Friday, 25 October 2013
Thursday, 24 October 2013
Tuesday, 15 October 2013
Prop list for my music video.
- Campfire
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- Genre conventional clothing/costume.
- Empty alcohol bottles
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- Motorcycle
I do not require many props for the production of my music video and to progress the narrative. Although for the main focus of my video I will use a searing fire as a prop and focus many unique camera angles around it, using the symbol of the fire as the troubles between the couple who are sat each at either side of it with it between them. I will shoot these shots focused around the fire at night when it is pitch black to intensify its light and contrast to the darkness. My friend who is one of the main characters in my music video also owns a vintage motorcycle and will fit with the stereotypical conventions of my genre, so I will shoot several shots including it. I will use empty alcohol bottles and place them near the fire, showing shots of them for when the lyrics 'We were young and drinking in the park' play.
Sunday, 13 October 2013
Saturday, 12 October 2013
Cast list for my music video for 'Bad Blood.'
Due to the fact that my narrative does not span out and involve any other characters than a main boy and girl, my cast is small and provides a more focused, non-complicating story line that the audience will understand.
Male character:
Played by: Nathan Allen
Nathan is a long term friend of mine but not a student at Wyke College. He is currently partaking in a course on construction and electrical engineering elsewhere, and jumped on the opportunity to star in my video.
Nathan was a great choice for a main character in my music video due to the fact that the two of us constructed a previous music video for our GCSE Media in high school and received an A grade for the piece of coursework, of course GCSE and A-level are incomparable, but I think this will give me a slight advantage from past experience of the two of us working together on a media project.
Nathan is reliable and will fit to the shooting schedule, and dresses in the costume that I would like the character in my video to be in on a regular basis, this indie-rock costume fits the conventions of my chosen genre without the need to specifically purchase these clothes. He also has a vintage motorcycle which could fit perfectly with the genre conventions of indie rock, which I could include in several shots.
Female character:
Played by: Georgina Isitt
Georgina is a close friend of mine and studies Applied Science, Film studies and Psychology at Wyke. I have chosen her to be my second and final character because I know that she is reliable and more than capable of fitting the role of my female character, she also lives locally to the shooting areas that I have chosen so will be easily accessible, which is convenient due to the fact that many of my shots are planned to be taken at night.
Her appearance and the way she dresses also reflects the genre conventions and costume of a stereotypical indie female character. This will help me achieve a sense of realism with my characters, sticking close to the costume conventions of real music videos of this genre.
A few first practice shots for music video.
Before I go to my friends farm this weekend to light our fire that my video revolves around and hopefully film a majority of the music video, before travelling to the Humber Bridge to film other sections, I took the camera and tripod out and captured some first test shots.
Compiling several first clips I obtained on movie maker.
I did this in order to see what effects would work well when coming to producing my piece and editing it properly with my final shots.
Shooting schedule.
Saturday 23rd Oct - Begin filming farm scene at night.
Monday 18th Nov - Take several daytime shots for instrumental.
Friday 22nd Nov - Shoot sunset shots.
Saturday 23rd Nov morning - Shoot sunrise shots
Saturday 23rd Nov evening - Shoot sunset shots, then light fire. Shoot most shots including the fire and motorcycle.
Tuesday 26th - Film any other filler shots.
To be added to.
Monday 18th Nov - Take several daytime shots for instrumental.
Friday 22nd Nov - Shoot sunset shots.
Saturday 23rd Nov morning - Shoot sunrise shots
Saturday 23rd Nov evening - Shoot sunset shots, then light fire. Shoot most shots including the fire and motorcycle.
Tuesday 26th - Film any other filler shots.
To be added to.
Audience research - Blog poll findings.
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From the poll that I carried out on my blog as part of my audience research, I have collected the following findings:
88% of the people who answered my poll were female, which could suggest that not only females mostly responded to fill out my poll, but that indie rock genre contains an audience that is female dominant.
To validate these results further I carried out extra research into the audience of Indie Rock and have found this to be true, supporting the answers to my poll.
100% of people who carried out my poll were 17 years old and every one of these people who answered my poll believe that 16-19 year olds are the main audience that consumes music videos most often. 85% of people who answered also think that the age group of 16-18 year olds search for and watch Indie Rock music videos most often.
These results show a clear corresponding pattern that the exact audience that have answered my poll believe that their age range watch the most music videos overall, as well as the majority agreeing that this age range watches indie rock videos the most, despite being given the option of selected 4 other varied age ranges. This majority pattern proves significant reliability to what is being answered.
I also posed a question to the audience on their favourite music genres. The results returned with 11% being interested in by R&B and soul the most, 22% interested mostly in the genre of Rap and Hip Hop, as well as acoustic. 44% of people who answered had a favourite genre of Dubstep and Dance music, and finally 66% of people preferred indie rock the most. Due to the fact that I have received answers from people that would mostly consider indie rock as their favourite music genre I feel as though these statistics from an audiences point of view have a clear pattern and have a certain
degree of accuracy.
Tuesday, 8 October 2013
Audience research - Focus group.
I posed several questions about my chosen form (music video) to a selection of students in order to find out what they want to see and what they like regarding music video. The answers I recieved allowed me to gain information which I will use to engineer my final media product to appeal to a larger audience, and how I could do this.
Monday, 7 October 2013
Textual analysis of 3 existing music videos of the Indie/Alternative Rock genre.
Written by: Dan Smith
Directed by: David Knight
Genre: Slow Indie/alternative rock
Structure: Mainly narrative but also abstract.
The video follows the conventions of its genre mainly because for the longevity of the music video the lead singer and the band do not make a single appearance throughout, which is conventional due to the fact an indie rock bands performance usually does not play a large part in their music video, this is due to the fact that the writer and director wanted to focus more solely on the narrative and getting the message of its content across without disruption or the crossing of another narrative of the bands performance, which is not a bad thing and makes the video more creative. A commonly found feature of this genre.
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A shot of the girl asleep in bed is then shown straight after the opening, slowly zooming into her, and her personal possessions whilst slowly panning over them. Handheld close up camera shots overlook and pan across a book (which the girl then clutches as she walks out in the night) dolls and the girls face whilst she sleeps in bed.
These different shots and camera techniques are used to piece everything about the character together so that the audience understand the narrative more fully.
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In relation to ideology, two very different points of view of the girl are shown. For the first and most of part of the music video the girl is represented as innocent and pure. This is done by the fact that the girl is dressed in all white (suggesting these themes of purity and innocence), wearing child-like bed clothes including a white t shirt with a white cats face on it, and white shorts. The girl also has no shoes on for the most part of the video, walking through dark London city streets at night bare foot. I think this suggests the fact that she is exposed and vulnerable, which is a common stereotype of females in media texts of any genre, which supports Tessa Perkins' representational theory of stereotypes.
Although towards the end of the video, a sudden force overcomes the girl as the music picks up pace after burying the book she has been carrying throughout the video. Shots of the girls face and her expression change from innocent, to hard and powerful. Also several shots of this girl smoking, wearing red lipstick, dressed in darker colours, denim and high heels, leaned against a brick wall at night are shown. The girl is now shown in a completely different point of view, challenging previous stereotypes as the girl is now in these more revealing, less innocent clothes, smoking a cigarette. This ultimately shows her independence, and how she can make her own decisions (to smoke, wear these clothes) unlike how she seemed weak and controlled for the first three quarters of the video. These two different stereotypes and images of this same girl could also relate to Levis Strauss' representational theory of binary opposites, as the girl goes from being represented in one way, and then as the exact opposite by the end of the video to show a change. From pure and innocent, to rebellious and dangerous. The mise-en-scene of a music video can have an effect on the connotations of the narrative by using different costume such as in this case, and how the dim lighting and dark settings give off a completely different feel than the bright, colourful settings.
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Written by: Alex Turner
Directed by: Nabil
Genre: Indie/Alternative rock
Structure: Narrative
The music video does follow the conventions of this genre to a great extent due to that fact that there are conventional locations including bars and city streets, and the bands lead singer is the main character in the video, which is commonly found in the indie rock genre. Other conventions of the genre that are fulfilled include the costume and hair. The main character (and lead singer of Arctic Monkeys) is wearing a black leather jacket, a black t shirt, dark blue skinny jeans and has his hair slicked back with wax. The costume is probably the most noticeable and recognisable conventional feature found throughout the entire genre of rock (especially the classic leather jacket), as well as in the sub genre I have chosen to study. In the indie rock genre (unlike other types of rock) it is conventional to not feature a performance element of the band, and music videos of this genre are usually more focused on narrative aspects to progress a story.
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The mise-en-scene along with the diagetic sound within the video of the noise of people talking as they would in a social, public place like this also creates a sense of realism. This fits alongside with the element of extras that pass the camera, (which is in the midst of everything) through the shot, and the fact that people are shown walking around the bar with everyone going about their own business as it were real life.
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This is a good example and a key element in this video of how the narrative is represented and developed, through what actually happens in the video. The man in the video is at a bar and gets drunk, and throughout the rest of the video certain effects such as blurring show this from his point of view.
As a good example of these 3D effects and editing, when the main character looks at the clock it is completely distorted, looks as though it liquefies on the wall, his own face in the mirror also does this.
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At the end of the video the editing displaying the conversations on a mobile phone as a hologram occurs when we see the girl the lead singer has been trying to communicate in her home, as she picks up her phone 'Alex Band Guy. 17 missed messages.' is projected into the shot for the audience to see, which the girl ignores, thus being the conclusion.
The main ideology in this music video includes the stereotype that men are stupid and get drunk often, yet again linking to the theory of Tessa Perkins. This is represented and shown through the way the character see's his own distorted face in the mirror and see's that he is drunk, yet carries on drinking alcohol and doing shots. He then stumbles and falls over many times whilst hallucinating. During his hallucinations, the lead singer and main character see's many sexual actions happen to women before his eyes, and we are then shown that they are not real and it is only what is happening in the man's mind. This relates to Laura Mulveys theory of the male gaze and that women are seen as 'sex objects' by men, and as we are seeing from the mans point view in the video, this is definitely the case.
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Due to the main character being a male and the content of the video including sexual themes, the music video would appeal more to men, which is in co-ordination with the fact the Arctic Monkeys have a larger percentage of their fan base that are male. In the video the lead singer of the band: Alex Turner, drinks too much and gets drunk and imagines sexual actions and people dropping from rooftops then jumping over fences, adding an edge of humor the video.
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Written by: Dan Smith
Directed by:
Genre: Indie/Alternative rock
Structure: Narrative
The main artist in the video is shown wearing a black t shirt and leather jacket, with skinny jeans. This is a formal genre convention and fits the code of the indie rock genre due to its reflective nature of the genre as most indie rock bands can be seen wearing these clothes.. The majority of the music video is set in and around dark, urban city streets. This location is conventional to the Indie Rock genre due to the fact that it co-ordinates with the impression and feel that the genre of music gives off, which is rebellious, suburban and cool. My statement of these streets being a conventional location is also backed up and shown by the fact that for the most part of the video for 'Overjoyed', (the song I first analysed in this post) it is set in city streets, and the entirety of the video for 'Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High' also shares the same location. By coincidence, the most part of each of the videos that I have analysed are also filmed at night, suggesting that this is another conventional feature of the genre shown in this video.
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This is conventional for the rock as well as pop genre, to establish location.
This then cuts to a shaky handheld camera shot from behind the lead singer overlooking LA whilst slowly panning across to the right, the shot also includes the song title and the bands name in the middle of the screen, which is a type of editing.
The artist only takes up a quarter of the shot and the majority of the shot is of the city, although this is a depth of field shot which shows the man in perfect focus, yet the city is blurred. This could connote that although the location is established in these shots, this is the mans story and the narrative is still led and progressed by him. Straight after this camera angle, the camera then cuts to a close up from the front of Dan, showing his emotionless, expressionless face.
Close up shots are good for revealing the reactions of characters and how they are feeling, and for the sake of star appeal which the audience expect to see in a music video. This shot delivers both of these purposes. A similar close up shot of the characters face, with everything else around him out of focus is also used later on the video.
For a large amount of the video, the character is seen moving. With the segments where the lead singer is running away from the antagonists with the black eyes (such as in the games arcade), there is a shaky handheld camera chasing behind him from a low angle, tilting upwards. This camera angle represents the characters panic, how he is scared, and his frantic need to escape. The shaking of the camera also reflects his emotional being, and how he is probably shaking after his encounter with these strange people. The fact that the shot is taken from below at a low angle at some speed could symbolise that he is being chased by these people also, as the girls he see's in the arcade are much shorter than him.
On the other hand there are segments of business where movement of the character can be seen present, but steadicam tracking is used. Steadicam is used in this individual parts before the character is aware and alerted of the antagonists when he is riding a bike into the city, the fact that the camera is still and not shaking whilst following him represents how the cinematography can amplify how the character is feeling. The audience will understand that the character is calm at this point, but then factors such as; close ups of the characters face showing different expressions, and the shaking of a handheld camera can give off different meanings and provoke the audience the understand and receive the media text in a different way. The character is calm and collected, and so is the camera. Going from still, steady shots for the first third of the music video, I think this builds tension up for when the camera is in rapid movement.
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In the section of the video where the character drives a car in an attempt to flee the city, the cinematography consists of many extreme long shots of the location around him as he is travelling, with very little focus on the character and his vehicle in certain shots as he only takes up a miniscule portion of them, with the dark surrounding environment overpowering him.
At a later point in a shot filmed at night, the lead singer mimes the words of the song, bows his head and then closes his eyes. The shot then cuts to a long shot of a brand new setting during the day time, set in a desert with Dan still in the same position. There are many changes of scenery throughout this video, all justified and fully established using long, and extreme long shots so that the audience get a clear understanding of the transition and how it has happened. Such as showing his car, or bicycle for example.
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Without this form of editing the narrative would be understood as to why he is running from these people and the video could not progress along with the story. The implementation of a title screen style edit featuring the bands name and the name of the song included in one of the opening shots slightly breaks conventions but then again does not look out of place in the video and adds an abstract element to it. Montage editing is also a technique found within this music video. Montage editing is the editing in quick succession of multiple short shots that only appear for a few seconds at a time. This is found whilst the character is cycling through the streets of LA and shots of a bulding site, a river and an old shop, before cutting to a shot of the main character on a bicycle. This form of editing is used to establish and show the location that the music video is filmed from another perspective other than what we have previously seen (the shot from afar.) At a part where the lead singer bows his head and then closes his eyes, the shot cuts to day time, where it was previously dark. Editing at this point is used to symbolise that he has slept and shows progression in time, showing continuity and a chronological order to the structure of the video.
On the subject of sound in the video, a key point for me was that the lyrics correspond to the actions in the video at certain points in the music video. As Dan enters the games arcade in a panic he comes across two young girls.
The ideology behind these girls is that due to the fact they are wearing 'baby blue', child-like dresses that look like they should be worn by dolls, they are stereoyped to be innocent and harmless. Although this is soon negated due to the fact that where their eyes were once closed, they open wide and are shown to be pure black. Relating back to sound, as the girls open their eyes, the lyrics of the hook in the music are 'but if you close your eyes.' These lyrics are very ironic compared to with what is shown at the current time here. Shots of graffiti on the walls of buildings and structures in the video also give off a rebellious, dark feeling of uncertainty and a lack of security. This form of ideology is also a stereotype that we automatically assume, that graffiti connotes rebellion, thugs, and violence.
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The text appeals to the audience through the use of superficial themes, exciting locations and an interesting narrative. The video also has a satisying ending as it features a final conclusion to the narrative that Dan turns into one of the antagonists, revealed by showing a medium-close up shot of his back, as he turns around to reveal his fully black eyes, before the video ends. But leaves a slight cliffhangar as the audience are left to wonder what the cause of this is.
The narrative is action packed and excites the audience through the use of the editing of the eyes of the people to make them black, this adds an almost sci-fi element to the music video and would appeal to fans of this genre. The fast editing as the character is escaping combined with the shaky, frantic camera movements is entertaining to watch and leaves the audience wondering what is going to happen next, as he travels location to location in search of refuge, with a conclusion that leaves the audience to unravell the meaning embedding within the music video.
The theme of Levi Strauss' theory of binary opposites also comes into the video as the main character is the protagonist, who is in fear of the the people with black eyes, who are the antagonists. The binary opposite aspect visually is the fact that instead of a large amount of the eyes being white, the entire eye is black, which is a contrasting colour and considered an opposite. Which easily identifies the people as the enemy, although this view is questioned and challenged towards the end of the video.
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