Filming!!

On Friday 17th, as planned, Danni and I filmed at the first location for our music video. As explained before, we did this as it was the last day of term and we therefore had half a day at school.

We decided in the end, after looking at both locations, to use Nowton park. The reason being was that it was more problematic for us to use Ickworth as it would be harder and involve dragging the equipment further. A friends brother had kindly let us have his drum kit to use and we wanted to make sure it got pulled about as little as possible. So we found a nice area not to far from the car at Nowton.

We had planned exactly what time we were hoping to arrive and therefore how long we had to film. We planned to arrive at 2.30 and get as much as possible done before A) it got to dark and B) before Danni had to leave for work.

So, after a bit of confusion over Will (Drumer) forgetting and getting the bus home (Panic!!), we did get everything set up by about 2.50 ish. So with everything set up (lugging the drum kit to a nice part of the park), we were ready to go. The good thing about Nowton was that it was very quite and as its public we didn't have to get permission. Mr Morrison had previously told us that students had filmed there before without permission and had no problems. Despite it being VERY VERY cold the day we filmed we got really lucky with the weather. We hadn't had great weather all of that week (rain, snow and cloudy/foggy). But when it came down to the day, we got clear sky's and no more snow (than what was already on the ground). We didn't want it to obviously rain or snow at the time because of the equipment. We liked the idea and picture of having snow on the ground with them playing in the country side. It made it look a bit different... in a good way! :)

Things however didn't go smoothly. We placed an iPod in Danni's speakers and found that she had run out of Battery! (MAJOR PANIC!).

So we played the iPod out loud, but no one could hear it over the drums. It was looking really bad. The next idea was to give Will (Drumer) some head phones and he listened to the song via the iPod and then Kris and Ben (who had learnt the song) just played in time with Will's drumming and then George actually sung when the lyrics come in. This too, was looking really bad. The boys found them selves out of time with one another really quickly. Time was now getting on. So we made the decision to move everything back to near the car, where there was this area we could set up and then play the song through Ben's iPod adapter in his car. ... Basically ... Ben saved the day!

We moved everything really quickly and set up again and this time played the song through Ben's car, with the boot and doors open. Luckily he has some good speakers and it was nice and loud and all the boys could easily hear it over the drums.

This then was an easy process. We shot the video 3 times all the way through, from different positions, without any stopping or mistakes (I think the boys were to cold to mess around or lose concentration at this point! They wanted the ordeal over with!) We then shot pacific bits that we needed (E.g- close up of guitar) - This didn't always require all of the 'band' so they would sit and warm up in the car with a flask of coffee!

We fortunately were done before the lighting altered to much. However, now that I have uploaded it from the HD camera, it seems that some of the last close ups we got of George singing, the light does change, so that is something we will have to look into when editing when we get back to school in January.

Using the HD camera and Dolly worked really well and we were pleased with the results. Using the dolly also enabled us to use high angle shots, as it goes higher than a normal tripod. Also when watching the footage back, it is annoying that we had to move locations (due to not hearing the music) because the first spot did look better. However, the quality of the band itself is A LOT better in the second load of shots!

Here are some pictures of us setting up:

Location Scouting (Not Final Decision)

In our music video myself and Sarah had the idea that we would like the band to perform in outside areas as we believe this theme fits well with the song and the performance. These pictures are one of the locations we would like to choose. We have chosen to look at Ickworth House as we think they they have some beautiful scenery for a band.

This is not our final choice as we would like to look at Nowton park as well.
The only problem we feel that we will have with Ickworth House is that it will hard to get permission to bring a band into the park. We will also be making a lot of noise with the owners might not be happy about. Another problem is that we will have to bring our cars in close to the surrounding and not in the car park due to the fact that we will have equipment.
Here are some pictures below:










we liked the idea of performing down a vally because we like the surrounding and that the area is closed in on the band. It reflects on the party scene that are to come showing that they are adored by the fans at the party.

Clothing

Although we got useful feedback from our questionnaires we thought we would do a bit of research into what our band members should be wearing ourselves.

To do this we simply looked at what The Summer Set themselves wear. Considering we want our band to wear clothing that fits the genre of the song- why not look at the band who actually created it?

So in the photo as you can see they have a general laid back style, which I think does suit the music they play. They are wearing shirts and t-shirts. Obviously there is a girl in the real band however we wont be having a girl in ours. Therefore what we can only take from her outfit is that it too is quite relaxed. Also just wearing a t-shirt and jacket. They obviously have there own individual styles that are reflected too. For example one wears a hat and big glasses. I don't think we should be afraid of letting our band bring their own style into it as we will see them also in photos, ect. So, for our band to become well known, sometimes it helps to have a certain style for each member to signify them more.

A tip that we could take from this is looking at accessories. It seems a couple members have bands ect round their wrists. This is perhaps festivals or fan made bands/bracelets which again reflect more personality about them.

They are wearing different types of jeans, from black, grey, blue, skinny and baggy. Therefore it seems in concluding that we should keep our band casual in perhaps an array of jeans/trousers to reflect their individual style. Then wearing shirts, t-shirts with a causal jacket I think would work well with our cast and the way that would reflect the song genre.

Results

When looking over 26 completed questionnaires we wanted to blog about what we actually found and how this helped us. So for each question I have calculated what all the answers were or at least what the most common were.

This is what we've found from the questions we asked:

We can now refer to these when having to make decisions in the near future about peoples preferences towards certain things.

Questionnaires

I made a questionnaire and then got 26 people (13 Males and 13 Females) to fill it out in order to help us with this music video. Some questions were for general interest (E.g- Have you ever heard of 'The Summer Set'?). Others however were in order to help us make some decisions that we have not reached ourselves yet and felt that research into the matter would help (E.g- What special features would you want on a digipack?). Also some questions were there for extra opinions than just the two of ours (E.g- What do you expect pop-rock bands to be wearing?)

Here are 6 (3 Females, 3 Males) randomly selected, answered questionnaires to have a look at :)

Filming Dates!!

We've collectively decided what days we are filming, which is exciting! :) We have arranged to film the first location (Country side) on the 17th of December. We have chosen this day as it is our last day of term. This day the college only has half a day whereby all students leave after lunch. We have decided to take advantage of this opportunity to film in this afternoon. The reasons being, that weekends are often difficult for both myself, Danni and our actors due to weekend jobs and school work. Although us 6th formers (myself, Danni, George, Kris, Ben and Ellie) have free periods in which we could film during the week, our drummer (Will) is still in main school, so he has a full timetable and we are obviously unable to pull him out of lessons. So that afternoon, if the weather is kind to us(!), we will be filming the main performance extracts of the music video.

The second date we have decided to film is Wednesday 5th of January. We will be filming this part (the party scene) inside and round a friends house. We will be filming it early after the Christmas holidays, not only due to deadline but due to January exams. They will be fast approaching and the longer we leave it the harder, for not only us, but our actors to commit there time to it. We will be filming it on that Wednesday straight after school where by we will have our main actors and other extras in the background. :D

Marking Criteria - Our blog so far ...

We were recently asked during a Media lesson. To go through our own blogs and self evaluate them so far. This meant giving them a level and a rough grade. This was actually very helpful as it made us realise what still have left to do. So we went through each stage of the planning and research marking criteria and gave ourselves a rough level for each section to give us an over all level and mark.

• Research into similar products and potential target audience = Level 2/3 - We need to do more on our target audience. We are currently doing some questionnaires.
• Organisation of actors, locations, costumes or props = Level 2/3 - We have information on our blog about our actors. However, despite being on location shooting, we still need to write a blog about it as well as costumes and props.
• Work on shot lists, layout, drafting, storyboarding = Level 3 - We have put our scripting (lyrics), story boards and shot lists up.
• Time management = Level 3 - We have booked the HD camera for two dates where we will be expecting to film at the two different locations (Country side performance and at the party scene with narrative and performance).
• Care in the presentation of research and planning = Level 3 - We have taken care on our blogs to lay out stuff nicely. For example making sure when we embed a video from youtube it sits nicely within the frame of the blog.
• Skill in the use of technology or ICT in the presentation = Level 3 - We have made more effort with the look of our blog this year and found new lays of doing this via blogger - for example we used our own picture for the background of a crowd scene to give it more of that 'music video' feel.
• Communication skills = Level 3 - We have tried to communicate our ideas clearly for example uploading our notes written next to the lyrics.

We feel our overall level for our blog sits and level 3 and roughly is about 12/13 marks. However we will keep working hard at them to push for a level 4!

Guitarist

For our music video we obviously want it to look as realistic as possible. This helps if the band roughly learn how to play their instruments to 'Punch-Drunk Love'. With help from a 'band member' we have found a website that had the tab for the guitarist.

http://tabs.ultimate-guitar.com/t/the_summer_set/punch_drunk_love_tab.htm

Shot List's

We have now completed some shot lists. This will hopefully help us when we go out and shoot. As you can see we have not gone for any extreme shot types as we want to keep a realistic feel throughout our video. Also we had to be realistic in terms of what we can achieve. It would be great to do high angle shots but that would involve equipment such as cranes. Which clearly we cannot access.

Story Boards

We have FINALLY finished our story boards which will hopefully show you what we plan to do for the whole video. As you will see each shot corresponds with lyrics. We flick between a few shots at times, particularly during the chorus. These are indicated with arrows on the story board.