Equipment List

Now I have worked out where I want to film and with what backdrop I can now work out what equipment I need.
I will need the following :
- Digital Video Cameras,
- Lights,
-Tripod,
- Microphone,
- Black Backdrop for Stage,
- Computer

To create the music video I want to do this is the equipment I need.

Bluestone 360

Today I visited Bluestone 360. Bluestone 360 is a advertising company who make adverts for Gregory's, Plymouth Argyle Football Club, Danepak and many more. I visited them today to see what Ian Gullingham the director there thought of my storyboard from an industry side.
He said that my storyboard wasn't detailed enough for industry. If a film director picked up your storyboard then he should be able to work out what happens in the video without having to read the caption. With the drawing you should include colour as it helps whoever is looking at your storyboard interpret it. The colour is very important to show the mood of the scene and it is vital to include colours, when you change the background colour this can easily change the overall mood of the scene.
As a company making storyboard for adverts and designing things he said that you cannot over do your storyboard as it is the bones to your video. Before he said he has done 50 drawings to make sure he is happy. He also said when choosing an illustrator for and advert that everyone has there own individual style and its important to show that.
I said that when I am making my storyboard that I am not very good at drawing so he recommended writing out the story and what I want to have in it and then draw the pictures, they don't have to be amazing just clear enough to the person reading who may never have seen it before knows whats happening.


He also mentioned that my storyboard captions must be much more detailed for an industry and have a lot more micro details in there. For example on the first scene in my storyboard is that a modern building, old building, what is the lighting like bright middle of the day or dark at night time, what is the weather doing.
He said that something he uses is finishing the video first. So make sure you know what your ending is going to be like first as this is the last thing that people are going to see and this will be the way they feel after viewing it so having the ending sorted can make people feel happy, sad etc.
He told me at the end to be creative because its the creative people with the unique style that get recognised and the people who stay in the crowd are the same. It is very important to draw or write down what you want to happen and show your own style rather than just follow the crowd.

Storyboard 1

Here are my intial ideas for my storyboard

This is my first intial storyboard with the timings ect on.

Audience Questionaire

I asked a group of people and asked for there feedback on two questions.

I had a couple extra comments:

Would be good to see a live performance and also see nature incorparated.

Live performance with music instruments.

Audience Research

I was curious to know where most people viewed music videos. So I asked a focus group to answer one question which was

"Where do you view most of your music videos"

This is how the results came out;

This shows that the younger generation view most of there music videos online on Youtube. Youtube is an ever growing company with more and more music videos going on there. Youtube holds all recent and past music videos, with the latest music on there.

Forms and conventions of a music video

A music video has many forms and conventions to stick to. When making a music video something the director has to consider is whether to follow or break the conventions of that genre.
Music videos tend to stick to the forms and conventions as the audience gets use to a certain type of video so there the audience feels familiar. Also the way the different music videos are filmed fit in with the right colours and lighting.

Pop videos

Pop videos tend to be based in a nightclub, or a party somewhere and they tend to use lots of close ups of the artists and mid shots. They don't tend to use a panning shot much it tends to be more jumpy and upbeat to go with the music. In a pop video there tends to be bright fluorescent lights and sometimes strobe is used.

Acoustic songs

In the music videos the tend to the natural environment, for example they use the sea, countryside, and woods for example. The lighting tends to be lighter. Usually you tend to see the artist playing the guitar. The video tends to be fairly free flowing with the transitions being smooth between clips.

Rock videos

Rock videos on the other hand tend to use dark colours using lots of close ups to show the facial expressions. The colours tend to be worn by the people on stage are usually very dark. The rock videos tend to follow two different story lines, usually one being performance based on stage for example and the other one tends to have a brighter lighting and is usually in cities.

Making a video

In the Guardian it gives a guide on making video. It talks about the different specifications of camera you should, what camera angles and other useful tips on making a video.

It was handy in here to read about Editing tips, sound advice, and how to make a film. It was really handy to read and other basic techniques.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2008/jan/26/makingvideoguide




Guardian January 2008 edition.

Storyboarding

Storyboarding is very important and its important to make sure that your storyboard shows a clear picture of each clip and then its important to to allow room for a short caption to go underneath to make sure that you can identify which shot is going to go where and how long you hope it will last for.

When someone looks at a storyboard they should be able to guess what its about without having to actually read or follow it.

This storyboard helps show that with a little bit of writing under each scene. This maybe to tell the director what camera shot to use, whether any effects are going to be added i.e black and white

Research

• How are music videos generally made?

Depending on the budget decides on how the video is filmed. For example if the budget is large then the record company and artist can afford to go abroad to film, use special effects and top of the range equipment to get the most from it.

• What is the production process?

Firstly a lot of footage must be taken because there is undoubtly going to be a lot of clips you are unable to use maybe because its not clear and easy enough to lipsync or because the mise en scene wasnt considered but overall there has to be alot of footage to allow for wastage.

• What is the purpose of a music video for the companies/artists that make them?

Music Videos are made to be shown and promote the music video. This is in the best intrest of the artist, and record company because the two step flow theory says that the word is spread so if more poeple view the video then this will encorage them to buy the song.

• How do audiences access music videos? Where can they be seen?

Audiences can watch the music videos on the television or online. Many people watch music videos online and this is where the highest proportion of music videos would be watched.

Catergories of music videos

There are three different types of category for a music video:

•  Performance Based,
•  Concept Based,
• Narrative based.

A performance based music video is a music video that shows band/artist performing.

A narrative based music video is a music video that has a story behind it.

You can get a mixture of the two where the music video has two storylines and shows the band performing and will then show a narrative side to it and switch between the two.

A concept video is a music video based around one idea. These music videos aren't very common and most music videos tend not to be purely based on the concept video and may include Performance and Narrative based.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is the reference to something in narrative to something else. For example earlier on in my blog I talked about how Dappy in his song No regrets talks about Chris Brown. In the song Moves like Jagger By Maroon 5 ft Christina Aguilera it keeps refering to Mick Jagger. This is really effective showing old clips and realting it back to Mick Jagger. It shows intertexuality in this video by showing old clips of the film.

My music video

In my music video I will have to think a lot about the mise en scene. I plan to use the countryside in my video .One place I want to use is Davidstow Airfield to film. I want to film here because for the panning shots I can do it will be really effective showing the landscape and use stopmotion. I want to use stopmotion in my video. I plan to film a sunset using stop motion. Watching Coldplay's song Every teardrop is a waterfall uses stopmotion to show the lyrics in the background.

Another place I want to try and use is a motor wait at night and speed this up to show all the lights going through to try and show the buisiness during the chorus.
I will then have two different storylines, the landscapes and the artist singing.

Stopmotion

In my video I plan to use stopmotion. Stopmotion is when you take a number of still in the same place of the same thing just altered slightly to try and show the video but have it in lots of stills sped up to make it seem like a video.
I plan to use stopmotion in my video to show a sunset or sunrise.

A advert on tv at the moment uses stop motion really effectively:

Another example of stop motion is Art Clokey's stop motion on Gumby. This tv series was made intirally using stopmotion. A tiny bit would be filmed and then Gumby and the surroundings made of clay has to be remoulded. 



Song Idea

I think that Mad World - Gary Jules is a very good to make my own music video. Some ideas I had about filming it is:

• I thought that in one part of the video I could use stop motion as I think this is very effective. I was thinking about using stop motion to film a sunset. I was thinking about doing this over the local Cornish hills.
• I want to also include the countryside and try linking my music video the countryside. This could be done either through the person singing in the countryside or have a panning shot of him walking in the countryside.
• I plan to use a varitie of camera angles including a panning shot, close ups, and long shot being my main three types.