Acting on our Rough cut feedback

After recieving very generous, constructive and helpful feedback for our rough cut video, we decided we need to do a 100% reshoot and change certain aspects of the video such as location, costume, and major camera shots and movements. After a bit of thought within the group, we decided to research studios for hire within our location rather than using the school's drama studio. We thought it would be more professional and would get much better footage using a professional studio, and we were all willing to a pay an amount of money each if that was the case. We found some industrial locations that had held real bands before around the Newcastle area. The first one we thought of was The Boiler Shop Steamer, Newcastle -Upon Tyne.

The Boiler Shop Steamer

This venue is a well known location that has been used for past events such as live music and bands, markets etc. It is very large inside and 2 of our group members, Bethany and Laura, have attended this venue to see a live band so are very aware of what it looks like in the dark, dressed with lights and a real band. As you can see in the picture above, the venue is very industrial and not very modern as it looks like an old building. We think this is a good style for our music video as we are trying to go for the stylish, indie, and simple look.

Another location we found was Hoults Yard, Newcastle -Upon Tyne.

Hoults Yard Studio 34

This is an image taken at a live gig in Hoults Yard's studio from a past event. This venue is similar to The Boiler Shop as we have guessed from images on the website, although we have never visited it before. This studio has sort of a warehouse style and industrial look, which again is what we are going for. Since we do not know what this studio really looks like inside, we will have to like always bring our own lighting and equipment and other things that can help us dress the studio.

Another thing particularly commented on in our rough cut feedback was other aspects of mise-en-scene such as costume. Both in narrative and performance side of the video we needed to have a closer look at ideas for costume and hair etc. Especially for the band, it is important that we go for the style of our whole project, so we should take ideas and inspiration from bands such as imagine dragons, arctic monkeys and the script. After a little research on costume, i liked this photo the most. This is a band photo of imagine dragons, all dressed in a simplistic/indie style.

This is more of the fashionable look we want to go for. The costume is still plain, dull and simple however looking closely, it is well accessorised with sunglasses, bracelets, bags and the perfect lace up boots. I hope we take some inspiration from this image especially dressing our band in a shirt rather than a plain t shirt, and accessorising the outfit with perhaps a leather jacket and some rock style shoes. Although our band members are clearly alot younger than the typical band, we need to make them look as realistic is possible, and costume is key to making this happen. I guarantee that the costume in the final cut, will make a huge difference.

Another comment i took into consideration was that, more expression was needed from our band members while singing/playing. I researched some close up shots from performances in music videos and live events to see what real bands look like when performing.

The above images have been taken from shots of live performances of bands such as Arctic Monkeys (top), The script (middle), and Imagine Dragons (bottom). All of these photos show the lead singer really going for it to be the best they can be. Facial expression in the lead singer is above all the most important as they need to show passion, and love for their song. The top image of the lead singer of the arctic monkeys especially shows passion, by closing his eyes and singing his heart out. The middle image of the lead singer from The Script is a really effective image. I feel this is because of the particular camera shot and focus. His eyes being directly towards the camera, especially connects with the audience, this type of shot would be good for a music video as it shows the connection with the audience and allows them to engage with the video.  











Rough Cut Feedback

Today we received our constructive feedback for our rough music video. We plan to make sure we take everything into account so we improve our video as much as we can for our final cut. We have been advised and all agree that we need to do a 100% reshoot, to make sure every piece of camera work is spot on, in terms of focus, positioning and that we include a large variety of shots and angles. This would push us to be able to reach or deadline for a final cut on November 26th, however everything definitely needed to be reach our target grade of an  A for out music video.

Camera Angles, Shots, Movement

• 'Try not to reuse the same shots'- For out final cut we has designed a plan to add more movement into static shots to make the audience feel like they are following the action in the narrative and performance. Furthermore, we were rushed for time nearer to the deadline of the rough cut from numerous of problem, however we are going to make sure that we film at least twice a week to make sure we have plenty of time for editing, digipak and advert.

• 'Shaky footage must go' - For our final cut we are going take much more footage so we aren't stuck with certain piece of footage that aren't up to the standard we want it to be.

Editing

• 'Editing is a real strength' - We wanting to concentrate and get a majority of the editing done to be able to just slot of footage into place. In addition, we wanted to be able to focus mainly on getting great footage which is perfect and excatly want we want. 

Mise en Scene: Lighting/Location/Costume

• 'Change the location for the performance' - As we used the drama studio for the band performance scene, we want to try to contact a proffessional studio for our final cut. This would let us to experiment with different piece of equpiment at a professional level.

• 'Costume of band needs to change' - As we were rushed for time in our rough cut we were only able to do one shoot of the band performance. This meant that we could only use the footage from that shoot even if we weren't happy with it. For our final cut we will fully think what each band member will wear and use conventions of indie bands.

Performance

• 'Lead singer performs well' - For our final cut we have decided a to use the same people for band as they work well and fit the image of our band. Our lead singer has done drama in the past which is an added bonus, which help us to make the band performance look more believable.

• 'More expression needed from all band members' - For our final cut we will add new elements to our band performance which will give direction to the band members on their personas and actions. 

Narrative

• 'Narrative needs more elements to it' - For our final cut we are going to add new strands to our narrative that will contribute to the events in the last scene. 

Booking Cameras and Equipment

Sheets were provided by Mr Converey to book cameras and equipment, these were vital for filming otherwise the shoots could not go ahead. We planned ahead in order to secure ourselves the relevant equipment. This way the group was organised and ahead of other groups who may of wanted to use the equipment. 

We planned to film the solo dance in school in the drama studio- This will be filmed on Monday the 27th. The cameras have been booked today for this day so they are secure.  

Band performance in a hired space called Haults Yard, this is booked out for 12th of November which gives us plenty of time to book the equipment and cameras. 

Group dance in Stages School of dance, the final streets scenes were also shot this day also. We are filming this scenes on 13th of November which gives us time to also book the equipment. This is vital as it is a major scene within the video. 

Roof Scenes on a friends balcony- we asked Liam if it was OK to film this scene using his balcony as it was in the perfect location. He said Yes and we arranged the date. We decided to film on the 11th of November as this allows us plenty of time to book equipments and also film the bullying scene, which we decided to also film the same day. We will be going to Liam's house at 3:30 so that it is not too dark and not too lights. The bullying scene will be in the subway which we will arrive to start filming at 2:30 so its still light outside but still gloomy and dull. 

Rough Cut

Rough Cut deadline day

Today is the day in which we must finalise our rough cut video. If we do not handle our music video at 4:30 we will drop marks on our overall project. As this is a very stressful day we have made sure that most of our editing of our video is done. We finished filming for a video two day ago so we don't have to stress with last minute filming. However, tomorrow we will recieve our rough cut feedback and we will be able to watch every other group's video in our class and give then their feedback. 

Fourth Filming Session

Today's filming session consisted of the bullying scene within the music video. Location we used was the Monkseaton underpass. This location was great to film these scenes as it is usually very dark and vandalised, so this will add to the affect of the boy in our video being absued and neglected. Furthermore, this location is iconic and is known to be dirty and neglected so many people will understand that this location is dangerous and if often home to troubled youths. Today we used many different types of equipment such as: the shoulder mount and the LED light. By using the shoulder mount, it creates shot that look handheld but stop the footage from looking too distorted and hard to understand what is going on. We used it to shoot scenes of our actors walking all the street to create low and high angles. In this filming session we used the LED light to create spotlight lighting on our main actor after he was pushed around. Furthermore, the LED light stopped the footage from becoming yellow. This would of happened if we just used them natural light in the underpass. Below is an image of the equipment we used in the session! 

Final Scene Filming Session

Last night we filmed shots for one of the final scenes for our music video. Many of these shots include long sweeping wide shots, tilt and pans of the location used. The location we used was a classmate's house. This was a fantastic location for the final scene as we could use his roof to create some amazing shots of our main actor and incorporating the scenic background. In this filming session the group had access to the crane. This was great for this filming session as we were able to get amazing wide shots, high and low angles. Below are some images in action!       

Third filming session

Tonight filming session consisted of filming scene from the narrative part of our video. The scene that were filmed in the session today was where our main character revels acidentally to his mum that he dances.

 The location of the filming was our group member Bethany's house. This location was fantastic for the scenes we were shooting as it was a boy room we shot in. This created a natural look for our scenes and it would relate to many young boys going through the same situations. In this session we used red head lights. These lights were excellent as they have a very bright light to be able to focus on our main actor. Also using the red heads instead of normal light stops the footage from becoming yellow. We also used the normal camera and tripod to be able to achieve close-up, wide shots, high angles and low angle shot. Furthermore, we used the camera handheld to be able to achieve tracking shots shaky of our main actor. Below there are some photos we took of the shoot, the location we used and the equpitment used. 

Final Scene location

The location we have planned to use for our big final scene of our music video is a house on the links, in Whitley Bay. Fortunately, we have a friend who lives here, and you happen to be able to get onto their high balcony roof which we thought would be perfect for our building scene. The aim is for us to make the audience wonder whether David has jumped or not. We aim to do this through a variety of different shots and camera techniques, without David being put in any danger. 

This is a great location as we have the sea view in the background. 

Second filming session...

Today we planned to film some of our Band Performance during school time. Most of our chosen members were able to turn up and had wore the correct clothing like we had asked them which was much appreciated. Unfortunately, our band member who was supposed to be our Lead Singer (Liam Moore) was unable to make the shoot but hadn't warned us before hand! After a bit of time trying to get in touch with Liam we came to an emergency conclusion of finding a new Lead Singer in a very small amount of time, as we needed something for our rough cut! 

Luckily Lewis Harper was able to come down for an hour to do as much filming as we had time for, and surprisingly, knew the song lyrics. 

In the end of the shoot I found we were particularly successful considering an hour before that we didn't have a Lead Singer. We came out with a variety of different shots and a fair amount of footage of the band with the help of 2 Cameras, a Crane, and the Dolly. However well our rough cut comes out to be, we will later decide if we will change the Lead or not. 

First filming session...

We packed up our equipment and headed to the dance studio located at Stages School of Dance, in North Sheilds. 

We used two Red Head lights, the Crane, the Dolly, and of course the Camera and the Tripod. We found it difficult to set up in the studio as we had to try our best not to get the reflection of us filming from the mirrors surrounding us, in the shot. This took a few takes of David dancing to get him in the correct position, which was helpful as he could then run through Ella's choreography a few times before we got started.

Considering we were working under limited time, I think we achieved quite a lot in our first session. We could only use the dance studio for about an hour and half, so we had to work fast. I think we will be able to go back and get some more needed footage in the studio, before our rough cut deadline. 

The Band

Today, we decided the band and received conformation that they were all confident and willing to do it. The band is now made up off 5 people, Ross Wall- Base, Ed Thompson- Guitar, Liam Moore- Singer, Liam Marriott- Keyboard and Matty Marshall- Drums. We have decided that the band will wear all black, belt, including t-shirts, black jeans  and any sort of dark shoes excluding trainers. We will add some colour to the bands face by using bronzer to make their faces sharper. Hairstyles will be messy and young, replicating the a messy boy band look. 

The bands formation when filming will replicate a triangle. 

         {front of stage}

          Singer (Liam) 

         Guitar (Ed)                                    Base (Ross) 

 Keyboard (Liam Marriott)                                                Drums (Matty) 

This way everyone can be seen in the shot and the focus of the shot will be the singer which is usual when looking at other bands music videos. This way the shot shows the band clearly and in an  organised clear way. 

First Film Shoot Plan - Friday 10 October 2014

Scenes

Dance Scenes throughout Video (Happy State)

Dance Scene at end with Dance Group

Scene of David walking to the Dance Studio

Mise en Scene

Location: Dance Studio, Back Alley and Street

Props: Gym Bag, Speakers

Costume: Dance Clothing (light), Baggy Hoody and Joggers, Dance Shoes

Hair and Makeup: Messy, Bronzer

Facial Expressions and Body Language: Moody, Happiness, Excitement, Relief, Relaxed

Lighting and Colour: Dark, Grey, White, Light

Positioning: David in the Centre, Off out the Way when Outside, At the End Scattered Around

Cameras/Equipment

·         Camera

·         Tripod

·         Crane

·         Dolly

·         Shoulder Mount

·         Redhead Light

·         LED Lights

Actors/Actress

David Jackson and the Dance Group

Timings

Intro: 0:04 - 0:12 WALKING, 0:15 - 0:19 LOOKING MIRROR, 0:19 - 0:27 GETTING READY/MUSIC

First Dance Scene: 1:00 – 1:02, 1:04 – 1:07, 1:09 – 1:12, 1:20 – 1:23

Second Dance Scene: 1:48 – 1:50 ZOOM OUT, 1:53 – 1:54, 1:56 – 2:00, 2:00 – 2:04

Falling Scene: 2:36 – 2:38 LONG SHOT, 2:42 – 2:44 CLOSE SHOT ZOOM OUT

Final Scene: 2:36 – 2:38 ZOOM OUT LONG SHOT, 2:42 – 2:44, 2:46 – 2:48, 2:48 – 2:50, 2:54 – 2:56, 2:56 – 3:00, 3:02 – 3:06 MASTER SHOT, 3:06 – 3:12 WALKING AWAY

Choreographing for Dance Scenes

One of our team members, Ella, has been choreographing the dance sequences for our narrative. The type of the dance the team have decided to do is contemporary as this type of dance is much more emotional and it will connect with the audience much more. Furthermore, it show the pain and neglect of the main character through the dance sequences. 

For each chorus of the song, it will include clips of the main actor dancing and other scenes of what happens to him in his life. Our choreographer used many themes for inspiration. For example, one of the themes used in the dance sequences is the theme of flying. This was used as in the song there are many references to 'flying' and 'leaving all your troubles behind'.  

  

Filming 13th October

In today's shoot, the group filmed the scenes of when our actor is in the house and on the street. The location of this shoot was on a street in West Monkseaton. We decided this would be a good place as it is a very suburban area, which would be very relatable to a 'normal' human being. Furthermore, it suited the mood of narrative being very stoereotypical of a boy dancing. In this filming day we went to another location to achieve a final scenes of our music video. The location was a high balconied house right on the sea-front of Whitley Bay. We choose this location as we could achieve amazing establishing and high level shots without putting our actor in danger.

 Addtitonally, we used lots of different types of equipment to achieve the most unique and innoavtive shots. One of the piece of equpiment we used was a LED light. This was very helpful for the sots we wanted as we were filming outside. The LED light stopped our footage from being too dark or yellowy because of the natural light. We attached the LED light to the top of the camera to be able to use the tracking technique outside on our actor with good lighting.

Furthermore, for lighting we used a pair of red heads for inside scenes. The pair of red heads were very influencal to create some good lit shoots, as we used them to spotlight our actor. However, from trying to achieve a spot light for our actor it caused the room to be very bright, which was not what we were looking for. As we wanted the lighting to be quite dark and vunerable in this shot.

Moveover, in this shoot we used the crane to achieve some low angled pans. This piece of equpiment was very useful to us as we could achieve slow pans to create amazing estblishing shots. Futhermore, the crane was also useful as we could create some very creative POV shots. These would be very influencal in our music video as it could show the actors action in our final scene.

Filming plan

This tomorrow's plan for the filming session. We will be filming the dance scene from the narrative. This plan includes which scenes we will be shooting, mise en scene (location, props, costume, hair and makeup, facial expressions and body language, lighting and positioning), cameras and equipment, actors/actresses and timing for each scene. Below is a photo of the plan. 

Booking Equpiment

As we starting to film scenes for a rough cut of our music video, we will have to start getting used to the booking system of equipment at school. The sheet in the four folders correspond to a week. The booking sheets go up to the week of the Evaluation deadline which is the week of 15th December. Each folder corresponds to different pieces of equipment we can take out for our planned filming sessions.   

Magazine Advertisement Research: You Me at Six

The band's name 'You Me At Six' is the center of the advert. It seems to be in black spray paint which makes it stand out from the white strip behind it. This brings automatic direct attention to the title and the song's name under it. In this advert, rather than having an image of the band they have an image of clouds and flours flourishing out in colour. This could perhaps symbolize that they are progressing and growing. This image is also used on their album cover. They may have done this to create familiarity. The album release date is essential for a magazine advert. The date is the same size font as the band's name and is a different colour, to show it's importance. At the bottom of the magazine, there is a web address and where the album is available. This could be a form of synergy between 'Play.com' and the the band label.

What Makes a A Standard Advert

Another part of this A2 media coursework project, as well as creating a music video, as a group we must create a advert for a magazine that will advertise our digipak. These adverts in the real world are very important as they will advertise their digipaks in big music magazine causing the digipak to be shown to a mass audience. There are many different factors that will contribute to creating an A standard advert. The first factor is that the advert is normally portait within a magazine. Designer usually create adverts like this as it is cheaper to advertise in magazine as it will only take up one page of a magazine. As this is one of the main conventions of an advert for the digipak, so when creating the advert the desinger must follow this convention to make it look proffessional. Another factor to make a successful advert is that the advert must present the digipak on the advert. The digipak is mostly shown as the main image. By placing the digipak as the main image it will make the reader of the magazine interested in the product being sold by it been so boldly shown. Furthermore, it will make the image memorable to the reader, so when they see the advert on someother media platform is causes them to assoicate the image with the band.

Meet the dancers

These are our dancers Ella Reveley, Lizzy Drew and Laura Young who are all 17. One of our dancers Ella is actually in our group for this project so she was easy to be avalible. Ella has danced from an age of 4 and wants to persue a career in dance/musical theatre, so this project is a great oppirtunity to develop her portfolio. One of our other dancers, Lizzy as also danced since the age of 4 and also want to persue a career in perofrming arts/dance. As she is auditioning for drama schools in London, she jumped at the chance to be able to have this on her portfolio for when she auditioning to drama schools in London. Our last dancer is laura. She has also danced since the age of 2. Laura is also auditioning for drama schools next year as she want to take up a career in musical theatre. 

The girls will be playing the part of being angels in the final scenes of the music video. They are vital in these final scenes as they will be dancing with david, in which they will be in heaven.

The role suited the girl fantastically as they are all amazing dancers and they all are very strong. We arranged their first shoot at Stages School of Dance in North Shields, which is the start of the roughcut filming.

Meet our actor

                              

This is our actor for the narrative David Jackson. David is 17 and studying A Levels at Whitley Bay High School. We chose David due to his passion for performing. Last year, David starred as the lead in Back to the 80's the school performance. He has also recently been cast as Fagin, for the school production of 2015, Oliver. A keen dancer was what we we're searching for as a group. After watching endless productions that David starred in at school whether it was singing, dancing or acting he had such enthusiasm, we decided he was perfect for the part.  

We contacted David, via text, to see whether he would help us in our music video. It did not take much persuasion as he is currently building a portfolio for his application to London Drama School and any experience offered to him was welcomed with open arms. 

David will be playing the part of a lonely teen age boy with a passion for dance. After overcoming a range of battles throughout his life, for example, being kicked out and unsupported by his family and consistent bullying by peers, he finds his happy place... Heaven.   

The role suited David perfectly, as he has the timid teenage look. After dealing with bullying himself, he knew how to play the part well especially dealing with the emotions himself for a short time in middle school. We arranged the first shoot at the dance studio in north shields and filming of the EXODUS music video commenced. 

Film Planning

We have created a table to help us plan when, where and how we are going to film the music video. We hope that the table will include each frame in lots of detail including locations, mise en scene and the camera shots, angles or movement we will use. It is important that we have shots planned before progressing any further with the filming so that when it comes to shooting our rough cut, we are able to direct the music video accurately. This also shows that we have managed and organised our time well. We can use the basic planning from the table as a basis when we start to film, and expand on our ideas when out and about with our actors and camera. 

Animatic

After designing and creating a final draft of the stroyboard, Matty our chief editor created an animatic. An animatic is a preliminary version of a film, produced by shooting successive sections of a storyboard and adding a soundtrack. The animatic helped us to develop our ideas about the camera shots, angles and movement. Below is our animatic with the final draft of the storyboards, with our chosen song 'Tiptoe'.

 

Lyrics Of Tiptoe

In the morning light let my roots take flight
Watch me from above like a vicious dove
They don't see me come, who can blame them?
Never seem to catch my eye but I never wondered why

 

I won't fall asleep
I won't fall asleep

 

Hey yeah, don't let 'em know we're coming
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher
Take some time to simmer down, keep your head down low
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher

 

From your slanted view see the morning dew
Sink into the soil, watch the water boil
They wont see me run who can blame them?
They never look to see me fly, so I never have to lie

 

I won't fall asleep
I won't fall asleep

 

Hey yeah, don't let em know were coming
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher
Take some time to simmer down, keep your head down low
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher

 

Nobody else, nobody else
Nobody else, can take me higher
Nobody else, can take me higher
Nobody else, can take me higher
Nobody else..

 

Hey yeah, don't let em know were coming
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher
Take some time to simmer down, keep your head down low
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher

 

Hey yeah, don't let em know were coming
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher
Take some time to simmer down, keep your head down low
Hey yeah, tiptoe higher.