Category Archives: Music Video

This is our final Draft for our music video:

As you can see below we have now finalised and published the last draft of our music video. Our music video we hope and believe is entertaining, conventional and genre supportive for our audience. We hope we have given the audience both what they are expecting and more from this music video. 

Our music video is inline with the key repertoire of elements in a traditional music video for example; lip syncing, editing to the beat, transitions, jump cuts, different camera angles, a variety of shot distances, range of location and good MES. We included these key conventions in our music video to make sure we understand what the audience are expecting, without including the repertoire of elements we would be at risk of the audience rejecting the text and not watching or liking our music video.

To be ‘ the same but different ‘ in our music video we used heavy MES in our performance. This was a risk as we hadn’t seen it much in our genre before however we were confident we could make it work for our target audience. We used both narrative and performance however due to our long storyline we now agree our music video is more narrative based then performance. However upon reflection if our music video was narrative heavy then the storyline would not make sense and the audience would reject the text. Both our narrative and performance had very different structure and costuming however we believed this to have worked well. 

The stars are represented as extraordinary as Dryer proposed in his theory as they are seen as strong confident and playful individuals in the performance with the bold and eye-catching shirts portrayed. The stars in the narrative (the animals) are seen as sad and helpless until the girl helps them get back on their feet playing with her and having fun as their home is not being destroyed.

Our group is happy with our music video and what we have produced and are confident it is how we want it to look. We believe that it follows the traditional conventions of a pop music video as well as adding our own takes when possible. We enjoyed this project and hope that our audience will enjoy it.

This is our 4th draft of our music video which has various improvements form the last feedback and daft 3. These improvements include:

• Cut to a close up as soon as he starts singing
•  included more close ups of the instruments
• Included more close ups of the singing including a reshoot of close-ups
• corrected sequencing of animals
• corrected the guitar playing
• Zoomed in on fingers moving to add more context
• cut into action more 
• added quicker cuts as the music video progresses
• corrected repeating shots
• re-framed the animals cheering
• fixed the 180 rule

Also from our draft 4 we got additional feedback from multiple people studying the same course as us, this feedback is below:

‘I think you did a good job with the variety of shots and distances particularly your narrative film. Your video also includes MES which goes with the genre and general feel of the music. However some things I think you can improve on is having more prominent lip syncing to allow the viewer to see the actor singing the song. I have noticed there are some parts where you are not cutting to the beat of the music.’ Travis 

After watching your music video, here’s some peer feedback:

What Went Well:

• You have included some great shots of the band in the performance.
• I especially liked the editing of the color-changing shirt to the beat.
• I understood the narrative at the beginning.
• Great mise-en-scene; use of animal costumes and setting of a real estate agent.
• You executed the transition from the guitar to the performance really well
• Good use of various camera movements and shots taken from different angles/distances.

Improvements:

• Black cuts are the beginning are distracting and don’t add much to the video.
• Didn’t understand the significance of the posterize, cartoony effect on animals.
• Some blank bits occurred, but I assume you are planning on adding in more clips.
• There’s a clip, a close-up of the bass guitar, where there is no movement of the performer playing it at the beginning when the music is playing; so maybe cut the beginning of that clip so that the performer is consistently playing it.
• Girl running away – the color changes in the clip of the slow-motion run so make sure to apply the same attributes to both clips.
• Clips at the end need stabilizing.

But overall it was a good video.

Lana DG

• On genre, all costumes match each other. 
• All shots are steady, and the pans are stable too.
• Some lip syncing but could be more consistent and constant throughout video (more close ups)
• Variety of locations for performance and narrative which all link to the story well. 
• Add more close ups for the performance scenes, cut in and out of close up more frequently. (in our video we used the crop tool if we didn’t have a close up filmed)
• Multiple angles concerning the animals and when the young girl is playing with them, this adds depth and conveys the genre. 
• Although you move locations for the performance the angle is always straight on. Could you add any side angles of performance or low/high. 
• I think there is a good amount of movement in the narrative which tells the story line. 
• Acting of animals and the young girl tells a credible story. 
• Shorten the clip of the girl ripping the paper – as you see that she drops it.
• A good amount of close up shots for the instruments.
• Plenty of long shots throughout.
• You could also add some close up shots of maybe the animals feet as they walk ? To add more variety. 
• More close ups – use the crop filter if there are none filmed, we did this frequently in our video.
• A variety of instruments used and edited to the beat well.
• More close ups – use the crop filter if there are none filmed, we did this frequently in our video.
• A variety of instruments used and edited to the beat well. 
• The colour filter used during the ‘count in’ adds character and looks really good.
• I think you could do more of these or something similar to add vibrance – maybe on the other clips of Emma to make it cohesive.
• You have cut from clip to clip on beat, including where there is use of instruments. 
• The transition using the ukulele is really good. 
• Add more transitions using effects to make the movement between performance and narrative consistent. 

Costume and location.

• Transition from one performance scene to another using ukulele.

Narrative and how the story line is addressed.

• There is a clip of Emma where she is speaking/lipsyncing but it is not in time to the lyrics. (2:35mins

Jemima

We have taken all of this feedback on board and although we may not agree with every aspect of the feedback we have definetly found it helpful. We will take these improvments for our final draft.

In addition to our feedback from both specsavers and our teacher we have produced a draft three We have taken in the initial issues and problems with our draft 2 in order to improve our music video. 

As you can tell from our draft 3 some things we have started including are:

• Adding contrast lighting in some clips 
• Editing to the beat 
• Using effects in places that may seem a bit boring at first glance 
• Cutting down long clips 
• Being initiative with effects and video cuts 

Screen castify:

As part of our new feedback on our draft 3 our teacher has produced a screen castify over the top of our video. This will be one of the last pieces of feedback we will be given, therefore it is important we use it to our advantage and edit our video using the following pieces of advice:

• Cut to a close up as soon as he starts singing
• Try and include more close ups of the instruments
• Include more close ups of the singing including a reshoot of close-ups
• correct sequencing of animals
• correct the guitar palying
• recreate fingers moving to add more context
• cut into action
• add quicker cuts as the music video prgresses
• correct repeating shots
• re-frame the animals cheering
• fix the 180 rule

This week we had digital designers and other creative industry visitors attend our class and give us feedback on our videos so far and mark out our next step to having a successful high mark music video.

Some of the pointers they gave us were as follows:

• They showed us how to put in keyframes when editing for us to be able to slow down a clip easier and zoom in to edit in a bigger and easier way 
• Organisation of our folders and footage for example specsavers showed us that when they do a music video like ours for a company they separate out the storyline (narrative) from the performance. They do this by putting them on different tracks and colour coordinate them in order to have them neat and tidy as well as them being easily establishable. 
• How to add more special effects for example having a split screen of each instrument to make the clip we have already used unique and stand out 
• Zooming in while adding an effect can be helpful as it means you have variety of shots in a small clip 
• They also helped us by showing us different ways we can add our vision of making the animals in our music videos animated which adds a new and improved element to our music video 
• Creating masks and mask paths for our animation to make it easier to cut the animals out

It was very interesting, helpful and definitely rewarding having a new face look at our music video and give us fresh ideas for how we can edit it to the best of our ability. This will help us in our post production stage as we can easily adapt these targets and helpful tips to the next elements of the course. 

our targets are to:

• Use some studio shots to have more of a variety in atmosphere and setting 
• They also agreed with us that we don’t have enough close up so we may have to either re-film a few closeups of the animals or zoom in and add an effect to give the element of close up but also not have the image blurry.
• Create a more interesting feel to the music video by adding special effects and different transitions

During the summer my group prioritised filming for our music video as we saw this as our target for summer and a  very important thing to do for our future selves in order for us to not fall behind. We filmed  in various locations and costumes as well as filming in an array of times in the day to best suit everyone in our group and our actors. The first week back at school we have worked hard to produce a 2nd draft of our music video making sure our work over the summer complies with our chosen genre, goals and target audience. Our group made sure we had a good song to edit to the beat too and although there is some work to be done in some places in order to get it to the standards we want it to be, we are proud of what we have produced in the summer and the first week back.

Self assess criteria checklist

Once we had completed our second draft we had to mark our own work against the criteria in order to create a successful music video and obtain a higher grade.

From doing this activity personally I can see that our group has a the following targets to improve and add in various spots:

Improvements

• Improve our tripod skills making sure to reshoot multiple times in order to create multiple videos of high quality
• Making sure we have all of the shot distances and angles as in some areas you are watching expecting it to cut to a POV or a framing shot and we didn’t film it in this way
• We are wanting to add more video transitions and effects into our music video however this week was just about getting a overall narrative and performance draft of our music video
• Making sure on shoots we are always obtaining the 180 rule and the depth of field etc

What went well:

• We filmed loads of footage over summer so have a choice of what to use 
• We had planned our shoots by completing risk assessments etc
• We only had one opportunity to shoot with our costumes and a short period of time however our footage is still a good standard
• Both the performance and narrative shoots work well together 
• We edited on the beat effectively 
• We have tried and started to experiment with the effects on the software 

By taking a step back and assessing what went well and what we need to improve we now have clear objectives of what we need to improve and change. This will be helpful for when we go back to editing our 3rd draft and final draft.

From our second draft we got feedback from our media teacher her feedback is as follows:

• Change a cut to edit so the beat drops on the cut to clip 
• Make sure all videos are lined up in the correct sequence 
• Do more close ups 
• Add in some more exposure and brightness in some areas as shots are too exposed or not exposed enough 
• Sharpen some clips in order to get the blur out

Our group found that our music video shoot suddenly was dawning upon us; however we had already done most of the preparations needed by completing a production meeting agenda as well as a risk assessment. Both of these essential planning documents helped our shoot become stress free and easy to accomplish with plenty of time to gather extra shots needed including a location change. We had also as a group collected a narrative story board on slides which helped us plan and think about what best shots would convey our narrative as well as making sure we had every type of shot we needed.

Photos from the shoot:

What went well:

• Everybody had brought the correct props and outfits 
• We sticked to our storyboard with shots to make sure we gained every shot needed
• The camera was maintained on a tripod for the majority of our shoot to make the shots as steady as possible 
• All models and actors arrived eager and happy to take part in our video 
• Due to us doing it in the morning we had natural lighting 
• We got plenty of footage 

Targets for our next shoot include:

• We forgot our tripod for the office shoot howere with quick thinking and teamwork we were able to create a make-shift tripod which worked effectively.
• We have a lot of stiff shots and would like to add some movement shots into our music video to make it less stiff and boring 
•  Although we planned effectively wwe could’ve been more exact with the shots as we were a bit stuck for ideas on the shoot
• Due to us being outside the lighting may need slight adjusting in editing mode 
• Plan and make sure as everyone is aware what is happening and where to avoid confusion or difficulty in the shoot.

Upon reflection our shoot was very successful. We gained shots we wanted as well as shots we didn’t need, however we can include in spaces that may be blank or empty. We worked effectively as a team. We would all agree planning effectively gave us a huge advantage especially due to us filming in the holidays where we all had a long break from using this equipment.

We made a storyboard with images and a range of shots we are going to include to help us out with our shoot for our narrative. This will be useful as we all know what is happening and when, but in more detail then the production meeting agenda. This storyboard was created so we are all clear on what we are trying to create in our video and how we are planning on doing this to create narrative sense.

A list of thing we will make sure we include in order to create a succesful narrative half to our music video is:

• sequencing
• narrative structure
• narrative themes
• cut to close up
• reaction shots
• variety of shot distances

These conventions will help us to not dissapoint the audience and give them what they are expecting for our music video.

In order for us to be able to go out of school on thursday for our shoot we needed to complete a risk assesment to minamise or eliminate any dangers or hazzards we may come across.

click on image to see PDF

This is our final risk assesment signed and completed by us and our teacher. This means we cannot change anything on this piece of paper as the stuff written is there to protect us on our shoot.

Click on image to see PDF

For our first narrative shoot it is important we have a PMA as this keep us organised and lets the team filming, acting and supervising to understand where we are at what times. This also helps everyone understand where they need to be and what they need to bring incase they forget or have had recent absences that leads them to not know what they need, when they need it and where thye need to bring it to. This would also help us as if our teacher needs to get hold of us we have the school phone number to gain contact easily.

After our shoot had completed we moved onto our post-production stage of editing and making our music video clips fit together to make a music video with the normal conventions. To edit our music video we are using PremierPro.

Upon reflection here is what we did well and what we need to work on:

What we did well:

• Aswell as doing mid shots and other essential shots we tried interesting transitions as shown above
• Our editing was done to compliment the music (edited to the beat)
• We made sure we didn’t randomly cut to different locations we recycled and reused clips to compliment our genre
• We all had a go at editing clips to help us gain a deeper understanding of how the softwarae works
• We managed to craete a music video that is interesting to a certain extedn just absed on performance

what we could’ve done better:

• Used more close- ups of the instruments to add a sense of dynamic and a change to midshot and longshot angles
• Make sure there are no unwanted people or objects in the back of our shot as this will create a new place for people to look and attract their attention away from the main star
• Made sure the camera angles complimented with the positioning of the band in certain shots and angles
• In order to keep our audience engaged we could do a different transition shot or swap between clips quicker and more efficiently to gain interest and attention from our target audience.

This will help my group when it comes to filming our narrative and editing our music video alltogther as we know what works with our genre and also have key factors we know we have to work on for example taking more angles then needed incase we cant use a previous shot. This will cause us less issues as we won’t have to reuse any clips that rae blurry or that have been disrupted.