Pig mask

We finally managed to locate a pig mask on the internet which we printed out and courled in with pink pencils

We got it from this website http://www.freefunfings.com/masks/masks/pdf/004008.pdf

Now we have the mask we cant go ahead and film some of the other scenes.

Getting Props

Props we need

1. Bin Bag


2. Glass Photo Frame


3. Several fragile glass or crockery items


4. Animal masks

The bin bag wasn't a problem to find as I would get one from my own household.

Myself and Megan went out around local charity shops and discount stores on Thursday 15th October looking for items we could purchase cheaply which we would be using to smash.

We found a glass photo frame in a discount store for £1.25 which we bought, also we bough a large glass vase costing £1

We then went to a few charity shops and bought two plates for £0.60 a mug for £0.30 and a glass for £0.20

It totaled to around £3.35 the cost of which we split between us.

The animal masks we printed out ourselves from the website http://www.angelfire.com/dc/childsplay/masks.htm

We were unable to find a pig mask.

Filming 18th October

We went out to film on Sunday 18th October which we managed to do. Our group and the actors met up outside Tooting Broadway tube station at 12:30.

I brought with me the video camera with DV tape and tripod and large unused bin bag for use as a prop. Charlie Marden had printed out and made all the the animal masks along with the 'I Wish' sign which she backed onto cardboard so it wouldnt get bent. Megan Valuks brough with her the items myself and her had purchased to smash and also put a picture of the lead male acotr into the picture frame we bought which again was going to be smashed and a print out of the Eviction notice we made. James Rath brough with him several extra items of clothing which we requested as we needed to fill out the bin bag as if it was full of the actresses possesions after she's been evicted.

We took with us the storyboards with us to help us with what to film, I also exported the animatic video in .mp4 format from Apple iMovie and added it to my video iPod so that we could watch it whilst out and about, this again gave us an better idea of the timing of the shots we needed to get with the music playing aswell.

We started by filming the scene where the bus drives past Ruth, to get this shot we went to tooting high street where we found two bus stops where diferent busses stop at each, we then waited at one of them until a bus came past that isnt meant to stop at it as we knew it would go straight past and then filmed Ruth putting her arm out for it to stop it going past.

We carried on to some of the residential roads nearby and got shots of Ruth walking down the road towards her 'Home'.

We then got the eviction and landlord scenes filmed using one of our colleges houses who didnt mind us using it, we also later used this house to film the cheating scenes.

We then headed towards the cafe which we were planning to use but unfortunatly it was closed due to it being a sunday, we were also unable to film any of the other scenes because we were still unable to aquire a pig mask which we then found was essential to the other scenes we needed filmed. The final thing we managed to film was the breaking shots of the items we had bought, we brought with us a dustpan and brush and a plastic bag to clear up the mess afterwards.

Looking at the filming day now we realised we needed to be a lot more organised and prepared for the next time we filmed. We spoke to our actors and group and decided to film next on Friday 23rd as we would all be free then it would also give us a chance to get the other props we needed.

Here is a photograph taken whilst I filmed the cheating scene

This is another photo from the day where we were getting the props ready

Location research

Location Research

Once we got all of our ideas down on paper on the storyboards we had good idea of what shots we needed to get. We then thought about possible locations to go out and film in, we then went out and took pictures of some of the locations we thought would be good to use.
Here are some of the pictures we took .


These were two of the places we were going to use for the shots of the bus going past.

This is the wall we intended to use for the shots of the lead female holding up the signs saying "I Wish" This is myself standing against the wall to see how it would look with somebody standing there.

We found several other locations to use such as Tooting bec common for scenes near the end of Ruth walking through the forest with the animals around her.

We discussed also using Tooting High street and Southcroft road, We found a cafe which we thought would be perfect to use due to the style of windows it had and the positioning of the tables within unfortunatly after going in and asking their permission the owner refused saying it would dirupt his customers. We had to find somewhere else so looked at other places such as 'Chandlers' which is a cafe on Moiser Road, we couldnt ask permission at the time becuase it was closed.

We planned a day to go out and film on Sunday the 18th of October.

We also used google maps to look up locations without having to go out, here are some screen shots of the places we looked

Genre Conventions

I looked at the normal conventions for music videos of the genres Indie, Rock, Hip Hop and R&B as these were the genres of music I had available to me to use. I found a lot of this research to be helpful as I hope to apply a lot of the conventions to my own video. Here is a list of some of the normal conventions with examples of bands of the genre.


Indie/Rock:

· Lots of performance by the artist or band.
· If a full band is featured, close up shots of them playing their instruments is usually used.
· Main focus is placed on the lead singer.
· Indie videos can have an abstract element to them
· Some of the rock videos can be seen as rebellious with louder segments of the song synced with some sort of in screen action depicting the change in sound.
· Depending on the gender of the band the mise en scene can vary, usually with an all male band the scenery is darker colours and vice versa for females.
· They usually begin with an establishing shot, possibly of the artist at a distance and then progressively have close ups of the artist throughout.
· The cutting pace of the video usually matches the tempo of the music with a complete change of the on screen action when a solo comes in.
· There is usually not much use of special effects, if any it usually involves green screen with some sort of vast landscape behind.
· Examples of bands: Metallica, Florence and the machine, The Arctic Monkeys, Blink 182.


R&B and Hip Hop:

· In every video I looked at it featured the artist
· The artist is usually shown to be boasting their fame with use of expensive things such as jewellery and cars.
· Usually has a lot of dancing women in it who are very rarely fully clothed.
· There is usually one women in the video who is different to the others who is usually who the song is about.
· Usually a lot of long shots and tracking shots following the artist
· There is not much of a narrative going on as all focus is on the artist and how ‘Glamorous’ they are.
· The cutting rhythm isn’t usually that fast and has a relaxed feel to it and fairly laid back.
· When the artist is a male there is a lot of women features
· When the artist is a female there is mostly focus on her.
· Examples of artists: Akon, 50 Cent, Rhianna and The Game.

Music Video Directors

Michel Gondry:

He is a French film, TV commercial and music video director he has become most famous though his inventive visual style and manipulation of mise en scene. He has produced videos for a wide range of famous bands including rock bands such as The Rolling Stones, The White stripes and Radiohead. He has been a big influence on the music video production of today; he started of his career by producing his first music video for the rock band Oui Oui. He later stared producing films alongside music videos where he imported his techniques into them. He is also very famous for his invention of the idea of ‘Bullet Time’ which was a scene in the famous film The Matrix where time slows to a halt and the camera rotates around the action giving what seems to be an impossible shot.

Research of potential target audiences

While planning our video we had to identify who our target audience was going to be. We looked at a range of possibilities but we eventually decided on the both males and females who are in their teens to early twenties, we chose these because the song we had and the artist mainly aim their songs at this age group so we felt it only right to stick with it. A lot of the ideas we came up with for the video were inspired by our knowledge of who are target audience is, this is because the things we had happening in the video were events that most typical teenagers have been through, this would then allow them to relate to the video this is also a concept by Roland Barthes and his idea of negotiated meaning. The bands genre of indie/rock is also a type of music that is normally associated with teenagers. The band and others like it have also been known to have relatively rebellious music and what with the general teenage rebellion that occurs this helps fit in nicely.
Before fully deciding on ages 17-25 we examined the possibilities of older and younger age groups, after looking at other music videos aimed at these audiences we decided not to use them as the videos aimed at younger children were very y colourful, very bouncy and full of obvious things happening in the video and the videos aimed at older people were a lot quieter and full of performance with a minimal narrative, we didn’t want this, we wanted our video to have enough action to keep the audience entertained but also some ambiguity so they would have to think about it as well and not have the narrative ‘Spoon fed’ to them but also not too complex as we though too much could bore the audience and cause them to loose interest and also an equal mix of the artists performance as well.

Things we will need for filming

Things needed for the production

We examined our idea and we then looked into everything we are going to need to film the video.

We went out as a group looking for possible filming locations, with us we took a digital camera to keep a photo record of where we found the photo's of which will be uploaded into a seperate post. The other things we identified are as follows.

Actors:

• Two young female actresses between the ages of 17-20. One to act as the lead character and one to act as the women the lead male is cheating with.

- For the lead actress we need to find somebody that not only fitted the role but whom also would be available for our filming dates.

- For the women who is cheating with the male we need to find somebody who would feel comfortable with acting out what we required for the scene.

• Three young male actors between the ages of 17-20.

- One mainly needed to act for the main cafe scenes and the cheating scenes, again somebody who will feel comfortable with the scenes needed.

- One to act as the man on the street jeering at the lead actress who then is seen wearing the pig mask

- One to act as the landlord who wears a mouse mask due to him being to afraid to evict her in person.

• Two other extra's of any gender between the ages of 17-20

- Needed to wear the two other masks to add obscurity to the video nearing the end.

Equipment:

• Digital video camera - To record the video itself
• Digital camera - To take location pictures and document the filming
• Blank Digital Video tape - To record both the animatic and main production on
• Tripod - To ensure our shots are steady and controlled
• Apple Macintosh computer with video editing software

Props:

• Several breakable items
• Bin bag full of clothes
• Animal masks, mainly a cheetah, a pig, a mouse, a panda, a rabbit, a owl and a raccoon
• Eviction notice sign
• Light colored scarf
• Items on the table in the cafe such as salt and pepper shakers
• Sign saying "I wish"
• Photo frame with a picture of the lead male in it.

Filming schedule:

We decided that we would be available to film mainly on Sunday the 19th of October and then late afternoons during the following week weather depending.

The Animatic

The Joy Formidable - Cradle

We created an Animatic for our music video project before filming to help give us a clearer idea of how the video and its shots would flow in conjunction with the music. We initially hand drew the storyboards and then captured still images of each one and edited them together to form the complete video. The shots in the animatic are generalized and the angles and movements shown in it are not necessarily what we intend to use for the final production. The video also comes up short at the end with an extra 16 seconds spare, we left this because we have assumed that after filming and during the editing process we will find the space will have been filled and also to allow for any other ideas that may be thought of now and that we can add these in without disrupting the rest of the timing of the video.

This is the video itself which we uploaded to YouTube so that we could embed it within our blogs and also to allow for any public feedback we may receive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zblc7hVa0mk

In our animatic we decided to show our motif of 'Breaking things' clear. We did this

through several things, we had the initial shot of two empty milk bottles and throughout the video they get broken, this bottle break associated with the break up of the girls relationship.

The relationship being broken is shown through the flashback of the boyfriend cheating on her and this is made prominent through the scenes being put in red. In the real video we do not intend to put it in red, possibly black and white. We also have several other items smashing which follows the same idea as the bottles.

Goodwins Theory of Music Videos

When looking at music videos I analysed them using the principles of Andrew Goodwin’s theory of music videos which he wrote in ‘Dancing in the Distraction Factory’ (Routledge 1992)


I came across many of the characteristics that he identified which were:


1. Music videos demonstrate characteristics of the genre
2. There will be a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals
3. There will be a relationship between the music and the visuals
4. The artist may develop distinctive motifs that may reoccur throughout their videos.
5. There is often intertextual reference
6. There is frequent reference to the notion of looking and particularly voyeurtristic treatment of the female body.


I noticed a lot of these occurred which I then decided I would like to apply to my own video, things such as the motif reoccurring, the link between the on screen visuals and music and lyrics. I also wanted to be able to reflect the genre of the music in the video I produce.

Here are examples of different music videos that use each of these things:

1- Music videos display characteristics of the genre

To show this I looked at the video by the Metal band, Bullet for my valentine and their song called Waking the demon.

The genre usual consists of a lot of dark colours and a lot of the band performing the song with frequent close ups of the instruments, they also usually have a form of narrative running as well.

The whole band playing the song

The narrative story running parallel with the performance, in this case its about a boy who's getting bullied at school and who eventually cracks and flips on the bully.

Close up shots of the instruments being played are frequent.

2. There will be a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals.

This is a scene from the video to the song 'I predict a riot' by the band The Kaiser Chiefs. As you can guess the video shows a form a rioting when the lyrics "I predict a riot" Are sung. To the keep with the genre of indie, the rioting isnt violent as such but instead it is done using pillows to keep things light hearted.

3. There will be a relationship between the music and the visuals.

The pace and tempo of a song will usually dictate as to how the video for it flows in terms of its cutting rhythm and pace.

For example in the song "Rusted from the rain" By the band 'Billy Talent' and the majority of other rock bands whenever the hook in the song is played the visuals will shows the instrument being played. I found this happens nearly everytime a solo is played in a song. This shot was taken during the solo in the song.

4. The artist may develop distinctive motifs that may appear throughout their videos

Some artists may have a reoccurring motif thoughout their videos this could be from a certain character to a colour. A recent example of this is in the video to the song 'Fight for this love' by the artist 'Cheryl Cole' in this video there is a reoccurring motif of the colour red throughout, here are some examples of it.

5. There is often intertextual reference

A prime example of this is in the song by the artist 'Bashy' and the song called 'Kidulthood to Adulthood' the song was used in the film Adulthood and throughout the video it has frequent flashbacks to scenes from the film itself.

This is a shot of the artist performing the song

And this is a shot from the film which was put in which is a form of intertextuality

6. There is frequent reference to the notion of looking and particularly voyeurtristic treatment of the female body.

This final one is usually found in R&B and Hip Hop songs. Here is an example from the song 'Sexy Chick' by 'David Guetta ft. Akon'

The Streets - Dont Mug Yourself

The second video I've analysed is one by the band The Streets with the song 'Dont mug yourself' I thought I would look at a male artist now to see how the filming style changed in contrast to a typical female artists such as KT Tunstall

The Streets - Dont mug yourself

View more documents from Peter Jones.

KT Tunstall - Suddenly I see

I have analysed some music videos which I feel would be benificial to my project as it will help give me a broader understanding of the normal conventions used in music videos of this genre.

I firstly analysed a song by KT Tunstall called Suddenly I see. I used the online publishing website Slideshare.net to host it. Click the bottom right hand icon to make the document full screen, and the ESC Key on the keyboard to exit.

Kt Tunstall Suddenly I See,

View more documents from Peter Jones.

Paramore - Misery Business

I next looked at the song Misery Business by the band Paramore.

Click the bottom right hand button to enlarge the document to full screen, press the Esc key to exit.

Paramore - Misery Business

View more documents from Peter Jones.

Kate Bush - Sat on your lap

Kate Bush - Sat on your lap

View more documents from Peter Jones.

The Joy Formidable - Cradle [Lyrics]

These are the lyrics to the song we chose to use.


I can see he says what he means
I can't say what he means when he says that
I'll pretend a pretty pretend
When all I wanna see is the end of this

I can see he says what he means
We'll deal him sticks and stones and apologies
I wish
Oh, I wish it was through

Scrape the skies
Get up off your knees
Just lift the marks
And new-found releases
I'll pretend a pretty pretend
When all I wanna see is the end of this

I wish
I wish
I wish the cobwebs would cover me
Cover me
Cover me

My vicious tongue
Cradles just one

Contacting bands

Contacting possible bands

The song we used is by a band called, The Joy Formidable. We found one of their songs and emailed the bands manager requesting permission to use the song in our production, we had to make clear that the video was for educational purposes not comercial. They agreed with no problem and this is how we got the song to use. I had also dont some other research into other bands and artists that had songs we would like to use before we decided on The Joy Formidable.

This is a clip from a conversation on Windows Live Messenger with myself and the music producer MC Mozart. Click the image to enlarge it.

We got permission to use any of the songs from his album 'Musikology' but decided that the we didnt want to do a video of that genre (Hip hop)

I also contacted a band called 'Futures' which I found by surfing myspace.com and looking at the music section at the unsigned popular bands. I listened to some of the songs on the band page and then emailed the band asking if we could use one of their songs called '16' but they didnt respond so we couldnt use the song, Below is a copy of the email I sent to their myspace band page.

Click the image to enlarge it.

One of our team members James, Discovered the band The Joy Formidable and contacted them asking for permission of use of the song, a copy of the email is below giving us the OK to go ahead.