Fast Sequence - Preliminary Task

Fast Sequence

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Slow Sequence - Preliminary Task

Slow Sequence

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RAINDROPS MUSIC VIDEO

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We hope you enjoy watching.

Myung Kwon

Final Sound Editing

Today I had to edit the sound of the music video to make sure it was clear, without background sounds (e.g talking while production filming). Also to generally check that the music video was at the high standard which me and my group intended to create for the audience.

Finding that the final edited music video had problems with the imovie program which kept adding the background sound even after muting the music video itself, it took me several hours trying to work with the music video to make sure it was precisely synced and also making audio of the music video clear.

There were mainly problems when exporting the movie to quicktime file (mov). Because every time i exported the file there was theses parts which kept adding new sounds that never existed before. There were also one or two parts which were out of sync with the artist, that the audience had noticed before when we got feedback and those which we had noticed too. That needed to be changed.

Therefore trying to change the sound first of all, every time i synced one part so it was really precise with the artist (and the beat of the music), there would be a strange sound when it had been exported. Then changing one part led to the change of every other part, that was following straight after. Meaning i had to go back and forth changing the timing to sync properly. Also it took atleast 10 to 15 minutes exporting the file, meaning there needed alot of waiting and patience. Not only once but around 5 times in total.

However, in the end after syncing the music with the video so it was even more precise with the artist, I decided to keep trying and it finally exported into a clear (disturbance free) music video that was also a mov file that can be played on quicktime and keeping the quality of the music video.

Therefore i can now add a link of the music video to this blog, so it can be viewed directly.

Myung Kwon

Producing Evaluation Video

Whilst producing the evaluation video of raindrops, i used the photo booth program on my mac which has an integrated camera. When editing the footage i used imovie '09. The same program as what we used when editing the Raindrops Music Video. This way i could make corrections of what i said, and add a couple of effects so that it is improved visually. Making it more interesting for the viewer and i could include the questions of evaluation in slides too, making it easier to understand what i was talking about. I was also able to increase the volume to twice as loud on the video because when i was filming the evaluation the mic was a bit distant, therefore the sound was a bit low. Using this program made it easier to decrease the length of the footage from around 30 minutes to about half which is of 18 minutes. It generally helped increasing the aesthetic qualities too.

- Myung Kwon-

Evaluation of Raindrops

Raindrops Music Video Evaluation

Click the links below to view.*

PART ONE.

PART TWO.

*These videos have been separated into two parts, because of the length of the videos. When watching volume may need to be increased.

-Myung Kwon-

Parasocial and fan behaviour

Parasocial behaviour is a one way relationship between the fan and the celebrity. This terminology is used alot in media psychology. In this case the parasocial behaviour would be between fans and a solo artist. Parasocial behaviour for example: gossip, and keeping up-to-date with celebrity behaviour is important for the success of distributing and promoting our artist Ellanor Rose. Because if we create parasocial behaviour in fans then they will be more interested and help 'word of mouth' by telling other people about Ellanor. Also it will help increase her popularity and if the fans want more from Rose, then record companies will value Rose more and this will help marketing and sales. It is a good idea we used twitter, because it helps fans and Ellanor become engaged more. It should also keep the fans interested in Ellanor, if they learn a bit about her personality too from first hand accounts.

-Myung Kwon-

Andrew Goodwin's Theory of Music Videos

Goodwin suggested that there are five key apsects of music videos in which the audience look out for: Thought beats (seeing the sound), narrative and performance, the star image, relation of visuals to the song and the technical aspects of music videos.

First of all, thought beats. There are three steps to which the audience see the sound in their head. First step is to look at the music itself, taking into account the structure of the song for example: chorus and verse. Then next step is the voice of the song, where the artist's voice is unique and forms identification that works well with the star's image.

Roland Barthes theory on the grain of voice, can be used to explain this. He states that the singing voice is an expressive instrument in its own element and is able to make associations of its own. Third step, Goodwin portrays the artist's mode of address. What this means it that songs can be seen as stories, where the artist acts as the narrative. This makes the music video a two way communication device, the audience is the listener and the artist is telling the story.

The narrative and performance. Songs don't tend to tell the audience the full story... this is so that the audience can make up they're own interpretations. Goodwin explains that commonly used narrative should be ignored because it is important in their role of advertising. If all songs used the same narrative, it would have no effect on the audience. Music videos should have repeatability, this is done by narrative and performance working together. This is what makes the audience keep their attention when watching a music video. The artist plays two roles which are the narrator and participant, this increases authenticity. Never the less it is the lip sync and other mimed actions which are the focus points of music videos. Therefore the audience need to be able to believe the music video is real.

Next is star image. The star is the vital aspect of all music videos. Therefore many considerations should be made when choosing the star's image such as: looks, personality.

Meta narrative is like a timeline showing the progressive development of the star over time. Which is very important in the music video production process.

Relations of visuals to the song. There are three ways that music videos work to promote a song: illustrate, amplify and disjuncture. Firstly illustration is using a set of images to display the meanings of lyrics and genres. Iconography could be worked around here to symbolise meanings. This is the most commonly used method. Secondly amplification is where meanings and effects are manipulated repeatedly which is transferred to the audience's perception as they watch. This method is similar to repeatability. Lastly disjuncture, which is the complete ignorance of the meanings of the song. This method can be seen is some music videos which use completely different visuals to the song.

Finally technical aspects in music videos are what brings it together. Using camerawork, movement, angle, mise en scene, editing, sound and special effects. For example for sound when the beat of the music cuts to go with the visuals or lyrics, which makes the audience more entertained.

-Myung Kwon-

Product unification

Product unification is about linking different media platforms together. If this is done professionally, then the consumers should not know which one came first. For Raindrops, we used digipaks (which is a physical release), and websites.

The digipaks were made because any artist who has debuted should have some form of physical release for example album CDs. This is because this is the best way to increase the amount of sales of the song and because there are alot of people who prefer collecting albums instead of using alternative methods such as 'downloading'. Also downloading has a lot of problems with illegal downloading and piracy.

Product unification is important is sustaining the audience's interest in the artist, and keeping their expectations high.

-Myung Kwon-

Web 2.0 Technologies

Web 2.0 technologies are the new way in which we use the internet nowadays. Youtube is an example of this. Therefore we are using online marketing strategies to promote and distribute our 'Raindrops' track. This method should be more effective for an artist like Ellanor Rose who has just debuted to become more known by the public. Using Youtube, is much cheaper and easier than fighting with other dominating competitors in the music industry who are trying to advertise on for example television.

Twitter is an example of social networking and because the internet revolves around social networking (having nearly everyone use it), this is a good way to promote Rose. Twitter also allows Ellanor to engage with the audience more and increase the number of fans she has.

-Myung Kwon-

Evette's Evaluation

Here is my individual evaluation.

Thank you for watching..

Evette Anderson-Sampah

Audience feedback

Here is the footage we recorded of two of the students who watched our music video and gave us feedback. They watched the music video and we then asked them a range of different questions about it in order for us to make improvements before our final product would be sent off.

Finished Digipak

This is the finished single. I decided to create both a digipak and a single to visually show the benefits of buying the digipak. I have included in the single a track list of five songs including the title song ‘Raindrops’. It also includes a number of shots from the actual Raindrops music video and lyrics of each song.

Front cover
As I talked about this before, I made the album cover brightly coloured to be visually attractive to potential buyers. It gives a feel of what the singer's genre is. I asked a number of people and asked them what they thought the genre of music this was. The audience said they it thought she would be pop and/or glam rock. The specific sound would be happy and upbeat. The would see Ellana Rose has a powerful and uplifting voice. These are both right.

Back Cover

The back cover tells a whole new story of Ellana Rose. The colours are darker and more subtle and its simplicity shows she has another genre of music. I asked again what this cover says about the artist. The feedback I got was that the singer is a soft rock or jazz singer. That her voice is soft but powerful voice. The two covers show Ellana's vercitility as a singer. She can cover a number of different genres which appeal to different age groups and a general wider audience.




Roshi Theva

Filming Audience Feedback

Today Me and Mariam filmed our audience feedback, whilst Roshi and Evette were checking the final cut of the music video for small errors of syncing. After our audience had watched our Raindrops video, we took two of the viewers somewhere quiet and comfortable where they could give us their feedback and be undisturbed by background sound.

We asked questions, whilst they answered back and gave us their thoughts. It was a good idea to film them because it gives evidence we have considered the point of view of a minority from the audience's, so that we can figure out minor problems with the music video if there are any and fix them.

Which is much better than finding out later on when it is out to the public. Audience feedback is a very common marketing strategy in the music business before the music video is published to a wide audience, because it saves valuable money and time.

From the audience feedback we got today, i would say that most feedback we recieved was positive such as 'I like how the singer engages with audience through a range of shots' and 'the shots are very steady'. However except from the very few syncing errors that were carefully spotted. We received a '9 out of 10' from these viewers, and from the questionnaire sheets a very high standard average too.

-Myung Kwon-

Finished Website

Here i looked at a existing website, I decided to look at Avril lavigne as i noticed that the artists are very similar in their dress sense and type of music, http://www.avrillavigne.com. In order to make the website as realistic as possible, i looked at the things that made a successful website exist. I noted down the things a website much have.

• Artist's or Album name


• links to other marketing sites


• Picture of artist/Album


• Important dates


• Videos


• Members login/Club


• Tweets, blog (Something directly from the artist)


• Small prints


• Photos


• News (tour dates)


• Album details, song listings.

Heres the website i made : http://elanorrose.webs.com/

I also made a itunes advert similar to the one on Avril lavinges site. I think a online advert marketing her music is important, so to make the website as authentic as possible it needed one.

Evette Anderson-Sampah

Animatic

Here is the most completed verson of the animatic, i included a series of clips we as a group agreed we liked. However this isnt the completed verson of the actual music video, as we have changed and re-changed the series and added different shots we havent used before.
To produce this i drew each individual shot on a storyboard peice of paper and i used my digital camera to take pictures of the individual shot then i uploaded the image as a jpeg file on imovies on the mac computer. Similar to the process of editing i then added it on with the music file.

Evette Anderson

Video Analysis- Hayley Westenra 'Wuthering Heights'

This is one of the many covers of the famous 'Wuthering Heights' song by Kate Bush. This video and song is ,obviously,based around the story of the same name written by Emily Brontë. I particularly caught my attenetion to this video is its similarity to our own video. The story portrayed in the music video is basically the love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff. Catherine ,who has died, haunts Heathcliff.

The theme of death runs predominantly throughout the video. I liked how the cross dissolve transitions were used to give a more ghostly feel. The transitions make it look like the singer is a spirit appearing and disappearing. I was mesmerised by how a simple transition could turn a simple music video into a beautiful masterpiece. This inspired my group and I to add more cross dissolve transitions.

Another similarity between our own music video and this one, is its location. The setting of a olden day house adds to the eeireness of the atmosphere. When I first saw this video, I loved how it had the singer wandering and singing in the different rooms. Most of the time she is alone singing and if she isn't she is separated by something from her Heathcliff. I feel this represents the singer's loneliness, trapped without her true love. The fact that she is always separated from him, I feel, represents her inability to move on to the next life. This idea was incoporated into our music video with a similar storyline,( A young woman who tragically dies is unable to rest in peace and reflects on her life and past love).

Roshi Theva

What type of editing did we use?

We used non-linear editing (i.e. using digital/computer).

So what we had to do at first was to hire 2 mini HD camcorders from the media department,

making sure we did this in time for the location we had reserved for a day to film.

During the process of editing, we used the 'imovie 09' instead of the typical 'imovie' and we did consider using the 'finalcut pro' programme, however we thought that the 'imovie 09' was more convenient to use considering that me and mariam had also used it in the previous AS level foundation portfolio. There are better effects and methods using this programme than the older 'imovie'.

After the process of editing, i converted (using export in imovie 09 programme) the whole video using quicktime to a HD file so that it could be saved onto the hard drive 'Coombe Media Archive'. A few minutes later or so, it popped up on the desktop so that Sir could find it easily and save it for us.

I think it is quite fortunate for us to have 'Mac' computers available for us at school, otherwise it would take so much more time and effort to get the project done. Macs have the advantages of having a faster hard drive, large amount of storage space and certain programmes which cannot be available on a PC. One problem whilst using the Mac was that the programme size was fairly large causing the computer to crash now and then, or lag.

Also because the programme 'Imovie 09' autosaves the project, when an error occurred we lost our work and it was not possible to retrieve the same work again. Therefore having to start all over again, which is of course time consuming and inconvenient. On the bright side, it mean't that we could learn from our mistakes and also remember the sequence of editing better for the A2 written exam, where we will have to write about the entire process.

As a conclusion i think the effort of non-linear editing was well worth it because although it can be difficult to learn to use than the linear method, once you master the basics you can do much more work and it is much faster.

-Myung Kwon-