Images from Film Day

Band Image and Styling

Due to our previously encountered issues in terms of securing a band, I took it upon myself to get in contact with friends of mine that are musicians. All of which play an instrument, are part of a band or sing alone. After reflecting on the problems that occurred I thought that it may have actually worked in our favour because being a proper band, the previous members may not have listened to direction very well and may have thought that some of our requests didn't fit their "bands image". As all of the members are musicians themselves they are all very familiar with the roles that they play and I believe that because they aren't a real band they will listen to direction and have no objections to our ideas. I feel much more positive about filming next week and am confident that our band is secure.

Here are some pictures of the band members.

Aaron 

Harry

  

Bradley

Filming

Molly and I have booked 151 studio for Saturday 29th November for 4 hours with an additional 3 lights. We are both very hopeful that the filming this time is a success as we are much more organised than we were for when we filmed the draft. We have a secure and reliable band and both Molly and I are free to film. We aren't 100% sure both of our dancers are available but because we have just over a week to sort it all out I feel that even if they aren't both available we can get a replacements. 

What we need

Prior to filming, we need to ensure that we have everything we need organised and viable. Here is a list I made in readiness for film day next week.

Roles on film day

In order for the filming to run as smoothly as it can, Molly and I have decided what roles suit our character and skills best. 

Due to my creativity and communication skills I thought it would be best for me to be director as well as art director. I have a keen interest in interior design and I have a clear idea of what I want the set to look like as well as the video itself. Also, because the idea is mine, I have a clear vision and I have valuable communication skills so that will also play to my advantage as director as I can give clear instructions to the band members and dancers. After the problems we encountered filming our draft I know how to improve our organisation skills as well as learning how to be clearer in my explanations of what Im asking for. 

Although I created the storyboard, Molly watched me closely through this process therefore she has a clear view of what sort of shots we need and can watch the animatic/draft video back if needs be. She is also much more familiar with the camera and technical equipment than I am so we both agreed it would be best for her to film.  We also agreed that we would share the role of sorting out the hair and make up as neither of us are experts in this field but if the role is shared equally it'll share the responsibility. Any general jobs such as cleaning we will also share equal responsibility for so that our duties are weighted fairly.

Giving and Receiving feedback

Giving and receiving feedback is a vital process in the making of the different coursework elements, it allows us to give constructive criticism and allows our peers to comment on what they like and/or dislike. It also helps us both to make any improvements and to develop any ideas we already have. I feel as if the feedback I have given and received has had a huge impact on this process.

Feedback Received.

The feedback I was given was really helpful and all positive which gives me confidence in the elements I have produced. It also helps me come to the conclusion that if I was to produce these they would work and would intrigue the target audience to want to learn more about my band and the albums they produce. All of the feedback I received backed up my views on how minimalistic covers can be extremely effective if produced to a high quality. 

Journey Sheet

A3 Journey Sheet 1

Teachers Feedback

Our feedback we received from the teachers was mainly positive for what we produced. Molly and I had several problems during the filming process which we have created a post on. The main problem we had to deal with was when the band pulled out last minute which resulted in us losing the majority of our shots as the band made up the bulk of our video. Due to having no band we didn't give our teachers much to comment. 

The comments we were given were praising the dancing abilities but obviously due to having no band that it about all our teachers could comment on. Also, they said that in terms of filming and shots that we need to make sure we move the camera a lot more as our longer shots were very static and at times our dancers we almost out of the frame. A lot of this will come with practise and when we film again we will have scope to practice and get used to how the camera works and how to produce angles that work well. 

Obviously because we had little to comment on in terms of shots Molly and I have learnt that we need to use people that are 100% reliable and that we also need to ensure that we manage our time in the most effective way possible. 

Final Advert

Final Digipak

Improvements made to Advert

Draft Advert

For my advert I received positive feedback. I was given a 7/10 and was given very little changes to be made. As seen when you look at the comparisons between the draft and the final advert there is very little difference. 

Final Advert

The comments I was given were all positive and the only thing I needed to change was the amount of legal information I had used. I feel that my advert looks very professional with this change and the minimalism adds to the uniqueness of my ideas and fits in perfectly with my chosen genre. 

Changes made on advert

- Reduced legal information from 8 lines to 2 lines.

Improvements made to Digipak

Digipak Draft

The feedback I received for my draft digipak was relatively positive. I was given a 7/10 by my teachers and the following comments:

- text on back cover is too big

- remove circle of text on front cover

- make all panels equal to the lines they should meet

- remove the rectangles on the front cover and replace them with the image from advert

- two blank panels stand out and don't fit in, put something on them 

After researching further and going over the comments I was given I made all changes I could and produced my final product:

Final Digipak

I ended up making more changes than I had originally planned but I feel as if my final looks a lot more professional and all six panels compliment each other. Here is a list of changes I made:

Differences from draft to final

• Removed Transition / External Image text 
• Replaced 4 rectangles on front cover for the same triangular shape on advert
• The text on the back cover panel was taken down a size to make it smaller 
• The legal text on the back cover was also made smaller
• Changed the two blank panels to two rectangles on the left and four on the right
• Changed the four rectangles on the back inside panel for three rectangles 
• Made sure all rectangles are the same size
• Made sure that all six panels are to the size they should be in terms of where they meet the lines

Further Inspiration

The following albums and adverts have stood out for me because of the bold colour schemes and/or abstract design/images used. Most are a great example that my chosen colour scheme of pink, black and white were really effectively together. 

Digipak research

Through creating my digipak, I researched into minimalistic album covers and colour palettes. The following covers are the ones that I researched into and have looked in depth into the artists background and previous (if any) album covers they produced.

This album, LP1 is the debut album of English singer songwriter FKA twigs. It was released on 6 August 2014 by Young Turks. The album has spawned the singles "Two Weeks" and "Pendulum". On 10 September 2014, the album was announced as one of 12 albums shortlisted for the Mercury Prize for best British album of the year. Twigs self-released her music debut, EP1 on Bandcamp on 4 December 2012. Upon the release of AM on 9 September 2013, the album debuted at number 1 in the UK album charts, selling over 157,000 copies in its first week. As a result, Arctic Monkeys made history as the first independent label band with five consecutive number 1 albums in the UK. The album received widespread critical acclaim and brought Arctic Monkeys their third nomination for the Mercury Prize. The album also won the Brit award for Best British Album

The reason why this album stands out for me is because of the obscureness. I like the colour scheme and feel that the colour combination works really well. The pink/red colour on the face inspired me in the decision to use the pink colour on both my digipak and poster. The contrast between the duck-egg blue, the dark hair and the pale face makes the brightness of the red/pink face paint stand out. The colour combination itself works as seen in the album cover below by Thick Pigeon. I also like the way that her face doesn't look real, almost doll like. I think it adds to the manufactured look of the cover. It reminds me of dolls because of how unrealistic it has been made to look. 

On 26 February 2012, the Arctic Monkeys released a brand new song titled "R U Mine?" on their YouTube channel. On 4 March, it went to No. 23 on the UK Singles Chart on downloads alone. On 21 April, the song was released as a single, with the track "Electricity" as a B-side, released additionally for the Record Store Day. The song marked a direct shift in musical direction in comparison to their previous album, Suck It and See, by incorporating a heavy use of falsetto and hip hop beats, and eventually became the inspiration for AM. Upon the release of AM on 9 September 2013, the album debuted at number 1 in the UK album charts, selling over 157,000 copies in its first week. As a result, Arctic Monkeys made history as the first independent label band with five consecutive number 1 albums in the UK. The album received widespread critical acclaim and brought Arctic Monkeys their third nomination for the Mercury Prize. The album also won the Brit award for Best British Album. Alex Turner described AM as the band's "most original [album] yet," merging hip-hop drum beats with 70's heavy rock. The frontman has said that the song "Arabella" expresses the two styles of the album most effectively in one track. On AM, Turner continued to experiment with unusual lyrics, and the album includes the words from poem "I Wanna Be Yours" by John Cooper Clarke. Turner has stated that Homme's appearance on the song "Knee Socks" marks his favourite moment of the whole album.

The Arctic Monkeys have a very distinctive style when it comes to album covers. Their previous album covers are all very simplistic and have the same recognised logo in the top left hand corner. I like this album cover because of the simplicity of it and the contrast between the LP1 cover. I wanted to incorporate everything I researched into one. I thought if I incorporated the simplistic design of the Arctic Monkeys cover with a bright contrast colour I could create something different yet bold. 


I tried to look for obscure and different looking album covers and found the two covers below. Both covers stood out to me for more than one reason. 

The first cover, by Jamie XX stands out to me because of the chosen colour scheme. There are not many covers we see that use such a bold and daring colour scheme such as this one and as well as incorporating the minimalistic rectangle in the bottom left corner I feel like it challenges the usual conventions as we more often then not see minimalistic covers that are predominately black and white in colour. I wanted to create something that was bold and outstanding but something that kept to the simplistic idea similar to this. 

The above album by Goat stood out for me for similar reasons to the Jamie XX cover. Again I think the bold colour scheme makes the album stand out and would do against a plain CD stand background. I wanted to create something that I knew would grab my target audiences attention. The above album works really well for me because I think that the colour combination almost clashes making it more interesting to look at and more eye catching for the audience. The use of the two triangles add some uniqueness to the cover and the use of shapes is a rarity in the modern day era of graphic design as its all about the geometric and holographic patterns. 

After researching album after album I created a list of features I wanted on my digipak and advert. Some of which were the following:

• Simplistic colour scheme 
• Some kind of shape
• Minimal amount of text as possible
• A bold feature, possibly portrayed through colour

Problems with filming

Location 

One of the major problems within the process of filming our draft is the location. I think Molly and I may have underestimated how busy our location manager would be and therefore were restricted to what days we could film in our desired location. Resulting in not being able to get everyone in the same place at short notice. We have now had to change our location for the next time we film but in terms of equipment we need could be used to our advantage in terms of the shots we want. As Target doesn't have an 'infinity wall' it would have made our jobs that little bit harder when it came to capturing side view shots of the band as we would probably end up seeing either side of the studio and not just plain white walls.

Band
To begin with, we had a reliable band. They are a real band meaning that they were perfect for us as they already knew what they would have to do. The band accepted our filming schedule may change and told us they would be able to perform for us whenever we were ready. Unfortunately, once we tried to finalise a filming day, we were continuously let down by the band. Molly and I then decided to have a discussion about what we were going to do and how to deal with the situation. Through which we decided that unfortunately we could not work with the band as they had proven to be too unreliable. We knew from the start that it would be a difficult task to get everyone in the same place at the same time and this would have just added to the issue. In the end, we found the band unreliable and unable to fulfill our needs. I am currently in contact with a manager for another band however this has not gone far enough for us to stabilise them just yet. Molly and I have clearly learnt from our miss communication and lack of organisation and we aim to have a secure band for our final music video. 

Dancers

For the storyboard I had planned to use a female and male dancer to fulfil the roles. however due to a lack of communication on both parts (both mine and the dancers) it resulted in the male dancer not being available in the end for when we had organised to film. Thus meaning we needed to improvise. As dance as a whole lacks in male dancers we struggled to replace the male and had to substitute the role for a female. Although in the end this was not made out to be a problem as both girls worked well with us and were both of a very good standard. Molly and I were extremely impressed with the girls and are incredibly grateful for them to help us out with such little preparation. Again, I thought that we could play this to our advantage. The stereotypical loving relationship is between a male and female but both Molly and I thought that it would be a great idea to portray a same sex love and thus, goes against the stereotype.

In the end we made the best out of a sticky situation and we have learnt from our mistakes. We hope to be more organised for the next time we film and hope that with the right planning, everything will fall into place.

Music Video Draft

Advert Analysis 3

This Courteeners poster looks like it is in an underground station which in itself could accumulate viewings due to the mass number of people that use the underground in London ands other major cities. Location could be a huge factor in the successfulness of the marketing because if placed in major cities and locations that are popular they will be seen by many passing by. Whether they notice the poster consciously or unconsciously they are still likely to recognise it if they see it again another time or passing by the same place.

The bulk of the poster is an image of the album cover itself which again could be used to make the audience associate the poster and the album together. Using the same picture or design for both poster and advert have been proven to be successful in the past and continue to succeed again and again. The colour scheme itself is very monotonous and plain which is often seen on albums and adverts of the chosen genre. 

The typeface is bold and the use of the black and white contrast makes the little information we are given stand out thus grabbing the audiences attention yet again. The legal information is clearly seen in the left hand corner and the Itunes logo is in the opposite corner making the positioning of the text/icons balanced and equal. 

Advert Analysis 2

This poster for Kanye West's "Yeezus" tour is simplistic and does not give off much information. The target audience will know the type of person Kanye is and will therefore know that he is very secretive and does not give much away, thus meaning that this could be a representation of Kanye's personality which would therefore connect with the target audience.

The lack of information and therefore text on the poster could also intrigue those who may not already be a fan of Kanye. It would intrigue them to find out more about the type of person he is if they didn't know already and what the posters purpose is. The typeface itself is white in colour and bold making what is there eye-catching.

In the top third of the poster is the Yeezus logo which is recognised by many which would therefore in itself attract the audiences attention. The two fangs at either end of the word may represent the evil and darkness that Kanye raps about in his songs and would therefore be a connotation to the album and to Kanye himself.

Due to the fangs the logo itself is distinctly recognisable and different to other artist within the rap genre, therefore again representing that Kanye is not like the other rappers and holds his own against them.

Kanye often raps about god and religion, thus meaning that the picture within the centre of the poster is an example of this. He often refers to how religion has helped him through dark times of his life and the picture shows that there is hope even at the darkest of times. The contrast in the colour combination may also represent this because they are almost the complete opposite.  

Advert Analysis

The colour scheme is mainly black and white which makes the poster stand out as they are contrast colours. The poster must be bold and eye catching in order to intrigue the target audience and hold their attention.The multicoloured image in the middle of the poster is a representation of the album itself as the album pattern is a black and white version of it. The use of the multicoloured pattern is eye-catching because it draws the attention of the audience to the poster in the first place. It is the first thing the consumer would look at. It is an image of what seems to be sound waves which highlights the fact that it is a music advert. 

The poster is designed using the rule of threes and is different to the album itself. The masthead is the name of the band, which immediately informs the audience who the poster is for, all information on the album over the artist name is in the top left hand corner and on this everything is central. The fact that all the information is in the middle could suggest that no piece of information has priority over the other and are all equally as important as another.

The poster itself is very to the point and only includes relative information which is a representation of the band themselves because they are very particular in what they say and reveal to the audience. The text used on the poster is bold and could also be seen as a reflection of the bands image, (bold and imaginative.) The band are well known for using simplistic and monotonal colour schemes throughout their albums so the fact that this album is more or less following the same pattern could be seen as a trait that the band have and would be recognised by the audience. 

However, it could also been seen as to be out the usual style, the use of the bright colours could be seen as a sign of change for the band and could suggest that the concert they are advertising is different what they usually do. The text showing the special guests provides the audience with all the information they need and could open up new windows for the guests as well as connoting them with the arctic monkeys. It could benefit both artists as the audience would refer back to the arctic monkeys concert in terms of where they heard a band for the first time.

Weekly Reflection

This week has been busy for both Molly and I. We are still sorting out our film dates but all problems with storyboards and choreography have been resolved. Over the half term break we plan do film our first draft of the video and I myself will be having a rehearsal session with both dancers before we film so that everyone is prepared and everything goes as smoothly as originally planned.

With the stress of the digipak and poster deadline looming, this week our priorities have been getting those finished. As we both met the deadline are are up to date with all of the work we are in a very good position to start filming and editing our first version of the video. Molly and I have decided that I will be director as well as art director for our video and she will be in charge of hair and makeup, filming and picture taking. I will be assisting Molly with the filming as well as taking the pictures and making sure our band and dancers look the same throughout the video.

The thing to do now is to sort out what we need for film day, finalise dates and get our footage captured. There is a lot to do between now and film day and I am certain Molly and I will get what we need done by the time film day comes around. 

Draft Advert