Evaluation - Q4

I used YouTube to research for my music videos, as its the easiest accessible website to find and watch music videos. But because it doesn't just hold music videos, it also gives information on behind the scenes of certain artists work, i.e Bruno Mars describes his work on the set of Just The Way You Are. Avril Lavigne too explains and shows you the set of 'Alice.'
I didn't re-create many scenes out of the Alice In Wonderland video, because I had plenty of strange ideas twirling around my head when I first started. When I did come to planning and story-boarding, it was overwhelming and I couldn't seem to think one step at a time, finding where to start the story. My ideas were small segments of the song put into video but they didn't fit into the song, they were just small clips in my head. It was rather difficult to ever start creating a story so instead of writing down the images that I saw in my head, I built them up in my mind, like a story book. I first pictured a big table with great amounts of props and food, panning up and down the table showing different characters dressed in odd costumes and colourful make up.

Within the construction stage, I used both handheld and tripod techniques, such as, when I was running  after the dream character I used the handheld camera technique to give a more realistic view to the viewer, to make them feel as though they are involved in the situation. 
When building ideas on the music video, I tried to use a diverse number of props to make it as interesting as possible for the audience. Through examining the Alice in wonderland video, I listed all of the props used within the tea party segment and with this information I tried to re-create this scene using an assortment of sweets, tea cups and saucers including a teapot. Along side the use of my props I added a dazzle effect on top of the image to create a more fuller effect to the scenery. 

I used the photoshop programme and final cut pro to edit and manipulate my pictures and video footage. I found the process easy as I have had a lot of experience editing different pictures in my other subject Art & Photography. I enjoyed the process of making a music video because I was able to explore Final Cut Pro more with the effects, filters and transitions. My last project of creating an opening sequence for a Thriller, I used the programme Movie Maker on Windows so I wasn't able to edit any of the footage on Final Cut Pro.

Evaluation Q3

I chose to create my third question on the presentation site, Prezi.
http://prezi.com/oydiue8hwpdq/untitled-prezi/

Evaluation Q2

Evaluation - Q1

Poster - Colour Manipulation

I decided to insert this particular Avril Lavigne picture into my Poster because it's a good portrait and it shows dark, bold make up which is her signature look. Through researching a good photo, I did experiment with long shot modelling pictures and live concert snapshots but I didn't like the colours and the size when it came to manipulating.

I found that the modelling photos were too 'bland' in a way that it wouldn't seem very attractive to the viewer if it was displayed on a bus shelter or billboard. Although the shots seem bright with different colours and tones -pictures below- it was difficult to for me arrange the the collage of photos in a successful composition that would be intriguing for the viewer to look at. I didn't see an 'interesting' poster being produced because it was just too dark, in consequence of me attempting to brighten the pictures I lost a lot of needed colour and contrast.

The majority of the live photos that I collected were in conclusion too dark to use and left me with unwanted black corners that stood out too much like a sore thumb - I did however try to cut and blur the corners so I ended up rounding off her silhouette but it looked 'weird' in the sense she had half a body tilted at an odd angle.

The portrait photo-shoot was the best option. On the photo I decided to use an effect -I've recently forgot the effects name, but I am currently going through effects on photoshop. - It created a transparent but contrasting effect because it added boldness to the dark areas - her lips and eyes- and took away contrast and colour away from her body and neck so that the first thing you are drawn into are her black powdered eyes.

Here are some of the pictures that I had decided not to include or use in my ;

Adding screenshots of editing.

Concert Poster

First I collected pictures that I wanted to experiment with, then I decided how I wanted to present the artist. I have used a spiral picture created by light for my background; I simply found this on Google, using the key word ‘light’. Next I researched Avril’s photo shoot gallery to find the right picture that would suit my design to layer on, the shot I chose she is wearing heavy black make up, this helps with my effect that I will be using later on because her eyes will stand out more than anything else.

I cropped around her face and body then cut it out, placing it on my spiral background, then I went across to the effect’s. I chose the ‘Darken’ effect on Avril’s face and I increased the contrast to make sure the depth was enough and that her eyes were visible through the effect. The ‘darken’ effect actually burns out half of the picture with the darkest points focused more, making her distinctive eye make-up pop through the multi-colours in the background.

I chose to add Avril’s Record Label logos to show which records she has a contract with but also to fill up the dark, empty spaces that I have not edited or filled with any photos

Next, I had to choose my font and what I would be writing. So I decided to make a short example of places her tour locations could be i.e. O2 Arena / Manchester Arena. I had to be careful with the colours I picked because the font would disappear into the background and blend too much if I chose the wrong tone, so I decided to have two colours in the text box. The other title that I had to include was her name and also the name of the concert. I simply went from the title of my music video ‘ Wonderland’ and played around with words and in conclusion I created ‘Up In Wonderland.'

Step 1

step 2

Place the picture onto the background and use the darken tool to create a transparent effect as well as a sharpening effect, boldening the outline of her eyes

step 3

Through selecting a font, I chose, Engrave MT, position the lettering over the colours so that it stands out. Being aware of that it may blend in and that the viewer may not be able to see it.

step 4

Next, I added on my list of arena's, real examples that the artist will go to. I selected two different colours to help the picture separate slightly, so that the colours were diverse but away from each other not clashing. The white stood out more than the black and the red blended in too much with the spiral background. 

I included her record label logos to show the viewer who she is signed to and too also, fill in the dark corners which are now visible with bright colours.

step 5

The last thing I had to include was the title or even concert name, which I created the name, 'Up In Wonderland', this name relates to my music video ' Alice In Wonderland.' White font was the best to have upon the clashes of colours and it stood out more than the red, but even, I didn't like the red tones because it didn't match the  background and it looked too similar to her lips.

Record Messages

For producing my video, my task was to gain permission by the artists record company or them themselves to respond. But through my luck of trying with messages and even tweets, I didn't receive a message.

Here are some screen shots from FaceBook. These are attempts to grab Avril Lavignes' records labels' attention so I could ask for permission to use her song in my work. I researched the Labels she has contracts with and found out there are RCA & EPIC records. Her very first record label was Sony.

I found Avril's record companies by researching her Official website,

Avril Lavigne Home Page

But I did also discover that RCA and EPIC records have Twitter, so I tried to send them a message about my project, although, communicating through twitter is difficult because all messages have an 140 letter count. So attempting to explain in under 140 characters was too problematic, that was when I decided to turn to FaceBook. It was much easier for me to explain.

I did send out 5 emails in total to all labels because my email would be spread out and diverse then to just send it to one record label. It would increase the chance of somebody replying. Unfortunately, I did not get any messages back.

Acomplishments

Today I've continued to finish my video and I do believe I've found several more shots that I will need to shoot to complete the whole film. Scenes that I need are small but filling, these will include;

• Mid shot / extreme close up and pan of character holding a mug of liquid that the dream character will refuse.
• Face shots of characters
• Tumbles - long shot, mid shot.

Inside Wonderland

In this post I will display some screenshots of the programme in motion with stills of the video, menus and effects that I have chosen to insert so you're able to see the process of the music video

-Images.

-

-

Alice Effects

These are some notes from what I've included in on my music video. 
There are quite a few effects that I've decided to include on one clip so before I forget, I've noted them down so that for every shot, they are the same, i.e the lip singing video has, 'Prism' and desaturated colours and the dream character has 'light rays' x2, desaturate, and 'glow.'

Menu of effects > In Image Control - Use saturate (Intensify colours) to desaturate (to get darker tones)

                            > In Glow - light rays - For location, long shot. 

                         >   in blur -prism, on character. desaturate & light rays. experimented with settings and glow, amount. add        two amounts of light rays to brighten and contrast picture (strong effect)

                            > In Blur  -Lip singing has ‘prism’ effect aswell as desaturate & saturate.

gloom is applied to zoom out location shot - within the trees

                          > In distort - I have used the 'distorted glass' effect on a small segment to create a relationship with the lyrics, as she speaks, ' when my worlds crashing down,' I'd like to distort the picture so the image is now a broken dream.

• Transitions

> non-additive dissolve 

> cross zoom

Fake New Year - 31st December 2012

For the weekend before New Year my family and I planned to meet up with my cousins family. This was a good advantage for me as I could ask for my cousins help for filming.

Her characters role is important as she takes part of the 'dreamer' - main character. Her aim is to display a confused, scared expression and with this, her acting paid off, although I believe I found two different seconds of her looking into the camera. In my video I don't plan any interaction with any characters & the camera. On the other hand, I'm not annoyed with this occurrence as I filmed this certain shot twice. I can easily manipulate these two shots into one without the viewer realising there is actually a fault.

In the time limit of two days, I gathered running shots using mid shot and longs shot. I filmed my 'waking shots' with my character on the ground, here I included some panning's over the body along side long shot's and mid shot's. Panning's that were included followed the character at a long shot so that the viewer coul see the surroundings and where the character was heading.

DigiPak

The picture below is an example of me experimenting with ideas for my Digipak. On my first edit, I decided to lash out with colour and find the kind of poster I would like - using different colours and pictures. So this is my first attempt, the picture used is one I used from a photo-shoot for halloween a couple of years ago. I did start out with a black background, that's when I decided to add some colour. Firstly, I started off using only 3 colours but personally, when I came to finish using up all the available space, it was looking a little too simple, so I chose to add secondary colours as well as primary. The colours that I finished with all clash together. This represents the songs and moods given through the vibe of the lyrics.

I used photoshop along side lots of different effects and I included a picture from an old photo shoot of make up that I am using in the video. The make up itself was inspired by The black swan movie,
displaying black wings sweeping across the entire eye. I had actually used this for Halloween; the make up was quite effective as the eyes are bold and almost devilish.

This picture was taken from last years Halloween, so as I thought I didn't really need to do another photo shoot I opted to use this one as I thought it was relevant and suited my design; so I manipulated this image so that the viewer couldn't tell that it is me.

I chose to use multicolours on the front cover as I wanted the album to be eye-catching but I also want the appearance of the Digi pack to be a presentation of feelings, this can describe the content of the album with the songs and also show the typical mood colours that portray different feelings such as, red for anger, yellow for energy, purple for confusion and orange for calmness etc.

Accounts

I've been having trouble recently trying to upload my footage on Final Cut Pro, this was because my user was full of other work. Although it didn't work and only sent through a few scenes I was able to look at the effects and summarise what they do. So with my few shots I had experimented with every effect such as, 'earthquake' to shake the entire picture, 'fish lens' to use a circle zoom on the centre of the picture and different filter settings that made the video either black and white, negative, vintage -soft, grainy, multicoloured or sharp. There were many more effects and there are still some I need to figure out.

So with the minimal space on my account, I have now another user just for my music video. I have tried to upload this and I am still, for some reason, having trouble. A small symbol when I press 'Log & Tranfser' highlights my videos and says 'Unknown:Error'; this is something I don't understand; whether I've pressed a setting I shouldn't have or there's something wrong with my camera. Because I'm not so experienced with Final Cut Pro, I will need a hand to make sure all 30 videos are uploaded correctly with ease.

My next step is to find my Digi Pack designs and piece them together as well starting to produce my video for good.

Comparisons / Similarities On Genre

find similar videos to alice and analyse them
 two three at most.
mise en scene, sound, camera, characters. lyrics.


Lots of different artists over the years have taken extreme measures into what 'Wonderland' could be, there are surreal stories of drug use and bizarre creatures involved in this 'world' but there is also another side which explains the evil side of life i.e being trapped or being insane. Avril Lavigne's take on the 'Wonderland' is explaining the determination of escaping a dream, or situation happening.

Alice In Wonderland had quite an impact on people and their views on what and how it could be. Gaming companies created big story games on pc's and game consoles where the player could virtually walk through Wonderland and explore the hidden secrets and odd characters.
Some artists chose to act in certain scenes of the animation movie such as the the big kitchen which Alice had shrunk.
I've chose several songs here to demonstrate how some artists have decided to portray 'Wonderland.'

Alice's Location 6th January 2013

In this shot, I chose to perform a long shot, this is because on this day of filming it was quite misty and I felt it gave a really good effect and made the atmosphere eerie. 

On the actual filming days I will not be counting on the weather to be misty as I'd like clear weather instead, with this, as its extremely cold I'm not asking for clear skies either.

 This is a long shot of the park, this quite clearly shows the density of the mist and effect it has changed of the surroundings. 

In my music video I will be using scenes like this to introduce my location with panning and effects like, shakiness and different colour filters such s black and white, an extreme contrast change or a mild change in the histogram to make the picture stronger.

In this photo, it shows the entrance to the right of me of the park, I was thinking through my process of creating a story board that I end the video with my character 'escaping' from her dream and exiting the video through a long shot or mid shot of the gates.

I really admire this photo because of the extreme change in the trees. It creates a wickedly change in the normal view of the park on a summer day and makes the park look isolated and almost 'dead' in the form of how the trees are represented and how they sit. The thick bent branches and trunk almost mimic a persons crooked body creating different shapes and strange positions. 

The centre of the photo has the most dramatic change in distance and focus. It has both height decreasing from left to right and even the dying stages of a living tree, slowly shrinking and degrading into the ground.

The photo itself is quite powerful using the long shot as the whole picture is aimed at the uneven, tangled trees. It portrays power in the sense of the trees towering over the camera and strength as they stand tall together. 

In my video I will be using shots of the trees from various angles like mid shot, long shot and close ups of the trunks displaying patterns and age. To the video, I believe it will add mystery and uncertainty, especially as they will make the video 'creepier' and more eerie to the fact they look like hands and bodies.

I took dozens of shots for this location point as I really liked the composition and the depth in it but also because I am planning to film within it. I have already filmed various things from my story board to include. Now I need to figure out if I need any other different takes to insert.

I like this photo because it shows life on both sides, 'The crooked body', surrounding an ever ending path.

I thought this picture was one of the most strange and eerie as this tree stood by itself in the centre of the park as though it was trying to reach out to others further away like a giant hand.

I chose to do a portrait shot as I only wanted this tree to be individual as the mist behind didn't cover the trees heavy enough.

Attempt & Unattempt - 18th December 2012

Tonight I arranged to meet my friend to film with me down at the park. So straight after college at 4:00 I arrived at her front door. Now at this time the sky is rather cloudy but looking good enough to film. Now with an optimistic mood, we drove down to the film location. But the distance it takes to reach the park took the amount of time that the sky decided to turn black. I was quite surprised of how fast it became dark and with this, I just couldn't film. I'm starting to struggle to film now as it's just too dark too early.