Final Cut Express tutorial

Black and White effect

As a group we are deciding if we will edit our video into black and white. I think black and white would be effective as it would create a more dramatic effect between the relationship of the characters. To know how to edit our video using final cut express, I have been watching numerous tutorials on youtube. The clip below shows us how to do this.

 

Digipak

Barcode

Further research into digipaks shows me that having a barcode on the front of our digipak would be effective as I think it would make it look more authentic and professional. I realised this after my practice digipak as I thought it was missing something.

Editing my practice digipak by putting a barcode on it creates this professional effect.

Parental Advisory

From our audience research, we have worked out the target audience for genre. We found that the age of the target audience is quite young. I believe having a parental advisory sign on the front of the digipak would help attract the audiences attention as seeing the sign would immediately draw the audience in as they would want to look at it.

I have edited the front of my practice digipak with this parental advisory sign to see what it looks like.

Storyboard Draft

Today we had another group meeting, we discussed the main scenes in our video and wrote them down on a story board format. The story board highlights the main scenes with the main characters, it is not as detailed as our final story board will be, as we need to add the timings as well as the shot angles. 

 Shows the main character at the piano, an over the shoulder shot- close up emphasises the artists piano skills.

This scene brings in another main character, it shows a lady running out of a hall, it sets the scene, the running is in time with the beat of the music.

In this scene we are going to use a similar effect to Amy Whinehouse's video 'Rehab', as we are going blend the band into the background of scenes, here the band member is just in the back ground playing the guitar. 

We are going to feature flashbacks in our video, this flashback coincides with the lyrics.

This scene features the woman again, she plays with the audiences mind as they don't really know why she is important.

This scene shows another random band member, this time there is a drummer performing in a field.

This scene shows the main character walking past a busker in the street, the busker plays in time with the music.

Woman bursts into the hall where the main character was playing the piano, tension created.

Final shot shows the woman confused as she looks for the main character, but fails to find him.

Checklist

Today we had a group meeting, in this meeting we made a checklist to take to our first filming date, the checklist reminds us what we need to take to the set, this will ensure we do not forget anything, as we have booked out the school hall and only have one booked appointment.

DigiPack Ideas

The digipack for our song is called 'A Long Walk home'. The connotations of the digipack create many images, I have been looking at possible design ideas to use for the front cover.

The title of the digipack creates an image of an empty, long road with not much scenary. I have looked at images of scenary taken from dusty desert settings in America.

The image above shows an empty setting, with a road in America. I think this image would be appropiate to use as it creates a deserted image. This image would be good to use for our digipack as the band who produced the song are not very well known and it could imply they still have long way to go till they become famous.

If we chose to use the a desert setting like this we would be tempted to fall into using western styled font, I don't think this type of font would fit into our genre. Quite a plain and boring font such as 'Arial' would be more fitting.

As we have researched the genre we are focusing on, we know what age group we are aiming our music at. A craze in modern day youth is having a blackberry, a smartphone. Many youths have these so I think having a blackberry code on our digipack gives the audience a chance to learn more about the band through scanning this code onto their phone. This code would be an attraction and would draw the audience in, making them look at the digipack.

Using the digipak I created earlier on in the year I have edited it by adding this blackberry code to it, I chose to put the code on the back of the digipak as it is not a big part of the digipak however we may chose to put the code on the front of our final digipak to draw the audience in.

Music Video Ideas

Scenes:
Main protagonist on piano.
Protagonist walking passed band members - band members are seen as a part of the scenery.
Female chasing protagonist through scenes, passes where the band members once were.
Flashbacks of protagonist and female together.

The scenes chosen for the band members:
Band members room where he is practicing guitar.
Band member performing in a field/hill on the drums.
Band member playing the guitar as if he was busking.
Protagonist playing the piano in a hall.

Scenes used for flashbacks:
Protagonist and female arguing in a house, seen as a couple.
Protagonist with his friends, in a town scene.

Video Timeline

To make our filming easier we have chosen to jot down all of the main events in our video, this is just a vague start but it gives us an idea of our video, we can also build on this, with story boards.

The time line shows us the order in which the events in our video happen, this will make it easier for us when we film as we are more organised and know exactly when certain events will happen. 

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Planning

I have been searching for ideas for our music video, as our genre involves indie, I would like the video to reflect some of the characteristics of the genre, such as being 'Independent'. I would like to make our video stand out and have a wacky side to it.

Amy whinehouse's video 'Rehab' is particulary inspiring to our video as we like the idea of just having the band in the back ground, Amys video (below) shows her band playing in the background without her acknowledgement.

If we chose to use a similar effect we would be able to have a narrative in our video as well as a band performance. As we are deciding to film parts of our video on a street, we could have band members scattered around the street, we could even have a band member busking on the street playing the guitar.

The 'Plain White T's' music video 'hey there Delilah' also has elements of indepedence in it, which we could use in our video. The way the screen is split through-out the video shows different characters in the video. We could differ this in our video by showing the different band members. At the start of our song, all of band members sing together, this would be a perfect time to use this split screen effect.

Risk Assessment

Copy of Risk Assessment on Prezi

Practice shots

Location visits

We looked at places to film today, we went to Cambridge to see which street would be best to use for our busking scene, we also went to Widdington to find a field to put the drum kit in. We chose to use Widdington as Will lives there and he has the drum kit. In Widdington we found the perfect open field with a large tree in the middle of it. We could use this tree effectively as it looks unusual and would fit well into our video ideas. As the field is very open we would also be able to use the tree as protection against the wind.

Indie Rock genre

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Similar Indie Rock Artists

Detail - Artic Monkeys

The artic monkeys are from Sheffield, north of England. The band have three record labels, for the UK they are signed to Domino, an independent record label from London. The company produce mainly indie rock music, the record label has many set ups through out the world in places such as Brooklyn, USA, Germany and France. As the company is independent this is perfect for the Artic Monkeys as they are an indie band which have derived from independence. The Artic monkeys also have record label called EMI, which also based in London, this record label along with the bands US distributors 'Warner' contradicts the typical charateristics of an Indie band, as these record labels are more mainstream.

 

Similar Indie rock Artists

DigiPack - Artic Monkeys

Front
The main picture is of a building, probably council houses. In some of the windows there are colourful patterns, which are probably meant to represent dreams as the album in entitled “Favourite Worst Nightmare”. In the top right corner there is the bands logo and album name. This will clearly show viewer what artist and what album they are looking at/listening to.

Back
The back is very bland. It is solid black colour and the tracks are listed without track numbers at the bottom. This tells us what tracks are featured on the album.
Underneath the tracks at the very bottom, there is a bar code, information about where the album was recorded and the bands website. This is there as the band can advertise their website, and the recording studio can do the same. The bar code is there so that shops know exactly how much the album is.


Inside
Inside there are three pictures each looking like the same colourful patterns that were on the front. The pictures furthermore relate to the album title. On some of them there are somewhat evil things but with innocent colours surrounding them. This directly says that the colours represent the “Favourite” of the album title and the evil things represent the “Worst Nightmare” of the title.

Similar Indie Rock Artists

Narrative - Artic Monkeys

Below is the music video of 'Fluorescent Adolescent' by the Artic Monkeys.
The song has elements of a linnear narrative however the video doesnt always conincide with the video.

The narrative characters in the video wear clown outfits, this creates both a scary and fun image, the clowns run riots, smashing things and fighting, the young clowns wear 'fluorescent' clothing, and imply that the the young innocent adolescent years are over.
Through-out the song the lyrics 'dirty little rascal' is repeated, when these lyrics are sung, the video shows a clown smashing something up, implying that the adults are dirty little rascals, not like they used to be when they were adolescents.

A key bit in the video is when it shows a flash back of two younger boys on swings, one of them dressed up as a clown, the lyrics at this point say 'Where did you go?, Where did you go? Where did you go?' implying that the nice young innocent boy has now gone and he is a violent adult. The image below shows that there is a lip synchronise with one of the boys, it shows his innocence.

Similar Indie Rock Artists

Image - Artic Monkeys

The message created by the artists is very down to earth, in many of their band pictures, they look very average, and create the impression anyone could be them, as they look so ordinary. This image created sends out the message anyone could become a famous artist.
 

Similar Indie Rock artists

Look- Artic Monkeys

The image below shows a picture of the Artic Monkeys, a young fresh indie rock group. The photo shows that the performers are wearing pretty average clothes, the clothes of the performers are different from each other this is one of the characteristics of indie, as the word originates from 'indepent'.


The sighline of the band is looking directly at the audience, this could represent the artists as stars, the band has no props or bright colours, it implies that the band are just average and nothing big but they are down to earth and like every body else. This again backs up the characteristics of indie, enforcing the 'do-it yourself'' moto.

Hybrid Theory

Linkin Park's album "hybrid Theory" mixes primarily the two music genres of Rock and Rap. The album uses Rock to fill in the gaps which traditional Rap songs have, while using Rap to employ more unique beats and allowing for more complicated lyrics. 

You usually find the traditional instruments of rock such as guitars, bass guitars and drums, also used are elements of rap such as DJ's, scratch pads and electronic sampling equipment. Vocals are either sung or rapped. 

 

Rock Rap shares many similarities to rap and hip-hop such as the use of rhyme and the beat. Drums are used to keep the rock part consistent as well as allowing for an aggressive song to be sung or rapped. However drums do not normally accompany rap which is more to do with on the beat measuring.  It is also a popular practice to switch between sung portions of the song to spoken sections and back (i.e. chorus and verses sung but the bridge is rapped). 

Lyrical work

We have annatated the lyrics of our song with ideas, we have just noted down what we may feature in that certain scene, this helps give us an idea of the narrative of our video is.

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Location Ideas

After analysing the lyrics of our song- 'Call me up' I have been able to think of location ideas for our music video. Through-out our song, images of emptiness and abandenment are potrayed.

I like the idea of featuring a warehouse in our video. An empty warehouse can imply a sense of abandenment, this image created would reflect our song.

If we chose to use a warehouse we would have to look into the safety of the building and would have to ask permission to use the building. However I think the warehouse would be an ideal place to film our video as it has such an lost and loneliness feeling, which reflects our song.

Our song features a piano, I think having the master shot of the video being the artist on a piano singing passionately would be effective. As it would be the master shot it means in the video it would keep cross cutting back to this shot of the artist playing the piano. 

I think we would be able to potray an authentic image of an artist playing the piano as we have two piano players in our group, it would be utilised effectively.

Another place that we could use that would emphasise the image of abandonment would be a building site, I think a building site would be a good place to film elements of our video as it implies the narratives characters life is a mess without the girl and he has all alone.

Sub genre

The word Indie has originated from independence, it represents a do-it yourself attitude and low budget labels on which it is released. It implies that anyone can be indie, no matter what sex, age, or interests.
A sub genre is a category that is sub division of a larger genre.
The genre we have chosen is Indie Rock, this is a sub genre of alternative rock. The genre ensures that the music will involve elements of indie music and also rock. This means it is able to reach out to a larger audience.

Gratification

Gratification on Prezi

Voyeurism

VOYEURISM

The definition of voyeurism is the practice of obtaining sexual gratification by looking at sexual objects or acts. 

Sigmund Freud's theory of voyeurism claims that all of audience in media texts are voyeurs. He argues that films present us with sexual pleasures not exclusively sexual ones. 

In our music video, we could use voyeurism to help attract our audience; we have looked at the audience for our genre, and found that it is mainly young males, stereotypically males are usually known as voyeurs more than females. In 1975 Laura Muvlvey said that filmakers are predominantly male, the presence of women in film is often soley for the purposes of display, (rather than for narrative purposes).

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is the referencing of other media texts within another piece of media.
 

Theorist Goodwin believes that there is intertextuality references to other pieces of media, such as videos, tv, cinema.
 

Stewart says that visual reference in music videos come from a range of sources, however the most popular consist of cinema, photography and fasion.

An example of intertextuality is when Jay Z uses the illuminati sign in his videos, this links to his religion of worshipping the satan. 

  
This intertextuality can be very influential on his fan base.

Intertextuality in Indie Rock

Blur are an example of an indie Rock band that use intertextuality in their music. There album covers use unusal photography and art. The fans are able to recognise the band through their fonts and ironically blurred images they use.