photographs taken during filming

Group work, preparation and filming shots

 This picture shows Andrew (member of our group) applying the silver make-up to our actor James. Make-up and costume were essential features of our music video, so we had to constantly touch up on make-up and silver spray paint to keep the effect of the silver man realistic and flawless.

 Regardless of the pressure of time and schedule, we still kept the atmosphere (away from filming) as friendly and relaxed as possible. If we all felt comfortable with eachother, then we were able to perform to the best of our ability. Also, to prevent a tense and perhaps grouchy atmosphere and thus preventing an enthusiastic mood.

 This picture demonstrates the relaxed atmosphere that we worked under and the general fun we had doing it. If you enjoy working on something, then you have ambition to make it as good as you can. This was the approach that we took on the filming day.

 This shot clearly established how and why we decided to show James infront of the beautiful scenery behind. However, a less attractive public bin beside him was not easy to miss - so we had to be very creative with our shot in order to try and capture as little of the bin as possible.

 Here is a picture I took of the equiptment that we carried around that day, it includes a bag full of the make-up, costume and refreshments (as it was a long morning) as well as the big black case that protected the camera, which was quite heavy. It took at least 7 minutes for us to set up our camera and tripod, whenever we moved location (which, as shown by the music video itself) was a lot.

 Here I am with the tripod, we all took individual turns, and even in pairs handling the camera and equiptment. Everyone had the freedom to film a scene of the music video, as well as helping carry the case and bags.

 Potential album cover photo's I have taken.

This photo was taken in an alleyway, the pavements were filthy, and the only decent backdrop we could find was the white painted brick wall. I chose to take these photos with James in front of this wall as the silver colour of his make-up and suit matched the white wall. I tried to capture as many shots of James in front of this wall, without the pavement revealing its unappealing nature as it did not suit the photo at all.

I took this picture with James standing infont of the wall, but at a distance where his shadow would not then be spread behind him on the wall. I'm happy with this photo as its set to a specific colour scheme and ties in well with the narrative performance.

The unfortunate part of this photo would be the door in the far background, and his shadow. I will try to edit these parts out, as not to look so unproffessional. As you can see, I wanted to get as many good shots of James' silver suit, perhaps as a representation of th narrative (hands folded behind his back suggest a gentleman, polite nature and so on).

I wanted to get shots of James' profile (side of his face) to make the album mysterious (like the music video) and to also resemble something like a prison sentence, when the suspects hold the plaque. The light in this image compliment the silver painting and make the silver glow to some extent.

This photo is the worst one I took. Although James is standing in a desirable position and angle, the shot also includes rubbish bins further down the street. Hopefully I can crop this out.

feedback on filming

On Sunday our group met in the early morning at our chosen destination and filmed our narrative, I found that our group worked together well and maintained high levels of cooperation, communication and understanding; as well as trusting each other with filming high quality shots. We all had equal opportunities to film, direct and contribute to elements of mise-en-scene (such as make-up, costume, props and so on) - so we all rotated in our duties.
We were worried about restrictions such as weather conditions, time management, location accessibility and most importantly everyone turning up on time. However, the weather (despite it being mid-December, with predictable rain, sleet and strong wind) the day was dry, bright and crisp cold (which urged everyone to stay on their feet and stay energised). Our time management was well kept and we even had time to reshoot in different angles and places, as well as coming up with several different endings for us to decide on when editing. In terms of location accessibility, we filmed our narrative piece in and around Parsloes Park, opposite Gale Street - which is a public park and surprisingly was not busy/packed with people. So we have a diversity of different locations within the park that were not restricted by any public. Everyone turned up, bright and early, on time and ready to go.

INDIVIDUALLY

Directing
Strangely enough, I found directing the cast (and even sometimes our crew) reasonable. In order to keep the cast and crew fired up and ready to go, as well as feeling confident and knowing that they're doing the right thing; I needed to encourage them and keep urging them on. This kept the spirit and enthusiasm fluent, and therefore gave our music video the liveliness and effect that it needed - the footage was believable, because the cast and crew were confident in what they were doing.
Often, I found myself distributing energy and positivity to those around me and simultaneously keeping my own spirits high. Especially of an early morning, and such brisk, cold weather - the energy needed rebooting and everyone needed to be enthusiastic but at the same time realistic about what we were doing.

Being directed by others
Obviously, our roles rotated during the day and everyone from our crew got the chance to direct, film and help with props and give any advice/opinions. Whilst being directed, by different people throughout the day, I found myself at ease with what I was doing and felt confident in my group also. Throughout the day we enjoyed the occasional laugh and relaxed on our breaks, as well as having lunch together and socialising away from the music video (to create unity within our group) and I found that everyone in our group was giving encouragement and enthusiasm to each other and therefore we were all positive throughout the day.

Re-group after Christmas

Filming update.

We've set a date of which to get the filming for our performance done. We have organised all instruments that we will use, props, our location and our band members. Other elements that need to be arranged are the costume, any possible make-up and prepping lessons (to prepare our cast for what we expect from them, how to act etc)
We plan to accomplish this filming by week, Tuesday 15th of January.
We do not want to rush this process as we think that preparation and taking time to complete this footage will make the quality even better, however - we realise that we are under a lot of pressure concerning time. The sooner we finish filming, the sooner we can start editing.

Group meeting 1 - discussing narrative.

In this session we were discussing;

- whether or not it should be a comical or serious band.

- which narrative we must chose

- which idea's of performance we must plan

- should we follow folk music video's or rock music videos
- who to select for our cast

We've decided to make our narrative a stalking idea;

1. Band (performance) - The band are shown performing in a music studio, where close-ups of both the band member's expressions and their instruments will be common. These shots will jump cut through the narrative piece and will relate in that whenever the tension rises in the narrative, the close-up shot will transform into a long distance shot to infer movement in the story as well as the isolation that his character may be feeling.

   Narrative - Picture a London rush-hour morning with a a faceless sea of people in suits and work clothes on their way to their nine hour shifts. Its a stressful surreal blur, and no face in particular is highlighted from the crowd, because its all blurred away. Then, a beautiful woman emerges from the crowd to cross the street and the camera comes to a mid shot to draw the audience's attention to her. Following shortly behind her, the lead singer disengages himself from the bustling crowd and follows her with intent. The audience will assume that the two people know each other, as the man stares after the woman and stays within a few feet from her, as if following her. Simultaneously singing the lyrics and following the woman, the man pushes through the crowds to catch up to her, while the woman shows no means of seeing him or even knowing he's there. Suspense is built when the man suddenly catches up to her and is singing directly at her, but only the woman looks past him as if he isn't even there. This continues for most of the video, the man singing passionately and in some parts of the song, viciously - while the woman fails to even acknowledge him, and the crowd bustles on. Before the end, the man suddenly stops and the woman walks out of the camera view, and the audience is suddenly shown a shed that's full of photos of the woman. Close-ups of the pinned up photographs tell us that she is unaware that the photo's were taken, and is therefore being stalked. We end with a backwards creep of the man, standing among the crowd staring lifelessly behind the camera (we assume after the woman)

But to suit all members of our group, we have to reform and adjust this idea.

Our second group meeting.

Today we met up again as a group and discussed topics that concerned us and that were related to the music video. Previously, I had drawn up a few sketches of our narrative and structured them in a storyboard, with description, shot, angle, location, movement and shot duration and number. We then drew upon the rough storyboard and made alterations to it.
From my narrative original storyboard, we have reformed the narrative and have decided to make the storyline slightly comical, with the introduction of the 'living statues' from London. From this, I'll revise our new narrative and create a few versions of the new story, and then produce a final copy of the storyboard.

My first designs for our narrative storyboard. 

The same applies for our performance storyboard as we've decided to select location shots such as the school music studio as well as the school hall where performances are usually based.
Here is our second video where we discuss our preparations and aims.

Creating a schedule for planning/filming

Here we've structured a plan of times and dates in which we'll regroup, film, re-assess our footage and improve. This plan is scheduled in the period of 13 days, and Tuesday 18th December being our filming deadline. We've acknowledged that this is an extremely tight amount of time to prepare and film our music video; and therefore we've set in place 'safety net' days, to ensure that if we do not stick to what was required, or we re-assess our current footage and find that we need to reshoot some scenes, then we have 2 days to fall back on and get those tasks done.We've taken into consideration the busy time schedule of others (cast) and even ourselves, and have thus constructed a plan around these times and dates, we've also dedicated any available weekend to meet up and film.

We've spaced our days out wisely, and have planned the first 4 days to finalise the narrative, location idea, cast organisation and props - so that the upcoming days are organised and well planned for. Throughout these days (lightly scheduled for) we've added that each day we must create individual, as well as group feedback and analysation on what we've achieved and what we aim to achieve. This gives constant feedback and thus generates a clearer visual of our goal and what we aim to achieve.

 To extend our group feedback and to strengthen our understanding and dedication to the plan that we've made, we have created a group feedback video, in which we announce what we've done, and thereby aim to do in the plan. This video demonstrates the groups unity and co-orperation, and how we're stronger in communication as well as preparation.

Co-operation and Communication within our group

Co-operation and communication within our group.

Within our group, we've had differences both in opinion and idea all regarding the music video, but from last years experience in working in groups I've learnt that prioritising your own ideas is inevitable. Communication also seems weaker than it should be, and when we should be arranging group meetings and updating eachother on the work we've completed as a group, we haven't.
Before the we get further through the course and we can't communicate or cooperate at all, I've planned for us to do a few things to overcome these minor problems.
Things like . Swapping numbers/emails to communicate outside of school (for filming/general feedback)
                  . Create a schedule for when we should regroup and discuss work, for example, bringing back completed questionnaires to be assessed.
                  . Advising the group to stay neutral to all ideas and opinions, and to prevent denying good ideas of someone elses over your own.
                  . Set specific roles to each person in a task, for example, someone will be in charge of organising the focus group for research, while someone else can be collecting data from the questionnaires, and someone else can be developing the data and analysing the results. It gives equal opportunity to get involved and to work equally as hard as everyone else, also everything gets completed twice as fast, leaving us to focus on other details to add in.

My four pitches for our music video (individual thinking)

My five pitches for our music video

1. Band (performance) - The band are shown performing in a music studio, where close-ups of both the band member's expressions and their instruments will be common. These shots will jump cut through the narrative piece and will relate in that whenever the tension rises in the narrative, the close-up shot will transform into a long distance shot to infer movement in the story as well as the isolation that his character may be feeling.
   Narrative - Picture a London rush-hour morning with a a faceless sea of people in suits and work clothes on their way to their nine hour shifts. Its a stressful surreal blur, and no face in particular is highlighted from the crowd, because its all blurred away. Then, a beautiful woman emerges from the crowd to cross the street and the camera comes to a mid shot to draw the audience's attention to her. Following shortly behind her, the lead singer disengages himself from the bustling crowd and follows her with intent. The audience will assume that the two people know each other, as the man stares after the woman and stays within a few feet from her, as if following her. Simultaneously singing the lyrics and following the woman, the man pushes through the crowds to catch up to her, while the woman shows no means of seeing him or even knowing he's there. Suspense is built when the man suddenly catches up to her and is singing directly at her, but only the woman looks past him as if he isn't even there. This continues for most of the video, the man singing passionately and in some parts of the song, viciously - while the woman fails to even acknowledge him, and the crowd bustles on. Before the end, the man suddenly stops and the woman walks out of the camera view, and the audience is suddenly shown a shed that's full of photos of the woman. Close-ups of the pinned up photographs tell us that she is unaware that the photo's were taken, and is therefore being stalked. We end with a backwards creep of the man, standing among the crowd staring lifelessly behind the camera (we assume after the woman)

2. Band (performance) - The band are seen scattered across a room, all facing the audience, singing directly to them. They are all wearing casual clothing.The lead singer is in the centre and is the closest, followed by the bass guitar player, electric guitar player and drummer in the back. There are no microphones or amps seen, and it looks like an acoustic version of the song, or a unprofessional version of the song. The band members do not get up of make any drastic movements, but just sit on their stools ad play their instrument and sing at the audience, they seem somewhat lifeless in body language and expression. These shots are jump cut through the narrative.
  Narrative - The band are seen in the same room, except they are without any instruments or stools, and they are all wearing white clothing. They are doing random things such as sitting, or throwing paint over each other and singing madly into the camera, the jump about and act crazy, and the audience (viewing the jump cuts of both juxtaposing scenes) and assume that the narrative performance is enacting the passion/feelings inside the emotionless band members in the performance scenes. The camera at some point (preferably when the track is at a loud point) turn on its side, so that band members will be seen from the side, and then the camera will turn again so that the band members are seen doing outrageous acts from upside down. As the music dies down - the camera slowly moves to the upright position and the band members (all covered in brightly covered paint) all line up in front of the camera and bow.

3. Band (performance) - The band are first seen with the instruments resting on the floor, and before the music begins, they pick them up and play them. The band, like the performance in pitch 2, are sitting on stools playing their instruments, but this time casually and with soul. They tap their feet along with the music and sing the lyrics with meaning, and when the music heightens, they spontaneously leap up from their chairs and sing at the camera and to each other. The performance ends with them sitting back on the stools and playing calmly, and then when the music stops, they rest their instruments back on the floor like the beginning.
   Narrative - The main singer is seen on a field, sitting down on the grass with a girl, close-ups of the two laughing and talking give the audience that the two are intimate with each other. Then (using the cloning software) the main singer is seen twice, in the same shot, sitting down next to himself and looking in on the conversation. The girl then enters and stands behind the second version of the main singer and looks at him with a regretful expression, then walks off the set. The second version of the main singer sits beside the first version of the main singer for duration of the video, smiling fondly at the conversation, and every now and then looking at toward the exit that the second version of the woman had left in. He then gets up and walks out, leaving the two originals sitting their laughing away, not aware of his presence.

4. Band (performance) - The band is seen playing in a studio, the camera jumps from the view of seeing them behind the glass and to being inside of the same room as the band. Close-ups of their expression, them as a whole band, and close-ups on their instruments are common in the performance element. The band sing with soul and emotional input, not giving direct address to the audience at all, but leaving this aspect of the band as vague and us looking in on their everyday practise.
   Narrative - The band are seen on the London streets scattered among the crowd, they are handing out paper and pinning paper to walls and posts. The crowd is barely acknowledging them as they thrust paper into their hands and miming something (we assume their urging the people to do something) The close-ups of the paper on the lamp-posts tell the audience that theses are 'MISSING' posters, and the band are on a frantic search for someone, but the camera does not reveal who it is they are looking for (the face is blurred out on the paper). As the song comes to an end, the band stride past the camera, leaving the lead singer behind walking slowly towards a lamp-post, where he sticks one last 'MISSING' poster on there, the camera gets a close up on the person this time, and the audience can identify that the missing person is the lead singer, who gives the audience direct address and pulls his hood up. He walks past the camera and the camera remains positioned towards the lamp with the 'MISSING' poster.

Directing and filming a band

Today I took part in the directing and filming a band.
I learnt from this practice that spontaneous shots and movement is always welcomed, as we found ourselves producing static shots (not moving) which could make the footage dull. I moved around the stage filming, while the band was performing and picked up useful shots that I wouldn't have if I was limited in space.
In terms of energy in both the crew and the band, the director (I learnt) needs to project enthusiasm and energy, in order for everyone to feel relaxed and comfortable with what they were doing. I felt confident enough to tell the members of the band I was filming, where to move, how to act and more importantly to be positive about what they were doing, to avoid them feeling self-conscious and freezing up on stage. I gained a sense of familiarity and connection with the band and was able to visually make the quality of the footage better, as it was more energetic and believable.
This was different from GCSE media filming because I feel we had more creative freedom and so, were able to produce better footage, as well as be comfortable and inventive with our shots.