Evaluation

My task for A2 Media Studies for my advanced portfolio was to produce, direct and film a music video for a song of my choice. Before any form of planning for the task I researched the history of music videos in order to widen my knowledge of different types of videos I would actually be able to create. Afterwards I then started to plan the music video, once I had a clear idea I then created a lyrics analysis an animatic and also created a shooting schedule.The song which I chose is Giving You Up by Miley Cyrus due to the fact that I am a fan of the artist and I like the song. Also, before even deciding on a song I had already created a few draft idea's on interesting things I would like to do in the video and this song fitted with these idea's. The genre of the artist is generally considered to be pop/pop rock/country pop/dance however I would say that this particular song would be country pop. I came up with the name 'Ivy Orsborne' for my created artist which is conventional of the genre of music as it is more alternative and different. Like the original artist (Miley Cyrus) I would categorise my artist as being signed to a major label, however because of this particular song and how mellow it is to release as the first single of the album I think this type of artist would start off on an independent label. In reference to the first three (1) (2) (3) music videos I analysed, after creating my own I would say it is mostly similar to Kelly Rowland-Stole. Similar to this one I have created a narrative as well as used performance clips too. Although they are very different I would say that the emotions of the song and the narrative are quite similar too, they both have strong as well as deep meanings which means interesting narratives can be created, specifically using many close-ups. A main feature between this example and my video would also be the lighting. In mine I purposely made the lighting at the beginning of the video quite dim then made everything brighter at the end to give reference to the lyrics of song which refer to a girl giving her ex boyfriend up, so the  brighter lighting connotates her finally doing this and at the same time being happy again.

The several different forms of media texts all have different conventions.  More specifically, a music video depending on its specific genre and form. Different forms of music videos are features of performance, narrative and abstract. A performance clip, these performances can take place anywhere and can be split into three types; Song performance, Dance performance and Instrumental performance. A Narrative clip is a story being shown which should be easy to follow without any dialogue being used. And finally an abstract clip is one that doesn't use lip synching, performance, or a narrative, it is simply art form. I would say my music video uses aspects of all three, but mostly performance and narrative and more specifically song performance and instrumental performance. The narrative I have used within my video represents the lyrics to the song, which are talking about a girl letting go of a previous relationship, giving that person up and moving on. I have attempted to do this by showing specific memories of the two characters in specific places. And then showing the girl in that place alone afterwards reminiscing. I have also shown scenes of the boy in some of these locations alone after the girl has been there almost as if he wants her back. Doing this, as well as what the lyrics are saying make out to the audience that he is too late now and that she has already moved on. I tried my best to make sure the narrative used shown in my music video also successfully connotates the lyrics in the song. In conjunction I have included performance clips where the girl is looking at the camera and using certain facial expressions and gestures to emphasise the fact that she is the girl who is giving the boy up. Within the performance clips I have also shown the girl and the boy playing the same guitar to try and interpret into the music video that a love for music, more specifically playing the guitar is something that they shared when in a relationship with each other. 

This is a wide variety of different types of camera shots to be used within a music video. Having a narrative in a music video means it is is extremely important to include shots such a close-ups and extreme close-ups as it emphasises the facial expressions of the different characters involved to then be able to understand their thoughts and feelings. Establishing shots are also useful to use to benefit the telling of the narrative too as it emphasises the location. I have used quite a lot of establishing shots nearer the end of the music video in the field as it is when the song's tempo get louder and the singers voice is stronger, so also having bigger establishing shots connotates to this. Using shots like this also help promote the artist as the audience feel as they will be getting to know the artist more. As my music video involves a narrative I have followed this convention, specifically in conjunction to the artist singing the more meaningful lyrics, to add emotion to the video and for the audience to be able to interact with the artists feelings. Camera movements are also an important aspect of filming when it comes to any music video too, but when in conjunction to a music video with a narrative it gives an effect of the audience following the artists story and experiences, especially if the movement is a pan. The speed of these specific movements can also be changed depending on the tempo and beat of the song so they can always give different effects. After filming, editing the music video is extremely important. Editing the cuts in time with the music is a convention almost all music genre would use as it gives the music video structure. I myself have done this in some parts of the video, but due to the beat of the guitar being played being quite fast, yet the singing being quite slow and emotional, for the narrative to be shown effectively, not all parts cut to the beat, this was my intention and I think the story being told within the music video and the music video itself has benefited from this, an example of these benefits would be that I think that the music video doesn't look rushed and each shot is shown for a reasonable duration of time. I have also used jump cuts in my music video, which made the video non-continuous but the story being told is continuous, cutting from one location to another. I started the video with a shot of my actor unfocused stood a field, whilst zooming out the shot then goes into focus, I did this by myself using the camera on manual focus, It was difficult to zoom out as well as focus at the time same at the same slow speed but after several attempts I think I managed to make it look successful. I then ended the music video in a similar way, however instead of unfocusing the shot I faded it to black which helps connotate it being the end. Starting at specifically 1 minutes and 46 seconds into the music video I have created a sort of montage on body shots using a slanted shot showing from just below her shoulder up to her nose, a shot of her face, a shot of her back and then a medium close-up of her, the first and third shots are of the actor topless. This contrasts with the digipack I created for the music video which refers to the artist being exposed and vulnerable, letting the audience know about her true feelings. I used several different transitions throughout the music video, however the one used mostly was the Cross Dissolve. I particularly liked using this transition as I could change the length and speed of it so that each time it was used it looked different and because of how well it contrasted with the narrative. Because the song is quite mellow the cross dissolve made each shot transition look mellow too. 

Throughout the music video I have attempted to use specific shots to make links between the cinematography and sound to give the audience a better understanding of the action code. The first time I have done this is at the start of the music video when the lyrics are 'In my deepest darkest night', to connotate this I showed the actor holding a lit candle, then using manual focus on the HD camera I focused the shot, then unfocused it then cross dissolved it to the the next shot.

The second time I have done this is for the lyrics 'Now I'm not, sure you can', to connotate these specific lyrics about how the girl doesn't need the boy any more I used the swipe transition, cutting the girl from the screen and leaving the boy, giving the interpretation that she is now gone and they are not together any more.

Another example of me doing this is nearer the end of the music video when the lyrics are 'there's no light left to shine' to try and connotate this, I have shown the girl walking towards the sun at the time of sunset, faded the shot to black to connotate there being no light like the lyrics say, then a shot of the sunset it'self. During editing I sped the specific shot up so that the clouds move across the shot faster, to match the speed of the song at that point. 

I have also followed the conventions of mise-en-scene, for example artificial lighting. Throughout my music video there are several different shots of the artist in front of a white background singing, I have shown these scenes when emotional lyrics are being sung and have quite sad meanings to them, so to give the effect of the emotions of the artist I turned off all lights when filming and only used a spotlight directed at the artist so she is the main focus of the shot and the surroundings around her are dark. I did several different types of shots using the spotlight, some with half of the artists face in shadow too. The use of props is another convention which I followed. As my music video is performance as well as narrative I used a Guitar in some of the scenes, with the artist using it and also the actor conveyed as the artists ex-boyfriend. I did this as part of the narrative to add to the emotion. As the lyrics are explaining that the girl is giving the boy up I wanted to show old aspects of their relationship, so by him being shown playing the guitar as well as her I am trying to make out as if music is something they also shared, to try and make this as obvious as possible, when I have shown scenes with a guitar I have always used the same one. Usually an instrument is only used for mainly performance based music videos but in my case it has in fact benefited the narrative also. To make the guitar playing look realistic and to look as if it is going with the song, I had someone I know who plays the guitar learn how to play parts of the song and then try the best they could to teach it to my actors. The costume worn by the actors in any music video is important as it reflects personality and represents the artist, attracts attentions and can sometimes even define what genre music it is. As there are several reminiscing scenes throughout my music video i tried my best to use several different oufits for the actors, but as I filmed the majority of these scenes between the two it was difficult for costume changes when outdoors so I optioned for just changing jackets, due to it being cold I managed to accomplish this method successfully as the jackets were hiding what the actors were wearing underneath so it looks like a totally different outfit.

Although not many props were actually used for this music video, the few that are in fact used, I think help with the narrative very well. These are the guitar, the rose, the tea stained paper and the photo frame with a photo of Rob inside. As previously explained the guitars purpose was to help interpret the fact that music was a shared love of the ex couple. The rose also was to interpret an aspect of their relationship, earlier on in the music video in the several different shots of the couple in their 'reminiscing scenes', Beth is seen holding the rose so making out to the audience that Rob had just given her it. Then nearer the end of the music video Beth is also seen holding the rose again. My original plan was to show Beth dropping the rose, and then another shot would be shown of Rob finding the rose and picking it up. However due to problems of not having free time when Beth I wasn't able to re shoot on that field again with her. Because of not showing her dropping the rose I then thought it wouldn't fit in with the narrative very well if Rob was shown finding it. Therefore I just optioned for shot of showing Beth drop to her knee's with the rose in her hand. 

I didn't originally come up with plan of using the tea stained paper as a prop until filming the tattoo of the original girl I was going to use for my music video. I tried to make it as obvious as I could that the text on the paper is a translation of the tattoo. When filming the shot of the tea stained paper, I placed it on a glass table, then put the glass table near the the wall with the blue wall paper so wall paper reflected onto the glass, I am happy with the way this turned out as it gives the paper a 3D effect and the wall paper had already been used in a another shot so I have used continuity.

 I am very pleased with the way the use of the photo frame prop turned out in the music video. As the photo was taken in the field where both characters end up being at the end I was trying to use this to connotate that this particular location is obviously somewhere the couple had memories and is somewhere they were both drawn too, however I think for this to be interpreted more successfully I should have included a shot of them both actually in this particular location. To actually give the effect of the boy disappearing from the photo I first took a photo of the location, then kept the camera in the same position so the setting didn't change, then had the boy stand in the frame. I then took photo's of both of the photo's actually in the photo frame. Again, keeping the camera in the same position so it didn't look as if the photo frame had moved. After I had finishing filming I spent the majority of my time in the editing suite, editing my video to the best of my capability. Although I found this very time consuming as I wanted to test many different effects and see what I could actually do I enjoyed this process very much as I was in full control of everything. (1) (2) (3) (4)

After evaluating the ten audience feedback questionnaires I conducted I found that half of the ten people I asked rated the video eight out of ten, three rated it seven out of ten and two rated it 9 out of ten. I asked a wide range of people between the ages of fourteen and twenty one, half of them who study Media Studies and then the other half who don't. I did this so I could receive genuine feedback from the ones who have knowledge to do with Media Studies and then to receive an honest opinion from the other half. Every single participant answered yes to question number two '2. Do you understand the narrative of the story clearly? if so, what is your interpretation of it?' and all gave their own interpretation of it which I was happy about, as this means the narrative I wrote, my directing and my producing were all successful.  All of the participants also answered yes to question four too, 4. Does the video show continuity according to you?. Receiving the answer yes to this question was extremely important and valuable to me as again it meant that the editing techniques I used were successful and helped the audience fully understand the narrative within the music video. However the most important feedback I received from these questionnaires was the answers I received from question number five, 5. what would you do to improve it?. The most common answer I got back, which occurred three times was to have less performance scenes and include more narrative. I agree with this to some extent, as previously explained  I said that due to not having back up plans I ended up having too use performance scenes instead of narrative, on the other hand now that I have finished the music video I in fact feel that there is just enough performance as well as narrative within the music video. Before actually making the music video I also created a poll to feature on my blog, as I did this before finalising my idea's on what I actually wanted the music video to be like It helped very much to give me inspiration and create a music video my target audience would want to see. 

To conclude my evaluation, I feel that I have created a successful music video, promotional package (2) and album artwork to represent my artist. I made sure to link the products with the music video so that they support one another in the promotion. To do this I followed a range of conventions such as making sure colours match and using the same artist for both products, but then also interpreting my own individual idea’s. I feel that I have definitely progressed in my knowledge and skills from the start of my production up until the end, working with a HD camera gave me confidence to test my abilities when it came to filming certain types of shots such as panning and knowledge of the music videos has developed due to researching the history of them. After gaining feedback for my music video I realised many strengths about it but also many weaknesses. Knowing these meant that I knew things I would have to change and do differently to do my music to make it better. Over all, I feel that I used the time given to plan, create and evaluate my music video very sufficiently and managed to stick with the deadlines. During the preproduction of creating the music video I created a storyboard of ideas I had thought of for my music. After this I scanned the drawings, using the scanner in the editing suite to then post on my blog. I then saved each singular shot as a separate to put them on Adobe Premiere CS4 and put the song over the top of the scenes to create an animatic. Doing this gave me practice using Adobe Premiere for when it came to creating my music video. Creating this music video has allowed me to express my interests in the form of a media text in very specific ways and gave me the freedom to make everything exactly how I wanted it. Although I am happy with finished product, if I were to do it again I would definitely change several things. The first thing would be finalising ideas and doing more drafts, I started planning my music video very early on before filming so I felt organised, however when filming I realised that some of my original would not work very successfully so I wish I would of made back up plans instead of shooting random things in replace of something else, If I had a few back up plans then the shots I replaced could have been a lot better. An example of this is these following shots...

When I attempted to film these few shots they didn't look very effective as to make this look interesting as being within part of the narrative straight cuts would have to have been used so it's quick enough to understand. However, as the tempo to my chosen song is quite mellow the fast cuts didn't look very effective and didn't cut to the beat. So in the final video, in replace of these shots I used a performance sequence and then a shot of the actor on a shore front facing the water. Although I am relatively happy with these, I think if I had back up plans I could have come up with something more interesting.

Another aspect I would change about my music video would be the quality of some of the shots therefore meaning I would have to re-shoot, particularly the field shots nearer the end of the music video. Here are a few examples of some things I would change an an example of what I already did change and improved...

As you can see in the first shot, on the far left of the shot there is a goal post, whilst filming I didn't realise this was there so during editing, to get rid of the goal post I cropped the frame and then zoomed it in so the artist was still seen as being in the centre of the shot. 

Although it isn't anything extremely obvious I would still re-shoot this as there is someone in the background of the shot, when the shot is zoomed in and then zooms out it is more obvious to see but again unfortunately I didn't notice this whilst filming. On the other hand, having other people shown in the music video apart from the main characters helps to create verisimilitude.

In this specific shot Rob is shown sat looking to his left and then the next shot is Beth sat in the same location yet looking to the right. To give the interpretation that they are looking at each other, although because I haven't shown the two shots together and shown the characters in the same place at the same time, they aren't really looking at each other, it's more like their fate and that they just happened to look towards that direction at the different times of them being there. Although I am happy with the shot of Beth, I would consider re shooting this shot of Rob due to my shadow being shown on his face whilst I was filming, although it isn't obvious when he if facing forwards, when he turns to the side it is very noticeable. 

This is the shot I would mostly reconsider filming as the main focus of the shot, which is the actor isn't in focus and the tree's in the background are. Once again, I didn't notice this whilst filming using the HD camera so if I were to do the whole video again or just re-shooting these shots I would take more notice of shots as well as making sure I would be directing properly. 

Another thing I would definitely change about my music video would be the effort put into the lip syncing performances. However this does not mean I would change the actor, as I am happy with the rest of the acting shown in the music video. But unfortunately in a few shots the lip syncing looks out of time with the actual lyrics, the main errors of lip syncing is the white background mid shot starting at 0:40 seconds in and again another white background mid shot starting at 1:41 seconds in.

Despite these errors a lot of which I planned did in fact go right for me whilst filming. Obviously a successful video depends on how well you can film and edit but locations and other things such a props benefit the video too. Meaning I am happy with how things turned out, due to the time of filming which was from October to January I was worried about what the weather would be like, for example if it was raining I would not of been able to film out doors. Although this did in fact happen, preventing me from filming on specific days I am happy with the way the weather looks in the video, in some shots specifically the outdoor shots on the field the weather looks quite dismal which fits with the song and the lyrics, yet the sun set which is bright also fits with it too as it's the end of the song, the lyrics represent the end of the relationship and the sunset represents the end of the day. 

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