Blog 15 - Digipack

In this blog i am going to be looking at digipacks: what they are, and how artists use them for promotional purposes. A digipack is a patent style of a compact disk or DVD packaging. Digipacks typically consist of a gate fold paperboard or card stock outer binding, with one or more plastic trays that are in a circular shape that is going to hold a compact disk firmly in place. First Digipack design- My first digipack design is very basic. This is because it resembles the artists previous artwork, which is bold and simple. The simpleness attracts my target audience (that i have researched in previous blogs) because of the clothes that the male in the digipack is wearing are urban, which is the same way the fans of the Streets dress. The inside of the digipack is dull and consists of only one colour throughout, with lyrics from the song posted on the left side. On the back shows the tracks on the CD. This is commonly were all artists place the track listings to the CD. This makes it easy for customers to pick up the case in a shop and see what songs are on the album with ease. Second digipack design I have made changes to my previous Digipack idea. I have still kept the layout simple, but have added art to attract the audience more than to it being one plain colour. I have decided to add a brick wall theme to the front and pack of the case. This adds to the urban theme of the CD and relates to the style of the music. The use of liquor bottles on the front and inside of my case also adds to the urban theme, and also alcohol plays an important role in our video. I have kept the track listing in the same place, also keeping lyrics printed on the inside left of the case. I have added a bottle of vodka behind the CD fixture that is the same size as the CD. The vodka bottle is lying on the floor half full, resembling were it has been placed on the front of my digipack design. Final Digipack design My final Digipack design has added further images on to my second design. All I have changed to the front cover is have added a fence above the wall, purely to fill up the gap that would have otherwise remained filled with a dark colour. Adding a fence behind the wall adds to the urban feel furthermore and relates to the place of were the target audience live. Which is in a council house that have a garden surrounded by walls and fences. The back of the pack is the same as my previous design. The inside of the pack is relatively same to my previous design of being based around the front cover. I have added the characters foot to the image and have changed the camera host to Birdseye view. I have changed this because it allows more detail to be added into the shot, as it covers a wider surface area. I have kept the idea of having the lyrics on the left side of the pack, but instead of placing them on top of the image, i am going to incorporate in to the background images that are in the picture, so the the lyrics look as though they are meant to be on the item. Existing Digipacks: This is an album cover, front/back for an album of Kayne West. The image stretches from the front to the back, which allows the image to be larger, eliminating the need to squash the picture onto one side of the pack. This is similar to my design as i am also going to cover the front and back of the my cover with one image. As Kayne West's music is also urban having a similar design shows that i am reaching out to my target audience with the image, because of the success of Kayne West's album sales. Evaluation of my Digipack in powerpoint form (link) : https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B7hZWTkEhQ07NTdkODE3MGMtMzllOC00YjFmLTk0MzAtOGNiZTQwMDk0OWNi&hl=en

Blog 14 Shooting Diaries

We collected all of our footage and are now ready to edit it down to a final video and add a soundtrack. As we only had one days filming, we have a relatively short shooting diary, however I had entered into this blog the diary from yesterdays filming drawing upon any problems or issues we had during the day and how I felt the filming went. Wednesday 16th March- Filming for Music Video: We started the day by heading to college to pick up the steady cam and a Risk Assessment form during Danns lesson the previous week, we were then ready to start filming at Telscombe Cliffs. We had managed to miss the rain which was a massive bonus. Uur first location at the beach front was deserted which was exactly how we had planned it as we wanted it to reflect an early morning, despite us not filming till 10. We encountered a slight issue with the handycam,as we realised the person filming would only have one hand to be able to use in the shot as the camera would be being held in the other which proved to be difficult, however we decided for the scenes in which both hands are required to have the other person who was not filming to hold the camera whilst the other did the movement. We had difficulty with the ipod scene, as the camera could be seen in the reflection so it took a few takes to get this right, and we will edit it down during the editing process. All of our filming down at madeira went perfectly, with the weather continuing to be miserable, exactly how we wanted it, however there were some members of the public around so we needed a few takes to ensure no-one walked past during our shots, as it was important to ensure our character was shown totally on his own during shots. Other than that we had a very incident free filming process and returned the camera on time to Craig ready to begin our 6 weeks of editing, which we ensured we had enough time to complete

Blog 13 Shooting schedule

This blog contains our shooting schedule. A shooting schedule is important to keep the effiecency of the group. It allows the group to discuss when they are able to film. Not keeping to this shooting schedule will result in the video not being completed on time.

Blog 12 Health and safety

During the filming of our music video we had to carry out a rick assessment to ensure that we were all safe. We carried out a risk assessment down at the beach for the tide being out, despite watching the steepness of the steps on the way down, and the shattered glass by the bench we had nothing else to take care around.

Some of our footage involved driving a car and accelerating at a fast pace, after carrying out a risk assessment we decided that this was fine, but only when their was not any other traffic around.

For our video we were using a replica gun. We failed to carry out a risk assessment on using this item. this costed us dearly because it turned out that using this prob in public was illegal. the result of this was having the police around our houses, eventually having the prop taken away from us.

i have learnt that it is very important to carry out a risk assessment to ensure the safety of all the crew, it is also important to carry out an assessment to ensure that you are not breaking the law.

Blog 11: Storyboard

Here is our storyboard. We created this storyboard before we set out to film, the reason we did this was so that we had a clear idea of what the story of our video is telling. The storyboard also allows us to plan what shots we need to get whilst we our out filming. Our storyboard includes the location of the shot, a sketch of the shot we need to acquire, the number of the shot, and the camera position and angle.

Storyboarding is one of the most important attributes when making and producing a video, if a storyboard were not created then the filming proccess will not be planned. The crew would not know exactly what shots our needed, or even not have an understanding of the story of the video.

Blog 10 - Mise-en-scene

In this blog i will be discussing the choices we have made regarding the mise-en-scene of our video. The term mise-en-scene is a french term that means; everything visually seen of the screen.



We have discussed a few possible ideas that we are going to include in our m-e-s. which are:



The costumes that the actors are going to be wearing, the clothes are going to be tatty and dirty, and look as though they have not been washed for several weeks, which will contrast with the person that the song is being sung about.



The Props that the actors are going to use (Mobile phone, possibly alcohol bottles and ciggarettes). These probs relate to the target audience because they are going to be similar to what the audience themselves come across in ordinary day to day life.



Were we are going to shoot the video,(setting is going to be shot in a local town, during a dark time of the day, because of the dull nature of the song).

Blog 9 - The pitch

This blog includes a video of our pitch ,(attachment below). The pitch is intended to persuade the artists record company to hire us to create the video for The Streets. The pitch is created on PowerPoint and includes images, graphs, and ideas of what our video is going to include. Me and my partner whom I'm working with the presented our PowerPoint presentation to the class. Link to the powerpoint presentation: https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B7hZWTkEhQ07MGQwYjU5OTUtODYzZC00NDI5LWE4NzctYTI0ZDhmZWQyNTZk&hl=en Link to the pitch: https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B7hZWTkEhQ07ZjAyZDU2OWUtNDJmOS00MGM4LTg2ZGYtN2FjNzY5ZDI4ZTVh&hl=en

Blog 8 - Initial ideas

In this blog we are going to be thinking of ideas about how we are going to make our video. Taking in to consideration what the storyline is going to be, camera shots, the colour of the video and props that we may wish to include in our video. I have thought of ideas by producing a mind map, which is below, (click to enlarge).

By producing this mind map we now have a clearer idea of what we are going to include in out video, also have now been able to start thinking about how certain shots and scenes in the video are going to look like. Our video is going to be shot in black and white, we having chosen to do this because the mood of the song is very meaningful and daunting, therefore a dull colour will reflect this attitude.

Blog 7 - Copying an existing video

In this blog i am going to be developing knowledge on how a camera is meant to be properly operated, and what is required to shoot a music video. Doing this by copying and existing film that has already been produced. I am going to be doing this with my fellow peers that are in the same Media Studies class as me. We are going to be working together to re-enact the song '' Whetus - Teenage Dirt bag''. This song has been chosen because the video has been shot in a high school. The video being shot in this location makes it a lot similar for us to shoot because we can do i t during lessons without have to travel off campus because the college we our is already an appropriate location to shoot, as it corresponds to the High school in the video. We will be filming our video on a video camera that is going to be placed securely on to a tripod. A tripod will help to stabilise the shot and limit and movement or shaking of the camera. This is my storyboard. A story board is crucial when filming a video, this is because it allows the video to be planned shot by shot. Each individual section of the storyboard contains: a image, the shot type (ie, close up, medium shot, long shot or extreme close up) , camera movement (ie static or dynamic), description of the action (what will happen in the shot), sound or audio (referring to the lyrics in the song).

Before undertaking any test filming i was shown how to use a shooting script. A shooting script helps to monitor the effectiveness of the shot that has just been taken. The shooting script is similar to the storyboard in that it details the shot type and camera movements etc, but the shooting script also had a space for writing brief notes about each take of every shot that i have filmed. I was also shown how to use a clapperboard, a clapperboard is put in front of the camera before a shot is about to be filmed. The clapperboard contains the shot number and the take number, eg shot 1 take 1. Clapperboards and shooting scripts should be used in conjunction with each other to monitor which shots were suitable for use in editing.

I was also shown how to direct a shot. A director helps to keep everyone/everything on the set running smoothly by letting all of the participants know whet they are meant to be doing. i was the director, and was working with the camera operator to set up each shot, we then got the actors in to position, and shouted 'action' to let the actors know that we are about to start filming. During this process i also learnt how to setup a camera properly. The first stage was mounting the tripod, this enables stability for the camera when filming. It is useful for for zooming, panning and tilting the camera. The tripods at college have a spirit level on them which enables you to position the camera on a flat surface.

i learnt how to set the white balance on the camera. This has to be done suit the conditions that are being filmed in, whether in or outside. As the camera reacts to differently depending on the light conditions when filming outside the white balance has to be set to 'daytime filming', otherwise the footage might end up having a blue tinge to it.

The exposure of the camera should be set up using the manual settings on the camera, this is because using manual settings gives more control over how light or dark the footage is. The exposure can be changed using a combination of the shutter speed, aperture and gain.

The frame size can be changed to be like a widecreen film, which is called a 16:9 ratio. The normal camera setting is set to the standard frame size ratio of 4:3. Which ever ratio used ypu can apply the rule of thirds to help you compose the frame.

Depth of feild is also important when filming a music video. Depth of field refers to the focal range of the camera and can be used to centre the audiences attention on a particular part of the frame, by having it in focus whilst the rest of the shot is blurred. This is called a shallow or narrow depth of field.

Here is a link to our group testing film of the video:

http://blackboard.sussexdowns.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_654_1%26url%3D

Blog 6 - Video analysis

In this blog i am going to be analysing two videos that have already been made by 'The streets'. I am going to be examining: genre, representation, narrative, audience, and what story the video portrays. The two music videos that i am going to be examining are, ''Dry your eyes'' and ''fit but you know it''. I will be posting a link of the video that has been taken from youtube.com.

The Streets - Dry your eyes
www.youtube.com/results?search_query=the+streets+dry+your+eyes&aq=2
''Dry your eyes'' is a UK garage (hiphop) song. The song is about a male who has just split up with his girlfriend, and the male trying to deal with the brake up.

The video relates to the depressing lyrics and tempo of the song. This has been portrayed by having dark lighting throughout the length of the video.Also Mike Skinner's body language stays low and glum for the full length of the video. This video attracts consumers who are fans of the band and enjoy listening them, also may attract consumers who enjoy watch/listening too UK garage. This particular video may also attract men that are going through the same ordeal that the male (Mike Skinner) is in the video. The video goes against the stereotype of a young male of not showing emotion, because the video consists of Mike Skinner looking depressed throughout. Mike Skinner does not leave his dog in the video which suggests that he is now lonely and his girlfriend was his only human contact because the dog is the only living thing besides Mike in the video, he does not have any friends comforting him in the video.

The Streets - Fit but you know it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPbNMLwmxYkatch?v=rPbNMLwmxYk
This song/video also fits in to the UK garage (hiphop) genre. The music video consists of the lead singer (Mike Skinner) meeting a girl who is greatly marred by her self-estimation. Throughout the video Mike walks into various places, and remains singing the lyrics to the song, and imagines the girl in his head throughout,which relates to the lyrics of the song. This video would have been watched by fans who enjoy listening too the band/genre and are maybe interested in what the girl from the song looks and acts like in the video.


By looking at videos by The Streets i can now have greater knowledge of how they shoot and that all of their videos follow the storyline of the lyrics in the song. The videos are also pretty budget and are also shot in the England, meaning that my video will have the same style to the streets previous videos.

Blog 5 - Target Audience/Band

In this blog i am going to be researching/finding out what audience 'the streets' target. Looking at the artists terms of psychographics, demographics and socio-economic classifications. Pschographics looks at the consumers; views, personality, values, interests and lifestyle. Also paying attention to the consumers demographics which consist of their age and gender. A socio- economic group states the persons income, and the basis of their household.

To establish what type of fans ''The Streets'' have i had a look at the bands facebook page, i have took a screen shot of the home of their page and have put it below. This pages show fans posting comments to the band through their 'wall', this will allow me to view the fans who write pleasant post about the band and view the fans page and find out what type of age, gender. class they are. Also a post has recently been posting on the fan page wall about the the song that i am going to be producing a meaning for. The post Say's; ' ''Stay positive'' always gets me up and movin on hung-over Monday '.

After viewing the bands page i have found out that around 85% of the fans who have posted on the wall are white, British working class males in their late teens/early twenty's. This is a fans facebook page, stating his age, gender, also showing his appearance.


I have been researching what music magazine 'the streets' have been featured in. One of the magazines one of these has been 'NME'. New musical express (NME) has been produeced weekly since March 1952. It was the first British paper to include a singles chart, which first appeared in the 14th of november 1952 edition.

By knowing that the band are in this magazine i can find out what audience purchase this magazine, this can be done by looking on the website; 'http://www.nrs.co.uk/' and looking at the latest top line readership. web site will show what the age and working class the consumers are. The higher percentage of the readers are in the ABC1 class, and are aged between '15-44'.The total number of consumers that purchased the magazine was '325,000', the amount of copies purchase in the working class 'ABC1'was '218,000'. and the amount of copies purchased by people in the age boundary of 15-44 were '294,000'. However these results do not necessarily mean that they are purchasing the magazine because they are interested in reading about 'The Streets', but the band/artists that are on the front cover, this is why the majority of the consumers are in the ABC1 class. However if an issue of the magazine did include a picture of 'The Streets' on the front cover than the issue would be purchased by those in the lower working class sectors, which are 'C2DE'.

Blog 4 - Permission

In this blog i am going to be writing an e-mail asking for permission to produce the video. This is needed due to copyright.

Blog 3 - song choice

I have chosen to make a video for the song 'stay positive' by the band 'the streets'. I have chosen too make a video for this song because i enjoy listening to this band, and found out that this song does not have a music video. Also the lyrics too this song are very in depth and meaningful, allowing me to create a video with a story, allowing the audience to understand and possibly relate the video to their previous experiences. I found out that this song does not have a video by searching the Internet, including the website 'youtube'.

This however was not my first song choice too make a video for; my first choice was 'Dizzee Rascal - Stand up tall'. i wanted too make a video for this song because it is a song that i have enjoyed for a long time and not got bored of. Unfortunately this song has all ready got a music video, so i could not choose it.

These are the lyrics to the song 'stay positive' by 'the streets';
cos this world swallows souls
and when the blues unfold
it gets cold silent bums holes
your going mad
perhaps you always were
but when things was good you just didnt care
this is called irony
when you most need to get up you got no energy
time and time again sitll happen
the dark shits unwrapping
but no ones listening your mates are laughing
your brethrens fucking and then you start hating
your stomache starts churning and you mind starts turning.
so smoke another draw
it wont matter no more but the next day still feeels sore
rain taps on your window
always did tho but you didnt hear it when things were so so
your on your own now
your little zone you were born alone and believe me youll die alone
weed becomes a chore
you want the buzz back so you follow the others onto smack

just try staying positive
just try staying positive
just try staying positive

feels nice and still
good thing about brown is it always will
its easy, no one blames you
its that world out there thats fucked you
you know less of a person and if god exists
he still loves you
just remember that - the more you stink the further back from that brink
mabe youve lifetime stars and you think tattoos more fitting
but whos picking?
searching for yourself you find demons
try and be a free man and grasp that talisman
cos your the same as i am
we all need our fellow man
we all need our samaritan
maybe im better looking than you though
maybe ive got more dough - but am i happier though . . no
get the love of a good girl and your love will be richer than my world
and your happiness will uncurl

(chorus)

stop dreaming.
people who say that are blaspheming
theyre doing 9 till 5 and moaning.
and they dont want you suceeding when theyve blown it
and your idols - who are they?
they too drempt about their day
possitive steps will see your goals
whether its dollars or control, feel the gold
i aint helping you climb the ladder
im busy climbing mine.
now thats how its been from the dawn of time
if you reach a col-de-sac
the world turns it back
this is you zone, its like blackjack
he might get the ace or the top one
so organise your twos and threes into a run then you would have fucked him son
and for that youll be the better one
one last thing before you go though.
when you feel better youll be a hero
but to forget today, you could b back here
things can stray.
what if you see me in that window?
you wont help me though.
thts cool, just keep walking were you go
carrying on walking through the estate, starring at the geezers so they no you aint lightweight
and go see your mates
and when they dont look happy
play them this tape.

(chorus)

i hope you understand me
i aint no preachin fucker and i aint no goody- goody either
this is about when shit goes pear shaped
and if you arnt or ever been at rock bottom then good luck to you in the big wide world
but remember that one day shit just might start crumbling
your bird might fuck off or just loose your job
its when that happens that what im talking about will feel much more important to you
so if you aint feeling it, just be thankful that every things cool in your world
respect to bc

(chorus)


By knowing exactly what the lyrics to the song are will help me to be able to create a video that'll relate greatly to the song, because i now know every what exactly the song consitsts of and what it is trying to relate to.
I am going to be including the song in my video. It is going to be played over the top of visual and sound effects.

Blog 2 - Exploring music video

In this blog i am going too be looking at at a few videos that have already been produced, they are going too be from a range of different artists; genres and budgets. By researching a range of videos i will develop knowledge of what is needed to make a successful video. The techniques that i acquire from this task will help me when i come to make my own music video.

The first video i explored was 'Beyonce - Single ladies'. www.youtube.com/watchv=FyHVQT8aIBM
The first thing i noticed about this video is that it is shot in one long shot, focusing on Beyonce and the two dancers either side of her. The three of them are all wearing dark clothing that draws your attention to them as the room that they are dancing in is all white. The mes-en-scene in the video has been put together in order to make Beyonce the main subject of the video. This has been done by; lighting, her lighter hair colour (than the other two dancers), positioning of Beyonce, and the large metal bracelet on her arm. this video fits in to the hip hop genre that she is working in, because of the style she is dancing in. The video does not follow a story of any particular meaning, but this has been done because the song itself has a dark meaning behind it, and a relevent story (relationship gone wrong) would not go with the high tempo of the backing sound track. The video appeals too teenagers and young adults who enjoy to dance and party.

The second music video i have watched is 'prodigy- Smack My Bitch up'
www.youtube.com/watchv=20tWDFxQq5A
This video is very high tempo and explicit. The violent nature perceived in this video relates greatly to the fearsomeness of the lyrics and the high tempo of the song. The video consists of a person going out for a night of drinking; partying; drugs; violence; theft; sex, therefore targets the audience of teenagers/ young adults. The video is all shot from the persons point of view (point of view shot) throughout the length of the video which puts the viewer in the characters shoes, allowing the viewer to experience what the person is doing in the video. It is not until the end of the video the characters gender is revealed, which is female. This is not expected and throws the viewer because the actions match the typical stereotypes that a young male would possibly do on a night out. ''Smack my bitch up'' is such a controversial video and was banned from many television stations.

The third video that i have watched is 'Michael Jackson - thriller'.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_muUcxHATo
This video started the a whole new revolution of music videos. It was the first ever video that cost around $750.000 millions to make. It was so popular a short 15minute movie of the song was created. This video consists of a whole load of camera shots, editing and a huge amount of the budget was spent on costume and props. ''Thriller'' appealed to a range of different audiences across the board, (teenagers, young adults, adults and maturer adults, whether or not they were into the style of the song(people would have watched this video because nothing had really been done like this before of the time it had been produced), which was rock/pop.

Finally i have chosen to to analyse the music video ''stan'' by ''eminem''.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOMhN-hfMtY This is a music video that follows along the same story as the lyrics in song, in this case it is about eminem having a stalker, and through out the video the stalker gets more and more suicidal as eminem does not reply to his messages. The chorus of the song is sung by ''Dido'' who in the video plays the role as ''Stans'' pregnant girlfriend The video is very dark and has limited lighting and stormy weather etc, which reflects the depressed mood of the song. The genre of the song is rap and therefore has a target audience of youth and young families with low too medium income.

Blog 1- introduction

my task for this year is too create a music video for a song were a video has not yet been made for the song. I am going too produce a video by using and developing the skills that i learnt in the a/s part of the media course. This is a link to my previous blog woods17.blogspot.com.