Similar bands/artists to ours

We did some research into similar bands and artists to see their style in clothes, makeup and locations.

Costume and makeup

In lesson, I printed off some face makeup templates to have a look into makeup, Issy created some possible looks on the templates and Lucy looked up similar makeup on the internet.

These images are all quite bold as they use a lot of makeup but they would look good in front of the camera and would avoid the singer looking pale and timid. I haven't chosen pinks as the image we are going for isn't as girly, although I don't think the makeup should be too heavy as we aren't going for the 'Goth' look either. The makeup should be a mix of natural and dark colours.

 

For clothing, we have looked at similar artists and bands and have decided on an image we would like to go with. Below are some images to show the theme to our song.



 

From looking at these other artists and images, we like the look of the shirts, jeans and skirts/dresses. We will look into what shirts Soraya already owns so we can hopefully go for the shirt and denim look.

 

 

Prop list and prices

Prop List

I did some research into the props, I looked up different websites which sold craft items and compared the prices of each site. These websites included; http://www.hobbycraft.co.uk https://www.minervacrafts.com, http://www.ebay.co.uk/ and http://www.amazon.co.uk/

All of these websites were useful, especially 'Minervacrafts' because this was the best website for the tulle material which was the hardest item to find, and at £3.99, this price was affordable for the group. EBay and Amazon which are more popular websites were good but the delivery and prices were good on the other sites which was more suitable for us as we needed these props/items for our video as soon as possible.

Shown below are the prices I found from my research from the websites http://www.hobbycraft.co.uk and https://www.minervacrafts.com.

Our total purchase prop list:

- Glow in the dark body paint £2.00

- Googly eyes £2.00

- Glitter £4.00

- Tulle material red £3.99

- Tulle material orange £3.99

- Canvas/wood £7.50

We already has access to other items such as white paint, paint for the canvas art, fairy lights and paper so we did not need to buy these items.

Lucy (myself) did the research into these items and bought them which we will divide the price by three which will cost us individually around £5. 

Mood Board

Shown below are images of a mood board that I created for the group. It shows the 'art' we will use in our video and how it all relates to the lyrics. I highlighted the lyric and printed photographs from online to show our ideas. One idea we have for the art is the canvas we are using which will be covered in the 'art' from that lyric, for example 'strange eyes' at this stage in the song we will use the canvas which will be painted white and cover it with eyes (painted and images etc.) we also had the idea of using glow in the dark paint to use on the hands of the singer (Soraya) which has an image to explain on the mood board.

 

Also shown briefly on the mood board are the 'arty' things we will need to buy and I have looked up prices for these items.

 

 

Possible locations

Possible locations for our filming 

 

The images below are photographs of one possible location we are thinking about, the location is Galley wood common in Chelmsford. We think this would be a potential area to film because it has both open space and trees, this is suitable for our video as it is outside and we hope to create an outside scene at around the time of dusk. We also like this location as we have easy and quick access to it so if we end up re-filming anything, it is easy and quick to get to.
 

 

We also need somewhere for the performance which needs to have good lighting, we were thinking of using the schools drama studio but will need to book a time to use it. This would be good and will help us make it look professional as the lights are good to control ourselves and we can use this anytime as long as we check first with head of department as we have easy and quick access and can get to, to look at in school time, lesson time and our free study periods. It is a big open space which is good for our shot we will need, we can adjust lighting to make it look like a studio or stage.

As well as this location we have also been looking at other possible locations, another we like the look of and is suitable for our video is shown below which has a graffiti wall.

 

Similar videos to our ideas

Somebody that i used to know- Gotye 

Here is a similar idea that also uses a canvas. They use it like a green screen to create a background for the whole video which is an idea that we have, however it is different as although it also uses art, we will create a unique piece of art. This video uses one canvas for the whole video where as our video plans to use more than one.

Another similarity with this video is that it uses art which is gradually added in the video. I like this because it keeps the video interested as you want to see the end piece. Our video will be similar to this because at the end of the video, we plan to add all the art together for the end image, this will keep the audience interested through out the video as they will want to see the ending art piece like I did for this music video.

Lip Syncing task

 Lip syncing task

 

For our music video we need a main singer and in our group there is three of us who all wouldn't mind being this role.
 

As we didn't really know what others were like at performing, we did a lip sync task where we used the green screen room to film each of us singing to the song. We did this to see who of the three of us were best at performing. After filming this lip sync, we watched them back to see who had the presence, skill of lip syncing and confidence. I personally think that the best person in the group is Soraya, I think her and Issy were both really good at the task but as soon as the song had started Soraya had the presence and personality for the role.

The images below show images we took from the lip syncing task.

 

 

We had a group discussion and we decided that Soraya would be the best for the role as we could imagine her being a really good performer because as soon as she was in front of the camera she looked the part and her lip syncing was accurate even though she hadn't heard the song many times at this stage. We also used this task as a chance to try out the green screen as none of us had used it before. We adjusted the lighting and used a tripod to film and used the song as a



 

 

Music video ideas

Here is our music video pitch which we have used to show to the class. We kept it simple as we just wanted to include our main ideas for both songs.

Music video pitch

Our music video pitch

As the beginning of our music video research, we have looked into a few songs which we could possibly do. We wanted to find a song that isn't as popular and is sung by a solo female. This is because our group consists of three girls therefore would be our best option rather than using someone else outside of the group to perform. We wanted to have a song which we could make girly and upbeat.

 

Below are our best two possible songs both sung by female singers who fit the 'pop princess and diva' female singers.

 

The first song is by Meghan Trainor called ' Walkashame' this was a new song to me and had no music video which was good to listen to first time because it meant I could picture what I would put in the video with fresh ideas. This song fits our group of girls well as we could do a good job of involving a lot in the video.
The ideas we had for this song was girly costumes, settings and props. For example a pink glittery dress/outfit with heels. The backgrounds and settings would be colours such as pinks and purples and could have settings the match the lyrics such as a bedroom. We have a few clear ideas for this video which is why it is our first choice. 

This song is also good for our group as it has one female and has a good pace as it is slow then speeds up at the chorus. We put this as our second choice because although we have lots of ideas to go with the song and pace, we found it difficulty to picture a story to it which would make it jumbled up and confusing. We had ideas of using glitter, fairy lights, dark settings, animations and a projector. However although we had better ideas we couldn't think what order we would have things which would make it less professional.


Feedback

We presented our songs and images to the class to gain some feedback and opinions on our ideas.







 

Representations of women in music videos

Looking at female singers, we found in this time there are 3 main groups of singers and how they present themselves in their videos.

'Pop princess'




The typical image of the 'pop princess' would be a younger female or a female that has a younger audience that wears a lot different clothes to other groups of females. For example they will wear layers which cover up the areas that a 'diva' or 'gangster hoe' may display on purpose and would wear less makeup then the other groups.

'Diva'

This group are seen as powerful but are still similar to 'gangster hoe' because they have little or less clothing then the 'pop princess' they are seen as an idol to their audience and have big personalities. For example Beyoncé has a very large audience as is seen as a role model but not because of her ways as a singer but the image and she sets.

'Gangster hoe'

The group that is described a 'gangster hoe' is similar to the 'diva' image as they also have little clothing. Their image is different though because they have more of a rap related song where as 'divas' have more of a pop based background.

For example Iggy Azalea is seen as recent 'gangster hoe' as she presents herself as attention seeking as she wears little and revealing clothes and goes with the rap genre.

 Another example is Nicki Minaj. She also wears revealing clothes and is the main image in the music video, whereas in 'pop princess' music videos they may show other scenes such as a party or with friends. The 'gangster hoe' and 'divas' however have mainly themselves in the video.

Male gaze

The male gaze is used a lot for 'divas' and 'gangster hoes' as they use the clothing the females wear as part of the male gaze. This is where the audience are made to think the female is an object and it is so powerful that it also makes females watching think like a male and view their own gender as an object. These two groups display this male gaze because the way they act and come across makes them seem like an object to stare at, especially males which is exactly the point of the male gaze.  

Star Profile

Harry styles then and now from lucy_harding98

 

As research into star profiles, I have created a presentation on the changes of Harry Styles, a singer from the band 'One Direction'. I explored the way fame has changed him and I have also included another example within the slideshow of Miley Cyrus.

Prelim task evaluation

Prelim Task from sophie on Vimeo.

 

This is our final prelim task music video. We completed this within a couple of weeks of planning, finding costumes and location, filming and editing. We worked well as a team and managed to get all the shots we needed to produce a video which had similar frames to the original video.

Evaluation of our music video

1. Who did you work with and how did you manage the task between you? 

I worked with a group of me and three other girls, Olivia, Sophie and Bonnie. I think we worked really well together as we had similar ideas which made it easier to film and plan. Especially when thinking of locations, we all thought of the same places which then we used which worked. What was also good about our group is the people in our group had a similar image to the people in the girl band of little mix. For example Sophie dressed similar to Jesy and had a similar image to her which worked well when we were deciding who was going to be who.

We managed the task well, we all gathered our costumes together to use which was done quickly and the costumes looked similar. We all had a go at filming and editing and we also used a tripod for a lot of shots as all four of us needed to be in the frame.

Overall I believe we worked well as a group, we didn't have any disagreements which allowed us to get on with the task.


2. How did you plan your sequence? What processes did you use?

We planned our sequence by creating jobs for each member of the group. We had a list of things we needed to do before filming, this involved location recces, storyboards, costume list and lip syncing tasks. Me and Olivia took the job of the storyboard, we completed half each which involved getting screen shots of the original video of the song, we got the image of every time the video changed frame and wrote underneath how long the image lasts for. We also wrote what happened within the time of that frame. Sophie and Bonnie looked at locations and costumes list and decided what we needed for the video, this also included props such as the book in the beginning of the video.

We used lists and mind maps to discuss what we were doing. We took a lot of time deciding and looking at costumes as we thought this would have to be very precise to make it look good. We borrowed clothes from other people to make it look better and discussed what we had for other people in the group.

We also took a whole lesson to look into locations for our video. We walked around the school taking recce shots and for a couple of scenes we had to choose between a couple of possible places or change locations because they were being used by other classes.



3) What technology did you use to complete the task, and how did you use it? 

Firstly, we used a camera and tripod to film our music video, this involved setting up the tripod in each location and attaching the camera. We used the camera then to film our scenes. After this we used premiere to edit our footage. We added all our scenes onto the programme to edit them, we put them in order and added the music. something that took a lot of time on premiere was the editing because the music video we recreated had a lot of editing to do. For example the magic tricks within the video; the colour change of hair, the fire and the other little background edits such as the sparkles when something magical happens.

We then used YouTube to get our finished video from premiere to our blogs which took time but worked successfully. We also used vimeo.



4) What factors did you have to take into account when planning, shooting and editing? 

 

We had to take a lot into  account when planning. We needed to figure out what costumes we were going to use as this was a big thing for our video as it separates the two scenes of the costume change in the girls. They change from 'geeky and quiet' girls to a 'outgoing and confident' group.
when filming, we had to take into account that where we filmed may be busy as other classes from the school may be in our location. Because of this we created back-up locations to use if they were busy or with one scene we shooted it after school when no one could be in the way, therefore it wasn't rushed and we got better quality footage as we took our time.

Also when filming we needed good lighting to make sure our footage came out clear as one location was good but we couldn't control the lighting as it was too bright and it would have created shadows.

 

 5) How successful was your music video copy? Please identify what worked well, and with hindsight, what would you improve/do differently? What did others say about your production? 

I believe that the thing that worked best was our costumes and our team work. We worked successfully as a group and managed to get our task completed within the time  needed and our costumes looked similar to the original video. This was really important as it gave a more accurate image linking to the music video.

What could have gone better was accuracy in editing, we struggled editing certain shots as it was difficult to get right to the original video, for example when changing the hair colour to purple was tricky as the colour of the hair was too similar to the skin tone meaning the skin also went slightly pink. Although we didn't have time to re shoot the scene and it may have just happened again.
Other people said it was good and a lot like the original. They liked our costumes, character similarity and editing. They especially liked the part where the glasses where in front of the face and was turning on there own. We did this by attaching some very thin hair to the glasses like string so we could make them hover above the person.

 

 6) What have you learnt from completing this task? Looking ahead, how will this learning be significant when completing your music video, do you think? 
 

 This task has helped me more with editing, especially that we hadn't done a lot since our last task, it helped me gain more knowledge of using premiere. It also helped us realise how different our main task is going to be compared to our film opening. This is because of the amount of shots and how quickly they change. We used a lot more shots in this prelim compared to the film opening and that was only around 1 minute, where as our real music video will be a whole song. This task has also helped us with editing the music video therefore we have more skills for our next task as I am still learning how to use all of premiere.

 7) How does it compare with filming an opening to a film?  

 

 It is a lot different as the shots increase in the music video, we only used a couple of different shots for our film opening 'Saving Santa' where as just this prelim task we did so many more shots which is a lot more detailed and are quick changing. Also the lip syncing is a huge difference. As well as quicker changes in shots and more detail, lip syncing is also needed which is quite difficult to match where as the film opening only had acting which involved no lip syncing skills.

The film opening consisted a lot of planning and less filming where as the prelim music video task took a lot of time filming and less time planning, not only because it was a prelim task but it was easier to plan. However filming took a lot of time for the prelim as we had to lip sync, the film opening however, the actual filming only took a couple of hours.
 

 

 8) What are your strengths and weaknesses as a group member? 

I think my strongest point in the group is getting little tasks done, for example I completed planning tasks quickly, for example the storyboard for the music video. This was good because it set us off with a good and quick start. I also think I came up with good locations and we all got on well as a group which shows we were all hard working and contributed well.

I think my weakness was editing, although I had a go I was slow and it took time for me to learn how to edit certain points of the video even though I enjoy it. This may be a problem for me when it comes to the main task but I have been learning  along the way and have still got a lot to learn which I know I am capable of doing.


 9) Looking at the other group's videos which do you think were most successful and why?

I think the most successful music videos were the ones which had a lot of shots and changed quickly, this made the video interesting, especially if the song had speed. However one song which was quite slow was also really good because the slower pace allowed them to concentrate more and add more detail to the fewer shots.