Letter of confirmation

Props and Costume List for Music Video

Props

Towel - When actress comes out of bath.

Mirror - Above sink in bathroom, shot when she looks at herself in mirror.

Cards- Falling cards represent the girlfriend 'gambling' for her life if she stays with abusive boyfriend.

Water Tank - Cards fall into a glass water tank, we are able to get different shots of the cards in water from different angles.

Chair and table - She sits alone in an empty space living room. 

Bed - For bedroom shots. 

   

Costume

I was inspired by Madonna's 'Like A Virgin' for the costume design of our female. 

Silk white nightdress dress

• Helps create the innocent look we want the star to have. 

• Male watchers will find sex appeal to the star as the costume is made from silk material, thought to be appealing for males. 

Red lipstick

• The star is in love, hence the red lipstick. However we find she has also killed her boyfriend - blood reference.

• Red lipstick, yet again, another common attraction for males.

Ruffled hair

• Our actress actually has short, pixie like hair, so this picture represents the style I would like her hair to be like. It is slightly messy - representing her 'messed up' life. 

Editing Storyboard Process

Watch the video clip to see us editing our storyboards - and other random...things..

Feedback

Excellent.  Loads of blog entries which are explanatory of the process - needs developing in terms of appearance and the way you re blogging - use  a wide range of tools to present ideas.

 You have a secure knowledge and understanding of who you want your artist to be signed to; perhaps you could link this further by stressing the advantages that your artist has signed to the particular record label.  Your clearly identify your target audience and have profiled them well, but could develop this with the use of VALS.  Good research into CD covers and you have a wide range of examples, and this would be developed further if you can link the real product to how it will influence your own designs.

Completing and filming storyboard

We have now completed our storyboard for our music video. We are going to create a 'draft' version of our music video through filming our storyboard shots to go with the song. We will edit this later. Here is a clip showing how we have been working today.

Designing a front cover for artist

My group don't have an artist name yet for our band, but I came up with the name 'DUMMY' and think it's quite cool. I find dummy's in general quite scary and disturbing, and because the track is very dark in itself I think this could be an appropriate name. 

Here I have created a few front cover album designs we could possibly use.

I took this picture a few years ago, but I thought revisiting it was appropriate in this case. I added lots of grain and  used shadow to create a disturbing image. 

Here I added a cold effect to the picture to give the feeling of isolation and loneliness. 

I took this picture from the previous photographer Anna Misoni, but this is the idea I would like to have with a similar style. 

Again another idea for an album cover using Misoni's work.

Other ideas we currently have for CD album covers...

The first shot shows our actress scared with a card in her mouth. The cards resemble the way she is 'gambling' with her life staying with an abusive boyfriend.

The second shot shows a hand showing a card, which is the main focus of the mise en scéne of the picture. 

THE GAMBLE WITH HER LIFE.

Digipack Covers - Similar Artwork

PJ Harvey's photographer is Maria Mochnacz. Her image has been constructed by the photographer and by other creative teams such as make-up and costume designers.



Maria Mochnacz also photographs other musicians, but PJ Harvey is the most well-known. Here are some other artists that Maria Mochnacz has worked with, so the pictures and artist images are all similar in style. Her ideas could help me think of some ideas for our magazine cover.


Vanessa Quinones

This photo was taken in the artists flat - not a studio

Richard Ashcroft 

This was shot for Nylon magazine.

Chikinki

Mochnacz shot a video of this artist through an analogue video night vision camera. She then played the video back on her television and took a picture of the video from the tele.

Ana Da Silva

Mochnacz placed a giant piece of paper behind the artist and cut out various letters in different fonts and stuck them behind to make the photograph look like something out of a magazine. Da Silva's dress is covered in all her favourite things - that would normally be kept away in a box or mantelpiece.

So the pictures are all noticeably in black and white, which is the idea that my group and I are going for as well. Because our music video deals with memories and flash backs, black and white is an appropriate colour scheme I think. Particularly with Chikinki's grain look...we want that gritty feel.

Here is also some work of similar nature from Anna Morisi. Again the black and white pictures convey a dark attitude and the teenagers at the top right are portrayed as rebellious and very indie. I like the picture of the girl alone on the bottom right most. She looks sad and hurt, and the lack of clothing has some sexual implications. I think this could be a possible idea for an album cover photograph.

We'd probably be attracting a target audience of around 17-27 year olds, people who are more sophisticated with their music taste and have that typical grunge style about them. 

Research into the institutional context of PJ Harvey

Today I researched information about PJ Harvey's record deal just to have some more feedback on what her background is.

PJ Harvey 

• is signed to Island Records.

Island Records was based in Jamaica as an independent music label but was bought out and is now a subsidiary company of the major, Universal. 

It's quite interesting to see that Island has a mix of artists signed up. Lets see...

They've got Florence and The Machine signed up. She's a very distinctive artist. Noticeably indie, particularly how she wants to stand out with her ginger hair - as these days it's thought of as socially embarrassing to have ginger hair for some reason. But she has that mainstream look about her what with the pink lipstick and eye shadow going on. The leopard top might indicate some sort of sexual reference...she's an animal..? And her open mouth could possibly be suggestive.

Oh they've also got the band The Feeling. Ah here we go...it's the typical boy band look with the formal blazers and but they've got modern day hairstyles and one is wearing a hat...smart casual look I think. Again, another noticeably indie group yet they still have this mainstream constructed image about them. They aren't all exactly good looking - obviously their success and popularity isn't so much about their looks...

So PJ Harvey has some similarity between these artists too. She's definitely indie, we know this for sure, but maybe all this commercial success she's been getting recently like winning the Mercury Music Prize this year is increasing her fan base as she becomes more popular. Thus more demand is in for her name and she begins to cater for a more mainstream target audience.

Clever old Island. They're targeting with their artists both for mainstream and indie tastes..

Storyboarding and Working Progress

We are now in the process of creating our storyboard for our music video.

View below to see what we've done so far.

I am also working on the timeline for our group, planning and organizing our shot choices for the shoot day.

Analysing the Lyrics

I've been analysing the lyrics to 'A Perfect Day Elise' so that we can start to create some narrative in our music video. 

• There's a load of double meanings in this...'Hitting on the girl' (as in way hay wink wink get in there boy) as opposed to 'HITTING on the girl' (should be slightly obvious - the guy hitting her).
• So there's a load of violent themes in here and sexuality issues.
• And I reckon she's got a thing against God...she seems to be attacking religion in reference to 'God is the sweat running down HIS back' - the guy is powerful because God is helping him but not her. 

I'm glad i've analysed the lyrics, we now have a more of an idea of how to start storyboarding the track! 

Track Ideas - Shots

After the absence of group member, Vlad, he came back with a brilliant idea for some focus pulls. Additionally notice the 'black and white' film noir feel we are going for. Inspiration came from this video;

Track Ideas - Look and Style

Now that we've decided on our track, we know what sort of look we want the video to have. 

I really liked Eminem's shots in his music video 'Space Bound'. The smoke effects and the dark, shadowy images and Eminem's disturbing presence all heighten meaning to his song. I would like to use similar effects in my music video. 

Feedback

Excellent work through sustained blogging with all homework’s completed in detail.  You make use of different blog tools and are able to link ideas to real media concepts.  

Well done! 

Finalizing decisions

Just a reminder of our song choice again...

Progression and Track Ideas

We made some changes today...

'A Perfect Day Elise' - PJ Harvey

The colour scheme on the music video has been darkened and there is lots more shadow here. Even the narrative does not make sense...we would like to have a similar effect on the audience so that they have to really think about what they are watching. 

Honey's idea - potential use in promo video

The video Honey watched and got the 'hands' idea from...

Target Audience

Considering PJ Harvey has a very indie style, we are going to be catering for those who prefer niché tastes. They may read magazines such as NME or Kerrang.

  

Each magazine caters for non-mainstream tastes and specialises in promoting popular indie artists.


More info 


The audience are probably;

• Living in the US/UK

• Aged between 17-30 years male or female - middle class (sophisticated tastes) 

• Arty and creative people with unusual hobbies

Mood Board

I have made a mood board of PJ Harvey - the artist that my group and I are thinking of covering. The board helps us distinguish what kind of star image we are hoping to promote. 

You can tell she has a unique style as she bares a lot of her body, her hair style is edgy and the pictures covey her cool attitude. The clothing style particularly enhances her music style.



Overview of the day, first initial track

Here is a YouTube link to the song 'My Beautiful Leah' by PJ Harvey.

If we do not use this song for our promo video track, at least we know what genre route we are heading towards - Grunge/Rock

Introduction to the group and first initial music track idea

Today I researched and looked at the styles and image of many singer/songwriters with my group. We focused particularly on Kasabian and the way they present their image. However, we found their music is too mainstream and my group and I agreed that we wanted to go down a more niché area. So I suggested that artist PJ Harvey's 'My Beautiful Leah' would be a good resolution...

Research into music video's

I've been researching into what sort of music video I would like to produce with my group. I'm not particularly interested in the typical, synthetic construction - i'd like to try something arty and a bit more creative!

I watched 'What Makes You Beautiful' by the band 'One Direction'.

The band is clearly a carefully constructed image...

• They're good looking.
• The title name flatters girl fans - what girl doesn't love to be told they're beautiful?!
• The song publishers have taken the recognisable theme 'Summer Lovin' from 'Grease' so there is something identifiable for the audience there already.

It's all rather clever. But just a tad cheesy...I was much more interested in the band Radiohead's approach...

Now here's something much more organic!

• Look how free the lead singer Thom York is in comparison to the obviously choreographed movement in 'One Direction's' video.
• Much more arty approach going on here - the editor has chosen black and white to give the band some edge, which also suits the genre better. 

I researched more into unknown bands such as 'Air'.  I suggested to my group this video:

I love the spacy sound/feel and the cartoons are so creative. It's also got some humour in there with the little toy monkey wearing a top 'sexy boy'. It brings across the artists' sense of humour. However, the instruments are quite synthesized and it would be difficult to create a narrative story line for this song without copying elements from the original video.

So I've moved on to look at PJ Harvey's style. She's a niché artist with a distinctive style, but uses acoustic instruments, particularly bass, to give her tracks a gritty sound. 

She's obviously had a constructed look - the sexy black v-neck dress and red lipstick with high black heeled boots...but she still manages to maintain that slight 'goth/emo' look which I love. I think i'm verging down the route of something dark and slightly 'indie'. PJ Harvey's personality comes through here as really fun, free and careless in this video, yet the video has little narrative - if any. 

I'll be suggesting this artist to my group next...

What am I doing again?

So my upcoming tasks in the next few weeks is to create a promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with two of the following options...

• A website homepage for the band
• A cover for its release as part of a digipak (CD/DVD package)
• A magazine advertisement for the digipak (CD/DVD package) 

I will have to make sure that we have special permission to use the song that my group and I chose to use, otherwise there is always the danger of 'plagiarism'. 

THE MUSIC INDUSTRY

Right...so today was pretty much a re-cap on the music industry.

There are five major music industry companies:

Sony, Universal, BMG, EMI and Warner are the five biggest conglomerate companies that own 76% of the music industry share. Alongside this are the 'Independents', some of which are subsidiary companies of the majors, which own 24% of all music shares and production. 

Smaller more subsidized music companies are known through the term 'Oligopoly'. 

The five big majors are known as conglomerates. They are each a business, aiming to produce popular mainstream music to a wide audience on a global level. There is not so much focus on the performer, but more on the star image, as Richard Dyer's theory suggests, creating 'synthetic acts' as opposed to 'organic' which the Independents specialize in. 

The Independents additionally target their audience on a more national level and help to nurture the artist to hone their creative talents. Media theorist, Keith Negus, suggests that we have 'a web of major and minor record labels' and that music video is a 'promotional tool' and a form of synergy. 

Improving my blogging skills

To improve my blogging skills from my AS year, I have researched previous A2 student blogs. I am going borrow some ideas of theirs to put onto my blog this year. Possibly by;


Creating video diaries/commentaries. 

Presenting new layouts and designs.

Use of less text and more visual image.

Use of more media technology software such as PowerPoint, slide share etc. to develop my technological skills.

CD Cover Package

I created an album/back cover of a CD advertising Acres of Life's tracks.

I wanted to bring out the grungy, punk sound of the band through the design.

I used;

Picasa software 

Adding text in Picasa to CD back cover

I chose the font carefully, making it look edgy. In contrast the font colours are bright against the dark backgrounds to bring out their youthful sound, yet sit well against the moody image. I also lowered the saturation levels a considerable amount and reduced the colour to capture the gritty image of the band. Additionally I added some grain onto the front cover to enhance this.

Increasing grain and decreasing saturation levels to CD back cover



Before and After! 

Prelim Day

The preliminary task day came by and my group and I were feeling fairly confident with our planning and preparation. We had chosen what key shots we would specifically like in our thirty second clip of the track.

Considering we had been allocated the opening to the track, it was important that we convey the band's star image as soon as the track began. In preparation we had created a rough timeline of where we wanted to place our key shots for the first thirty seconds of the track.

Me helping set up with the lead singer, Sam

We wanted our opening shot to be a wide shot of the set, and then seeing the band walk onto it and set up. We wanted to convey Acres of Life's very laid back attitude and the fact that it is not in their nature to hide anything, they expose themselves and their unique image - just as we expose the set-up before the actual shoot.

We had a quick reminder and introduction on how to use the film camera's and then moved onto filming our shots. With only half an hour for each group to complete the shots we wanted, we had to be very efficient as a group and direct with what we wanted to do.

I managed on playback, as the director and worked mostly on camera. We knew what shots we wanted to use, but we were quite slow at the start and took too long to work on what shot we ought to film first. We ought to have planned our time more carefully, but with just enough time to spare, we filmed all the key shots we wanted with a few extra.

Me working on camera

I learnt to be more firm and direct and to have to think on my feet and make decisions quickly in a limited amount of time. I also learnt how to deal with different types of people as I worked with the band and with people in my group collaboratively.

The prelim task I felt helped my directory skills the most. I had noticed at the beginning of our shoot that one of the band members was feeling quite nervous. I took him aside and encouraged him to peform his best - I even had to dance manically to the song backstage to encourage the members to perform their best and 'let themselves go'. Thankfully this put the band in a good mood and, despite my embarrassment, they gave us a good performance!





Working in progress

I found the editing task quite fun and it seemed this was something my group was strong at doing. We used final cut pro software to edit our shots together and create our product.

We finished in about an hour and after checking and watching over the few clips, we were pleased with our final result. I learnt through the editing process to cut shots in beat and time with the song and also how to bring the music video 'to life' by speeding up the editing and using short, quick cuts in time with the music.







Below is a video of our final product. I contributed from 0s - 35s.