The following embedded video below highlights perfectly all of the necessary skills and ambitions needed in order to create a top quality music video, even at an amateur level the video provided me with a great deal of help and guidance to inspire my research in to my very own Music Video. The video itself was embedded on to my blog via the embedding function on the Vimeo website.
Below i have chosen to analyse, review and rate several existing Music Videos performed at A2 level. Analysing these videos against a strict set of criteria will develop my understanding of exactly what i need to include within my Music Video, a key tactic that was first taught to me by Pete Fraser on our trip to the BFI last year. I have chosen the fantastically easy to use embedding software provided by both YouTube and SoundCloud in order to analyse a wide range of productions which have very different grades in my opinion.
A
Music Video is a short film or video that accompanies a complete piece of
music, most commonly a song. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as
a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. Although
the origins of music videos go back even further, they came into their own in
the 1980s, when MTV’s format was based solely around them.
A Break Down of Pop Music
•8
verses separated by a repeated chorus
•Middle
eight or bridge Sung in middle of song to break the monotony
•Phrases
or standard line length tends to be four bars
The following Timeline of events was created by the use of an online web application named ExamTime, ideal for creating mind maps which will give a viewer a guided route through the timeline i have created.
Pre Production The following pieces of information are demonstrated on a web application called Pinterest which allows you to select and image and write various pieces of information before embedding it on a blog or a board.
Production
For the production element of my film i used real thriller texts in order to create multiple presentations on the exact elements the opening title sequences of the thriller genre feature. I truly feel that using my media knowledge and passion for thriller films developed my skills which are visible in the footage from Ultimatum.
Post Production
My post production involved creating multiple directors commentary's on films and programmes that are real media texts that have truly inspired my creation of Ultimatum, denoting to my audience exactly what creates tension in terms of Camera, Editing, Sound and Mise-En-Scene. The clips below feature inspirations from top Thrillers such as Inception, Taken and Breaking Bad.
Furthermore, there are several conventions key when creating a media production that require a great deal of editing. For example, the editor always has to be able to make the audience instantly understand who the antagonist and protagonist are using various techniques such as the lighting there shown in or the pace of the cuts when they are in shot. There are also Thriller structures that I myself had to follow in order to produce our opening title sequence. The Narrative structure of a Thriller film follows the conventions of Equilibrium, New Equilibrium and return to Equilibrium where everything Is solved, climaxing in the middle. Another element in which digital technology played a huge part was matching the pace of our editing on Adobe Premiere Pro to match the convention of our opening title sequence. We held an interview with Michael Harrowes which is visible in another blog post which was extremely helpful, however we also used crossed cutting after we released the tension wasn't building enough for a truly thrilling audience experience.
For example placed below is the final cut of Ultimatum before we realised that our song was indeed not copyright free, causing our group to utilise multiple mixing and editing skills making sure the new copyright free songs were extremely fast flowing and provided an action match to the production.
Below is the cut with the copyright free songs in, the clip truly shows our skills of editing to quickly adapt to change and still produce a high quality piece.
The following answer is presented by a Prezi Presentation an extremely interactive way of presenting information which allows you to customise the visual experience of the information for your audience.
Furthermore as a further indication of creativity in our production stage we were also able to create an animated clip for our production company which thoroughly enhanced the quality and audience experience of the film. The following graphic was created on SONY Vegas providing another element of digital technology that our group were able to acquire.
Furthermore I personally also held an interview with Michael Harrowes who is an editor by career path who truly inspired some of the elements in my film. I feel that the element of creativity to interview him and get extremely valuable advice. This video is embedded below via YouTube.
Plenty of Digital Technology was used over the entire AS year for my Media Studies coursework. The preliminary tasked for example was filmed with a Canon Legria which was for me a good introduction in to filming and producing for both my group and myself. The editing software we first used consisted of Adobe After Effects which after a test run we decided not to use and opted for the far more user friendly Adobe Premiere Pro (Adobe CS6). I felt that some of the editing effects we utilised were extremely advanced in comparison to other groups who stuck to the basic shot reverse shot edits. Further Technology that I myself used stretched through Blogger, to iMovie, A Skype Interview with Michael Harrowes which I myself hosted.
As for the Pre Production technologies for the film I truly feel that we used a humongous amount of technologies that truly contributed to the end quality of our final piece. Foley was used to turn the sound quality of our production completely, changing poor quality interrupted sound in to crisp, clear vocals. The image below highlights how a Foley artist would replace poor quality sounds with high quality recordings which improve the audience experience hugely, we used a Foley artist to create car door sounds and the sound of a lock opening to release a secret draw filled with the assassins weapons.
In terms of blog work technologies, I chose to utilise such technologies as Prezi, Soundcloud, Youtube, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter. Technologies such as these enable young people to experiment and interact with the film industry; cameras are easily obtainable and operated by most and basic editing software can be purchased and determined without excessive difficulty. Projects such as these can give students valuable knowledge and understanding of the film industry and the requirements needed to create an effective production. This modern day access to making our own films is known by many as Web 2.0, the next generation if you like of interaction with the film industry. I feel that having the equipment and software that we have had available really has helped the whole group to create a truly fantastic and creative opening title sequence. I myself feel that experiencing these technologies really developed my skills and improved my directing dramatically.
In terms of Post Production we felt that we ourselves could utilise Digital Technology in order to acquire audience feedback to be placed digitally on our blogs for multiple people to see at one time. We chose to shoot our group responses using the Canon Legria and used Adobe Premiere Pro (CS6) in order to compile all of the footage together. The audience feedback was then documented on YouTube, and can be see embedded below.
