Music Video - Final

My Final video. I have sped up the music video to match the music and have gotten rid of boring bits by adding more shots and flashes. Using Adobe After Effects CS6, Mr Wallis taught me how to add in the CRT TV Static Effect which I think looks really cool as it makes the less flickery, less jumping chorus shots more interesting

Music Video - Draft

 

I have finished and exported my music video draft and it has been uploaded to the Ashfield School media channel on YouTube. This is a draft of my final product because there are are a few changes I need to make including issues with video speed not matching the speed of the song, there are some boring bits and shots I feel dont quite fit in where they have been place. I'm also going to put the video on facebook and get some feedback and ideas on how to improve it. I'll then make appropriate changes based off of my own views and the feedback I get.

Digipak is Finished

Turns out even with my crazy limited knowledge of photo editing and with only Pixlr for editing software I can still manage to put together an awesome Digipak in less than a day.

 I created the image for the front and back covers by taking a weird static-looking frame from one of my shots from my filming and edited this in such a way that it looked bot industrial and a bit digital. I added noise and pixelated the image then adjusted it with the colour editing tools available on Pixlr. I actually really like the way they came out.

Using made up names and the (real) company Warp Records I added all the necessary information that needs to go on the back of an album over the image that I had created for the front cover. I think that the similar covers are cool as it'd look as though the cover continues all the way around the back. The lack of focal point in the images is interesting also as it draws attention to the text without being completely lacking in detail; cool shapes and lines are visible in the image

My favourite panel of the design is the inside front cover. For the background image of this panel I used a still frame of the cloudy sky from one of my days of filming and edited it using tools such as Gaussian blur, Add noise, pixelate and many more. I again played with the colours until it looked perfect (to me, you may think otherwise). I then had to go onto paint to add the text in the font i liked as it is not available on Pixlr. The font I used was embarrassingly called 'MineCrafter 3' which I already had on my computer because I'm a bit of a Minecraft nerd. I came up with some names I thought sounded cool to go on there along with 'Transmission' the track for which I created the video.

Panel four the inside of the back cover wouldn't be attached on the seam nearest the fold (if it we're real) to create a sleeve for the disk itself to go in. For this panel I took a picture of Gracie which is actually already on the 10,000BC site and edited it on Pixlr until I was happy with it.

I really like the way all of the panels turned out, I feel they're all similar looking enough to be part of the same digipak and I feel they match the artist brand and the song really well.

 

Digipak - Template

I have decided to make a four panelled digipak as the examples of digipaks that I have seen that match my genre tend to have just four panel as opposed to six,

I have created a template using one at this link  and made a few changes on paint

I have chosen to make the Inside Back Cover a sleeve for the disk as the design on this panel will be easier to see without there being the casing for the disk like most digipaks and CD cases.

Website Update - Completely Completed

(Click the Image)

 

I was under the impression the site would automatically be at the domain name 10000bc.wix.com/

but it is instead at aaronweir1996.wix.com/10000bc which sort of sucks. To change the domain name of a wix website you have to pay for Wix Premium. If were going to do that the ideal name would be 10000bc.com but as I'm not going to do this I'll have to deal with it as it is

Website Update - Homepage Completion

I've finished the website homepage since the last post I made on here and I have changed the entire site's background to this crinkled paper background that I found as one of the preset background options on Wix. 

I quite like the way this looks. I prefer it to the plain white as that seemed a bit boring and empty. I have also finished the gallery page as I got Gracie to come round so I could take some cool photos, I chose the best ones to put on the site, I actually like the average quality and lack of editing oin the pictures as it makes it look a little less 'trying-to-hard'y. I also added a side scrolling galleryget on the info page. The info page and the music page are all that need doing now as I dont know what to do on either page.

Filming - Day 05 Kingsway Park

Itinerary: Light, Camera and my phone(to play the song)

Last night me and Gracie met on Kingsway park. I decided on this location as the batting cages on the park resemble well cages. I thought this'd be ideal for the 'Come on little Fucker you can let me out,' Lyric. I had originally planned to just use the side of a building site near my house as they mark the building site perimeter with a similar fence but Gracie suggested the batting cages which seemed slightly more appropriate.

I got shots of Gracie lip-syncing the 'Little fucker' lyric a few times. I think the shots look really cool as I filmed them without the tripod as the shaky look came out well in the other shots. I also again used the light as we filmed at night as the dark shots from our fourth day of filming looked really cool.

Website is Coming Along

Using a template on Wix.com called 'Black Barby' I have managed to make quite a bit of progress into building a Wensite for my artist 10,000BC. I really like how it's coming along

 

 

The Tour dates section at the side remains from the template but these will be changed to be 10,000BC's tour dates and it'll all look awesome. I still have to do the other 3 pages but they shan't take too long

Filming - Day 04 Filming in the dark

On Moday 25th November, Gracie came round so that we could filmed some more. We managed to get quite a lot of footage. we went back up to my upsatirs where there is the nice plain white wall to use as the backdrop. I filmed her lipsyncing the two main verses in the light because the original clips were barely usable. We then did the same again in the dark using my really bright 20 LED light. I filmed this by hand, without the tripod to make the shot less boring and make the video seem less repetative and dull.

The shots in the dark were particularly hard for Gracie as it was difficult for her to read the lyrics which wasnb't helped by the fact that she was without her glasses. We managed though, and I think a lot of the shots we got look really good.

Filming - Day 03 Commotion in the Quarries

Itinerary: Camera, Tripod, Lyrics sheet
Location(s): Portland Park, The Quarries

We managed to get quite few shots including a few lip syncing shots under a bridge on the way to the quarries, multiple shots of Gracie just walking around looking creep and a few other shots, like establishing shots of locations and a couple others such as water flowing in a river whilst it was raining.

 

Our filming was cut short by me noticing I had lost my phone so we had to go looking for it. We eventually found it though as we heard my gay-ass ringtone of  'A Thousand Miles - Vanessa Carlton' it had fell out of my pocket as we were walking down a hill, luckily it didnt fall out when we were jumping over rivers, that'd have been really bad.

 

Overall it was an alright day as we did manage to get a fair few shots and my phone was eventually found.

Planning - Album name

Using the site I used to get my idea for my artist name I found an idea for my album name. After clicking the 'This name sucks. Give me a new one.' button I came across the name 'The Grinding Mechanism ' which I think sounds pretty awesome.

Filming - Day 02 No Success

Itinerary: Camera, Tripod

Location(s): Portland Park

We took the camera and tripod to Portland Park, planning to get some cool shots there and down the Quarries but it was too dark by the time we got there and Gracie was barely even visible in the shots; She suggested brighteneing them up in editing but that would create a lot of static and noise so we went back to my house.
On the way back to mine we managed to find a little residential road right near mine called Sylvan Avenue, that looked creepy enough at night so I managed to film a few shots of her looking mysterious walking around under lamposts and stuff.

 

Filming - Day 01 Lipsyncing

Itinerary: Camera, Tripod, Gracie
Location: My Bathroom

Filmed in my bathroom we got the lipsyncing done. I chose that my bathroom would be an ideal location as there is a plain white wall to have as the background. In every take of the lipsyncing Gracie messed up a little bit but I think I can crosscut it together and make it look good enough, if not the we could always re-film it if needed as it wasn't a very taxing task.

 

I also managed to finally get the costume photos needed for my blog which I uploaded on the day we filmed. Obviously a lot more needs to be done 'til I get even nearly finished but it feels good having finally made a start.

Planning - Costume, Hair and Make-up

As Gracie is going to be the only one in the video, and there are no real, major costume changes only one costume needs to be planned for.
 

Throughout the video she'll be wearing her black, ankle length leather coat, with a black shirt underneath some black skinny jeans and her black converse.
 

 

I chose to go with the black shirt as it looks amazing, the white shirt simply didn't match the rest of the attire. Gracie actually has and incredibly Gothic waistcoat that I sold her because it barely fit anymore and it was far from my style. I figure this will look good with this outfit as it seems likely. Next time we do some filming,I'll have her bring the waistcoat along. Gracie independantly decided the studded choker should be added. I really like the choker, it makes the costume more alternative and less plain black however the plain blackness won't be an issue once the waistcoat ius added because although it is black it is also really cool.

 

The waistcoat is a black sort of denim material, the sleves look asthough the have been ripped off  which creates an awesome effect and it does up with a thickish steel zip along with keyring type clasps that lay over the zip. this should make the outfit look less boring and plain.

 

[Picture of waistcoat here]  [Picture of costume+ waiscoat here]

 

No major make-up should be required as her face is already very pale which will contrast the (/mainly) black costume and fit the alternative genre characteristics as a lot of alternative artists / actors in alternative videos are in dark clothing looking pale.
 

Gracie currently has dark brown hair, this may fit the video well and look good but if it doesn't then it wont be hard to make her hair look darker with brightness and contrast settings in editing. Her hair for this video will be made to be a bit messy so as to look industrial and alternative, but not so messy that it looks scruffy. 
 

Some of the scenes will just show Gracie lip-syncing to the track, these will be filmed in my house against the plain white wall of my bathroom, I think this is a good choice scene as there is a lot of natural light. For these scenes I may not have her wear the leather jacket and instead just have the shirt. As these kind of shots will be close ups - with just head and shoulders showing - it doesn't really matter what shoes and legwear are worn for these shots.

Planning - Actor/Actress

This is Gracie, probably my best friend. She will be playing the character of 10,000BC in my video and will be the "artist" of the song. The song is clearly voiced by a male; this isn't an issue as Gracie, previously Adam Saxton, is transgender and is thus biologically a dude despite feeling mentally that she is female. She has agreed, and wasn't offended with much relief to me, to play the guy in my video.

Planning - Name

After further thought into artist's alias, I've established that he will simple be know as '10,000BC' as oppsed to '10,000 Broken Chains' [Ten Thousand Broken Chains] and instead have the name '10,000BC' just stand for 10,000 Broken Chains. Just as the band 'H.I.M' [pronounced 'him'] go by 'H.I.M' but that stands for His Infernal Majesty.

 

The logo remains as what i posted on Tuesday.

Location - My Bathroom

Weirdly one of the filming locations I have chosen to use is the upstairs bathroom in my house. I chose to use this room for filming as it is a well lit room, with lots of natural and artificial light, but the main reason that i chose this room were because there is a plain white wall that can be used as a nice clean looking background to the lipsyncing scenes such as the ones we filmed Thursday. I also thought this room would be ideal as it is ver close and easy to get to for Gracie and it is crazy-easy for me to get to it as it is in my house.

Planning - Shots

Planning - Name and Logo

I had the idea to call the artist '10,000 Broken Chains' [Ten Thousand Broken Chains] instead of just 'Broken Chains' because it can then be shortened to '10,000BC' which is an awesome artist name because it sounds like the year 10,000BC. I have adapted the logo from the original and have produced this logo draft

I really like the idea of a crossed out zero meaning broken chain because it looks like a chain link, it is crossed out to show that it is a broken chain link rather than a normal one, and also because if it weren't crossed out it'd look like the artist was just called '100,000'.

 

I need to have more of a play around with fonts before I make final descisions on the logo.

 

Another logo idea that I have had since deciding on '10,000 Broken Chains' as the artist's name is to just have 10,000BC as the logo. I had the idea that I could use a more digital looking font to contrast the fact that 10,000BC was a very long time ago. Although this does look very cool, I have decided against this as I dont think the song sounds digital enough for the logo to properly apply.



 

After playing around a bit more on Dafont I have found a few examples of good fonts to use to make my artist's logo. Here are some that I thought looked cool.

Font names (top left to bottom right) 'Face Your Fears','Inky','Levi Brush','L.C Smith 5 Typewriter','Bad Gudge' and 'c39hrp48dhtt'.

My favourite out of these 6 designs is 'L.C Smith 5 Typewriter' as it looks alternative without looking scruffy like 'Levi Brush' or 'Face Your Fears' which look as though they'd fit better with a more harcore, metal band. The barcode styled one is the collest looking but like 'Digital 7', I feel it looks like it'd suit a more digital or electro band a bit better.

I've spent lots of time exploring fonts and have concluded I'm going to use the 10,000BC logo in the font 'L.C Smith 5 Typewriter'. I've decided this looks better than the crossed out '0' logo and it is more obvious that it is supposed to represent an artist called '10,000 Broken Chains'.
 

Finalised artist logo

 

Research - My Target Audience

To get a better idea of my target audience I took a look at the target audiences of the bads I looked at such as 'How To Destroy Angels' (HTDA), 'Nine Inch Nails'(NIN), 'Ministry' etc. and have deducted from this an idea of the audience that would enjoy the type of video I'm imagining I'll produce.

 

Trent Reznor's bands HTDA and NIN are aimed at a similar audience despite being music from very different genres (NIN make Industrial Metal music whereas HTDA make Post Industrial/Electronica music). Their audiences' are, particularly for Nine Inch Nails, are older (35-50 year old), Industrial, Alternative/Metal fans however a lot of their (NIN's) target audience was younger (20-25 year old) Industrial, Metal/Alternative fans back in the late 80's- mid 90's meaning most of their fans have aged with them whilst maintaining their like for the band's music.

I feel most of the people within NIN's, HTDA's and Ministry's audiences fall in the demographic range of E-C1 (maybe B also).

 

I feel my song applies well to a similar demographic as these bands; anyone from early 20s - late 40s. My song is  an Industrial Metal track so I feel it is also aimed at Alternative/Metal fans like NIN's music. However the song is quite fast paced, it is for this Reason I am picturing a fast paced, flickery video which applies more to a younger audience as I see thge product I am going to make to be energetic at the same time as looking industrial and alternative

Website Research - How To Destroy Angels

 

How To Destroy Angels' Website

Website Research - KORN (Changes)

Korn update their site the day after I made my last post. Their website is now themed to reflect their ablum newest album 'The Paradigm Shift'. The changes include the obvious background change; the page has now been made blue with what is made to look like dirt marks at the bottom. They have also added the giant, weird, translucent faces at the side which is the main element on the album cover.

 

The page colour scheme as also been changed; the frame around the youtube video player has been changed to fit the new theme and all the navigation links and stuff have been made yellow to contrast the new blue background. The Register/Log in button has been moved to the top of the screen so as to not abstruct the images (of the faces) at the sides, the button still remains in place when you scroll down as it did before.

Website Research - KORN

KORN WEBSITE

Mature Science - Retox

 

Goodwin

The brutality and violence is one way in which this video reflects the genre and the genre characteristics; frequently in metal video there is excessive rampage and violence. In the video as they pull the KKK guy out of the man, it appears all slimy and gross this relates to Goodwin’s words as the lyrics say ‘Lubricating our driest generation!’ This makes good point as he seems to be referring to racists and murderers as “our driest generation”. AS the record label demands there are lots of shot of the lead singer’s face along with lots of shots of the band members playing their instruments the final point of Goodwin’s theory that I can see in this video is the use of close ups on eyes and lights reflect the notion of looking

Mise en Scene

The use of static/glitch effect they have added in the editing right at the beginning has been used to show the violence and volatility of the music. The video also does this when the human body is ripped apart and when the klansman is killed. The building in which the video is filmed is shown as empty and possibly abandoned like the locations I am planning to try and use. I feel they have chosen this location to show that they know what they are doing to these people is illegal (despite not being wrong because obviously the other guy is supposed to represent someone whom in the KKK)

 

Camera

This seems to have been filmed mainly on handheld camcorders to create the same jittery, faced paced and disjointed. A low angle long shot is used as they are carrying the person around; they are shown scuttling around with this live body as if trying to get it somewhere quickly without getting caught.

Editing

In editing they have added in static glitches like an old TV playing a video and have put lines over the screen throughout to hold on to the old TV feel.

-

I really like this video and am going to try encapsulate a similar effect they have achieved from their editing however I also really like the use of playing clips backwards like they have done using trickling blood.

The Loop Closes - How To Destroy Angels

 

 

 

This is pretty much the sort of thing I want to have produced by the end of the year. I really like the whole general feeling of the video. I like the way that the video uses the a filter to create this affect of an old, broken television. I'm going to try reflect this in my video except using the shots I have listed earlier on this blog

Survival - Eminem

Being a huge fan of Eminem since childhood I was psyched when I heard he was back (again). On the 8th of October Eminem released the video for his new single 'Survival', which is incredibly different from his other awesome and recent single 'Berzerk'.

Eminem's music is incredible he's constantly producing great music. Just yesterday he released 'Rap God' which I think may be the best rap he's ever released (not the best song he's done but the best rapping). In 'Rap God' he is mainly just boasting like an obnoxious ass about how amazing he is at rapping; which would be annoying, if he weren't right.

Research - 'With Teeth' Digipak

'With Teeth' (stylized as [WITH_TEETH]) is the fourth studio album by American industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails.

I think that the Digipak album art for 'With Teeth' by Nine Inch Nails nicely captures the genre of the music on the album and the music that the band normally make. The cover shows the band logo very largely across the top but nowhere on the cover does it say Nine Inch Nails; this has been done because the logo is very well recognised by their fans and people in general. On the cover their is the Parental Advisory tag, this is there to indicate that the album contains explicit content. On the front of this digipak there are two stickers; one stating that there are 15 new songs on the album along with 2 bonus tracks on the digipak vertsion only, and the other sticker simply shows that this is the special edition version of the album.

The front folds away to the left like a book revealing the track list on the inside of the cover and a weird, smeared looking, glitchy image of something on the other cover. 

The picture behind the track list continues on carries on through all three panels when the digipak is fully opened, stood infront of the image, in the middle panel, is Trent Reznor who is like partly faded away in a sort of glitch art effect. On the right panel is the housing for the disk and the background image is carried on behind it.

 The disk has a similar stripy effect running across it to the background of the panels. The disk reads 'NINE_INCH_NAILS: [WITH_TEETH]' across the top, with all the 'N's backwards. The disk also says 'HALO_19' on it, this means that it is the 19th CD that Nine Inch Nails have released. On the disk, in the bottom right, are the record labels, distribution details and copyright details etc.

Here is the back/outside of the digipak when it is fully opened out, on the back of the middle panel, in the bottom left corner, we can again see the record label, copyright and distribution details. We can also see the whole of the cover picture extended across the three panels. In the bottom right corner of the back (middle) panel is the Barcode; this is obviously there on the outside (when closed) of the digipak so it can be scanned by shop cashiers when the album is being bought.

Planning - Shot Ideas

Seeing as my video doesn't particularly need a narrative I have just drawn a few shot ideas rather than storyboarding. Instead of putting my crude little etchings on here I'm going to list a few of the shots and ideas in writing so as to not ruin my blog:

• I decided I'd get quite a lot of shots of my actor Gracie (who is transgendered and thus looks like a dude despite being mentally female) walking round abandoned places such as the few old factories and abandoned places in Kirkby whilst looking pretty vacant. I'll also get a few shots of her walking around town at night and in the rain.
• I'll use close-ups of her face looking serious as well as maybe one with her middle finger to the camera.
• There's a building site near my house that we used to go on and climb about on, we can break in and climb on there at night to get some cool idustrial shots
• We can use the chain link fence around the building site to look like a cage and use that shot to match the line "Come little fucker, can you let me out?" because "let me out" implies the artist is trapped or encaged within something.
• I'll use close ups and mid shots of her looking at the camera when it's raining showing her wet hair and clothes with a serious look on her face.
• For the line "followed by the vision of my God" I'm going to show the clouds and the sun because the sky connotes God and religion.
• Close ups of like moving worms and maggots and stuff that is 'angin'
• At the begining I'm going to have a picture of a perfect red apple and then at the end have it looking all gross.
• I'm going to get loads of shots of just normal things; I'm going to just film a busy road at night showing loads of cars.
• I'll get a bird's eye shot from a really high building like the big Westgate building thing in mansfield and film the town below .
• Shots down the Quarries including the running water in the little river thing. There's a little concrete shelter with grafitti everywhere, we could get a shot or two there of Gracie looking mysterious and sinister.
• Down the quarries there are some train tracks that we can get a few shots of Gracie on, just like walking about on them.
• POV Shots looking down on Gracie's feet walking around
• After feedback it was suggested that I just use few shots of my cat just doing cat stuff
• A blurred shot out of the bus window just showing the street, possibly when it's raining
• Sped up shots of people walking around, in groups eg. getting off of a train
• Feedback suggested I should only show the actor in blurred/unfocused shots, I may use this in a few shots to create more mystery around the actor.
• Something, like a glass or a window or something, smashing in slow motion
• Footage/ Stock footage of moths and other bugs
• A flickering light

 

Planning - Band Name Logo

After playing around on a few font sites such as Dafont, FontSquirrel and a couple others I have found some cool industrial fonts with which to write Broken chains.

This is a nice simple name logo thing that uses a stencil like design to create a bold, bulky logo

This is a cool creative name logo thing that also uses a stencil like design to create a bold logo however I feel this design looks more industrial as the writing is made to look worn and rusty. This is probably the font I'll be going with as it is may favourite of the 6 that i have found.

Planning/research - Band Name and logo

After listening to my song more and talking a bit with my actor for the video, we decided to take band/artist name into closer consideration and have pretty much concluded the artist's name shall be Broken Chains. This will be a solo artist under the stage name Broken Chains; similar to Pictureplane (Travis Egedy) and Marina and the Diamonds (Marina Diamandez). I have decided to discard the name Binary Future as it sound far too Electronic for the sound of the song and not nearly Industrial enough.

I figured bands and/or artists whom have a logo are more easily recognized. I came to this conclusion because loads of people know of H.I.M's famous heartagram logo, and Misfits' Skull logo. Many other examples such as The Rolling Stones' tongue logo are recognized frequently and it is for this reason why I have came up with this logo. The logo I have designed (in 5 minutes on MS Paint) shows a zero in italics, this represents a chain link. The zero has then been crossed out which shows the chain is broken (top right). Some more examples of widely familiar logos include Nirvana's drunken smiley face logo, Nine Inch Nails' simple NIN logo, Slipknot's aztec tattoo styled 'S', Van Halen's big VH and many more.

Band logos are useful to have if you want you want to get your band noticed because they often use simple ideas to create significant designs. An example of this is the use of backwards letters; NIN have their backwards 'N' as show above this teqnique is also used by Eminem whom has his second 'E' backwards, Korn who have the backwards 'R' and ABBA whom have their secon 'B' backwards this is done to add a feel of symetry to logos and to make the more distinct from other logos.

Many bands such as Van Halen, Anal Cunt, Nine Inch Nails, The Dead Kennedys, Skinny Puppy, Foo Fighters and probably thousands more have a logo simply built up of their band name initials, this is a good idea because the use of initials/acronyms is a great way to remember things this makes the logos simple and memorable.

Bands such as Prince, Aphex Twin, Throbbing Gristle, Bad Religion and  use logos that are just weird designs or well known symbols editied. For example Aphex Twin's logo is apparently just an alienified 'A' and Bad Religion  have simply put the Holy Cross inside a No sign thing . I have used the idea of creating an abstract logo like this rather than using BC (Broken chains) as I found it difficult to make BC look like a broken chain.

A lot of bands have a logo made of just their band name except in a certain font this is good because the font becomes part of the bands identitiy. They become recognised by their name being written in that font. I'm going to also come up with a band name logo like a lot of bands do for example Linkin Park have their LP logo and then they have their name wirtten in their chosen font and they use these 2 logos on different things.

Ten Little Girls - Curve

 

Goodwin

The video uses close shots showing the band members which, as Goodwin clearly states, is done to make the audience recognise them and remember their faces.

Mise en Scene

The video is quite dark and frequently uses high contrast to make the video look ominous and creepy. The video uses lots of shots filmed on a handheld camera; this is evident as the visual is shaky and unstable, an effect I quite like and will be using myself in my video. The video is mainly black and white with an exception of a few shots filmed in sepia or with a sepia-like filter, this is cool as colour would make the video seem too happy and would draw away from the cool dark feeling.

Camera

Lots of close-ups and big close-ups of faces are used to get the audience familiar with the band members. Fast camera movements along with short cuts are used to make the video feel disjointed and fast

 

Editing

Close-ups of instruments and other things are used as quick cutaways throughout, this creates an effect I am fond of too and may also be using. Slow exposure (probably) has been used to create a warm yet sinister feeling whilst again showing a big close-up of the lead vocalists face.

Track 4 - Lyrics

The lyrics and lyric timings for the song

 

Research - Digipak

We have to, as part of this project, produce a digipak for the single/LP with our tracks on. These are the dimensions of a regular 6 paneled digipak are: 139.5mm x 6mmx 125.5mm.

This will be usefull as i can print this out and produce some little sketches of my ideas.

Eat Raw Meat - Editors

'Eat Raw Meat = Blood Drool' is the full song name.

 

The song is not industrial at all really and it's not the happiest song in the world and isn't a fun song you can dance to but the video includes some similar imagery that wouldn't be out of place in an Industrial Rock music video.

 

 

Mise en Scene

The video uses dark, almost propaganda-esque animation that looks like it may well have been animated by Cyriak. Cyriak frequently uses something normal like a sheep going baaa and make it a crazy creepy video of a sheep falling apart into different mechanisms. The Editors' video uses dark animated imagery to make social statements.

Editing

When the song gets faster the scene cuts come quicker and the video clips used are shorter.
 

Goodwin

The video relates to Goodwin's theory of music videos in a very small way as it shows no video of the band themselves like most videos. Infact the only way this can fit to Goodwin's theory is though the few instances where the lyrics relate to the music video for example when the lead singer says 'When I'm a gun in a fist fight.', on screen there is a loaded gun on screen.

_

 

Obviously I wont be producing anything like this in my video because I don't now how to be an awesome animation jedi. There aren't many ways I can use this video to inspire my own because it's all animated. Although I like how the video is greyscale (black and white) throughout, which I was thinking of doing anyway, but this video has probably made this more likely because it gives a cool sinister effect.

Homemade Music Video

Some girl and some friends made a video for 'Not in Love - Crystal Castles (ft. Robert Smith)' and has got over 4M views and 50K likes on it on youtube. This video is honestly awesome, I just hope my video for Track 4 comes out as good.

 

The video looks very proffessional and matches the song well. I really like the fact that it is filmed in the snow as it makes the video seem very cold, emotionally and physically. The shaky camera of the chase scenes creates a very hectic feeling and makes the fact that she is being chased even more scary.

Planning - Band name?

Iwas distraught after finding out that H2So4 was already a band so instead I simply searched 'Industrial band name gnerator in google and came to a site. After clicking the 'This name sucks. Find me a new one' button about 70(approx)times the site started throwing out great words and word combonations that fit my track (Track 4) incredibly well.

.

 

Binary Future is far from a finalised name but it's fairly good.

 



Digital Hazard

The Grinding Mechanism

The Broken Machine

Archaic Violence

Digital Violence

Future Data

Damn The Chains

Binary Hazzard

Mass Effect

Broken Chains

Zombie Slaves

Future Nature

Desolation

 

These are just a few of the awesome name suggestions that the generator gave me, plus some ones I thought of during the searching process, but at the moment I think I am fairly settled on Binary Future, for now at least.



Planning - Location

The only sort of ideas I have for locations is that I wanna find derelict, abandoned buildings to film in. I have a few in mind. there's one in Sutton and a few place that'd be good in Kirkby. I also know of a few that might be good in Mansfield.

My actor for my artist is my good friend Gracie, She is transgender so it wont be an issue that my actor isn't a guy. I just need to get some shots of her looking dark and creepy whilst lipsynching in these different locations.

There's an old abandoned factory in Kirkby that is really easy to break in to and I can think of a few other locations in the Quarries that might be good to get some footage at. There is a giant (scarily high) tower thing above the train tracks that we used to climb a few years ago, we could also get some filming done on tracks and in a few other places in the Quarries that I can think of.

Timekiller - Project Pitchfork

I'm not really going to be using this video for research I just came across it when looking around on youtube. Project Pitchfork are an electro-industrial/ darkwave / goth band, I have literally just heard this song by them just now and I quite like them. I'm fond of the video a lot but it isn't exactly the sort of video I am hoping to produce, I just thought I'd post this because I like the use of bugs and stuff I'll probably use this idea a lot as I have seen it in a few other industrial music videos and I feel they could sort of add an essence of creepiness to my video.

(screenshot 0:25)

 

Came Back Haunted - Nine Inch Nails

Planning - Ideas so far

Stigmata - Ministry

The video for Stigmata by Ministry is the video I like most out of all the videos I have chosen to research as I want to make my video similar to this. I especially like the flashing of images that is frequently used in industrial music videos.

 

 

 

Krank - KMFDM

Goodwin

One of the points in Goodwin's theory states music videos present genre characteristics. This video does this by showing the band members playing their instruments, representing the stage performances shown in a lot of other metal and industrial metal videos. Another way that this video fits Goodwin's theory is the fact that the lyrics are directly related to the video; for example after the lyrics say "With another motherfucking Dirty Bomb" an explosion graphic appears as a woman falls into frame. It also relates to the notion of looking a lot showing loads of screens. Finally, this video fits Goodwin's theory as there are frequent close-ups of the band members.

Mise en Scene

The video is mainly quite dark with high contrast, this has been done to show the dark side of Industrial metal however the video uses quite a lot of electric greens, I believe this has been done to make it really obvious that they are more electronic than regular metal music. There has been lots of fire and explosions used to show the destruction and anarchy that their music reflects. The video has a sort of digital feel to it; heavy use of screens, static, glitch art and pixelated images have been used to exaggerate the digital feel to make it obvious that they have a much more electronic sound than most metal artists. The outfits used in this video are like Skinhead style if it were crossbred with Cybergoth, I really like their style but it is not for me and would not suit my song by any means.

Camera

Fast, jolty camera movements reflect the high-speed, crazy, alternative music lifestyle that KMFDM presumably lead. Lots of weird camera movemnts (including a spinning zoom out) make the video feel disjointed and thus more exciting. Low angles of the artist performing make them seem more important. The direct address to the camera makes the video feel aimed at you when you watch it, it isn’t just a video, it’s like a video for you which makes the audience more attached to the artist..

Editing

This video is so heavily edited I don’t know where to start. Quick takes and short cuts and cutaways make the video faster and more extreme and thus more interesting to watch. CGI oh people riding on falling A-Bombs make the video even more violent and extreme. Flashes of the band name help the viewer remember the name and help the band get their name out more. Every sing shot or scene in this video is edited to a ridiculous extent, all to make the video cooler to their target audience.

__

This video is sort of exempt from Archer's music video analysis as it shows no narrative whatsoever. I really like this video as it includes fast placed flashes between images and text like a lot of industrial videos do. I plan to use this technique in my video as my song is industrial sounding too, however my track (track 4) is far from industrial metal and is much more industrial rock/goth/darkwave.

In the lyrics they say “Krank it to 11!” this is a intersexual reference to the American Rock-Mockumentary ‘This is Spinal Tap’.

My Chosen Track - Track 4

We were given - as a year group - 25 unnamed unknown tracks to chose from, each group/person must chose one track, market it and make a music video for it by the end of the year. I chose Track 4 from the list

listen to ‘Track 4’ on Audioboo

 

Research - Steve Archer

All the information I could find about Steve Archer's theory is that he says that all music videos have some sort of narrative.He also says that all music videos switch between a performance of the music by the band/musician and the narrative. A great example of this is the video for Stan by Eminem (ft Dido). The Narrative shows a guy, Stan(ley) as he makes poor choices causing his, his wife's and their unborn childs' deaths.

This narrative is constantly being switched between narrative and performance as the characters in the narrative are singing the song.

Research - Richard Dyer

Richard Dyer created a theory known as star theory. This theory states that stars are constructed, artificial images, even if they are represented as being "real people", experiencing real emotions etc. It helps if their image contains a USP — they can be copied and/or parodied because of it. Their representation may be metonymic — Madonna's conical bra in the early 1990s, Bono's 'Fly' sunglasses, etc. Pop stars have an advantage over film stars in that their constructed image may be much more consistent over a period of time, and is not dependent on the creative input of others (e.g. screenwriters writing their lines).

 

Dyer proposes that:

A star is an image not a real person that is constructed (as any other aspect of fiction is) out of a range of materials (such as advertising, magazines etc as well as films and music).

Preliminary Task - Piece

I had to upload through blogger alone as Youtube took it down as it was a breach of copyright regulations. 

vimeo squished it down a bit but here it is

A2 Preliminary Task Piece from Aaron Weir on Vimeo.

Preliminary Task - Evaluation

This is by far the worst thing I have ever produced. We didn't get nearly enough footage to fill the one minute twenty-five seconds that we were supposed to film so we had to substitute in the original Britney Spears video making the narrative of it make no sense; One minute the main protaganist is Kirby and the next it is Britney. I think I have edited it quite well however I probably could have put more effort into matching the colour, brightness and contrast to the actual video but I couldn't remember how and wanted to get this done so that I could begin to focus on my actual A2 piece.

The final preliminary piece produced is pretty terrible but it could've been worse to be honest; however I'd be lying if I said I was happy with it.

Preliminary Task - Editing

I chose to do all my editing at home on Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 as I am better at working at home and I prefer CS6 to school's CS3.

All I did was take the Britney video with the music and layer our visual footage over it. I then simply muted the second audio layer so that you can't here us talking over it. I used some fade ins and outs when needed and left the colour and brightness all the same.

Planning - Settings

To match the scenes of the video we are using a classroom and a school corridor.

 

We're using (what was previously known as) Trent Houseroom, now: Year 7 Base as our class room as there is a lot of space, a lot of light available, and it's rarely got a class in. This class is good because we can easily organise the tables in the way we need without getting told off. We can also use the computer at the front of the class so that we can watch the Britney video and put it on the big screen so we can actually see the video while we film it. We watch the clips and then film then immediately after.

 

We chose to use the corridor in the PE block as it is spacious and full of light. Although there is a lot of space there's is howver some pillars in the way that may be a problem when we try to re-enact the dance scenes. This is a good choice of setting as it is similar looking to the actual corridor used in the music video.

 

(this post will have pictures on, eventually)

Planning - Costumes

As we're only doing up to the scene and costume change at approximately 1:25 the only costumes we need to prepare are the school-themed ones, these are:

 

Britney is wearing a grey cardigan with a white crop top shirt, a short black skirt and a maroon coloured top/bra is also visible underneath her shirt. She has knee high grey socks and black, high-heeled creepers. Her hair is in pigtails, which have been done with little pink ribbons.

 

The female back-up dancers wear much the same however they are not wearing cardigans. Some of their knee high socks are black and other's are white.

 

The male back-up dancers are in white shirts, black blazers, black and blue striped ties (some are in maroon ties), sand coloured school trousers and school shoes however swome are in trainers. Some are also wearing weird grey trilbys/fedoras that make them look gay as fuck.

 

The teacher of the classroom at the begining of the music video is shown wearing a dark brown blazer and big round glasses to make her appear old despite her looking no older than 25 (no idea why they didn't get an actual teacher to play this part, or just someone actually old). She's wearing a white shirt and her hair is shoulder length and flicks up at the ends which along with the full fringe makes her look old and outdated

Research - Laura Mulvey

Laura Mulvey is a British feminist film theorist. She was educated at St Hilda's College, Oxford. She is currently professor of film and media studies at Birkbeck, University of London.

Laura Mulvey coined the term 'The Male Gaze' in 1975. The theory suggests that the audience are forced to view the text from the perspective a heterosexual male as the films constantly focus on womens' bodies and because for some reason everyone thinks that's all any heterosexual male can ever think about.

The camera sexualises women by lingering on their breasts, curves and booties much like hetero men do all the time supposedly. To an extent I agree with Mulvey's theory as it is what is done in the media the male gaze is used an awful lot to sexualise and objectify women. However I find it generalises far too much about men saying the camera focusses on womens' curves and bodies because that is what all men do. I will admit that a lot of hetero men do do this but I think it is quite harsh and a little bit offensive to state outright that this is all that we think about.

Planning - Story Board

Kirby produced a story board for our preliminary task using snapshots collected by Harry from the video to 'Baby One More Time - Britney Spears'

Planning - Roles

We decided in our group that Myself and Aidan would be the cameramen for out Preliminary task piece, we also decided that Lauren Skinner (previous media student) would be our Britney, this was a good choice I believe as Lauren does dancing and as she has allegedly said to Miss Jarman she is willing to help. However we chose Kirby as our back up Britney if Lauren for some reason can't come in to help on the certain days we would need her for, or if in fact she is unwilling to help us. We also decided on Harry, Aidan and Kirby as back-up dancers if obviously Kirby isn't Britney and Aidan will presumably be filming the shots he isn't in. (I may also play the teacher at the begining)

Baby One More Time - Applying Goodwin

Goodwin's theory applied to the 'Baby One More Time' Video

Goodwin's first point states music genres demonstrate genre characteristics. This is evident in the video for 'Baby One More Time'  as the ridiculous-looking, intricate dance routine reflects the pop genre as dance routines are often present in the videos of other pop songs.

Goodwin also points out that there is often a relationship between the lyrics and visuals however there are not many relations of visuals to the song, only in dance moves really, for example when there are lyrics to do with a broken heart they dance move will have them touching their hearts.

As Goodwin's theory states; the record label will require there to be lots of shots of the main artist. There are many shots of Britney throughout the video and whole time she is shown to be a school girl, with the matching uniform, but she stands out by wearing slightly different clothing, to make her stand out. For example she wears a grey cardigan over her shirt, but the other dancers and extras do not.

One of Goodwin's main points is the use of voyeurism and the notion of looking, both are very broad themes that almost every single music video contains. Voyeurism can be used to sell the artist's music through sex appeal. This has been done in the Britney video as she is wearing a deliciously revealing outfit. The notion of looking has also been used here as, although people in the video aren't looking at her that much, we are. We are drawn to her as she is the obvious star and because she is centred and at the front during the dance routine scenes.

Finally the intertextual reference point. Goodwin says video are often an intertextual reference to another piece of media such as a film or TV programme etc. however I feel this is not the case as it only seems to reference general school life rather than referencing another media text. The video, at the end turns out to be a day-dream; the editing shows this by using a faded effect, the edges of the screen go fogged. This is a popular effect used in the same context and in the context of TV programmes. This may be considered an intertextual reference however I don't think so.

Research - Goodwin's Theory

Baby One More Time - Routine

 

Uncut version of the corridor dance routine

without cutaways and in between shots

Baby One More Time - Video

Listened to this well over 10 times today, love it

Baby One More Time - Lyrics

 Lyrics:

(Oh baby, baby)

(Oh baby, baby)

Oh baby, baby

How was I supposed to know

That somethin' wasn't right?

Oh baby, baby

I shouldn't have let you go

And now you're outta sight

Show me how you want it to be

Tell me baby 'cause I need to know now

Oh because

My loneliness is killin' me

I must confess I still believe

When I'm not with you I lose my mind

Give me a sign, hit me baby one more time

Oh baby, baby

The reason I breathe is you

Now, boy you got me blinded

I bet you baby

There's nothing that I would not do, no

It's not the way I planned it

Show me how you want it to be

Tell me baby 'cause I need to know now

Oh because

My loneliness is killin' me

I must confess I still believe

When I'm not with you I lose my mind

Give me a sign, hit me baby one more time

Oh baby baby, oh baby baby

Oh baby, baby

How was I supposed to know

Oh baby, baby

I shouldn't have let you go

I must confess that my lonliness is killing me now

Don't you know I still believe?

That you will be here and give me a sign

Hit me baby one more time

My loneliness is killin' me

I must confess I still believe

When I'm not with you I lose my mind

Give me a sign, hit me baby one more time

I must confess that my lonliness is killing me now

Don't you know I still believe?

That you will be here and give me a sign

Hit me baby one more time