Finished Website

Our finished website.

Our finished Digipak

Digipak - Outside

Digipak - Inside

The following images are our final digipak. We decided to center the theme around the title of the album "Light Me Up" which gives us the notion of the ignition or the burning of something and the bright light on the cover which contrasts with the dark background and setting.

Update on CD cover.

For our CD cover, we have finally used our own images. The above illustrates the raw images inserted into the CD template provided to us.  A few modifications were made towards the two images. we will be posting further updates as we progress

Music Video Shoot: 24 November 2012

We shot our narrative music video in a hamlet in Ashbourne, Derbyshire. This section was the flashbacks section of the narrative, where we see the central character kill each of her subsequent boyfriends.

Cellphone signal was barely present and access to a town centre was almost an hour away. Nevertheless, we still had all the necessary equipment and enough supplies to shoot this section of our music video.

The first section was shot in the woods in the hamlet, which was a short walk from the house we were staying and shooting in.

This sequence was the confrontation and retaliation in the woods scene. Here, Kathy, the vocalist shoots the first boyfriend (DAN) in exchange for attempting to do so himself.

Stills and behind the scenes from this scene:

The next sequence is shot indoors. This sequence Chris (2nd Boyfriend) walks in and confronts Kathy in the toilet. With the use of mise-en-scene, we imply that Chris is intoxicated and is has motive to sexually assault Kathy. However, being in his intoxicated state, loses the upper hand and any form of strength, leading to Kathy smashing his face on the edge of a sink and drowning him in it. The sequence required Chris to be drowned after the previous shots were up to standard and up to how we intended them to look like in order to preserve continuity. In the plan of an accidental or premature dunking of Chris's head into the water, we were provided a hair dryer and a towel, both we fortunately only used once.

Music Video shoot: 21st November 2012

We scheduled and shot the performance sections of out music video on Wednesday, 21st November 2012, 3 days before the scheduled narrative shoot in Ashbourne.

The set up went with no hindrance and the shoot went smooth with time to spare (from the room booked time) in the end. The structure consisted of shooting a master shot of the entire song, then moving onto shooting each individual band member playing their part of the entire song. After each individual master shot, at least one bridge and one chorus was re-shot in the above format, and the final chorus, which consists of a majority of perfomance footage, took the most amount of takes to get right.

A few stills from the shoot:

Editing progress

We've begun editing our shots together using imovie. Once we have the rest of our shots and they are all edited together we will begin syncing it with the music for our video.

Progress update

Our Digi-pak and website design must be finished by 19th December-15 days from now.

Our first full shoot of our video will be finished by the end of this week.

Progress report 27th november 2012

Deadline for first shoot is exactly one week, we currently have footage of most of the main sequences in our video and will be uploading some stills from our shoot.

Digi-pak first draft design

Our first digi-pak draft using images found off the internet, we will be using our own images for our final design; this just a mock up.
The images used were not of our own, but instead were used for practice purposes only

Here we have loaded up the template set up for the CD case. Here we have transformed the image of cigarette ash tray to fit into the dimensions of the cd cover frame.

The image is then desaturated, allowing the first step towards coinciding with out genre color scheme.

Now we then added the image of a zippo lighter and blended in a subject's face.

The image of the subject's face was feathered down to blend into the background. The fill value was also changed in order to achieve this.

Although these are not our own images, this was only an example as to what our final digi-pak will look like. This served as both an example as to what we would want to achieve and as a test for what works in terms of aesthetics and compliance with the genre/band image.

Website design progress

Here is our website progress so far, we've begun adding our own images of the band we're using and will be adding our album cover once it's finished.

PITCH

This is a video of our music video pitch we did to our class, in this pitch we detail the idea's a and plans for our video.

Music video textual analysis

As research for our video, I created a textual analysis of a Paramore video, Ignorance. With my findings, the camera work seems to move in each shot and no still shots occur and the main focus stays on the vocalist for the majority of the video. In conjunction with the conventions of the genre, the whole band is seen along with their instruments for the performance aspect, which is an element which we will carry into our own music video.

NVC (Non-Verbal Communication)

Non-verbal communication is how the actor uses their facial expressions, gestures and body language to communicate with the audience.
-Costume:
at 2:55, Band performing will be in similar colour schemes and matching outfits according to their genre, establishing a physical manifestation of the bands image.

As for the narrative, the band will be wearing varying outfits (casual clothing) that do not necessarily have any connection/association in a collective. For the flashback murder scenes.

The confession part of the narrative, the vocalist will be wearing formal clothing.

To add to the realism, Ryan will be wearing a priest outfit.


Posture:
at 2:55 When the band appear in the last chorus they will have a serious performing posture as opposed to happy and playful postures in pop music videos, as they will be portrayed as undead.

As the video progresses the vocalists posture becomes more playful.

The vocalist will be in proper posture as she walks towards the confession booth and as she appears in all the shots walking in the church.

Gesture:
The vocalist at 0:58 will be singing with hand gestures whilst in the confession booth emphasizing her desperation.

Facial Expressions:
at 2:55, when we first see the band's faces together, they will be emotionless to further imply that they are undead. The lead singer at this point will be allowed to grin as much as she wants towards the conclusion.

at 0:25 when the priest first appears he will appear bored, staring at the floor as the girl confessing her murders.

Space:

During choruses there will be close ups of the girl, including the final chorus.

Voice:
During the refrain at 2:30 the singers voice is softer so the singer will have a more sincere expression.

Pitch Presentation

Music Video on Prezi

Chosen song 1

Our chosen song is 'Future in my hands' by Aimee B (Performed with Rungran)
The genre is alternative/pop rock and from what we have seen from some examples of other artists from this genre thier video's usually involve a performance aspect alongside either a narrative or conceptual aspect.

Target Audience

Why do you think it is important to understand target audience?

In order to efficiently sell the artist's videos, the unique selling points of the artist must be used, which is usually elements that appeal to the target audience of that particular artist.



In the video, Blur - There's no other way,  two videos are released for their respective UK and US audiences.

The UK video expresses British cultures as it depicts British culture and aspects British audiences can relate with.



As for the US release, it is evident that the video is  a lot more simpler in context and is solely performance video, catered for a wider audience, which is suitable for a US release.





Kaiser Chiefs



Narrative and performance with conceptual elements.
Also illustrates the working class stereotype of Britain, evident in the appearance of the girl, appearing with features associated with the chav stereotype eg, sport wear and big earrings.  This stereotype is also emphasized when she is presented with blatant pregnancy for the purpose of welfare as evident with the fact that the family looks unstable yet the woman is pregnant.



Narrative and performance style video.
Set in modern british setting made obvious by the tower blocks that can be seen through out the video in various shots, the performance aspect of the video is also shot it what appears to be an empty pub illustrating another aspect of british culture. The video illustrates how contemporary youth are effectively an underground, rebellious society and how they are sometimes feared and judged incorrectly by older generations.

Music video group

This year for our a2 media project we are making music videos and our group is Kyle Samson . Harrison Lee and Ryan Hayes.

Our initial song ideas for our music video: