Editing Day 5: Finishing Our Video

Our Final Day of Editing focused around tightening up our music video, in order to make it look as professional as we possibly could. We had the basic outine of our video and the structure sorted, so we now began to make various different changes and edits to perfect it, such as making sure all the lip-syncs were in time and the transitions worked effectively from one image to another. This proved to be another particularly valuable day of editing due to the number of imperfections in our film that we realised, such as over prolonged transitions which we specifcically payed attention to editing. To exemplify this, the final three shots of the film can be looked in which we employed cross dissolve transitions over an image of our lead singer in order to provide an eerie effect and remind the audience of the previous content of the video. Upon viewing this we decided to take out a clip of our drummer playing as we believed that it undermned the effect that this technique had and therefore took away from our video. We also decided on our final day of editing that we wanted to add in the sound of wind, in order to add to the surrealist tone of the video- as the wind contrasts the brightness of man of our forest images.

Editing Day Four: Filters and Contrasts

The next stage of editing our video proved to be another important, but time consuming endeavour in terms reaching our creative goals for the music video. We filmed the majority of our music video on the same day, so that we didn't have any continuity issues in terms of 'Alice's' role in the film, e.g. her hair, clothing and skin tone. However this left us with inconsistency in terms of lighting and colouring, therefore we were forced to add filters and edit the contrast on Alice's scenes in particular in order to keep a consistent lighting and tone within our video. We added the 'film noir' filter onto the final scenes of Alice in order to keep in fitting with the earlier shots, as well as using the 'match image' tool in order to continuity between the shots we did earlier in the day and later in the day. We were also forced to adjust the contrast on different images taken during the filming in the graveyard, specifically the shots taken from behind of Alice's parents, which turned out to be considerably darker than the other shots.

Audience Feedback: Number 1

Following a class a viewing of our rough copy of 'Call and Gone,' here is some of the postives and negatives we received from the class which will hopefully help us to make progressive changes in terms of reaching the desired outcome.


Positives:
-Performance Segment Lighting
-Development of Narratives
-Religious Imagery
-Abstract Imagery
-Cinematic Shots
-Convention Breaking




Criticism:
-Lip-Syncing
-Shakiness of Camera
-To little shots
-Longevity of Transitions
-Inconsistency of Light

Editing: Cross Transition

Today we were able to create what we consider to be the stand out moment and piece of imagery in our music video, the cross transition. This is a simple clip in which we transitioned a picture of a Christian cross into a girl dressed in white lying in a crucifix position. This is a pivotal moment in our music video as it meant to transition the narrative from live on earth with Eve's parents into that of purgatory, where Eve wakes up. It was a simple manoeuvre to make on Final Cut Pro, but in order to get a more powerful effect, we prolonged and slowed down the cross transition so that the viewer would focus on the shot and try and force them to come up with their own interpretation of where the narrative is going.

Editing: Day Two

Upon the completion of filming for our music video 'Call and Gone' we now had the opportunity to discover a clearer structure to our music video and get a sense of what shots transitioned well into others and how long different shots had to be. So we spent this period just putting all the footage together so that we could begin properly editing in the next few lessons. We now had the skeleton of the video, we just had to give it some blood and flesh.

Filming Day 3

The penultimate day of our filming took place in the school main hall after school, in which we were successfully able to film the footage of our makeshift band performing 'Call and Gone' along with me lip-syncing the lyrics to the song. Following filming we had numerous conversations about the style in which we wanted to film the individual instruments in and how we wanted the performance to look. We decided to take inspiration from one of our favourite bands Nirvana and their music video 'Come as You Are' and from Radiohead's 'Fake Plastic Trees.' We had also previously discussed the possibility of filming the bands footage in black and white, but we decided to film in colour so that we would have the option in editing.


In took about an hour to set up the stage, mainly due to the time it took to carry the drum kit to the hall, but we were eventually able to film on a stage we intentionally dressed in black in order to keep in tone with the song. Once we had set up, as a band we ran through the song so that we were all comfortable with our own parts and so that we could improve the confidence of our talent before we put the camera in front of them.


This was another successful day of filming, we were able to capture many different wide angle shots of the whole band performing using the wide lens as well as many close up shots of the instruments and myself lip-syncing with the macro lens.

Animatic for 'Call and Gone'

http://youtu.be/MHrW6sfLvq0

Tired Angels: Problem Solving

Today we have been faced with a large problem, that we will be unable to film Tired Angels performance in time for the editing of our music video. This was due to complications with booking the Phoenix Theatre were we intended to film our music video and due to the surprise 3 month absentee of one of Tired Angel's guitarists. We are still going to make a music video for Tired Angels, however we will recast the band in the next few days.

Preparation for Filming

We prepared our band by sending all of the members the song and make sure that they learned the lyrics and structure of the song so that they could stay in time. We also made sure that they would be dressed to a fitting style of the song, telling them to wear alternative, dark clothing similar to that of a band like 'Queens of The Stone Age'. Josh Jameson-Wallis did not have any appropriate clothing so Lara has given him some clothing to borrow.

Casting the Band

 Bass: Pierce will play the Bass. He is a model so he has experience behind the camera and he is also a skilled bass player.














Drums: Will is playing the part of the drummer. He is staying with me the weekend of filming therefore he is available, he also fits the look of a rock drummer.

Recasting the Band

So far we have cast three of the five members of Tired Angels for the filming of our music video on Friday, due to late notice and extra curricular activities we have limited resources however we have cast the roles of Lead Guitarist and Singer, Rhythm Guitar and Keyboards.
The members of our band are going to be:

Lead singer and guitarist: I shall play the part of lead guitarist and singer. This was a pragmatic decision as I already know the lyrics and the guitar for the song, therefore it should help us create a realistic portrayal of the song.

Rhythm Guitarist: Josh Jameson-Wallis, a fellow A2 Media Studies student, will play the part of Rhythm Guitarist. This was due to his availability and his excellent musicianship and stage presence which the group had all previously witnessed.

 Keyboard: Ryan, another A2 Media Studies student, shall play the part of the Keyboardist. We cast him due to his availability and his talent and eagerness on the Keyboards. He will also be extremely helpful to have on set due to his skills as a Cinematographer.

Lip Syncing Practise

Jeremy Music Video Opening

Originally we had discussed opening our video with a similar intro to that of Pearl Jam's music video for 'Jeremy', in which newspaper titles would give some background to the video, explaining that Eve had gone missing and that she was presumed dead, following police investigation. We have decided against this opening as we want to leave the discussion up the viewer, to what Rebecca is doing and whether or not she is alive or dead.

Editing: Day 1

Today we began to edit the footage we have already filmed. We are currently unable to get the proper structure of the video correct as we are yet to film the footage of the bands performance, which we plan to film on Sunday. So for now we basically looked through the footage we had and chose the best of what we had. We also spent time stabilising many of the handheld shots and added filters onto the footage of Rebecca in the forest as their was vast contrast in the lighting between the footage in the forest and when she is exiting the forest.

Three different purposes of Music Videos

Advertise: These videos are not necessarily made in sync with the lyrics in the song but are instead meant to be visually stimulating and iconic for the bands. An example of this would be Nirvana's 'Heart Shaped Box,' where despite some relevant lyrics, the narrative of the video is irrelevant to the song.



Amplify: This is when the music video has direct relevance to the lyrics but the video will be exaggerated in order to amplify the lyrics meanings and get them across in usually a more comical way.

Illustrate: This is simply when the video has direct links to the lyrics of the song and shows the narrative of the song through moving images

Filming Day 2

Our second day of filming took place in Hampstead Cemetery. Here we were filming the scenes in which 'Eve's' parents, played by my father and Lara's mother respectively, accept the death of their daughter and visit her gravestone, where they leave flowers. We briefed the talent on what they would be doing and how they had to dress, in black smart clothing.


We filmed the shots that involved our parents first as my father had a meeting, therefore we only had a limited amount of time to film them. The shots we took of them were successful, involving zoom shots and close ups. After we filmed the talents shots we moved onto to filming panning shots of the graveyard, which will cross dissolve into each other for the opening of our video. We were also able to get numerous different shots of the graveyard that we could play around with in editing. This day was perhaps more successful than our initial day of filming as we learned from our previous mistakes concerning staying in focus.

Production Call Sheet: Day 2

C&G - Day 2 Call Sheet