Question 4

using technology in the planning stage

Technology in the planning stage was important because it allowed me to research and effectively plan the production of my music video.

When researching the style of music video I wanted I used various websites to create a better understanding of the genre and its audience. The websites used included Sonymusic.co.uk, sonymusic.se and fueledbyramen.com. These websites allowed to understand the different stars that fall under the genre and helped me to find out what genre my original artist came under.

The preproduction required me to create an animatic which meant producing a hand drawn storyboard which I completed on Paper an iPad app for iPad and then produced the animatic using FinalCutProX for Mac OSX to produce the final animatic. The development of the Animatic was greatlty sped up by the use of the iPad because it allowed me to work on the images faster and create small changes to the image at later dates.

When producing the music video I filmed on The Fuji film HS20EXR which allowed me to film during my own freetime and because of the versatility of the of camera I could achieve some unpractical shots such as when I had to film off the edge of the block over the river.  The problem with the camera was auto focus locking because the camera wanted to readjust all of the time some of the shots were ruined and had to be re shot. The Camera did however allow me to readjust the focusing on the image including rapid refocusing on the image, this effect was also readjusted later on when editing in post production.


To edit I used My MacBook Air and FinalCutProX, this program allowed me to edit my music video using tools similar to professional grade level. The program in particular using the advanced trim tool allowed me to precisely choose which parts of the clips I wanted to apply to the final music video. the edit suite also allowed me to apply a type of bug eye filter to my work to create the same shot repeatedly over the same area, this effect was rectangular lenses.

The production of my CD/DVD digipack was done in Photoshop CS6 for Mac  the image was created using firework brushes which were adjusted to properly fit the scale, I adjusted the pressure placed upon the brushes as well as the fade distance to ensure that the images would appear distant and faded as to fit into the image and be a background image rather than a main one. The main image was apart of the artist only shown in red and 5% transparency this means that the artist is on the image but to achieve the theme I was going for is faded into the distance and blends in well with the constellation ideas that I had set out to create.  The Font source was Dafont although all fonts on the cover were adjusted to fit the style that I was aiming for including colour overlays and readjusting the edging of the image.

draft poster for digipack

creating the background

To create the background I first had to research for styles similar to the one I wanted to portray, this meant websearches of supernovas and outerspace cosmos. After I had done this and looked at the various styles I had to locate the brushes that would enable me to create my own versions.

 creating the stars meant creating a sepreate layer for each of the colours.

Changing Of The Style Of Music Video.

I am changing the style of the music video, the video will no longer feature Lauren Wilson as my stsr, the video will have another actor in it, the actor will be reacting along to the narrative of the song, this will be taken in an ironic sense because the character will commit suicide despite the fact that the song is called still alive. This means that the overall style of the music video will change, as will its intended meaning and message.

The intended message was originally supposed to be one of betrayal, love and forgiverness, this was going to be shown through the Mis-En-Scene, which, consisting of having the main performer dancing around in a forest, this would ultimatly end in the main character walking off into the sunset, it would have consisted mainly of abstract performance. The music wouldn't have really linked to the music video much in that it would have reflected part of the performace but otherwise they would have not really linked together.

In the new music video the lyrics closer link to the Mis-En-scene, they link through the fact that when the lyrics say 'come fire, come fire let it burn', I filmed inside a burned building to show the significance of the character walking alone. the character is an empty shell of their former selves as reflected in the house which is a burned out shell of its former glory. The overall narrative is linked closer because the character commits suicide in the video. This is taking the lyrics in an ironic sense, the lyrics 'I'm Still Alive' will be ironic if the character commits suicide instead of living and moving on with their life without the female in the video. It can also mean that the singer of the song is still alive and is singing the song to show that she has moved on without the male in the video and no longer feels responsible for his death and is moving on.

Digi-pak Draft 2

In this second draft I decided to change the colour scheme of the album cover, I did this by removing the applied filter to  make the colour really stand out I adjusted the levels of the images, When doing this I played around with the levels to choose colours that looked realistic but also looked surreal to fit with the 'out of space' feel. This draft still does not include the artist on the cover because I want to expriment with the album cover and its layout before adding the artist to the image.

This draft was important because I united the use of fonts on the album artwork, this meant changing all of the fonts on the enitre thing and recolouring and recreating them. The source of the fonts was Dafont,com, this website allowed me to use fonts that would better match the genre and they gave me a wider range to souce my fonts from.

I am going to experement with the album art by removing the backgrounds and seeing whether that looks too basic or whether it would make the main artist image stand out and be more pronounced on the album art. I have removed the spines from this draft because I feel they need to be redesigned to fit into my genre more.

Digipack 6 Disc Draft 1

 

 

 

This first draft of my Album cover doesn't contain the image of my star, I wanted to experement with the album cover without the star being featured on it, I have decided to follow the conventions of the album cover widely seen in the indie genre and will be adding images of the star. I have also decided not to keep the title that is currently featured on this draft I will be changing it for a font that better relects the style of music video. 

Drawing in the style.

This is essentially a practice drawing,  I recreated the drawing on Sketchbook pro on the Samsung Galaxy Note 3.  The program allowed me to add different layers to the image, to make sure I got the proportions right I first drew the image detailed and realistic,  afterwards I added a new layer on top and began removing the detail from the image. The image it's self can be broken down into 5 layers separating background clothing, outline hair and skin, and facial features.