Update- 29th December

With our storyboard finished Chris and I have set our first date for filming. It will be on the 5th of January. We are filming at Seal Church Hall. The filming will commence at 2: 30 with just the band. and at 5 : 30 we are aiming to start filming with our audience. This day's filming should provide us with the majority of our shots for the music video. After this we will need to film on two other occasions; a day's filming for the outdoor narrative of the video (on the 6th) and the filming of the indoor scene containing just the lead singer and his "mardy bum" (hopefully this will be filmed on the 5th).

For the filming of the narrative we have organised that we have two cars and two drivers who can travel from location to location. Our aim is to finish filming by the 7th of January so that we have enough time to properly edit our music video.

I will be producing the call sheet and Chris will handling our shot list.

We have done two band practices on the 29th and 30th of December. Not only have the band been able to play together but it gave me and Chris the chance to explain the music video and show the band the type of shots which we will be using.

Ideas for the Narrative Shots

Jake and myself have discussed possible ideas for our narrative shots. We wanted them to follow the lyrics to the songs and to conform to the expectations of the audience, however we didn't want them to be to "cheesy".

Here are some of our ideas, with the corresponding lyrics:

Lyrics: None - Start of video before song starts
Idea: The lead singer, walking down an alley, using point of view shots. Also had the idea of him walking along with the camera stationary and as he steps over the camera, the camera twists upside down to show him walking off (for reference see this post: Technical Analysis - Chris and view the video for "Oceans Avenue" by Yellowcard starting at 00:27 and finishing at 00:32). Also have him walking through a crowd, to get to his performance.

Lyrics: "Remember cuddles in the kitchen"
Idea: Flashback, possibly in black and white, of happier times, when the leadsinger and his girfriend are hugging, possibly in a kitchen although this may verge on the "cheesy" factor.

Lyrics: "That reoccurs, oh when you say I don't care"
Idea: Have a close up on the lead singers face, having an argument with his girfriend, and as he sings the lyrics, have the girfriend "slap" him and use a swish-360-pan back to his face to connote him being slapped. Follow this up with him looking and singing "Well of course I do, yeah I clearly do!"

Lyrics: "Well now then Mardy Bum, Oh I'm in trouble again, aren't I"
Idea: We have a couple of idea for this part, we could use a selection of photos where the couple are together, but have them curling up in flames. Or have the lead singer on a park bench, under a lampost singing but not looking at the camera, similar to Stereophonics, "It means nothing" video, where he is on his bed singing.

Lyrics: None - End of video, song ended
Idea: Have the girlfriend and the leadsinger alone in the hall, looking at each other, and then the lead singer walking away, leaving the girl alone.

planning review # 3 - CF

Very strong pitch - clear, focused, thorough, informed by primary and secondary research, planning for performance shoot already begun with actors and location. This is an excellent start to planning, everything clearly posted on the blog. I suggest that you now take a camera and do a detailed reccie, posting ideas on the narrative section. However this is a very strong project. Well done guys - keep it up for top marks.

Combined review of our Pitch.

Looking back at our pitch we would say that it went well. Not only did we receive positive feedback on our ideas but we also received new point of views, angles and ideas for our music video. We started the presentation by playing our track and having people write down their ideas and thoughts on the song and what they would put in a music video. This was useful because the people in our class where also media students, and because they where also doing music videos, they could provide a developed understanding of our idea and how we would achieve it.
Generally we received positive feedback particularly in our track choice which, it was agreed, was simple and reflected the band and its genre. Below is a list of ideas that other people mentioned when listening to the song:

• Performance Based
• About two people fighting- Narrative
• Fast paced (particularly the cutting between shots and the camera movement)
• It needs a real band (it need to be authentic)
• Simple cutting
• Avoiding complex special effects ( challenges the IndieRock genre)
• Show the band being a fun group of friends
• Light hearted- lost the girlfriend but not a dramatic emotional piece.

All of the ideas above are, to a certain degree, involved in our music video and this reinforced our idea. Our pitch was also very successful and we presented our ideas clearly and in detail using a powerpoint as an aid. We also included our moodboard in the powerpoint to show our ideas visually for ourselves and those who watched our pitch.

Field Trip to the National Film Theatre

10 Top tips from Pete Fraisers:

1. Choose a short track
2. Pitch for material with a simple but strong idea
3. Storyboard - Plan people, placeces, props and costumes
4. Blog - Use a blog to link ideas
5. Know equipment - practice effects and shots
6. Shoot at least 3 times - loads of shots and experiment
7. Label captures, and break them up into managable chunks for editing
8. When editing, set up performances, then cuts then special effects
9. Get feedback
10. Start analysis early

Audience Research- focus group

Chris and I decided to use Qualitative research because we wanted to see how our target audience interacted with our song. As this type of research is subjective we knew that we would receive individual responses rather than Quantitative research because that only looked at statistics which could be miss leading.

Auidence Research Results - Combined Post

From our results, the audience have told us that the most common 5 words associated with the track were: (the number in brackets is how many people said it)
1. Indie (4)
2. Sad (4)
3. Catchy (3)
4. Fast (2)
5. Nostalgic (2) (meaning that the song had some natural romanticism)

The focus group also suggested that the track had a dark tone 3 people rating it 3 out of 10 on our scale, 1 ranking it 4 and the other ranking it 6.
Most people said it had an urban feeling, 2 people marking it as a 1 on the scale only one disagreeing saying it was rural, giving it at 7 out of 10.
There was mixed feelings towards the track being performance based or narrative based. Generally it was voted towards the middle of the scale with more people scaling it around 4.