight of Amber's face in the hand mirror next to the laptop and I suggested that we could position the camera on purpose so that you can see Amber in the mirror. This could be one of the few times that we actually see Amber's face during the entire video, showing us both characters and establishing the audience's opinions on them both.

Another shot that we decided to change was that of the shot where Amber gets caught between two people. We decided instead of making the shot an 'awkward situation' that we would choreograph the movements in time with the music. This was to give links between music and visuals and to parallel the editing, which will be in time with the music the entire way through.

The last shot that we decided to change was the one with the music notes. Originally we wanted only the music notes in the top of the shot, not a person then when we got to filming the shot, the extras couldn't hold the music notes above Amber's head without hurting themselves! So we decided to include Jazz in the shot. Wee thought that this actually looked better anyway, as there are extras in most shots and by doing this makes it link to the rest of the shots but also carries on the theme etc.

At the moment we still have just under half of our footage still to film, and we plan to do that asap. This should be done by the end of this week and then we can get really stuck into editing! I also feel like I need to get to grips with final cut a bit more, as I am very unfamiliar and prefer to use imovie, even though final cut is tenchnically better for effects etc. So I plan to have a  lesson this week where I play around with final cut and then I will show you what I've learnt from it. This will help my overall editing technique and will gradually improve as the project carries on. Watch this space for a blog post!

Both me and Carla are getting stuck right into working on our digi pak and magazine advert. I am currently researching typical things that are included on a magazine advert and what we should include. I have also been given a template for the magazine advert and need to discuss with Carla which template we decide although I have chosen which one I would like to work with. Carla is currently editing the photographs that we took for the digi-pak and magazine advert on photoshop so they should be finished fairly soon! All in all, we are happy with our progress and we plan to overall, have most things complete by the end of term, before christmas.

Watch this space, more to follooooooooow :)

Video update

So we've filmed a video update this lesson telling you what we've been doing and what we have done in detail, enjoy!

I personally enjoy the thumbnail quite a lot!

More to follow :)

Start of our filming!

Yesterday, we began our filming by shooting the shots that are in the 'dream sequence' of the video. Our main difficulty throughout the day was the massive amount of fog that followed us around for the entire day! The fog was so thick that we had to postpone filming until the very end of the afternoon, by then it had cleared slightly but not that much! However we still went ahead and filmed just to see what the shots looked like, and they turned out looking alright! The shots were clear and you could see all of the action happening in the shots, so we decided to keep them. If we decide to re-shoot these specific shots then we will do so after shooting the main bulk of our footage on monday.

The first two shots are the shots that involve our two main characters, Max and Amber, spinning round holding the camera.

 We thought that this created a state of euphoric happiness and also made the dream sequence very cliche and cheesy, which is the sort of romantic attatchments that happen in a dream! We wanted these few shots to be as cheesy as possible! We also felt like the fog and the mist surrounding the shots makes the shot look 'dreamlike' and unrealistic because of the haze on the screen. We are also planning on editing this shot on final cut, to give it a more dream-like feel. I want to blur the edges of the shot so it looks like Max is projecting it into a dream thought-bubble. This will make it stand out from the rest of the footage because the audience will know that these few shots are in a dream.







The next shot that we did was of Max and Amber taking a picture of themselves. We struggled with the timing of this shot and carla suggested that we shoot a bit more than we actually need and then when it comes to the editing process we can chop off the bits that we don't need, as long as we get them taking a picture of themselves. We made them do very cheesy smiling faces as if they're in love! So cringey!

Looking at this picture I think we might edit the shot so that it looks brighter and happier, to reflect the moods of the characters!

The last shot that we did was the shot where Max and Amber were meant to be at a picnic. However, we realised that as the day was quite overcast and foggy we couldn't really have the pair having a picnic as it wouldn't reflect the settings or the weather. We were a bit stuck for something to include in the shot, and the we spotted the leaves! As trees and leaves are a recurring theme throughout our entire project, digipak, magazine advert and video, we decided to incorporate the leaves. We had Max and Amber shoot about fifteen seconds of throwing leaves up and jumping and laughing in them. We also recognised this as very cliche and cheesy, so thought that it was perfect for the dream sequence shots! We also decided to move it to slow motion so that the cheesy factor was emphasised even more! It also shows a new editing technique for us within final cut, which we can incorporate into our video.

So that concludes the post on yesterdays filming! we're filming the rest of our footage on monday so we're in preparation for that. At the moment we're focused on our magazine advert and didgipak research as we need to really get into the research and planning involved with that.

More to follow :)

Planning; ancillary task - CD sleeve

Obviously I need to do some planning for the CD sleeve before I can design it, I won't be planning any of the wording because thats what Ruby is going to be doing!! 

For the inside I think I'll use a base colour using a brush on photoshop then perhaps use a variety of different downloaded brushes to create a tree and vines coming down from it - I then have the idea of taking silhouette photographs of both Amber and Max and having them either side of the tree. The bottom most foldout will be the roots of the tree which I think will look really interesting. On this fold Ruby is going to create a band biography which we can add on top of the design!

For the outside folds of the CD sleeve Ruby and I thought for the 'front' cover it would be interesting to have trees and leaves around the outside and then in the middle it would be a cream background with the band and song name in font that connotes vines and leaves. I'm really keen on this idea so will probably do this with brushes again. For 3 of the folds we are going to have photos of Amber and Max against a tree and leaf background  -  I've actually already taken these photos and will upload them when I'm on my laptop. They look really good and I think they will go with the rest of the CD package. 

I really want to get onto photoshop and start designing now - I'm going to continuously update blogger on how it's going with some screen grabs and i'll talk through exactly what I'm doing!

Planning; photographic storyboard

I have created a photographic storyboard as of last weekend, however I've been having multiple problems with exporting it from windows movie maker; if I attempt to export it into the correct type of file it will look as if it's exporting however when it's finished I will open the file and it will only be the music with a blank black screen. I've tried doing this about four times now into different types of file.
I talked to my teacher about this and she said perhaps if I can find no other way then I should record the video on my phone and then upload it to blogger which is obviously extremely annoying as the quality wont be anywhere near as good after I spent such a long time creating the video!
However I still really want the photographic storyboard up on here, so I've done just that.. of course we didn't have our extras with us today so Ruby, Ryan and I stepped in for them but it gives a good idea of what we've planned for our video!

update after Americaaaa

So we're back from America! We've been planning a little bit but its been hard for us to launch straight back into our routines but we're getting there! We made a to-do list yesterday of all of the stuff that we have to complete in the next few weeks. The main priority for us in the next few weeks is the making and completing of our ancillary texts. We haven't begun planning for our ancillary texts but we have chosen to do a cd cover and a magazine advert. We have already chosen the layout for our cd cover:

We decided on this sleeve because it will show a range of different artistic techniques that we could possibly show. It will also leave room for a bigger photo and more special editing techniques on the photo. I think Carla has posted a picture of our initial layout that we would like on the cd sleeve. I will describe it but if you want more detail, look at the picture that Carla's posted!! We plan to have a tree that begins in the middle with the roots and spreads to all four folding layers to make the tree llok massive! Also we want Amber and Max on either side of the cd sleeve to remind people of the video but also to draw them in to watch the video! We want to have a lot of neutral colours with trees and birds and a lot of natural elements in the design to give the entire album a laid-back feel and a happy ethos. 

We haven't properly discussed the magazine advert yet but today I'm starting some research into different band adverts to see things that we should include and designs that are appealing. I want to link it with our video and album cover so probably something to do with nature etc. 

We're filming tomorrow, monday and possibly thursday after that, so our footage should be completely shot by next thursday! then we need to get on with the editing as we plan to finish the editing and get a draft in way before we break up for christmas. We have lots to be getting on with in preparation for our filming!

Happy to be back!

More to follow :)

Research; ancillary tasks - CD cover

Finally we are back from America!! We're straight back into work, but unfortunately although we had planned to film yesterday - we hadn't really thought out how completely shattered we would be from our trip and our journey home and so there was no possible way we would have been able to film and direct 10 people!!!

However I'm now going to start looking at the ancillary tasks and so hopefully will have these both completely finished by the end of next week. 

Firstly I'm going to research, design and create the CD cover before moving onto the magazine advert. 

To begin this design and creating process I firstly want to look at some existing CD covers to get an idea of some designs and also some techniques used to target certain audiences.

I thought it would be a good idea, and quite interesting to look at a CD cover of 'The Hush Sound' which is the band's song that we are using for our music video, although I have actually already created a few designs which I will put up on blogger later, it was really interesting to see that their album cover had quite a few similar ideas to me for our cover!

I've then decided to look at a CD cover from a band from the same genre as 'The Hush Sound' perhaps with a slightly younger audience but still a similar audience.

Lastly I decided to look at a 'Mumm-ra' album cover, again this is from a similar genre, but again perhaps a slightly older target audience. 

So I've taken some really good ideas from each of these album covers, and really just want to get on with designing and creating my album cover now!!

Lesson update!

So in todays lesson I made a really good to do list for us, it consists of;

This isn't a list of every single thing we still need to do, this is a list of immediate things we need to get on with in order for filming to run smoothly etc. 

Also I decided to begin designing our ancillary tasks in this lesson. I talked to Ruby and told her some of my idea's and so began to draw out some (very) rough drawings of the sort of thing I had in mind. We had already decided the layout of the sleeve that we wanted to use so I didn't have to practise different sleeves which was useful. I've chosen the idea I want to go with and sketched it really quickly, so here it is! 

As you can see this is really rough, in tomorrows lesson I would like to continue designing this!

Textual Analysis of music videos: 'Jeremy' by Pearl Jam.

So I've decided to just bulk out the research portion of this blog, as I didn't feel like I did enough music video analysis when I was researching the different forms of music videos. So I'm going to do a few posts on different music videos, just to get my head around some of the genres and styles of music video that I didn't research well enough. The first example of this is 'Jeremy' by Pearl Jam as it's a metal song, and I didn't analyse a metal video, so have no idea what they looked like before analysing this video!

So, firstly the camerawork. The camerawork overall is very steady, and tends to be very snappy shots of just a few seconds. However, there are a lot of tilted shots, implying that reality is off balance and the tilt represents the break in normality. This is particularly evident when there are close-up shots of the lead singer performing, which is inter-cut with conceptual shots of the story being played out in the song. When there are shots of the lead singer, he is sitting down and performing directly to the camera.

However, his shots are always tilted, leading the audience to believe that he is not in 'reality' but in some other world. Overall, a lot of the shots are tilted, as the story is quite shocking, so the shots are tilted and at extreme angles to reflect that.

Also a lot of the shots have extreme colour editing. The majority of shots that have the narrative played out in them and involving the boy in the story, (Jeremy), have extreme reds or blues, showing that it is hyperreality and that the boy is being very effected by the entire situation and that we are being shown this. At the beginning, there are a lot of shots of newspapers displaying quick headlines and shots that are displaying messages etc. This is to show the audience the different points of the story and to relate the hectic narrative to the audience.

Next the lighting. As I mentioned, a lot of the colour editing is very extreme, and there are a lot of reds and blues being shown through the shots. This doesn't really save a lot of room for lighting, however, when the shots of the narrative are being played out, a lot of the shots are very washed out, giving the shots a very white look and making the shots very bright. This is very contrasting to the shots of the lead singer performing, as they are very dark with a dark red background. This gives connotations of hell and satanic references, as the facial expressions that the singer is doing along with the lack of light, gives an overall impression of hell and the devil. I think that the two lighting states contrast because they wanted to show a clear difference between the two 'worlds' and that the story world where the Jeremy story is being acted is a binary opposite of that to the 'performance world'.

                           

Editing. The editing is extremely fast throughout, only slowing to focus on the lead singer when he performs which is one of Goodwin's six theories in music videoes. It allows lots of shots of the lead singer in the video to keep up the hype and to promote the actual band through the video. There are lots and lots of jump cuts throughout the video, and because the Jeremy story is being told through a series of flashing bright images, we are slightly unsure of the story and become increasingly unsettled at times. The jump cuts are very evident at the beginning of the video when there are lots of shots of newspaper headlines and bible verse nunmbers etc. These are very VERY fast, and are shown two or three times, so that the audience remembers certain phrases that also set up the beginning of the narrative. This is extremely helpful for the audience as it sets the story and the background, but also sets the mood and the feeling of the music video.
                                  

Mise-en-scene: Costume. The lead singer is wearing distinctly normal clothes and we are made to focus more on his face and his expressions rather than his clothes, and I am not entirely sure what he is wearing! However, the Jeremy character flits between two states of costume. The first being in a white shirt and black trousers which we associate with being a school uniform, implying that he is a schoolchild. This is particularly evident when he is in a room full of boys and girls that are wearing very similar to him, and we immediately associate them to being in a classroom. The second, and more prominent of his costume is when he wears grey trousers and no top. This implies that he is in a frantic state and is so stressed that he is not even dressing properly. This is evident when he enters the classroom wearing his second costume, as we know that he is having bizarre thoughts etc.
                                    

Another point on costume that I thought was particularly prominent was the end shots of the shoolchildren when they are wearing bland school costumes that are spattered with blood as the Jeremy character has shot himself. This is implied as the characters are shielding their hands to keep the blood away from them, but also it is shown through the bright red blood stains on their very bland white and grey costumes. The red sticks out very prominently to the audience and is very poignant, as it is the image that the audience is left with.

                                              
Setting and props. There are three main locations that were recurring throughout the video. The first of these is that of the performance space where the lead singer is performing directly the to camera. This setting is incredibly dark and quite dark and eerie. This puts the audience at unease as they are used to the singer being in light spaces and being seen, however, the themes of this song are not exactly light so the space is reflected as this and is incredibly dark. The second of these poignant locations, is that of the forest. It is one of the first shots that we see the Jeremy character and we can clearly see that is the outlet for all of his frustration.
                                                  

This is shown through the paintings that we see and the paintings that he is making. These are frantic and have shocking images on them, which is quite scary as the editing is very quick, so we only get flashing images of the pictures. This setting is also quite creepy as a lot of horror films are set in forests, and so we immediately associate being alone in a forest with a horror film and start to feel at unease and spooked!
This is a contrast to the third setting which is the one in the classroom. We are shown that this is a classroom by the monotonous desk environment and the school uniforms. However, the only thing that is out of place in the classroom is the frantic acting of Jeremy as he draws his pictures etc. This classroom is easily recognisable throughout and offers some kind of comfort for the audience as it is a location that we keep coming back to throughout the video. It also uses another of goodwin's six, the fact that music is going along with lyrics. 'Jeremy spoke in class today', and there are frequent shots of him being in class, and the end shot is of course him speaking in class.

One of the particular moments in this video that has stuck with me after watching this video was that of the shot where all the schoolkids are doing the 'heil hitler' sign. This was after seeing them doing a shot of them all doing the pledge of Allegiance, which is veery patriotic. I was very shocked by this shot as I wasn't expecting it, and it was a load of children!! However, it made me pause the video and go back to that section several times, which meant that I had shown interest in the video and wanted to see it more.

                                    

I thoroughly enjoyed this video and thought that it was very interesting. There were a lot of references to other cultures and worlds which made it very good to watch as I was trying to make a lot of connections throughout. I really liked the way that the story was told because it was all very choppy and hard to follow to the story so you have to be attentive when you're watching, which is challenging the audience to actually crtically view the video and think about it rather than passively viewing it. Overall, I was very impressed with this video! :)

Here's the video:

Thank you! More to follow :)