A2 Media - Movement

This is going to be a short post but i have been thinking more about how the final product should look and watching videos as i do in my spare time i realised movement is one of the most important things in a video especially a music video the music itself is constant and flowing and therefore the camera should be as well. Doing this i feel it will give the video a much better feel and make it alot easier to flow to and watch and for a music video obviously to "bop along" to. This is even more important with a video as fast paced as ours, we should therefore make sure most of all in the edit that we have a lessened amount of still shots and make sure we have some kind of ,whether it be large or small, camera movement or movement of the actors in a significant way not just simply playing an instrument, there is however one exception that being the vocalist often the shots of the vocalist may be still shots with no movement however I fear this could slow down the pace of the video, me and james will see how this plays out when we come to the final edit.

A2 Media - Filming

We have attempted to get out and film twice this week first of all on monday, this fell through because one of the members of the band could not make it. We has also created a new plan to film tomorrow but once again this failed as one of the band members could not make it, I am meeting one of the band members today in order to try and arrange some definate plan as to what we are going to do, but so far it is not looking good. By the looks of it it could be another week or two before we can get out with the whole band and so we may have to begin filming the narrative footage first rather than the footage of the band either way we should attempt to make sure that by the time we get back next week we have some footage to look at and edit on the computers.

A2 Media - Storyboard

This is the storyboard which is obviously shorter than the actual piece will be as this is mainly going to be used as guidelines as to what we need to film as well as showing us and reminding us multiple shots which we need to take. The reasoning for this is because alot of our video will be quick and fast cuts from each shot and so if we were to draw out a storyboard for each and every shot it would take probably 50 pages and would take such a long time that it would become a waste of time when we can simply condense it into this which we can glance at quickly to remind of how the video will look.

A2 Media - Vortex

On Thursday I attended the Vortex supporting Evile gig, and it was amazing. Vortex performed amazingly and it great to see them on a bigger stage than usual. Unfortunately my media work did not go as well, at the gig i took several pictures in hope to use in the ancillary files, but the room was often dark and the lights were constantly flashing and so the pictures i took came out blurred and obviously unusable. However there was a professional photographer there for Vortex who gave Vortex some photos when it comes closer to the time i will get in touch with Vortex and see if they are willing to let me use some of these in the digi pak even the album advert if we so wish it.

A2 Media - Project Reflection

Compared to my previous AS project much has changed since then; instead of working in a group of three I am now working with only one other person, more over it is a different person to who I was previously working with, which in itself could have been a risk of which did not work out. However so far the project is going quite well me and James are working well together and playing to each others strengths which is a very good situation for the both of us. In regards to the actual project I am doing, this is a significant change from the precious AS piece. Instead of creating a opening 2 minutes to a film or even something related to a film we are now doing a music video, which in some aspects mean starting our research right back at the beginning. Both me and James are very passionate about music which has helped us greatly with the project meaning we are willing to put more time and effort into the project. So far I feel that I have improved upon my previous piece in terms of research I have posted a lot more videos and discussed them in better focus of what i need compared to last year, at the moment my planning from last year is looking slightly better than from this year but i intend to rectify that with the process of multiple documents ready to be uploaded onto my blog.

The main things that differ from this project from my previous is several things obviously one of them being that this project is a music video and not a film opening. But we have had to re-think the whole way we are filming being that when we film a music video we have to text so many more shots at so many more different camera angles, this does however give us way to include a wider range of camera shots and angles which allows us to be more creative with our project. However there is some similarities in our previous project despite its premise as a film we did not actually include any dialogue mainly because we felt that because we could not use professional actors it might affect the quality of the work, this is the same for the music video being that we don't have to worry about whether the dialogue will be professional or not mainly because there will be no dialogue. In comparison I hope that we can make this project better than my previous hence why i have taken this time to reflect upon my precious project and realise what more I have to do like the extra planning such as log sheets, call sheets and agreements there are things like this that i did not do on my previous coursework and so I am hoping that by studying my previous piece and looking at what i did and didn't do i can use that to make this piece of coursework better than the last.

A2 Media - VORTEX

Tonight vortex are playing a gig with Evile in Durham at the Live Lounge! Whilst there however I will talk to some of the "cult" fans of vortex (also being one myself) and see if i can pick up a few more ideas for what would be expected of the band and what kind of things that they would enjoy seeing in a music video but also from a digi pak and an album advert. I will also take this opportunity to perhaps take some photos of Vortex and then upload if they are of good quality that we could perhaps later use in the digi pak.

A2 Media - Presentation of the Band

 

These kinds of images are typical of how I want the band to presented. Each of these pictures are typical pictures of the thrash metal genre which as mentioned is the genre in which vortex slide into, and so therefore when we take pictures whilst out on our shoot it is these types of pictures that we will be attempting to try and put into our digi pak and on the album advert. The most common feature of these is that of the dark clothing and the dark colours of the band and background in general. When me and James come to get these photos hopefully at the weekend we will be using editing software primarily adobe photoshop to potentially saturate the colours on the photos making them darker and greyer such as the ones above. Looking at the picture is quite easy to grab the tone of them, a darker tone that which separates this genre from other genres in general. Very importantly is the seriousness of which each of these pictures hole, the band vortex themselves are very much like this, while they do have a humorous side (Daniel Jordan's funny faces pulled during gigs) but at the same time they do and will retain a certain amount of seriousness during their performance and so attempt to keep this feel for the band keeping within the genre itself.

A2 Media - Genre

When making our video in intend not to subvert the genre but instead to adhere very close to all aspects of the metal video genre. The aspects of this being what is typically in a metal video. In order to gain an idea of this me and my partner James studied several metal videos looking at similarites and difference in between the metal genre as a whole and then at sub-genres of metal such as thrash (vortex's sub genre of metal), death and power metal. From the videos we watched we came up with a sumisable list of what features in the genre in which we are engaged :

• Quick fast paced edits
• Range of shots, from establishing, long, close-up, medium, two and moving shots
• Focus on the vocalist during vocals
• Singular shot on the guitarist frets during the solo
• Movement of the actors across the area playing
• Headbanging (actors)

Each of these things we noticed was present in the videos we watched and so in order to slide into our chosen genre we need to make sure that we ourselves include these in our video also.

A2 - First Shoot

On either sunday or monday whichever day we can gather the memeber of the band together we are intending to travel to wharton park and being our first shoot. For this shoot we going to filming just the band themselves and film the narrative on a separate day, by tomorrow we will have completed the storyboard and a shot log of all the different shots in which we need and more. Roughly we think the shooting will take 3-4 hours, however for the bands sake we are going to provide them with the new rockstar energy drink to keep them motivated. As planning has gone so far we will run the song a good few times even going over certain parts of the song using and ipod with the song on to sync everything up to make sure we have every second of the song filmed and more. We will most likely film in bulk 20-30 second intervals filming each about 8-10 times making sure we have every part of the video in every aspect we need.

A2 Media - Audience

The target audience for our video is already and established group as the band already has a distinctive and loyal fan base. The main target audience of the video will be in an age group of typically around 17-25 primarily obviously that is just general there are many people younger and even more so older who have listened to metal all their lives who will be interested in the video and the band and so to whom this will appeal to. However mostly this will be aimed at an audience of around this age, the type of people who go to gigs and will be right in the center or the crowd the ones who will be involved in crowd surfing, stage diving and most primarily mosh pits. The audience are, as mentioned, fanatically loyal they are the type of fans who travel miles to attend a gig, check the website everyday for any sign of new album release or music video releases. The research I have done into the audience have proved them to be a massive fan of the Evile - Thrasher video which is what our video is based on primarily with the addition of a narrative. From this therefore we know without a doubt when we have created our video it will receive positive reception from the audience it is intended for hence why we have adhered to closely to codes and conventions of the genre.

http://craig-mullen-a2-media.blogspot.com/2011/08/a2-media-evile.html This example from my blog shows just the type of video in which the audience love and this is how we will base ours on however this does not include a narrative hence we looking into several other videos, http://craig-mullen-a2-media.blogspot.com/2011/09/a2-media-deicide.html this entry from the Deicide video shows again how an inclusion of narrative can be effective. As with the Evile video I asked around in particular people who were fans of vortex and asked what they thought of these two videos both were recieved with popular feedback and so we know that what we are doing is something that is approved in the genre and we know that what we are doing and creating will indeed appeal to the audience which is obviously the primary intent of the video.

A2 Media - Scenario

We are currently in the middle of the making of the storyboard for our video. The scenario for our video which we have finally decided which obviously we have mentioned being set in Wharton park in Durham. For the general plot of the video will be focused most primarily on the band itself with the narrative integrated into that. We plan to have the band stood playing on a circular point of the battery in Durham and us while using two camera will continually focus on the band from several different angles shifting from close ups to long shots and two shots, to begin the video we will use a establishing shot setting the scene allowing the audience to see where the band are, and creating a general opening to the video to do this we will be moving up from the ground tilting the camera upward from an angle to reveal the band as they begin to play the song as the song begins to pick up pace we will jump straight into a shot of the band close up. We also intend to have as we begin a quick shot of the forest in which the narrative will take place in perhaps giving a slight insight into the narrative and how it will run, essentially creating enigma about what is actually happening in the narrative itself. From this we will focus most primarily on the band as they open the song jumping from shots of the drummer to the guitarist to vocalist to bassist repeatedly integrating two shots and long shots to close ups etc. Obviously at regular intervals as the song begins to pick up pace and really speed up we will make the changes from both the band and the narrative even quicker, the effect desired from this will be to capture the audience as soon as the video begins. The narrative in which we are using has changed slightly from the original idea, we now intend to have a scene whereby there is a chase or something of that nature occurring within the video in time with the song resonating the rhythm of the music with the narrative keeping the synchronisation with the music the band and the narrative. For the narrative we are inquiring into a piece of artwork in which we intend to get permission for which depicts a monster like creature with a baseball bat running through some trees, hence the forest scene, Daniel Jordan has offered to act as this creature for the narrative and we have a few people who are willing to be the victim or the person just generally being chased by the creature. We intend to keep this kind of flow to video changing the pace altering the narrative until the end where we will have a climax that will ultimately end with either the band or the narrative whichever we feel would look best we will play with the two in the editing process in order to see which we think is best, however it would seem most likely to finish with the band as that's how the video begun. While filming the narrative we while use obviously a variation of shots, but we intend to keep to an extent full view of the monster to a minimum mainly in order to keep the viewer watching and furthermore to keep them held in suspense and ideal and shocking end to the narrative would be a blood splatter on some trees to give the narrative a decisive and shocking end.

A2 Media - Clearance

This is an e-mail from Paul Ryan at the Durham county council, he has e-mailed me back regarding our filming and has very optimisticly given us permission to film our project at Warton Park which is amazing news for us. He has said he is very keen for us to film there and he is happy for us to film if we can give him the dates and times of when we will be filming at the park. This obviously finally gives us a secure location to film and begins to set our filming in notion.

A2 Media - Agreement with Vortex

In order to get permission to get the music, despite the fact we are friends with the band, is that we have agreed to help them as they help us. There is a metal festival, of which I attended with two of the band members, has a "New Blood" stage. The new blood stage allows unsigned bands such as Vortex to enter a music video and if the festival is interested then they will allow the band to play on the stage on either the Friday, Saturday or the Sunday. Therefore the agreement we have established allows us to use their music and themselves to be part of the video and in turn for their cooperation we will send them a finished copy of the video in which they can send into Bloodstock and have a chance of getting to play there. Not only the opportunity of Bloodstock but also by providing them with a music video it gives them that for as long as they need it and we have more time to sit and edit it than they would and so it works both ways with both us and the band. However we will also be giving them a copy of the album cover of which they are going to use to release their EP and so once again showing how our partnership with the band with be beneficial for all.

A2 Media - Clearance

We have e-mailed both DCC and the English Heritage, in order to inquire about using either the Battery in Warton Park or Finchale Priory. This is the basis of what we have e-mailed to two:


"We are A2 Media Students at Framwellgate Sixth Form in Durham. We are e-mailing you to inquire about filming our coursework at one of your sites, specifically                 . Currently we are producing a music video for our second year A-level project. We have researched the                       site and we feel that it would serve as the perfect background for our music video. Regarding the content of the video, we would simply be bringing a few pieces of musical equipment onto the site - two guitars, a bass guitar and a small drum kit - which the band would use to mime to. We will go to the greatest lengths to ensure that we do not generate a prohibitive amount of noise and we would aim to keep our presence on the site as unobtrusive as possible. We would certainly make sure that we did not get in the way of other visitors. We would also assure you that the monument will be treated with the greatest resepct; we simply wish to use it as the backdrop for the band's performance. If you would like further information, or a reference, please contact our teacher (Mr Earl) who can give you more information about what the filming entails. He can be e-mailed at https://vle.fram.durham.sch.uk/owa/redir.aspx?C=26e6646554d0402bbd73d1a12aa4e551&URL=mailto%3achris.earl%40fram.durham.sch.uk. Thank you for taking the time to read this e-mail. We look forward to hearing from you soon with any news."

A2 Media - Costume

For the costumes in the video, we are generally not required to have costumes, all of the band members all dress in they way that is typical of the metal genre and so a clothing/costume code has little relevance toward our actual shoot. However the narrative will need some level of control, we intend to use most likely a "casual" clothing style to make the person in the video more accessible to the audience. Either that or we may try to find a hospital outfit if we feel it will work or is necessary.

A2 Media - Health and Safety

The places we are intending to film generall pose no danger to the safety of the cast, we are intending to film either finchale priory or the battery in durham whichever we think is best when me and James look further in detail. From both they are sites that are often subjected to public view and so from this we can tell that in these places will be safe to be in as they will be constantly maintained to make sure that they are atractive for public viewing but at the same time to make sure that they are actually safe for the public to be around.
   Secondly in  the places we intend to film there is certaina avenue for the ability to climb on walls etc, however considering the nature of the film a music video being that it would require equipment being on the person as well this would most certainly be a seemingly bad idea, however the idea of a guitar solo could be placed on wall that was perhaps not so high off the ground but slightly elevated in order to make sure it is still safe for the actor and doesnt place them at risk and doesnt risk the damaging of any of the equipment.
   Being aware of other people around is a problem we may have to face on the day, with us recording the band playing at this these locations we will be bringing out two guitars, a bass guitar and a drum kit. Out of each of these only the drum kit will be the problem, as for the other band memebers they can basicly just mime playing the guitars or at least not have them plugged in as to reduce minimum noise volume. The drums however cannot be muted and so they will be reasonably loud which could cause a problem but this will be brought up with the place that we are filming in, we will however as much as possible keep out of peoples way and be willing to move to the most secluded place around in order to keep out of way as much as possible.
   In terms of vehicle use, we intend only to use cars in order to get to the location there will be no cars involved with the actual making of the video. I have already requested use of my friend's car who has agreed to transport people and equipment I will inquire around more so when we actually sort out a definate date for beginning the filming.
   Regarding legality we do not intend to be doing anthing that is particular obscure or that could be considered as obscene in anyway, the only possible legal problem we could face is noise however I intend to go to the locations and experiment in order to ensure that we are not violating the noise levels which i think is possibly inlikely with one set of drums however the noise level may be undesirable for the owners of the locations and visitors who will inevitably be there on the day.

A2 Media - Planning

Over the course of the next two weeks me and James will produce a series of documentation to accompany our project and to allow us to ensure that everything will go smoothly and according to plan on the days of the actual shoot. The documentation we will put together will consist of:

• Production Schedule
• Prop Sheets
• Costume Sheets
• Call Sheets
• Clearances
• Booking Sheets
• Meetings/briefings with the team etc.
• Contingency Plan
• Risk Assessment/Health and safety
• Location Log sheets
• Edit decisions log sheets
• Storyboards
• Completeled script scenario
• Shooting schedules
• Personal log
• Pitch
• Treatment

A2 Media - Rough Album advert

This is the rough copy of our album advert and how we plan for it to look, obviously as we have found through our research the name of the band goes at the top, and much like the Antares Predator album advert we have decided to place the album in the middle of the page directing full attention to it. At the bottom we will have the band standing as shown in the sketch, and as further shown in the sketch they will have the all the production companies etc in the bottom corner as well. The scribbles down the center are in fact suppose to be lightening bolts, the idea for this just came from the work vortex itself, we had originally thought of flame but we agreed that lightening bolts suited the band better. The bolts that will be coming across the screen will be green, same as the logo, and as they pass through the logo they will fade out only to fade back in when they have the passed the logo and the digipak. James has already whipped up a quick draft which closely replicates my sketch, see his blog to find it. 

A2 Media - Album Adverts

This album advert featured on the back of a terroizor magazine and seen from the actual advert itself it has a slightly different format to the previous ones I have uploaded. With this advert once again the name of the band is clearly shown across the top of the page, as to it being the first thing to be noticed/read. The difference with this advert however is that of the size of the digipak being advertised, here the picture of the digipak takes up the majority of the page showing a different approach in which to take for the album advert. The paragraph at the bottom of the advert simply describes the band and the influences the band have used and why they have produced the album while doing so in a interesting style in order or perhaps entertain or amuse the reader.

This advert is not actually for an album but for a series of tours, however due to the sparsile nature of adverts being found online I felt this would be appropriate to upload as well bearing in mind that it is an advert in a metal magazine and so would conform to the conventions of adverts advertising metal bands. Firstly as ever the band name it sprawled directly across the top of the page as always this obviously being a convention of adverts of this genre. This advert however does something a little different, while it has the main information like the tour dates (on ours that will be the digipak) it shows the band at the bottom rather than artwork which is a possibility for us as it would be more accessible than acquiring artwork to the quality of some of the adverts.

Once again this advert differs again from most others that I have uploaded, this one like all the others does have the band name at the top of the page like all the adverts do. However this one does not feature a confirmed picture of what the album looks like it simply has a piece of artwork that, most likely, will be associated with the album and so allow the audience to link the two and realise it is the same piece of work by the same band. An interesting note on this album is that it included the date of release a lot heavier that the other adverts, this could be that the album digipak has not been produced yet or some other reason perhaps that they do not need to show as it will resemble the background of the advert itself too well.