Evaluation of filming

Day 1--Due to the technical difficulties of my camera I wasn't able to take any photos that we might have needed for our digpak or the advertisement. It wasn't the ideal situlation for our group and didn't help us stick to our plan. Although this was a problem she still carried on and produced some brilliant footage of the band, we recorded everything this give us a huge range of different shot to chose from for our music video. The close up of the instrument playing and Gavs singing looks great, we managed to get all the shots we planned on getting--according to our storyboard and shot list. We were really pleased with what we have recored on both camera and hope to edit and adopt the footage to fit what we wanted from our music video. We also found out the footage we got of the band playing a different song from the gig became helpful as they were some of the same chords as our song KC.
Day 2--The footage that emily recoreded from the fireworks night, was good. She managed to capture the different coloured fireworks exploding within the black sky looked so viscal appealing on screen and will look great within the music video. As a group watching back at Emilys footage we were really pleased with what she did and i think it will help add a different element to our music video. It also fit really well with the theme of the song--celebration and friendship. I think this will look great within our music video with the different elements or the live gig performance and the woods filming.
Day 3--This was the biggest day of filming out of the three, so we needed to get the best footage possible to inable us to achieve the standard and music video we want. After looking and showing Emily Thompson our filmng we were really pleased with what we have got, we did try to film everything so we have to choice to decided what we want and what we don't. This give us the oppunity to decide whether or no a shot works at a particular point in the song--if not, we could change it due to amount of footage we have got. This will become very useful for when we come to editing our music video. We all worked well together and discussed what we like and what we didn't--this allowed us to experiement with some shots that we didn't recored on our storyboard, instead ones which we came up with on the shot, which we throught might work and they came out great.
Overall our days of filming went really well we were pleased with our footage that we recorded from the days and everyone in the group contributed well and we are all happy with the progress we have make and hope to make a music video that we can all be proud of.

Roles

Day one--Gig
We all asigned roles we could do so, everyone was busy and to make the most of the event-get as much filming done as possible. So we set up a camera at the back of the gig, where the sound desk was positioned. This was were Emily Thompson was placed with her camera, she was going to recored the whole gig from start to finish. With a wide angled lens which could capture the whole of the gig, she was also going to try and get some close ups of the band. We also set up a camera on a tripod at the front of the stage to the left then moved to the right and we also did some shots from the side on the stage. This was controled by Emily Dougall she was recording all the time, so we didn't miss an oppunitly to capture an good footage that might arise. She moved the camera from the front of the stage to the side to get the close up that we really need. I also worked a long side her in this role, giving my advice on what i thought looked good, many idea i might of had a voiced and we worked together well. My role was using my camera to take stills of the actions, that we could protentially use for the digpak or the advertisements, but due to technical difficultlies, this wasn't doable and the camera was functionaling problerly.

Day two--Thurbly fireworks
As some of the members couldn't attend this shooting day--due to event being late at night and in a location that needed to make travel arrangement for, it became difficult as I live in Stamford and the event was in Thurbly there was no way of me to get there. With Emily Thompson and Emily Dougall having work commitments. Emily Olver was only available to attend the fireworks night so she took on the role of filming the footage that we need. We only want a small amount of footage--the fireworks, bonefire and people dancing around. She was in control of get the footage that we need--setting up the camera, filming and orgnising the scene for filming--especially for the dancing around the fire scene.

Day three--Bourne Woods
Emily Thompson was able to attend this day of shooting as she had other work comittments, this wasn't ideal but we managed without her. My role for the day was camera work, i set up the camera, lining up the different shot and thinking about how best to frame the shot, so we could get the best possible footage. I was pressing record on the camera and helped set up the tripod. With this i was in contract with the other memebers in the group to discuss what they throught looked good for the position of the camera for a shot--this made sure everyone was happy with what i was doing. Causing no dissappointments when we came back to look at our footage, everyone was inform for what we were doing. Emily Dougall sorting out the band within the shot, but telling them were abouts we wanted them to stand and what to do. She also played the song at the particular point we needed, so the band could play along with the song. This made sure that the band we playing at the right speed, making it easiler to editing. We also work in discussion with the camera. Emily Olver taken on the role of taking photos of the shooting--for evidence for our blogger and she also took some photos for our Digpak and for the advertisement, she directed the band on what to do and arrangemented them to take a good photo ready for the premin tasks.

Final Make Up and Costume

Due to discssion with the band, we decided as a group that maybe the face make up would be too much for the music video, so in turn the black cloaks wouldn't be suitable too. The band strongly dissagreed with this idea to continue the theme of the gig through the filming in Bourne Woods for our Ok Go inspired shooting. We came to the conclusion that we need to take ther ideas and feelings in order to create a music video that they and we are happy and proud to present. So we make contract with the boys and asked them what would they feel confident and comfortable in wearing for the filming, then we came up with a group decision they we were both happy with. With our alterturnative genre in mind we wanted them to kind of bring there own sort of style in the fold as they are an actual band, so the clothes had to suit them. We like the idea of a causal vive, nothing too smart or untight, as it wouldnt fit the surroundings of the woods of the meaning/feeling of the song. We thought Jeans, hoodies, trainers and t-shirt would be fine, it was suitable for the environment of wood terain and look visal appealing on camera. This also fitted our music genre of alterturnative. As we did our research, this is the typical clothing that could be featuredin bands like Owl City and Ok Go.

Development of album

These are our rough sketches of our ideas for the digik pack, we want the focus to be on the band, include a photo of them on the cover--to you automatically drawn to the band. We also wanted to create something that almost represented there music it had to be-unique, creative and with a sense of humour. This idea of being creative really enagged us as we are all artists, we started to think how we could use our creative knowledge and skills to make a piece of art for the front cover. We started to look at other artists covers, see the relation between the music and the album art. We were really inspired by the Stone Roses album, that had huge reference to Jackson Pollock with the paint splaters on the canvas, there is a sense of confusion, movement, bold, unique, daring and somewhat expressive. This really enagged with us, as we loved the mood and the theme that was created in this piece of art. We hope to take this inspiration but take a step on from it--use our own knowledge of art and our experience and make something that sums up the band.

From these rough drawings we started to play with paint, experiement with different ways to putting bright colours on paper--through splatering the paint with a paintbrush, with a splacher, putting drops on the paper straight from the paint bottle, then we experiemented with slightly mixing the paint, we used our fingers. We still wanted 
to maintain the colours, so they were vivid and bright, we also used a fork and a splacher--this worked really well. Our final test was to use black paper we originally used white, but found out it looks better on black.

We took a photo of these pieces and put them on the mac and started to experiement with different affects, so they looked brighter and more vivid on screen--this added emphasis on the paint, the we print screened a picture of the band from our music video--(we are going to use the photos we took from the shoot for the album but we didn't have them at the current moment of time) then cropped out 
the back ground, so we just had the individual band memeber with no background. We then combined all the elements of the paint splaters and the photo of the band. We postioned them and added text, we tried this with a white and a black background to get a visal representation of them both, so we could make a decision as a group--looking them both side by side which looked the best.

We then got on Photoshop and edited out the black paper and took some screen shots of the band in our footage that we have taken when we were filming as at the time of planning for the digipak or magazine advert, we didnt have the photo's that were taken on the day of filming in the woods. We then put these together and then used a random font that was on Photoshop, as we hadnt planned that part yet, saying The bands name and the song title. We then experiemented with a white background behind the paint or a pitch black background.

We hope to continue developing and thinking about our final album cover. With building on our orginal ideas, as a group we are happy with the progress we are making. A particular thought that we want to consider is the font of the text we put on the album, on these idea versions we have put just the standard bold Arial font, we did this to experiment with the colour and theme we wanted to create. We hope for the final cover that we could put some affects on the text for example create a shadow to make it look 3D, at a blur effect--so its not so straight cut. We hope to try out these different ideas to see what works and what doesn't.

Inspiration for Album

The Stone Roses is the debut album by English rock band The Stone Roses, released on Silvertone Records in 1989. It cemented the band's reputation among critics, and is still rated by some as one of the most influential albums. W were really enagged with this particular art work cover, is through the different line, colours, patterns and paint it was somewhat simplistic--this really appealed to us as a group to create this in our own style.



This lead us into doing more research into another album covers that inspired is us, we found the band OneRepublic artwork almost a continue on the theme of paint splaters but with a black background and just including the primary colours. This then allowed us to develop our ideas futher to start drawing rough ideas. This particular artwork is bold, daring and powerful, they have decided not to go with a photo of the band instead they have picked a piece of modern art. Another reason why i picked this album is because they are a music band which is similar to our band Dance Grenade in the genre of Alternative. So this link with the similar kind of music really reforced out ideas to create a piece of art for our album cover.

The last album cover I looked at in detail was the Ok Go cover, the reason i picked this was the strong reference our band has with this band--the humor, music and passion were all elements that Dance Grenade like and want represented in there music video and album cover. It is unqiue and wildly funny, with the bright yellow, orange, pink and white flowers as the background with a 3D graphicaly drawn outlined car with the name of the band in the top left hand sid corner. Whether or not it has any reference to the music of them persoanlity it makes a funny twist on a normally serious need. I like the light hearted funny it creates for the audience, it shows that they dont take themselves too seriously and there just having fun which is what we get from the music. So there is a link between the music and the album cover art work, although not automatic there is still one there. I hope as a group we can recreate this theme of representing the music within the album cover.

Final Routine

Taking key reference from OKGO End Love music video as a group we wanted to recreate our own stop motion--similar to the one featured. We studied in detail the music video and worked out we could create the same affect but not actually doing stop motion--taking photos every second. We could film it continously, but once editing we can speed it up or slow it stop, spilt the clip--create the same effect.

 

This taken in consideration we wanted to test the different type of techniques that create the same effect. We did this by various testers before filming in the band, the video 

 is a simple series of images that are edited together when we were testing some moves which we thought would look good in this scene and be doable for the band to complete and perform well.

 

When we finished testing various moves we put a routine together meaning we could direct the band through it on the day. I wanted to see if it might look effective or whether we should decide on another idea, we filmed the the routine which is in the video below we also decided to do it in a similar location so we could get an idea of lighting and idea of what the final outcome might look like and whether it works or not.

Detail on Actors

As we have picked a band that are local, they were passionate about being in the music video and expressing there view on potential idea--this was helpful in creating a good, unique music to fit them. So we decided they should stare in the music video-as its there song and they want to promote themselves, there band to appeal to a wider audience. Although we did have troubles, as the go to a differnt school. There was a breakdown in conmuncation, as we didn't keep regular contract via e-mail so making plan was differicult as all four members needed to be there for shooting day. Partened with our dealines, sorting out a date is important so doing most of the filming will be done in the half term and/or weekends--this should hopefully fit into everyones scheudal of working, school and dealines.

 The band members include; Gavin Jones, Adam Weisz, Loui Parsons, Jamie Cameron.

Planning and testers Routine

This is a video of use coming up with the routine and making sure we were confident to teach the band at a later point. We practiced the routine to make sure it was perfect and make any changes or adjustment if needed to simplfily, so it was teach for the boys to pick up and master. We hope once we have shot the band performing in the woods we could then add our editing technique--to speed or slow some of the elements to make it more exciting. We took inspiration from the Ok Go End Love routine for example the step forward and lugen.

Lighting for final shoot

Day 1--At Mama Lizzies the lighting was out of our control, as it was a reschudeled events that was perfect timing for us to use for our music video. Although it wasn't in our control the lighting has a key part of the gig, as it lit up all the band members, so the audience could see them even if they were standing at the back. The lighting was bright and really highlighted there white faces, that we painted for the theme of halloween, although this wasn't ideal when we filming, as it didn't look as viscally appealing as unpainted faces might have been. This taken into consideration, we came away with good shots. The lighting tended to be bright primary colours, this was a strong viscal link to the potential idea of our album cover--of spashes of bright paint on a canvus with the band members as well. This would link all our different elements together to create a style/look for the whole music video and album--this shows its one group.
Day 2---Fireworks night, we wanted to just use the light from the fireworks and the fire to light up these particular shots. It was a dark, black night that was the perfect backdrop to the bright, vived colours of the fireworks as they exploded into the sky. These were beautiful shots that captured the mood and theme of the song, there wasn't much to consider lighting wides. We also captured shots of the bonfire, with the bright, reds and oranges of the burning wood with produced smoke and electric colours, these shots really lit up the screen as it was rich with depth of colours. The lighting really work so well with the black backdrop--we really hope to include these in our music video.
Day 3--Bourne Woods, these were very depended on the weather on this particular day, as we were outside in the elements whether it was raining or snowing we had to film on this day. As a stroke of luck it was a beautifully sunny day that really showcased the autumn colours of the trees and the leaves making it look bright, vivid and unique on screen. We were very luckly with light of the sun really hit the trees beautifully to create shadows and light. We had to be careful with where we postioned the band members at times as they did become right in front of the sunlight--which didn't look affective as it almost glared into the camera and wasn't comfortable.

Planing Costume/ Make-Up Ideas

We wanted to discuss with the band our ideas for costume inparticular, we wanted them to wear something that they would be comfortable in. Due to the pre-recorded filming we got from gig, they were dressed up in halloween inspired outfits--the lead singer Gavin was in a black cloak with a white painted face, the Guitarest Loui was in a turtel suit, the drummer had a painted face with big dark rings around this eyes and the final band member was also i a black cloak. So the gig was very much a scarey experience, we wanted to link all our intial ideas together with a conmon link with them. So as a group we decided that we wanted to get them in costumes for the second part of our video--to make these two pieces of film link smoothly and affectively. We wanted to paint there faces similar to the way they did for the gig but with more of a professional edge. This is a tester of our experienment with the way we wanted there faces. You can wee we like the idea of the harsh black eye that really gives the sense of death and darkness. Through our research of face painting we mixed a grey from the white and black to create a sharp look. This worked extremly well, and we were very happy with the paint facing experiement and i hope that we can redo this for the band members when we come to film on Sunday..

When we asked the band to wear black clothing they said that this wasnt their vision of how they wanted the music video to look and on the day of filming in the Bourne woods for the OKGO aspect of the production they turned up in normal clothes. This actually worked better as they were showing their individuality as a band and because of the autum colour within the leaves and trees they stood out more than what they would have done if they had been in black clothing and with skeleton face paint on. They stood out more due to them actually looking as though they should be their and the clothes they wore suited the weather and the genre of their music more than what our initial idea was.
Add Video

Day Three

Before we went shooting on the last day of filming we wanted to make sure that we had all the needed equipment, so when we got to our location we didn't forget anything. Or delay the filming, as it was important to shoot straight away for the best lighting and, so people could get to work later on in the day. It was also important for us to film on this day, as we needed to get on with our editing.

Equipment

• Cameras X2--Emily's Sony camera and Cannon 600D
• Drum and Drum sticks--supplyed by Adam
• Costume--trainers, jeans and hoodie X4
• Guartars X3--supplyed by Gavin, Louis and Jamie
• Shooting Script
• Storyboard
• SDs X2
• Ipod with song downloaded
• Printed lyrics
• black tripod
• Wideangled Lens
• Camera case

Location for Narrative filming

Location 3--Bourne Woods Another location we are looking at using is Bourne Woods, we feel that this location will work well in creating some good shots of our Ok Go inspired sequence and live performance shots. The mix of nature, paths and trees and autumn colours would make a visally appealing music video. It is an area that will work well for a variety of shots. It also has a small park which will be useful for filming whereever and whenever we want to. I think this time of year that the weather would be dull and we would have lighting issues, however on the day of filming it was sunny all day, which gave a really nice image of the autumn leaves surrounding the floor in colourful blursts.

Props Needed for Shoot

Filming Schedule

Gig-at Mama Lizs
The gig started at 7pm at Mama Lizs, we got there early to set up our camera to different angles in the room for the best and most affective shots. We discussed as a group what we though might work well and experimented with what we wanted. We had a list of the different shots we wanted to achieve, then adopted with the performance to create more creative and different shots.

Second day-Bourne Wood
We hope to get to bourne woods by 11am on Sunday 11th November, this would mean that we would all have to be there--all of the band members and the production team with all the tech equipement and instruments. We wanted to start prompt as, this is the best time for lighting as the sun is raising, it is just hitting the trees and the camera would pick up upon this. This also means that we could hopefully include all the different shots we want before some people have to go off to work, we had limited time, as we had to get there on time and work quickly.

Third day-Bonfire-Bourne Abby
We just wanted to film the bonfire and the fireworks in this particular day. This meant we had to get there on time, ready for the start of the fireworks as they were first. We want to film everything, so we could then chosse from there what to include and what not too. It started at 7pm on Thursday.

Location for Bonfire

The 2rd part of our music video will be filming at the local primary school called Bourne Abby, where there is a yearly bonfire and fireworks night. We really though this would fit in reallly well with the message of the song--of celebrating friendship and love for one night, they are together and having fun.We were lucky in the timing of needed to shoot as it was just in time with the 5th of November which made it perfect to capture shots of the fireworks and the bonfire. The location is within the grounds of a primary school in a large green field, this is a big open backdrop, perfect for filming. We hope this will work well with our music video, tieing in the different elements of the song to create an exciting and meaningful music video.

Location for Gig

After conversations with the Band we found out that they are performing in a couple of weeks at the Voodoo Lounge at Mama Liz's. The Voodoo Lounge is an underground venue that is full sound proofed and is attached to Mama Liz's. The Voodoo lounge in Stamford is a very small location but allows the bands that perform there to be able to get used to doing a live performance infront of people even if it is just to their friends/family. These images are from the Voodoo Lounge website of previous bands that have perfromed there but it shows the location and the stage set up and the lighting that the venue provide.

http://www.mamaliz.co.uk/ 
http://www.mamaliz.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=49&Itemid=56

The band had an advertisement on the Website saying what other bands are there performing with them and telling people how much it will be for them to enter the venue on the night or in advance. This location can help towards our performance aspect of the production as the band already have the instruments, the venue already has lighting and the stage, all we need to do now is film at the live performance which we did so on the 28th October 2012,



This screen shot shows that the band invited people that they know through the social networking site Facebook. This meant that the band that the band could have people pre pay for their tickets and also publicise the bands gig. Within the description the band suggest about how the band will be dressing up in Fancy Dress Halloween costumes.The band had organised this gig before we decided to use them as our choice of song for our music promo which was lucky as we could then film the band live and then work with them throughout the rest of what we are planning to do for the promo.

Ideas for Filming Locations

 





This are the protentional locations, we were discussing for our music video, these developed from our audience research of the type of representation they thought of when they listened to our song--the continue theme of the countryside, trees, the seasons and the whole influence fropm Ok Go. Lead us into thinking of location that could maybe fit with our idea, of including stop motion of the band members, these woodland/park location would be ideal for this type of idea. We hope to maybe visit these locations and get a better idea of what would work and what wouldn't. I hope we can build on the ideas we already have and continue the conversation with thr band on there ideas.

Mood Board

 This a mood board which is collabrating our ideas drawing inspiration from bands like Ok Go and Owl City. It also features images that really sparked interest and ideas from. For example the idea of the paint splaters, really appealed to use creativity-with the vivid bright colours and the sense of movement and a unique twist. I include images of the band, these are images which they have taken themselves but it shows their unique, humorous side which we will capture within their music video. The other set of images is inspiration for the live performance/firework scene. This shows how we tend to develop and explour our ideas futher to recreate a music video that totally unique and fits with the image of the band but still maintains our influence.

Letter to Dance Grenade

We wanted to write a letter/email to the band keeping them updated with our progress, with the potential ideas we have for the music video and including any dates they would need to attend. This also gave us the chance to listen to there ideas, as it is there band and they need to have a creative influence too, as our goal is to make a music video that both groups are happy and proud of. We hope to recieve a reply soon.

Hey, Guys

We have a few question regarding the planning of the music video, we wanted to discuss our ideas to make sure you were comfortable and happy with what we are thinking. We were really inspired by some music videos in particular-Owl city Carly Rae Jepson-Good time, Ok Go-End Love. We really like the live performance element—in a gig style environment, so the audience watching it gets a real feel of the atmosphere. We thought your event on the 28^th of October would be a perfect time to film a live performance. With regarding this we understand it’s a Halloween themed event, with known what costumes were you thinking of? We were also concerned whether or not we need permission from the venue to film? Do you have any knowledge on this subject?

Our initial idea is to feature some stop motion clips of the band members creating another element to the music video instead of just performance. This idea was inspired by the End Love video by Ok Go. We wanted a party scene around the bonfire, with firework shots and you as the band genuinely having a good time. We plan to film this on bonfire night but we just wanted to make sure that you are free on the 5^th November to do this in the style of the music video done by Owl City Promo.

Thank you letting us use your song, we are very grateful and I hope to continue this communication with you, in order to create a unique and creative music video that we can both we proud of. 

DanceGrenade

It was brilliant to find a local band, with a great song for our music video as this meant we didn;t have to rely on actors, who might needed to be informed on the style, mood and influence we wanted for the video. The band members where in total sink with they wanted, this meant we could come up with something that worked for both groups. This also meant that they could play there instruments to the song, as we didn't have to teach people how to play or ge them to learn the lyrics. As the lead singer of the band Gavin wrote the song, so it would make it easilier to synic the footage to the song.
To be able to go to their live gig at Mama Lizzies, use their equipment and get the experience of working with band, who may perhaps put more work into it than if we were to use friends etc to act as the band members. It was a great oppunitly for both group--the band to get a music video for one of the song which will hopeful advertise there band more--spark interest and maybe allow them to book more gigs and become more popular. For us it was a real insight to what it might be like working with a real band in the industy and the needed compises to achieve something that boith sides can be happy with.

Shot List

Storyboard

This is our first draft of our storyboard, we wanted to get our ideas on paper, ready for the shooting days, so we are prepared and organised with what shots we wanted. This is going to save time and would allow us to not to forget any important shots we might want. It was also important because we had three different elements of the music video, that had to be drawn together in somehow, so drawing this plan really helped us think which parts of the shots would work annd what wouldn't. We will take this storyboard with us to the shoots.

At the bottom of each picture we wrote detail of what shot we are expecting to have whether that be a mid, long or a close-up shot. The board is made up of the main concepts that will be involved in the main music promo such as the Ok Go inspired dance routine, live performance and some footage of a bonfire and fireworks.

Lyrics