On our second day of filming, we had shooted the scenes for the introduction of our music video. Because we were filming in the dark room in our school, we did not have to go on a particular location which made it a lot easier for all of us incase we had to pick up anything that we had forgotten from the media department or to charge anything that died while filming.
Using the dark room in the art department for this scene, we had previously planned to play around with lights and shadows to make the introduction interesting, which we did. This was challenging as the dark room was not built for filming and as such did not have enough space for us to move the camera around much, however we worked around that and were able to capture some good footage.
Before filming, we came across a problem where we were not allowed to use the professional lights as some students had broken them beforehand. Instead of rescheduling, we had improvised and used the lights on Kimberley's and Iva's phone which was bright enough for the shots we needed. This had meant that our idea of having filtered lights was not possible to do. Instead, what we had done was use silhouettes of writing from projector paper to create interesting shots. We had wrote the title of the song and the lyrics of the first verse. Filming this, we were able to shoot some more cut aways in case we needed to fill up any spaces in the video. Overall, despite our problems, we had all manged to improvise, take up a challenge and achieve a good outcome.
Our first day of filming was successful. Myself and my group had managed to shoot all the shots we needed from our first location which is the forest in Wimbledon Common. This location offered some lovely wildlife and horse riders too, we attempted to capture some riders for cut aways. What we also did was experiment with the camera to get differents shots and angles so that it will be useful for when it comes to our editing. We had started shooting around 2:30 knowing that in a short time it will start getting dark, so what we had done to speed up the process was use two other cameras. Filming at this time also allowed us to capture a beautiful sunset that allowed us to film silhouettes of the trees. For the filming, we had used the schools camera with a tripod which proved to work well for tracking and panning, my camera and Iva's video camera on her Iphone. Using these three cameras not only saved us time, but also allowed us to experiment with the different angles which gave us a good outcome. However, the only downside using three different cameras is the different qualities. We found that the quality on Iva's Iphone was far more better in comparision to the school camera which could give us problems when editing our msuic video.
Sarah Elizabeth Blasko is an Australian singer-songwriter and a musician. After fronting Sydney-based band Acquiesce from the mid-1990s, she developed her solo career from 2002. In 2007, she won the 'Best Pop Release' for What the Sea Wants, the Sea will have at the ARIA Music Awards, which peaked at #7 on the ARIA Albums Chart. In 2009, Her latest album, As Day Follows Night, reached #5and won the 'Best Female Artist' at the ARIA Awards. In 2002, Blasko decided to go solo and wrote/co-wrote material for her debut release which appeared in September, later produced by Blasko with Schneider and Steve Francis. She released and promoted her material independently, with financial assistance from her manager Craig New. She also produced the music video for lead track, "Your Way",which was played on local community radio, and national broadcaster, together with two other tracks, "Will You Ever Know" and "Be Tonight". "Your Way" was featured on new Sydney community radio station 2FBi when it first broadcast full-time. Blasko was signed to Brisbane-based label, Dew Process, which repackaged and re-released Prelusive in March 2003. Due to minor variations in packaging, the earlier independent release is more valuable to collectors.
Deciding what locations we need, we had to find ones which are near by to all of us so that it is less time consuming and more convenient. For our fist location, we have chosen Wimbledon Common in Wimbledon Village. It is a local park that is vast in size and has a variety of beautiful trees and wildlife. We will be commencing filming at Wimbledon Common tomorrow for our outside shots. We had checked to see what the weather was like in order for all of us to decide if we are able to film or not. The weather forecast was set to be mild for December, around 5 degrees which will be good to film in.
Thinking about costume, myself and my group have come up with different ideas of what the star could be wearing in this video. In a music video, it is important for the star to wear a minimum of three costumes and words such as ‘wool’, ‘warm tones’, ‘autumn’ and ‘earthy’ have inspired the costumes that we will use. Therefore we all decided on a simple dress; winter clothes such as, winter coat, scarf, boots etc; and casual wear. We want to portray our star as being simple and natural.
During our planning, we decided to use mirror shots which would allow us to improve on our camera and editing skills. What we did was use YouTube to look at the different mirror techniques we could use for our own music video.
Our star image for this music video has been inspired and influenced from a range of British pop folk artists. Predominantly, from the likes of Laura Marling, the runner up for the song choice, her soft earthy look is similar to what I believe we want to produce for our singer. Laura wears a small amount of make up which looks natural and elegant. Another person we looked at to take influence is Florence Welch from Florence and the Machine. Unlike Laura’s simple and natural look; Florence combines a vaster range of colours and a wider range of textures to her image. Despite their differences, we have used these two because they both have the genuine ‘British look’ and they both exemplify the stars image that we will strive to achieve. In the case of Florence, we will take her glamorous looks however, tone them down to make them more subtle and approachable.
We had contacted Sarah Blasko in order to get her permission to use her song for our music video. We used the social networking site Twitter to message her and we will also be using Facebook and other networking sites to do the same thing. While using Twitter we came across a problem with composing a message. Unlike Facebook, you have a limit to how many characters you use, so we have to make 3 different messages to compose a decent length message for her.
In groups, we started to look into the possible songs for our music video. During the lesson, we used YouTube to show the other member’s the songs that we could use. We looked at about 10 different songs, but were able to cut them down to a final 6.This is the list of our final 6 songs that we will now decide upon.
No Doubt- Just A Girl
Lucy Rose- Scar
Best Coast- Boyfriend
Modest Mouse- Float On One Republic- Say (All I Need)
Laura Marling – Night Terror
Wants to move on but doesn't have the courage to do so
She thought he was different as he had stood out the crowd for her
She is fed up of blaming herself
In this song, the story tells us about a girl who was in a relationship where her partner made her feel guilty about something or that something happened in the past that hasn't been solved. Now after time, she has realised that it was her fault and is fed up of putting up with his grief. She is now ready to face reality because she can now see what type of person he really is and wants to move on, however he is not. She wants to feel happy again, and to do so, she leaves him behind despite her reluctance to forget the past.
What we had done was write down the days myself and the group were available to do the shooting. Doing this time table allowed us to see when is everyone is able to do the shooting.
After deciding our song, What I did was bullet point rough ideas of what could be included in the video. This included the costume, locations, props and shots. Listening to the lyrics of the song, we had all noted down the images and different ideas that we thought of whilst listning. Some of our ideas matched to the lyrics so we decided to use some shots showing this. What we all liked was our moon idea where we could take an image of the moon or even take an image of it and use that and ss a result, we looked at the dates of when the full moon is on Google. The nearest date for the full moon is the 10th of November.
When we started planning for our music video, we listed out the possible songs we could develop on to create the video. from our list, myself and my group did not know which song out of the two (above) to choose from. So what we had done was do a samll survey asking people to listen to the songs and choose which one they like. From our results, 4 people had chosen "We Wont Run" by Sarah Blasko as they had said it will be good to develop on this song which would not need much narrative. Choosing a song that has a lot of narration and meaning would have been time consuming.
c1900 => Edison invents the gramophone in the USA: first shift from music as as a solely live and audiovisual experience to recorded audio on various forms of disc 1920s => Fischinger experiments with sound/vision synchronisation on film 1927 => First sound film, The Jazz Singer (Alan Crosland, USA) 1930s => Creation of first 'soundies' 1939 => Introduction of Panarom 1940s => Peak period of MGM Hollywood Musical 1954 => Elvis Presley records That's Alright (Mama) 1960 => Scopitone introduced in France 1963 => UK's first music TV programme, Ready Steady Go (ITV) 1964 => Top of the Pops TV programme begins (BBC) The Beatles release the film and album, A Hard Day's Night (Richard Lester, UK) 1966 => The Monkees' TV show starts on NBC in the USA 1967 => The Beatles release TV promos for Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields Forever 1975 => Queen: Bohemian Rapsody (Bruce Gowers) 1977 => Saturday Night Fever (John Badham, USA) 1979 => Buggles: Video Killed The Radio Star (Russel Mulcahy 1980 => David Bowie: Ashes to Ashes (David Mallet and David Bowie) 1981 => Pop Clips on Nickelodeon MTV starts Duran Duran: Girls Film (Kevin Godley and Lol Creme) 1983 => Michael Jackson: Thriller (John Landis) Beginning of country music 1984 => Music Box starts in Europe MTV Video Music Awards launched 1985 => VH1 Begins MTV taken over by Viacom Live Aid 1986 => Dire Straits: Money for Nothing (Steve Barron) top video 1987 => MTV- Europe (MTV-E) launched, broadcasting to 1.6m homes Peter Gabriel: Sledgehammer (Stephen Johnson), wins best director award 1988 => MTV-Europe achieves 3.5m subscribers 1989 => MTV- Europe reaches 6.7m homes Live broadcast from Moscow Peace Festival Modonna: Express Yourself (David Fincher), wins best director award 1990 => Madonna: Vogue (David Fincher), wins best director award Launch of MTV- Unplugged 1991 => Madonna: Justify My Love (Jean-Baptiste Mondino) 1992 => MTV Launches The Real World, a fly-on-the-wall documentary following the lives of seven people sharing a New York loft 1993 => MTV launches TV series Beavis and Butthead 1994 => REM: Everybody Hurts (Jake Scott), wins best director award Launch of VH1 in UK Launch of MTV-Europe Music Awards 1997 => MTV UK and Ireland launches as stand-alone channel 1998 => Launch of Celebrity Deathmatch 1999 Fatboy Slim: Praise You (Spike Jonze), wins best director award 2000 => Launch of Jackass 2001 => Launch of MTV Dance
Colin Tilley:-
He was born on June 27, 1988 and is an award wining music video director for interesting entertainment who has written and directed music videos for big artists including Chris Brown, 50 Cent, Lil Wayne, Chipmunk, Wiz Khalifa, Usher and more. He has directed all of Chris Browns singles off his award winning album "FAME". This includes videos such as "Next To You", "No Bullshit", "Deuces" and more. He has also won several awards including video of the year at the 2011 BET Awards for Chris Brown's "Look At Me Now" video.
His videos are cinematic and what I like about them is the use of special effects.
In this Video, Eminem appears in flashbacks in the first three verses of the song, however his presense seems as if it is throughout through the memorial of his fan, Stan. Looking at the basement scene, Stan has re-built Eminem in his basement using the posters and photos which conveys the audience his obsession and the fact that we can hear Eminem rap whilst looking at Stan, this delivers Stan's monologue, and Stan's appearance as a look-alike. This situation echoes many films about obsessive fans such as, The Fan (Ridley Scott, 1996) and The King of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1982).
As soon as the video starts, the audience is forced into claustrophobic rain soaked worlds. Stan has created himself a world in which his obsession has taken over his actions to the extreme that even his girlfriend says to him "Don't you think you're taking this too far?", hence the reason why he comitts suicide. The camera enters a building through window at night in a middle of a song which is significant as this image is repeated again in the last shot where the car plunges off the bridge in a night storm. In the bathroom, Stan his bleeching his hair, transforming himself into an Eminem look-alike. In the style of a horror film, the mise-en-scene with the storm raging in the background, is reminiscent of the killer's lair in Silence of the Lambs (Jonathan Demme, 1990).
Just before the song begins, the first cutaway to the artist himself occurs as we see Eminem, reading a letter as Stan continues writing. The feeling of unease is emphasised when the fragmented cutting and the roving camera is in use. The narrative then developes when we see one of Stan's letters left behind at the office. The character of Matthew is introduced when we are shown a flashback backstage, the victim of the star's apparent lack of interest in his fans, though what the camera shows us which is repeated later from Eminems point of view, is at odds with Stan's interpretation of the scene.
The final sequence begins when Stan's girlfriend finds a photograph where she has been replaced with the star. We are then shown that Stan is speeding with his girlfriend in the boot of the car while he is recording a suicide note to the star who is apparently ignoring him.
As the car sinks, it cuts to Eminem reading the letter, not knowing what has happened. Because the audience has seen a shot of Stan writing a letter, we are again shown a similar shot of Eminem writing a letter, however, to differentiate the two, Eminem is wearing spectacles to give him an intellectual look. As he responds to Stan's letter-writing it in pencil like Stan did- and tells him to seek help, the camera cuts back to the car and then to a cemetery where we see a woman and Matthew in the rain. As we see Matthew's hair bleached like Stan's and Eminem's, it is then the star realises that the tragic story herd on the news must have been from his fan. This sequence unravels with a montage of shots and images from the letter he has read, which completes the narrative for Eminem.
In this video, it portrays star image and a clear powerful story which has references to intertextuality. The visual imagery is closely linked to the lyrics and the camerawork and editing emphasise the impatience of the music. There is strong emphasise on looking; as viewers, we look into people's private lives- in the basement there is a video which plays footage on a screen within a screen.
This was my Preliminary task which was to create an extract of a music video of our choice. In my group there was four of us altogether; myself, Adam, Faisal and Ishma.
This task helped me get an understanding of the music video as a whole. What I had learnt was that creating a music video is different to creating a short film clip. This is because in music videos a lot of close-ups are used; it is important for the artist to look at the camera when appropriate to connect with the audience; no wide shots should portrayed in your videos; etc.
Before creating our own music video, we did a warm up task to give us a clear understanding of what we were going to do. What we were given was the story of Little Red Riding hood and were told to storyboard what it would be as a music video. Previously, we learnt about the three ways in which music videos can be related to the visuals of the song. These were; illustration, such as image of what the lyrics describe; amplification, such like illustration but going to the extra mile to add new meaning; and lastly disjuncture, the method in which something completely nonrelated to the song is shown adding new meaning to the whole music video. For the task we were given, we were asked to experiment with disjuncture as it was the hardest one to grasp accurately and professionally. Initially, we were asked to make as many as 30 images for our music video, keeping in mind the conventions of music videos; do just about anything you want. We worked with obscure angles and voyeuristic based shots, making sure that the narrative was ambiguous. After we had completed this, we were asked to take away half of the images leaving us with an obscure music video storyboard. from this, what I learnt was that all codes of films and TV programmes (that is; consistency, chronology and logic) is not to be used for a music video. instead, you should be using, illustration, amplification and disjuncture.
Disjuncture is used to describe those music videos that seem to work by ignoring the original song and creating a whole new set of meanings. This is a radical technique and used by arty bands in order to assert their difference and originality. Using this technique, I did my own example for 'Little Red Riding Hood'. Some of the images were completely random and some images had matched the lyrics. This therefore links to Goodwins theory as he suggested that lyrics will make a constant reference to the visuals on screen.
¢Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics, for example, strange performance in a metal video, dance routine for a boy/girl band, etc.
¢There is a relationship between music and visuals. This could either be illustrative, amplifying or contradicting.
¢There is a relationship between music and visuals which could be illustrative, amplifying or contradicting.
¢The demands of a record label will include the need for many close-ups of the artist which may develop motifs which recur across their work (visual style).
¢There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes, etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.
¢There is often intertextual reference to films, TV programmes, other music videos etc.
Lyrics and Visuals:
Goodwin suggests that lyrics will make constant references to visuals on screen. An example of this is seen in Adele’s video in ‘Rolling in the Deep’. The lyrics depict a beautiful love that has shattered. It seems that this relationship has gone through destruction, heated fights, which has hurt her. She expresses the loss of their love and how they could have been something special as she loved him deeply as suggested when she says, “We could've had it all”. After all the pain and chaos, she realises the type of person he is and at the same time she is saying this, the audience is shown a medium close-up of glasses that are full. The fact that we are shown this could be because she wants to convey the audience that everything is ‘crystal clear’ to her giving us a literal and visual example. This therefore exemplifies the relationship between the lyrics and the visuals are illustrative as the audience is involved a lot more as you not only hear how the singer feels but also see it for yourself making it easier to understand.
“Finally, I can see you crystal clear”
Music and Visuals:
Goodwin suggests that there is a relationship between the music and the visuals. In Adele’s video, an example of this would be when we are shown a medium wide shot of the glasses filled with water. When the beat starts, the water inside the glasses ripple in time with the beat which could represent Adele’s heart beat. Before this, we are shown a man about to play the drums. You could say that this man is controlling her heart beat as she was in love with him. The fact that this beat is constant throughout the video, it could symbolise her anger as it gets louder and faster. Each glass has its own ripple which could represent her individuality as a person. She is showing her strength as a person as it is her music that is giving these glasses their ripple effect; this could furthermore convey that in her own experiences, through music she plans to release others, her being the sound and the glasses being others.
Demand of the Record Label:
The record label has a control over the artist they sign to a certain extent. Ultimately, it is up to the record label to decide what the artist should be represented as. For example, usually for women, the label requires them to come off as ‘sexy’ in order to appeal to men and reach that target audience. However, Adele has been represented in a different way as she is not shown as people would stereotypically expect. She is represented with a lot of emotion and class which relates to all women as it is more realistic. This is clear from the way she is dressed in her videos seeing that she wears simple clothes. In her videos, she wears mostly dark colours which could symbolise her pain and loss as her songs are based around that. Also, the demand of the record label includes the need for many close-ups of the artist which develops motifs which recur across her work.
Notions of Looking:
The notion of looking at the camera allows the audience to engage with the artist as you feel part of the video. However, in this music video there is no notion of looking as the artist does not look at the camera at all. One could say that the audience does not feel part of the video but it seems as if Adele does not want the audience to go through the same pain she went through. You could also say that she is too hurt and ashamed of her situation and is not able to look into our eyes to connect with the audience.
Voyeurism refers to the idea of looking in order to gain sexual pleasure. In this video there is no link to voyeurism as the artist is sitting down throughout the whole video.
Intertextual Reference:
One of the pleasures that audiences experience in the consumption of media texts is the joy of recognition. One form of this pleasure comes in recognising the reference in one media text to other media texts. This process of referencing is called intertextuality. In this video, there is no link to intertextuality.
Richard Dyer has noted: " a star is an image constructed from a range of materials"
Construction of a pop star:
These materials include:
The songs- their lyrical themes and musical structures/ genres
The record covers- singles and albums and the image of the star they present
Music videos
Magazines- Newspapers- Celebrity gossip
Concerts- Live performances.
A good example of this would be Lady Gaga. Her real name is Stefani Joanna Germanotta who comes from an italian, french and canadian heritage. She played the piano at the age of 4 and began performing at open mike nights by the age of 14. Gaga has recorded a couple of hip-hop songs and has also began a band called the Stefani Germanotta Bnad (SGBand) with some friends in NYU. At the peak of the band in 2006, Gaga was scouted by Rob Fusari. The band grew apart and she therefore began her career in New Jersy. Her name came from the Queen song 'Radio Gaga'. Her image became fasinating with some of the emerging neo- burlesque shows, Gaga began go-go dancing in bars and dressed in little more than bikini. She was then re-located to LA where big celebrities are and she is able to control her own look as she is successful; this exemplifies that she has that freedom that most other smaller artists don't. When we compare her first music video- Just Dance- to her most recent music video- You and I, it is easy to pick up that she wears more clothes in her first video and as she progresses, they get less and less. This is maybe because the audience is not ready to see someone new in a way she portrays herself like she does now. Also, her image is changing constantly to keep viewers interested:
This music video starts with a medium close-up of the main singer but has her back towards the audience. Already, we are engaged and being a part of it as it seems as if we are following the singer. Her back is portraying her as the leader, reminding the listeners of the title of the song “Run the world” This also represents her power and authority as she is in front of us riding on a horse.
The camera then zooms out showing the audience the run down area symbolising chaos and destruction. However, because the singer is dressed in white, it could signify peace and harmony, so it seems as if she is bringing peace to the run down society.
As the clip goes on, this long shot again symbolises her power, authority, strength and the fact that she is above everyone else as the audience have to look up to her. The long shot makes her look above the land and mountains, it is as if she is up in the sky to rule. The rule of three is being used here as she is in the centre of the shot, making her the predominant focus of the shot. By wearing white and sitting on top of the black horse, this symbolises evil being taken over by purity and goodness hence white over black.
The vandalised car and bull are used to introduce the men in the song as they are usually used to portray masculinity. The car says ‘revolution’ signifying the war destruction, and the women's rebellious attitude. The fact that it is in red stands out to the audience as it is surrounded with dim colours. The red shows a contrast as it signifies love and danger; these are the two emotions which could be perceived as extreme.
The bull symbolises the women's power which is eccentric because bull fighting is a masculine sportso the audience would associate this with the men.
The clip goes onto a medium shot of a woman coming out of a cage. This links to voyeurism as she is wearing short clothes and is in a cage. This signifies the stereotypical view of a woman from a mans perspective. There is a contrast between the spacing and the element used; the woman is placed on the right hand side of the shot so it seems as if she is about to escape, however, as she is inside a cage which represents her isolation and entrapment.
The use of the mise-en-scene in this wide shot is symbolising the power and unity of women as they are all standing together like an army. Their Gestures are feminine yet they are portraying their strength and determination to face anything and everything. The lion represents bravery and again reminds the audience of the title because lions are king of the jungle, the same way the women are ruling the world.
The lighting in this video is quiet dark highlighting the destruction and chaos the girls have caused. Reading the title, you would expect the video to have bright colours, however, it is a complete contrast of a stereotypical view from a woman which makes it interesting for the viewers to watch. In the first few shots, we are shown the main singer in an area which has dull and dim colours with low lighting in which the audience can constantly see the sunset. This could represent the girls bringing a new beginning for the world and an end to the destruction caused by men. An example of a powerful shot with the use of different lighting is when the singer is standing on the car. Half of this mediumwide shotis light and the other half is dark which could represent the good and evil in this world. Her body language looks as if she is trying to come out of the dark side and bring goodness into the world hencethe reason why there is more light then dark. Also, the camera is tilted upwards which makes us as the audience look up at her emphasising her power and authority.
a whole new set of meanings. This is a radical technique and used by arty bands in order to assert their difference and originality. Using this technique, I did my own example for 'Little Red Riding Hood'. Some of the images were completely random and some images had matched the lyrics. This therefore links to Goodwins theory as he suggested that lyrics will make a constant reference to the visuals on screen. 
The camera then zooms out showing the audience the run down area symbolising chaos and destruction. However, because the singer is dressed in white, it could signify peace and harmony, so it seems as if she is bringing peace to the run down society. 
As the clip goes on, this long shot again symbolises her power, authority, strength and the fact that she is above everyone else as the audience have to look up to her. The long shot makes her look above the land and mountains, it is as if she is up in the sky to rule. The rule of three is being used here as she is in the centre of the shot, making her the predominant focus of the shot. By wearing white and sitting on top of the black horse, this symbolises evil being taken over by purity and goodness hence white over black. 
