Team Update 1

Over the week, I have been in contact with all my team individually to discuss when would be the best dates to shoot. I have been using Google Sheets to keep a personal track of everything before I finalise the plans and produce an official Call Sheet.

Additionally, I have informed my cast about filling in adult release forms, and will spend the next few days compiling everything and getting the forms filled out.

Furthermore, I used a mini Facebook Messenger group chat to discuss with my actresses who was going to play the wife role. Using the social media platform made the process simple, efficient and ensured consensus.

Recce Day 2

Recce Day 1

Recce's are essential to get the right location for a shoot - pictures and videos will never give the true feel to a location like a real life visit does.

Recce Theatre

This space in the theatre is exactly what I need.

The Infinite Mix

Today, all A2 students went on a visit to The Infinite Mix: Contemporary Sound and Image - a collection of 10 very creative, unusual music videos. They were extremely eye-opening and unlike any music videos I had ever seen before. Below I have briefly written up the videos that I feel are most relevant to my own music video.

Martin Creed - Work No. 1701, 2013

This video was an interesting example of a low budget video. It showed a range of people crossing a road - they all appeared to have some sort of impairment, eg. the last person was physically disabled and had to drag his body across the road. The song linked to the lyrics as the one of the main lines was 'the same again', and the video was different people crossing the same road again and again.

The mise-en-scene told the audience that the video was set in New York City, as the yellow taxis and American street signs represent the famous city.

Stan Douglas - Luanda-Kinshasa, 2013

This is a performance based video put on loop which is supposed to give an illusion of an endless real-time jam. It combines jazz, funk and Afrobeats to represent the target audience - the rising independence of African nation for the time era that this recreates (70s). The camera uses a range of different techniques such as handheld, pans and tracks between band members, which adds to the 'never stop moving' effect.

The content of the video depicts the band members really feeling the music, and they wear colourful, funky yet smart casual clothing which represents their fusion of genres.


Ugo Rondinone - Thanx 4 Nothing, 2015

This spoken word was set out in a unique fashion. A large room had a huge projection of the video on each wall, with four mini cube shaped TVs per wall, also displaying the video. Despite its simplicity, there was something very captivating about the artist and his poetry and I didn't want to take my eyes off the video.

The artist wore a black tuxedo with a white shirt - later on in the video, there are flashes were the studio behind him gets lit up and his suit switches to white while the shirt goes black. This was memorable for the audience and could've been done during either production or editing. Additionally, he was barefoot for the whole performance which added to the rawness of the spoken word - I am considering integrating this into my own music video.

A spotlight illuminated the artist, placing all attention on solely him. The camera used a variety of framing types - the close ups really added a sense of intimacy. At times, the video would link to the lyrics, such as when he would repeat a line three times, the camera would zoom in for every repeat. Also, when he said 'may they multiply,' the screen split into 4x4 mini screens.


Kahlil Joseph - m.A.A.d., 2014

This video had an extremely high budget, so any ideas I take will have to be adapted to suit a student budget. It was very well done and the dual screen meant and fast cutting rate meant there was never a dull moment. Many many things occured - at one point, home footage from an old camcorder was played to give the narrative some history and realism.

The two screens would somehow link to each other - sometimes they would show different angles of the same subject, other times one would show the setting while the other portrayed the narrative. A few shots were filmed from a helicopter showing a birds eye view of the city where it is set. This was beautiful and mesmerising for me as the audience.

Near the beginning of the video, some home footage shows a group of youths playing around with a large gun. Following this, an old woman's voice is played as if it were on a phone, and she started preaching about Jesus and peace in a call and response style with the youths. These techniques incorporated many different social themes into the video, such as race, culture, age, gun control and death.

Treatment Feedback (Individual)

After pitching my treatment to a few teachers and peers, I have gathered quite a lot of feedback which I can adapt and apply to my own music video.

 

Shay has just moved to university to study Television Production, so I thought it would be worthwhile to get her feedback on my pitch. She gave me some great ideas which I will look into applying to my music video. One thing she suggested is splitting my target audience into primary, secondary and tertiary categories. My primary audience can remain at fans of jazz, however I can introduce uses and gratification theory into creating a secondary audience - my video will be set in London, so people from London can identify with the British identity. Also, people from outside London will get a diversion by feeling like they are in London while watching my video.

Additionally, Shay suggested that I take inspiration from Iyeoka's Simply Falling video by including a projector in the background of a low-key lit stage. This would enable me to recreate the silhouette band idea without actually having to consume time making cardboard cutout instruments.

For my actress's costume, Shay's idea is to use a retro puffy dress with Doc Martens, to give the look a 'kick'. This idea seems to be the general consensus with people who have given me feedback, so I will definitely incorporate this style into what I choose to do.

Rob is a teacher at my college and gave me lots of useful advice which I will take on board for my production. One of his points is that my target audience is too broad, and that perhaps I can split between a primary and a secondary TA. The reason behind this is because jazz listeners generally tend to be women over 30, however my secondary TA is where I could incorporate youth.

Additionally, Rob brought up the idea of mixing both black & white and colour - perhaps the female in black and white and the male in colour to add to the contrast between the two. This is something that I will consider however I don't actually need to decide on this until post production.

Also, the idea of paying a real taxi driver to participate in my taxi scene to add production value is something I will definitely try. It is true that some taxi drivers in London are very friendly and may do it for a reduced price, and it would add more to the London feel with the London landmarks in the background. At the same time, I am on an incredibly low budget so will explore all my options. Alternatively, I could try and fashion my own car to look like an Uber cab, as this would definitely be the low-budget option.

One of the final points made was to be careful with my cast and to ensure that they are reliable - I have already tackled this by making sure that I knew anyone I recruited for at least two years.

Jack is a peer and also gave me some useful feedback. His constructive criticisms involve expanding the websites for broadcast to include sites like Daily Motion - I will definitely do this once the video is complete.

Another point that he brought up was about how when I shoot outdoors, the lighting as well as the weather will be uncontrollable, and I will need a plan on how to protect the equipment if it rains. To tackle the lighting issue, I will organise an extra tutorial with the technicians in my college to consolidate my knowledge with how to manipulate a camera to provide the right shot. Regarding the weather, I will check beforehand and if it is forecast to rain, I will take out some family size umbrellas to protect the equipment.

Rob is also a peer who has studied lighting and sound, so he had a useful perspective on things. He brought up using a CD instead of a vinyl as vinyls are valuable and expensive. I will take this into consideration and will resort to a CD if finding a vinyl proves to be too much trouble.

Tom is technician at my college. I have taken on board what he said about the size of my crew and have now removed the hair and make up manager as well as the set manager. My crew has now been cut down from five to three - this will be easier to manage on the day of the shoot.

Now that I have pitched my treatment, I will start working on shooting schedules, scripts and detailed storyboards - after having made any adjustments to my treatment.

Treatment Feedback (Class)

I pitched my presentation to my class to gain feedback from my peers and teacher. It was very useful and I gained some good ideas.

The first question I was asked was seeing as I have created a team of my own, why didn't I just work as a group in class instead of working alone. My response to that was that I would like to be in full 100% control of exactly how my video goes - if I was in a group, any input that I had would've had to have concensus within the group, and I doubt I would've been able to do jazz.

The second point raised was that I should film in the theatre instead of the hall. I will definitely do this as the theatre is more geared to the style of my music video.

Finally, I was given some advice on my main actress's costume. A black rara dress was suggested with some boots to show that she is feminine, but not the typical 'princessy' type woman. I will most likely do something similar for my production.

Treatment

Green Screen Session

To gain further understanding of how to shoot and edit with a green screen, I asked one of Leyton's media technicians to show me how to do it. I learnt a lot about the whole concept, such as how time consuming it would be to create a frame that genuinely looks good, and will probably not be using a green screen for my own music video, despite how keen I was on using it before.




Leyton's TV Studio


Here is a write up of the steps we took:

1) Put down flooring

2) Sort out the green background and make sure it is matte

3) Film the subject
If the subject has dark hair or skin, a dim hair light would be sufficient to illuminate the dark hair/skin.
Any new angles must be simulated eg. three different angles cannot be filmed at the same time, they must be filmed seperately

4) Adobe After Effects > New Composition > Preset HDTV 1080 25

5) Import video

6) Effects and presets > Keying > Keylight 1.2 > Screen Colour > Remove background

7) Get an image for the background and layer it behind the filmed image

8) Play around with minor effects accordingly.
The After Effects ring shows the spread of light and can make a vignette.
To make a silhouette, select the image and then turn the white output down.
Can also create masks to mark out a certain area.

Lights Inspiration

I have a friend who studied lighting and sound at his college, so I asked him to show me some photos of previous set ups he worked on that could inspire me. Here are the images he showed me:

I am a big fan of this lighting set up because it sparked some creative ideas in my head. One idea that I had is that I could also have a harsh key spotlight on my singer/s, with a very dim light on the band in the background. However, for ease of practicality, I could make cardboard cut outs of jazz instruments - the dim back light would keep the fact that they are cardboard unnoticable. Albeit this might be time-consuming, the pros outweigh the cons as real jazz instruments are difficult to find and heavy to transport.

These colourful lights cast a friendly, warm atmosphere that I could apply to my own music video.





This lighting seems to cast rays of light, similar to rays of sunshine, over the artist/s. This could imply hope and joy.





These lights have quite an artistic effect, aesthetically pleasing the eye.

The contrast of colours on the two above create a beautiful effect. It is quite attention-grabbing and nice to look at.

Adele - Hello Cover (Practice Task)

As a practice task for our actual music videos, we got into groups of 4, chose a popular song and made a basic music video for it. Following this, we edited it using ??SOFTWARE?? The purpose of the task was to practise lip-synching, test out different framings and getting a feel for what directing/producing/editing our own music videos are going to be like.

We worked amiably as a group, ensuring consensus with shots and that everyone got a creative input. When working with a group, you have to be easygoing and flexible with ideas as everyone will have slightly different visions to what they want to create.

My role was shared equally with the other three people in my group, as co-director, co-producer and co-editor. After having taken the skeleton frames (long shot, medium shot and close up), everyone got to choose one creative frame (only one due to strict time management) and I chose the shot against the wall, the second one in to the video, as I liked the composition of the frame using the rule of thirds.

A strength of the camera work is the variety of shots we got within a limited time frame. We filmed a mix of basic shots and creative ones, such as the silhouette shot that ends the video. Varied shots are important to prevent the audience from getting bored of the video.

One weakness of the camera work is the mise-en-scene, or lack of. The props, costume and background are not that appropriate for the song - it is quite a slow, soulful, beautiful song which doesn't really match up with the connotations of a red brick wall and the artist wearing a Superman t-shirt. I can take this weakness and learn from it for my own music video - planning early will avoid any inappropriate mise-en-scene elements.

A strength of the editing is the unusual experimentation with the final frame. To do this, we layered the close up on top of the silhouette shot and then changed both opacities to 50%. We then horizontally flipped the close up so that it was on the right side of the frame. This composition is a strength because it worked successfully and taught us a new technique which we can apply to our own music videos.

A weakness of the editing is a lack of continuity regarding the cutting rate. For example, from 00:12-00:15 for the line 'To tell you that I'm sorry,' there are two different frames and a fairly fast cutting rate for the lines before and after. However, for the second round of the same line at 00:37-00:40, there is only one different frame and a much slower cutting rate for the lines before and after. This weakness was due to a very tight time budget - when I edit my own music video, I will plan the frames out on a storyboard first before I actually edit them together so that I can ensure continuity between frames.

I have found this practice task very helpful as it has reiterated to me the importance of careful advanced planning to ensure organisation and a general high quality video. I will take into account all the strengths and weaknesses of both the camera work and the editing from this task and apply my reflections to my music video.

VFX Session

Definition of visual effects: 


'In filmmaking, visual effects (abbreviated VFX) are the processes by which imagery is created and/or manipulated outside the context of a live action shot. Visual effects involve the integration of live-action footage and generated imagery to create environments which look realistic, but would be dangerous, expensive, impractical, or impossible to capture on film. 
Visual effects using computer generated imagery have recently become accessible to the independent filmmaker with the introduction of affordable and easy-to-use animation and compositing software.' 

- Wikipedia


To gain inspiration, I asked one of Leyton's media technicians if he could show me what sort of visual effects software I would have at my disposal for my own project. We started off with an introduction to Motion Graphics, a digital technique that combines pictures, words, sound and video.

Motion Graphics




This animation from Motionographer is an example of motion graphics. The leading software to create motion graphics is probably Adobe After Effects which I have available on the college computers, so there will be no barrier of access if I decide to integrate animation into my music video. The way I would include motion graphics into my own music video is by designing my images on PC software and then animating them using After Effects.



Tracking





Tracking is a digital technique which mixes motion graphics/CGI with live action. This technique was used heavily in my third case study (Nicola Conte - Do You Feel What I Feel) and now that I have learnt what the technique is actually called, I can look into possibly integrating it into my own video.

The two videos above are examples of very well-done tracking techniques. I find them really effective because the animation emphasises what's going on in the video in an eye-catching manner.

Rotoscoping


Rotoscoping is an animation technique in which animators trace over footage, frame by frame, for use in live-action and animated movies. Complications with this technique include time - I have to be considerate towards the time I have for this project and tracing over footage, frame by frame may take more time than I have.

 

However, the term is slightly different in the visual effects industry. It refers to the technique of manually creating a matte (combining two or more image elements into one single image) for an element on a live-action plate so it may be composited over another background.

I feel this technique may be very useful towards my project because I may be able to give an illusion of a much greater location than I actually have. Furthermore, this particular example was made using After Effects, a still image of the city and Boujou 5.0, a motion tracking software.



Green Screen




Using a green screen is filming technique whereby moving subjects are filmed in front of a green screen and a separately filmed background gets added to the final image.

Similarly to VFX rotoscoping, this technique would be able to help me create illusions to give much more interesting locations for my music video, such as a stage in a big theatre or something similar.




Film Noir




Film noir is a style or genre of cinematographic film marked by a mood of pessimism, fatalism, and menace. It includes harsh-key lighting with lots of shadows. It was used for the duration of my first case study (Iyeoka - Simply Falling) and now that I know that the style of the video wasn't just simply black and white, it actually was a technique called film noir, I can look at applying this to my own music video. 


Jazz was huge around the 1920s, so having a black and white/film noir style would be highly appropriate if I wanted to represent typical features of the genre.






Film Burns


Film burns occur when a film roll begins or ends. Back when the usage of film rolls were popular, the roll would get exposed to light when first loaded, and then exposed to light again when it finished and would 'flash'. Adding in this technique to my music video would create a retro effect, like in my first case study Simply Falling by Iyeoka.

Case Study 3

This is my third jazz case study. The song studied is called Do You Feel Like I Feel by Nicola Conte.

Case Study 2

This is my second jazz case study. The song studied is called Liquid Spirit by Gregory Porter.

Case Study 1

This is my first jazz case study. The song studied is called Simply Falling by Iyeoka.

Initial Ideas Mindmap + Mood Board

Here are my initial ideas for my music video created using MindMup. I have chosen the genre of Jazz.

I also created a mood board using Microsoft Powerpoint to add visual aid to own creative thinking process.

Production Schedule

This is my initial production schedule containing deadlines and key events over the course of the project.