Album Cover

Florence + The Machine

We have been comparing album covers with the videos that we have been individually analysing to try and see if the theme and aspect shown thoroughout the music videos matches with the theme and design shown on the album covers. In the music video for 'No Light, No Light' dull colours are used throughout except when another character is shown, the melancholy colours are also used on the album cover representing a link between the two. Even though the album cover uses dark colours which we would normally associate being bland and boring it attracts us towards it as it's quirly even highlighting the innocence and purity shown by Florence in the image used on the front cover, it represents her being fragile which is shown throghout the music video. This link's back to the main theme's shown in the Indie Pop genre, they are never bold or brashy but mainly simplistic and natural.

MATTE

The close up shot used of the poppy in the corn field during the short music video around (0.36) we wanted to keep with the change of the colour contrast but keep the red colour of the poppy as it would stand out and be eye catching towards the audience. We used an effect called Matte which allowed us to select the image and basically cut or trace out the outside of the poppy's petals allowing us to keep the red colour. We had to drag the points from the corners of the box and put them on each point or curve of the poppy. We really liked this effect and have decided it will be perfect and very effective to use in our final project and it adds a unique edge to certain objects which will then hopefully be symbolic in our video, and something an audience will be able to remember when the video is over. However when watching the short music video you can see some of the background colour slighty as when we filmed the poppy shot there was wind, which unfortunalty meant we were not able to use the Matte technique to it's full standards, but we now know when using this techinque in the future for our final project we have to make sure the object we are focussing on is not moving so we are then able to drag the points perfectly over the footage and the movement it does so we don't have this difficulty again.

Editing

Whilst editing we have encountered some difficulties when saving the music video, the computer would freeze and our work would unfortuantly be lost. Which meant we had to keep on going back to the last saved project and starting again from where we left off. We had to contionuously keep re doing certain clips, adding effects and putting the some onto the footage. Even though we had this problem we still managed to get the short music video in on time and completed. We are proud of the music video, and have learnt mant new techniques that we will be using in the final project and have lots more ideas in what we can achieve and create when coming to the planning of the project soon.

Home Made Video

Whilst we were filming the footage four our short music video, we can across the idea of filming the music video as if it was from a 'Home Made Video' so it doesn't look stadged and gives the feel of freedom. We could be very playful and different when shooting different shots and we also thought not only changing the colour of the wheat to a different pastel shade but to change the contrast of the whole music video to give it a unique twist, and also so we could see if it was effective enough to use when filming our real music video. We really liked the look of the music video being in a different colour, even thought we kept the video in with codes and conventions music videos have in the 'Indie Pop' genre we wanted our music video to stand out and look a little different. This was very effective and we are thinking about definitley doing something along the lines of changing the colour when filming our next music video.

When putting the video together in the editing process, we were very unsure about the different jumps to each of the clips we were using. We thought it looked unprofessional and messy, we had a discussion about this and in the end thought that having the shots jumps to one another fits in well with us wanting the video to seem like a 'Home Made Video' it makes it look real and if it makes it look real then it is professional.

We mainly shot most of the short music video hand held, which adds to the home made feel we wanted to give to the audience. It let's the audience feel as if they are with us our the journey we were trying to show throughout the music video.

Short Music Video

This is the short music video we made to the song 'Keep Your Head Up' By Ben Howard.

By making a short music video along the same line which we are basing our real music video on has let us get an idea of the different camera angles and techniques that will be very effective to catch the theme and feel we want from our music video. But has also let us find out which things don't fit and look right so we can stay away from them when shooting our real footage, meaning we can spend more time concentrating on shooting footage that we know works and fits in with our genre of Indie Pop.

This short music video is a 40 second clip that has allowed us as a group to practice shots and different codes, conventions and techniques that are needed to create an effective muisc video for our genre 'Indie Pop'.

Our group found this short task easy to handle as we have already learn the techniques using the camera, which meant we could be more adventerous and play around with shots a lot more than usual. We did encounter some filming issues due to the weather, as we had rain most of the week we were shooting which meant our sunny, radiant scene we wanted to create would be replaced with mud and a melancholy setting. Luckily with contionously looking at the weather forecast we picked a day to film in the location we wanted and the weather was sunny and exactly what we wanted to film in making the setting location and the feel of the music video exactly what we wanted to achieve when planning.

One of the main things that stands out in the colour and the different contrasts of the scenes. We wanted to have a bright image throughout the video so it seemed very summery and jolly. So by changing the colour and the contrasts and brightness we would be able to create this effect, the colours are very unique which adds a twist to our video making it our own and not sticking soley to the norm for Indie Pop music videos.

We have kept the typical codes and conventions of the Indie Pop genre, sticking with having the video in outside locations where nature is all around. Having our setting in woods and cornfields fits well with the norm, which follows the typical genres themes.

The shooting of the music video went according to plan, we were able to get all the shots we wanted to create and even more, we filmed when walking to different locations (Hand Held) which we ended up putting in the short music video, it made it seem more realistic and believable and fitted in well with the home made video theme we wanted to achieve. By filming when walking and creating different shots we didnt necessarily plan made it easier when coming to put the music video together we have plently of choices of different clips and shot to use when coming to the editing process. This is something we will aso do when creating our final project so we have plenty footage, even if we don't use certain clips it will be good to know we have a back up plan incase some of our shots don't turn out how we planned when coming to the editing process.

Filimg Delay

We decided to film our preliminary task on 11th July, we came prepared to shoot the footage we needed for this task. Unfortunately the weather was not what we expected from checking the weather forecast, there was heavy rain and it was very windy. Not the best weather to film in. We did want a little rain in our music video, so we could get the real festival feel, but as the rain was pouring down we thought it might effect the camera and be to difficult to film in.

So as a group we decided that the best next day to film was the 12th July, the weather forecast was what we wanted to film our video in. The type of weather was very similar to the type of weather that we found in music videos when researching our genre indie pop. This creates more a relistic look to our music video as it fits in with the genre we are trying to portray. Shooting the footage was a lot of fun, and very successful we got a lot of useful footage and will be editing it in our next Media lesson.

Planning for Preliminary Task

For our preliminary task we are going to use the song 'Keep Your Head Up' by Ben Howard. The song is very chilled out and relaxing which matches the theme of nature we will be portraying throughout the music video.

We can up with some ideas that we are going to include in the pliminary task, the whole music video is going to be very natural so it will be set outside keeping the theme norm in the genre we are doing. Most of the video will be shot in or around a wheat field, we are thinking about changing the colour of the wheat to give the music video a unique little twist we are thinking about making the colour of it a pastely light pink. The sing is very playful so we are going to make the actors be very playful and joyful. To keep with the theme the actors are going to be wearing festival clothing, which will be very floaty (natural) and vintage so by having sunglasses and pretty patternes. We are also thinking about using close up's on feet during the music video, as we are going to have a few shots of the actors playing hop scotch, this will really catch the movements of the actors as hop scotch is a childish game it highlights the innocence of the actors which we are going to try and portray throughout the music video. We are going to use lots of long shots and dolly shots to catch some running sequences and certain motions of props we will be using such as a hullahoop which will highlight the playful and excitement. We are also thinking about having some of the music video in slow motion to create a different effect, also we are planning on shooting one of the actors jumping off a step but then in the editing process to reverse the jump off the step once the jump has already happened to the go on to continue to carry on walking during the music video sequence.