Unit 2 to Unit 4 - Music Production

Let It Happen Music Video (Finished Product):

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RPGB0rttKnk5nI1vCV4kyoZdMZ0xmuP9?usp=sharing

Task 1 - Research:

A music video is a piece of media that moves the artist(s) message through their songs onto a screen, presenting a visual representation that plays alongside the song itself. Having a music video encourages the audience to listen to the artists music, its used as a marketing tactic to promote the artist. For the majority of music videos, they usually contain specific characters and a story to tell, great visuals, themes that stands out/make the song iconic. The 6 key elements of a music video: Lyrics, Music, Genre, Camera Work, Editing, Narrative & Performance. Slow zoom ins/panning, one frame, slight shake when the narrative gets intense. Created emotion throughout.

Performance MV - Typically the artist/band preforming with instruments to support them, this is a great resort for artists with a low budget. Usually on this production type, the set of the performance will change as the song progresses and they would preform in a few areas. To piece it all together in the end, the editing aspect is very important, without it the video will end up quite dull in the end - you can add effects and edge up some of the clips etc. Even though the video is the artist(s) preforming, there would be something else happening which keeps the video interesting and enjoyable, making it memorable for the audience.

Narrative MV - When the artist(s) are trying to tell some sort of story, a narrative music video is perfect for the song. Sometimes the music video will contain dialogue which can be seen as a mini film - kind of like the song being the script and the music video being the movie. For the narrative, usually it's based on the artist(s) visions that are intertwined within the lyrics and the video helps show the meaning visually. The scenes within the video can be complimentary and don't have to directly follow the lyrics of the song, as long as it makes sense to someone.

Concept MV - Typically, these music videos that have no relevance to the lyrics so no storyline at all. What makes these videos appealing is that it's memorable and gets people talking - you don't have to be specific about the lyrics as long as the video alongside it matches the vibe. There are two types of concept videos : Thematic & Symbolic; Thematic are based on a theme whereas Symbolic build up a meaning throughout the duration of the video. 

Lyric MV - These type of videos are simply just videos with the lyrics of the song on the screen, at the time the artist says those lyrics. What makes these stand out and look good rather than just a screen with words is there are usually designs across the background, the font and colours match the type of song the lyrics are and it matches the vibe of the song. Like a karaoke video but instead of instrumental music it's music with the artist singing.

Animated MV - An animation music video is quite simply an animated version of anything that is put up while the song plays. Some of the different types of animation can range from stop motion to cartoons, CGI, 3D etc. Like a cartoon, that's all the music video is but with a song as the character's lines.

 Avicii's 'Waiting For Love' Music Video 

For this video, the plot follow an elderly couple and the husband isn't very capable, constantly relying on his wife as he's too weak to do everyday tasks. In the middle of the night his wife leaves him and it was a wake up call for him, he was overwhelmed with sadness but decided to get his life together and he sets off to go find her - the video ending with the two being reunited. The video follows the lyrics with the odd line not connected to the video in any way - the man represents changing the way he is for the person he loves the most. The music is very upbeat and motivational depending on how you look at it - it's conceptual. The genre of the song would fit into the pop genre as the beats closely match up with the vibe, it's quite mainstream. As for the camerawork on the music video, it contains a lot of close ups on the character + the items he's holding which symbolises that it means a lot to him and makes it feel very personal. With personal, the close ups on the character show his raw emotion and how he feels throughout the duration, making us feel bad and hopeful for him to reach his goal; we can also see the desperation in his face which allows the audience to tap into their sympathy and root for the character alongside his journey. 

Lyrics

Avicii's lyrics in 'Waiting For Love' are both sombre yet inspiring, on the surface it looks like a few lines talking about love in a 'if there's a will there's a way' motivational tone - but it goes deeper than that. Going between the lines, the lyrics carefully describe how the subject is longing for a redemption to get back their love that they let get away, they started growing weak as everyday that went by they still stand alone without anyone to hold or call their own.

Task 2 - Design:

For this task, I looked into ODESZA's 'A Moment Apart' album promotion music video and took inspiration from that. The video contains an array of eye-opening visuals that all clash together to leave a 'coming-of-age' movie effect on the audience. The video presents a story entirely made up of various scenes that show for a few seconds at a time, giving you the time to take it all into account and create a concept based on your imagination. For my choice of three songs,

 I decided to go with 'A Moment Apart' by ODESZA, 'Let It Happen' by Tame Impala (the radio edit) and 'Breezeblocks' by alt-J. 

Like the open visuals for the album, 'A Moment Apart' creates an effect of brief euphoria and is a refreshing melody that is really catchy, I think I could maybe make a concept/narrative music video to this song. For the narrative, I can envision a person trying to run away from all of their problems, they're sick of the same thing every day and they start to realise by the end of the song even though it's difficult to stay there, it's everything they've ever wanted; I can include an array of visuals alongside this to complete the project.

Here are some visuals taken from the video that I would like to incorporate:

 'Let It Happen' is a song that is about giving into the unknown and knowing you can't control it, so you just 'let it happen'. The song powerfully has an undertone of becoming one with this force that has constantly been there but you just kept blocking it out - this can be emotions, mental health, world problems; it can be however you interpret it. This project would be classed as a symbolic concept.

Here are some visuals taken from the video that I would like to incorporate:

Lastly,  'Breezeblocks' by alt-J is a complicated song about a man who is deeply in love with a woman who wants to leave him, because of this he starts deteriorating and resorts to believing that drowning the girl he wants is the only way to make sure only he can have her; for this song I could create a concept and narrative music video that gives a visual of alt-J's raw emotions, it's chaos and a mess; simply all it's doing is adding fuel to a raging fire. For some of the visuals I'll be filming, I could use the colour theory - potentially using red visuals for anger, blue/dull for sadness, purple maybe to symbolise the state of mind when the lyrics imply the woman has left him etc. 

Here are some visuals taken from the video that I would like to incorporate:

Out of the three options I have chosen, I would like to pursue the song: 'Let It Happen' by Tame Impala, I feel like there is a lot to say about this song in particular and I could really make a story come to life with it. The first half of the song has a slow beat that drags towards the second half, that part then speeds up to deliver a promising mood-lifting spirit. For the music video, I could follow a conceptual music video with some parts that follow a narrative that leaves a lot of double meanings for the audience to decipher. 

For my greenlight pitch, during the opening of the video I'm going to introduce the main character of the story who will be what the main song is about, I can use various camera shots to capture the body language, how the character dresses, basically their personality which breaks the ice for the audience who are seeing them for the first time. I am going to follow a 3 Act Structure which introduces the start, the dilemma in the middle and the triumph ending (possibly, the ending could crash down on the character which follows the message of the song, just because you let it happen doesn't mean it's a good thing). For my visuals, I can use a lot of close-ups on objects and the main character slowly turning in on themselves, the character's appearance deteriorates while the objects that looked fresh at the beginning then appear broken by the end (this again loosely follows the meaning behind the song). Possibly, I could even use this idea the opposite way, everything is deteriorated at the start while the song is caving in through the slow part but as the second half appears and speeds up everything becomes clearer and normal - because the character just 'let it happen' so there's nothing that's weighing them down. Moving to locations, I could film in very closed and content places that could seem a bit claustrophobic, highlighting the idea of being trapped and belittled, I could move to more open places as the song progresses and eventually the actor is out in the open as the instrumental beat drops.

Task 3 - Planning:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1gtaEi7fv3-rvJmeOcZ1ZItnpD5OEZM5O

For this task, I started by creating a greenlight pitch which I went in detail of in the task above, after my group and I decided on which greenlight pitch to work with I then began creating a presentation that included a break down analysis on each verse and we made some ideas of what to film for it. We did end up changing our main idea a few times before we landed on the perfect one - the idea of overwhelming stress while sitting an important exam.

The video would start out in an exam hall, students coming in and taking their seats, beginning the exam, our main character (Noah) zoning out and imagining himself lost on a beach; as the video progresses Noah starts trying to get back and it triumphly ends with him finding the 'answer' and going back to the hall. The 'Answer' can be anything the audience interprets it to be wether it's asnwers to the test or answers to Noah's life problems - it's up to them.  

The time duration for these documents was roughly a week as we tried to fit in as much detail as possible, one of the problems we faced while planning was casting actors for the video. We managed to overcome this by allowing the actors to give us when they're free and so we worked around the issue and had a date set to film within the college. We ended up filming in one of the classrooms in which we transformed into an exam hall to film interior scenes and also travelled down to Seaton Carew beach, where we filmed exterior scenes.

If you view the Google Drive link above, you will be able to see all of the planning/documents that have been created and put into this production.

Task 4 - Production:

Filming roughly took around 4 hours a day as we didn't want to overwork our actor but also we managed to actually film these scene fairly quickly due to us already knowing what the vision was and how to bring it to life. Overall we filmed for three days which were spread out over 2 weeks due to our team's availability. Day 1 filming on Seaton Carew beach, Day 2 filming in college, Day 3 filming back at the beach one last time. 

Day 1:

For day 1 of filming we started production at the beach, we started by gathering the equipment we needed on the morning (camera, batteries, lights, tripods, carrying cases) and headed up to Seaton Carew beach to begin. As the director, I assisted the camera operator in setting up shots to get a rough idea of what it would look like - once I approved the shot I then had a run-down with the actor and explained how the scene would go, what they would need to do, how to do it and their emotions they needed to incorporate. We repeated this same process for all the other shots we took while stopping and reviewing the clips to see if we needed to reshoot or even film from a different angle; we had a few clips of the same thing happening but from different angles so in the final version it wasn't one long clip. 

Day 2:

Focusing on Day 2 of filming, for these specific scenes we were indoors and needed to film 'exam in progress' type shots to use at the start of the video (we did different scenes for different days). We did run into a problem with the room we had booked out. That room was being used for a meeting at the same time as we needed to film in there so we did end up finding another room that was close as it was not currently in use - with the space provided we ended up moving around most of the tables and desks to replicate an exam hall.

Before and after pictures:

With help, we set up a dolly in the classroom and used that piece of equipment to record camera shots freely and smoothly - we didn't have the screws for them so it was a bit difficult trying to keep it in place; we did end up doing it and arguably the shots turned out quite well.

Day 3:

On the final day of filming, we had a little problem with waiting for everyone to show up but once they did it went smoothly from there (almost). For the first half everything was okay filming wise although it felt a lot colder than Day 1 so we were more strict with wearing jackets when we weren't recording. For these specific scenes we progressed to the dunes that were on the beach, Noah would be running up to find the 'Answers' then once getting them retreat back down to his seat to try go back to the classroom. By the time we got to filming that section the battery we were using had around 5% left and we couldn't find the spare one we brought, this meant we were trying to quickly film all of this before it died out. The last few scenes we filmed were sort of rushed due to the fear that the battery would run out while filming the ending but afterwards we realised we had already shot the ending earlier so we decided to call it a day. The battery managed to stay alive with 1% left, then we packed up and left. 

Final Product:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RPGB0rttKnk5nI1vCV4kyoZdMZ0xmuP9?usp=sharing

Task 5 - Evaluation:

While brainstorming through our ideas during the planning stage, we had settled on going to various locations to make the production whole but as the filming dates got closer we figured it would be a lot easier and more accessible if we just made it so we only switched between two locations (college and the beach). Our planning that we did went great with filming as we followed it very closely and it helped us out a lot, our shot list massively helped with getting the different angles too plus our actor had the right costume on and I feel like it really pieced everything together. 

On the planning documents, I did a verse-by-verse breakdown analysis which I then compared with the lyrics of the song to - this made sure that the scenes we shot lined up with the lyrics and the video actually made sense. Adding onto this, it did in fact help a lot and during editing it was fairly easy to put the clips together as it followed the sort of 'storyline' the song is trying to say.

If you look on the PowerPoint document included in the Google Drive link above, you will be able to view all of these documents and you will also be able to see the mood board I had created prior to filming. A lot of pop culture references are shown which I wanted to pay homage to and I feel like in the final edit we did do them justice - even if some of them were just little details that connects to it.

A few things did go wrong while filming the outdoor scenes, for example:

- The weather was a lot worse than expected,

- Didn't anticipate how far the filming location was,

- A few interferences from the general public etc.

We did some research prior to filming about the tides, weather, population times but still our filming days didn't go exactly as planned. It was a lot colder than we were anticipating and it kept raining throughout filming so we did have to stop and start a few times to avoid damage to the equipment. At one point, we were so absorbed in a scene the tide rolled in and we didn't even realise until it came up close and we had to quickly move the equipment. We did end up resolving this issue by wearing thicker coats on day 3 of filming (day 2 was indoors) and we encouraged our main actor to wear his coat when he wasn't acting to stay warm. 

For the second point, we had a little trouble communicating over the location due to how far the actual beach is - most of us got the train up while one of us drove as they lived near the location. Due to train times and distance from the train station we didn't actually start filming until about an hour after we expected due to our actor arriving later, this was about the same problem for both days we filmed on the beach. On top of this, the team member who had all of the props and main items we needed to film had arrived a bit later than two of us so for the tiniest bit it was just a lot of waiting around. Unfortunately there was no way around this but for future projects we now know to be clear of travelling times. 

Lastly, while taking a lot of the shots we did have some problems with the general public getting in the way of shots, pets running through the scene, items being left in the back etc. While we knew there would be some people around we did choose to go on a relatively bleak day so we wouldn't bump into that many people - it's hard to film with people in the back as we need their permission to be on camera and if they say no then we can't get that shot. Also, for the beach scenes anyways we didn't want anyone in the back as our character is supposed to be isolated at this point (this is all in his head so there shouldn't be people around). To resolve this, we did end up having to rerecord some scenes a few times due to people in the back/their pets running past the camera, through the scene. Furthermore we also did end up waiting a few times for people to pass before we could start recording and even had some come up to us and ask about the project which set us back a bit with filming times - nothing too serious though.