What have I learned from this music video.

Green screening

-The subject must be better lit, taking out every shadow
-I wont be getting the subject to wear white, that was a big problem for reflections
-Box out an area for the subject to move so that they don't go in front of the over head lights and change the lighting on their face

Outside shooting

- Invest in portable lighting equipment
- If the lighting is back, probably shouldn't shoot there
- Have back up locations


Over all

-Film more, even thought I had almost 40 minutes of footage for a 3 minute film, I still struggled to find really good stuff to use.
-Making sure the shots are perfect before moving on to the next


Good things

-I have gained experience working with clients, taking into consideration of their style, genre of music and target market.
- I have developed knowledge in cinematography and composition when filming
- It has significantly improved my editing skills
- I have learned how to polish and make a video look more professional.
- I have learned the basic green screen and editing process

FINISHED!

YAY finally finished, here is the final piece, like I have mention in previous posts there are still things that I am not fully happy with but I have addressed those issues and I know how to improve on them next time.

I hope you enjoy!

(This is the link to Daniel's youtube video)

(And this is the link to the one on my page)

The only reason I have put two links up of the same video is that, Daniel and Lewis have had problems with people reporting their videos for no other reason that they dont want the boys to do well, so I was worried that it might get taken down and you can see it and therefore I cant be marked on it so here it is on mine too.

Working long into the night..

Another late night is on the cards, I have just finished the second edit fixing the problems in the first edit and adding in the night scenes. I think the night scenes really help to break up the black background and add a better aesthetic to the overall music video.

P.s the edits 3+4 got added very quickly as it was just a few adjustments 

Right just one day left of editing so here is the list of things that I have to alter tomorrow

1. close ups at 23 sec are too dark

2.transition at 33 seconds is too quick and then the timing is off

3. transition at 45 is too jumpy

4. transition at 1.14 doesnt work and after the timing is off

5. 1.30 timing is off

6. 1.41, blackness comes in slightly before lights

7. 2.16 transition could be smoother

8. 2.24, blackness comes in before lights again

Tonight's escapades

RIGHT! I am just back from shooting, jeez what a night, for a start when I got the location it starting raining so I had to take refuge in a pub. So I have been playing around with the effects to optimize the footage I took and here are some tests.

The first of probably many re-edits

Ok so I finally finished my first edit at around 5.00am this morning, I am POOPED but it was worth it. Ive gotten some sleep and taken a look back at the edit.. yea I need to work on it more.

1. The mp3 quality has went down hill quite a lot, I think that has something to do with rendering, I shall sort that out.
2. There are quite a few lip syncing issues
3. Some of the shots are a bit too jumpy.

Also around 5am this morning when I watched the video back, I noticed a lot of black space. This was intended as it is a song about heart ache and you don't want it all cheery but there is just TOO much, so to break it up, I am going to go out tonight and film some cars on the motorway and it would tie in the introduction. The reason for the cars, its just to symbolise going somewhere and it this case, its moving on from the relationship. I wanted to shoot at dark so there was still a moody and sultry atmosphere.

The first edit

The old building footage

So I was a little bit worried about the building footage as the lighting was AWFUL! but I have given it a go at restoring the footage and here are the results.

To restore them I played around with the contrast and brightness, colour balance (which in the end I made the building footage black and white as it looked better), Noise and grain remover,sharpen and the saturation.


Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Green screen editing- keying out and the problems I had

Ok So yesterday I was trying to correct the old building footage, now was the turn of the green screening and keying out the colours.

I had saved the tutorial sheets that I was given on the channel 4 day so I hunted them out, It was great help!

It told me how to do it step by step and I wasn't wasting my time looking for a youtube tutorial.

Here is my first green screen test:

I think it worked really well! I was happy with the results from this test and so I am now starting to put this music video together and I'm hoping to have the first edit done tonight!


Then as the night progresses, I start having REALLLL problems with some other green screen footage. Then dont work as well and the boys still have a haze of green to them, I couldn't figure it out, I even started writing down all the numbers so I could copy them to the other video.. still didn't work.

Here are screenshots of places that the green screen didn't work out so well

Parts of fingers are missing at the sides.

 green haze around daniels back and lewis's hand is not refined enough and green shade under armpit

 green hand and haze around head

 green haze around side, green shadow and unrefined arms

 green shadow all over face

 even thought I believe this to be my most successful green screen, there is still a small hint of green in the shadow

 huge green shadow on face

 I was really annoyed that the old build shots didn't work out so I tried to put daniel in the picture, this worked quite well, I made him the same shade and tones as the background but it is not fully conceivable

 unrefined hand

 slight green haze around the body

Light reflected off the size of Lewis's eyebrow and ear



BUT

Baring in mind these errors only occur for a small part, this is just me trying to pick at my faults. I have realized where I have went wrong:



LIGHTING

I never lit the green screen properly, if I had more lights, it would have removed the shadows off their faces and I would not of had the problems that I did. But I learned from the experience.

And the editing process has begun!

Ok so I got up bright and early ready to edit today and woke up with a stinking cold...typical! But I have been playing around with the footage that was shot in the building to see if I can save it or not.. Here a video of the original footage to see what I was up against.

I took about 5 different takes in this possition but in the end, after my attempts, this shot was just not salvageable. I have other shots though that only have one of the boys in and this meant that I could get the other boy to hold a light.

FILM DAY!

What a day! Everything that I was worried about all went well! After nervously waiting for a lecturer to give me the thumbs up for the green screen and worried that we wouldn't be able to shoot at our location, everything worked out surprisingly well! The only problem was the rain, BUT its Scotland, and there is nothing that can be done about that! I will start the editing process tomorrow and were going for a Friday 6pm release. But I plan to have a first edit finished by the end of Wednesday and then however edits may follow to give time for iterations and polishing. here are some photos of the day!

The only problem that occurred was the lack of light in the old building. Not to mention it was very over cast so I am a little bit worried about the quality of the footage shot there but hopefully some touch up in the editing process should fix things, fingers crossed!

Tomorrow is the big day!

Well, tomorrow is the big day..shooting Daniel and Lewis music video. My brain is going mental with so much things to organize so I thought I would right a blog post A. to clear my mind and B. so you lovely people can see what I'm doing! OK

First of all tomorrow could go really well or well, bad. Because we couldn't find a suitable day before the Christmas break, I didn't know if we were going to get the video completed before hand in. But we managed to get a date for tomorrow but by that point uni had closed for Christmas, and the lecturers aren't back until the 7th.. tomorrow so I couldn't email them and expect a reply. BUT Robin emailed me back saying that although he wouldn't have time to properly timetable me a slot, he may be able to get me the room informally. So we still have a good chance of getting the room. Which is why I will be at uni at 9 on the dot to try and find Robin or another lecturer. FINGERS CROSSED.

List for Daniel and Lewis:

3x sets of clothes- No green
Any jewelry they need/want
Portable speakers
Copy of the final edited song
Props, eg Microphone, headphones- if they want
Umbrella
Waterproof jacket

List for myself:

Camcorder- Fully charged
Camcorder charger (for green screen shooting)
Camera- to take behind the scenes pictures
Tripod
Umbrella
Waterproof jacket
Storyboards for reference
SD card
Extra SD card
Black bags (to sit on if shoot location is wet)
Paper
Pen
Route map to get to location
Bus times for the 22


Order for the day:

7:00- Amy Get up and get ready for day
9:00- Amy go into uni and find lecturers for green screen
11:00- Pick up Lewis and Daniel from the train station
Depending on the rain situation, if it is dry when they arrive at 11, then we will go straight to the shoot location, but if it is raining we will go shoot the green screen scenes and hope the rain will stop.
6:00- 7 shoot night time footage


Link to weather for Dundee on Monday the 7th : http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/2650752



Potential problems for tomorrow:

1. We cant get the green screen room ( option 2, go buy a very big bit of green material)
2. We cant get into the location (Resort to back up locations)
3. It rains all day- which may cause bad lighting for the camera (result of shooting in Scotland)
4. Boys miss their train-haha!


I think that is it from now but I will probably be on here in a mad panic about something else for tomorrow!

Storyboards for music video

I started to try and storyboard for the music video that is not too far away but it was basically impossible. As I have never been to the location I can predict what shots I can take, So what I have done instead is mocked up shots that I plan to take and know I can.

Some tests for the introduction

Ok so I went a walk today with an idea for the introduction to Daniel and Lewis's music video. This is just a test but I think it works pretty well.

I went down to the tay bridge and stood in the middle of the walk way. I filmed the cars passing and played around with the settings from really abstract blur to high quaility.
When I got home I watched all the footage back and really liked the maximum blurred versions, I added some timing delays and some width delays so that the cars left slight trails like in night time, long exposure pictures. eg. ----->








The reason I wanted this idea as the introduction is that I thought the starting was atmospheric and thought this style would really work. Here is one of the tests that I have done along with the introduction music.

Possible locations

I took a walk tonight for some possible night shoot places.

Music video- Daniel and Lewis

As part of my pre-production I wanted to make a music video as I feel that a music video is just one of many ways that you can visual music. Music videos are more representational of the works and artist but the visuals have to reflect the mood, tone, tempo and composition of the song. Two local artists Daniel and Lewis are keen to have a music video make for their new song "Im done" which is about breaking up with someone. I have been in talks with them for quite a while but getting a date that was suitable for all of us posed a problem. Hopefully a date will be set soon but for now, I am just running wild with ideas and storyboards. I will upload my sketches at some point but here a few videos that I have and want to take inspiration from

What I liked about this video was the simple black screen (done in green screen) even though it was simple, I found it gave a very isolated and lonely feeling which is the vibe that I would like to convey in my music video. I also really like the speed and lights that are projected on the walls of the bedroom. I will probably go out and film some footage at night for some media tests to try out some different ideas.

When I heard about that song and the meanings behind it my mind went straight to the old abandoned hospital outside Dundee. I have never been there myself but I have seen a lot of people go and take pictures there and I believe it would be quite symbolic of the feeling of torn apart and the heartbroken feeling would be represented in the derelict building.

Narrative Non-Narrative

More of an abstract way to visualize music but still enhancing the viewers senses with the combination of visuals and music is music videos! The aim of music videos are to enhance the viewers experience not just to physically visualize the music, you get see that on windows media player with all its psychedelic waves of colours and patterns. So instead of the direct one to one collaboration with visuals and sound what music videos do is more create a more abstract and almost inspired visuals from the music. For example if the music video has a narrative to it, the video could be what the band/singer is talking about in the song and the video simply displays what he/she is singing about. If the video is non narrative you can play around with what you feel when you listen to the song and with around with different styles and techniques. I will give you an example of a narrative and non-narrative movie video:

This is such a lovely example of a narrative music video, C'mere by Interpol was directed by Adam Levite which putt a contemporary twist on Hansel and Gretel in a snowy forest gives an aesthetically pleasing video.Visually the flames that are in fact fabric add a new interesting level to the video, giving it a softer edge where real flames would have been more aggressive. The fabric flames also tie the band playing with the snowy scene together nicely. Over all the short winter day light has added a gentle tone to the video with subdued colour tones which gives quite a vintage feel 

 A good example of a non-narrative music video is by Franz Ferdinand is "Take me out"

Directed by Jonas Odell. This Swedish director was influenced by the non-art movement Dada for this video. Franz Ferdinand comes from a Glasgow School of Art background and Odell has sympathetically emerged it with a graphic edgy style. Odell used a mixture of filmed performance, animations and green screen.

From the book "Experiencing Music Video: Aesthetics and Cultural Context" by Carol Vernallis, Vernallis describes music videos as 

"showcasing the star, reflecting the lyrics, and underscoring the music"