Editing!

In today's lesson, we did A LOT of editing... We have completed the split screen... Nearly...
This is how much we've done:

Next lesson, we will concentrate on the flashbacks, and put a really nice effect on them :)

Editing!

During lunchtime today, I did some more editing.
We had a lot of gaps at the end of first period, and that really worried me! So I've worked a lot more on making it flow more evenly and come together more.
You can see that our footage has gone from:

to:

• The gap at the beginning is of the split screen, which we are going to do tomorrow's lesson
• The second gap is Dj giving me the necklace, which I will film this weekend
• The third, very small gap I think should be of a shot that follows Dj from behind as he runs up to me (as this is just before the 'just crash' bit). We don't actually have this shot, so I am going to have to go to Needham Lake and hopefully film it this weekend if we have the right weather!
• The final big gap, is another flashback which we haven't filmed yet, but shall film this weekend

So, the footage that we are hopefully going to get this weekend will be:

• The big argument scene, which results in Dj walking off to meet Sophie (my house)
• A shot from behind of Dj running up to me (Needham lake)
• I also think we need to go to Needham Lake again to get some more shots for the next 'just crash' bit. We need some more shots of us both really upset, and crying and stuff like that. It needs to be really dramatic as the song is really dramatic at the ending. We also need some more shots of us walking away from each other for our montage at the end as I don't think we have enough footage for this at the moment.

Hopefully we will be able to get this completed this weekend though. It is definitely possible, it just depends on the weather. So, fingers crossed the weather is good this weekend!

Unsupervised Lesson 2

Whilst our footage was uploading, we began creating a website on Wix for our ancillary text. We've decided on our fonts, and have made pages for our website.\

Once our footage was uploaded, we began editing. This is our progress so far:

We already have the footage for the first gap, and the last gap. The only bits we need to film, is the gaps in the middle! :)

Unsupervised Lesson!

In todays unsupervised lesson, we are importing the footage that we got at the weekend:

Afterwards we will begin editing it!

Filming

Unfortunately, we were unable to film the scene where Dj gives me the necklace, as the Christmas tree lights have not been turned on yet and seeing as we're going to film it in the dark, we need the lights to be on!
Fortunately, the lights are being switched on on the 30th, so Dj will come over next weekend so we can film the scene then! :) we will also film the argument scene then too!

Video blog!

This is just me talking about the filming that I got done today, rather than typing about it:

Also, I forgot to say (when I'm talking about the shots in the car) the reason I've decided to add these in, is because in the storyboard I often didn't anticipate the duration of each shot, lyric, interlude etc... and I'd rather have too much footage than too little! So if we can fit these shots in then we will :)

Change of plan!

Fortunately, it's reaaaally sunny today! YAY! So we're going to film the happy, young flashbacks today. And we're also going to film the scene where Dj gives me the necklace.
Next weekend we will film the argument scene, then all our filming will be done :)

Filming!

Filming hasn't quite gone to plan this weekend :(
I am over Dj's at the moment, and we have filmed his half of the split screen and him laughing on his phone. However, we were going to go outside and film the flashback where we are supposed to be young, happy and in love but the weather has been awful! It's been raining loads and the weather won't exactly mirror the emotions the characters are supposed to feel. I believe this will really affect our audience, as ultimately the message of them being happy and in love, will not be received.

So, next weekend. I have already checked, and it's supposed to be nice weather. So, I will film that flaskback then. I will also film the flashback where we have an argument at my house, and Dj goes off to meet Sophie. So, by next weekend all our filming shall be complete!!!!!!!!!!!

As you can see, Saturday is supposed to be sunny, which means we will be able to film the happy flashback scenes then :) and Sunday is not supposed to be sunny, which means we can film the inside scenes, where we have the argument then as the weather won't matter! :)

During next weeks lessons, we will have to perfect the split screen opening scenes, we will follow a youtube tutorial to acheive this as it may be challenging!
I've been looking online, and these videos seem like really helpful tutorials:

During next weeks lessons, I also think that we should really concentrate on the look we want our video to have. We already edited every image to make it appear 'softer' as some of the lighting was quite harsh, and we felt that the situation our chracters were dealing with was very delicate and sensitive, so we altered the brightness and the contrast to create this look. However, we haven't done anything with the cheating scenes other than made them black and white. I feel we could do something to all of the scenes we have to make them look better and have more of an impact on our audience. Hopefully we will receive some helpful feeback concerning this from our classmates who will hopefully comment on our draft that we uploaded in our previous blog post :)

Draft!

Before exporting a draft of our music video, we edited most of the scenes to make them look a bit softer, as some of the lighting is harsh and shiny. This also makes some of the shots match better!

After editing, we exported a draft of our music video so far. It's not complete and there are a lot of bits missing, but we have plans to film again soon!

You can skip the first 25 seconds, please leave us any feedback! :)

Editing!

Seeing as I won't be in Fridays lesson, I decided to do some editing this lunchtime as we are handing in a draft tomorrow!
I added in some more shots for the 'just crash' part of the song, which is pretty much just the chorus.
I think we will have to do some more shots at Needham lake now though, as I've realised that we have missed out some shots. For example, in the bit I have edited, I walk away too early and without Dj pulling me back, whereas in the shot list, he pulls me back and further into the song, I walk away.

However, I will talk to Caroline next week to see what she thinks :)

Todays lesson!

Todays lesson consisted of a photoshop trial/tutorial of the basics that we will need to know for making our digi pack. We played around with all the tools etc, and now feel a bit better about our ancillary task! :)
We then continued editing our music video, we have quite a lot done now, including this big section:

Ancillary Task

Whilst we're waiting for our footage to analyse for stabilisation, we thought we would look into our digi pack.
We already think we know what we're doing for the images, which we've already blogged about but we haven't decided the sorts of fonts, wording, layout etc.

Things that we are going to include on our digi pack will include:

• The name of the artist
• The name of the album
• Record label branding
• Pictures of relevant visual imagery
• Tracklisting
• Our website
• Credits - who wrote the song etc
• Logo
• Recording info
• Barcode
• Possibly CD/DVD logo

We think these things are important as they are the most common seen things on the most successful CD covers. For example:

The front of Adele's album cover:

The back of Chris Brown's album cover:

The back of Beyonce's album cover:

The front of Taylor Swift's album cover:

As part of our digi pack, we also have to include the inside of an album cover. Here we will include pictures of relevant visual imagery, credits, recording information etc.

We have chosen to include this sort of information inside as it past student examples with a high grade have included these sorts of things. For example:

This digi pack received a high A grade, and so we intend to take a similar approach and use the same marketing techniques. 

Importing footage

In todays lesson, we are currently importing our footage that we got last weekend, and we will then begin editing it all together!

Filming!!!!!!!

Unfortunately I was unable to film Saturday as the weather was really dull all day and it started to rain. However, I filmed today, and I think it went pretty well. However, undoubtedly some problems arose.

• Firstly, the camera didn't have enough charge so towards the end, a few of the shots were a bit rushed however I don't think it is going to affect our project too much.
• Secondly, I forgot to bring the list I had made that had all the shots I needed to get on it, so it was all based on memory, but I think I was able to get everything we need.
• And the biggest problem of all! There was a model boat competition at the lake. And the area where we previously filmed was completely swamped with competitors! So we had to re-film the entire 'present day' scenes on the other side of the lake. Although I think this has benefited us, as all these shots look so much nicer and better quality!
• A minor issue we had was that the part where I fall down just didn't look effective at all, so we had to change it. But I think it works so it's okay :)

After watching the footage, there were a few other problems. As the sun was behind us as we were filming; there is one shot where this is a complete silhouette of the camera on Dj's tshirt. We are hoping we could edit this out somehow! Yet this is unlikely and we may have to film this one shot again.

Also, there was one shot with someone really noticeably in the background, but they are right at the adge of the frame, so if need be, we can just crop the frame.

Filming tomorrow!

Tomorrow, I am going to film at Needham lake again, to reshoot some of the scenes we forgot to film the first time.

Thankfully it isn't going to rain:

So hopefully we can get the majority of our filming done! And only have a few flashbacks left to do :)

Editing 2

I didn't want to change anything drastic today as Caroline isn't here, so I've been trying to think about what shots should be black and white and what shots should be duller.
I just put the cheating scenes in black and white and it actually looks really good:

From our previous blog posts, you can see that we were debating what scenes should be black and white or not as we have LOADS of flashbacks. So, I think we should have the cheating scenes black and white, and Dj's half of the split screen during the intro should be really dull and my half should be really bright to create a contrast and evoke a mixture of different emotions. Although I will check with Caroline if she thinks this is a good idea :)

I think black and white will be more effective with the cheating scenes as it provokes a very sad feeling and it implies that there is no good (colour) in what he is doing. 

I also thought that the black and white made both of their clothing look darker, implying that both of their actions are bad.

Editing!

After uploading our footage on Tuesday, I noticed that as it was evening time, a lot of our shots were quite unclear and dark; so I am going to work on brightening up some of our shots and looking at different effects we could use to make our footage look better quality and to show that this is a negative moment in the narrative and that it is from the previous day.

Ancillary Task Planning

During todays lesson, Caroline was absent and so I didn't really want to edit that much as I didn't want to change anything or mess it up! So I decided to look into our Ancillary Text.

The other day in class, Miss Hill spoke to us about the Ancillary Task that we had to do which includes creating either a website, digi pack or a magazine advert alongside our music video.
After we had spoken to our teacher, Caroline and I decided on creating a website and a digi pack. However I already had a few examples for a digi pack and I have posted about it previously, and Caroline also likes this idea so we are going to continue with it.

After seeing previous student examples of both websites and magazine adverts, we have decided to create a website to promote our music video, we are going to use a website called Wix which Miss Hill has recommended to our class.
We are going to have a clear link between our video, digi pack and website by using the same text and images. In terms of layout; we both really like this previous student example, however our look will be very different:

http://turningdays.wix.com/online#!__home

Preview

This is just a very quick section of our music video that Amy and I have put together. It's barely anything, but we thought we would show you anyway!

Today's lesson!

In today's lesson Amy was absent so I didn't really want to do any editing without her in case she didn't approve. So I went through what we have done so far and created another table of what needs to be filmed and how long the scenes need to last at minimum. I also showed some of our music video to Ms Mullen who pointed out how when Amy goes to kiss Dj she is already close to him, but in the next shot she is far away. I edited this until I could see that they were at the same point in each of the two shots. I also put in a transition between Dj cheating and Amy crying, which we were trying to do yesterday.

This table is mostly the same as the last one, except that I have included the shots that need to be filmed in more detail, and haven't included the song lyrics as with what we have already edited into our music video we more or less know where things are meant to be place. I think the next time we film it is more important that we pay attention to how much filming is needed for each part, as we would rather have to many shots than to little.

If you open the image in a new tab / window, you will clearly be able to read it.

Unsupervised Lesson!

During todays unsupervised lesson we are going to edit the footage we gathered last night at Sophie's house.
At the moment, the clips are being stabilized on imovie, we will then import it to final cut express and begin editing!

Filming!

Last night Amy, Dj and I went to our friend Sophie's house and managed to film all that we needed for the shots where Dj is cheating on Amy. We went straight from school as we had to do some shots outside and we didn't want it to be to dark, however by half 4 it was nearly pitch black so when editing we may have to change the brightness on some of the clips we did outside. We filmed several shots of each thing we needed just incase we spot something during editing that isn't that good. 

No filming!!!! :(

I just got up to go to Needham Lake, to film in the sunshine and when we got there and got the tripod out, the bit that attaches the camera to the tripod was missing! My dad was with us, and he tried to attach the camera to the tripod himself but it just wouldn't stay. So annoyed!!!! But, I'm hoping the weather is good next weekend and hopefully we will be able to film again next Saturday!

However, seeing as there is no way to attach the camera to the tripod, we can't film any of the flashback scenes we were going to try and get either!

I will go and get a new tripod for filming at Sophie's house tomorrow though, so at least we will get some filming done before Tuesdays lesson.

Filming tomorrow!

After looking through my shot list and Caroline's table she made, I have noted down all the shots I need to get tomorrow; with clear instructions, so that I can get all our filming done accurately and so that we don't have to re-do anything!
So far, weather shouldn't be a problem either! :)

Hopefully I will be able to film some flashbacks tomorrow as well, but as you can see, sunset is extremely early tomorrow and by the time I finish the Needham Lake scenes, it could be dark, and this may be a problem! Although I will have to wait and see but I will try and get as much done as possible!

Filming we have left to do

These are all the parts we have left to film in our music video, in today's lesson Amy and I estimated the time and lyrics in the song where shots would take place, and on average how long they need to last to be in time with what we have done so far. From the notes we made I created this table so that we can easily see what we need to do, and by including the costume option we are able to see what costumes the characters need to be wearing when we are filming as there are 3 types needed. I also named the characters by there actual names because it makes it so much easier to distinguish between 'girl' and 'other girl'. We also need to re film the introduction of the music video, but I have not included that as Amy already knows exactly what needs to be filmed for that. Hopefully, most of the 'cheating flashbacks' will be filmed on Monday night, as we will be able to go to our friend Sophie's house and she can be the character that Dj cheats with. Over the weekend (if the weather improves), Amy is hopeing to be able to re-film the introduction and maybe even some of the 'present day' or 'young flashback' shots. We have yet to decide the actual costumes of the the different flashbacks.

The colours represent the different costuming and shots that need to be filmed, and it just helps us to read this just that litle bit easier. Green stands for the 'present day', red stands for the 'cheating flashbacks', and black stands for the 'young flashbacks'. If you open the image in a new tab, you will be able to clearly read it.

More Editing!

After finding out that we need to re-do most of our shots in Wednesday's class, we decided to look at our shot list and put all of the footage that we have filmed and we can use, into the correct places in the song.

We are also working out exactly where all our other shots should be; so that when it comes to editing next week once we have more footage, it should be less time-consuming! 

Split Screen Problems!

During todays class, we encountered a problem whilst editing and we found that for the whole of the 'intro' clips where Dj and I were getting ready to meet each other; all of these clips should have been filmed with him over to the left of the frame, and me over to the right rather than in the centre of the frame so that we could crop half of the clips and join them together; to create a split screen effect. Unfortunately, we aren't going to be able to use any of the 'intro' footage we had previously filmed and will have to film all of these clips again. We will try and film some of it again this weekend, and hopefully we will be able to edit the 'intro' next week. For now, we will edit the Needham lake footage that we filmed last weekend!

Filming this weekend!

As our footage uploaded, we were able to see what shots were okay, and what shots were missing/needed re-doing.

• We feel there is an issue with the wind at times, and so we are probably going to film the bench scene again. We also need to remember to have the camera pan in to girl already sat on the bench and boy entering the frame. And then to have the camera pan down/up to them on the bench after flashback.
• Shot of boy wiping away tear, and girl pushing him off and then walking off and leaving him alone on bench.
• Close-up shot of boys sad face watching after his girlfriend, camera moves in closer to focus on his eye.
• Tracking shot of girl walking off, out of frame, crying.
• We also forgot to film the necklace scene, so we will need to do that - close-up of girl holding necklace, extreme close-up of necklace and mid shot of girl throwing it on the ground.
• More close-up reaction shots of the boy - to make our audience empathise more with our characters.
• We need a shot of the couple in the embrace, before she pushes him away.
• Close-up reaction shot of boy crying as girlfriend walks away.

If the weather is really different this weekend, we may have to re-do the scene where the boy runs after his girlfriend and hugs her as she cries. And the ending, where they sit on separate benches.

We will also film some of the flashback scenes this weekend. And we hope to go to our friends house one day after school to film the scenes where the boy cheats on his girlfriend.

Audience research results

Originally when we were undecided as to which narrative and song we were going to do for our music video, we placed a gadget on our blog which enabled our audience to choose which of the ideas they best preferred. Even though this is no longer relevant as due to time constraints we had to pick an idea as soon as possible, the results we found were positive as 4 out of 5 of the people that chose to vote, picked the Crash - You Me At Six idea which we had chosen to do in the mean time. This was good as we wouldn't have wanted to have changed all of our planning last minute.

Audience survey results

A few weeks ago we created an online survey as part of our audience research, sadly only 3 people took it!  But as we have started to import our footage we have to begin to to analyse our results.

Question 2. Do you enjoy narrative-based music videos? - The possible answers were Yes, No and Sometimes, in the results for this we found that all 3 participants chose Yes. We chose to ask this question as the music video we are aiming to create it based on a narrative, the results are positive to us as it shows how our audience should enjoy the basis of our music video.

Question 3. Do you like it when the lyrics match the visuals in a music video? - The possible answers for this question were also Yes, No and Sometimes, for the results of this question we found that everyone chose the answer yes. The reason we asked this question was due to the fact that in our music video we are aiming to match some of the lyrics to the visuals, so our preferred answer would have been Sometimes. Due to our results we are aiming to try and match some more lyrics to visuals, other than just the one we originally planned.

Question 4. Is there anything you dislike about narrative based music videos?

Question 5. Is there anything in particular you would like to see in a narrative based music video? - For these final 2 questions we had no results as the participants of our online survey chose not to answer them, we don't know if this was due to the fact it would have to be a written response other than ticking a box, or whether it they genuinely didn't dislike anything about music videos or there was nothing they particularly wanted to see. We asked these questions because we wanted to see whether there was anything we definitely should or should not include in our music video, but due to our responses we can not know for sure!

Audience Questionnaire Results!

A little while ago, we posted a questionnaire that we had made online on to our blog for members of our audience to take!

Some of the results found that our audience preferred to see Narrative, Performance and People our age/things you can relate to, rather than things such as Dancing, Random images, Close-ups of the artist, People not our age/things you can't relate to or anything other. Here are the results:

We have found this feedback extremely useful, and reassuring as the main thing our music video centers around is a strong narrative with people our age, and a subject our audience can relate to.

When deciding the narrative for our music video; being a teenager myself, I knew what would appeal to the majority of other teenagers (our target audience); but I am really happy that the results prove this assumption :)

In answer to some of our other questions; we also discovered that narrative music videos are one of the most appealing to our target audience, as when answering our question: 'Is there anything you dislike about narrative-based music videos?' one person replied with 'Nope, they're great!'
And when answering our 'Is there anything in particular you would like to see in a narrative-based music video?' we received a response of 'People!' seeing as we have people in our narrative-based music video, this is great news!
Ultimately, I am really pleased that our music video seems to be very appealing to our target audience, which is exactly the result we had hoped for! :)

Importing Footage

In todays lesson, we have begun importing the footage that we recorded over the half term, and once we have done that, we will begin editing!

We still have some shots that we need to get, although we will do this this weekend.

Filming tomorrow as well!

Tomorrow, I think Dj and I will try and film some of the flashback scenes just so that we have less to film next week.
I think that in order to make the love the Girlfriend and the Boyfriend characters felt for one another, is to have many intimate close-up shots of the two together. I feel that the Miss Dior Le Parfum advert starring Natalie Portman shows the sort of intimacy I want to capture:

There are many intimate extreme close-up shots of the couple in this advert; they are very simple and quick shots yet they have a very lasting impression on the audience:

After watching the advert/seeing these stills; the audience can easily identify that this couple are happy and in love. Seeing as this is the impression we want our audience to have during the happy flashbacks in our music video, I think it would be in our favour to use similar shots in our music video as it would result in a stronger narrative and a stronger connection between our audience and our characters. Therefore, Dj and I shall film some shots similar to this tomorrow! The shots will either be used as an actual flashback scene, or possibly at the end during the montage scene where there is just a montage of present day and flashback scenes.

Filming, again! :)

Today Caroline, Dj and I met at Needham lake to do some filming, it was really, really windy and cold which made it quite difficult, but we proceeded with our filming.
However, we are a bit unsure of some of the shots due to how windy it was seeing as our other shots (that we filmed earlier on in the week - which are supposed to be the same day in the music video) will most likely look different! This may/may not be an issue, although Caroline and I have decided to begin editing next week and just see whether continuity is an issue for us and if so, we will film again next week :)
Now, all we have to do now is the flashback scenes! The majority of our filming is done!!

Weather for tomorrow is looking good!