Some videos looked at for raindrops video

Music Video Resource Evaluation

Before we started filming the raindrops video, we had to find some videos

which could be looked at to spark our ideas. Which we could use as a source

of reference now and then too.

Whilst everyone had a different idea of videos to look at, i am going to evaluate a few

videos i was inspired by to help me and my team put together our storyboard and music video.

1. Taeyang (Artist)- Ill be there (Song)

These are different shots from the music video.

This particular shot inspired us to use cobwebs as part of our mise en scene.

As soon as we put together our ideas for the raindrops song, i.e the concept, genre

i immediately thought of this particular music video. Though the artist is from a different cultural background, i thought that the concept would be exactly what we wanted. That someway making a connection between 'raindrops' and 'Ill be there' would work.

There are alot of iconography in Ill be there, suggesting different

meaning to the items used. For example the rose, suggesting something quite beautiful but dangerous. So instead of a traditional red rose, we thought in the video having a black rose would suggest a more dark, dangerous and mysterious idea to the audience. Coming back to the idea that we wanted the audience to be free in interpreting they're own idea of the ending of the video (therefore being mysterious). Whilst the rose represents the artist's name and personality as 'the rose' itself.

Whilst using the same idea of the black rose, alot of shots we used have also been inspired from this video. Such as the close up of our artist 'Ellena Rose's' face where she is lying down on the bed, is one similar of the female actress in 'Ill be there'. Finally the part where the artist falls to the ground, is a part inspired by this video.

Click here to watch the music video

2. Bruno Mars- Just the way you are (Making of video)

This particular clip, sparked my idea that having 'fade to blacks' repeatedly to go with the beat

of music at the start of the music video would go well with the piano keys in the song raindrops, as done in bruno mars'just the way you are'. It would add some dramatic effect to it too.

Click here to watch the music video

3. Mariah Carey- We belong together

This is a very nice establishing shot, at the start of this music video.

Looking at this video, I got alot of ideas we could also use in our own video. The way most of

the footage from the music video is revealing the house and showing a connection between the solo artist and the house (i.e. why she is there, where it is.) Which me and my team attempted to do in our own music video.

Even the colours in the shots from the mise en scene which are mostly black and white, green can also are very similar in our own video. I thought that

these colours show: black- darkness and secretive, mysterious. white- pure, innocence. green- neutral. Putting all these colours together can show some form of confusion and depth for the audience to think about.

Also the part where Mariah carey is sitting down and singing part of the lyrics, with the wind blowing on her hair, is another key concept which contributes to our own video.

Click here to watch the music video

4. Neyo- Mad

This music video uses alot of iconography and detail such as small skeleton figures (meaning death) to guide the audience through the video, and explain what is going on. Also using black and white only, to show that the artist in the video has actually died in the scenario. I think the use of black and white, also shows some element of sadness to the audience watching the video whilst the colours do co-ordinate to the colours of the keys on the piano.

This music video also helped me and my team to pick out the rose and cobwebs to add more meaning to our own music video.

Click here to watch the music video

Other media- Atonement (Working Title Movie).

The opening establishing shot of the british traditional house in atonement was

something which inspired me to film the footage used for the opening scene of 'raindrops'.

Where i thought it would be nice using the doll house to be compared the real house. So by doing this, the audience get a sense of idea that the artist is lost in her own fantasy. Whilst it establishes the location beautifully.

First of all it was just something done as part of experimentation, whilst i had some spare time

whilst Evette were helping out getting Mariam ready with Make up and other, and Roshi was setting up the lighting and second sony HD camera ready. However, whilst editing we found it to come in very nicely as part of the opening sequence.

This is the real house.

This is the doll house in atonement.

- Myung Kwon

Today we evaluated everyone in our class' music video so far. Myung, Mariam, Evette and I enjoyed watching each others video as it was informative and fun. We got to see the creativity of each other as well get new ideas from each other. It

Record label

In the music industry, a record label is a company associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. They vary in size , smaller companies are labled as "Independent" or "indie", or they may be part of a largeer internation company; or somewhere in between. Major labels are the largest 4 record labels. A sublabe is a label that is part of a larger record company, but it uses a different name. Vanity labels are different as they are lables that gives the artist the control. ....

After much had work we finally manged to get back all the work we lost. It was pretty difficult to remember everthing that we had already done, seein as we were well into finishing our work. But as a group we manged to pull together. Before we did anything we wrote down as much as we could remember of the video, noting down the angles, timing and effects we might have used.

Lyric Analysis

I saw a dark cloud

Darkness has negative connotations; the dark clouds bring bad events for example storms. The cloud being dark shows the evil representation of the cloud and the misfortune that it could bring to the protagonist Darkness could also be a metaphor for the lack of knowledge (ignorance). It is also associated with mystery and with unknown things. The dark cloud could also mean the stress in her life.

Of stories never been told

These stories could represents secrets or forbidden tales that the singer knows but haven’t revealed it to anyone else, the fact that she is keeping it secret could show the danger of it possibly being revealed.

I made ‘em come out

Like raindrops

Falling raindrops are often described as "tear-shaped", round at the bottom and narrowing towards the top. Rain is a very lonely and unsociable event as many people prefer to stay inside on rainy days. Rain traditionally has a sad and negative connotation, in contrast to the bright and happy sun. The protagonist use of the word ‘made’ shows that they didn’t come out voluntarily.

You heard my secrets

You told me let ‘em unfold

The references to the pronoun ‘you’ draws the audience in, this personalises the song, as the protagonist is talking directly towards the audience. The audience ‘heard’ the protagonist secret, this could represent all of the protagonists insecurities and by telling them she’s setting them free from her life.

They fell on your ground

This use of the word ‘your’, is quite demanding, as it’s as if she is pushing her problems to your shoulders. The ground could also represent the roots and culture, as it’s your part of the earth/soil.

Like raindrops

And it feels like home

There is a lot of meaning using the word home rather than just house. This comes from the proverb ‘A house is also called a home, but a house is not a home’ A house generally is a building with 4 walls and a roof. Its purpose is to provides shelter .However when it’s filled together by a family of people joined by love and affection it’s called a home because its soo much more than a just a house. For example a family can be happy in a cardboard box, as long as they are together. Your home is wherever you are together.

Like we’ve never been away

‘We’ve’ shows the togetherness of being in a home together. The protagonist has been absent or separate from the thing she misses, and the feeling of being reunited again, makes her forget about the hard times she has experiences.

And the light goes on

The light could mean inspiration. This makes you assume that the protagonist has been in darkness throughout the song until now; this could represent her mind frame of not seeing the truth and only seeing what she wants to see.

And it all begins to fade

Now the protagonist can see clearly, she can make better judgments, and she now sees all the things she believed to be real being to vanish as it possible that it wasn’t there in the first place.

And we look towards the dawn

Dawn is the beginning of daylight in the morning. It could represent the creation of something, in the protagonist case her mind is anew she now can begin to be perceived or understand things afresh.

Like raindrops from a storm

Commonly with every storm there is a rainbow at the end, this could show that even thought the protagonist is now going through the hardest times of her life, there is a rainbow at the end that would make these entire problems feel worth It. The raindrops could represent her tears and the storm is her problems in life.

And we look towards the dawn

Like raindrops

And once you’ve seen them

She doesn’t feel embarrassed about her problems, she allows the audience to see her tears.

Then you can breathe in the air

When the audience sees her misfortune they can also join her and realised that everyone goes through similar problems, before people used to not breathe her air meaning they used to judge her. The air is used as a common figure, as to say it doesn’t matter what age/race/religion you are from we all breathe the same air.

You get to free them

It starts with one person. By us allowing her to express herself, we free all the prejudices and judgments people have against people who are different.

Like raindrops

Nobody’s perfect

The protagonist once wonted to fit into the ‘perfect’ and accepted society, but she now realised that no one is perfect and she can embrace her differences and insecurities. And it doesn’t matter when you make mistakes because everyone else does.

But we’re never alone

Feeling different can lead to isolation, and the protagonist is saying that because no is perfect we are all different and that alone unites us so we are not alone.
If we’re together
We should join together, that we need people to be happy. We should allow people to help us and to built strong friendships.

By Evette Anderson-Sampah

15/11/10

Today after a long day we left the media room at 5pm, because as we lost our work previously we felt that we need to make extra sacrifices in order to ensure we make the deadline.

We completed the first verse and we are now up to the chorus.

Here it our next lessons To-do-list


-Add the birds eye view of piano
-Add hand shots using the 2 cord beat
-Edit Mariams Close up shots
-Remember the (orange) on the imovie for the position of our edits
-Remember to save!!!!!!
-Make the cross dissolves longer
-Crop Mariam's hands out of the shots to ensure the cords are in sync

By Evette Anderson-Sampah

12/11/10

Unfortunately our work on the Mac computers have been lost, this happened without or doing, we think it possibly happened because the Mac book we was using and always use at the same Mac was switched with another Mac. The work we lost was about 3 weeks of edited footage including scene effects and transitions. We were up to the second verse of the song. This event has put us behind in our schedule it gives us under 3 weeks to complete everything.
The lesson we found out this news we tried to stay positive and listed all the positive things that can come out of this unfortunate event.
- We now can quickly edit up our work as we are not experimenting anymore as we know what we won’t to do and where it will go
- Luckily it happened now rather than on the last week of our project
- And now we are extremely safe with saving our work in multiple places.

When starting imovie again, with the fresh filmed footage we was finding it difficult to remember specific scenes, so we made a list of scenes, having the list then made is easier to fit them into the right order.
Even in this misfortune we are stronger as a team as we supported each other to pull through and perceiver, now we are even more determined to make our project the best.

By Evette Anderson-Sampah

Moodboard

When brainstorming we made a list of images that came to mind while listening to our song. And i produced a moodboard, this would help us when making the storyboard in thinking of shoots/props and framing.
A moodboard is used notebly in the music industry e.g a costume desginer would have one to show to the singer before they make the outfit. It helps you to get a better understanding of what we want to produce, what's needed, what can be done.

I attempted to capture all the visuals produce from the emotion of our singer, of the setting and style of house we would be filming in.

Each picture attempts to capture a particular theme of the music video. E.g. I have added a collection of images of a girl which you don’t quite get too see her entire face ; this reflects music as we felt the singer does not open up until the end of the song, so we have a idea of now showing her face but bits of her body in the beginning. Also I have added images of a girl whose make-up is very natural and not heavy, we got the impression that the singer is innocent and almost angelic so we wonted to reflect that in her facial appearance and also in her dress sense as the clothes that we all agreed on was a white dress. All the images I have used are of a girl who seems distressed and in each image she is alone, that was the impression we got from the song.

Noticeably, the mood board shows mostly primary colours, very natural; blue for the sky, green for the grass, white for the clouds and brown for the trees.

This mood board mirrors the mood and tone we hope to put across in the video, which is one of unhappiness, feelings of living in a never-ending battle but in the end walking away and moving on with your life.

By Evette Anderson-Sampah