Ancillary Task Decision

After looking at the briefs for the ancillary tasks:

I decided that the two I would choose to do would be:

• a digipak for the album’s release
• a magazine advertisement for the digipak.

I made this decision as I previous experience from GCSE media of creating album covers and magazine advertisements. This means the skills I learnt from this can be applied to creating this promotional package.

Although I have designed a website for an artist previously, I have never made a full functioning website.  I feel like it would, therefore, not be a true reflection of my skills as I would have to focus on the technical side of making the website function correctly.

Editing Session Six: Final Music Video

In the final editing session, we decided to act upon target audience feedback and concentrate on adding more creativity into the editing aspect of the video.

• We began by changing two shots within the narrative which were a close up of the actress scratching her head and a long shot of two people sat on a bench. This is because we decided we needed to try to suggest the joining of the red thread to help to establish the theory. Therefore, we filmed a close up of someone tying a red thread to someone else’s hand. We also filmed a clip of two people with string around their hands who move away from each other so the string unwraps. When it came to editing this, we put the slip in reverse so it actually appeared as if the thread was wrapping around the two hands as they join together as one. I did this by using the reverse tool and also changing the speed of the clip to ensure it was long enough for the audience to understand what was going on.

• We also decided to add a stop frame within the narrative. This occurs when the two female actresses who were originally in love have an argument and Luna leaves. The stop frame connotes how she was destined to stay and wanted to stay but she has to leave. We did this by blading the clip and overlaying each section as a layer.

• We also added a series of light leaks as a layer over the top of the live performance clips. This conformed to the indie genre as it creates an almost retro vibe. We did this by adding the clip of the light leak over the top of the narrative clips and reducing the opacity to make it appear ‘see through’. We also made the light leaks red in the beginning of the narrative whilst the homosexual couple were together to connote love and passion. However, as soon as the two meet in the library, the light leak changes to blue to connote the loss of love between the original couple.

• We also reimported the music to try and fix the issues we were having with the base.

Overall, after this session we have finished the music video. We ensured that the editing was more creative in terms of the technical aspects and tried to focus on effectively establishing the red thread theory again in the initial opening 30 seconds.  The final video:

Final Target Audience Feedback: Music Video

To gain specific target audience feedback on my music video I completed a survey on Survey Monkey. This allowed me to ask specific questions so I could categorise the responses. For example, the first three questions I asked were: ‘How old are you?’, ‘What gender are you?’ and ‘Do you enjoy the indie music genre?’. This meant that based on the responses, I could filter them to ensure the responses I gained were within the correct target audience I had created the product for.

Overall I gained 20 responses from the survey however after I filtered the results for: both males and females, ages 16-25 and people that did enjoy the indie genre there were only 13 responses. The first question I looked at after this was ‘After watching the music video, does it appear as if it is a real music video?’ and out of the 13 responses all of them said ‘yes’ which assured me that the music video conformed to codes and conventions like we had set out to achieve.

The next question was: ‘Do you understand the music video?’ and out of the thirteen responses 11 of them said ‘yes’ and the other 2 were ‘no’. Although not everyone replied with yes, the narrative we created was intentionally complex and is not a passive text, it has to be decoded carefully and therefore I expected there would be some people that did not understand it.

The next question was ‘What is your favourite part of the music video?’ and some of the answers included; ‘the library scene’, ‘the costa date’, ‘the read thread theory’, ‘the part where they had ribbon on their fingers’, ‘the singing’. The most common answers were the library scene, the Costa date, and the red thread theory which all had two comments each. One person said ‘ALL OF IT I LOVE IT ALL’ and there were two comments surrounding the editing. This was a surprise as I thought that less people would identify the red thread theory as their favourite aspect as it is subtler but I am pleased with the feedback as majority of it is complementing the changes I made based on the previous feedback I gained.

The next question was what do you not like the music video. The answers included: ‘I think the start was a bit confusing but just a bit’, ‘The bit with the other couples confused me? I don’t understand the relevance’, ‘Some parts weren't clear and could be misunderstood’ and the rest of the ten responses said ‘nothing’. Although it is negative that some people didn’t understand the beginning of the video, this was what we expected as the narrative is meant to be complex. Also, the fact that some people said their favourite part was the red thread aspect (the beginning part they’re referring too) means that there is a mixture of those who do and don’t understand. This can be due to the fact that some of the have specific psychographics of complex narratives and symbolic codes whereas other don’t.

The final question was ‘is there anything you would change?’. Four of these responses included ‘nothing or no’ and one said ‘Music was very bass-y at times, to the point where it vibrated my speakers a lot making the vocals a wee bit harder to hear’. After listening to the music video again, I haven’t heard this issue personally and considering no one else mentioned this, I assume that this is an issue on the device the person listened to the video on and therefore there is nothing I can do about.

Overall, after collecting this feedback, I know that the music video I created conforms to the codes and conventions of music videos and it appeals to the target audience I tried to attract. Although some members of this audience were confused about the beginning of the narrative (the red thread) this was expected as the music video has subtle symbolic codes that the passive members of the audience would not decode. However, a lot of people also did understand it meaning the encoding of the red thread theory was still effective.

Editing Session Five

In this editing session, I am finishing the editing based on the outcome of the target audience feedback. In this season I will focus more on the editing in time with the music and change the clip that was considered ‘awkward’ in the sequence.

• I began by zooming in closer in the audio bar for the music video audio and the audio from the song that we played during the live performance shoots. I then looked for peaks and troughs in the real music video audio and bladed the audio in these places. This made it easier for me to see where the clips should be cutting. I then went through the sequence and extended or shortened the visual clips in accordance to the blading. This allowed me to emphasise the beat more and make the editing seem more ‘sharp’. I specifically focused on the part of the clip where the two females are sat on the sofa together. 

• In terms of the clip, I replaced it with another clip that I had from the live performance. So that she had the microphone in the right hand. 

This is the music video after this editing session:

Editing Session Four

In this editing session I decided to focus on the font, the editing of the titles and the music in the very beginning of the music video as these are some of the points that were picked up on in the audience feedback.

• I began by editing the way the font appeared on the screen. I zoomed in to watch frame by frame the way the font ‘swiped’ along the screen but I could not figure out why it seemed to ‘jump’. Therefore, I decided to change the way I incorporated the text. Instead, I added a white image that I imported from the internet and changed its opacity to make it appear translucent. I then added the font on top of this. I made ‘Luna’ bigger in size than ‘Sober’ as this is a convention of the font in music videos. However, because of the ‘Sober’ was on a different line so I changed its baseline to make it seem central. 

• I also changed the font of the text so that it had a slight uniqueness corresponding to the feedback. Although the font is still ‘simple’ it is less ‘block’ like and therefore conforms to the codes and conventions of indie fonts but has a slight edge. 

• In terms of editing the music, I cropped the audio so the music begins instantly over the music video. However, I also edited the sound bar so the audio fade into the sequence. 

In the next editing session I will complete the editing based on the audience feedback. 

Audience Feedback: Music Video Rough Edit

In order to ensure our music video appeals to our target audience and that the complex narrative we tried to create can be understood, I sent the music video the three boys and three girls within our target audience to gain feedback around what we can improve.

I sent the message: 'After watching the music video do you have any favourite aspects/aspects you don’t like or aspects you would change?'

These are the responses I got:

After these responses I will act upon them before I get more in depth target audience feedback. The things I will act on are:

• I will either adapt the way the font transitions onto the frame in the introduction. I will either make it appear more ‘smooth’ or of there is not a technique to do this, I can just change it completely. 
• I will also change the font and I also realised that we decided to call the artist ‘Lüna’ instead of ‘Luna’ so I will add the umlaut onto the ‘u’.
• After watching the video again and reading the feedback, I did realise that there are aspects where the editing isn’t in time with the music which I believe is what Kate was referring to when she said it ‘feels jumpy’. Therefore I will try to go through the rest of the sequence to ensure the editing emphasises the music more; specifically focusing on the aspect where the two female actresses are sat on the sofa. 
• The part where the Tristan talks about the clip being ‘cringey’ I will change. After watching it back, it does also have a continuity issue as she is holding the microphone in a different hand in the next live performance clip. Therefore, I will replace this. 
• In the beginning to take away from the ‘awkward silence’ I will change the music so it begins earlier in the sequence. I can also edit this in time to when the titles appear on the screen. 

Editing Session Three and Rough Edit

In this editing session I carried on trying to edit all the footage after the library scene. This included the main chorus of the song so the editing of the visuals in time to the audio was vital in this editing session.

For the fight scene, I tried to increase the pace of editing in order to help build tension. This is because the music doesn’t increase in speed, only in volume so the increase in edits in time to the beat in comparison to the previous edits helped to create the effect that the music was building up. This assist with the audience feeling the anger and tension in the argument they are seeing and helps them to understand what is going on. The shot types of the live performance also zoom into the artist and get closer to create a more passionate tone so the audience can understand her emotions displayed in the narrative performance.

After the argument scene, there was the final shots to edit. This included the point of view shot of the mobile organising for Lauren and Callum to meet up for coffee which is place before Liv walks out. The two shot with high key lighting of Lauren and Callum in the coffee shop is also intercut around Liv walking out of the house in low key lighting and an angry and sad expression. This creates a clear juxtaposition of their two situations and creates a parallel to the two person shot of Lauren and liv that the audience saw at the beginning on the narrative. This allows the audience to understand the change in relationships so I was careful in the way I edited these two shots. This then followed with the final shot of live singing the final line of the song and then the camera pans back to the landscape of the live performance location. This again creates a parallel between the ‘blurry’ establishing shot and the clear finals shot of the same location.

Therefore, when editing these shots, I tried to ensure that the live performance didn’t interrupt the narrative sequence in order for the audience to understand what has happened correctly.
After this editing session, this is the rough edit that we will use to get audience feedback. Then based on this feedback, I will edit the video again in order to improve on their feedback.

Editing Session Two

In the second editing session, I decided to carry on intercutting the live performance into the library scene.

Instead of intercutting the live performance and the library scene into each other in order, I decided to create continuity in the library footage first. This allowed me to understand the change in the sequence in the storyboard as it deviated on the day of filming.

Once I had done this, I began to edit the live performance footage inserting the library footage into the gaps where it was suitable. I again used a variety of different angles and shot types from the footage I took on the day of filming and utilised the ken burns tool In order to create a zoom in one of the clips. This method also allowed me to edit the visuals in time to the audio (I placed the cuts on the beat) conforming to Goodwin’s music video theory.

Overall, this editing session was much quicker than the first session as I had established a technique that I knew worked. I also only had one aspect of the narrative to intercut into each other and having a storyboard to follow made it easier to follow.

Editing Session One

For the first editing session, I began by uploading all the footage we had onto Final Cut Pro X. I also ensured I made copies of all the footage on the computer in case anything happened to the hard copy. I also downloaded the live version of the song (Lorde Sober) and placed it on the timeline.

For this session I decided to focus on the first 30 seconds of the narrative which would include the introduction and the red thread. Therefore, I began by adding an establishing shot of the background of the live performance as the introduction to the video. I also added ‘Luna – Sober’ over the top as it is a convention of music videos to do so. However, when I played it, the font was not bold enough to contrast the background and hence made the text difficult to read. To fix this, I added a filter on top of the clip to make the background out of focus and increased the font size. I also realised that the clip wasn’t as long as I would like it to be to allow the audience to read the text. Therefore, I changed the speed of the clip to 70%.

When I played back the text over the top of the clip, I realised that I wanted to find a more creative way to reveal it is it didn’t conform to the ‘unique’ way that music videos often introduce their titles. Therefore, added two lines either side of the text that scrolled along the screen to reveal the text. I did this by adding the two lines in text format and blading it at each frame so it appeared to scroll when it is played back. I also did this with the text to make it appear that it is being revealed by the scrolling lines.

After I had completed the introduction, there is a ten second gap between the beginning of the audio and the first lyric. Here, the soundtrack becomes louder. Therefore, I decided that in order to conform to Dyer’s Star Theory, I would utilise these ten seconds to display clips of the artist. I used different shot types, one including a change in focus to conform to artistic music videos. I also utilised the speed change again in order to create a dramatic effect of the artist staring into the lens- creating a relationship with the audience.

Due to the fact we played the song in the background whilst we filmed the live performance, the sound bars of the live performance clips matches the sound bar of the actual audio. Therefore, I used this to help me align the clips to ensure the lip sync was in perfect synchronisation. I also used different angles, framing and shot types to ensure that there was more variation within the shot types of the live performance, I used the crop tool to help me achieve this in one of the clips.
When intercutting the red thread scenes between the live performance, I tried to insert two red thread clips in-between each live performance clip. This helps to obtain the balance between live performance and narrative performance that I had researched. Also, due to the fact I had to deviate away from the storyboard when filming, I had less footage than I had less scenes that I had planned to film. Therefore, instead of each clip lasting 3 seconds they lasted five.

In the next editing session, I can continue to edit the red of the narrative performance with the live performance. After finding a method to make it easier to align the lip syncing to the audio, this session will hopefully be more efficient.

Filming Log Five

For this filming session I filmed the red thread section of the narrative.  Due to filming in the school holidays, the time I had to film was restricted due to members of our team being on holiday. I was also restricted due to the time the actors and actresses could be available to film. Therefore, I made a few changes to the storyboard.

• I had planned on filming scenes inside of two people in a bed together with the red thread on their fingers however, I didn’t have a suitable l0catuion to do so I didn’t film this. I was also were meant to get a shot of two people in a coffee shop however no shop would allow me to film inside. Therefore, I improvised with other scenes to film.
• I filmed a two person long shot with symmetrical framing of two lifts. The characters were both waiting at the lift and the red thread can be seen between them. I also replaced the bed shot with two people walking down the stairs. It is a high angle close up of their hands with the red thread seen on their two hands.
• I also had to improvise with the actors and actresses I used as I was let down. Therefore, I tried to use the same two people in as many shots as possible by changing their clothing to make it seem like they weren’t the same person. I also got shots in the light and in the dark to make it seem as if I had filmed on different days, again to make it seem as they weren’t the same actors and actresses.

After filming this aspect of the narrative, I am now able to begin the editing stage/. As the red thread is the first aspect of the narrative to be intercut into the live performance, I can begin to do this and edit the lip sync in time with the music.

Filming Log Four

For the fourth filming session Phoebe filmed her argument scene as well as getting footage of equilibrium between Lauren and Liv (the homosexual couple).  When filming we realised we made some mistakes:

• As Phoebe filmed the argument scene and the equilibrium aspects in the same day, we forgot that the scenes within the narrative would not have been consecutive. Therefore, originally, we filmed the argument scene first and then the equilibrium scene but we forgot to change the costume. This meant we had to re-film the equilibrium scene again because there was an issue with the continuity. Although this was not a massive issue as we weren’t under a time restraint, it took longer than we originally expected. 
• Another issue we encountered was in terms of the acting of the argument scene. As none of the actresses we were using are professional actors, there were issues with the anger coming through onto the camera. This meant that it took a few takes of over exaggerating the anger within the acting for it to come across accurately on camera. 

Other than this, this filming session went successfully and although it took longer than expected, we still stayed within our allocated time for filming. We ensured Phoebe took many different shots from different angles as we were aware of the fact that when it came to editing, having multiple different angles would allow us to cut between them to create a quicker pace of editing to build tension during the fight scene.

Filming Log Three

For the live performance, we decided to split the filming into three sections: red thread, library and the rest of the storyboard would be in the final filming session. This was to make it easier in terms of the actors available on the specific days and to get a clear idea in our head of what we were filming so we could concentrate better. Therefore, in the third filming session, we filmed the library aspect of the narrative (Livs section).

As Liv was filming, we realised that we have to make some changes to the narrative in order to fit the location we had:

• The storyboard we had planned was that the male character (Callum) and the female character (Lauren) met in a library and then decided to go for coffee together. It was in the coffee shop that Lauren accidently left her purse which allowed Callum to go to her house to return it. However, when we arrived at the coffee shop, it was a lot busier than we expected and therefore it made it difficult to get a place to sit and to not get strangers in the background of the filming. Therefore, we decided to still include this in the narrative but we changed the location so this also happened in the library.
• Also, we decided to film the two characters meeting outside the library for Callum to return the purse and them to swap numbers in case we had issues with both the actor and actress being available at the same time again meaning we wouldn’t be able to film that scene which is vital to the narrative.

Other than this, this filming session was successful in terms of Liv’s efficiency and the standard of acting. We decided that for the moment, we didn’t need any extra footage and that we have completed this section. However, if we do need extra footage, it should be easy to recreate the costumes and makeup of the characters and to reuse this location as it is easily accessible. 

Filming Log Two

After trying to film the live performance in the first filming session, we decided to film it again. This was due to the time we allocated to film: sunset. The background changed throughout each take of the song making a continuity issue and the quality camera gradually decreased as it got darker.
Therefore, in the second attempt we made numerous changes to get around this:

• We decided to change the time we filmed from sunset to around lunch time to ensure the weather didn’t have an effect on the continuity. However, on the day of filming, the weather was still an issue as we had planned to film outside but it was raining and windy, which we realised would again have been a continuity issue in terms of hair placement throughout each take. Therefore, we tried to look for an alternative location. We found an inside part to the carpark we were originally filming at to continue the landscape background with the natural sky. We had three locations to use but we chose the one with the window and a green post in the background as it conformed more the ‘grungy’ tones we were aiming for.

• We also made slight changes to the makeup and costume of the artist. Instead or wearing white, we decided she would wear a black and white checkered top. This can connote a more complex character. This can create binary opposition of good vs evil surrounding the character, creating an enigma around her as a ‘star’ conforming to Dyer. Furthermore, in terms of makeup, we decided to go for thick eyeliner and a bold dark red lip to create dark tones specifically for the extreme close ups. This also creates a unique style for the artist.

• After the camera quality decreasing so drastically throughout the last live performance, we decided to try and borrow a higher quality camera of a friend. Her camera is the Canon 800d. The camera quality was a massive improvement from the iPhone camera we used. It allowed us to use the manual focus on the artist with the skyline in the background to create a shallow focus. It also had a manual zoom and hence allowed us to create smooth zoom in and outs throughout the shots to give us more variance in shot types. This was assisted by the tripod we used which ensured we got a stable shot to conform to the professionalism of other live performance we have analysed.

• The final improvement we made was in terms of how efficient we were when filming. As the actress for the artist had learnt the lyrics off by heart, we were able to take five takes of the song the whole way through of lip syncing. This meant we had five different angles of footage of the song that we can utilise throughout the live performance part of our narrative to make it more interesting and use more shot types.

After this filming session I have realised that we should change the time of day for the rest of the filming to midday where there is better natural lighting. Although this won’t apply to the library scene as it is inside, the natural lighting through windows will still effect the quality.

I will also be able to begin editing the live performance once we have the library and red thread scene filmed as it allows me to intercut the two aspects into each other and establish chronology.