Props

• Disco ball
• Record player
• Mobile
• Mega phone
• Women's wig
• Cardboard
• Toy doll
• Green card/ paper
• Magnify glass
• Animal mask
• Fake money
• American flag
• String
• Ghost
• Taboo bottle
• Fake spider
• Glass bottle

TV - We planned to make this using a card board box. To make the shape I cut out the screen and used this left over piece to make two circles to act as buttons. These were then glued onto the box with a hot glue gun. I then made an arial also out of cardboard and glued this to the top of the box. One of our ideas was to film the TV 'floating' in the air, this was done by attaching the TV to a pole using string. Our ideas were to make it look surreal and funny,

MegaPhones - I came up with the idea of making them on photoshop and then putting them onto card to make a card board cut out to look humorous yet intentional. I created the megaphones in photoshop by tracing over a image of a real megaphone to leave just a black outline. I then filled in the center using a gradient fill. I printed these out several times all with different colours to make the video look colorful and to make each one slightly different.

Call Sheet

As our personal details (phone number & Email Addresses) were on the original call sheet for blogger purposes & privacy reasons i have pixelated these.

Costumes

We wanted to create costumes which were over the top flamboyant, and decorative. We took inspiration from other videos done by the Scissor Sisters and thought that our costumes need to be over the top and dramatic to help tie in with the fast paced song. I got some pink material covered in sparkly sequins and made a top with it, this consisted of an over the shoulder simple top with a mesh shoulder piece and one flared arm sleeve coming off it, down the side was a strip of the same mesh material to show the skin. I am pleased with this top however I feel we will still need several more outfits for our performance to add variation and originality.

Another idea which i thought would be good is to get an old vest top some polystyrene cones and a glue gun. I would then attach the cones onto the vest using the glue gun, this would be unrealistic and unusual which is the desired effect. This is inspired by Madonna.

Amy used a a pair of lycra leggings which had bright colours in them, this was to add a bright contrast to the backgrounds which we hoped would attract attention and make the shots look more interesting for the viewer. I feel we did achieve this.

Another top i made was this multicolored jacket. This was done by using a flag and sewing it together. we wanted The costumes to be bright and colorful therefore i thought this idea fit the ideas and would become useful. I think the jacket is vibrant against the white background and attracts the viewer into the video.

Sam had been in shows before and she remembered about this top she had. It was brightly colored with neon orange, yellow and green feathers on. This fit with the other costumes due to the bright colours and therefore was a good idea for use to use this in the video.

We wanted to create a casual look to some parts of the video to create a good contrast and variation. After looking at the video ' David Guetta - Gettin' Over You' we realised that leather jackets were often used in music videos. We used our leather jackets in our videos to replicate this in between clips of us in the bright coloured shots.

Mind Map of Ideas

The group sat and thought of various ideas which we thought would work well with the song choice. This is what we came up with:

Selected Music Video

As a group we decided to use the Scissor Sisters song 'Night Life', this song doesn't currently have a video produced by the group therefore we realised that it would be easier to come up with fresh new ideas without being influenced and tempted to replicate there own version. There previous videos include allot of bold colour, and over the top costumes which we thought would be good to twist and make our own ideas up using there previous videos for inspiration.

The music is fast paced and of the pop genre which means the video can be exciting and will contain different;

• camera angles/shots
• costumes
• lighting
• colours
• dance routines
• makeup
• locations

This will give us allot to work with and allow us to come up with interesting original ideas.

Bellow is the track and lyrics:



I was a young girl
Knew next to nothing
Living in the suburbs
And my heart was lusting
For a new way
And a new sound
Crawled over my hang-ups
To the underground

I had a breakthrough
I had to shake you
You couldn't come to
To see my point of view
I had a breakthrough
It was my debut
It didn't faze you
But it meant something to me

Night Life
Beneath the surface
Night Life
Some say it's worthless
Night life
It's a state of being
Inside
It's the song you're singing
Night Life
If there's no spirit
Night Life
Then don't go near it
Night Life
It's a high turnover
Inside
You can find your life in the night life

If you are feeling
Like you don't have nothing
Under pressure in a cooker
With your head in the oven
There's a new way
So come on down
Life in limbo will be over
When you're underground

You need a breakthrough
You need to make due
You need to come to
A brand new point of view
You need to break through
And then get wise to
All that is taboo
And you'll be something to see

Night Life
Beneath the surface
Night Life
Some say it's worthless
High Life
It's a state of being
Inside
It's the song you're singing
Night Life
It's the heart you're racing
Night Life
It's the pill you're tasting
Night Life
It's the cash you're making
Inside
You can find your life in the nightlife

Beneath the surface
Some say it's worthless
It's a low-cut ceiling
It's the rush you're feeling
It can break your spirit
If you let them near it
It's the back you're breaking
Are you in it for the Nightlife?

Find your way to hide in the nightlife
You can find your life in the nightlife

Permission Letter

As a group we have decided to use the song 'Night Life' to make our music video to. To use this song we must first seek permission from the artist. Bellow is the letter which I sent to the artist over MySpace:

Audience Research

To allow us to have some more knowledge of what people want from a music video we constructed a questionnaire. The answers are bellow:




1.Are you male or female?


Male-10= 50%
Female-10= 50%






2.What age group do you fall in?


Below 16-0=0%
16-18-18=90%
Over 18-2=10%






3.How often do you listen to music?


Every day-16=80%
Up to 3 times a week-3=15%
Weekly-1=5%
Fortnightly-0=0%
Hardly ever-0=0%








4.Where do you listen to the majority of your music?


TV-1=5%
Radio-1=5%
CD/Record/Tape Player-1=5%
IPOD-8=40%
Laptop/Computer-9=45%








5.What music genre do you listen to the most?


Rock-6=30%
Indie-4=20%
Dance-0=0%
RnB-1=5%
Pop-8=40%
Other-1=5%








6.Do you prefer fast or slow songs?


Fast-19=95%
Slow-1=5%








7.Do you enjoy watching music videos?


Yes-18=90%
No-2=10%








8.What type of music video do you prefer?


Visuals relating to the lyrics-3=15%
Disjuncture (no connection between the video and lyrics)-12=60%
Live performances shown as music video-1=5%
Parodies-4=20%








9. Do you think it is important to show shots of the band and instruments in the video?


Yes- 5=25%
No-15=75%








10. Do you think carefully thought out costumes are important?


Yes-18=90%
No-2=10%

Video Analysis

9 Frame Anyasis

Advertisement Analysis

This is a magazine advertisement for GoldFrapp, Headfirst album. The album name is almost replicated within the album art as it features a woman's head in the sky, the clouds around the face create a pleasant and soft image, the colours used are blues orange and red to replicate a sun setting in the sky, this is vibrant and eye catching. This advertisement would really stand out if someone was flicking through a magazine which is the effect that the artist wants however I personally feel that this advertisement does not portray its dance genre very well, if i did not know the genre already and saw this advertisement I would assume that it was chill-out style music. To improve this they could of made the album art more futuristic or "stylish" to attract the young target audience.

The Stereophonics advertisement bellow is of Alternative Rock. The advertisement uses unusal photography to attract the attention of the viewer, the fact that the band is sat around a table having lunch in the middle of the ocean makes the viewer want to read what its about to allow themselves to make sense of the image, this type of impact will stay with the viewer and help them remember the band members for future references, which eventually makes the band more popular and well known. The titles on the front are all the same font however it uses different text sizes and different colours to show the band name/CD name and the information about the album.I think that this album art does help the viewer decide what the genre of the music is, the ocean is rough and the art is unusual, there fore i think this is a really effective advertisment.

Conventions of a Pop Video

CD Cover Analysis

What are the typical features that an album cover has?

From viewing the different album covers, which I have found, I can clearly see that they are similar in more than one way. Bellow is a list of the elements that they have in common;

• They all have a minimalistic look and layout, this keeps it easier to read the small amount of text and helps the viewer see it from a distance.

• Each piece of text is in a different font or has been formatted in a different way, I think this is to make it easier to read and so that the viewer can understand that the different format of text means something different for example on the David Guetta album his name is in a modern fresh styled font while the album title is in a different font and colour, this makes it clear that David Guetta is the artist and that this text is not part of the album title. Often the same font is used when the artists name is placed anywhere, this helps make people associate the font with the artist and recognise them if they see the name somewhere else. One difference with the P!nk album would be her font is all the same however her leg separates the two pieces of text while again stop the viewer from thinking its part of the title.

• Every album cover features the artist filling the picture. Two of the album covers show only the artists face and chest where as the P!nk album is slightly different, it does feature the artist however you can see almost her full body whilst she is straddling a rocking horse, this image is quite fun and outrageous this helps the style of the music become associated through images, the album name is called fun house and I feel that this is reflected through the front cover.

How would you categories the albums?

Each album has a different sort of genre and style, this can generally be worked out through bu the look and feel of the album art. For example a dance CD is not going to have a picture of a saxophone on the front because that would give out the wrong image, it would not have anything to do with the contents therefore the wrong image of the CD would be given out.

The Florence and the machine album art is quite natural, she is situated in front of what looks like plants and is leaning into them, the top is quite thin and allows us to see through it, and to go with the title ‘LUNGS’ she has a pair of lungs over her chest which can also be seen through the top. Her hair is simply tied up at the back and not done in the perfect style, which some artists go for. These reasons give a very calm and careless approach image out, which is almost hippy. The album is of an indie genre which I feel is portrayed well through the album art.

For David Guetta's album he is featured filling the full cover wearing sunglasses in an almost snap shot image of him. The album name and artist are positioned to the left and are the only part of the album which is colour, this makes it stand out on a shelf and keeps the attention on the artist name and the album. This is an unusual CD to categories by the look of the album art. I personally think the fonts used tell the viewer that it is going to be up beat and therefore showing it is going to be a dance / trance CD this is enforced by the bright pink title.

The final CD Cover which i looked at was the P!nk one, this is a very fun looking album art, which gets across straight away that the CD is going to be fun and up beat, the artist is featured in a happy mood whilst sat on a child's merry go round horse which helps the viewer make this assumption. The colours are bright which is the opposite technique used by David Guetta, however i think it is still eye catching due to its unusual visuals.

Shot Count of Kelly Rowland ft. David Guetta - Commander

Amount of shots:

There are approximately 157 shots that can be seen in the music video, each featuring a well pumped up dance routine which has clearly been well thought out. The amount of shots has made it clear that the song is fast pace and packed with interesting visuals.

Meat Shots:

There are approximately 121 shots of the artist (meat shots) in the video. This makes her the center of attention and shows that the produces wanted this to be the case. With only 36 shots that she is not shown in throughout the full video it would be very hard to recognize who was the main performer!

Link lyric to visuals:

When the song says ‘Ill be your commander’ the visuals are of Kelly Rowland showing she is in control which helps the audience visually see what the song means. This is shown again when she says the word ‘commander’ she does the salute signal. This again helps the audience to match the audio with the video.

Pace:

The song is very fast paced and the shots match this. There is no shot longer than 3 seconds which helps the rhythm of the song be visually exciting for the viewers pleasure. If the shots were slow and longer the viewer would loose interest fast.

Type of Shots:

The video incudes many shots, a lot of which are close-ups mixed in-between of long shots, the rest of which are extreme long shots and a few of which are tilts. This variety of shots allows the viewers interest to stay throughout the entire video.

Green Screen Practice

As none of us had used the green screen technology in first year properly we had a practice lesson, showing us how to remove a particular colour in background of footage. To achieve this we used the "croma keyar" tool which allowed us to select which colour range to remove out of the image. We then had to move the different sliders which allowed us to sharpen up the edit and make it look crisp around the edges of the performer.

Once we were happy with this we could then do it for another clip, shrink it down and layer it on-top of the first edited video clip, this allowed us to have two people on separate video clips on the screen the same time.

Bellow is the final result which i think is a good first attempt.