Magazine advert drafts, feedback and final choice

We all brought in our groups drafts for magazine adverts as well as our completed digipaks, to show how the two share brand identity and match in terms of themes and colours. The group gave feedback on each persons designs for the magazine adverts, this is what the group had to say about our digipak and magazine advert ideas/design.

The class generally liked the digipak and its use of black colour filter around the images, this theme is in keeping through all of the digipak and the magazine advert. They also liked the inside picture of the band and the front cover of the cracked glass screen. Some constructive criticism for the back cover of the digipak was that some people thought that the track-list was a bit too uniform and un-stereotypical of the convention in our genre.

In conclusion, the class helped us decide upon the magazine advert that was the favourite, so it was easy to chose which one we were going to use.

This is the final design which follows closely one of the original pitched ideas for the magazine advert, its been tweaked slightly and improved with an eye-catching colour palette and bold titles and great brand identity being carried across between the digipak and the magazine advert. Keeping the same album cover in the advert but as an actual CD case and a similar kind of background, but changing the glass shattered picture to have a hand coming through it with the album in his grip.

Magazine Advert Brief

A magazine advertisement for the digipak.

Conventions of magazine adverts for an album

Generic Conventions of a Rock Digipak

Conventions of Digipaks

Digipak Breif

We have been tasked to make a digipak for our music video.
A digipak is a style of CD or DVD packaging used to promote a particular artist.

Shot Lists

 

Storyboard

Shooting Schedule

Shooting Schedule
This is the basic footage we needed for
the music video, this doesn't include
footage we went back to re-film.  

This includes the props, cast and crew we needed for each filming session and scene. as well as the dates we put aside to film them.

Risk Assessment

The colour next to the name of the person who is responsible for the safety hazard shows the level of risk or likelihood of the hazard being problematic. Everything else is explained in the table, it basically outlines possible health and safety hazards during the filming on sets and getting prepared between them.

Classic Album Covers

At the time of its release (the early 1990s) the main issue for Walmart wasn't the baby eagerly trying to grasp a dollar from a hook under water, it was that the baby's penis could be seen in clear view. Cobain's team wanted to enter the mainstream music world by offering their old and new fans an image of new birth, symbolising the band's transition from independent to the mainstream. As with many bands who promote their albums with challenging album covers and music videos, they wanted to "push the envelope" of might be accepted by mainstream audiences while holding onto their old independent audiences.

Kurt Cobain wanted to shock and surprise audiences by creating a memorable image which would challenge business values. The baby symbolises innocence and the dollar bill, grubby temptation. The image of an innocent baby swimming underwater greedily grasping after a one dollar bill on a fish-hook is difficult to reconcile. After all, it is an odd combination: a baby would not understand the concept of money - yet big business aims to "hook each and everyone of us from as early an age as possible. The dollar on a hook is a fishing image in which once the baby ( and we) are hooked on the almighty dollar we can be reeled in and caught up in a world of money and greed and readily accept the values of capitalism. Only a few years before "Greed is good!" was the motto of Gordon Gekko, the greedy capitalist from Oliver Stone's film, Wall Street from 1987.

Of course, the baby swimming underwater with its mouth open is not the only symbol of innocence on the cover: blue is associated with purity and water with baptism. For Cobain the baby's penis only symbolises the baby's gender; and it was only a problem for people who could not understand the concept of innocence and found sexuality a problem. Cobain thought that people who were troubled by this feature were probably "closet paedophiles" and he refused to change the image. Some observers thought the penis also represented the umbilical cord and that it would remind audiences that the open-mouthed baby was happy to being underwater as this is the natural state of a baby in the womb.

The baby is just below the surface and the deeper blue suggests greater depth which may signify danger or, as is more likely, the peace of mind implied by the band's name, Nirvana: "The Buddha described Nirvana as the perfect peace of the state of mind that is free from craving, anger and other afflictive states (kilesas). The subject is at peace with the world, has compassion for all and gives up obsessions and fixations." (From Wikipedia)

Another interpretation is that the hook with the dollar bill on it may be periodically whipped away from the baby's reach. The title of the album is typographically written in dark blue as if it is shimmering water; the album's name, Nevermind may well be setting up the teased baby's impending frustration at perhaps not grasping the money, with the reassurance that the baby's "state of mind" remains secure without the means to indulge in consumerism.

Ultimately, there is a greater irony at work here: the singer and his band still wanted their album to sell well - and make pots of money for themselves!

Digipack - Photoshop

http://uk.complex.com/pop-culture/2011/08/the-25-photoshop-tricks-tips/adding-fill-light

Editing Progress

We have began to bring all the best of the footage we filmed and uploaded it into our editing program, removing all the other, lesser footage we filmed and putting it away in a folder on the computer. This left us with only the best most usable priority footage to include in the video.
The footage we have included so far sets out the primary concept/story material part of the video.

We have begin to include filters and contrast lighting effects on the footage we have in the editing of our music video,

Filming Update 2#

The last few filming sessions we did were filmed around the same location, using the garage interior as the scene. The extra time spent filming here aloud us to cover more footage of the core music played in the song as well as time to try unplanned things with camera and stage setting such as different camera shots/techniques trying to find new and hopefully interesting shots to include in the video.
http://www.friendsofhdvideo.com/blog/2009/11/fix-night-shot-red-color-tutorial-hdr-fx7/


We filmed at our next scene recently, which involved filming the two characters bedrooms and housing, showing them where the sleep and how their daily routine begins. The weather in the scene would have been better with a bright day for natural lighting, but on the day of filming it was quite cloudy and raining, this didn't effect the lighting too badly but when filming outside we had to take extra care to keep the camera and other devices dry from the rain.
Some shots were effected by the plastic bag we used to protect the camera from the rain, in some cases the plastic bag is blown by the wind over the camera lens slightly.

Filming Update 1#

The filming we have done so far has taken place at the garage location as an interior, we filmed a variety of shots covering all the essentials we needed at the time, after that we went back through the song creating some creative concept shots and footage that would be nice extras to have a work into the music video to keep it interesting.

We came across a few problems while filming, mainly involving continuity errors and trying to keep all the background and props the same while having a lot of moving components e.g. cameras and cast.

The lighting of the first scene we had to control, due to the natural lighting from the window being quite inconsistent and darker than we wanted. We overcame this by introducing a new artificial light to the opposite side of the room that had a nice contrasting effect inside that appeared natural but with a slight improvement.

We also had problems in the first filming session with the battery life of the camera itself and the size of the SD card in the camera saving all the footage. We only had enough space in the camera for 2 hours of footage, and the camera battery itself only lasted an hour. We managed to solve the saved footage problem by moving the footage into folders on a memory stick for the class work shared on it, as well as finding the suitable charger for the camera and taking this with us on all of our filming sessions.

Auditions and Casting

Before we selected our cast for the music video, we hand picked people we thought would fit the character roles well and act convincingly as well as preferably play an instrument, we have prepared an audition for the people selected, that helped us greatly to narrow down our choices for the key four cast members.

We auditioned the selected people for the roles by requesting them in costume and props for the characters that they would be best suited to, we had everyone learn the song on their instruments and see how they would look while playing it. When we saw them playing it was clear to see how well they would be in the music video playing with the desired enthusiasm.

Cast/Characters/Roles

The cast we have chosen for our  music video is selected from the numerous auditions we held, for the auditions, we used a studio setting and recorded each candidate individually, so we could listen to their skill later and make an informed decision about who we preferred for each role. The candidates were all dressed in full costume and given the necessary props for their character. After we narrowed down whom we preferred in each role we all played together to see if the group was compatible and what we wanted our 'band' to be.





The four key characters that are featured in our music video and who plays them are;


The Drummer - Harrison Cattell
Harrison was a good choice for the role of the drummer as he plays the drums in real life to very impressive standard, and adds a feel of authenticity to the performance with skill and legitimacy.


The Bassist - Joshua Shardlow
Josh was a perfect fit for this role as he has an extensive repertoire with many different instruments and styles, that allows him to seamlessly fit any role in a band, as well as looking the part convincingly.


The Vocals and Rhythm Guitarist - Matthew Wheldon
Matt was a decent choice for the role his guitar mastery is very impressive, he has obviously spent a lot of time practising. He brought another level of character to the 'band' with his excellent vocals and harmonies.




The Lead Guitarist - Callum Bibby
Callum is a good choice for the role of lead guitarist as he has a lot of experience with the instrument to give the feeling of realism to the performance as well as having experience with the song itself and its required portrayal.

Target Audience Research

This prezi includes detailed descriptions of early ideas, target audience demographics, target audience interviews and questionnaires. As well as research into our genre and audience in the chosen industry.

Lyrics Breakdown/Chosen Song

"Heart Attack"

Remember when there was nothing else to do, but lie and bed and,

wonder how it was always up to you, and no one else and,

Early mornings, made by warnings, what's the point of the alarm that I'm ignoring?

It's either raining, I'm not complaining, but waking up is hard to do so,

[chorus]

 

Turn my head its back to bed with no delay, can't be bothered by the phone ten times a day,

Why get up my morning doesn't even start till two?

Forget reality waking up is hard to do.

Remember when we would hang out every day, and we would rather,

Not be told what to do or what to say, Cause nothing mattered.

Never boring with slept in mornings, not ashamed of bad habits that I'm forming.

Its not important if days are shortened, I can't make time when nothings new,

Cause waking up is hard to do so,

 

[chorus]

 

What's a day when it all ends up the same, and lasts forever?

Can't complain when there's nothing there to blame, and things can't be better.

Summer evenings, teenage grievings, got no problem with the life that I've been leading.

No concentration on hesitation, I can't make time when nothings new, Cause waking up is hard to do so!

 

[chorus]

 

Iv highlighted the lyrics in different colour to show what I thought were key lyrics to inspire visuals and how to structure the music video, including lyrics that are repeated and are rich in imagery in the narrative side of our music video.

 

 

The annotations in the original lyrics breakdown,  



The beginning involves a lot of shots of the band and instruments to establish the location and music.

 

Song Ideas Pitch

Good Ideas

• Theory of Opposites between 2 very different people in very different lifestyles
• Use of 2 different narratives
• Use of new creative camera shots such as POV from neck of guitar
• Performance element where appropriate
• Creative editing such as split screen between two characters

Feedback

• Where to stage narratives?
• Characters? how to make them very different
• Linking split screen to lyrics
• Twist at the end... maybe they 2 very different character meet

Changes after feedback

We are going to stage the narratives in everyday life places such as work, home. The difference between the characters will be very clear, one will be very aspirational, very clean. The other will be no bothered about life, maybe some scenes of drugs. The characters could be a boy and a girl, we could use classic stereotypes of men to portray the boy as the untidy, unruly person. The twist at the end could be them meerting up and starting a relationship, like in a lot of occasions, the girl sorts the boy out

Generic Conventions of Rock Music Videos

Artist's Permission

Our group contacted Sum 41's record label, Aquarius Records, to request permission to use the band's song 'Heart Attack' under their record label, in our music video for the same song in our media studies project. we wrote for their consent via e-mail and received an e-mail back soon after, See below.

Chosen genre and track

The song we have chosen is: Heart Attack by Sum 41, which is a rock song that would work well with a fast paced video that includes the use of the band playing live instruments, to reinforce the strong music elements to define them and the song to the genre of rock music. This could also include a combination of narrative and performance in the music video, to accompany each other and keep the video interesting.

Conventions of Music Videos

Early Ideas

The early ideas we had for a music video and song were;

Magic Carpet Ride - Steppenwolf

That is a psychedelic themed rock song from the 1960's,
the song has a heavy feel of a psychedelic atmosphere that we would have taken advantage of in the editing side of the video, by adding bright colourful and cloudy effects over footage of our 'Band' playing the song and boasting a variety of camera shots and movements.

Heart Attack - Sum 41

This is a punk rock song from the early 2000's when punk rock was most popular, the song's lyrics suggest imagery of a maturing teens and his routine struggling to change into grown up life, a theme that is relatable to most. This helps the music video's popularity and finding its audience.

Our Group

Our group for the music video project is; Harrison Cattell, Shane Chamberlain, Callum Bibby and me. We chose to work together on this years project, as we worked well together last year in making a film opening and now have the experience of that project to make this year's music video the best we possibly can. The combination of all of our specialties and skills in different areas such as, editing, and creative development, make our group a strong one and efficient in dividing the work out between us.

Brief

Brief:

A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with two of the following three options:

• a website homepage for the band;

• a digipak for the album’s release;

• a magazine advertisement for the digipak.