Production Week 8

Monday - We edited our work to a point where we could show it to the class and get feedback on what we had done so far. After this we began making the final changes to our video so we could reach the highest marks possible to us. It was also a big day for our digipak and poster as we started fresh after negative feedback from our audience.

Tuesday - From the feedback we had been given on the previous day I continued editing our music video while Aaron continued experimenting with Photoshop to create a unique poster and digipak for our band. We also began filming audience feedback to add to our blog and for coursework.

Wednesday - After listening to some of the feedback we had received we brainstormed some ways in which to make our video more interesting for the viewers. We came up with adding typography linking to the lyrics across the music video. We acted on this idea and started creating the wording to later import into the video. We used after effects and live type to create the typography as we wasn't sure which program was best suited to the job.

Thursday - On Thursday we worked as a group trying to finish the poster and digipak however while we finished the majority we still needed to get audience feedback before finishing them. Along with this we also got more feedback about the video we showed on Monday. We plan to later upload this footage to blogger while also considering every remark made.

Friday - On Friday we was back to editing our music video and started importing typography into our final piece then deciding where they should be placed. Luke also updated the blog with feedback from what facebook users had said and also adding more detail to older posts.

Script for question four - :Luke

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Construction

Final cut - We used this program to edit our footage. We was slow at first but soon got to grips with it due to its basic and understandable layout. It was a good program to use as it offers many effects to add to your video's with a wide variety of transitions. Another strength of this program is the different levels of tracks you can add letting you distinguish the diegetic footage sound from the easily dragged in soundtrack. However at times our footage would disappear and we would have to re-import it slowing down our editing process.

Photoshop -We used Photoshop to create our poster and digipak for our band. We imported photo's from the digital camera and then manipulated them to create a unique digipak. This was a time consuming program to use however it was the best option available. While the digipak and poster was the primary use we also used it to crop and edit our pictures of the plankers before exporting and importing the new photo's to Adobe after effects.
. 
After effects -  This was used to add most the effects seen throughout our video including the placing of plankers. It was a difficult program to understand and we had to watch a few tutorials to begin with to get to grips with it from sites such as Videocopilot. However it is a very useful program as it has countless effects. A problem we had was we had to import our video from final cut to after effects and then back across. This was time consuming and lowered the footage quality of our music video.

HD camera - This was a vital piece of kit as we shot all our footage on HD cameras. A strength of this is they gave great detail giving the video a better feel. Another positive was their slender size making it easy to take when carrying over equipment. While a negative we found was the battery life and also a lack of room on the memory card. However the Camera did have photographic capability's meaning we needed less equipment on the shoots. Another positive of the HD cameras was they recorded straight onto a SD card making them tapeless unlike older cameras.

Research
Blogger - Blogger was a very useful site for me across all the elements. I researched previous students A2 media blogs via blogger.com to see what was needed to achieve a high level 4 blog. It also allowed me to upload video's and pictures of my research on music video's and digipaks. Another positive of this site is I could access it any where provided I had a internet connection however a weakness of the site was a times the server would go down and be unavailable for me and Aaron to continue work. The site not only helped orgasation for me and Aaron but also our group collabation as we didn't have to be in the same place while doing work meaning we could be at home but working on the same project this was a very helpful positive.

YouTube - We watched numerous video's of past students work to get an understanding of what a high grade piece of work looks like and what a low grade looks like, this helped as it showed us what to do and not to do when creating a music video. A strength of YouTube While we used it to look at past student works through their channels on Youtube such as Hurtwood house. We also viewed many professional video's to understand different genres and what traits came with them. On top of this we also used the site to find video's which gave us inspiration for our up and coming project.

Internet (Firefox) - Using Firefox as my web browser allowed me to not only access pictures and video's online but every other site i needed to research and create my final project this is a very long list including blogger,youtube,soundcloud etc. While it helped all of this i also researched a number of major and independent labels for our artist which later changed into a band. A problem we found with the internet is sometimes it would become slow or be unavailable for us bringing out research to a hault.

Hotmail - This was our primary way of communicating with our band as we used it to get permission for the track and keep them updated with how our work was going. A down side of using Hotmail was when the internet was down we could not access our emails.

Soundcloud -This was a key site in our research as it gave us access to millions of artists from every possible genre across the world. After changing our original plan we used this site to find us a new band. A big positive about this site is that you could download the songs instantly from the site and also get in contact with the band or artist directly. You could also narrow down your search easily into genres saving us time however we felt it almost had too much music even after this and made it very difficult to pick someone out. We eventurally picked our track by cutting down to a few songs and then took audience feedback and our own ideas into account for what we wanted to create.

Planning

Slideshare.com - We used Slideshare a few times throughout our project, first being our power point presentation pitch about our original ideas. Slideshare has a number of advantages for its users one being that after uploading a presentation to the site you could then upload it into blogger as blogger does not have the capability. Slideshare was a valuable tool as it helped to keep as organised as it allowed us to easily refer back to previous presentations we had done such as our pitch or conventions of the genre when planning our shotlist. While we was able to create and view our own we was also able to view other uploaded files made public by the account holder. This helped with our work as it gave us information and ideas. However a problem with this tool was at times it would not allow us to upload our presentation because of a 'Error' which wasted our time and slowed down our project.

Blogger -  Very useful for updating plans about the video and digipak as could access from any internet connected PC/Laptop. Blogger allowed us to check planning schedules and other vital pieces of information such as our animatic in numerous locations including when on shoots via our smartphones

HD Camera - The HD cameras were very helpful for our group throughout this project. In the planning we used them to take practice shots and test out ideas which we hoped to incorporate into our music video. A strength of the HD cameras was the quality of footage you could shoot on them and also their size as we had to travel a lot with them.

Digital camera - We used digital cameras to take reece shots of potential locations and costumes for our band members. Because of the small size and light weight they was easily portable to locations and shoots. We also took band photo's for our digipak and poster while out on shoots. On top of this we took pictures of people planking which we later edited into our music video. A positive of the digital cameras besides them being portable was the easiness of uploading after coming back from shoots. One problem we faced was the battery life however we soon learned to double check before booking them out.

I Movie - This was a key program in our planning as it allowed us to view our practice footage on a mac while also edit it we also created our animatic in this program after uploading pictures of our storyboard from a digital camera and then cutting to the pace of the music. This was effective as it allowed us to see how our ideas matched the track however sometimes when we went to save work it would have a problem with the server and would have to save on the desktop and drag it across at a later date.
I stop Motion -  A useful program in both planning and construction.After watching video's on Youtube such as Plan B's music video "No Good" we became interested in using Stop motion at some stage in our video we attempted to make a quick scene and then uploaded it to blogger for feedback. This taught us a lot of lessons on how to edit and create a stop motion piece.
Microsoft Work - We used Microsoft word to create our shot list and shoot schedules. It was a useful program as we could place information into easy to read grids and charts making the intake of information more organised. We could also print of the work to take on shoots with us.

Evaluation

Flip camera -This was a useful piece of kit as it allowed us to quickly film feedback from our audience and then upload it straight as the flip camera boasted a built in USB.

Prezi -
Wix -

Youtube - We used this web 2.0 site to upload our finished video so people could easily view it from anywhere and comment on it. We also added annotations to explain decisions about the video for our evaluation. It had easy instructions about uploading then editing the video with annotations however took awhile to actually upload our video.

Blogger - We used blogger to record written feedback given about our digipak, poster and video. While also uploading the video's taken from the flip camera onto the site. We also scriped our evaluation questions on the site however we came across a big program that the site would randomly delete paragraphs after being saved numerous times.

Facebook - We uploaded our video to facebook a web 2.0 site, so we could get feedback on our video and comments on how to improve it. However a negative of this is only my friends on facebook  could view and comment on the post.

Another useful tool used across all the elements of this project was Screenshots/Screengrab as we frequently used the tool to compare music video's and other texts and allowed us to import the shots into blogger and other sites. It was very useful when talking about video's and also in the edit when we wanted to show what we was talking about. We had no problems with the tool and was vital for us completing our work.

Feedback via social networking (Faceback)

These are some printscreens of the feedback we recived for our rough edit via faceback.

To get this feedback Luke shared our music video to quicktype creating a .Mov file which is a much smaller file then the final cut one. However this was still to large so we had to compress the file once again at the cost of quality before we was able to upload the music vid onto Lukes facebook account withtin the first couple days we had a few comments about our rough edit. While we was pleased by our audiences responce we did hope for more accurate feedback at a larger volume however what we did recieve was valuable. Also Aaron shared this footage to our other band member in the video to get his responce and views about what we have done so far and what would improve the piece.

Script for question one evaluation - Luke

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products ?

The genre for our video is Indie Rock, a main stream genre which is growing in popularity. Through the use of Web 2.0 sites such as YouTube. Throughout the video will conform and also subvert conventions of this genre creating a unique video. Some conventions of Indie rock are

Casual clothes – Jeans, polo shirts

Band performing

Guitars and drum kit

Low key lighting

Shadows

Standing still/little movement on feet

Use: One key convention of the genre is a  band performing. We use this convention in our work, the band are denoted throughout the video at numerous points playing instruments and singing. You can denote this through the high angle mid shot on the band. We were inspired by the Arctic monkeys- I Bet you look good on the dance floor an performance based video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK7egZaT3hs&ob=av2e . While we decided to have a hybrid video of performance and narrative using parrael editing this arctic monkeys music video played a vital role in what we did shoot.

Use: A key convention through Indie Rock and the other sub genres of rock is the limited costume changes during a music video. We used this trait after numerous research into the genre and being inspired by Arctic Monkeys and their videos, a good example is their music video 'Teddy Picker' As the band don't change costume at all during the video. We decicded to also incorporate this into our music video. We also found that another convention was to have plain casual clothing symbolizing that they are down to earth people unlike their pop rivals. This is why we have our whole band wear white T-shirts throughout the music video with plain trousers connoting their like anybody else, this links them to their audience.

Use: Convention of star persona. The lead singer is evident through the composition of the shots being normally kept between the power points (rule of thirds), connoting the importance of the band member. A common trait in the indie rock genre. We was inspired by the Arctic Monkeys video Teddy Picker http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A2XBoxtcUA&feature=relmfu
. While the costume blended into the rest of the band connoting the unity between them the lead singer stood out through the use of close ups on his face.

Use:A Convention of all genres we followed was editing our music video to the tempo of the music. This is can be denoted across the whole industry including our work. The reason for choosing this is because it helps the video flow which causes the audience to stay focused on the video.

Use: Convention of having instruments shown throughout the music video, in this case a guitar and drum set. While doing research we was inspired by a number of bands as we saw this convention used across all the bands performing during their video's. One video that caught our attention with this was Bloc party - Banquet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdkmhquF60o . This conforms to the convention of indie rock videos having band members playing their instruments in a performance video. This is because they want to show they have talent and create their own sound unlike their mainstream rival pop artists however over the years Indie Rock has crossed into the mainstream market but this convention remains reinforcing the differences between them.

Use: Another convention we followed was having an all male band.This is a common trait within Indie Rock as we struggled to find a mix gender or full female band during our research phase. However through numerous hours of work we did find some including Blood Red Shoes - Its getting boring by the sea -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ap2oXTQBSfk&feature=relmfu. On top of this our track was sang by a male lead singer so we could not replace them with a female and felt the other two roles ( Drummer and guitarist) was not suited to a female because of stereotypes and what we wanted to potray.

Challenged: While their is black band members in Indie Rock it is much more conventional for them to an all caucasian band. We was unable to find an entirely black band where they was not the minority and used this to subvert the convention. We was inspired by the band Noiseaux as they have a black lead singer the only example of this we could find http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwpZ9AlSoDM . We chose to subvert this stereotype as we wanted to create a wider audience for the band and felt because they was a urban band, a multicultural band would connect them with their whole audience more.

Challenged: The use of titles used throughout our music video subvert stereotypes of the Indie rock genre and have been linked to Pop. These titles were added to give the video  watch-ability and help keep the audiences focus during the video. The chosen typography has been likened to the pop genre which shares similar traits to our track of energy and joy these are the reasons we chose to use a bright and bold font.

Challenged: The use of locations during our music vidoe subvert stereotypes of the Indie rock genre. Common locations include studio's and on stages at concerts with low key lighting, a video which highlights this is Arctic Monkeys - Fake tales of San francisco - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6c0LwdCf9X0&feature=relmfu . While these are common locations for a traditional video we went agaisnt this and decided to use a number of outside locations with high key lighting after being inspired by another Arctic Monkeys video Fluorescent adolescent - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ma9I9VBKPiw&ob=av2e . The use of lighting and location makes us stand out from other Indie Rock bands and gives our video a unique feel.

Develop: Indie Rock is acknowledged for often having a humerus narrative as the bands are viewed as laid back, friendly individuals. When doing research into indie rock we was inspired by Radio head's track 'Just' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_qMagfZtv8 . We then developed upon this idea by using Plankers in our video a current global trend to help create a humerus narrative with repeatability for the audience. This is also a example of intertexuality within our music video as we create a parady challenging established ideas.

Develop: The use of the guitar during our music video...

Cropped Photos of the Plankers

These are the cropped photo's of our plankers after we have imported them into Photoshop and edited them.

This is a screen shot of one of the photo's being cropped so we can later import it into our music video. On the picture on the left you can see how the photo was cropped as the lasso tool is in use partly around the person we want to crop while on the right you can see the finished task. This was time well spent as we avoided keeping the background in which would ruin the effect we wanted to create.

Track list names

To come up with our track list names we brainstormed about Indie Rock and what it links to. This was a long process but we think was worth while as we came up with tracks related to our band and genre. Another way we got inspiration for track names was by looking at signed bands such as Arctic Monkeys and Bloc Party on Youtube however this was less productive than the brainstorm as we noticed the names would often be random and unrelated.

1. Intro
2. Its All Mine
3. Anything's Better
4. Lights on Lights off
5. Right at your Door 
6. Snakes and Apples 
7. Interlude 
8. Beyond These Walls
9. Road Trip
10. Another World
11.  Free fall
12.  Dead End
13. Outro

Adobe after effects and Photoshop

This is a screenshot of Photoshop of Aaron editing an earlier photo of Luke planking to import into our music video to get this image Aaron had to cut the original clip as it was from our footage shot at Ashburton park and then import it into Photoshop while he cropped it and removed the background after this to create the illussion of more people he changed the colours by editing the...

This is a screenshot of After Effects where the plankers have been imported to create the idea of a mass planking event but the plankers will also be used across the music video. Luke imported the cropped photo's before Aaron placed them into our project creating this look.
This is two screen shots of Photoshop where we crop the original photo and then import it into Adobe After Effects (Bottom picture) and edit it more so we can place it into our project.

STEP BY STEP DIGIPAK

This is a screenshot of our Poster being made in mid production. Aaron created this poster within Photoshop after dragging into different elements to make it such as the band members pictures.

He began with a black canvas before adding the band pictures we had taken on a earlier date while out shooting the music video. After this he then cropped each person individually to avoid keeping the original backdrop in the photo's. Next he used a graphic tablet to hand draw the bands name across the top this was a long process as we couldn't decide on a colour shceme and he had to re-draw each time we had a new idea of changed our mind. We opted for him to draw the title himself instead of using an earlier researched font as we felt it gave a more personal independent feel as we was creating this for an indie rock band.

These are some pictures from our original Digipak however due to audience feedback we have decided to start again as many of the comments we received from the audience feedback said they don't think it suits our genre and presents the band as being Pop and targeted at young kids.

Photo's of plankers

These are some of the pictures we plan to edit and put into our final project to create a field of plankers.

The way we will edit them is by importing them into Photoshop where we will use the lasso tool to crop them away from everything else allowing us to export from Photoshop and then import into After Effects. The reason we have chosen the Lasso tool to use is because it allows you to be dynamic and crop around the whole person instead of missing parts like you would get with a straight line cropping tool. This will take sometime as we want to only  get the person and none of the background as this would lower the quality of our music video and make it more obvious that they have been imported there.

Before and After (Re-Shoots Phone shot)

 This is the original and re-shoot of the alarm shot. We decided to re-shoot this small shot as the first one was poor quality and was very shaky. Its not a very long shot but is easily corrected and will bring up project.

Before and After (Re-Shoots)

This is our original final shot and new final shot. After feedback we decided to change the ending of our piece as people didn't like our original idea, Now we have our running man join a bunch of plankers which you cannot see in this shot but will be added during the edit.

Production Week 7

Over the weekend we went back to the house where we have been filming and re-shot some scenes  to improve the quality of our project

On Monday we continued the re-shoots we started over the weekend including the ending of our piece while also including a new scene we shot using stop motion after this we uploaded the footage and started editing what we had done at the same time of updating our blog with today's activity's.

On Tuesday we continued editing our project and tried to import our stop motion video however this was not working and we ended up not completing this task.

On Wednesday however we continued editing our project and managed to finally import our stop motion scene we are very pleased with this as it adds another dimension to our piece.

On Thursday we have been adding additions to our final piece by using adobe after effects and have began remaking our Digipak due to audience feedback. We plan to have a complete overhaul of the Digipak and start from scratch using some of the comments by our audience. 

On Friday

Stop Motion

After reviewing our video so far we felt it was missing something and could do with more elements contributing to the project making it more watchable. From remembering back to one of our earlier side projects of using stop motion animation and how it was received by audience we decided to add a small clip into our music video to break up the running and band scenes. We did this by getting two pairs of trainers and took pictures of them a number of times after each slight movement. We had to focus while shooting this as one mistake could mean ruining the whole sequence. After taking all the photo's Luke uploaded them to the Mac where they was imported into the programme Istop motion and edited to create a short sequence after we had finished creating this we exported the file so it could be dragged into final cut and be edited into our music video.

Audience feedback on Rough edit

Production week 6

On Monday due to unknown technical problems we could not access our work however instead of wasting the time by doing nothing we updated the blog slightly and went over footage we had on the camera discussing ideas about what we want the final piece to look like. We also managed to download the alarm clock sound we plan to incorporate into our video.

On Tuesday the technical problem had been patched and we could continue editing our piece. This meant importing the Alarm Clock sound we had recently downloaded for this project.

On Wednesday after some trouble i was finally able to upload our rough edit and will soon add some writing to it in the days to come i also uploaded the video onto facebook so we could get some a wider range of feedback and hopefully create a better final piece. We also continued with the edit and believe we should be able to finish the basic edit soon and then move on to the more technical side of using after effects etc.

On Thursday we continued with the edit and started to look at how to use after effects in our work.

On Friday we focused on editing and started to plan out what needed filming over the weekend and also on Monday to help improve our work

Rough Edit of Music Video

This is a Rough edit of our A2 Music video project.

This is what we have produced so far however we already acknowledge that we need to make numerous changes to improve the work and intend to do so in time.
One of the main changes we need to do is go on re-shoots for a number of different reasons. One of these reasons is because we believe that the band footage is limited and that it could look better this has also been brought to our attention via feedback. Because of this we have actually changed the costume for our band scene and intend to shoot it with the whole band wearing white T-shirts where in the edit we will add colour to them as an extra to the performance.

Production Week 5

During the festive break we had hoped to finish the re-shoots needed and add shots suggested by audience feedback received about our rough edit piece. However due to our actors schedules over this period we was unable to do this and had to wait for a time when we was all available.  Instead of doing nothing we decided to plan everything which needed to be done and also shot a few scenes where no one was needed EG. When the phone alarm goes off.

On Tuesday we continued the editing process and started making the recommended changes suggested to us by the viewers of our rough edit. We also went over the shooting schedules for tomorrow and made sure we had the necessary equipment to film the shots we needed and wanted.

Once Wednesday came we didn't have to waste anytime trying to organise what was needed and could get straight into filming. This proved to be essential as filming was cut short by an unforeseen event however this wasn't a problem for our group as we was able to finish everything with time to spare. This lead to us being creative and filming some shots we thought could add to the value of our work however we will need to review them. We also took new photo's for our digipak and poster

On Thursday we returned the used equipment and began editing what we had filmed on wednesday. After viewing the new footage we had shot we was impressed with what we saw and continued editing. After editing the majority of the new footage trying to make it fit with what we had already done, we had a flick through the new photo's we would use to create our groups digipak and liked what we saw.

On Friday we returned eager to continue where we had finished editing the new footage yesterday. While also editing on friday, Luke uploaded the new band photo's writing a small paragraph under them explaining our views and ideas on them.

Soundeffect for Alarm

While editing our original footage of the bed scene we opted to add some non-diegetic sound an replace the real alarm sound for a more generic sound which our audience could connect to more.
After a lot of searching numerous sites we decided to use the alarm clock sound from Youtube titled Alarm-Clock Sound!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNpXCzaWW1s&feature=related

New Band Shots

 

After reviewing our earlier photo's and footage from the music video, we decided and was also advised to re-shoot the band scene and take some new photo's for our digipak. When comparing our new and old photo's we thought they offered two different styles. We will get some outside audience feedback before selecting the final photo's for the official digipak.

With the new photo's we plan to edit them and add some colour to the bands t-shirt's as that was the reasoning behind all wearing white T's.