Making of music video: A little video!

Here is a little video I shot of our two dancers (Prince and Eleni) practicing their dance moves!

Making of music video: First day of filming pictures

Here are the promised pictures from our first day of filming!

Until then!

Stephanie

Making of music video: First day of shooting.

So we have finally started to film our music video! Horrah! We filmed on the 30th of October which was in the half term (yes, we are very dedicated!) in the Barbican. I love the Barbican, there is were so many mise-en-scene opportunities for us, it was amazing, the scenery was beautiful and I am so glad we chose that as our main place to film. We gathered all of our group together, me, Prince and Kehinde apart from Medhi as he couldn't make it, and we got the beautiful Eleni to be our second dancer alongside Prince. Today was just the dancing scene, which isn't a base track but will be featuring in the second verse in the song, possibly it will be repeating itself during the song, following Vernallis's theory of repetition! 

During the filming, Me and Kehinde filmed them dancing from different angles because we wanted to add variety to our music video and make it look professional. We filmed them dancing quite alot of times, and one dance was choreographed and one was a freestyle and we shall be using both in our music video. It went really well, however the lighting was slight problem as towards the end of our filming session it became a little dark. Hopefully we should be able to make it brighter during editing.

Also, since we wanted some establishing shots we went around the Barbican and took shots of the place and some close ups of them.

I will be uploading some pictures soon so stay tuned!

Until then!

Stephanie

Teacher feedback

Hello group 22
I am really enjoying your blog.  I look forward to seeing some footage and photos from the filming session this weekend.

Another one for those that are interested.

Just for those that might be interested.

Performeris constumes

Right now this was a headache! disagreements some agreements however at the end we all decided what was right. Emeli Sanders was the inspiration for our female performer Stephani. Why? simply the reason that her look was very feminine just the way we wanted our performer to be, although something different to it. For example Emeli is very feminine however her hair is unique as it has a certain style, the hair being up is an example of this. This gave us the image for Stephani to be feminine but with a twist. So for stephani we wanted her to wear bold make up  along with hills and a dress. This is for her to stand out for the audience for us to look at her to grab our attention. 

This is a picture of Emeli Sanders.

What the dancers would wear was a very hard decision we had to make. We was thinking of avvoiding the sense of having to much urban clothing. The reason for this is because people would mistake our video for a grime/rap/hip hop track instead of a Dubstep one. So we thought they should wear something flexible, easy to move around whilst still looking great on camera for the viwers to see. The main colour we was thinking was for them to wear something black, or a leather jacket( although this has not been decided as we do not know if a leather jacket would be suitable). Black leggings and trainers whilst having a lot of hair swerving around the place.

Top 5 dubstep songs by nutsire.com

1)Rusko - O.M.G.!

2) Cutline - Lemon Party EP

3) Pendulum - Hold Your Colour

4) Deadmau5/Rob Swire - Ghosts 'n' Stuff (feat. Rob Swire) - EP

5) Trowa - TROWA - Single ( Evanescence - Missing (Trowa Remix)

What is Dubstep and examples.

Since our music video will be based around a dubstep track i decided to make a blog about what dubstep actually is for those that do not know about this type of music.

Dubstep is simply a sub-genre of electronic dance music. which is short for EDM. For example gangster rap is a type of rap. Also political rap. While dubstep is a type of EDM and there are also different types of EDM such as: electro, techno, trance, ect...

Drops

This is when a song can start most of the time gently and then instantly come to its climax and drop by creating a loud bass.

An example of this would be Flux Pavilion - Got 2 Know

Wobbles

This is when the instruments/sounds make a kind of wobble sound which is most common basics of deubstep. Not all dubsteps have wobbles however most of them do have it.

Here is an example by Kid Sister - Pro Nails (Rusko Remix)

Dance test shots

Music Video's That Have Influenced Our Final Planning Decisions (Planning)

Since we started thinking about music video's me and my group have been looking at many music video's so that we can get inspiration from. Some of them we picked because they had great editing skills. The first video that stood out to us was Pixie Lott's video All About Tonight. 

We liked this video because of how it starts, it begins with an establishing shot of high rise buildings at night, shot with a high angle and then a close up of pixies face which blends into the city and overlays it. We thought this was good because it was a great way to introduce the artist and also to set the scene and let the viewer know where the music video is located. We also want to have our music video start like pixie but it will be hard for us to get a overhead shot of london so we might have to get something similar and easier for us to capture. 

Our main inspiration for our music video

This is the inspirational vid that helped us decide on certain aspects of our music video.  It is from Pixie Lott- All about tonight. The main reason in which this video had imediatly grabbed our attention is the fact that the video shows the artists face, simple blending in with the city which is shown in an high angle shot. This introduces both the artist and the location right at the start of the video in which we may intend to do. Although we cannot get a amazing shot of London city like this we can still use the idea for other shot angles in different locations.


Here is her video.

short list of potential songs

Here are the shortlist of our potential songs.

Lowkey- My soul

Jai Paul - BTFSU

RD - Do It Like Me

V9 Collective

Noisettes - Wild Young Hearts   

Nero - Guilt

Nero- Promises

Nero- Innocence  

 

An analysis of original video for our song choice and why will it differ from our video.

Here is the original video for the song we have chosen.

First of all the music video starts of with showing a birds eye view of the whole city which we cannot do since we do not have that kind of technology to show this quality. In addition the song with the lyrics it contains have nothing to do with the actual video. Their is no narrative at all, although ours will not be a complete narrative video it will have some aspects showing a story line. Not many but enough to grab the audiences attention. In making such a statement the original video has a stripper/pole dancer in which we definetly cannot get and not want to get. Their are red lights in this video a lot of darkish colours ours will be more brighter although we may include a few darker scenes. Furthermore most of our performance will be outside not inside especially not in a club like the original video. We should be able to have a range of locations instead of just 1 or 2.

Test shots of potential performers

Here are the definet performers for our music video. We have decided Prince aged 17 and Stephani also aged 17 they will be our main performers along with another dancer.

This is a picture of Prince who will be the lead dancer for the music video.

 

This is the lead singer the artist we want to actually promote.

Nero Website for original artist

This website shows many ways in which the artist promotes their brand, image and songs. First of all they have the recent news about the brand so latest update on what they are doing for the fans. They have their videos, music, gallery, shows, game up. Whilst still having pictures for the artist and album covers to promote and make them noticed. They show all of this by giving the fans somthings to look at rather then just waiting for their music to release.

Here is a link to their site. 
http://www.thisisnero.com/ 

Final song choice

Our final song choice is by Nero - Guilt

the reason we chose this is because it suits the dancers we are going to use. We have certain parts of the dance routine to be slow while it also is fast at the same time having enough lyrics to be able to lip sync. This song is perfect for this as it has a certain part where the beat slows down and then rises up again.

List Of Potential Locations (Planning)

When thinking about locations we first thought about maybe shooting at night in places like Piccadilly circus but we then had to scratch that of as we wanted to film in daylight and the lights in piccadilly circus would not be as effective in daylight as it is at night. 


Our teacher was kind enough to put up some locations in our class wall (Thank You Rebecca) so me and the group looked at all the locations she had put up and one of them that stood out to us was the Barbican Centre. I really liked it because it look so isolated in the pictures and I loved how big it was and the steps. alleyways and open space. I thought it would be a great place for the dancer's to perform. We plan on going to visit it in a few day's to see if it is suitable for us to film in location until then I have found some pictures for you to see how it looked liked. 

Nero Crush On You (Planning)

Nero - Crush On You

Since I have been on Nero's site and other online sites I have realised a lot of promotion for there new song. I have just seen the video and was left speechless and just thought I had to share. This video is very bizzare I don't know the meaning behind it yet but I know they have one. I just wanted to show that Nero and dubstep music as a whole they really don't like their video's to be generic and boring they always love to take it a step further and create different meaning and story's in the video. I found the video really interesting end it kept me entertained for the whole process. 

Asos Urban Tour

From the begging I have not stressed enough how much I wanted there to be dancing in our music video. When I thought of the dancing I did not really think of a certain style of dancing, I just wanted their to be dancing so we can showcase the groups skills. I want the dancing to be the base track as I think it will be the most entertaining part of the video. I wanted the dancer's to dance in freestyle for the camera and then I wanted to do close ups of their moves and to shoot them from different angles and places. When we edit I will make some of the moves in slow motion and I will also make them go backwards. This can either work or not but I will take a chance and see how it works. I have searched some of the different style of dancing to expect in our music video and straight away I thought of the Asos urban tour commercial.


Ok I know what your thinking why am I talking about Asos when I should be talking about music video's. Well I had to post this because I thought that the new Asos campaign is marvellous. It shows dancer's in a warehouse dancing to Dubstep so I found it very interesting as we are also using dubstep for our video.

Shot's Of Potential Performer (Planning)

This Post is to introduce you to the people who will be performing in our music video. 

Name: Stephani Attoh
Age: 17
Role: Singer/Artist
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Name: Prince
Age:17
Role: Dancer

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Name: Eleni
Age: 17
Role: Dancer  
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Performer's Costumes (Planning)

Costumes

It took us a while to decide what image the lead singer was going to be at the end we decided she will be feminine but with an edge. So we done some research on other female artist and we looked at their style and what they where, Lady Gaga came in mind but the we though no as we can't have our artist walking down the street for the shoot in a dress made of meat (Think about the smell). So we looked at another artist and that is Emeli Sander's, we liked her because her look was very feminine but yet she had the edgy hairstyle to even it out and she looked good and it was her image that we can familiarise her with. So for our singer we wanted her to wear maybe a dress with some killer hills and then have really bold make up to make her stand out and for her to grab peoples attention. 


The hardest decision will have to be what the dancer are going to wear. We was thinking nothing too urban as then people might mistake our song for a hip hop track. We need them to be in something they can move in but also that looks goo don camera. I was thinking maybe black/ leather jackst's/bandu's/ black leggings/ Trainer's and big hair. I have searched fro some pictures I think can loog god for our video. 

Dubstep Genre (Planning)

I wanted to take time off to write about the genre that our music video is going to be in for those who don't know. Dub step is a genre of electronic dance music that originated from south London England, it began as an underground movement being played in small south London raves and parties by Dj's who remixed tracks and added darker beats and added drum and beat to the tracks. The tern dub step came around 2002 to describe the sound. In 2005 grime artist started to rap over dub step which created more success for the genre.


The first time I ever heard dub step was as a child like 2am in the morning. I know your thinking what was I doing up but I just could not sleep and there was this pirate radio station that played dub step after midnight. One day I could not sleep so I was searching the radio to find anything intresting then I discovered the radio station and they where playing this new genre and from then I fell in love. It always takes you to a different place the instrumental makes you want to do something crazy and wild and I think that is why it's so popular in clubs and raves.


Radio stations such as BBC Dj John Peel and station Rinse FM helped to spread the sound to a much wider audience. The influence of dubstep in other genres could be traced to 2007 when Britney Spears song freak show was built around the wobbler that is heard in many dubstep songs. 

• 2009 - Three Dubstep Tracks are included in Rihanna's Rated R Album. Bullet proof is remixed by zinc and The genre in reviewed by The New York Times, NME and the sunday times.
• 2010 - Pop heavy Weight Britney spears releases Hold It Against Me which is responsible for promoting dubstep in pop mainstream radio. I Need Air By Magnetic Man reaches #10 on uk charts, Katy On A Mission By Katy B (produced by Benga) debuts at #5 in uk singles chart.
• 2011 - In july 2012 DJ Fresh's track Louder hit's number #1 becoming the first ever dubstep track to achieve this.

Wiki Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dubstep

   

Nero's Website (Planning)

Official Site: http://www.thisisnero.com/

Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/nerouk

As soon as you go to Nero's official website the first think you see is there name BANG in big bold letter at the top of the page. This is a really good way to welcome there fans it is very in your face and looks metallic and futuristic just like their music videos. 

The website gives you all the latest information on the band, to concert's, release dates, new video's and much more. The website has lot's of advertisement advertising the bands latest projects like the new album and new singles they have banners for them at the top and the side of the website. The site represents nero image by having dark colours and the font of their name at the top of their page helps the fans familiarise themselves with their logo as the font is also used in their album cover. They have all the latest videos by them and they have a section on the right hand site that shows all their Live concert days so that fans can know when they arre going to be in their town. The site even links you to a game that previews their new album, so as your playing their album is being played at the background. I thought this was a fantastic way of promoting their new album it's fun and also helps people hear their music.

I think the site helps represent the band really well. It is designed to a style that fits them and fans automatically know it's abou them. The sites help in so many ways to promote the band and to get people to purchase and support their music.  And the site is very interactive as you can listen to their music, watch video's, look at pictures and even play games.

When you are free go play the game In their site I did and I really enjoyed it =D!!! 

Pitch Feeback (Planning)

In our Thursday lesson every group in our class had to represent their plans and ideas in a pitch to the class. Our pitch was presented in a prezi presentation. After we presented our pitch Dan gave us feedback on what was god and what could be improved.


Our feedback was positive he said he liked our ideas, he gave us some suggestions that we film our music videos in more then three days because our music video is filmed in many locations we would need time to travel from location to location. 

Music Video Pitch in Prezi

Planning for Music Video : Costume ideas for the dancers

We want our dancers to look quite original and mise en scene is quite important in our video, so we wanted a costume. Originally I came up with the idea of the dancers wearing all black. It would be a good contrast to the artist, who we want to look innocent and angelic. Here are some costume ideas I had in mind:

All black and very modern

I like the contrasting colours here, and also the fact the dancers are of  different nationalities. We want our video to look diverse too.

As you can see, the dancers look very modern and artistic, and it's quite obvious that they are dancers. Unfortunately, it was a little hard to gather the dance gear, as we teenagers are short of funds and Prince and Eleni didn't have anything like that, so we decided to settle on something that was 'standoutish' but affordable. So we are going to make them so semi-naked! Prince will be topless and Eleni will have a crop top on!

Until then!

Stephanie

Research for Music Video: Costume ideas for music video

Our group and I have the idea of the artist appearing innocent and sweet but still with a modern edge, so I have done some online shopping (a favourite hobby of mine!!) and I have found a few dressers from Select that fit into the ideal look. Here are the pictures:




I also took the liberty of providing a few pictures of the heels I will wear. These tall platforms will give the artist length and elegance and will give a more modern vibe. Here they are:

Until then!

Stephanie

Research for Music Video: Make up ideas for music video

For our music video, we plan to have two looks. The first look, which will be the main base track for the video, will be me with shimmery silver eyeshadow because we wan't the artist to appear fresh and edgy but innocent at the same time as that is the main theme throughout our video, which is fresh and bright which do contradict the lyrics as our video is a disjuncture. However, we will have a costume change at the end with the artist wearing dark make up and dark clothing similar to the dancers to have a little twist in our video. This is the first look we are going for.





As you can see, in these looks the silver is just a hint but it works at brightening up the eye, and the long eyelashes give it an edge, which is perfect for setting our artist and video. This is the second look we are going for in the video, which is dark and smoldering, with either dark lipstick or dark lips, which is a good contrast between her looks so the audience gets a clear heads up to the costume change. This will also add interest to our video as mise en scene is important. Here are some ideas I found on Google:




 Until then!

Stephanie

Research for Music Video: Short Analysis of Animatic

For our animatic, we had to use these cute little figures so represent the characters in our film, but even though our animatic is amazing, I figured it might be a little hard to interpret what certain scenes are, so I'm just going to do a brief summary of the characters.



From the left, the Fairy (singer) is me, the doctor is Prince and the Bride is the second dancer which is Eleni. The video basically follows the typical conventions of a music video which is using a master track which then switches between the dancers and me and low and high angle shots of the Barbican. Our video will be basically a Disjuncture, but we will have a little story line to it, which is the dancers are portraying the emotion of guilt through dance. The dancers will dance freestyle and choreographed, and the singer will just be doing dramatic hand motions for the performance. The section of the music video when the Fairy is in front of a bunch of cars moving fast, this will basically be an editing trick where I stand in front of a camera for a long time, then we speed it up to show the crowd behind fast while I stand behind ;) 

Until then!

Stephanie

Research for Music Video: Summary of the making of the animatic

Today in lesson me, Kehinde and Mehdi made animatics by taking pictures of little doll figures representing the artist and the dancers in front of a backdrop which are pictures of the Barbican centre. I didn't really get much practice with Final Cut Pro last year so this year I got abit of experience with it. I learnt how to convert Youtube clips with Clipgrap on the mac and import it into Final Cut Pro. I also learnt how to place pics on the timeline and make sure its to the beat, which proved difficult as our song has many different beats.

Until then!

Stephanie

Evaluation for the animatic

While I was editing the animatic for Nero Guilt, I started to refresh my memory of the editing skills I used for the opening thriller last year. It was quite interesting having to do what I did last year again only in slightly different form.
I had forgotten how long editing can sometimes take. We could not finish it during the lesson I had to wait after the lesson to finish it.
After the editing, I knew I had to use Handbrake to upload it to blogger. I closed final cut pro, opened handbrake, found the source of the animatic video, but handbrake refused to convert it. Confused as to what was happening, I sought for help and called Rebecca who then told me what to do. From that I found that I missed one very important step which is to convert the animatic video to Quick time in Final cut pro before using handbrake.
Hopefully, when it is time to edit the main music video, I would get my self and memory together from last year to make the best video.
So, what a class to remember and refresh my memory of my editing skills!!!

Animatic for Nero Guilt

This is the animatic for our music Video Nero Guilt.

Making of animatic

Dilemma

Having to make decisions(the best) is an element of the discussions that I almost always have with my Group mates. Presently, we are trying to decide which time zone will be better for our music video, i.e. daylight or night time.

Music video at night time

Music video daylight

Music video daylight

Music video in night time

Both has limitations and advantages. For example, 

• Lighting in the dark has to be really monitored and positioned well. 
• Extra care has to be taken most especially while filming at night.
• Nighttime in places like Piccadilly circus is so beautiful and will give any music video an excellent touch.