First cut music video!

 

This is our first cut of our music video.

Main Task: Filming log.

Today we re-filmed our scenes shot in the wood location and I feel like this went very well.

The lighting today was a lot better than it had been previously as there was a lot more sun which meant the camera could pick up on more intricate details. As we are going to be darkening all the shots to make it seem scarier anyway, it does not really matter about the actual sunlight however having it just means that when we do darken the shots it wont be grainy and unfocused.

The problem that this presents is that it may be difficult to match the wood scenes we have just filmed with the old ones, as some may be of a different quality, and this may ruin the continuity of the shots, which is really something we need to avoid.

To combat this we could put all of the wood scenes in black and white, or sepia. As well as being practical this could also enhance our video as both black and white and sepia connotes a different time period, or something a bit surreal and this would work with our apocalypse theme.

Ancillary Task: Digipak-Band Photo

One of our ideas for our Digipak includes a picture of the band. We have decided that we don't want to use a picture of the band for the front cover of the album as we feel this does not really fit in with the genre of music. Although some metal bands do use a photo of themselves it is a more common marketing technique for popular artists as these artists are more generally image focused than metal/heavy rock bands. We instead think we may use a photo of the band for the inside cover as this is quite common for our genre as it still markets them as a band but suggests they are less concious of their image.

To make sure that our photo fits in with the conventions of our genre we have looked at a variety of photos from other bands in the same genre although all slightly different sub-genres.

Lamb of God- Heavy Metal/ New-wave metal.

Lamb of God are a semi-recent band, starting in the 1990s and are mostly known as heavy metal or New wave heavy metal due to their influences from punk rock and hardcore. Known by their 'European-style riffing and throaty vocals.' and are also part of the movement said to be 'bringing heavy metal back into the mainstream.' Other bands like them are Slipknot, Pantera and Machine Head.
They are a good band for us to look at as they have a huge fan base and are a highly thought of heavy metal band, meaning their marketing and branding must be very good at capturing an audience and interesting the target market. They are a similar band to Ravenface and this deconstruction of one of their photos will help when we set up our own shoot.

AC/DC- Hard rock/ classic rock/ heavy metal.

AC/DC are a hard band to put into a genre and have been called many different things but the band describe themselves as 'simply rock and roll.' They are an older band, starting out in the early 1970's but they are still one of the most relevant 'alternative' bands around. Famous for their power chord songs and catchy choruses as well as Angus Young's guitar solos they are one of the highest grossing bands ever. Other bands like them are Metallica, Iron Maiden and Led Zepplin.
As they are one of the oldest metal band to still be going strong today they are a good band to look at as they have been the inspiration for many modern bands and we could perhaps hint to this in our marketing and branding.

Bring me the Horizon- Metalcore/screamo

BMTH are a recent band, formed in 2004. This band are known by their image, which is quite 'emo' and their vocalist, Oli Sykes is considered a 'poster boy for heavy metal.' What is notable about them is that they mix having an attractive image and sex appeal, much like many boy bands and pop artists, with very heavy music. This is interesting as often in heavy metal the band do not focus as much on their image, like their clothes and hair whereas Sykes is known for his heavily fringed hairstyle and own clothing brand.
This makes them a very interesting band for us to look at as they have achieved mainstream popularity by mixing up their image and they have been branded very well indeed. It also makes sense to look at them as they are very recent for today's market. Other bands like them are Aiden, The Devil Wears Parda and As I lay dying.

Black Veil Brides-Rock/PostHardcore/Emo

Black Veil Brides are another recent band, formed in 2006, and they too have an interesting image. Whilst their music is quite often associated with emo and screamo they have an image highly influenced by the glam rock movement, which is quite uncommon in recent times. However they have proved to be very popular even though their image does not quite correspond with their music, a lot like BMTH.  They are famous for their anti-bullying lyrics and for promoting awareness for self harm and depression in teens, which could be why they are so often referred to as 'emo.' Other bands like them are Escape the Fate, Bless the Fall and Falling in Reverse.
They are a good band to look at as their image is unconventional and it will be good for us to see what could work with RavenFace as well, such as the theatrical use of make up.

Main Task: Story Narrative

We have decided to expand on our story narrative within our music video as at the moment it is quite ambiguous as the only clues the audience get is that the band are running away from something through a wood. We have developed our narrative by using old objects such as, a photo in a photo frame that's been smashed, an old pocket watch and a teddy bear, and having the band run past these objects as they lay in the wood.

This gives it a much more recognisable feel of an apocalypse as it is more obvious that something has happened which lead to all these items being scattered around a wood. I also feel that it gives it a much more creepy feel, especially the teddy bear as this normally has connotations of childhood and innocence but as it is dirty and left abandoned in a wood it becomes quite scary.

I think using these objects will give our music video another level and will make it more interesting for the audience as they will now be asking questions about these objects and it will make them more engaged in the video and they are therefore less likely to switch the video off.

Ancillary Task-Digipak: Planning.

As we can't film until the 29th in lessons we have decided to concentrate on our ancillary tasks and have chosen to focus on the digipak first. We have discussed what sort of themes should be explored in our digipak as this will effect what images we use for it. We also looked at some other digipaks online to see what they look like. After thinking of images we thought of content, a lot of digipaks include things like, lyrics from all the songs on the albums, extra photos, thanks from the band, description of the band and things along those lines. We are still not one hundred percent certain on how many of these things, if any at all, we should include but have done some research into it.

Our ideas

Nine Inch Nails Digipak

Main task: Re-filming.

We now have conformation of when we are next filming.

Thursday 29th November- Performance shots.

Saturday 1st December- wood shots.

We are hoping this will be the last time we have to shoot as we have prepared ourselves well so that we know exactly what we have to shoot. 

We also have remembered that we need to make sure the actors wear the same clothes that they did before to make sure there are no continuity errors and so we watched all our footage in lesson and wrote down what they were all wearing to avoid this happening. 

Main Task: Editing

We have now edited a lot of our footage to our song and it has started to look quite good, however it has become apparent that we still need to film more footage as we have some gaps in our timeline where we need new footage. As well as new footage we also need to re-film some shots as although we like the concept of them, the actual shot is slightly out of focus or just isn't quite right. So to combat this we watched our video all the way through last lesson and made a shot list of all the things we need top film. We also contacted our actors to find out when the can film next and we should have our filming schedule soon.

New Shot List
Re-film establishing shot of wood
Film solitary note being played by guitar at start
Re-film vocalist jumping over camera-get the jump in middle of shot
Replace birds eye view shot of band with a better angle x2-creates more enigma
Re-film drum shots- make sure we can sync visuals to audio
Replace band helping guitarist up when he falls- doesn't fit in with genre
Re-film band siking up- make acting believable
Re-film last slow-motion shot of band running away
Film more close ups and mid shots of instruments
Film vocalist singing into camera-close ups
Film guitar battle
Film more close ups in the wood.

Main Task: Editing.

We have now uploaded all footage from both shoots, the car park and wood scenes, and started editing it. Throughout the editing process we have been using a variety of different effects on Final Cut Pro, such as:

• Colour correcter- We have been using the three wheel colour correcter to edit the lighting in our shots, both wood and car park. We are using this effect to dim the shots as they look a bit bright and this is making them appear too happy, which does not fit with the dark and brooding atmosphere we wanted to create. So far we have edited the highlights down to 214, the blacks to 88 and whites down to -12 and this has made them look a lot more gloomy which fits the stereotypical atmosphere in our genre music videos.

• Strobes and Blink- We have decided that we don't want to use the strobe effect that we learnt earlier throughout all of the performance shots as this can get a bit off putting and would draw attention away from our shots and just make people focus on the flashing. For this reason we have only started applying it to certain shots within the breakdown of the song. As well as strobes we have used Blink on its own, which means the shot flashes black and this is also quite effective. The only thing hard about using these effects is changing the speed so that it goes right with the tempo.

• Motion, Scale- We have also used scale to zoom in on our shots on Final Cut Pro and this means that we can cut into certain parts of the shot quickly, without having to film the close-ups separately, which could lead to some continuity errors. Whilst this is good, for extreme close ups we will have to film these separately as the quality of the shots goes down the more we zoom in and we don't want any shots to look unfocused and grainy as this makes them appear more ammature. 

• Speed- We have also been changing some shots to half-speed, such as the opening shot of water dripping. This is because it makes the shot a lot more effective as it makes it seem more dramatic and it means the ripples of the water are easier to see and this corresponds with the pace of the beginning of the song, as it is a lot slower at the start. 

Main Task:Filming Log

Yesterday we went out to our location, a car park, to film the performance aspect of our music video. We had to bring all the instruments with us, including a drum kit, two guitars, and a microphone, as well as amps.
When we first got there the car park was quite busy so we decided to start setting up outside and see how well we could film there, however soon it got dark and people started leaving the car park so we could film in there like we originally planned. Whilst we got some good footage outside that we may be able to use, the majority will be from inside the car park.

I think that the filming went very well although we will probably need to re-film another day so that we get the best possible shots we can, this is because it started getting quite late and it was hard to keep the energy necessary for performance shots up as it got later and people got tired. However we got lots of good footage that we can start editing tomorrow.

Research&Planning: Final Storyboard

This is our finished storyboard, complete with timings, pictures and annotations.