Chapter 1 – Proposal & Project Action Plan Timetable
1.1 Analyse the requirements of a creative media production project
The Proposal
I will be independently embarking on a series of different research to help create my final production as this will give me ideas on exactly what to do for my FMP as well as evaluate how I can truly show my knowledge and skill set to the best of my abilities.
I have chosen to produce a music video, planned and directed by myself with the main theme having a dark and mysterious attitude throughout, Similar to the likes of the film "Joker" which I plan on taking huge inspiration from, As well looking at similar styles of music video such as a few by an artist by the name of Billie Eilish who's horror style music videos fit into the same style that I wish to shoot. Sticking to this theme I will be changing my footage to black and white in post production via premier pro to ensure my footage maintains a consistent look while also having plenty of behind the scenes images to show my progression over the duration of this project.
I have chosen to do moving image because this is, in my opinion, my strongest section in media as well as my most favourite to precipitate in. I have also previously shot this type of media in the past prior to this project, where I have looked into, more specifically, the construction of a music videos which I feel will be extremely helpful during the duration of this project of mine.
My Project Action Plan
Chapter 2 - Context
1.1 Analyse the requirements of a creative media production project
Project Background
I Decided when planning my project that I was going to create and produce a music video as, during the time of planning, I have found that I prefer the videography style units over the other units in which I have taken part in so far on this course, The other sectors of media consisting of radio broadcasting, film processing, a day in the life of a student and more.
But one of the main reasons to why I decided on making a music video for my final major project is because I have previously made one as part of my unit four assignment where I was required to research into the history of album covers as well as make my own, along with a music video to match it. So with this past knowledge I aim to achieve a much better and more organized production and taking this task as an opportunity to challenge myself and push my knowledge and skillset to the max. But Overall, I really enjoyed the whole process of this past unit, from the research to the planning and then producing the final production itself. From experiencing this all first hand, I felt like I could showcase my abilities far better through moving image in comparison to other sectors in media such as photography and making an audio broadcast as personally I felt that there are a lot more things I can do with a video. them reasons and more has had a huge impact on what I look to do for my final major project as I look to improve and reflect on what I have done in that unit and take that new knowledge into my new project.
Who am I? / About me!
My name is Dylan and at the time of writing this I am currently a student in my first year of college studying creative media and photography (Level 3).
From this I aim to obtain a level three diploma at the end of the two year course and hopefully go on to working somewhere in the world of media. As of yet I haven't quite decided on what sector I wish to progress onto but one of the great things about my current course is that we dip into a wide variety of media so I feel that by the time my course comes to an end I will have a greater understanding on my plans for the future and where I will eventually look to improve and grow into. But so far, as my first year here at college comes to an end and I reflect on the improvements and growth I have gone through already I personally think there has been a huge step up in comparison to when I first started. One example of this is I have been practicing a lot over the past year on my photography skills and knowledge by going out to places like Southport and Liverpool to take photos to familiarise myself with the camera and understand how one works. As well as this, to showcase my work I have created my own Instagram account especially for my photography called "@dylancoxmedia".
And on a more career based reflective, I was also given the opportunity to have a go at some real client work as the restaurant I currently work at in Liverpool was in need of some pictures being taken for their social media platforms and asked if I was able to help out. This was a new experience for me as I had never done anything like this before for someone, let alone a company but once I came in a few times I gradually got used to it and felt more comfortable in that type of atmosphere and hopefully that experience can help me improve on future work and projects in college as well as my own ventures.
My creative journey
I began my photography journey back in September 2021, when I started this course I knew absolutely nothing about how cameras worked and was not sure where I wanted to go with this course but I did know I wanted to study the different jobs available in the world of media as I have always been interested in just media in general, from jobs like social media managing, content creators and freelance photography. I wanted to learn about it all in hope that I will find something that I would want to take on as a future career.
Below are some of my very first pictures taken at the beginning of my college course.
At the time of taking these I didn't ever plan out my shots or keep any kind of theme in mind as I knew so little on this media sector. But to reflect on my progress here are some of my most recent pictures taken as I aim to build up my portfolio. (Shown below)
My Research Plan
Chapter 3 - Research
2.1 Review a range of research sources to support a creative media production project // 2.2 Interpret research to develop ideas and effectively communicate to an audience
Inspiration
My inspiration for this project comes from numerous sources of media, one in particular being from other music videos themselves. Artists like the verve, Billie Eilish and Kanye West are all influences for the planning process of my own music video as I wish to include their style of filming as well as pay homage to some of their iconic scenes by attempting to reference them myself into my final polished edit. Looking at the requirements for this unit I understand that my project needs to be a way of showcasing my practical skills as well as my overall knowledge and understanding when it comes to completing a form of creative media production within a planned out and agreed timeframe, something of which I believe I can achieve by ensuring I can provide the appropriate screen shots of pre-production as well as showing the physical evidence that goes into planning such as mind-maps, mood boards and story-boards.
Brief History : Music videos and how they began
With film technology getting a little bit cheaper and more accessible throughout the 1960s and onwards, the growth of broadcast television and consequently the rise of pop culture the late 60s and early 70s was a time of exploring all these new phenomenon's as a way to promote the music artist.
For example, the first music video to broadcast on television ever where by the The Beatles, titled "We can work it out". The band, who were already making some very popular full feature movies at the time, were looking for a way to promote their latest record releases without having to make in-person appearances thus birthing the idea to create a form of video that can be shown and watched by anyone across the globe.
From then on once the foundations were placed music videos became one of the main selling points for artists when they were to release a new single as it became evident that this was more interesting and entertaining new way for an artist to show there music, which is something I find interesting myself as this concept then was passed to many different music genres, producing so many unique styles of music videos which can all be found at a click of a button thanks to modern day technology.
Subject Inspiration
To build up a better understanding of how this type of media is created I have looked into a variety of unique individuals who direct music videos as part of their profession as well as also dipping into specific movie directors as I believe that they can also be a helpful source of knowledge when planning out moving image of this type.
Michael Chaves
Michael Chaves is an American film director, screenwriter, visual effects artist, editor, and executive producer who is responsible for productions such as the Maiden, which won the best short horror film award at "shriekfest" back in 2016. He also created his own television series titled "Chase Champion" in which he directed every episode that aired on nickelodeon back in 2015.
He then eventually transitioned to feature-length filmmaking where he found his main theme in thriller style productions which was a big jump to was he was originally known for.
His career achievements consist of films such as:
"The Conjuring: The devil made me do it" - (2021)
"Regen" - (2010)
"The Maiden" - (2016)
But one of the most useful information to me for my planning is that in 2019 Michael directed Billie Eilish's "Bury a friend" music video which has generated over 400,000,000 views currently on YouTube and has over 7 million likes from fans across the world.
I look to take inspiration from this video of his in particular as there are things that go on in the video that are done without any high production special effects. For example there is a section in the music video that features the artist sat centre screen with arms coming in from multiple directions, then to the beat of the song she is dragged around, maintaining eye contact towards the camera. This scene I enjoyed because its something that can be recreated without the need of any high budget equipment due to the concept being quite simplistic.
Walter A. Stern
Walter A. Stern began his career directing music videos at Control, a small production company based in London. In 1993, he moved to production company Stigma Films where he first directed a promo for the band "The prodigy". Their collaboration continued throughout the mid to late 1990s, including two critically acclaimed and award-winning promos in 1996: "Firestarter", which won Best Video in the NME People's Choice Awards in 1996, and "Breathe", which won Best Video at the MTV Europe music awards in 1997. Stern then joined Academy Films in 1997, introducing himself with the video for The verves "Bitter sweet symphony" which is one of the main pieces of work by him that I will be taking inspiration from in my own project as the concept of the music video itself is simple but effective.
Todd Phillips
Todd Phillips is an American filmmaker and actor who got his big break by directing various comedy films such as "Road Trip" and "Old School". He is also known for directing the likes of Starsky & Hutch, The entire Hangover trilogy, Due Date, War Dogs and School for Scoundrels. Phillips most recent work has been the award winning "joker" starring Joaquin Phoenix, Joker is the highest grossing R-rated film of all time and has earned over 1 billion dollars of revenue in box office. I look to take major inspiration from his work, mainly the joker due to the style of the film being something I want to imitate into my own work in the post production stage.
One of the main things I look to take away from Todd Phillips, "The joker" is the idea of being the odd one out amongst a large crowd of people. Having such a stand out character such as the joker himself and seeing him interact with just the general public in almost a dark and sinister way is something I enjoyed while watching the film as you see the contrast between them so clearly and I found it so entertaining to watch so id love to take inspiration from this and include it a different form of moving image such as a music video.
Jon Watts
Jon Watts began his directing career by directing commercials for production company Park Pictures. Watts' film career started with the short film, "Clay Pride: Being Clay in America". A Claymation film, it is a satire of films about gay issues, with the main character, Steve Thompson, coming out as "clay".
Over the next decade, Watts would continue to work in short films, as well as directing several music videos for various artists including Fat-boy slim, Death cab for cutie, Reliant k and many more. Jonathan then became a popular American filmmaker when he was given the opportunity of directing the Marvel cinematic universe superhero films such as Spiderman: Homecoming, Spiderman: Far from home and Spiderman: No way home; he has also signed to direct the Marvel Studios-produced Fantastic Four.
Matt Reeves
Reeves was born on April 27, 1966, in Rockville centre New York. He moved with his family to Los Angeles when he was five, where he began making movies at age eight, directing friends and using a wind-up camera of his own. Reeves met and befriended filmmaker J.J Abrams when both were 13 years old and a Los Angeles public-access television cable channel, Z channel, was airing their short films. Matt fits into my research due to his plethora of movies he has made with a similar style of his own, his films being multiple planet of the apes instalments and most recently "The Batman" which came out in 2022 and contains an almost gothic video style similar to Todd Philips' "Joker".
Tim Burton
Timothy Walter Burton is an American film director, producer, writer, artist and former animator. He is known for his gothic fantasy and horror films such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, and Frankenweenie.
Tim Burton is one of modern filmmaking’s best-known directors largely because his films all look like "Tim Burton films". It’s hard to find a recent director whose distinct visual aesthetic has become so universally, immediately recognizable. Even in his live-action Disney film Dumbo, which is something a lot different in comparison to Burton’s usual work but is still noticeably directed by Tim. By age 15, he was winning local advertising art contests, shooting creepy 8mm films around his neighbourhood, and creating illustrated children's books of his very own and After high school, Burton attended the prestigious California Institute of the Arts, which opened in 1961.
I feel Burtons whole style of film will benefit my research as I feel it fits the style i aim to go for in my music video, just like with the joker inspiration Tim uses strong visual techniques to show emotion in his projects, for example with his infamous characters such as "Jack skellington", who is portrayed through Tim's iconic style which I found to be originated from what is known as German expressionism, a modern area movement expanded to influence art across Europe in the 1920s.
Finding my aesthetic / Mood boards
I believe that Music can be extremely influential on us as individuals and can really have an effect on how we feel depending on the genre of music that is presented to us. But this can also be enhanced when accompanied with a video that has been carefully planned and crafted to fit the genre of the song itself. And there are numerous ways to ensure that the video links well with the song that it has been made for. One way in particular would be looking into different aesthetics that you or the artist feels matches the mood of the song.
This is something I heavily focused on when setting the foundations of my production as I really wanted to make sure that I had looked into many aesthetics to ensure I display the best visuals across in relation to the mood of the song. From researching aesthetics I have found that they are often linked to artistic beauty that create a mood for the viewer of the video. Although sound is typically a main component of music it is difficult for the artist that had created the song, to show their intentions just through the audio as it is very easy for listeners to misplace certain messages or meanings that the artist looks to get across to their audience. This is why choosing the right aesthetic is important to me as it is a way to properly express the mood that was intended by the artist of the song or even the producers making the music video. So with this in mind I began creating different mouldboards of athletics I felt would match the song "Alien blues".
Strategies & Questions
By taking on this kind of project for my FMP I intend to almost push myself out of my comfort zone and begin to take a more professional and technical approach when in the process of creating this music video. To achieve this I look to broaden my knowledge of premier pro to the next level by watching tutorials on YouTube as well as challenging myself with mini-workshops as I believe that I will take it in more if I was to have a go myself instead of watching a large plethora of different videos online. But it is not just knowledge I aim to take from this project as I intend on making this my best work possible as I would like to use this video as a way of advertising my abilities to people in hope that in can attract future opportunities.
I aim to use a wide variety of different methods to ensure that this project can be done to the best of my abilities. This will involve multiple experiments with special effects and different types of colour grading to make sure my options are open and that I have examples to choose from when it comes to the final decision in post production. Another method similar to the experiments that I look to take part in is also the workshops that I plan on creating, these will consist of little projects that I will set my self to help sharpen my skills and knowledge in the video side of the production as well as the editing side of the production.
One project that I have recently completed was my "Unit 4" where i planned out and produced a music video to the song "No Buses" by the Artic monkeys. I feel that I gained a lot of important knowledge when going through the making of the music video from time organisation to the post production and using premier pro which I know will definitely come into help me during the duration of creating this music video.
Colour grading Workshop
During colour grading, colourists use editing software to stylize the footage captured. Emphasizing the visual tone and atmosphere of a production, as well as making it look more cinematic or just to fit the aesthetic of the video. I will be using colour grading to adjust contrast, colour balance, white balance, black level, saturation and luminance. All this is for artistic purposes to ensure that my music video's colour palette conveys a specific atmosphere, style and emotion. For example, a colourist might use more red in dramatic moments to represent either passion, anger and, or power. But before I was to use this in my final cut I decided to take some test shots in Southport car-park with some mates just to take back to college and practice on. I had chosen the car park as I knew there was little light there, similar to the main shots I planned on shooting.
And to achieve the ability to colour grade I turned to online videos such as YouTube tutorials where I had premier pro opened alongside so that I could follow the videos and practice the basics of colour grading. One video that stood out the most for me was one I found by a content creator under the name of "Colour grading central" on YouTube. I found his video really helpful as he slowly went through the basics and explained the logic behind important things such as balancing the Whites and blacks and ensuring the white balance is correct in each clip.
Green screen workshop
The idea of greenscreen is that it allows a moving image production to remain within a sound stage but have easy access to change the location or can even be used in more creative ways like for example to duplicate a person. But in other words there are many uses for this technique in filmmaking, many of them to do with special effects. A green screen can be a key component in any kind of production and is known as "chroma keying", in which foreground action is combined with separately filmed or constructed background footage. The process works by filming actors in front of large, bright green backdrops, then isolating and removing that green colour range, and replacing it with a different background.
Understanding this, I then tested my knowledge through an experiment I orchestrated involving an actor and a green screen, my goal was to put my knowledge to the test and attempt duplicating the actor multiple times. This is a nod to the infamous Kendrick Lamar music video titled "HUMBLE" where the American rapper is seen in the centre of a crowd of people, delivering his lyrics of the song while the rest of the crowd aggressively nod their head to the beat. This is something I plan on featuring in the final cut of the music video as I admire the creativity and think it fits my aesthetic well.
(ORIGINAL)
(REMAKE BELOW) - Screenshot
Overall from looking at multiple types of techniques and skills I feel that they can defiantly be trialed and implemented into my final production to really show off my abilities when it comes to post- production. To evaluate on this I can use these in the post production stage for parts in the video that may need reviving or just simply made a slight bit more interesting to look at, which is something I had found out from conducting my surveys.
Survey Activity (Primary research)
Before I began on putting the pieces together in the practical side of my project I wanted to make sure that I was to get some form of feedback on my ideas from people who I knew as I felt it would help me when it came to finally shooting my footage. In order to obtain this kind of data I turned to "Google forms" where I created a survey for my friends to fill out, within this survey I included questions relevant to my project with some of the questions looking like this.
"What would you say your favourite genre of music video is?"
"Do you prefer a storyline in music videos or just a series of different clips put into one?"...etc
Below are the questions I filled in onto google forms:
I then sent this survey into our course teams group chat and asked if my peers and teachers can fill out the short survey so that I had a fair amount of opinions from a variety of different people.
Location planning
In order to ensure my music video is detailed enough and planned properly I had to ensure I had locations planned out in advance so that there was no time wasted when it came to shooting as if there was no planning I would have ended off just spending important shooting time just walking around looking for good locations to shoot at.
This is because thinking about a set or location is extremely important. you can have a really good concept or a good level of special effects but realistically, if your location doesn't have anything to do with the idea or concept of your project then it can really make or break the video visually. This is because I believe that the location will set the whole tone for my music video overall so making sure it works is heavily important.
Location 1 : Southport College, Lighting studio/ Green screen studio
Location 2 : Liverpool City Centre ( More across the slides)
Research Findings
Reflecting on my research ventures, I think I have benefited hugely through Researching individual directors in the film and music video industry off of reliable sources such as wikipedia as well as looking at portfolios from the producers themselves. I believe that this has helped widen my mindset immensely as well as inspiring me to try out different techniques to further boost my ways of producing and orchestrating my work. Another thing I took from my preproduction was the data collection I decided to put together questionare online, hearing opinions and ideas from other people really opened my eyes to what people enjoy when looking at this form of media.
Analysing my data collected
As mentioned earlier I decided that to help my planning process It would be beneficial to conduct my own online questionnaire so that I can get the opinions and preferences of my peers and tutors. After waiting a while for people to fill the form in, I went back onto the website to have a look at the feedback and individually look into the data that was collected.
One of the first forms of data that I decided to look at was the one where I asked what type of music video do people enjoy when given just two options which were a storyline based plot or a performance based plot. As shown below a performance based music video was the favourite getting 66.7% of the vote in total. This then settled my decision to plan my music video in the style of a modern day pop song where there's a constant change of scenes and effects compiled into one video.
Then with that information I then moved onto my other question titled "Should our vitals represent the lyrics?" which in the end turned out to be 50/50, thus meaning that I would make the decision myself on what I should follow as the 10 people who took part in the survey were split on if the video should represent the lyrics or not. In the end I decided to do a bit of both, have some scenes match up while some where different while maintaining a even balance so that the video ran smoothly.
Now moving away from the general assets of the video itself I also decided to learn more about the demographic of my peers
Influential media products
Tutorials online
From taking on this production it has been quite hard to step away from it in times when I'm just relaxing and doing other things in my life, this has resulted in me just venturing music video related things in my free time as a form of entertainment thus resulted in quickly becoming interested in short TikTok videos that show how to do things like effects and color grading on premier pro but in more entertaining ways than the typical 20 minute tutorial videos you see on youtube. One of the first videos to get my attention was a color grading video by "@dodford" where he made a one minute speed run on the basics of colour-grading and how to get the iconic aesthetic look from the award winning "JOKER". This is something i trialed with the first few clips that were shot exept i dont think it will make the final cut as i prefer the black and white look that i have settled for as i believe it keeps everything consistant and flowing.
Another one of the videos that was influential in making my music video was another one of "@dodford"'s TikTok tutorials except this was not a video on color grading, instead he showcased a special effect done in a music video and showed a way of creating it on premier pro in as little steps as possible. For me this tutorial opened my eyes to using special effects in my own video to make it look more interesting and give it that unique look and hopefully help it stand out from other videos you may see online.
Chapter 4 Practical Skills
3.1 Apply practical skills, knowledge and understanding to complete a creative media project within an agreed timeframe
My Project - Introduction
For my final major project I have directed and produced a music video to a song titled "Alien blues". I have chosen to produce this form of media as I enjoyed the production process from my previous unit 4 where we where challenged to produce a music video. This time I ensured to create a more organised and better produced product to show the best of my abilities In moving image as well as have the opportunity to reflect on what I have learnt and how I have improved over the duration of my first year here at southport college.
Pre-Production
*Images below were screen-shots taken from my notes in my phone as that is how and where I planned out this production
Costume design
As this was my final major project for this year I wanted to make sure that everything was planned out down to every last detail. This also meant planning out what the "talent" was to wear in the video as I felt the decision would be an important one as they are essentially the main focus point through out the entirety of the song.
And as the music video was going to be changed to black and white in the post production phase I decided to go with plain black jeans as well as a plain black jumper with no design on as I didn't want it to be a distraction when looking at the character. I also knew that if there was any form of colour on the "TALENT" it would have made the shades of black and white look different with its surroundings with is something I did not want to happen. Then finally down to the last important piece of the costume, the mask. Now I could have just kept it so the talents face was visible in the video but I wanted to make the identity of the "TALENT" unknown as I felt it would add to the theme of uncertainty and Eerie-ness. I had also wanted something of the "TALENT"to very much stand out from itself and its surroundings and create a contrast when put in comparison to the dark low lit background that the "TALENT" was to be placed in.
Production
Now that everything was thought out and ready to go I then began the production phase of the project, this took approximately three weeks in total to shoot with this consisting off both on location shots as well as studio shots done within college, using the resources open to me. As planned I kept my locations to a minimum having shots of the character making their way through a busy city centre and then to contrast, shots of the character in the lighting studio, isolated and alone.
Location 1 - (Liverpool City Centre)
The main location for my music video was Liverpool city centre as I found it to be an interesting place to shoot. A lot o the time I aimed to have the clips shot at night as I felt it would look the best once put I black and white during post production. But doing so led to sometimes having to sit around and wait for the darkness to get to a certain point to where I was happy to shoot with which sometimes meant a large quantity of out shooting time was lost waiting around.
But this was not the only hurdle I had ran into during shooting in Liverpool. This was because a few of my scenes relied on some places being open as one of the shots I wanted to get was in a certain carpark not far from the city centre. But when we eventually got there a few moments after walking in I was greeted by two of the carpark security team as they were beginning to lock up the site for the day which resulted in me having to leave thus being unable to shoot there that day.
But this was down to me not checking the times that the carpark was open for as I as under the assumption that the time I planned to get there for was early enough to have enough time to shoot what I needed to.
Location 2 - (Camera studio, College)
For a split majority of my shots I had planned to involve some studio work where I would use lighting and close up angles to record short sequences that would then be included throughout my music video. To achieve this I had set up a small set consisting of a chair, a tripod, camera and a soft box to act as a soft source of light that would also minimise my shadow In the background as well as simply ensuring that my face was well lit througout. Using this equipment I was able to get short clips of myself mouthing some of the song lyrics to create a more contrasting series of clips. (Shown below, A video of me recording one of my lip sync sequences in the lighting studio)
But these were not the only shots that were shot in the studio. One of the first things that I had shot was the beginning introduction of the video where hands slowly crept into the frame to then grab the talent. But this was before I had decided to put everything in a B&W, because when I originally began shooting I was planning to have my scenes in colour so we set up two LED soft box lights, one red and one blue to create a contrast
Green screen Studio - Southport college
As I wanted to take as much advantage of the resources that were available to me at college, I wanted to get clips from the green screen room to include into my music video.
Here I shot clips of myself stood in the costume so that I had clips to overlay over other clips for my video. Having this available to myself in post production will be helpful in sections like transitions or add-ons to add more interesting visuals to my scenes.
Equipment used
Canon EOS 250d
For the main shots, they were shot on a DSLR camera with a 50mm lens.
I had chosen to shoot my video on a DSLR camera instead of a video camera as I feel there is more control as with a digital camera I have control over lenses instead of having to work with a fixed lens on a standard video camera.
Canon Powershot A800
One of the cameras I had used to shoot my music video was a 2011 canon Powershot A800 which I had found laying around in my home prior to starting this project. upon testing it out I realised that due to the camera being rather an old model, the footage it records was in a way aesthetically pleasing as it had added an almost vintage effect, something that I wanted to include in my video. (Below are some off the still images I took while testing out the camera)
Studio Soft box
Soft boxes are commonly used in photography as a soft source of light that calms down harsh shadows. The walls of a soft box are reflective to increase the light intensity as it escapes out through the front diffusion screen.
I used this form of lighting to light up my face in the studio when getting the close up shots of my face for the lip syncing clips. this type of light worked really well as it was not too harshly lit on my face so that it wasn't visible on the camera footage.
Post-production
Finally, for my post production I decided that I was to use premier pro as my editing software to put all my clips together and edit them.
To begin I transferred all my clips from both cameras and uploaded them onto a USB stick so that they were all together in one place, making file organisation a lot more easier.
Now that my clips were all onto a project file I was then able to begin the editing. To begin I stuck exactly to my plan and started with the introduction video I had filmed in the studio. my first action was to create a "Colour matte" which was basically an all black image that I could use to create the flashing effect that ran smoothly along with the beat of the song.
To achieve this, what I did was listen closely to the beat of the song over and over again until I was able to understand where I could place the colour mattes over the clip I had. I made sure they were all equal distance apart so that they looked fluent and smooth when watched back with the music.
I then made my way onto the next task I had planned, which was creating my text overlays.
I wanted an efficient and eye-catching way of transitioning between parts of the song so I went onto Canva which is an mobile application where you can create graphics through interesting templates and pre-sets, except I wanted to keep it simple and have it fit in with the style of my video.
So what I did was start with a black background and typed single words from the lyrics on multiple black backgrounds to use as a pop up feature throughout my music video.
And as well as the text overlays I decided to take it a slight step further and mess around with different blending options to see if any worked well when placed over a video.
Which resulted in an artistic looking scene in my music video when changed to the "exclusion" setting in blend mode.
And upon learning about this Blend mode I decided to be creative and use it to create a signing off sequence to my video where I placed multiple green screen clips over each other and blend them to "Liear light" creating a shadowy effect to the clips that are overlaying.
Chapter 5 – Authentication, Evaluation, Reflection & Bibliography
4.1 Critically evaluate a creative media project against the agreed requirements and parameters
Authentication Document
Final Product
Project Evaluation
Project introduction
For my final major project this year I have created a music video to the song alien blues by vundabar which I planned, shot and directed over the course of the twelve weeks that we were given to complete this project. When planning this I wanted to step outside of my comfort zone and push my self to create something that I haven't yet done.
Strengths & Weaknesses
I have really enjoyed the production process to this project of mine and personally think I am proud of my achievements, this ranges from the special effects used through out the video which I had done through premier pro, where I had included text overlays, transitions and even included the chroma key feature when including my shots done in the green screen studio in college.
Another thing I would say I am proud of was how the overall aesthetic came together, the contrast of the black and white through out my video added to the Eire mood of the video as a whole and I feel it helped create a sense on continuity throughout the video from start to finish. Another thing that I was happy with when it came to the overall aesthetic was how well I feel that the low resolution clips worked alongside the high resolution clips, with the low resolution clips creating an almost retro vibe along side the high resolution that I kept cutting back to as almost a different perspective as to the low res clips. But I was not completely happy with everything when my video came to completion as some of my shots, once edited down completely, didn't look as good as I had intended them too. One example of this was a scene about half way through the video when the "Talent" was moving up and down a staircase located outside the Metropolitan cathedral of christ in Liverpool. What I thought would look like a smooth, well orchestrated scene ended up looking tacky and awkwardly framed but that was down to having the incorrect lens on the camera so the camera had to be placed relatively far away to get the whole staircase in frame. But that was not the only shot that didn't go to plan, as there were many green screen shots that I had shot but once edited didn't turn out to be the best when in the post production phase as I felt like some just didn't fit into the theme or mood I was trying to implicate into my video.
Theme & Influences
My planning for this music video was heavily influenced from darker genres of music and they're accompanied videos. With the likes of Billie Eilish, The Verve and Kendrick Lamar all being researched heavily from they're aesthetics to their types of music videos. Some I had even recreated In some of my scenes. Like for example in the beginning of my video there was a clip where arms slowly came into frame to grab the talent and drag him out of the chair, this was recreated from the music video titled "Bury a friend" by Billie Eilish which I believed would fit rather well in with my theme. Speaking of themes when in the planning phase I decided to go with a formidable and eerie theme for my music video as after listening to my chosen song a couple of times I felt that the tone of the song itself would match well with the horror-like mood as the visuals. This involved things like having close up shots of the talent with a mask on looking straight into the camera and also shots of the talent stood from a far staring into the camera again but the time in busy places where they were surrounded by people which was something that was inspired by the verve song called "bitter sweet symphony" where the lead singer is centre frame walking through crowds of people with out caring about them at all.
Experiments & Workshops
Before the production phase of my project I wanted to conduct some experiments and trial a few different things before I was to use them in my completed product. So to avoid wasting valuable recording time and overall production time I conducted my own workshops that I took part in. These involved looking up colour grading tutorials on YouTube and following along with sone so that I knew the basics on how to do that on premier pro. As well as colour grading I also did tests on premier pro involving green screen clips I had collected to conduct my tests. Tests of which involved attempting to recreate the crowd scene in Kendrick Lemar's "HUMBLE" music video to see how a duplication clip of my "TALENT" would look if I was to add it into my music video, something of which I ended off not doing as I discovered from executing the experiment that it wouldn't have fit my theme that I had been following.
Product Comparison
Comparing my planning and production to other directors and artists has helped me immensely as I feel doing so has helped me stay grounded in my abilities as well as have a much more focused drive to attention to detail. As well as this others work has been inspirational to me during the course of this project, helping give me fresh and creative ideas to make my own video the best I can.
Areas of development
Looking back at the completion process of this project as a whole there are a few things I would definitely do differently if I was given a second chance at this project or just in future projects in which I may take part in. Little details in scenes like some being a slight bit off beat is something I will look to improve on in the future as well as working on my location to explore more interesting and unique locations for my scenes.
Proposal review
In my proposal I wrote about wanting a dark horror themed music video, full of interesting effects and techniques that have been thoroughly planned out and researched which is something I believe that I have accomplished in my work. As well as this it was one of my main challenges from the start to take my previous experience from the last music video i had made and see how much I can show that I have improved and learnt, which i am also proud to say that I believe that I have done so.
Future improvements
If I was to look back and make any changes to this project it would properly involve adding a more cinematic look to the video, extra additions such as adding a cinematic crop to the video would have been a way of doing so.
Fulfilling the project brief
Finally as I reflect on the project as a whole, I believe that I have successfully met the requirements that were presented to me in the project brief. Objectives such as planning together a organized set of scenes that fit my theme well as well as providing the evidence to prove it is something I had been able to achieve at the beginning of the project. As well as being able to successfully location plan for the shoots and when the time was right go out and record them while using the correct angles and technical skills to really show my skill range and capabilities as much as I could.
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