Overall guide to my promo

Name of band - Crossroad

Name of song - I know

genre of band  - Alternative Rock

images relating to the band

These are images which represent the type of style and appearance which we want our band singers to look like. This includes a scruffy, but smart sense of style for example, shirts undone, revealing of chest etc, a stubbly beard and slick back but scruffy/worn down hair style. Our actors for the band members will be:
- Mr Beagle
- Mr McGuigan
- Mr Crawford
We would like to have the album image involving all 3 band members, we plan to use a white backdrop and dress the singers in black tshirts, black shoes, black jeans/trousers and a denim shirt. We plan to involve musical instruments such as a guitar in order to portray the genre through the image

images of music video characters

We would like the character in our music video to be male, have long dark hair and have a skinny physique. We want him to have a skater boy style and he will pose as though he is vulnerable and reserved, like the boy in the film 'disconnect'

fonts that you might use - clear, bold capitals such as 'Castella'

Music magazine you will have your advert in - Q magazine


Treatment
A young boy, vulnerable and naïve lives his school life being threatened and intimidated by his peers. He walks home, depressed and alone, everyday reflecting on the nasty comments and jokes made about him, because of his timid and shy nature we plan to have our first shot introducing and emphasising on this aspect of our main actor. We plan to have a point of view shot of the boy looking down at his scraggy shoes as he walks home from school. This will be followed a range of different shorter shots, such as close ups of his face in his bedroom showing his depression and anxiety to live any longer. We will also show medium and long shots as he sits on the edge of his bed and runs his hands over his face and through his hair demonstrating his stress and incapability to deal with the situation in which he is facing.
We plan to have the first verse of the victim walking around alone at school, we will use medium, 3 quarter and close up shots of him as he walks. We then plan to have him looking at the happiness of the other students in school, although he is aware that they consider him to be watching them in a freaky or weird way. We will present this by having point of view shots as he looks at the other students, then with continuity we will use a close up shot as he looks away in fear. This should set the lonely atmosphere and inevitable troubles which he faces everyday at school.
As the song comes to the Bridge, 'Don't laugh at me' are the lyrics sung which we want to emphasise on, we plan to do this by having the point of view shots of the students as they give him strange looks and laugh at him as he walks alone, envious of the friends and normal lives which the other students have.
For the start of the Chorus we plan have the young boy walking home and through his back door, where we see his mum in dirty clothes smoking, without acknowledging the fact her son is a bad state. We will then show extreme close up lip syncs of certain words such as 'what do I know' and 'I know' as it almost seems as though he is talking to himself, creating a more personal feel and linking the lyrics to the video. We will locate this part in his bedroom as though he was thinking back on his day at school, realising he cannot deal with his issue any longer.
For the instrumental we plan to speed up the pace and use close up shots of the boys face crying as he wipes his face roughly. Then we will shot back to his mum, using a close up of her mouth as she smokes, showing her unawareness and inability to care for her son, this will continue to go back and forth to the son as he debates his death and the mother as she smokes irresponsibly. Leading to the last chorus where we see a close up of a chair and the boys feet as he stands on it preparing to take his own life. Then will then have a shot of his mother sitting up. Cut back to him knocking away the chair as the music fades down, this will follow a fade to black as his mum looks up rapidly and shouts his name. There will then be a series of fade to black shots where the mother runs upstairs, (Fade to black) then opens the door (fade to black) clutches his legs crying, then fades to black at the ending of the song.

Target Audience  - 25-40 year old women and men

Experimenting with exposure and natural light

During this exercise, we have used a reflector and positioning of our model to experiment with natural lighting. The aim of this task was to see whether  we could create a halo effect by standing with our back to the sun. This however, made the models face become too dark, therefore we discovered that the reflector was very useful as it made the light bounce back onto the models face, not only giving her a halo (or a light rim around the perimeter of her figure), but by also making her face become in a correct exposure.
We found that the reflector is also useful to capture professional images as it highlights the centre of the models eyes, making them stand out and become more lifelike, overall helping them conduct more emotion, which is important to us especially as our music video will need to conduct a particular emotion, which is usually constructed from within the eyes, in order for it to be successful.

Below I have edited together our footage using adobe after affect, to show what we have learnt from this exercise in a short video.

lip sync exercise

  In this exercise I have shown an example of  how to create a good lip sync on Adobe Premier Pro. We have used 2 models to compare how miming and singing can have an effect on the overall look of the lip sync. The girl on the left is actually singing, whereas the one on the right was just miming. We did establish that we can see the rifts and change in vocals when the person is actually singing to the track instead of just miming.
 Having accurate lip syncs will be very important in order to get a high grade for my music video as in time lip syncing is essential in any music video to make it look professional and realistic. In order to do this I have used the 'Add Marker' button on premier pro, which adds a marker on a particular place of the audio and video track. I found out from this exercise that finding a word which includes the letters 'P' 'B' or 'M' is an appropriate place to insert a marker, this is because the lips shut, making it easier to capture this letter more accurately, they are also more obvious in an audio track therefore by placing a marker over this letter in both the audio and video, I found that the mouth and the audio track were a lot more accurate and in sync.

Feedback

We have gathered some feedback of our attempt to lip sync on Premier Pro:

• 'its in time but there's not enough emphasis on the words, like it doesn't seem enthusiastic'
• 'you've matched up the track and lips well but its hard to see if it looks realistic because there's 2 people singing a song sang by 1 person'
• 'I like the way you smile and give some sense of attitude just through a close up of lips'
• 'its in perfect timing, you could emphasise on the words some more but overall its a good first attempt and wouldn't look fake or put on in a music video I don't think'
• 'The one on the right looks like they are singing at first then starts miming and looks more fake'

From this I have assumed that the technique which I used to get accurate timing has paid off, and this is very beneficial as its timing which is the main priority when lip syncing. However, I have taken into account that we may need our model to emphasise more on the words and keep it within context to the song, I agree that having 2 people singing a song which is evidentially being sang by 1 person can look unrealistic and strange and this will not occur in my actual music video. We used 2 models to compare the ways in which we could film a lip sync. We will also need to make sure the technique which we use when filming a lip sync stays the same, for example if they are miming to continue to mime, if they are singing, that they continue to sing. Preferably I want my model to physically sing as I find and from feedback can see that it makes the lip sync look more realistic.

The Creative Role of the Director

Narrative video

Green Day - Wake me up when September ends

Following on from my post explaining what gives Bayer an original identity as an artist, I have found that Green Day's - wake me up when September ends has a narrative based video which has been used to create a story. This is useful to me as most rock bands focus solely on live performance and involve a lot of screen time being given to the main band as they create chaos, this has made it quite difficult to relate the genre of my song to a narrative based video for examples and influence for our music video.

 

Within this music video we gather an understanding of the characters at the very beginning of the video, whereby a short clip is used to explain the idea of the story and create a connection between the two people. However, because our music video has to be a maximum of 3 minutes long, The idea which Bayer uses in some of his videos whereby a short, statistical fact opens the video may work perfectly for our music video, in order to set the scene and build up a sense of emotion straight away.

 

The main focus within this music video is the young boy and his decision to go to war. This is a touchy subject as it could be relevant to many people who may have a son, brother, dad or boyfriend who has died or is currently fighting in a war, this is like our idea on bullying, where a taboo topic is used to spark emotion from the audience. Although there is a main focus on the actor, the band themselves do occur within the music video and are seen performing, this convention of rock music may be something we need to add within our music video, even if only for a very short length of time, as even within this narrative based music video, an element of performance and the band is revealed.  

Auteur Theory

'The Auteur theory was introduced in the 1950’s by French film directors like Francois Truffaut who advocated a focus on the contribution directors made on the style and form of film, he said:

“A true film auteur is someone who brings something genuinely  personal to his subject instead of producing a tasteful, accurate but lifeless rendering of the original material” This theory holds that a film's director is its “author” (French, auteur).

An auteur is a film maker whose style and practise is distinctive which creates a signature auteur status for them. It is also a film maker who has a personal, signature style and keeps creative control over his or her work.
Making any film or in this case a music video the director is the auteur but it would not be possible for them to create the whole production on their own, instead they collaborate with others and team up with; writer, cinematographer and actors but the director is still an auteur in a sense as they control everyone and everything in the production. Supporters maintain that the most successful films bear the distinctive imprint of their director and that an auteur would place a significant visual style that would be visible throughout their work.  An example of a music video auteur is Chris Cunningham. Chris Cunningham is a British music video film  director and video artist. Cunningham is known for his warped style and disturbing imagery, he has worked and produced music videos for the likes of; Aphex Twins, Bjork, Placebo and  Madonna.'

Samuel Bayer

Director Samuel Bayer has been director for many music videos of the alternative rock genre such as videos for green day, my chemical romance, blink 182 and good charlotte, he has also directed horror film 'nighmare on elm street'. Bayer is an American  Visual artist, cinematographer, commercial, music video and filmdirector. I have been analysing some of his music videos and found

 

I have seen in both of these videos that Bayer tends you use hand held camera in a close up shot in order to make the visual become more messy. This may reflect the genre of the music as being rock/punk music a sense of chaos and disruption can be connoted through the use of a hand held camera. I have also noticed that there are a lot of fast cuts, this is because the songs themselves are quite fast paced, and this also creates that busy, wreckless feel to the video and moreover creates a typical camera movement and identity to Bayers videos.

 

 

We also see elements of live performance within his videos, this is because he focuses a lot on rock, indie and heavy metal genres, therefore live performances are a key convention of these particular genres.

 

 

In these screen grabs we can see that Bayer has used monochromatic colouring inside a television. This ages the video as the television in both music videos is small, square and has a curved screen. This also adds the effect of the genre as rock and heavy metal music is an old genre and acts originally, not to please the majority of the population, unlike pop music, but focuses more on the expression within the song and the band.

 

Occasionally Bayer uses short facts to open the music video, this is something which I would like to take as influence from Bayer, as the harsh statistics is what enhances the emotion and reality within alternative rock videos such as those in the above images.

Bayer also uses a low saturation to create a pale feel to his videos, this makes them become more gothic, which may be because rock and heavy metal music is linked to death and darkness.

 

Intertextuality and Post Modernism

Postmodernism

 Postmodernism is the distinguishing of the real and the fake in the signification in society and culture. In a simplistic sense we could argue that early man’s use of smoke signals was a form of post-modernism. Its what is actually meant and what is implemented that is arbitrary i.e. only understood because of a common consensus on what symbols means not because there is any connection the form or pattern and meaning. In a more contemporary context post-modernism can be seen in the way in which media texts play with their own status

and conventions. In this sense, they acknowledge the arbitrary nature of the meaning that is being communicated. 

Intertexuality
The music video is often described as a ‘Post-Modern’ form, a term which is often used to describe intertextuality, one of post-modernism’s more easily definable features. Broadly, if we see music promos as frequently drawing upon existing texts such as films, making reference to small elements in order to spark recognition in the audience, we have a working definitions of intertextuality. Not all audiences will necessarily spot a reference and this doesn't affect their ability to connect with the text but it may not cause as much pleasure  to them as it would to those who recognise the reference as they may feel flattered by this. Arguably, it also increases the audience’s engagement with, and attentiveness to the product, an important facility in a culture where so many images and narratives compete for our attention.

Reference intertextuality - Video Maker

I have created a short powerpoint which shows some images from  the films 'Disconnect' and '2:37'. I have done this to show how I will use intertextuality in my music video. I have looked at the image and style which the bullied boy in Disconnected has, we see a lot of close up shots where the boy is looking down and his hair is covering half of his face. I find this very effective as it cannotes a timid and withdrawn personality, which is what we want to display in our music video.
Secondly I have looked at the depth of field and focus in 2:37. I find that this makes the emotions and recognition of the 'invisible' character within school more evident and shows how it can be used to block out the 'normal' teenaged life, which occurs in the background, although this is not an intertextual reference, I have gathered from the film how this genre and taboo type film can become more effective by the use of depth of field and focus while filming.

Star development

Biography of my chosen artist

I will be looking at lead singer of the band 'Chris Martin'. He is the lead vocalist in coldplay. I have chosen him because coldplay are of a similar genre to my alternative rock band.
Martin is an English singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, also he is lead vocalist, pianist, rhythm guitarist, and one of the more popular members in the band Coldplay
Coldplays first album 'parachutes' is what got them recognised, they have also released 6 studio albums as well as several EP's.
As a solo artist, Martin has written songs for  Embrace ("Gravity") and Jamelia ("See It in a Boy's Eyes" and he has co-written with Coldplay producer Rik Simpson. Martin has also done collaberations with Ron Sexsmith, Faultline when he sang on two of his haunting Faultline tracks: 'Where is My Boy?' and 'Your Love Means Everything Part2.', The Streets, and Ian McCulloch.
He also sang a part of the vocals for the Band Aid 20 single, "Do They Know It's Christmas?" in 2004. In 2005, Martin collaborated with Nelly Furtado on the track "All Good Things (Come to an End)", for her 2006 album, Loose.

Star image in early years

Here is the video 'Yellow' which was in Coldplays first album 'Parachute' in 2000.
As we can see he is constructing quite a casual image, he isn't overdressed, fancy nor does he particularly look like a star. However, this casual appearance is what gives coldplay their image, I have also recognised that the use of sexualising women is not used very much in any of their earlier videos, showing that they are mature and this may interest their music towards a female audience and older men as they tend to focus more on the band and their music rather than the typical visual appeals such as sexualisation.

This is also seen in their early video for 'The scientist' where the focus of the video is the lead vocalist, central in the camera as he walks and sings the song with a familiar or everyday background, e.g the English beach or town.

How their image has developed in more recent videos

In Coldplays more recent music videos we can drastically see how their image has changed. Chris Martin not only looks more masculine, but he is also wearing smarter clothing and looks more of a star, although his videos still feature him as a main part of the image, there are now elements of females seen within the videos, this may be because nowadays men respond and enjoy the music video more when a female is involved. As they have expanded their career and become more famous they have broadened their audience and changed their image in order to stay within the publics interest. The lighting in his newer videos has also changed, which makes the videos become a lot more professional and less casual. They are more complex and involve more shots. As we can see in this video the close up shots as the first sentence is sung and walking around has become a signature opening for Coldplays music videos.

Within this more recent music video we do capture whats meant to be a live performance, with an audience, this is a change in image for Coldplay, however, it is a convention of rock videos, and as an alternative rock band they are using the conventions to create different videos, although still using the signature walking and central short of Chris Martin as the song begins.

Close ups

There are constant close up images of the singer, and central long shots of him walking. This extenuates him as the lead singer and band member. We can see in all of the above videos that even from his earlier videos, close ups and central shots have been key in their music videos. As I have covered, the hairstyle and costume of the star is quite smart/casual and the hairstyle is neat, but masculine and doesn't give away any particular wealth or stardom to the band, this is an aspect which may be recognised and appreciated by their fans and audience as they do not portray themselves in a way which segregates them from normal people who aren't within the public eye.

Camerawork

There is a lot of tracking in each of the videos, whereby the camera will track where Martin walks, this gives him a sense of power, but also makes him seem quite down to earth because of the location which he is walking through. There are hard cutes used mainly within the music video, I presume this is because it makes it easier to cut to the beat and makes the videos have a better continuity.

representation and star image

I have used information about Voyeurism, Exhibitionism, Star construction, Star image, Star vehicle, Star power, Race and Gender and presented them into a Prezi PowerPoint.
Below I will show my own examples of each heading using music videos from youtube.

An example of Voyeurism is seen in Sak Noels music video for 'Local People' We can see within the screen shots below that high and low angle shots are used in order to enhance the woman's assets. This is an example of Voyeurism as the use of sexiness and sexualising females is used in order for the male gaze and is done for the interest of predominately male audiences.

 

 

Examples of Exhibitionism is where females purposely sexualise themselves as a sense of power or character, the female isn't exploited in any way as a sexual object, as they themselves have control over the way they are perceived. Lady Gaga is an example of this, where she reveals her body and flesh in a way different to those shown in voyeurism. In this music video we see Lady Gaga half naked in bed, and wearing small, revealing leotards which emphasise her legs and bum, however she portrays herself as quite artistic and this does not sexualise her in a way relevant to the image shown above.

  

 

Star construction and Star image is important for any celebrity, pop stars in particular as a certain image is what creates their character and persona as an artist. Beyoncé has a very classy type image. She is yet another example of Exhibitionism, whereby her sexual image is constructed by herself and this image and classy attire makes her seem powerful as an artist. This can be seen in her advertisement for her mrs carter tour in 2013, where her outfit extenuates her curvaceous figure and the red lipstick cannotes a sense of seduction and sexiness, however the way in which she uses a throne and royal dress code addressed the idea that she is powerful, the well known 'Queen B'. 

 

As we can see in these album covers, Beyoncé has a typical pose which has occurred in 3/4 od her album covers, this involves her face looking central into the camera, while having her hands held behind her head. This adds a sense of movement into the image and reflects her sassy personality and as a stance reinforces her ability to dance and move very extravagantly in her music videos

This is one of Beyoncé's music videos 'single ladies'. As we can see in this video that she is a good dancer and is very seductive. However, she is seen to be the dominant and strong character within the video, she is not being sexualised by the man she is creating a respectable, classy and independent image for herself, this is also seen in videos such as 'dance for you' and 'ego' where she is central within the frame the majority of the time. Her exotic dance moves makes her unique and adds a sense of craziness to the sassy diva image she portrays.

 

Star Vehicle is what emphasises the stars image, whilst also creating a new one in order for the artist to stay relevant and enforce a particular image into the character. An example of this is Rihanna. We can see her image change within a short periods of time.

In her video 'unfaithful' she shows her bad personality through the way which she wears a black off the shoulder dress and shows close ups of her applying lipstick. However, her image here was slightly changing as the idea of the song is about disloyalty, although her light hair, fair makeup, lip gloss and delicate clothing cannotes her as being quite innocent and shy, this video is where a darker side to Rihanna began to show.

 

However, in her next video 'Umbrella' she still uses the idea of revealing herself slowly, but her image had completely changed, she was 'good girl gone bad' and her hair style and delicacy of her clothes had changed. Her nails were long and sharp and her clothes were black leather. Image is very important in order for a star to remain a star, and Rihanna found herself going from innocent 'SOS' and 'selfish girl' to 'Umbrella' and 'shut up' and drive' where she discovered and revealed her darker side.

Representation of women

In this article we can see that the way which women are represented in music videos is through the eyes of a male, making them look like 'whores' through the costumes and flashy clothing which they are made to wear. It compares the way woman are portrayed in different genre of music video, however all of which seem to sexualise woman in some way.
Woman are also seen to be sexy in a dominant way, for example in rhiannas 'so hard' video and shakiras 'hips don't lie' and 'whenever wherever' where mud is used to show she isn't afraid to get dirty, but this is shown in a sexualised way was she wears a colourful leotard, exposing her shape and flesh.
This article explains how celebrities get told what to do and what to wear, Rihanna being an example from where she was a 'good girl gone bad' where she decided she was going to do her own thing and become more of a sex symbol. This may have been a career based decision, so that she became more noticed and popular with a wider range of audiences.
This idea of audience focus may be useful when filming my music video, as the character which we use will need to have an identity and our video will need to match our character and ancillary task to make sure we cannote the correct meaning from the song from our own choices.



 

Laura Mulvey

Here I have posted an example of The Male Gaze being mocked by lily allen. We can see within this video that Woman's assets are emphasised on a lot in order to mock the Male Gaze. However, below this I have posted another video which focuses on the male gaze in a serious manor.

'Pop That' by Rick ross is an example of a music video which objectifies woman in order to present and appeal to the Male Gaze. We can see in this video that the womens assets are focussed on by the camera, we rarely see a women fully clothed, whereas the majority of the men are dressed..even when in the pool, creating quite a degrading stereotype towards women.

Forms and Conventions of Music Videos

Marking exercise

In this print screen I have shown evidence of using markers to edit my audio sound for my music video. In these images I have shown my step by step process of using markers to accurately match beats in order to create a high quality audio track.
In image 1, I have zoomed into the sound waves to ensure I selected the correct beat.

In image 2 I have demonstrated how to select the marker. This is done by, right clicking and hovering over the button 'marker' this then reveals a second task bar which will reveal the button 'add cue marker' - which can also be accessed by holding 'shift' and the letter 'M'. This will then add the marker to the desired place on the sound audio.

 
 

Lastly I have taken a screen shot of the final step when placing a marker on a sound audio. This is helpful during editing layered audio tracks as the markers allow the editor to accurately sync and recognise a specific beat.