Wednesday 14 December 2011

JT- Casting


Katie

Nathan


This week we got in touch with the cast for the second time, our elder male (Joel) pulled out last minute so we found a replacement which was our second choice. We will now be using Katie and Nathan who are available all holidays. These two are perfect because they are already a couple so it won't be hard to find onscreen chemistry as they already have it. They are the exact age of our target audience (18+21) so our primary audience will link to them more. They are applying with common codes and convetions of the Pop Genre because they are a hetrosexual couple, fashionable and are attractive. There costume will be of a similar style (more Indie) which will be asthetically pleasing and will look as if they have grown up together and taking in each others characterisitcs. Although Katie has red hair and nathan has dark hair, it doesn't matter about all the 3 generations hair colour matching as it creates versimilatute, as in real life everybodys hair changes when they grow up


ALL - Week 6 podcast

Tuesday 13 December 2011

ALL-NUmusic productions logo


We made our NU Music Production logo in Flash. We found an image of some headphones on the internet and copied the image into our Flash file. From here we used the onion skin tool to trace the image. We improvised and drew the wire free hand so that it looked exactly how we wanted. We then exported it as a JPEG so that can be used around our blog and in other sections of our coursework.We think this is a good logo for our target auidence which is of a youth age, because youths today are wearing Dr Dre Beats headphones so it will appeal to them

Thursday 8 December 2011

GM - Contacting the cast

Originally we spoke to our cast members at school to find out if they would be interested in staring in our music video. Once we had an idea of who we would involve and when we wanted to film we emailed the cast via social networking site Facebook. This was the most convienient method of communication between ourselves and the rest of the cast members.






ALL - Contacting Chrysalis Records


We searched all over the internet to find Chrysalis record company contact details, it soon came apparent that it isn't a independent company anymore but it is a subsidiary of the conglomerate BMG. After using there website http://bmg.com/category/contact to find out the email address, we then emailed them asking for permission to use the track.
After recieving the email reply suggesting that we contact the local collecting society we tried to find a new email address online but there appeared to not be one.

Wednesday 7 December 2011

GM - Magazine Ad Research

Features of Greenday, 21st Century Breakdown digipak magazine advert

  • Says the format it is available in - CD and download
  • Bold writing
  • Text is very clear agains the darker background - white on black/brown/red
  • Includes basic information such as band name, album title, release date, web address
  • Band name is in the largest font so it stands out
  • Band name is recognisable of their image/brand (logo?)
  • Frames the image - graffiti style - same as the album cover
  • Colours compliment each other
  • Introductory sentence to grab the audience's attention 'the wait is finally over...'

Other conventions we found as a group
  • Album artwork is included in the advert (all)
  • Says 'new album' on the ad (3/6)
  • Tour dates (2/6)
  • Release date (all)
  • Social media links - twitter/ facebook (no longer myspace for newer releases)
  • Tickets website (2/6)
  • Artist website (all)
  • Artist name positioned top, central on the page (5/6)
  • Tour sponsor advert and website (1/6)
  • Phone number for ticket (1/6)
  • Name of hit single included in the album (2/6)
  • Image of the band (3/6)
  • Thumbnails of the album (1/6)
Other ideas
  • Label it as limited addition to increase sales
  • image of digipak spread out

ALL - Shots we will use for filming

When doing our call sheets we realised that to get a variety of shots we will need to film at every different angle, so we made a list so when filming we can refer back to it 



  • Long Shot
  • Medium Shot
  • Close up
  • Extreme close up
  • Mid shot
  • Over the shoulder
  • Establishing shot
  • Medium close up
  • extreme long shot
  • high angle
  • low angle
  • two shot
  • POV

ALL- Week 5 Podcast

Friday 2 December 2011

ALL - Audience Quiz

Me and Gina decided to see if our interpretations of our audience were correct. We set out to find out if we have correctly matched the age ranges of our target audiences to our video/ancillary products. To do this we filmed 3 people, the ages were 18 (Primary Target Audience) and two 40-50 year olds (Secondary Target Audience). We put together a quiz of 4 male solo artists from different eras, Olly Murs (2010-2012), Justin Timberlake (1990-2012), James Blunt (2005-2012) and George Michael (1980-2012). Also on the quiz was Robbie William's first album cover and his latest album cover. This was so all age ranges had something that they could relate to. 





The video shows that our guesses were right. Leah (18) managed to get everyone except James Blunt and George Michael and Robbie's latest album. Jan (40-50) managed to guess George Michael and Robbie's latest album cover. Miss Haigh (40-50) guess everyone single one except She didn't remember Justin Timberlake and Robbie's first album cover. Although this is a small sample of people and ages/gender, we think that this represents our audiences enough. They all guessed which one's we thought they would and this is how we devised our products to match them. 

Thursday 1 December 2011

ALL - Mise-En-Scene Issues

When planning our idea we came across potential issues regarding the props and mise-en-scene we have chosen:

  • Some of our locations are outside so matching up lighting and weather may be difficult if re-shoots are required
  • At the time of filming we may be to far into Autumn so all the leaves will have already fallen of the trees and started to decay on the paths rather than being crisp and in a perfect condition to throw 
  • An alternative to the leaves scene was to use snow instead however due to the unusually warm November we have experienced it is unlikely that snow will fall
  • As we are using three generations in our idea it may be difficult to achieve verisimilitude to the time period
  • We are also using 2-4 year old children so it is going to be difficult to get them to cooperate on camera
  • Some of the scenes involve getting messy, eg painting, so we will therefore have to order our shooting to ensure that we do the messiest last

Wednesday 30 November 2011

JT - Key Influences

After looking at several music videos, both me and Gina have found that there aren't any that are exactly like our idea. Although we have found some videos which represent different bits and some story lines.

Both One Directions video's 'What Makes You Beautiful' and 'It's Gotta Be You' and the X Factor 2011 charity single 'Wishing On A Star' used layering and editing techniques we would like to incorporate into ours.








These 3 video's use different clips fading into one another but still having them places on the screen, also keeping different layers on top of each other such as the group and fire. We want to use these editing techniques because the song we have chosen (Robbie Williams - She's The One) is a 'nice' song and the usual code and convention of music video is fast pace editing, this will not look right with the type of theme we are going for so we need slower editing to fit in. The video of Gotta Be You by One Direction also has a cold effect that we want to use for ours such as woolly clothing and a cold atmosphere, the lighting helps with this, another example of the cold effect is The Saturdays video of 'My Heart Take's Over', this also has the type of style we want to use for Robbie When he is on the Cow and Calf rocks.



Olly Murs also has a range of songs that are about love. His videos don't link into our idea as much but 'Busy' shows his love (even though the girl isn't real) this is something we definately want to incorporate into ours.



Katy Perry's 'The One That Got Away' is another example of loving someone. This video shows two different ages (similar to ours except were using three), one being a young couple and then the other being the woman of the couple grown up. The director has made the younger couples mise-en-scene to look older in time period, this is something we need to think about and incorporate into ours. It's a love story which ends in a tragic way when the young boy dies after they have an argument in a car crash. One of the opening scenes that they use is of them painting portraits of each other, we are using this idea too. They also dance together which we are having in our, the basic idea is of them being very close and in love.




Another video that is similar to the love story is the Breaking Dawn Soundtrack single - Bruno Mars 'It Will Rain'. This shows both performance and a love story between him and the girl. It shows there rocky relationship but love is still keeping them together. It links in with ours because it again shows the love and how they are with each other.



Another influence on our idea is the John Lewis advert. This is a perfect example of a young girl growing up with the same man as she met when she was younger. It shows aspects that we want to use in ours. Also it uses a messy baking scene which is another one of our ideas.




Our Vodcast on the key influences



Tuesday 22 November 2011

ALL - Sample Footage



This is a vodcast to show potential rooms we might use and locations. We are definately using Ginas house so its chosing which rooms we would like to use for each generation

Tuesday 15 November 2011

ALL - Digipak (group work)

Definition of a Digipak
Digipaks are a type of CD packaging made out of card stock or other heavy paper/cardboard material. Digipaks can flip open like a book, or it can have three parts, so that one portion of the packaging opens to the right and one to the left, with the CD in the centre. 


Codes and Conventions of a Digipak 
As a group we researched and looked at examples of digipaks. When looking at some of the example ( Ignacio Fernandez - Buscare) we discovered the typical codes and conventions of digipak which include:

  • Front and back cover
  • Back cover includes a track list with timings 
  • Artist and the album names are placed on the front cover
  • Some may have a track list with the names of the composers underneath in small print.
  • Also on the back cover there is the record company name and sometimes their label. 
  • At the bottom of the back cover there sometimes may be the artists website address. 
  • There is a bar code/Qr code
  • Where the CD has been made.
  • Panels - different parts to the panels and different colours sometimes. 
  • Sometimes there is a lyrics sheet you can pull out of part of the digipak.
  • Sometimes it can be special edition or a collective and could include a DVD. 
Advantages of a digipak rather  than a standard Dual Case
  • You can recycle the material used to make the digipak  as it is cardboard not plastic
  • A digipak is cheaper to produce, making the distribution cost cheaper.
  • A digipak is a more up to date version of an LP which is basically a 12'' square cardboard, showing a resemblance to a digipak. 
  • They cannot crack like Dual cases can, however they could rip or eventually over time fall apart.
Digipak design layout 






















Four Panel Digipak 






































6 Panal Digipak 


Friday 11 November 2011

ALL - Props

The majority of our scenes will only require everyday clothes, warm for the outdoor parts. However we will need 3 similar fancy dress outfits (we are flexible to this as long as they get more revealing as the couples age), a long black coat for the male posing as Robbie, candles and cake, cardboard box for the toy car, tv, paint and flour. These will all be easily accessible.



  • Everyday Clothes
  • Wii and Mario Game
  • Fancy Dress
  • Warm Wooly clothes
  • Long black coat
  • Beard?
  • Condensed window
  • Pen and paper
  • Car
  • Candles and Cake
  • Card board box
  • TV  
  • Paint
  • Flour

ALL - Casting

Josh
Katie
The person playing Robbie will ideally be in their late 20's early 30 however this may change if that is not available to us. For our youngest children we may have problems with getting permission of parents to feature in our film so we are lenient to the age of them, as long as they are under 7 years old it will work. We have asked and got permission from Mrs Morgan to could use one of her sons however we still need to find a young girl. We asked about perhaps a girl friend from his play group but we haven’t a final answer on this yet. The second couple will be about 14 and these actors will be hopefully some of Gina’s brothers friends in his year. Finally will be two 18 year olds for which we will use people in our year for. The ages of the younger children may vary depending on parental consent and availability during the time of filming. Permission slips will have to be signed by parents in the case of the younger children.
Chris


We have possible ideas on different cast members but we are yet to ask them and decide who we want



  • Joel and Livi
  • Katie and Nathan
  • Miss Morgans children (boy) and some friends who have a little girl
  • Chris and Harriot
  • George Scaife or Jack Hanson for Robbie
Joel
Nathan







Sophie

Livi


Zoe






John
George

Jack