Vlog

Meeting 10th November

We had a meeting with George who is our actor for the music video. This lesson was really productive because we could finally schedule some dates to begin the most important part of our project which was the filming. We scheduled to do some filming the next Tuesday (17th November) which worked very well. We filmed all of the footage we needed for the indoor scenes which included both happy moments and sad moments.
 I believe this filming session was very successful. The next filming session will be tomorrow afternoon where are using all of tomorrow afternoon, Wednesday 25th November to film the country scenes and very last shot where the girl character places the flower on the grave.

Storyboard

Lip Syncing Practise

In our lesson recently we practised lip syncing to get used to singing along to the song whilst filming.

To begin with I found it very difficult to stay focused. So Jake and Lucy came into the shot too and tried the lip syncing with me which helped.
We found the best method of lip syncing was to actually sing the song whilst it was playing through the computer. Then we edit out our voices and place the song on top of the video. It was hard to try and get the timing correct and therefore slows the editing process down. But once we had got the timing of the video with the song right, we think it looks very effective and so was successful.

Location Searching

During our double lesson we took the time out of school to visit some of the locations that we had decided we would potentially be using in our music video. This short video shows two locations that we had thought about using: Daddyhole plain and Meadfoot beach. Both of these locations are in Torquay rather close to each other. We also wanted to look at a section of woods in Newton Abbott and Dawlish Warren beach which we will look at on a later date.

Music: Half The World Away, Oasis.

Band Website Case Study

This blogpost is about my findings of research into the websites of bands and artists similar to Oh Wonder. 

Ohwondermusic.com is Oh Wonder's website. This website is easy to navigate and to understand. Their tour dates are clearly stated on the homepage and they have links to all of their social media accounts on the homepage too.

On their website Oh Wonder have links to music, videos, merchandise, tour dates and a photo blog. Their merchandise is fairly priced at £25.00 for a sweatshirt and £12.00 for a canvas bag. 

I have researched bands/artists that have a similar music genre to Oh Wonder to discover whether or not similar bands have similarities in their websites.

Ben Howard 
benhowardmusic.co.uk is Ben Howards website. He also has a white writing on black background theme. The main focus on his website homepage is a constant rolling of his latest music video and song, 'I Forget Where we Were'. This is a good promotional idea that gets the audience intrigued before they've had a chance to visits his website properly. He has hyperlinks to tour dates and an online store.

Gabrielle Aplin
gabrielleaplin.co.uk has a short animation when you click on her website. It reveals her name centred on the screen written in white on a black background that slowly fades to reverse colours. We are then taken to her homepage. 

with hyperlinks of: including her new single, 'Light up the Dark' 

These screenshots show whats happens when I click on the hyperlinks. In my opinion Gabrielle's website is slightly more confusing to navigate because of how busy the page is presented. However she has a recent news page which keeps fans updated with her current actions. The other websites don't have this and I think it makes a good asset to the website.

Mumford and Sons

Mumfordandsons.com website is very appealing. When you click on the link you are taken to a page that has a large logo in the centre. If you scroll down you are taken to tour dates therefore is easily accessible for fans looking to buy tickets. 

There is a button that says, "Go to main site." When you click on this you are taken to the main site that includes many links.

You enter a type of news page on the home page of the website.

And by clicking on the links, the page redirects to the certain areas very quickly and easily. This is the store page.

Overall the website is easy to navigate and very appealling. I like that the tour dates are the first thing that is seen when you click onto the website.

Ben Howard music example:

Gabrielle Aplin music example:

Mumford and Sons music example:

How Weather Compliments Emotion

"Pathetic fallacy is a literary device wherein the author attributes human emotions and traits to nature or inanimate objects. For example, the following descriptions refer to weather and how it affects the mood, which can add atmosphere to a story: smiling skies, somber clouds, angry storm, or bitter winter."


Pathetic fallacy allows for videos to amplify the emotions of the characters. Here, I have introduced some videos that I believe show types of pathetic fallacy used to portray certain moods.

James Blunt- You're Beautiful




Coldplay- Paradise





Coldplay-Yellow





Oasis- Little by Little





Cheryl Cole- I Don't Care. At moments in this music video, Cheryl is playfully walking around the beach. She is happy and the sunset compliments the way she is spinning and turning.





The Script- The Man Who Can't Be Moved. Towards the end of the song camera shots are shown of Danny (lead singer) sitting through every type of weather in order to stay in the place that he first met the girl he loves. He is seen in snow, rain and sun. This shows his commitment and dedication and love for the girl. 

     

Story Boarding Time Lapse

We created a time lapsed video of our two hour lesson to briefly show our communication while creating our story boards. In this lesson we roughly devised our story boards to reveal each scene and how long this scene would be shown for. Next lesson we will be doing more detailed sketches of specific shots using the draft we did today to help us. 
Lucy was absent in todays lesson but we had a phone call with her to make sure that she was happy with what we were doing and/or had any suggestions.

Oh Wonder Artist Case Study

Oh Wonder-Case Study

Oh Wonder is a duo based in London. It consists of a girl and a boy Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West. They are quite a new band evident in their first album being released on September 4th, 2015. The genre of the bands music is Indie Pop, with a self-titled album named, 'Oh Wonder'. This album was released on iTunes after each song was released every month on SoundCloud. The duo has 14 tracks on their SoundCloud profile including an album sampler. They have 99,000 followers and their album sampler has been listened to over 70,000 times.

I have created a short video presenting some of Oh Wonders tracks. This video reveals the image of the artist through photographs and their style of music. The aim of the video however is to reveal fans comments on the duo. this gave me a taste of what people thought of the duos music. A majority of comments indicated how they cannot believe the band is not more famous than they are presently. Others said they enjoyed listening to their tracks because they were easy to listen to. Comments such as 'beautiful' and 'happy' were seen quite often too.

Oh Wonder also have their own website, ohwondermusic.com. The website keeps fans updated with links to the bands social media pages, new Youtube videos and most importantly, dates of their live tour. There are currently 24 locations, 16 already sold out. The last tour date is Thursday 17th March 2016.  and the next date is today, Tuesday 3rd November.

Audience Profile Research 3

I created a survey monkey to help me gain quick and easy audience profile research.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/JVZT3VP

This link shows how people answering the survey would be directed to the website to answer the questions. It is simple to complete and only takes an average of 5 minutes to complete.

Audience Profile Research 2

I interviewed my brother, Leo, face to face and recorded his answers to the questions I asked him. I asked him the questions that I have posted in this blog which are the same questions I asked Emma.

Questions For Audience Profile Interview

These questions were used when I interviewed various people for our research. This includes Emma's video blog and another written interview.

Interpretation of the lyrics

1. (After showing copy of lyrics) What do you think the theme intention was for the artists when they wrote this song?
2. If you were to see the music video to this song, what characters would you expect to see?
3. What are your interpretations of these lyrics?
   “Count stacks of routine lies 
   Funny how easy you can see my blind side
   still the same old songs with the same old beats
   Sure I can stay but there’s a place id rather be.”
   … And if you had to choose one word to describe their relationship using this verse, what would it be? 

Interpretation of the song

1. (After playing the song) What do you think of the song?
2. What do you particularly like/dislike about it?
3. What do you picture taking place in the music video?

Our group concept
 

1. Our group concept is to have two characters, a boy and a girl. The girl is in the video the majority of the time. She is lonely and walking by herself. There are flashbacks of both happy and sad memories with her supposed boyfriend but he is never seen in the real time with her. The audience eventually learn that he has died using a twist at the very end of the song. Firstly, Do you like the concept?
2. Do you think the concept will suit the song?
3. If our music video was successful, do you think you’d enjoy watching it? 
4. With this concept in mind, is their anything you would change?
5. Is there anything that confuses you about our concept?

Audience Profile Research 1

Video Blog Pitch Review

Music Video Pitch

Here is the pitch to our music video. The song we have chosen to use is Drive by Oh Wonder (Official Audio Below). We have chosen this song because it has perfect climbs and lulls during the song that allow us to use these to our advantage by matching it with shots that will create our desired effect on the audience. I have attached a copy of the Slideshow that we used to pitch our music video.

Slideshow:

Official Audio:

Miley Cyrus Case Study

How has the image of Miley Cyrus developed over time?

Miley Cyrus, aged 22, rose to fame after auditioning for Disney Channel's 'Hannah Montana' when she was 12 in 2006. After receiving the role she rapidly became famous for her acting and singing.

 

Her father, Billy Ray Cyrus, is a country singer who was famous when she was younger. He also got the role of playing her dad in 'Hannah Montana'.
2007: She signed her first recording contract, and released her first hit single 'See You Again'. Her first image was set for her to become a teen idol, for children to look up to her and be inspired to be like her.
2008: Her second album was released, 'Breakout'. This album included her popular single '7 things'. This also launched her film career as the voice of Penny in 'Bolt'.



2009: Miley featured in The Hannah Montana Movie that had a successful single 'The Climb'. At this point, Miley was still seen as the teen idol but of course, after having grown up, her fans grew up with her. Her style and clothing were always natural and appropriate for her fans.
Miley also released an extended play in 2009 called 'The Time of Our Lives'.
This album included the popular song 'Party in the USA.' This song accompanies a music video that begins to show Miley as having grown up rather a lot since the beginning of Hannah Montana. She is seen wearing short shorts and cowboy boots. This is the first time we are shown how Miley grew up being from Tennessee rather than LA. She sings about the true country girl in herself, which contributes to her next image portrayal.

2010: in 2010 Miley released her third album 'Can't be Tamed'. With this, her new single 'Can't Be Tamed' is accompanied by a music video that portrays Miley to have become more of a woman than a teen idol. She sings about being impossible to tame and dances with other dancers whilst dressed in a 'sexy' black outfit showing lots of skin. Also in this year she starts in the coming-of-age film, 'The Last Song'. This year for Miley showed her grow up the most. She became more and more aware of her personal appearance to become 'the male gaze', and her unconditional talent of singing and acting proved her to be more than the teen idol she used to be.

Between 2010 and 2013 Miley made her most dramatic image change to date.
Miley still stayed in touch with her country roots in 2012 when she sang a cover of her Godmother's (Dolly Parton) song 'Jolene' in her 'Backyard Sessions'.



She had moved away from the 'Can't Be Tamed' phase of dressing to play the part of a Teen finally grown up and is now seen as a smart young lady. She cut her hair shorter to just below her shoulders. Many fans of Miley's would follow her image changes and copy them.
In 2012, Miley made the drastic decision of changing her hairstyle completley. Below show the images of two public appearances before and after she cut her hair. This was the beginning of a huge change in image for Miley.

In 2013, Miley released her fourth album 'Bangerz' showing a completely new image that was unexpected by the world. Singing singles such as, 'Can't stop' and 'Adore you', Miley had created a whole new image for herself that made her fourth album more popular than ever.
'We Can't Stop' left the world in shock after Mileys accompanying music video showed a party animal rebel that had changed so much in the past year.

The song that got her the most recognition from her new album was ofcourse, 'Wrecking Ball' that received 795,897,999 hits on Youtube. The purity of her face in the first frame is different to anything that her fans had ever seen. She shocked many people by posing naked on the wrecking ball, and definitely left her stamp by being the main focus of many parodies to come after this video was released. She definitely got the attention of many people. 

Since 2013: Miley has kept the image of being a crazy/rebellious party animal. she has grasped the attention of press all around the world for her loud behaviour and extraordinary stage presence.
The difference between her first Hannah Montana Tour and her recent Bangerz tour couldn't be more different. She has collaborated with artists who are not appropriate for young teenagers or children, which contrasts what Miley used to be like during Hannah Montana. An example of this is her collaboration with will.i.am in the song Feelin' Myself.

2014

2008

During the summer of 2015: Miley went back to doing her Backyard sessions similar to the ones she did in 2012. The theme of her covers are somewhat similar to the ones in 2012 yet of course her image has changed. She still shows to have perfect singing ability and although the dramatic change in her change in 2013, she still manages to maintain her good reputation of being a beautifully accredited singer.

           

Styles of Music Video

To begin our music video project, We began looking at the different types of music videos and soon found that most music videos fall into three main categories of the way in which they are presented.
We chose one music video from each category and further analysed them.
These categories are:
-Performance music videos: David Bowie, Life on Mars?
-Conceptual music videos: Queen, I Want to Break Free
and
-Narrative music videos: Bon Jovi, Always

We analysed the music videos by commenting on the main style of the video and the stages that it goes through, describing the image of the artist, describing the purpose of the music video and if there were any 'WOW' moments within the video.

Describe the style of the music video. Describe the 'stages' the video goes through.
David Bowie, Life on Mars?



This video is a performance piece by David Bowie. As you can see, there are lots of long shots used to present the detail in his person. He is very serious in his appearance to show that this performance is not humorous and is important. the detail allows the audience to connect with the artist through the bold makeup and 'different' colour suit to the classic black suit and tie.

Queen, I Want to Break Free



This video is more humorous than David Bowies, Life on Mars? 
The first shot involves Freddie Mercury, dressed as a woman hoovering a carpet which is very humorous for the audience to watch because they are not used to seeing him in this light. This music video is based on the concept of wanting something more out of life. Freddie is dressed as a house wife but only dreams to be in the 'bigger world' so the video progresses to reveal Freddie looking at a photograph hanging in the wall of the house, only to notice that as the photograph zooms in, it comes to life and he is actually in the shot.

Bon Jovi, Always



this narrative video involves the heartbreak of a man who loses his girlfriend due to cheating and then realises that he has a made a big mistake, only to find that when he returns after he, she has gone off with another guy.
The story begins very mellow and comfortable as the couple are in love. As the song progresses, so does the video. It becomes heightened. The characters begin to get enhance their performance and become more intriguing. 
There are cutaways to show the performance of Bon Jovi playing with passion throughout the whole video, becoming more intense and emphasised just like the characters do as the video progresses.

Describe the image of the artist(s) that is being represented. How is this technically achieved?
David Bowie, Life on Mars? 
In this video, David Bowie is being represented as being serious about the issue he is singing about. He is singing about being alone and not fitting in his world. The use of extreme close ups allow the audience to connect with him. His outfit and extreme outfit allow us to see that he is 'different' to the typical stereotypical artist, therefore clarifying his position he is singing about in his song.
Queen, I Want to Break Free
Freddie Mercury is being represented as very humorous in this video. He is dressed as a woman and is acting very melodramatic, therefore allowing the audience to enjoy the song and enjoy his performance.
Bon Jovi, Always
Bon Jovi are being represented as very passionate about there song. As they sing about love, they show the passion in their voices and connect well with the song, therefore allowing the audience to become involved with the lyrics.

What is the purpose of the music video? What is it designed to do to your opinion?
David Bowie, Life on Mars?
David Bowie is trying to send a serious message in this video that he feels alone in the world and is different. On the contrary he is showing he isn't afraid to be different because of the extravagancy of his makeup and the colour of his suit. He is the only person in the whole music video which shows he is not afraid to be the centre of attention, yet at the same time, he is singing about a sensitive topic of not being the centre of attention.
Queen, I Want to Break Free
This video is more for the audience to relate their lives to it. People always want to strive for their larger dreams and so this video gives the lyrics justice and puts the artists in the same position as the audience of always wanting more out of their life.
Bon Jovi, Always
This video is very specific in the narrative and what actually happens therefore it is harder for the audience to actually relate in detail. But by watching this, the audience can still feel some of what the characters might be feeling, therefore trying to send the message of losing and learning, and always remembering that love is not a hard emotion to simply release.

Any 'WOW' moments?
David Bowie, Life on Mars?
The first vertical pan revealing David Bowie in a close up of his face and his body.
Queen, I Want to Break Free
The first moment we see Freddie Mercury dressed as a woman
Bon Jovi, Always
The moment that the boyfriend lights fire to an apartment of a man that his girlfriend was seeing. It amplifies the smoothness of the video.

Music Video Representation

We looked at the representation of particular artists in their music videos. This included:

-solo female: Beyoncé, Crazy in Love- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViwtNLUqkMY

-solo male: Ed Sheeran, Thinking Out Loud-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lp-EO5I60KA

-boy group:Backstreet Boys, I Want it That Way-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fndeDfaWCg

-girl group: All Saints, Black Coffee-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0Xej6Sz5nU

-male band: Muse, Mercy-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5bjJzJ-T4c

-female band: Hole, Celebrity skin-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3dWBLoU--E

After looking at all of these music videos, We then commented on the representation of each artist, and also commented on features of the music video style and the way in which it complements the according representation.

BEYONCÉ-CRAZY IN LOVE

comments on representation: 

• used to contribute to the Male Gaze.
• Beyoncé is central to the camera composition 
• used to convert girl power
• her ethnicity is represented as being Ghetto stylish and glamourised

comments on features of the music video style:

• her body is emphasised as being sexy
• romance and flirtation with Jay-Z the male character

ED SHEERAN-THINKING OUT LOUD

comments on representation:

• his loyalty to the female character 
• non threatening, innocent, romantic
• he is showing elegance
• metrosexuality contributing to emotional depth 

comments on features of the music video style:

• balanced between both genders
• female gaze, sleeves rolled up to reveal tattoos, nice suit.

BACKSTREET BOYS-I WANT IT THAT WAY

comments on representation:

• they are represented as a group
• suggestively desirable, through the fans in their video, having a named jet
• being unthreatening and presented as the boys next door
• each member has a significant identity 

comments on features of the music video:

• a shared harmonised chorus
• individual solos
• a dance break
• singing to the camera, pointing=inviting

ALL SAINTS- BLACK COFFEE

comments on representation:

• the male gaze isn't as large as the female solo
• they show a sense of girl unity

comments on features of the music video:

• individual segments 
• harmonising chorus

HOLE-CELEBRITY SKIN

comments on representation:

• challenging 
• direct to the camera
• quite intense
• hierocracy of hollywood glamour 

comments on features of the music video:

• fast paced
• focus on the band
• lots of focus on the singer
• cutaways to singing separately