Thursday, 31 March 2011
account of editing week 4
Now that I have finished cutting the shots together, we are beginning to add the after-effects. Because we shot the band onto green screen we are going to use the technique of chroma-keying in order input in the wallpaper and the floor. This is done by first masking out the band members, and making the green “invisible”. This keying was done using the software “key light” which is part of after-effects. I then changed the saturation of this layer in order to make the band appear as if they are in black and white. Then I added in the floor and wallpaper to the shot as a different layer, the wallpaper was found by searching on an online home-wear store and then copying a screen shot of some wallpapers and then seeing which one worked best. The wallpaper screen shot was then made into a tile format in order for it to look more realistic. The floor tiles where found and made in the same way, expect this time when they where keyed into the shot they had to put at a specific angle in order to make sure that it looked like the band was standing on them. To also make the room look more realistic I added an omnilight to the middle of the shot in order to light the wallpaper and flooring layer. The next step was to add the layer of coloured rain in front of the shot. The rain was shot at night so the background is black with the rain being lit by coloured gel’s over lighting. To make the colours better and brighter I changed the hue. In order to place the rain over the shot I used the blending tool linier doge so that the black would become transparent. This sequence had to be repeated for every shot. The effect when wanted to use was to have colours start coming back into the shot at the end promo, this meant having to another two layers. I got the rain water splatter effect from the animation library called “riot gear”. I then placed this over the shot and used a blending tool to make the white in the middle of the splatter transparent showing the band in colour underneath, I then used another blending tool in order to make the black around the splatter transparent this time however revealing the black and grey layer.
account of editing week 3
Now I am cutting in-between the shots in order to create an interesting visual experience for the audience. This is done by using a mixture of concept and performance shots. As “Now is everyone” is a new relatively unknown band, we have made sure to use a large number of performance shots. This is because we want the audience to begin to recognise the members and what their role is in the band. I put extreme close up shots of them playing the instruments next to either a mid-shot or close-up of the This week I am tightening up the shots, making the cuts tighter and quicker and add in some extra shots in order to make it visually more interesting. On one of the days we where editing we logged into final cut pro only to find that the music and the video had all un-sycned its self. This took a while to sort of it meant marking and remarking the music and the shots again so that we could make sure they were all perfectly re-synced.
account of editing week 2
The next step we are doing is to sync up long performance shots so that we could intercut between these to get a rough idea. This was done by listing to the shot and placing a marker on a specific bit, we when put another marker on the music on the time line at the same part of the song, we then dragged the shot onto the time line and levelled up the markers. I also then have to remove the sound element of the shot so that it does not affect the sound quality of the promo. This is simply done by separating the video from the sound and then deleting the sound bar. I did this with 5 of the clips that went from the beginning of the song to the end. The next thing I’m doing now is placing markers on the song at specific beats in the tune; this is so that when we cut it has an ecstatically pleasing rhythm and cutting pace.
account of editing week 1
We are using the program final cut pro in order to edit our prop promo. I used this programme before in the editing of my thriller title sequence. We filmed the promo on Mpeg 2 NX5 Cameras which have a hard disk so that every time that I paused the camera it would save as a different shot, this also meant that the raw film uploaded much faster onto the computer then with our thriller title sequence. This is because we filmed onto celluloid film for the thriller, which downloads in “real time” so that if we took 10 hours worth of film it would take down hours to upload to the computer this is not the case when using a hard disk. Once all the film had been uploaded I have set about sorting the shots into bins so that it would be easier to find the right shots we wanted later on. Some of the bin titles included: Head shots, wide shots of performance, puddle shots, concept shots...etc. The next thing we did we did was to place the sound track onto the time line. We are having a slight problem with it as the version of the song we had was not compatible with final cut pro, so we are going to take the track and convert it to a WAP file in order for it to work.
Task 4 How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
My group and I are going to describe the technical aspects of our pop promo and digi pack, focusing on the 3 production stages; pre-production, construction and post-production. We will go into detail in each stage explaining the different elements that we used and why.
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Pre-production
We saw clips of ‘Now is Everyone’ on their Myspace page and decided to contact them through Facebook. We then schedulable a meeting with the band to discuss ideas for the promo. I know people are really negative about myspace these days, but what an absolute gold mine of visual stimuli it turned out to be! When researching initial ideas for the promo, we searched the internet, using sites like YouTube. We listened to the song repeatedly and wrote down the images and ideas that came to mind. The coloured rain came from an idea to have some of the elements in colour and some in black and white because we thought this was a way of introducing their star quality metaphor, which is “from the gutter to the stars”. Various different types of puddles and rain effects were mocked up on Photoshop, as part of our preliminary planning. They were eventually filtered out due to the lack of time and technological ability. The creative anamtic enabled us to have an idea of how long each shot would need to be and where we would cut it.
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Construction
During the shoot day we took digital stills with a SLR camera. We used them in the construction of the digi pack. It consists of a front and back cover and two inlays. The inlays are made up of a montage of stills from the shoot day, the promo and their private life, giving the audience a voyeuristic view of the band. This reinforces their organic nature. For the front cover we made the title bold to draw the audience in and scaled the band members larger than life to emphasise their importance. The colour reflects both the mood of the song and band, tying it altogether. The poster creates certain enigma codes. The most obvious being the positioning of the lead singer. He is positioned in the background but is the only one giving direct address, just like in the promo, showing he is present but out of reach which relates to Richard Dyer’s theory of star image and reinforces that they are, as a band, different to the audience. When shooting the band in the studio we painted the walls green in order to use the technique of chromo-keying. To make sure it was as effective as possible we used specific lighting in order to eliminate shadows but also to light the band.
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Post-production
We used an Mpeg 2 SD NXCAM which has a hard disk, to shoot the promo, this made editing easier because each take is captured on a separate file. Editing time was reduced, bins easier to manage and extended footage easier to handle. We were able to edit the footage to an effective cutting rhythm for the promo, by listening to the audio we used markers to mark the significant beats to make the cuts clean and sharp. The wide of the band was shot using a green screen and the wall paper and floor were pictures from google images. When editing we placed an omni light into the composition in order to make the room look more realistic. We then keyed in the band by using key light to eliminate the green so the wall paper and floor were visible. The rain was a separate layer, which was filmed on black. In order to place the rain over the footage we used the blending tool ‘liner dodge’, which makes the black go invisible. This then left the coloured rain. For the splat effects we repeated the same process, however we had to construct a separate composition which used an animated splat effect from ‘riot gear’. We used another blending mode, darken, which turned the white see through, then placed this composition into the original and proceeded to edit it in the same way and do another set of keying to remove the black around the splats.
Finally we used the internet to promote the video and gain audience feedback by uploading the video to youtube and using a site called ‘surveymonkey’. By using this particular site it allowed us to create a questionnaire, which we then got people who had seen the video to fill out, giving us our audience feedback. And that concludes our pop promo commentary.
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Pre-production
We saw clips of ‘Now is Everyone’ on their Myspace page and decided to contact them through Facebook. We then schedulable a meeting with the band to discuss ideas for the promo. I know people are really negative about myspace these days, but what an absolute gold mine of visual stimuli it turned out to be! When researching initial ideas for the promo, we searched the internet, using sites like YouTube. We listened to the song repeatedly and wrote down the images and ideas that came to mind. The coloured rain came from an idea to have some of the elements in colour and some in black and white because we thought this was a way of introducing their star quality metaphor, which is “from the gutter to the stars”. Various different types of puddles and rain effects were mocked up on Photoshop, as part of our preliminary planning. They were eventually filtered out due to the lack of time and technological ability. The creative anamtic enabled us to have an idea of how long each shot would need to be and where we would cut it.
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Construction
During the shoot day we took digital stills with a SLR camera. We used them in the construction of the digi pack. It consists of a front and back cover and two inlays. The inlays are made up of a montage of stills from the shoot day, the promo and their private life, giving the audience a voyeuristic view of the band. This reinforces their organic nature. For the front cover we made the title bold to draw the audience in and scaled the band members larger than life to emphasise their importance. The colour reflects both the mood of the song and band, tying it altogether. The poster creates certain enigma codes. The most obvious being the positioning of the lead singer. He is positioned in the background but is the only one giving direct address, just like in the promo, showing he is present but out of reach which relates to Richard Dyer’s theory of star image and reinforces that they are, as a band, different to the audience. When shooting the band in the studio we painted the walls green in order to use the technique of chromo-keying. To make sure it was as effective as possible we used specific lighting in order to eliminate shadows but also to light the band.
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Post-production
We used an Mpeg 2 SD NXCAM which has a hard disk, to shoot the promo, this made editing easier because each take is captured on a separate file. Editing time was reduced, bins easier to manage and extended footage easier to handle. We were able to edit the footage to an effective cutting rhythm for the promo, by listening to the audio we used markers to mark the significant beats to make the cuts clean and sharp. The wide of the band was shot using a green screen and the wall paper and floor were pictures from google images. When editing we placed an omni light into the composition in order to make the room look more realistic. We then keyed in the band by using key light to eliminate the green so the wall paper and floor were visible. The rain was a separate layer, which was filmed on black. In order to place the rain over the footage we used the blending tool ‘liner dodge’, which makes the black go invisible. This then left the coloured rain. For the splat effects we repeated the same process, however we had to construct a separate composition which used an animated splat effect from ‘riot gear’. We used another blending mode, darken, which turned the white see through, then placed this composition into the original and proceeded to edit it in the same way and do another set of keying to remove the black around the splats.
Finally we used the internet to promote the video and gain audience feedback by uploading the video to youtube and using a site called ‘surveymonkey’. By using this particular site it allowed us to create a questionnaire, which we then got people who had seen the video to fill out, giving us our audience feedback. And that concludes our pop promo commentary.
Monday, 28 March 2011
Task 3 What have you learned from your audience feedback?
I wanted to have some audience feedback on our Music video and the star image, so we created a questionnaire using the website "survey monkey", this was then posted with the video on the networking sites facebook and myspace, as these would be be network sites which the target audience would use. We also created a focus group that watched our video then answered the questions on the survey.
Audience expections-Part 1:
b) There hair
d) The locations
e) All the above
6.From this picture who do you think is the lead singer and why?
Reactions from target audience- Part 2:
5. Can you identify yourself with either the lyrics or the band?
6. Anything else you want to add
After we had gathered all the information which we got from the surveys it shows that according to theorist Stuart Hall we had a preferred reading. This means that we successfully portrayed the star image of the band to correct target audience. This was shown in the first section of the questionnaire by a majority of people answered that they where either already into the Indie rock, in a band themselves and then correctly answered what type of genre “Now is everyone” is from. The majority of people also answered that Elliot was the lead singer, because he was standing in the front, middle of the group and wearing a brighter coloured top. Most females anwserd that they would like to be in a relationship or in the social group, where as the males anserd they would like to be in the band.
All the females who answered the questionnaire said that they found the lead singer attractive. This is important for the record label to know as it shows that the girls will be likely to become fans of the band because of Elliot’s looks. The majority answered that they thought the band was talented. This shows that they have respect for the bands ability and reinforces the fact that they are a talented young organic band which is one of the major selling points. All answered that they would download “Now is everyone’s” music and a majority said that they would pay to see the band live. This shows that band to become as profitable as possible would need to make most of there money touring, over people legally buying the album. Most people also said that the song and video made them feel reflective and empowered. The most common reason given for this was that they felt like the band was speaking for them and that the images coming from black and white to colour made them feel better about life as a teen or young adult. The video also managed to hold the target audience’s attention throughout, this shows that they found it both interesting and entertaining. These are two important things to note as if the audience find it interesting they are likely to show it to friends and re post the video on sites like face-book. The more the video gets published though new media means the more recognised the band will become within the target audience and to a wider audience.
Many of the males who answered the question said that they also found the band inspirational, as they where almost the same age as them but had been able to manage so much (have a following, perform at a music festival, have a music video and many professionally recorded songs), most of these also anwserd earlyer on in the questionare that they where themselves in a band. Being inspirational and succeeded against the odds if also one of the major selling points of this band.
The reason that we this questionnaire was so important was that we needed to make sure that the decisions we made in the construction and planning of the band where correct. It would also allow us to check that that we have read our target audience correctly and that they are the ones, who will most likely buy into, understand and most enjoy the band’s star image and their music.
Below is the questionnaire: Audience expections-Part 1:
- What kind of music do you like?
- Do you play in a band?
- Do you want to be in a band?
- Looking at this product what type of music do you expect this to be?
- What things in this picture helped you make your choice?
b) There hair
d) The locations
e) All the above
6.From this picture who do you think is the lead singer and why?
Reactions from target audience- Part 2:
- Do you find the lead singer attractive?
- Do you think they are musically talented for there age?
- Would you download there music?
- Would you pay to see this band live?
- What type of relationship would you like to have with the band?
a) a relationship
b) part of their social group
c) Part of the band
d) Not botherd
- Do you find the video entertaining?
- Did the video hold your attention throughout?
- Did you feel any emotions during watching this video?
- If yes which ones and why? (write answer in space below)
5. Can you identify yourself with either the lyrics or the band?
6. Anything else you want to add
After we had gathered all the information which we got from the surveys it shows that according to theorist Stuart Hall we had a preferred reading. This means that we successfully portrayed the star image of the band to correct target audience. This was shown in the first section of the questionnaire by a majority of people answered that they where either already into the Indie rock, in a band themselves and then correctly answered what type of genre “Now is everyone” is from. The majority of people also answered that Elliot was the lead singer, because he was standing in the front, middle of the group and wearing a brighter coloured top. Most females anwserd that they would like to be in a relationship or in the social group, where as the males anserd they would like to be in the band.
All the females who answered the questionnaire said that they found the lead singer attractive. This is important for the record label to know as it shows that the girls will be likely to become fans of the band because of Elliot’s looks. The majority answered that they thought the band was talented. This shows that they have respect for the bands ability and reinforces the fact that they are a talented young organic band which is one of the major selling points. All answered that they would download “Now is everyone’s” music and a majority said that they would pay to see the band live. This shows that band to become as profitable as possible would need to make most of there money touring, over people legally buying the album. Most people also said that the song and video made them feel reflective and empowered. The most common reason given for this was that they felt like the band was speaking for them and that the images coming from black and white to colour made them feel better about life as a teen or young adult. The video also managed to hold the target audience’s attention throughout, this shows that they found it both interesting and entertaining. These are two important things to note as if the audience find it interesting they are likely to show it to friends and re post the video on sites like face-book. The more the video gets published though new media means the more recognised the band will become within the target audience and to a wider audience.
Many of the males who answered the question said that they also found the band inspirational, as they where almost the same age as them but had been able to manage so much (have a following, perform at a music festival, have a music video and many professionally recorded songs), most of these also anwserd earlyer on in the questionare that they where themselves in a band. Being inspirational and succeeded against the odds if also one of the major selling points of this band.
Task 2 How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
The theorist Richard Dyer says a star is an image not a real person that is constructed out of a range of materials. The raw materials which I have used to build my Band “Now is everyone” include a pop promo, a digi pack and a poster.
Organic- One of the main points that make now is everyone so appealing is the fact that they are a “real” organic band. They put themselves together when they met in school and not by a record company. They write about things that are real to them and do not have someone writing there lyrics for them. To make them look organic in the promo we have them walking around the area which they are from, which was made famous by other organic bands such as The Smiths in Manchester and the Arctic Monkeys in Sheffield. In the digi pack to show there organic nature in the inlays we have used a montage of images from both the shoot day and there private life. This was to show that although they are a band they are real people to. This gives the audience a voyeuristic feeling as they can look into the lives of the band and feel as if they know the band better, but there is still separation as they know the band knows nothing about them. In the poster there is no gloss, it’s very honest and down to earth. The band has been shot in an alleyway which is somewhat like a gutter which was to reinforce there saying that they will go from the gutter to the stars.
Craftsman- One of the major strong points of “Now is everyone” is that they are all talented artists in there own right. I have tried to emphasize this by using lots of close up shots of the band playing their instruments, which are clearly worn and slightly battered and not brand new. This is to show that they have been grafting on these instruments and these are the instruments that have toured with them. This is also shown in the digi pack as in the montage of pictures there are images of them playing there instruments at gigs, parties’ and in the studio.
Youthful- This band although young they have already managed to reach a level of stardom. This has enabled them to be very inspirational to many other young upcoming Indie rock bands. We have shown that they are youthful throughout the products by the way they are styled, with there hair and clothing strongly representing the young Indie rock genre. This enables there target audience (who are likely dressed very similarly to them) to feel more connect to the band as they feel they are the same as them.
Sexual magnetism- The members of “Now is everyone” are quite appealing to there target audience, this will be another reason why girls will become fans of the band. To make the most of this in the promo we have made the band (bar the lead singer) seem quite distant form the audience as there is nothing people want more then what they can’t have. This was done by them not making eye contact with the camera for long periods of time and also when they walk up to the camera it jump cuts before they get really close. In the poster we have the band all leaning up against the wall in an almost rebellious manner, according to Richard Dyer’s star image theory rebellion is one of the things which create a “star”.
Success against the odds- “Now is everyone” is a band in one of the most competitive genres of music for young artists. They have been able to get a name for themselves, won many music competitions and have even performed at a music festival. To portray the fact that they are succeeding against the odds in the promo we used the special effect of having the band in black and white and then having them come into colour. In the digi pack we have a mix of pictures of them performing and them just hanging out. This shows that they are just a teenage rock group and that although they are “normal” teens, they are succeeded against the odds.
The theorist Richard Dyer says a star is an image not a real person that is constructed out of a range of materials. The raw materials which I have used to build my Band “Now is everyone” include a pop promo, a digi pack and a poster.
Organic- One of the main points that make now is everyone so appealing is the fact that they are a “real” organic band. They put themselves together when they met in school and not by a record company. They write about things that are real to them and do not have someone writing there lyrics for them. To make them look organic in the promo we have them walking around the area which they are from, which was made famous by other organic bands such as The Smiths in Manchester and the Arctic Monkeys in Sheffield. In the digi pack to show there organic nature in the inlays we have used a montage of images from both the shoot day and there private life. This was to show that although they are a band they are real people to. This gives the audience a voyeuristic feeling as they can look into the lives of the band and feel as if they know the band better, but there is still separation as they know the band knows nothing about them. In the poster there is no gloss, it’s very honest and down to earth. The band has been shot in an alleyway which is somewhat like a gutter which was to reinforce there saying that they will go from the gutter to the stars.
Craftsman- One of the major strong points of “Now is everyone” is that they are all talented artists in there own right. I have tried to emphasize this by using lots of close up shots of the band playing their instruments, which are clearly worn and slightly battered and not brand new. This is to show that they have been grafting on these instruments and these are the instruments that have toured with them. This is also shown in the digi pack as in the montage of pictures there are images of them playing there instruments at gigs, parties’ and in the studio.
Youthful- This band although young they have already managed to reach a level of stardom. This has enabled them to be very inspirational to many other young upcoming Indie rock bands. We have shown that they are youthful throughout the products by the way they are styled, with there hair and clothing strongly representing the young Indie rock genre. This enables there target audience (who are likely dressed very similarly to them) to feel more connect to the band as they feel they are the same as them.
Sexual magnetism- The members of “Now is everyone” are quite appealing to there target audience, this will be another reason why girls will become fans of the band. To make the most of this in the promo we have made the band (bar the lead singer) seem quite distant form the audience as there is nothing people want more then what they can’t have. This was done by them not making eye contact with the camera for long periods of time and also when they walk up to the camera it jump cuts before they get really close. In the poster we have the band all leaning up against the wall in an almost rebellious manner, according to Richard Dyer’s star image theory rebellion is one of the things which create a “star”.
Success against the odds- “Now is everyone” is a band in one of the most competitive genres of music for young artists. They have been able to get a name for themselves, won many music competitions and have even performed at a music festival. To portray the fact that they are succeeding against the odds in the promo we used the special effect of having the band in black and white and then having them come into colour. In the digi pack we have a mix of pictures of them performing and them just hanging out. This shows that they are just a teenage rock group and that although they are “normal” teens, they are succeeded against the odds.
Task 1 In what ways do your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The genre from which our band is from in “indie rock”, our style of music video generally fits in with the conventions set within that genre.
The begging of our video is very much like the start of the music video for the ‘Kooks’ song ‘Naïve’. In which we see the lead singer walking towards us, this introduces us to the lead singer. Seeing the area they are in, but deigning the audience to as yet form a “relationship” with them as they keep there heads down or eyes away from the camera and are either far away or in the dark. This is followed with continuity shots of the lead singer coming closer to us before it is cut away to the performance shots with the band.
Another vital part of any music video is using direct address. This means having moments when the singer or band members look directly into the camera henceforth making it look like they are directly looking at the audience member. This enables the audience member to feel as if they have had a “special” moment with the artist and feel as if they have some sort of special bond with them. This is used every genre of music video.
The begging of our video is very much like the start of the music video for the ‘Kooks’ song ‘Naïve’. In which we see the lead singer walking towards us, this introduces us to the lead singer. Seeing the area they are in, but deigning the audience to as yet form a “relationship” with them as they keep there heads down or eyes away from the camera and are either far away or in the dark. This is followed with continuity shots of the lead singer coming closer to us before it is cut away to the performance shots with the band.
Other similarities that are video share with this video is that they both use images showing the band members with close ups on there instruments. This is to show that they are a true organic band with real skill and talent and not an industry synthetic put together.
Another vital part of any music video is using direct address. This means having moments when the singer or band members look directly into the camera henceforth making it look like they are directly looking at the audience member. This enables the audience member to feel as if they have had a “special” moment with the artist and feel as if they have some sort of special bond with them. This is used every genre of music video.
photoshop work for digi pack
Below are some of the images that we played with when trying to create a front and back cover for our digi pack. However we decided that it would be more eye catching to use some colour on the front cover of the digi pack.
acount of shoot day
The shoot’s set preparations started the day before with the painting of one of the walls green and the painting of a platform that was too pushed up against the wall in the same shade of green. This was done in order to create a “green screen”. A green screen allows for ‘Chroma Key Compositing’ which is a technique that enables two images or frames to be put together, to do this the green is removed (or made transparent) in after effects and another image is put behind it. In order to make this look as effective as possible we had to first make sure that none of the band members where wearing green as this would have then also become invisible. We also had to light the green screen in such a way that there was minimal to no shadows being left on the back wall. This is because the shadows would affect the green screen. To do this we used four overhead flood lights and four side lights. As the band where bringing in all there own instruments we had made sure that the platform was big enough to house all of them at the same time.
The morning of the shoot day the whole team met early at breakfast to have a final quick talk over everything in order to make sure everyone knew exactly what they would be doing that day so that there would little to no time “wasted” during the day. We then went to the media suit to collect the camera that we would be using and make sure it had a full battery pack. Francesca then went out to guide the band into where the studio was, the rest of the group went into the studio to set up the camera and monitor. The camera had to be “bubbled” which means getting it at exactly the right angle so that we get the best possible shots. The monitor is linked to the camera so that we can instantly see how well the shot transfers into screen. Also so that no everyone has to be crammed behind the camera to see what is going on in the shot. When the band got to the studio myself and Francesca met them and briefed them on the plans for that day (what they would need to wear, when they would be needed and where they would need to set up there instruments). We then helped them set up the instruments and told them where they would be standing on the stage. After the band had changed and were more settled we began to rehearse to enable them to feel more calm and natural performing with a camera in their face and a crew surrounding them (this can be quite scary the first time). The rehearsal was also good for the crew as this gave us a chance to try out different angles with the camera without actually recording or wasting a take if the shot didn’t work, also to adjust the lighting in order to make band look as good as possible. After we finished the rehearsal we started straight away with the takes. The first take we took was a wide shot of the whole band; this was so that there confidence was built up even further before asking them to perform alone, this will also be used as an establishing shot of the band. So that the band play exactly in time with the music track we will be using when editing the video, we the song playing on speakers in the studio; this is called playback. We took four takes of the whole song of the band in wide, then we moved on to the mid-shots and close ups. It was half way through a close up take of Chris the lighting in the studio tripped. In order for them to turn back on we had to let them cool first, as soon as it was ok to turn them back on again we quickly reset the shot and begin filming again right away, trying to keep the amount of time lost to a absolute minimum. We continued to film for the rest of the morning getting a big mixture of shots of the band (e.g. over the shoulder shots of the drum kit, extreme close-ups on the guitar strings and fingers playing the keyboard) until 1:10. At this point we packed up the camera and locked it back into the media suit and help the band pack up there kit. We then went to lunch with the band, over this I briefed them on what would be going on that afternoon. After lunch Francesca, Oscar, Jo and I went back to media suit to get the camera, extra battery pack, new memory card and a large piece of green card which was to be used as a portable green screen. We then travelled into central Guilford. When we got into Guilford we set up for shots in some of the more recognisable town areas. At first we where trying to get shots with no other people in the shots, after a while we realised that for one it was taking ages waiting for there to be no passers by and also that by having them in the shot this would add to the realism of the shot. Other shots which we filmed were of the band members walking though puddles. Our original idea was to use the piece of green bored to reflect into the water in order to be able to use the technique of chroma-keying to superimpose the band playing into the puddles. This ended up not working as we found that the bored was not big enough and also the puddles where to dirty to properly reflect the green.
The next part of shooting was when we were trying to get the entire band meeting together outside the “boiler room”. To do this we had them all entering from different sides of the shot. This took a few rehearsals to get right as it was difficult to judge when we needed to queue each one of the band to come into the shot. We were also lucky with the fact that as we where filming the owner of the boiler room turned up and allowed us to get the band walking into the location and also turned the lights on in the venue. This further added to the realism of the shot. After we finished filming at the boiler room we called it a wrap, packed up the equipment, said goodbye to the band and then went back to Hurtwood to upload our raw footage onto the computer.
The morning of the shoot day the whole team met early at breakfast to have a final quick talk over everything in order to make sure everyone knew exactly what they would be doing that day so that there would little to no time “wasted” during the day. We then went to the media suit to collect the camera that we would be using and make sure it had a full battery pack. Francesca then went out to guide the band into where the studio was, the rest of the group went into the studio to set up the camera and monitor. The camera had to be “bubbled” which means getting it at exactly the right angle so that we get the best possible shots. The monitor is linked to the camera so that we can instantly see how well the shot transfers into screen. Also so that no everyone has to be crammed behind the camera to see what is going on in the shot. When the band got to the studio myself and Francesca met them and briefed them on the plans for that day (what they would need to wear, when they would be needed and where they would need to set up there instruments). We then helped them set up the instruments and told them where they would be standing on the stage. After the band had changed and were more settled we began to rehearse to enable them to feel more calm and natural performing with a camera in their face and a crew surrounding them (this can be quite scary the first time). The rehearsal was also good for the crew as this gave us a chance to try out different angles with the camera without actually recording or wasting a take if the shot didn’t work, also to adjust the lighting in order to make band look as good as possible. After we finished the rehearsal we started straight away with the takes. The first take we took was a wide shot of the whole band; this was so that there confidence was built up even further before asking them to perform alone, this will also be used as an establishing shot of the band. So that the band play exactly in time with the music track we will be using when editing the video, we the song playing on speakers in the studio; this is called playback. We took four takes of the whole song of the band in wide, then we moved on to the mid-shots and close ups. It was half way through a close up take of Chris the lighting in the studio tripped. In order for them to turn back on we had to let them cool first, as soon as it was ok to turn them back on again we quickly reset the shot and begin filming again right away, trying to keep the amount of time lost to a absolute minimum. We continued to film for the rest of the morning getting a big mixture of shots of the band (e.g. over the shoulder shots of the drum kit, extreme close-ups on the guitar strings and fingers playing the keyboard) until 1:10. At this point we packed up the camera and locked it back into the media suit and help the band pack up there kit. We then went to lunch with the band, over this I briefed them on what would be going on that afternoon. After lunch Francesca, Oscar, Jo and I went back to media suit to get the camera, extra battery pack, new memory card and a large piece of green card which was to be used as a portable green screen. We then travelled into central Guilford. When we got into Guilford we set up for shots in some of the more recognisable town areas. At first we where trying to get shots with no other people in the shots, after a while we realised that for one it was taking ages waiting for there to be no passers by and also that by having them in the shot this would add to the realism of the shot. Other shots which we filmed were of the band members walking though puddles. Our original idea was to use the piece of green bored to reflect into the water in order to be able to use the technique of chroma-keying to superimpose the band playing into the puddles. This ended up not working as we found that the bored was not big enough and also the puddles where to dirty to properly reflect the green.
The next part of shooting was when we were trying to get the entire band meeting together outside the “boiler room”. To do this we had them all entering from different sides of the shot. This took a few rehearsals to get right as it was difficult to judge when we needed to queue each one of the band to come into the shot. We were also lucky with the fact that as we where filming the owner of the boiler room turned up and allowed us to get the band walking into the location and also turned the lights on in the venue. This further added to the realism of the shot. After we finished filming at the boiler room we called it a wrap, packed up the equipment, said goodbye to the band and then went back to Hurtwood to upload our raw footage onto the computer.
Running order
• Beginning of the day. Breakfast meeting – meet up in media suite – Wait for band in the road – told them a breakdown of what the day would consist of. Began setting up – began filming.
• Instead of a set we are now using just green screen and location shoots is Guildford.
• Green screen info – eg. Facts: what kind of green and why, the way it has to be lit etc.
• Lighting – four flood lights top of green scene and four side lights – trying to light green screen evenly and take out any shadows
• Lighting problems that day – the light tripped and we had to wait for them to cool down before they would light back up.
• Set the band up – let them rehearse to the music four times before recording them, so they could get used to the studio looking at the camera playing and singing in time to the music etc. Watched them from a monitor set up in the corner whilst they performed.
• Davina was on play back – in control of the track that the band our playing to.
• Oscar, jo, and I were all photographing the band to start with then I got to use the camera and film them playing. Facts and things about camera: Tripod (Things about the tripod), bubbling, focus, zoom in, zoom out, record button, tilt, pan etc.
• Shots – we did several establishing shots of the whole band, CU’s of each member, mid shots of each member, ECU’s of each member, Over the shoulder shots, then ECU’s of the guitar strings, drums, etc.
• Oscar and Jo helped with continuity and focus of the camera by saying whether the image was sharp on the monitor or not.
• Filmed all morning in the studio until 1:10 then went for lunch, then at 1:45 we packed up all the equipment ie. Camera, tripod extra batteries, changed the memory card, and a green screen board and took this all to Guildford.
• Shot in several places where it was obvious land marks connected to Guilford but only if you knew Guildford. Band wanted to be connected with Guildford. Started by shooting some puddles. Green screen board wasn’t used in the end because it wasn’t big enough to reflect entirely into the puddle so that we could superimpose the band members into them. Also did shots of the band walking from right to left either through or around puddles, down alley ways and side streets and finally ending up at the Boileroom, which is a venue they play at in Guildford. On the day we were quite lucky because the owner turned up at let us film them walking into the building itself, making it more realistic.
• Finally packed up all the equipment, said our goodbyes to the band and went back to Hurtwood.
• Instead of a set we are now using just green screen and location shoots is Guildford.
• Green screen info – eg. Facts: what kind of green and why, the way it has to be lit etc.
• Lighting – four flood lights top of green scene and four side lights – trying to light green screen evenly and take out any shadows
• Lighting problems that day – the light tripped and we had to wait for them to cool down before they would light back up.
• Set the band up – let them rehearse to the music four times before recording them, so they could get used to the studio looking at the camera playing and singing in time to the music etc. Watched them from a monitor set up in the corner whilst they performed.
• Davina was on play back – in control of the track that the band our playing to.
• Oscar, jo, and I were all photographing the band to start with then I got to use the camera and film them playing. Facts and things about camera: Tripod (Things about the tripod), bubbling, focus, zoom in, zoom out, record button, tilt, pan etc.
• Shots – we did several establishing shots of the whole band, CU’s of each member, mid shots of each member, ECU’s of each member, Over the shoulder shots, then ECU’s of the guitar strings, drums, etc.
• Oscar and Jo helped with continuity and focus of the camera by saying whether the image was sharp on the monitor or not.
• Filmed all morning in the studio until 1:10 then went for lunch, then at 1:45 we packed up all the equipment ie. Camera, tripod extra batteries, changed the memory card, and a green screen board and took this all to Guildford.
• Shot in several places where it was obvious land marks connected to Guilford but only if you knew Guildford. Band wanted to be connected with Guildford. Started by shooting some puddles. Green screen board wasn’t used in the end because it wasn’t big enough to reflect entirely into the puddle so that we could superimpose the band members into them. Also did shots of the band walking from right to left either through or around puddles, down alley ways and side streets and finally ending up at the Boileroom, which is a venue they play at in Guildford. On the day we were quite lucky because the owner turned up at let us film them walking into the building itself, making it more realistic.
• Finally packed up all the equipment, said our goodbyes to the band and went back to Hurtwood.
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