Editing

The last lesson of media I think was very successful. I took part in editing some of the clips that we had filmed and began reducing the clip overall into just the most important part. I cut some of the clips into effective short and snappy shots of the scenery and signs which said "Danger!" in yellow, which I think was effective for the mise-en-scene aspect of our film. I have also learnt how to use Final Cut quite effectively and will now be able to edit our film to a much greater extent.

Editing

Today as a group we opened our work in Final Cut Express and began editing what we could. However when we first opened our work, the film that we had uploaded before had not worked properly, therefore we had to re-upload the film from before. Once we had done this, we began putting together the opening sequence of our Music Video. This included some shots of the narrative part of our film, myself drumming in the band section and shots of surroundings which I think we put together quite effectively.
Overall I think we had quite a successful lesson, as well as editing, we discussed what needed to be re-filmed and when we were going to do this. So in the next couple of lessons and after school we will re-film some of our band section and then we will have all the footage we need and we can focus completely on editing.

Re-Filming

Today our group re-filmed the DJ section of our music video of John playing on the Decks. He used the desk and put a vinyl on and played it. We then filmed him from different angles as well as using a cut-out of a Tarantula and put it on top of the Vinyl as it spun round. Also as well as using the camera from different angles in a fixed position, we also moved the camera around and got some mobile shots.

Wednesday 14th Lesson

In toady's lesson we carried on uploading our footage to Final Cut Express. We uploaded more of our film including the story and some of the band section. Later on once the film had uploaded I started trying out some editing techniques and effects. Some looked quite effective but we have finalised what effects we are going to use yet.

Uploading

In toadys lesson we carried on uploading all of our footage. The software that we are using to edit our film with is called Final Cut Express which is a professional piece of software used in the media industry. We began to upload our footage but were having some problems with saving the work we had uploaded. Also we have misplaced a tape however we have already uploaded the footage from it so it is not as big of a problem as we first thought.

While uploading the footage we saw some things that we think needs to be re-filmed. Firstly we are going to re-film the band section as we are going to add another guitarist and a singer. Plus we are going to try and get a stensil of a tarantula and display it on the back wall of the stage.

Adjusting the film

At first we were going to have 3 different parts to our film. First a club/rave scene, then a scene of the band playing and then a story section to go along with it. However we have now decided to cut the Club/rave section and just integrate the band scene and story scene together. This way we can focus more on making the band scene much better and effective as I think we have more ideas and techniques to use and there is just much more we can do with it.

Uploading

Uploading our film is quite time consuming as we have filmed on four tapes so that when filming we used four cameras all at different angles. We started to upload the footage last Friday and have been carrying on uploading today. We would like to re-film some parts of the band scene and have adjusted parts of it to make it more affected. Instead of one guitarist we are going to have two, and they will come down each set of stairs at either side of the stage at the start of the song. Also we have an idea that we are going to try which is to project a Tarantula on to the black background at the back of the stage through a stensil.

Filming - Wednesday 7th - Afterschool

After a successful filming session during todays lesson, we also planned to film most of, or all of, our band section afterschool. We used our school's large drama room PDH which has a make-shift stage with stairs either side. We arrived at PDH and brought 4 cameras and 4 tapes with us so that we could leave the cameras filming constantly but from different angles. We also used a tool called the Fig Rig which we can put the camera on like a tripod and carry around to get mobile shots.

We set up all of the cameras and the Fig Rig with a camera and prepared to film. Georgina was working the lights for effect while filming, while me and Andy were acting as musicians in the film. I was playing the drums and Andy was on the Bass guitar while also singing. The main lights were dimmed and we decided to have a slight red and white lights showing while also having flashing lights, especially when the tempo of the music increased.

We managed to get quite a lot of footage on four different tapes as well as the camera on the Fig Rig and was a very successful filming session. After seeing the footage afterwards, in the room where we filmed there were stairs either side of the stage. We have now decided to have two guitarists instead of one and have them walking down the stairs either side at the beginning of the song, and then have a seperate singer.

Filming - Wednesday 7th

Today we filmed the story part of our film. In the lesson today we looked at our storyboards and focused on the narrative section. Then we set off to film this part, using myself and John as the actors showing drug use and the quite dangerous and strange environment we were in. We went behind our Sports hall where it is quite overgrown. We used props such as syringes, a coat to cover our indetity, shots of the environment such as CCTV cameras, danger sign, metal staircase and railings. We managed to get quite a lot of footage and it was quite a successful lesson and in just one lesson we managed to pretty much get all of the story part filmed.

Problems With Filming

Originally we had planned to film a band that would be in the video as if they were playing the song. However we have had a lot of problems with deciding a time to meet with the band as they are only free at certain times like we are. This has lead to us having to re-think what we are going to do and now have decided to just use ourselves in the band as we have used up a lot of time trying to get together and meet the band. We will still film the same sequence although we have just had a slight change of plan.

What we have left to film

• Band scene - 7th october - anything thats left on the 8th october
• Story in the forest -
• Club/ Dj part - 7th october - anything thats left on the 8th october

James there is a lot of good work here. Just make sure your analysis is detailed and really looks at the connotations of each element.

MCU

Storyboards

From this storyboard you can see that we had many ideas about the scenery of our shots and where we wanted to shoot the background of our shots. We thought that with the style of our video that woodland and forest type environments would be most effective and so we decided to design some shots as you can see below.

As you can see from the first storyboard we had quite a few ideas about what to include in our film. Firstly as you can see we wanted to include a Tarantula at some point but we were unsure on where to bring in this idea. In the end we decided to project a picture of the Tarantula on a screen behind the band.

From this storyboard it was mainly looking at just other ideas we had and drawing them out. We had sorted the other storyboards into sections such as chorus and opening sequences. However this storyboard was mainly just simple ideas we had, such as referencing the Tarantula on a persons hand and different style shots we could use.

This storyboard below was about the narrative in our story and how we would show this through shots in our video. The shot of the spray can wasnt actually included in our video, however, we did include the needle and the shot of the arm that was used with the needle. This helped to project our narrative as it was along the idea of drug abuse and a party style genre.

This storyboard was about our original idea to have a rave scene in our video, mimicking a club/party. However we decided not to include this and instead used a band scene as we thought it would be more effective to see the band as its what the audience would want to see and it stays with the conventions of music videos.

This storyboard was an addition to the previous one, as it carries on the rave scene.

This however is the storyboard for the band scene. This is what we decided to use instead of the rave scene and I think in the end turned out more effective. As you can see below, we included lots of close ups of the lead singer, which again is part of the conventions of music videos, and we used many dynamic shots of the other band members through the Fig Rig.

This storyboard was a continuation of the band scene. As you can see we have used many shots of the band and other members.

Again this was still the band scenes, however we decided to take some more shots of the band including the instruments they used.

These are the storyboards that me and my group created on paper. We have been able to put the storyboards on Blogger by drawing them on paper, then scanning them on a computer and uploading them to blogger. The storyboards took about a week and we all put an effort into making them. I worked on them by writing the shot numbers on each of the shots and helped putting them in order. Also I helped write some of the shot type, and the timing of the shots.

Audience Research

This is the planning of the research I was going to carry out on a selected audience to find out information to create an effective music video.

I first thought about the sort of things I was going to ask the audience, aims and what I wanted to find out.

I then decided how I would collect the information and results from this audience which would be a questionnaire.

Genre Analysis Table

This is a genre analysis table of three different types of genre, Indie, Grime and R n B. Within each of the three genre's i have analysed three different songs and wrote about what characteristics are in each of the genre's. The things that i have analysed about them include Locations, clothes, props, camera angles, narrative/abstract, effects, coninuity/montage and humour.