Editing Update

We have now edited about two minutes of our music video, this means that we are on schedule and should hopefully finish editing by next Wednesday. Our focus today was to increase the pace of our shots as we felt that some were too long and began to grow dull. It is important that we keep the audience interested in our music video in order to make it more appealing, the best way to do this is to have a variety of shots that appear in quick succession. As we don't have a strong narrative, we need to rely on good editing to help, not only in creating meaning, but to keep the music video interesting.

Final Shot Inspiration

After abandoning our original idea of having the final shot of our music video be the performer exiting the maze in sophisticated clothing, we started to look at other options. We have decided to have a final shot that is the same as, or very similar to, one of the first shots of the music video. We wanted to create a video that is cyclical in nature, the idea of a 'cycle' alluding to our video's theme of being trapped and trying to escape.

The images below show one of our first shots (left) and our final shot (right). We felt that these help to make the narrative clearer, the first shot shows the performer entering through a doorway, the final shot shows her leaving or 'escaping'. We felt that this was a fitting shot as it is a clear end to the video - the performer walks out of the shot, leaving little room for confusion for our audience.

   

Another music video that has used this technique is Bear's Den's 'Above the Clouds of Pompeii':



   

The image of the hand is very important in this music video as it symbolises a connection, the video shows a dance between an elderly couple, this is a very intimate moment. The image of an empty hand is also very significant as the woman is shown to be in the man's imagination, the emptiness mirrors his loneliness. This music video showed me how a powerful starting and closing image can have a very strong effect on audiences as this makes the video more memorable. It also helps to solidify key themes, this was important to do in our music video as our narrative is quite vague.

Editing Update

Since completing our filming it has become a lot easier to edit our music video as we had previously left gaps where we needed our new shots to go. After adding our new footage from the Capel Manor Maze, our narrative has become slightly clearer, although it is still more implied instead of a clear storyline. We have finished editing the first minute of the song which leaves about 2 minutes left, this seems very manageable in the time that we have left until our deadline. We have placed the majority of the shots roughly where we want them the appear in the music video, however, we will need to go back and refine the lip synching and make sure that shots cut on beat. We also are yet to add special effects, such as our kaleidoscope shots or changing the opacity, we felt that these could be added at a later date whilst we focus on getting the shots and locations to 'flow'.

We also decided to change the ending of our music video. We initially planned to have a shot of the performer exiting the maze in professional-looking clothing, contrasting her previous grungy style and deteriorating mental state. However, when we added this shot at the end of the music video, instead of adding to the narrative and themes of reckless vs sophisticated behaviour, it made it more confusing. The shot lacks a connection to the rest of the music video, meaning that it seems to appear out of nowhere. We decided not to use this shot but are yet to find a replacement.

Framing and Composition - Capel Manor Shots

We used the rule of thirds when composing this shot. Typical of a performance video, we wanted the performer to be the focal point of the shot, and therefore, she appears along one of the 'thirds' lines. I like the balance created within this shot by the foliage emerging from the left-hand side of the frame, this also serves to accentuate the performer as she appears in the only open space in the shot. We felt that the structure of the window was grid-like so we used this to make the shot more interesting, by having the performer appear through a gap, a frame is created around her. This framing technique helps to draw the viewer's eye to the focal point - the performer.


In this shot, we wanted to centralise the performer to identify her as the focal point. The simple background also helps to draw attention to the focal point. We used the rule of thirds to calculate the composition of this shot so that we left a proportionate amount of headroom.





The interesting lines and angles within this shot help to lead the viewer's eye to the centre of the frame that contains the focal point - the performer. This was a hand-held tracking shot, these lines that 'draw you in' help to accentuate the camera movement.




We used the idea of 'leading space' in this shot. Whilst the subject is not facing sideways, as is typical of this type of framing, the large open space on the left-hand side adds openness and makes the performer seem smaller. This adds an element of vulnerability which is fitting for our narrative that explores the idea of feeling trapped.


We used the rule of thirds to draw more attention to the performer, as she appears along one of the dividing 'thirds' lines. I particularly like the balance within this shot, the dark green on the right-hand side contrasting the very pale, almost colourless performer. The idea of 'contrast' adds to our narrative as we wanted to present two contrasting sides of our protagonist.

Capel Manor Filming

Today we finally filmed at the Capel Manor Maze, marking the completion of filming our music video. This was an incredibly important location as it helps to make the narrative clearer, with themes of escapism being shown by the performer being 'trapped' in a maze. Unbeknownst to us, there were other interesting locations on the Capel Manor grounds that we discovered whilst trying to find the maze. These included a variety of gardens and an derelict church. Due to the weather, the gardens were not suitable for filming as they appeared dull and dead, however, we decided to film in the church as its decaying exterior reflects the deteriorating mind-set of our protagonist, adding further symbolism to our music video. Overall, I am really please with our footage and am excited to continue editing our video with our new shots, which will, hopefully, make the video flow better.

Here is our vlog from the shoot:

Kaleidoscope Practice

Inspired by Zayn Malik's 'Pillowtalk', we wanted to include a kaleidoscope effect in our music video. We felt that the interested patterns had a hypnotic quality that links to the lyrics of our song 'hypnotic' as well as the spiral shapes linking to our staircase location.

We used Final Cut Pro to create a compilation of different kaleidoscope shots. We imported different shots from different locations as this provided us with a variety of patterns and colours. We found that moving shots create more dynamic kaleidoscopes over still shots as these lack the pulsing, spiralling effect that we felt is better suited to a music video. We exported the Final Cut file and then imported this footage to our iMovie project so that we can add these effects to our music video.

Here is our kaleidoscope video:

Son Lux - Undone

I really like the music video for Son Lux's 'Undone'. The video shows a woman running through a forest and corn field, the obvious theme of the video being 'escapism'. This is very relevant to our own music video as 'Undone' expresses most of the same key themes, for example, escapism, desperation and feeling trapped and lost. The constant movement throughout the video (the dolly shot that follows the woman whilst she runs and the shot where the camera circles around the couple as they dance) adds fluidity and also reinforces the idea of escapism as movement connotes the idea of travelling.



I think that this is a very interesting shot as the camera follows the woman as she runs around the corner. The camera movement makes the viewer feel as though they are moving with the woman, this could perhaps allow them to empathise with her character more and her need to escape. I think that this would work well within our music video as we hope to include multiple shots of our protagonist running in various locations.



I really liked this shot as it makes the woman appear more distant to the audience, the plants creating a barrier. This creates a more disorientating atmosphere and presents the woman as helpless, the claustrophobic composition making her seem trapped. I think that we could use a similar shot in our music video in our Capel Manor Maze location as there will be plants and maze walls that we could film through in order to achieve a similar look.



This is one of my favourite shots from the music video. I like the effect of the people's actions continuing into the next shot, even more impressive is that the second shot is in a different location. This helps to link the two contrasting locations together and makes the transition seamless. This could be effective within our music video as we are including numerous contrasting locations, we don't want the transitions to be too jarring for our audience.

Update Vlog

Here is our vlog from today:

Intertextuality

Goodwin's theory states that music videos often contain intertextual references. This means that music videos refer to other existing media products, such as film or T.V. This can help to create and build meaning within a music video as the audience is already familiar with the concept that the particular video may be portraying.

For example, viewer's of Taylor Swift's 'Love Story' will be able to easily understand the narrative and themes of forbidden love due to the video referencing the Shakespeare play 'Romeo and Juliet'. These references can be found in the lyrics 'You were Romeo' and 'My daddy said stay away from Juliet', as well as the period costumes worn in certain scenes. The 'Romeo and Juliet' references take place in the artist's imagination, creating two parallel narratives, one set in the past with explicit 'Romeo and Juliet' references and one in the present that modernises the story.



Another example of intertextuality is Madonna's 'Material Girl' that references the film 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes', specifically the musical sequence 'Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend'. Madonna is shown in a very similar pink dress to the one originally worn by Marilyn Monroe, this creates a clear link between the two products. The composition of certain shots is also very similar, with both Madonna and Marilyn Monroe being surrounded by suit-wearing men.

   

This technique could prove to be very useful in making our narrative of being 'hypnotised' and wanting to escape more clear to the audience, providing we find a relevant source. However, it could also be quite limiting for our music video as it would draw comparisons to an existing product, taking away our product's individuality. As our target audience is described as 'individualistic', it would, perhaps, be wiser to create a wholly unique product as this would be more appealing to them.

Zayn Malik - Pillowtalk

Zayn Malik's 'Pillowtalk' conforms to Goodwin's music video theory. There is a clear link between visuals and the lyrics, for example, the chorus contains the words 'paradise' and 'warzone', both of these words are seen written on body parts during the video. The binary oppositions are shown throughout the music video with various imagery. The idea of a 'warzone' is shown through aggressive looking special effects that appear to 'shoot' out of the performers, as well as aggressive behaviours being shown, such as screaming and fighting. The idea of 'paradise' is reflected through calmer shots that contain less special effects, focusing on the performers. Floral imagery also supports this idea.

'Warzone':

'Shooting out' effect

'Shooting out' effect

Screaming

Fighting

'Paradise':

Calmer shots

 

Floral imagery

As a group, we found the movement of shots and the kaleidoscope effect (shown below) featured in the music video to be the most inspirational, and relevant to our own video. 'Pillowtalk' contains constant movement throughout the video, this adds an element of fluidity between shots and creates more seamless transitions. This is an editing style that I think could work well within our own video, the idea of movement being particularly relevant due to our theme of 'escapism'. The movement also becomes more exaggerated due to the spinning, spiral-esque shots that serve to disorientate the viewer. The kaleidoscope effect is the most interesting of these moving shots due to the geometric patterns that it creates. These patterns have a 'hypnotic' quality and would work well within our video and our lyric 'hypnotic taking over me', a kaleidoscope would solidify the link between lyrics and visuals.