R+P Post 33: Reflections on my role and contribution during Research and Planning

Researching the water guns we bought

So far, I'm really pleased with where our project is headed and based on the current work, I feel we are going to have a really successful end result.

I'm really pleased with my group because we all seem to be putting in equal amounts of work which means we're not having to make up for the shortcomings of one member. Therefore, it allows us to continue to be creative and efficient without having to worry about if the other members are up to date etc.

I have enjoyed going away and doing my own research and then bringing it back to the group and sharing during group meetings as I feel this is a really successful way at progressing. The fact that we have all been doing this means we all come back with fresh ideas ready to share for each meeting.

The planning process has also been very efficient as we've ensured as a group that we don't slack and fall behind. I created the costume and props lists so that we had a written indication of what we were having on each person for each scene rather than simply having it all in our head and running the risks of forgetting on the day.

Being the lead singer has meant I have an extra role too in having to learn the lyrics but this is something I did early on in order to not waste time later on in the course.

Overall, I'm really happy with where we're at and am looking forward to starting the production stage.

The costume list I created

R+P Post 32: Test shoot and rough edit

In the same way as our rehearsal week, we devised a shoot schedule to divide the studio between the 3 groups. Our group, in blue again, had 2 days where we were filming. Unfortunately, we had less time in the studio than both other groups and due to the heavy technical element of our music video, this proved to be an issue.

Due to the fact that other groups were in and out of the studio this week, it meant that we could only use a basic green screen which fit about 3 people on it. This was an issue as we couldn't space our characters out enough to film good long shots. We still managed to compile a range of footage and test a number of our shots but we couldn't create a complete rough edit as we simply didn't have enough time in the studio and technology let us down such as floor lamps blowing and the lighting rig getting stuck on a red setting. 

Above is an example of one of the opening shots. It gave us an opportunity to test the green screen, however, we didn't have time to edit in backgrounds as we were focused on preparing for the real shoot after putting the shot into the timeline. 

Points for Improvement

Make sure enough time is allocated to deal with any technical issues - This was clearly the biggest issue for us. In hindsight, there's not too much we could do about this as the shoot schedule was created around all 3 groups, not just ours but in future, we will make sure that we have enough time to deal with any technical issues. This is obviously often out of our hands as technology can fault at its own leisure but being prepared and organised will go a long way into creating a quick solution.

Try and fill out the scenes a bit more - The scenes look a bit empty, although a lot of this is down to how many people could fit on the small green screen, this is still something that we'll have to avoid for the real thing.

R+P Post 31: My call sheet

We created a call sheet in preparation for our real shoot. There weren't any special safety hazards other than hot lights and tripping hazards etc. but we still had talks with our cast about this, in particular students outside of media as they didn't have any experience of this. Overall though, it was simply good planning to create a call sheet which is what we aimed for throughout the whole course and it ensured that everyone had everyone's phone numbers in an emergency.

Our call sheet

R+P Post 30: My shoot-board

We have produced a shoot-board in preparation for our main shoot. A shoot-board is key and having produced this, I feel far more confident going into the real shoot as our organisation is sorted.

Benefits

• The shoot-board helped our organisation as we only called actors in when we needed them and filmed shots in terms of who we needed rather than chronological order
• We had a time schedule helping us to know whether we were on time and how far we should be
• A description of the shot so we knew what we were filming without needing our storyboard
• Acted as a multi-functional document collating other elements we've worked on e.g. scheduling and shots, into one document

R+P Post 29: Rehearsals

The rehearsal schedule

We've met with the other 2 groups to allocate time slots in the studio for our rehearsal week. This has been done based on when we're free and we've tried to allocate equal times for everyone.

Our groups slots were the blue ones meaning we had chunks on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. If there was an initial by the letter (I for Iggy, E for Eddie and M for Mario), this was when only that person could make the time slot. This was dictated by lessons. The even spread of our slots was useful as we could rehearse or get footage, review it and then make changes or try something else based on what we had seen.


We decided to test an initial idea we had for glow in the dark paint. To the left, the video shows our paint test which needed to be charged with light. Unfortunately, the paint didn't show on camera so we needed to rethink this idea.

We found this was a good opportunity to try some camera techniques also with our actress. As seen below, we're attempting to get the camera movement and opening of Shayam's eyes in sync as Eddie films and I direct.

We attempted to use the lighting rig to light our backdrop as we hadn't settled on the greenscreen idea yet. This proved problematic as we couldn't get our actors to stand out from the background, however, it was good that we were facing these issues now rather than in the real shoot. 

Overall, I would say that the rehearsals were really useful as it gave us an opportunity to experiment and try out some of our techniques but still allowing enough time to change an idea if it didn't work e.g. the glow in the dark paint. 

R+P Post 28: My kit list

A photo of the studio without the greenscreen

Our whole shoot is going to be filmed in the studio as we are using the green screen for the majority of our music video and it offers an unrivalled use of lighting. This means we won't have to be carrying heavy kit outside of school grounds.

Our Kit List

The lectern

• Canon 5D Mark II camera
• Canon 600D camera
• A variety of lenses (50mm, 24-105mm)
• Green Screen Cyclorama
• Floor lamps (ARRI lights)
• Lighting Rig
• Lighting Desk
• Tripod
• Dolly
• Batteries
• 2 SD cards
• TV monitor
• HDMI cable
• Lectern With:
• Macbook Pro
• Studio sound system
• Control tablet

Cameras

We will alternate on our use of camera's as we feel Eddie's 600D is more useful for taking close ups and the 5D is better at longer shots. In addition to this, we can film 1 clip from 2 different angles by using both of these cameras at the same time. 

Lighting

The lighting Desk

The ARRI lights

The lighting desk is going to be hugely useful. As we are using a green screen, we can set the lighting rig to bright white lights to achieve our desired lighting. We will also use the smaller ARRI floor lights to add any additional lighting if it is needed. 

R+P Post 27: Casting

The cast list

When it came to casting, we had some big decisions to make of who would perform. We had group meetings to discuss this and I compiled a cast list at home:

Our main issue was who was going to be our main character. We first opted to use Arian as we felt he portrayed the character we wanted well. However, it came up that there were scheduling issues as he had another commitment with rehearsals for the school play so we instead opted to use Shayam for our main character who did a great job.

Arian who was unable to be used

For our dancers/extras we mainly used people from our media class as they were available and ready to commit free time but also because they understood our concept well as we had been explaining it to them. A couple of my friends from outside media were also used in it as we felt they fit the role well and numbers were key in our bigger sequences meaning the bigger, the better.

One of the Extras used

R+P Post 26: Set design, location and props

The bedroom set-up

Due to the fact we've decided to shoot our music video onto a green screen in the studio, this means that nothing has to be done to our backgrounds for the shoot. Instead, we're focusing on trying to design the set to make it look like the situations we're aiming for, for example, the bedroom set-up with a desk and chair. However, because of the ability to add in props in post-production, we actually have few things to set up for the shoot.

Me ordering the water guns

The items from the party shop

We ordered most of the few props we did need online such as the water guns and glowsticks but I also made a trip to a party shop to pick up balloons, confetti and party poppers.

Me and Iggy testing the glowsticks

We have an all black set up at the end of our music video so we played around with this to make sure the glowsticks showed up.

The mic for my performance shots

We also need to include the microphone and DJ kit in our performance shots which means we have to source them. We had a group meeting discussing this and then asked if the media department had the items we needed.

R+P Post 25: Costumes, props, and make-up

Costume
We planned lists of costumes & make-up and props in preparation for the upcoming shoots:

Feedback when I asked a friend

Shayam's role is supposed to connote innocence, this why we chose the white vest which is often associated with purity and then pink and bright colours to complete the look giving her the appearance of a younger child. In combination with her hair, we feel this achieves what we are aiming for.

The costume and make-up list for our main characters

My role was that of the singer. We used our previous research on costume to assess that all black was the best way forward here with the sunglasses also there to add something a little different and noticeable.

Finally, Eddie's role of the DJ was also quite straightforward to put together. We realised that we could also use a plain t-shirt for him but felt this would be a bit boring so we opted for a graphic t-shirt instead to show a clear difference between him and Orlando.

In addition to our list, we also told our dancers/extras to bring in appropriate costumes for a party for our main shoot.

Props

We devised a props list also to make sure we were prepared for our upcoming shoot and hadn't forgotten or overlooked anything:

Our Props List

It was very beneficial to create a props list as it meant that we were prepared well in advance with our props and weren't having to wait around for our items to arrive as we could source them early. It also meant we could use a range of them in our test footage and disband any that didn't work well as we found with the Glow in the dark paint.

R+P Post 24: Planning my digipak panels

The first part of planning our digipak panels was to consolidate our previous research. The visual mindmap I created during research essentially summed up a lot of our possible ideas and also the common conventions in one document.

My visual mindmap

Therefore after all of the research, there were a few main conventions we felt we had to include:

• An album and artist name somewhere on the album, probably the front and definitely the spine
• A barcode, this is on every album
• A track list on the rear of the album
• Record label, copyright information and other institutional information

With this in mind, we started planning some more specific ideas. Below is a mindmap I created of more specific ideas. 

The mindmap

This eventually translated into more concrete ideas, however, we remained open even when we were creating the digipak in order to see what looked best rather than just trying one idea.

R+P Post 23: Planning my web pages

Our group first planned to draw out our flatplan but decided against this as we found it would be quicker and tidier to do it on the computer. We used Powerpoint to create our flatplan due to its ease of moving objects and shapes around the page and also duplicating pages to keep the basic template.

This was the plan for our homepage. A sliding out navigator bar looked sleek and we wanted to have heavy emphasis on our new track release. The sliding out bar was based on what we found on Calvin Harris' website.

Calvin Harris' website

We are going to have a tours page which will link directly to a website where you can buy tickets. A galley is another common feature on Artist's websites, it allows fans to see new photos of the artist. The page will be linked to Orlando's Instagram feed showing his recent uploads.

David Guetta's photos

We plan to have a bio page for Orlando. Although this isn't on all websites, we feel it adds a nice touch about where our artist started. We are also going to have a video page where music videos and announcements will be presented. 

Disclosure's video page

The store on Porter Robinson's website

We are also planning to have a store featuring a range of branded merchandise. There will be links to social media throughout the website enabling the user to go from the website to the twitter page to the instagram feed etc.

R+P Post 22: Planning my promo shots

The mindmap I created

To plan for our promo shots, we had a group meeting discussing poses, costume and shot types. After this, I created a small mindmap at home putting some of our ideas onto paper.








We then sketched some possible poses using real examples as a basis for our results:

The 4th photo along was inspired by the pose by Martin Garrix as seen below. We plan to take photos with and without sunglasses in that pose to add variety and in different costumes also.

The final photo, a side-profile headshot is a really standard pose as seen by the Avicii photo.

Finally, our 2 shot photo was inspired by the photo of Disclosure, we aim to get a range of poses of the DJ and Orlando together.

Disclosure

Avicii

Martin Garrix

We settled on 2 outfits focusing on black and white as this was prominent within similar artist's promo shoots such as Calvin Harris and Hardwell. 

Calvin Harris example 

Our white outfit

Our black outfit

R+P Post 21: My key shots storyboard

After working out the timeline, we decided we should create a key shots storyboard completely narrowing our ideas down to specific shots.


To the right and below is our finished storyboard. This was in chronological order featuring the majority of our key shots. This was really helpful going forward as we had now established an order of specific shots meaning our music video no longer had any gaps in it. The different colours highlighted different camera angles and arrows on the Post-it notes either represented camera movement or character movement.






This kind of planning was exactly what was needed going forward as we often referred to the story board in future and also found that it acted as a 'fail-safe' if we forgot any of the specific shots.

R+P Post 20: My Music Video Timeline

After creating our steal-o-matic, we decided we should create a Timeline to aid us with transferring concepts into specific ideas. We stuck 3 A3 sheets together and divided it into 10 second segments. We then began sticking Post-It notes of ideas onto the timeline for each section.

The timeline above highlights a brief structure of what was going to happen in each scene. The video would start in the real world in the white scene, the going through to yellow, orange, red, blue and finally purple/black. Our initial ideas of what was going to happen in each of these scenes changed quite a bit due to limitations of what we could shoot and being in the studio but the concept remained the same.

Creating a timeline was extremely helpful for our group as prior to this, we had a lot of ideas but were unsure where all of them were going to go. This gave us an opportunity to unload ideas onto paper and watch our music video begin to take shape.