WL - Shooting Schedule #1

This is a schedule for the initial filming Tom is going to do this week, at this shoot we hope to gain some rough footage in order to get some feedback and ideas for future shoots. 
For this shoot we are going to try and get footage of:

• Skateboarders
• BMX Riders
• Location footage
• Skate park footage

Location - Leeds, Hyde Park 

Equipment - HD Camera, Fig-rig

Group member - Tom

Electro House E.g. 8: Porter Robinson - Language

Track: Language
Artist: Porter Robinson
Director: Jodeb
Year Released: 2012

• This music video is narrative only. It shows a young woman being chased by wolves, she escapes them and meets a big creature thing. The wolves then kill the creature and at the end she chases after the wolves.
• SFX is used a lot in the video, for example to create the creature and the wolves and at one point it cuts between a blue and orange colour cast.
• The setting is a very scenic, isolated mountain range.
• It has a song title at the very start and at 0:06 it shows a title screen saying 'Directed by Jodeb'.
• There is a mix of steadicam, tracking, panning and steadicam shots.
• Flashing lights are shown in the underwater shots.

Electro House E.g. 7: Magnetic Man - Getting Nowhere

Track: Getting Nowhere
Artist: Magnetic Man ft. John Legend
Director: Diamond Dogs
Year Released: 2011

• There is only narrative in this video which is a modern interpretation of the four horsemen of the apocalypse.
• The main characters are BMXers and it follows them riding around which is similar to our idea.
• It is set in the more urban areas of London.
• Narrative enigma is created by having the horseman and bikers faces blacked out throughout.
• There are some slow motion shots of the bikers doing tricks.
• There are close up cutaway shot of things such as xbox controllers.
• The four bikers will each be shown standing in a certain place while the rest of the scene is normal (e.g. 0:53-0:56).
• There is a slight blue colour cast.
• SFX are used quite a lot in the video. The BMXers faces are blacked out, a woman has only white eyes, black spots fly at the camera (1:06-1:09) etc.

Electro House E.g. 6: Avicii - Silhouettes

Track: Silhouettes
Artist: Avicii
Year Released: 2012

• There is only narrative in the video, which cuts between a party and a young man before, during and after a sex change.
• There is diegetic sound in the middle of the video and at the end.
• Avicii makes a short appearance in the video as a chef on a cooking show.
• Combination of still shots and tracking shots.
• Blue colour cast used on most of the shots.
• Shows people drinking alcohol which is targeted at a slightly older audience.
• Photos of the main character before the surgery of posted on the walls.
• Close up cutaway shots of things such as the heart rate monitor and the main character taking (prescribed) drugs.

Electro House E.g. Vid 5: Wolfgang Gartner - Illmerica

Track: Illmerica
Artist: Wolfgang Gartner
Director: Ryan McNamara
Year Released: 2011

• Record label's (Ultra Music) company ident shown at start of video.
• Animated video created by Ryan McNamara.
• There is only narrative. It shows the story of America, beginning with the Mayflower and going up to the present day.
• The video ties in with the name of the song, but there are no lyrics for the video to connect to.
• The video uses mixed-media.
• Although not a filmed video, it is essentially just one long take.
• The beginning and end of the video are connected by a book. It begins by zooming into the book to tell the story of 'Illmerica' end ends with it zooming out of the book.

Electro House E.g. Vid 4: Zedd - Stache

Track: Stache
Artist: Zedd
Director: Roboto
Year Released: 2012

• This music video focuses on the use of technology. The narrative revolves around a man trying to code something on the computer and armed police trying to stop him.
• The setting is very urban and it is mainly set in an old, isolated, unused building.
• Cutting to the beat is used in some parts of the video to emphasise the beat (e.g. 2:17-2:22).
• The video is quite high contrast and the most commonly used two-tone colour scheme is dark blue/purple with a lighter yellow/orange.
• The video is narrative only, there is no performance.
• Near the end of the video there is a shock-wave which seems almost futuristic because of the bright blue light.
• At one point the police go past two homeless men who are drinking presumably alcohol. This is targeted more at a slightly older audience.
• There is a typing effect on the screen at the start which connects to the computer coding and the technology theme.

Electro House E.g. Vid 3: Swedish House Mafia - Greyhound

Track: Greyhound
Artist: Swedish House Mafia
Director: Carl Erik Rinsch
Year Released: 2012

• There is diegetic sound at the start of the video.
• Futuristic technology is the main theme of the video, both with the robotic dogs and with the Swedish House Mafia members controlling the dogs, as well as other details such as the floating drinks tray.
• There is product placement with Absolut Vodka. One of the reasons for this is that the song and video are aimed at a slightly older audience, and another is that Absolut Vodka and Swedish House Mafia are both from Sweden.
• The video is narrative only, there is no performance footage.
• The narrative of the video relates to the song title as there are robotic greyhounds racing, but there are no lyrics in the song so this is the only connection between the video and song meaning.
• There are quite a few cutaway close up shots, mainly of the people or greyhounds.
• Some movement in the video matches the sounds and beat of the song.
• Coloured lights are used in the video, again connoting futuristic technology.
• The costumes of the characters are quite theatrical and elegant. This could be connoting that in the future upper class people will go out and race robotic greyhounds.

Electro House E.g. Vid 2: Axwell - Feel The Vibe

Track: Feel The Vibe (Til The Morning Comes)
Artist: Axwell
Year Released: 2005

• The video is narrative only, there is no performance.
• The video follows a male and a female dancing through streets. Some of the dance incorporates the surrounding (e.g going over the bus shelter) and the style of the dance fits to the music.
• The camera work is mainly done using a Steadicam.
• There is quite a lot of shot variety, from extreme long shots to close ups.
• The clothing is very simple with jeans, trainers and a top.
• There is an effect at around 2:12-2:17 where there is a wave in the image. This matches the dance of the dancers.
• The dance moves can be imitated by a younger audience which is probably who the song is mainly aimed at.
• The video is similar to our idea in that it follows people doing sport through streets.

Electro House E.g. Vid 1: Justice - New Lands

Track: New Lands
Artist: Justice
Director: Canada
Year Released: 2012

• Titles are shown at the start and there are credits at the end. This makes the music video appear more as a short film.
• The record label's logo (Ed Banger Records) is shown in the titles at the start.
• There is a combination of still, tracking, panning and Steadicam shots used.
• The video is narrative only, there is no performance footage at all.
• Diegetic sound is used both over the music and on it's own in the middle of the video which provides some anchorage to the storyline.
• Futuristic technology is used. The main denotation of this is the use of coloured lighting.
• The video's narrative revolves around American Football. As our video is also mainly focusing on sport this is an aspect of the video that we could use to help us with our footage.
• The credits at the end come on in a typed style. Again this connotes the technology that is used electronic music.
• There are sound effects which match the movement of people on screen (e.g. at 1:16).

Initial Storyboard

Initial Storyboard Page 1

Initial Storyboard Page 2

Research: Ed Banger Records

Ed Banger Records is a French record label set up and run by Pedro Winter in 2002. It specialises in electronic music and has produced for French artists such as Mr Oizo, DJ Mehdi and Justice. In 2007 Justice received mainstream success which brought Ed Banger Records acknowledgment and acclaim.

SebastiAn first signed with Ed Banger Records in 2005 with Smoking Kills. He has remained with the record label since, most recently in 2011 to produce the album Total.

Ed Banger Records has received media coverage from The Guardian and Mixmag.

Ed Banger featured on the cover of Mixmag

The label doesn't just produce music though. It collaborated with Berlin based luxury cosmetics brand Uslu Airlines to produce a glow in the dark nail polish with an accompanying track by Pedro Winter. It also collaborates with So Me as part of their brand Cool Cats to make and sell clothing, trainers, skateboard decks and art prints, as well as other products.

Vodcast 1: Conventions of Music Videos

Here is a vodcast of me saying some of the music video conventions.

Video Idea Pitch Backing Video

Music Video Idea: Band

Prima Donna are a glam rock band from Los Angeles. They were formed in 2003 and are still active today. They've released three albums and their most recent one is called Bless This Mess which was release early 2012. Their most commercially popular songs are called I Don't Want You to Love Me and Feral Children.

They have fan sites and forums dedicated to them and have also received some media attention, mainly from punk and rock genre music journalists. Although they say they don't have a main target audience as their music is for everyone who wants to listen to it, I think their music mainly appeals to an older male audience.

More can be read and heard on the bands Wikipedia page, their website and their Myspace page.

Below is an interview with the band for iSCREAMgarbage.

Glam Metal Genre Research

Glam metal is a sub-genre of heavy metal that started in the late 70s/early 80s with bands such as Hanoi Rocks and Motley Crue. It incorporates elements of punk rock to heavy metal and includes pop influenced hooks and guitar riffs.

Some major glam metal bands included:

• Bon Jovi
• Europe
• Poison
• Motley Crue
• LA Guns
• Hanoi Rocks
• W.A.S.P

Glam Metal Music Video Research

So far I've looked at:

• Aerosmith - Dude (Looks Like a Lady)
• Europe - Final Countdown
• Warrant - Cherry Pie
• Poison - Talk Dirty To Me
• Extreme - Kid Ego
• Tigertailz - Love Bomb Baby
• Celtic Frost - Cherry Orchards
• Ratt - Way Cool Junior
• Hanoi Rocks - Don't You Ever Leave Me
• Bon Jovi - Livin' on a Prayer

There are many conventions in glam metal music videos. These include:

Appearance

• Band members will usually have long shaggy hair.
• A lot of black leather clothing is worn, mainly as jackets, trousers and boots.
• Sometimes skinny/spray-on jeans are worn either black or ripped denim.
• Spandex trousers are also common.
• Jackets are sometimes worn open or band members go topless.
• Tank tops and sleeveless jackets.

Reflections on the Directors Challenge

From creating the video for the Directors Challenge we learnt:

• How to use Final Cut Pro X by experimenting with it and watching YouTube tutorials.
• To watch at least 10 videos from a genre or director in detail to fully understand the conventions.
• To research into related media such as books or video interviews to further understand the genre/director.
• That getting and organising actors for the music video will be difficult so we will need to organise it quite a bit in advance.
• We need to be flexible and adaptable to fit around actors and weather conditions as well as other unexpected factors.

Directors Challenge Final Cut

This is our final cut of a music video in the style of Chris Cunningham for Roni Size's Brown Paper Bag.

Tools We Used in Final Cut Pro X Editing the Directors Challenge

List Of Tools

Year 12 Introduction to Final Cut Pro X

After spending a few lessons on Final Cut Pro X we were to teach the software to Year 12 Media students. The topics I covered were:

• Finding Final Cut Pro X
• Uploading Footage
• Extracting Audio
• Basic tools
• Using the Blade Tool
• Managing Layers
• Selecting Clips
• Transitions
• Effects - Audio and Visual
• Naming
• Saving
• Zoom Slider
• Rendering
• Exporting
• Cropping
• Panning
• Key Frames
• Layers
• Compounding Clips
• Preview Window
• Speed
• Reversing Clips

Directors Challenge Final Cut

Here is our final cut for the directors challenge.