Our video!!

We have finally finished our video and uploaded it to Youtube. Overall I am initially pleased with the quality of the video and I think that as it is a preliminary task and I was completely new to all the software and technology within this project, we have done a good job.

Firstly, I do believe that the picture quality is good, and the general visuals are acceptable, however one thing I know I would and will change for my actual task next year is to mainly use a tri-pod to shoot my video.



Ready to start editing

Now that we have finished our exams we are able to devote more of our time to the editing of our video, we have finished filming as well as having all the correct songs.
So, using Adobe Premiere Elements 7.0 we imported all of the clips and songs, the problems with this was that because we used two cameras, one hand held camera and one on a tri-pod, the scenes were not all together which was a slight problem when trying to find the best take of each scene.
Once this was done we then put the required song with the right clip, as I had not really used this software before I was a bit unsure of what to do, so with some help from the rest of my team we were able to work out what different controls did what we needed them to do.
Muting the sound while the music was playing was a large problem that I came across but once wokring at it for a while we soon worked out what to do. In order to only mute a select part of the song we had to cut the clip just as the actor started to sing with lyrics and just as they finished, then going to volume controls we were able to turn the volume completely down and insert the small part of song lyrics that we had just cut from the entire song. We then had to watch this part over and over again to ensure that the lip-syncing was as close as we could get it. This process was also very long winded and was not very fun to do.
However, continuing with this process throughout the whole video we soon had roughly a 2minutes 30second long video. Eric, Alex and I, all had a shot at editing different parts of the video and also advised eahother on what to do to help.
Because we all had work experience we were unable t do as much work to the video as we would have liked, but we all managed to spend a few hours throughout the week to finish it.

Re-takes!!!

A large problem we came across was having to re-take different clips when things went wrong, this was very frustrating for both us as filming directors, and the actors, as they were getting annoyed at having to do the same part over and over again. As you can see in these two clips, it was very difficult to get the right angles, as well as telling the actors where they should stand so that we can see their lips, as this would help us to lip-sync. Nearly every scene had to be shot more than 3 times, as well as being frustrating, it was also very time consuming.

Putting the clips together

Today we did another part of filming as it was raining a little bit, trying to find a time when all of us are available and it was raining has proven to be very difficult however i think that filming today went ok and we have now nearly got all of our clips we need.
As we were filming another part of the film we thought of other parts we could put in rather than the scene in the dining hall, therefore today when I was about to start putting the clips together I found that we were unable to as we did not have all of the required songs. Therefore 'Eric' another person in my group had to spend most of the lesson finding these songs on itunes and buying them.

As it was my first time on Adobe Premiere Elements I was a little bit unsure on what to do, therefore I did not get much done, however I did learn a few things such as how to cut clips in order to delete unwanted parts. I can see that it may be quite hard but hopefully when i get the hang of it, it should be ok.
One major thing that I was not expecting was the horrible background noise left from the cameras, especially in shots done from outside, removing or covering up this sound may be difficult and will be something that I will have to try to work out how to do next lesson.

Filming

This week we finally began filming and so far it has gone well. We have filmed a number of parts of our overall video so far and with a few trys, we think we have quite a few clips that are worthy of being in the film.

Top 10 tips on how to make a music video

Having researched ways to make a suitable and convincing music video I found that these 10 following tips were very useful and all relate perfectly to everything I need to do for both the preliminary task as well as my main task.
Top 10 Tips
1. Choose your song
2. Get a team and equipment
3. Plan your shoot
4. Filming
5. Capture live footage
6. Use stock footage
7. Editing
8. Get the right software and hardware
9. Be creative
10.Beware

'Filmmaking tips'

I found this video on you tube which was actually quite use full, although I knew most of the things that it said it was a good refresher and has helped me to visualise these things as apposed to just reading them. Some of the parts in this video are irrelevant to me, such as the small parts for the creator of this videos own personal uses. I thought it was good research and could be very useful for when I create my real music video.

Cameras..

While filming a couple of scenes we found that it was more difficult that we had originally thought to get a close enough view of the lips to help with lip-syncing and yet a long enough view to get the rest of the scene. So in order to over come this we set up two cameras, one hand held and another on a tri-pod from a different angle, this not only helped us to use different angles, but also gave us more clips to work with. I found that using the tri-pod was much more useful and logical that holding the camera, this is because it gave a steadier image and we were able to direct it as well as having to worry about what the camera was doing. We are going to use this two angled view approach for all of our clips as it will help us in the long run and we will then be able to make a better overall video as we will have more to work with and more examples of clips.

Problems so far..

As we have planned out our storyboard to be different times throughout the college day we need a number of different settings to play as the mise en scene and fit the song. For example, we were unable to film one particular scene as we needed it to be raining for it to fit with the song ' why does it always rain on me'This is where so far we have found it difficult to film, and one small problem we have had to over come. Another problem is having time with the same people to use as our 'actors'. Therefore we have had to try and film as much as possible in a short period of time.

Story board and songs

What is a storyboard?

Once a concept or script is written for a film or animation, the next step is to make a storyboard. A storyboard visually tells the story of an animation panel by panel, kind of like a comic book.

Your storyboard will should convey some of the following information:

• What characters are in the frame, and how are they moving?
• What are the characters saying to each other, if anything?
• How much time has passed between the last frame of the storyboard and the current one?
• Where the "camera" is in the scene? Close or far away? Is the camera moving?

Why make a storyboard?

Creating a storyboard will help you plan your animation out shot by shot. You can make changes to your storyboard before you start animating, instead of changing your mind later. You will also be able to talk about your animation and show your storyboard to other people to get feedback on your ideas.

Here you can see our ideas for the story board, we thought of ideas and drew them as they came to us, then as you can see we have numbered them in the order that we will aim to film and put them together in.

These are examples of other story boards for a variety of things, I found them very useful and a good source of research, they show a number of things such as:

- Structure

- Images

- Wording

- Planning

We tried to base our own story board on this, however as you can see, not as higher standard as these. 

The story board on the left is a very detailed and high quality story board, it shows camera angles and even facial expressions, although doing a story board to this much detail would be very time consuming, I can understand why it would be useful for when creating the final product as it would save more time when deciding what they wanted. However, the story board on the top right is more like our own, where it has simple drawings and short hand notes, however it also has much more detail such as saying in places where they would pan and zoom etc.

However we are also aiming to hopefully entwine more songs as we film and think of other ideas. So far we aim to use the following songs:

Leaving on a jet plane-

Umbrella- Rihanna

L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N- Noah and the whale

All of the lights- Rihanna ft. Kanye West

Bright Lights, Bigger City- Cee Lo Greene

Buzzin'- Mann Ft. 50 Cent

The Fast Food song-Fast Food Rockers

Frisky- Tinie Tempah Ft. Labrinth

The Lazy Song- Bruno Mars

OH NO!- Marina and the Diamonds

Smack That- Akon Ft. Eminem

Hello- Martin Solveig Ft. Dragonette

Rain on me-

Friday- Rebecca Black

Next we need to find approx 10 people to appear in our video, and begin filing using a 'Panasonic HDC-SD60 Full HD'

Preliminary Task

We watched this video called 'Songs in real life', which is a video made by a group of teenagers in America. The use normal conversation but with song lyrics and the song to make a video. We have decided to make one of these video ourselves as it will help us prepare for making our actual music video.
I hope to learn how to lip-sync which making this video and will therefore be able to complete my own full music video to a higher standard.
I think that this video is very well made and the lyrics to the song fit perfectly in time with the words being said/sung.
In preparation for making our own 'songs in real life' we will first create a story board with a number of ideas, then once that is completed we will ensure we have all of the required songs and then begin filming.