These are the possible risks which could happen during the filming of our music video, this also includes the level of the risk and how to avoid them as best as possible. Every production that needs to be filmed must have a risk assessment, to ensure the people in the making of the video are safe as possible. We filled out these shooting risk assessment sheets below before filming:
The sort of risks that we have to be aware of when filming include: warm clothing for myself after filming and getting cold, avoid unstable ground, beware of broken glass, loose wires and unstable walls.
Today I decided to write a permission letter to send to the production company of our artist Halsey. We researched and found that her production company is called Astralwerk's records. We found the companies email from their website and contacted them. I then emailed the record company the below letter of permission to ensure they know we will be using Halsey's song 'Gasoline' in our music video.
Today we decided to do some research on quirky, fun female names that we believe will fit in well with our song an the artist we are trying to portray.
We decided that because our song is slightly edgy and aggressive at some points, our artists name needs to be edgy and not a mainstream, common name. After figuring this out we came up with this list of names:
Aura
Bria
Ally
Eris
Jaya
Nia
Ivory
Iona
Zoya
Rue
Sania
After lots of feedback from our peers and teachers, we asked which 3 names they liked the most and which will match the image of our artist. After this feedback, these were 3 shortlisted names:
- Ivory (15 votes)
- Iona (12 votes)
- Aura (8 votes)
As seen above we asked people to vote for their favorite name and Ivory was the most popular. so we have chosen this as our artists name and our group all love the song.
Our artist is Halsey and is from the indie/pop genre. We researched similar artists to see their fashion, hair, style etc. to help us develop our artist and plan costumes. The artists below are also from the same genre... VÉRITÉ
VERITE’s moving Echo EP is pure pleasure-pop, featuring an enchanting mix of danceable beats supporting well-crafted harmonies. Byrne’s voice is warm and inviting, and she seems like a genuinely nice person, but it remains to be seen whether her social media persona and stage presence can flourish into something marketably quirky enough for the viral demands of the scene. Allie X
Allie X is putting her own spin on the shock-pop genre with her GIF-inspired Jungian meditations on medical trauma and issues of the self. With a good sense of style and an even better ear for synth lines and hooky choruses, Allie X is bound for fame. Phoebe Ryan
Phoebe Ryan is a American singer/song writer from Texas. She began her music career as a song writer, writing fro artists such as Oh Honey, Bea Miller and Skizzy Mars before moving on to bigger names such as Britney Spears. She released in her frist single in 2015 which was a mash up of 'Ignition' and 'Do You', before being signed up to the recorded label Columbia Records. With the help of Columbia she released the single 'Mine' which received recognition from Taylor Swift and Tove Lo. Here are the singles below... 'Ignition' 'Do You'
'Mine'
Phoebe Ryan currently has 1.2 million monthly listeners on Spotify and 20.2K follower on Twitter.
Below is the Steal-O-Matic that we have created for our music video, we have now chosen our song and need to begin to think about visuals for our video. To help with this we were asked to choose scenes, transitions, cuts etc. that fit well with our song and that we think would be achievable for us to create.
Our steal-o-matic helped us massively in coming up with ideas for our video and helped us to see what themes would work well with our song choice. The video above shows the themes that we think will match well.
We have finally decided that the song we will be creating a music video for is 'Gasoline' by Halsey and this song can be seen below in the video. We decided that I will be the performer for the music video and so now we are beginning to think of visuals our music video.
Below is our lyric timeline, it breaks down the lyrics in our song 'Gasoline' and what we would like the video to look like. Including shot ideas and timings for transitions that we include. Here it is:
Above is a presentation showing the feedback that we received from our class when presenting our three favorite songs to them, including 'Gasoline' by Halsey, 'Candy' by Doja Cat and 'Everchanging' by Rise Against. This feedback is very important to us because it will help us to decide what song we feel will work best for our group.
In order to help us to decide on our song choice for our music video, we completed a lip sync task. The two songs that we have narrowed it down to are:
Gasoline by Halsey
Everchanging (acoustic) by Rise Against
Below is the videos of the lip syncing that all of us completed, me and Sarah sung Gasoline and Connor and Jack sung Everchanging. Here is the lip sync video for Gasoline...
Both myself and Sarah filmed ourselves lip syncing the song Gasoline by Halsey. This will be helpful to see who we believe fits the part of the female better and which song out of the two has the most potential.
Here is the lip sync video for Everchanging...
Both Connor and Jack had to lip sync to our chosen male song, this will help us to decide who would be the best performer for our music video and which song suited which performer better.
Net Worth: $5 million DOB: 31st October 1975 (age: 40)
Julien Christian Lutz, better known as Little X, X or Director X, is a Canadian music video director. He also has his own clothing line X Fit. He was born and raised near Toronto, Ontario, and is of Trinidadian and Swiss descent.
Director X is known mostly for his directing in many amazing music videos, for stars including; Rihanna, Drake, Iggy Azalea, Nicki Minaj, Justin Bieber and Chris Brown.
His trademark is tweaking the letterbox format; instead of just using black bars on the top and bottom of the frame to frame the image, many videos by X actually feature the bars opening vertically or horizontally to reveal the video and closing vertically or horizontally at the end, like a letter box. Director X's Style: Director x's music videos are very contemporary, they are ones that are likely to appear on music channels such as MTV. This has contributed to his fame and success as a director as his videos are very well know. Such as the music video for 'Promiscuous' by Nelly Furtado and Timberland, this song was at number 1 in the UK charts for 3 consecutive weeks. His music videos are usually very easy to spot, due to their high budget and his use of beat editing and quick sharp cuts to match the pace of the music.
Director X manages to bring the same energetic attitude to every video he directs, he can achieve through all genres of music but mainly; rap, hip-hop and R&B music. For artists such as Drake, R-Kelly and Rihanna. In all of the music video's that he directs, the artist performs and is the main focus of the video.
Halsey- Colors Below is the music video for the song Colors by Halsey. I have broken down the first 30 seconds of the video and have analyzed it.
0-5 seconds: The opening shot of this music video sees the artist. Halsey, facing away from the camera in a close-up shot. The setting is very dark and plain. As the shot develops, Halsey is seen turning away from the camera and then walks away from the camera as the camera walks with her. The music starts at about 2 seconds in, as Halsey starts to move.
6-10 seconds: For 4 seconds here you can the artist Halsey herself with a wide shot of her looking out into the distance. Then the camera zooms in to a medium close-up of her looking through her Polaroid camera, this adds a sense of mystery. Especially as the shot develops and the photo is printed.
10-15 seconds: At the 10 second point there is then a medium close-up of the mystery man that the artist has been looking at. There is then a cutaway to a close up of another women who looks over her sunglasses at something.
15-20 seconds: In this shot there is only one character and that is the young female who is seen in a wide shot, of her looking out into the distance. Then the camera has a cutaway twice to two different close ups, one of her hand and one of the pictures.
20-25 seconds: At the 20 second point, you can see a wide shot again but this time of the mysterious man playing tennis. There is then a cutaway to a two-shot wear the young and older female walk down the stairs together. Before there is a pan to two different wide shots of men playing tennis, then cutting back to the two females walking along a path.
25-30 seconds: Lastly in this frame there is a medium close-up of the young man in a changing room, then a cutaway back to the older man playing tennis in a wide shot. Then there is a close-up of the young female in her bedroom before then cutting away to a mid-shot of her in a classroom day dreaming.
From creating this 30 second breakdown, it has shown me how many different shots you should use and cutaways to help keep a music video interesting. Having the same scene on screen for too long can become boring and this shows how when I make my music video, it needs to be fun and full of variety of shots and angles.
In lesson today we were set the task of creating a video for the Banana Phone song. This preliminary task was set out to help us improve our editing and test out new editing skills that we can develop and use in our music videos. My group consisted of me, Sarah Olivier and Angel Duncil, we all got along very well and all wanted to ensuring the filming was as a high quality as possible. We all had to edit the video individually, so that people including myself got a chance to edit even if they do not feel fully confident with editing. The shots that the video must include was: - Filming a person sitting down with the monitor window open and with another camera film the monitor. - Cloning editing task - Depth of field task - Reverse shot - Wheelchair/tripod - Lego stop motion - Split screen - Make someone colour and the background black and white
Evaluation What I think was successful: As a group we worked very well together and all spread the work of filming the video equally. I also believe that because I took extra time to edit the video, the editing is good and I have been able to add extra editing techniques (e.g. Split screen and colour correction).
What could be improved for next time: I think that the cloning shots of Angel was very difficult to edit and so I did not achieve the full cloning effect that I wanted, which slightly ruins the entire effect of the video. Also to improve this preliminary task was the lighting throughout the video changes, so if we would of had more time to film we could have ensured the time of day was right for the sunlight we was looking for. The stop animation is also a little too slow so if i would of had more time I would of increased the speed that each stop animation is on the screen.
After evaluating my preliminary task I decided that I wanted to re-shoot the cloning shot, so in my spare time me and Megan Thomas grouped together to film this and then I edited it into my original Banana Phone, replacing the first cloning shot. I carefully edited this and the final product is a lot better. It helps make the entire video of higher quality.
In today's lesson we learnt about cross-media branding which is a form of cross-promotion in which promotional companies commit to surpassing traditional advertisement techniques and decide to include extra appeals to the products they offer. The material can be communicated by any mass media such as e-mails, letters, web pages, or other recruiting sources. We analysed Daft Punk and Pharells song 'Get Lucky', we watched the album teaser trailer, looked at posters, album cover and official music video. comparing them and seeing similarities and differences between. Below i have analysed a couple of artists/bands the same way we have done in lesson today.
1) Wretch 32
Album Cover: Black and White
Music Video- Don't Go
After looking through Wretch 32 media branding it is clear to me that there is a huge link between his official music video, album teaser and album cover for his new album 'Black and White'. Although Wretch 32 has carried this link through the entirety of his branding phase he has not made a link in the same way as Daft Punk. The main link I can clearly see when looking at the branding for 'Black and White' is the lighting and costumes on all branding Wretch 32 is seen wearing only black and white colours. Also in his official music video for 'Don't Go' mise en scene and props continue this theme, when a black and a white flag are carried in the video. This is a monochrome theme and in the album cover it is in all black and white with no colour, this makes the album seem very dark and gives the impression that it will be very emotional. Also another similarity throughout the branding process for Wretch 32 is that he himself is seen as an actor on all media products used to promotes his album. He has his own unique style and wears all black, this is shown throughout the album cover, album teaser and official musical video.
2) Rihanna
Album Cover
Teaser Album Trailer
Official music video for 'Kiss it Better'
In a similar way to the branding of Wretch 32's album, Rihanna uses mise en scene such as colours to help carry a theme throughout all aspects of her branding. As seen in her album cover and album teaser trailer the colour red is dominant without as a symbol of power. Also the editing technique of this branding is very unique all the cuts are very slow pace this shows how Rihanna as an artist is very raunchy and sexy in the way that she wants her music to be consumed. In these videos and poster they have used wind machines to move fabrics, clothing etc. By creating this it shows Rihanna is being the main character and subject, this makes her image seem powerful and womanly. Although one difference between the branding of Rihanna's album 'Anti' is that Rihanna is seen in both the album teaser trailer and the official music video of 'Kiss It Better' but then in her album cover she is not on the front or on the cover at all. Instead is a child, this was the case to promote that her album is not just all about herself and may because she wants to reach out to a wider audience.
Once we have settled into our groups, we were asked to find 3 songs that we liked and think would work well for our group. so we researched songs that do not have a music video. I chose three songs that are all sung be women, so if we choose one of these songs it must be a female performer. The first song that I have found is Lenka by Unique. This is a pop song and it is very happy and playful, this means that I can see the visuals as the artist going on a fun day out.
The second song that I have found is Gemini by Anne-Marie. This song is a very chilled song and has the potential to fit with some very interesting visuals. The only problem I can see with this song, is that the artist has a very unique style of singing so this may be difficult for our performer to mimic.
The third song that I have found is Candy by Doja Cat. This is fun song and I have a lot of visions for a possible music video. It would be in a busy club scene but the camera focuses on our artist.
What qualities are needed in a good music video production?
- Team work is very important when working on a good music video production, everyone should know their role and balance the work load to help relieve pressure off of one person.- Planning is key to help make a production as good as possible, this means ensuring the shooting schedule, story board etc. is complete before filming begins.- Mise en scene, camerawork, editing and sound are all very important aspects that need to be perfect in order to make the music video become effective and realistic.
How will this year's music video differ from my film opening?
- This year' music video will differ massively from my film opening because it will be more challenging in many aspects, due to more advanced editing, more performing/acting and a longer video being made.
- Also last year my film opening was filmed mainly in one location whereas to make a music video more exciting and different it may need to be in multiple more interesting environments.
Latymer High School- Ava Ruskin- He Wasn't There
I have done some research to help me see previous music videos made by all different schools, including Latymer High School and Hurtwood House. Below is a music video that I have and think is very interesting called 'He Wasn't There'.
This is a screenshot of a scene I really like in this students video. I like this due to the carefully planned and well executed mise en scene, which fits in well with the pop song genre. It is very simple but also very effective.
This screenshot below also highlights another key aspect that is effective about this video, there is only one girl singing and she takes up the highest proportion of the screen helping us to focus on her. This means us as the audience automatically know who to draw our attention to.
