Teacher Feedback – screen castify

After constructing our draft 2, Mr Gregson did a screen castify to show his feedback on our music video. Below is the screen castify and I have summarised the key points of what he likes and suggestions for improvements.

 

Positives:

  • Lovely footage thatĀ  is in focus and well lit
  • Perfect lip-syncing
  • Clear narrative
  • Great use of mise en scene with the make up, hair and mirror as a prop
  • Lovely close ups and angles. He really likes the extreme close up of the eyes
  • Small details such as blinking in time with the music
  • Good comparison cuts near the end
  • Good use of the black and white filter
  • Likes the split screen

Things to be improved:

  • Possibly make the taking the make up off and letting the hair down later on in the middle. Maybe at the half way mark or just after.
  • Switch the clips at the beginning so that it starts with a close up of our star.
  • Possibly make some of the clips a bit shorter to add a bit more variety
  • Switch the clips of Anya at 2:16 so that it goes from a mid shot to the close up rather than the other way around
  • The lense flare nearer the end is a bit bright so either move it to a different position on the screen or take it away.
  • Lovely ending but make it last longer. Don’t fade it out so quick.

Overall we are really happy with the feedback we have been given. We will now work on our music video and use the constructive feedback to build on it and make it even better. One of the main changes that we will use is making the transition when they take off their makeup and hair later on in the video. This will impact our music video in that it will enable the full make up to be seen longer and hopefully impact our audience and emphasise how unhappy the people are at that point in time. We will also switch some of the clips around so that it goes from a longer shot to a close up. This will also create more impact as it is going into our models rather than backing away.

Music Video Draft 2

Below is our draft two of our music video. It now includes both our performance and narrative shoot.

What went well:

  • We are now very happy with our lip syncing. The timings are working very well and it looks as though our star is really singing.
  • We have parallel edited our narrative and performance so that there is a good mix of both throughout.
  • You can clearly see the message that we are trying to tell because of this cross cutting and you can see the progression of our star putting on the makeup and the girls taking it off as the music video moves on.

What we need to do:

  • We need to add filters to our music video to add to the full make up look and Instagram effect that we aim to achieve. For the performance side, the filter will be made more as the music video progresses to show how stars have to present themselves in a certain way. For the narrative side, the beginning will be where the filter is strongest and the end will be the most normal to show how we shouldn’t have to hide behind make up and hair to be happy.
  • We need to add transitions to make the cuts between clips smoother and more flowing. For example there is a section where we show Anya and Chloe from their full makeup look to their complete natural state so we will add a transition here to blend these two clips together to show the transition from one extreme to the other.

Specsavers Feedback

During the production of our music video, Lenny (a professional in editing from Specsavers) came and had a look at our music video and gave his feedback on it. Overall, it was all very positive. He really liked the concept of our music video and was impressed at the quality of the film that we had gotten. He also told us that the way we had constructed our narrative and performance filming together was well done.

During our time with Lenny, it was very useful as he showed us how we could apply adjustment layers to our music video to add a filter to a group of cuts. He showed us a way of adding multiple without effecting all of our film. In addition to this, he also showed us how we could gradient it throughout to make it increase/decrease as the music video went on. This is by using something called key frames in the opacity setting. He showed us how to adjust the colour curves to create the filtered look. He altered the blue which definitely created a look that we liked and will apply. This was really useful for me and Zoe to learn as it is going to make it so much easier to add filters to our clips to create the “Instagram” styled look we want to achieve. Being able to gradient it is also extremely useful as we want to show our models getting less made up and our star more made up as the video progresses.

As well as showing us how to add filters to our music video in adjustment layers, he also showed us how we can arrange our workspace so it is more organised and easy to access what we need. This is useful as it makes our lives so much easier when adding new clips in.

 

Shoot 2 Reflection (Narrative)

Overall, we are very happy with how our narrative shoot went. We shot in the white studio using our models Chloe and Anya. We shot them all natural (no makeup and hair down), then with full make up and hair and then also them removing it and letting their hair down. We managed to film all of this using lots of different angles and techniques.

POSITIVES FROM OUR SHOOT:

  • We managed to use lots of different camera angles which will add interest and excitement to our music video.
  • We managed to add lots of movement when filming such as panning and zooms. We did this using hand held.
  • The mise en scene of the make up and hair worked really well. The glitter which we used under the eyes was very effective in the videos.
  • The white tops which we asked them to wear worked really well as it allows full attention from our audience to be focused on their hair and makeup.
  • We got lots of clear film with good lighting. The use of soft box lights helped us with this.

NEGATIVES FROM OUR SHOOT:

  • A few pieces of film were not completely in focus. Fortunately it was only the odd few so we still have lots of quality film to work with.
  • When doing the panning, we used the camera as hand held. In the future, we could use a track to do this to make the footage even steadier.

Design Skills 2

Whilst using Premier Pro, we have learnt many new techniques and skills to help add to our music video. Below are some examples and how we have used them to improve and positively impact our music video.

 

NESTING

We used nesting when separating our narrative and performance shoots. Doing this enabled us to edit the pieces of video as a group rather than doing each clip individually. The enabled our clips to carry continuity throughout as the filters we created were then the same on multiple clips rather than trying to make each one the same. This allowed our video to flow more and be more pleasant to watch.

ADJUSTMENT LAYERS

We found that using adjustment layers very useful. They enabled us to add as filter to multiple clips which enabled continuity and more flow to our film.

KEY FRAMING

We found key framing our adjustment layers especially useful. We used them to make our filters opacity change throughout the music video. For example, at the start, the adjustment layer on our performance side was 0% however by the end it had increased to 100%. This opacity went up in stages using the key frames to show the build up of makeup and the Instagram look. On the narrative side, the key frame made the filter’s opacity to 100% at the beginning and decreased it in stages to 0% by the end. This helped to portray the message that you shouldn’t hide behind make up and hair and that being yourself brings the most happiness. We used the setting of ‘hold’ to the key frames to make them go up in steps rather than a gradual gradient. We did this to show more of a change to our audience.

CURVES

We used theĀ  curves tool when editing the Instagram styled look. We mostly adjusted the blues in the dark areas to create the man made styled Instagram look. We also adjusted the saturation and contrast which helped to brighten the lighter areas and darken the shadows. This helped to create an edited look which helps to portray an Instagram filter. For the artist, the curves were adjusted at the highest level at the end when she is made up and the opposite for the girls; the curves were altered most at the beginning when they are most made up.

Overall whilst editing our music video, we have learnt many new skills and techniques which have enabled us to positively benefit our music video. We have learnt how to use adjustment layers, add effects and transitions to our clips, create a split screen, and much more. All of these techniques have helped to portray our narrative to our audience and help to keep them engaged and impacted by our message.

Video Narrative Story sheets

Before our narrative shoot, we made story board sheets with what we wanted to show at each stage of our narrative and the type of shots that we aim to get at each stage. In scene one, you can see that our models are dulled to the nine with makeup and their hair is neat and also done up. They are quite unhappy. However this contrasts to the final scene where their hair is down and they have natural/no make up at all. They are happy and seem more free and relaxed. This mise en scene helps to portray the message that being your true identity brings the most happiness.

Through our narrative, we want to impact our audience and teach them that being true to yourself is the most important and that hiding behind a false identity does not bring you happiness. With the use of “ordinary” people, we hope that our audience can relate to the people featured in our music video, making it seem more intimate and more personal. This way our message will be more directed and hopefully create more of an impact as it is personal cinematography. In the modern world, it is seen as very normal to wear thick makeup and have to ‘dress to impress’ however does this really bring true happiness? Having to make yourself look a certain way can be so tiring and it is just hiding yourself. We want to express how important it is that being yourself is what matters and that you shouldn’t be judged by the way you look.

Narrative Development

In preparation to filming our narrative side of our music video, it was important that we understand what we want from it. We have made a step outline which shows the different stages of our narrative, the themes that are tied throughout and how we are going to present these and tell the story.

Design Skills 1

We are using Premier Pro to edit our music video on. Premier Pro has been very useful in adding small details and helping to portray our narrative and theme of our music video. Below are some examples of the editing techniques and tools which we used.

Basic Correction:

This was used quite a lot when editing our music video. For example, on the outside shots, we increased the exposure to make the lighting and colors brighter. This helps to portray the feeling and message of freedom and happiness. We also used the same type of editing on the inside shots. We decreased the exposure (increasing the blacks) and increased contrast to reinforce the feeling of entrapment and the idea of unhappiness.

Transitions:

We found that this was very useful when editing our music video as it enabled us to add interesting transitions that allowed one clip to cut and run smoothly into the next. The “dip to white” transition was especially useful in conveying the idea that a camera was flashing and taking a photo; representing the paparazzi’s photographing our music star.

Filters:

The filters were also very useful in portraying our overarching theme. At the beginning, a brighter filter was used (in the outside location) to show how our star is free and happy however this contrasts to the end when we use a black and white filter. This was chosen to show the unhappiness felt by our star when they are all full of make up and restricted from showing their true self.

Effect Controls:

We used the effect controls to mainly scale, position and rotate our shots. For example, we zoomed in on some of our shots to emphasize what we were showing. For example at the end, we have zoomed in on her eye which is dulled up with glitter and make up. This emphasizes how our artist has changed the way she looks to impress her audience. During the paparazzi sections, we used the rotational tool to position the pieces of film at different angles, emphasizing how stars are always trapped by paparazzi and that the have no space or time to themselves.