Below is my evaluation of the dummy mash up music video of the song ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’ by Justin Timberlake. This evaluation indicates what I have learnt, What I already knew, and my targets for next time. It has really helped me to reflect on what we did in preparation to making our section of the mash up and what I feel we did well and what we need to improve on for our actual music video.

Here is a photo collage that I have produced from screenshots of Jimmy from the production/ filming process:

 

 

• What lessons did you learn about planning and the use of Shot Lists and Production Meeting Agendas? Why are they important when out on shoot?

Through planning I learnt that it is essential to come up with ideas before the shoot day to produce a promising and confident shot day, where all members of the group are fully organised and understand what shots we need to take. Also what props we need to take with us and other equipment. I learnt that making a very detailed shot list is crucial to make a promising video and to collect enough shots to use in the video. I have also learnt that we were very limited for time to shoot, this meaning when it comes the music videos at the end of our coursework to allow longer time to film each shot that we need.

• Plus TARGET:Plan in further detail, every shot and extra shots then we actually need to make sure we have enough footage.

• What should the camera operator be doing whilst filming? 

The camera operator should be making sure shots are in focus, filming as much footage as they can and allow other team members to participate in shot compositions and framing ideas. They should also be nice and clear towards the performers as they could be nervous or unaware of what they are meant to be doing during the filming.

• Plus TARGET: Have enough footage, rather than just bits of a shot to collaborate into one.

• What lessons did you learn about directing people in front of the camera? What information do they need to know about their character / their performance style? How can the director get them to relax and have confidence in front of the camera in order to perform well? 

I have learnt to choose people who already know  how to sing and play instruments and to have confident people, so they are not camera shy or nervous with the filming sessions. Before the filming I believe they should look into the genre of music and learn about their character or performer that they are portraying so that they are fully ready and confident to perform in front of a camera. I also believe the director can get them to relax by giving the clear instructions on what they should be doing and where they should be standing within the frame of the shot.

• Plus TARGET: My target would be to make sure the performer is 100% committed to the role and understands how to perform and he/she is able to change themselves into different people to become the typical character or performer.

• What lessons did you learn about filming the performance for your production?

I have learnt that we need to film the whole song through more than once, in different angles. This will mean we will have enough footage without any worries to fill and produce a whole music video. As we were limited for time we ended up just filming the song line for line rather than all the way through, this meaning we were very limited for the choice of shots when in the editing process.

• Plus TARGET: Film the star at least three time all the way through the song.

• What did you learn about editing and post-production?

I have learnt that it is difficult to have the lip syncing completely in line and matching the song lyrics, however I now know for next time to make sure that my group and I have every moment of the song filmed as a performance. However I learnt that cutting each shot became quite easy for it to fit with the music video, this is because we cut in between the beats, so as a new beat started we would change the camera angle or use a filler shot.

• Plus TARGET: Try our hardest to make lyrics fit in sync with the lip syncing.

• What did you discover about the use of conventional Mise-En-Scene for music videos?

It automatically helped to give the song a clear recognition by the audience to understand what genre our sections of the mash up was. It also helped the actor to get into the mood and feel of what the actual artist/performer would be like and what their personality perceives.

• Plus TARGET: Make sure to contact the performer again the night before the shoot to make sure they are ready to perform and have their mise-en-scene ready for the shoot.

Here is the link to our final dummy mash up of ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’ by Justin Timberlake. This music video has different genres ranging from, disco to rap, female acoustic to male solo pop.

This task has really help me to understand all the different genres to the full, knowing their mise-en-scene, how they are performed and the different types of character that is portrayed due to the speed and tone of the music.

This will help me for my final music video as it has taught me how to match the lip syncing and the song lyrics as one. This task has also allowed me to know which genres of music are easier to produce a music video with than others as we have watched and learnt about all types of genre.

Here is my final edit of the male acoustic part of the dummy mash up, ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’ – Justin Timberlake. Myself and Ben edited a separate section of our genre so that we were able to work closer as a team and produce a different looking video to Louis and Tom.

From filming and editing the dummy mash up I have found that it will help me massively when it comes to making my end of coursework music video. This is because I heave learnt how to link each shot together in a way that matches the beats to the song to keep the audience intrigued and interested in the music video. I now know how to keep the music video fluid, exciting and eye catching through the use of camera angles and general mise-en-scene. Finally I am confident to select particular clothing to match the genre of the music video, in this case, the checkered shirt and sunglasses to emphasise the laid back, ordinary lifestyle that male acoustic musicians aim to live.

For our dummy mash up music video we needed to create a meeting agenda, this helped us organise our shooting time in advance. This meaning we were very organised, having the Mise-en-scene, locations and other props ready to film our star on the 27th of June.

Here is a link to the production meeting agenda:

This is my groups shot list for our section of the dummy music video song, ‘Can’t stop the feeling’. For this task we were asked to look into artists of the same genre, in this case; male acoustic and take screenshots from their music videos to help us to come up with ideas to create our own part of the video.

Here is the link to our shot list:

This task will help to understand different camera movements, eg dollys and pans, editing techniques and over effects of the music video genre. The use of more vintage colourings, soft focuses, depth of field, time of day the video was shot at and the overall appeal towards the audience.

Below is a link to my Pinterest page, showing a typical ‘acoustic male’ star image. The board includes photographs of different acoustic artists, in and out of performance. Each one of these artists plays the guitar and seem to have a relaxed ora about them, wearing casual young looking clothing and they do not seem to have a rehearsed performance when on stage showing they are truly talented and  are able to create their own backing music rather than just a sound track etc.

From this task you are able to see how similar all male acoustic artists are through their ordinary lifestyles shown in all music videos and performances and their general photos on the internet (Pinterest). They are laid back,  genuine, urban and emotional manners towards all of their songs. The paradox of the star shows that male acoustics are normally ordinary in the sense that they start their career busking in the streets, wearing everyday average clothes living normal lives. However they live a extraordinary life, performing in exciting, different places around the world and have a massive fan base of people, who look up to them and admire them.

 

 

To begin our learning of music videos and their conventions we have been set the task to create a ‘dummy music video mash up’ of a song called ‘Can’t stop the feeling’ – Justin Timberlake which is a solo male pop song. Here is a embed link of the music video:

We individually created a mood board to show the particular type of genre that had been selected for us, for example, rock, pop, girl band, rap etc. This would help us set up a overall blueprint for our mash up knowing what ti do, where and when.

For My groups section of the music video dummy mash up, we have been told to look into the genre of ‘male acoustic’. Where we will have to see the iconic and known factors that make a acoustic music video, for example;

-a guitar

-strong meaningful lyrics

-normally casual and laid back performances. etc.

Below is my version of a mood board.

This has helped me to grasp the idea of what exactly is included in a acoustic music video, what MES is used and how the artists portray themselves. I also found out the repertoire of elements for the particular genre of acoustic male, how they normally base their videos outside, having the nature take over the backgrounds to their performance and narrative sections. How the lighting for acoustic music videos are conventionally bright and white.

 

‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’ – Justin Timberlake

This is the song that was chosen for us by our teachers to produce our dummy mash up where we were put into different groups within our class and were given different genres to come up with 00.30 seconds worth of footage to do with the genre.

My group’s genre was solo male acoustic, starting at 2.10 minutes.

Each genre was contrasting each other:

*Pop Girl Group

*Pop Male

*Indie Rock

*Acoustic Female

*Acoustic Male

*Rap

*Disco

Here is the link to the track with all of the different mash up sections, which will bring all of our parts of the different genres together.

Click on the image below to view the lyrics to the song:

Here is my groups section of the lyrics for ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling’ where we have anaylised the lyrics into detail to find out the deeper meaning to the lyrics sung.

 

From this I have learnt how to analyse song lyrics, and gain an understand from the words sung by the artist. This will help for my music video as I have now gain confidence knowing and understanding how different genres work and how they are portrayed.

Below is a music video from a previous A2 Media Studies group. I have analysed this video against the assessment criteria, and below shows my views and opinions.

Bros- Wolf Alice

Holding a Shot Steady

*Throughout the music video, the shots are mainly shot steadily, this is from the use of a tripod, even their movement shots like pans (1.24minutes) show clear use of tripod and hand held apparatus to create a solid music video. However their low angle shot spinning looking up at the trees is not steady, this could be due to the bad weather conditions or no using the correct equipment for the camera to to held steadily.

Framing a Shot

*I really like the framing throughout the whole music video as they have thought carefully about spacing, interesting compositions, (When the main singer is closest to the camera 20 seconds into the video and the rest of the group are spaced behind creating a clear depth of field). I also really like the sections when the main singer is close up to the camera, taking up the main majority of the frame, this shows her dominance and importance to the music video.

Variety of Shot Distances

*The production group for this area of assessment have shown a wide influential range of shots, close ups of the band members in their solos, long shots of the band as a whole, showing their strengths to the full. They use rule of thirds nicely shown at points, 00.7 seconds of the tree at the beginning of the video and 0.38 seconds of the group running up the stairs in the forest.

Appropriate to Task

*You are able to tell the genre throughout the music video through the use of the Mise-en-scene being indie looking and location in the forest. The actors are also very well presented and portrayed in the video as they know what they are doing and when, especially the lead singer as she shows confidence as if she is actually the main singer from Wolf Alice.

Mise-en-Scene Selection

*The mise-en-scene is fairly simple in the music video but very effective, in particular towards the end of the video where the group of friends have blankets looking into the distance at the beach. The star image is clear in this video, being casual but having her own style which makes the music video’s genre seem indie rock.

Editing for Meaning

*The narrative is clear and simple, showing the ‘perfect summer’ with a group of friends. It indicates a day during the summer, making most of their time. There is a clear 50/50 split between the narrative in the music video and the performance. They merge together well creating a fluid exciting and engaging video.

Shot Transitions

*The shot transitions in the music video all flow and fit together really well, in particular the fades between the lead singer head shot and the pink flare in the background. This creating an exciting and indie appeal to the music video. However many shots do have simple transitions between each shot without any interesting fluid changes.

Sound With Images

*I am very impressed how well all of the lip syncing fitted with the music all on point correctly. Each shot changed with a different clear beat in music which helped the video become fresh and clean. However no other added sound was used, this was good as it kept the music video simple and engaging rather than being distracted by other sounds within the video.

Using Titles

*There were no titles used in this music video, which could possibly confuse the audience as they may not know what they are watching and would not be able to find the music video and song again. However having no titles stops the music video from looking tacky or over the top.

I have learnt how important it is to include as much of the assessment criteria as possible to make a fluid, exciting video. I really liked this music video from the students last year as they show a wide variety of camera compositions, movement, distances and framing giving them a strong over all video. This may not be my personal favourite music video from last year however they have included almost all of the criteria needed to make a outstanding music video to keep the audience engaged, and interested in the narrative and performance.

For this task we have examined and deconstructed the Kodaline video of ‘Love Like This’ in further detail than ever before. Firstly is the embedded link to the music video and then my analysation.

Here  is my second detailed music video analysation of the song, Born to Die by Lana Del Ray.

 

From this task I have learnt how to examine songs in a deeper way and understand the emotions and thoughts the artists feels throughout the song.