After our initial filming shoot we were lucky enough to have visitors from a proffessional company who work within the industry of editing. Familiar with the software we are using to edit our videos, they were able to give us an insight of all the tools available within the software, Premiere Pro. Already knowing knowledge of the software was helpful when it came to editing our first rough cut but with the help of someone who knew the programme with confidence to answer any questions and teach us some short cuts was extremely helpful and great advice. This has enabled my group to gain huge amounts of confidence with Premiere Pro making our editingless stressfull by having a wder range of knowledge.

What We Learnt:

• How to creaate different folders in order to keep our project more organised.
• The way in which you are able to slow down a video to create a slow mo effect.
• How to colour corrcect the shots and add different effects which could then be used in different segments if wanted.
• The many different shortcuts within the programme.
• Different frame rates and how we can possible change this in order to create different speeds.

Speaking to Lenny, a proffesional from Specsavers, about our plans for our music video e.g narrative, performance, location ideas, we were able to gather an opinion from someone outside our production group. He suggested some ideas for our video with what he though would work well and what we could possible adapt. Seeking opinions from different people can be extremely useful as it is almost a way of seeing what your audience may want to see and what they would not. From this discussion we were confident with our ideas and knew that what we had decided to do was both conventional and intresting helping us to have clear and direct path of where we want our project to take us.

When the day of our first shoot came around for our production team every aspect ran really smoothly due to our organisation and communication within our group. We ensured me had all of the equipment when arriving, created our MES before filming in order to create the atmosphere we wanted. Due to this our first shoot was very successfull in which we managed to get a variety of different shots and angles that we can use within our final piece.

Our production group arrived at our first location (saints bay) at 9am where we filmed the majority of our shots, after this we moved to our second location (a field outside Fort George) where we remained for the rest of the day. All of out team was there to take it in goes of filming ensuring that everyone is involved and has a go at this aspect. However I, as the performer, was unable to do so but will therfore be taking part in filming the narrative aspect of our video.

Images From Our First Shoot:

What Went Well:

1. When the day arrived our team was organised with all of our props, cotumes, make up and other aspects ready due to the communication in our group.
2. We used our time wisely and effectively.
3. We were able to get a variety of shots and angles to use within our video.
4. The scenery and props used worked really well with our genre and location.
5. I, as the singer, was confident within the perfromance and acting in order to create a realistic video as well as knowing all the lyrics to our chosen song.
6. Each group member cooperated well and bought new ideas as we went along.
7. We have displayed our star image well and how we wanted too.

What Could Be Improved:

1. The lighting displayed from the background was too bright in some shots and could not be ajusted as we could then not see the performers face.
2. Although we got a variety of shots there could still be room for experimenting more with the camera and trying other shots.
3. The wind was very strong and therefore was sometimes hard for the performers face to be shown due to hair blowing.
4. In some shots due to our location, some of our production team are seen within the clips and therefore will need to rerecord.
5. When not using the tripod the camera tended to shake a little which we will focus on when it comes to filming more clips.
6.  When it comes to shooting again we would like to involve the props more e.g the fabric.

From reflecting on our first shoot towards our music video we have been able to gather elements we need to think about when it comes to fliming again in order for it to become even more successfull. This is extremely important to do as it allows us to know what we did wrong and ways to go about fixing different issues. Our group has collectively decided to film more footage for our performance aspect of our video to get a high quality, professional video whilst allowing us to have a wider range of choice when editing. When it comes to doing this we will make sure we focus on these improvments with the main one being the lighting within some shots.

When it comes to running our first shoot within our production group for our music video it is vital that each member knows exactly what they are responsible for on the day. This allow us to have clear idea of how to run our shoot, enabling us to use our time wisely and efficiently.

Our Groups Production Meeting Agenda For Shoot 01

 

Involved within the document above is every aspect we need to consider for our shoot. We have decided who will be responsible for each props, costumes, make up, hair and equipment. When discussing with my group I have been allocated to be the model within the performance shoot as well as being responsible for my own costume, hair and singing props. By allocating these elements to our group members allows us from an earlier date to be organised and proffessional when it comes to the day of our shoot.

 

To ensure the safety of our production team when shooting for our music video it is extremely important to plan ahead for possible hazards we may come acroos during the shoot. Our group has organised a risk assessment for our perfromance shoot to communicate how we would deal with possible situations to make sure we are completley safe and nothing goes wrong, allowing us to make sue of our time effectively and smoothly.

Risk Assessment For Our Performance Shoot:

Above is our risk assessment for our first music video shoot involving different safety aspects we have thought about. The document involves where we will be at all times so out teacher is able to check up on us in case anything goes wrong. It aslo includes any possible dangers we will come across; we noticed that at saints bay there are cliffs surrounding the area so to ensure our safety we will keep well away from them. The rest of our shoot doesnt not involve any hazards however we will still take extra caution when out on our performance shoot.

To form and portray a positive and meaningfull star image within a music video it is necassary to research a star within our chosen genre to gather how they are represented within the media. From doing this we will be able to analyse the meaning behind these media texts; articles, images, quotes and social media, in order to gather ideas and show this towards our star within our production of a music video.

A Canva To Show How Emeli Sande Is Represented Within The Media:

Advancing On What All These Media Appearances Mean:

For this task I have accumalated a variety of different forms of media appearances that our star for our chosen song, Emeli Sande, has been represented through in order to form her star image and metanarrative. Involved within this canva is screenshots from her social media, article appearances, images, magazines and personal quotes from the artist herself. I have discovered that Emeli Sande is represented as a role model and activist towards the LGBTQ+ community, with being a part of the community herself, recently labelling as bisexual. One of the main ways she is represented within the video is through this aspect, creating a positive atmosphere towards her star image. This creation of her profile allows her audience to look up towards her confidence around this topic admiring her bravery and in some circumstances may help others going through similar issues. “I Want Everybody To Know The Full Version Of Who I Am” is a title for an article about Emeli Sande coming out and allows us to see the power she holds amogst this very challenging issue revealing she isn’t afraid of who her true self is, displaying her as dynamic, energetic, influential star.

As a result of digitalisation within the music industry, Emeli Sande is able to represent herself through social media platforms such as Instagram. Social media is an extremely useful way to distribute content and interact with your audience quickly and efficiently. Emeli Sande has a total of 408k followers on Instagram where she uses the platfrom to engage and promote herslef as energetic and friendly person by posting regulary about what she is up to within the industry. As well as this she uses hashtags, ‘#brighterdays2022’ relating to her released song, to promote her work in a positive way gaining a younger audience through the platform. In order to gain a wider audience Sande has also collaborated with other artists such as Labrinth to produce songs, ‘Beneath Your Beautiful’ which connotes a positive message towards it’s viewers. This form of advertising allows a cross over between the two artists audiences to gain a wider and more varied following benefitting both of the artists media products.

Emeli Sande has made many appearances in top magazines such as Pride, House Of Solo, Fabulous and many more. Everything written about her involved within these magazines and texts is shown is a favorable manor towards the artist boosting her career and image within the media. Another way in which Emeli displays herself as kindhearted charitable woman is through charity. Sande has played a concert for Ukraine following the recent events happening there with othe stars; Ed Sheeran, Camila Cabello. Not only does this create a wider audience for herself but it allows her to associated with some of the top stars within the industry increasing her music reputaion as well as being commended for helping others through her job.

Sande is usually featured in elegant and classy clothing as seen in the images above. This allows her star image to have a sense of class and wealth but also adventure and uniquness when involving bright colours & statement pieces. Having this unique style allows her to represent and follow conventions typically seen within the pop genre of music where artists have a fashion style which almost can represent them. Sande carries herself within the media in a positive manor, creating a role model for herself to boost her star image and audience, clearly shwoing she is looked up to within the industry for only ever good reasons.

How Do We Want Our Star To Be Represented:

When it comes to producing our video we would like to demonstrate a similar metanarrative of Emeli Saande but to also include some of our own aspects as well. We would like to represent our star in a positive, powerful, fun manor just like Sande in order for it to follow the conventions seen within the pop genre. However we would also like to add a sense of mystery and strong emotion within our star image to showcase a strong performance aspect within the star itself. It allows our star to have a meaning behind the lyrics and song in order for our audience to accept the text. Following common conventions we will also feature our star in classy clothin to maintain a put together and proffessional look.

We will showcase our star image throughout the repetoire of elments involved in our music vide; make up, costume, high & low key lighting, editing, camera shots and cinematography. In aim of creating our star image in this way we will follow common conventions typically seen within our chosen genre in order for our audience to accept our media text and not to reject it.

To allow us to understand what common conventional shots are seen within our chosen genre for the music video we need to gather research from previous media texts. Below we have designed a padlet, where we have gathered a variety of different shots from music video in the pop genre.

Our Padlet To Show Conventional Shots:

Common Elements:

From viewing and analysing a media text from the pop genre has enabled us to gather common narrative conventions, structure and performance styles, benfitting us by giving ourselves ideas to include within the creation of our own music video. Our group found that within the pop genre the repetoire of elements involved tend to be:

• Narrative Conventions- Tend to focus the video around love, emotion, power, loss and upbeat fun narratives. These narrative allow the artist and song to create a star image through acting as well as displaying a strong meaning towards their audience to ensure they accept their media text.
• Narrative Structure- Commonly feature linear and anachronic narrative structures which tend to switch between pefromance aspects as well.
• Performance styles- Tend to feature the singer as both the performer and actor within the narrative. The performance aspects show a wide variety of locations, shots and costumes to entice the audience. Bright colours are commonly seen as well as exciting locations to help represent the star. During the lip syncing aspect of music videos the star is usually seen using direct mode of adress towards the audience to help them feel envolved within the video.

However although I have picked out these specific aspects within the pop genre they have a wide range of differences depending on the individual artists and lyrics of the song due to conveying different meanings. Within all these elements the post production editing displays different shots and camera angles to convey different meanings as well as to keep the video exciting; tracking shot, close ups, mid shot, long shot, high angle, framing shot and many more.

Now understanding the repetoire of elements involved in the pop genre music videos my group will be able to reflect our knowledge into our music video in order to make sure our audience accept our text with common convetnions they will want to see.

In order to ensure our final plan for our music video is effective and all the different aspects work together it is important to discuss our decisions with out teacher to form other opinions. To show important aspects of music videos such as performance and narrative skills, narrative structure, MES and typical conventions. By having a meeting with our subject teacher to explain our groups pitch has enabled us to pick out key positive and negative aspects about our idea. This gives us targets to consider to allow us run of shoots and organisation skills to be high standard.

Our Final Group Pitch:

 

After finishing our groups final pitch we then went forward to our subject teacher to talk about our ideas allowing us to make sure it all works and then focussing on what could be fixed.

A Video Of A Discussion Of Our Pitch To Our Teacher:

Positives After The Final Pitch:

• The locations we plan to shoot it are uniqie and conventional towards our chosen genre.
• We will be able to display the narrative effectively and well through our planned scenes.
• Through the pitch we were able to expand on ideas making them more effective and visible within our storyline.
• The song choice chosen narrates our narrative well, allowing us to go through the process of producing our music video with a clear plan.
• Our video plan matches up well to our chosen genre showing clear signs of common conventions with room to expand our ideas and make the video unique.
• Our costume ideas allow us to give of a statment making it conventional and unique.

Targets To Consider:

• To consider having a seperate performer and singer to make sure there is no cross over or confusion.
• To ensure there are three clear scenes where we see our actor spereated from other and the ‘real world’.
• When focussing on the ‘party’ scene we need to be careful how we display it in order for it be effective.
• When filming the party scene we need to ensure we are fully prepared beforehand so it can run smoothly and we don’t film to late.
• Before filiming we need to assemble costumes and props to ensure we have everything for our shoots to run smoothly.
• Try not to overcomplicate the video to make sure it is clear and understandable to the audience.

To prevent copyright when producing our music video we have messaged the artist to gain permission to use their song for it. This shows proffesionalism needed within the industry and allowing the artist to understand that we are using her song for educational pruposes only.

In aim of creating a perfect production group when starting this major project of our media course we need to allocate and agree on different aspects that we will come across when producing our music video.

Our Group Agreement:

Creating this document has enabled my group to organise specific aspects that we will be responsible for throughout the journey of producing our final music video. Our group discussed each of our strengths and weaknesses to see who would be best suited to different roles. For myself we decided that I will be responsible for costumes, filming and editing. It’s extremely important to allow each production member to have equal responisbilities and roles in order to ensure that all group member to a sufficient amount of work to make the work load fair. Although we hvae four production members to produce our music video we will split into two pairs when it comes to editing the video in order to ensure that each person edits and contributes to the final piece; therefore we will have two seperate videos.

To ensure that our group is able to communicate reguraly about plans of our music video we will use social media messaging platforms so each group member knows exactly what is happening and when. This is extremely important for the run of the production of the music video so everything runs smoothly in order to use the time we have wisely. Other aspects that we have discussed, possible disagreements, shared documents, post production responsibilities, scheduling shoots, have allowed our group to know everything about the prodction of our music video in aim to produce the best conventional and skilled video we can.

Once being allocated into groups who we will work with going forward, in order to produce a music video we needed to discuss our ideas and opinions to bring together a final pitch of what our music video will involve.

Our Groups Final Mini Pitch and Song Choice:

Why We Chose This Song:

• The song is easily abled to be lip synced to which ensures the video will stay professional
• The lyrics allow us to portray our chosen narrative and perfromance well
• This song is recently released therefore has not been done in A-Level Media Studies before

Within this mini pitch of our groups final idea we have taken on my initial song choice and narrative however we have included and added extra ideas towards it to allow everyone to contribute their opinions. Our final chosen song is ‘There Isn’t Much’ by Emeli Sande which correlates to our narrative of our music video. Lyrics such as, ‘see look at all my stuff, you would think I have enough’ which relates to part of our narrative where she celebrates her birthday with her friends. The lyrics within the video allow us to incolve a linear narrative content with both narrative and performance aspects which are key to the genre of music chosen; pop.

As well as this, our mini pitch features conventions of MES which we will involve in our music video; costume, make up, lighting, shooting loctions and props. We have decided to use a variety of different costumes to create a star image for our actor as well as helping to keep the audeince intrigued as it creates more excitment and difference between each scene. The performance aspect will also feature in a variety of locations to enable ourselves to keep the audience hooked throughout the music video as well as to keep common conventions involved within the pop genre so the audience accept our media text.