Blog 9 -The Pitch

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B-et947J7WknNmIwMTNhZDctNThlNS00NjdkLWE2ZWUtMTY5YTE0NjA0Mzg0&sort=name&layout=list&num=50

This is the pitch we did last week relating to the ideas in our video and the initial ideas we have developed into a storyboard.

Blog 8 - Initial Ideas

We thought it would be a good idea to film a live performance cover of the song with my band in a certain location; one of these could be a deserted, derelict garage setting off the A27, another could be on the bus and film the bus driver kicking us off the bus. This would present a natural, realistic feel to the video if the situation we are creating is not scripted. The idea is to present to the audience how it would happen in real life if a band started performing in a no musical instrument zone. This will give our video a good mix of handheld and static shots, as well as rehearsed and naturalistic looking footage.

We were also thinking of filming a large proportion of the video from a first person perspective, possibly as one long sequence to represent a first hand view of whatever we want to represent. The solid idea that all of us are happy with is the idea of getting actors to turn up and get made up as zombies. This could be filmed by our crew and would be easy enough to produce. Research that I have conducted indicates that it costs about £1.50 per zombie. The recipe is flour, syrup and blue and red food colouring. Add this to water and you get a fantastic fake blood concoction. Add this to another recipe of cornflour, water and syrup which makes it look like flesh is hanging off, and you have realistic looking zombies for a very small price.

To go through with this idea we will have to get a large number of participants to make a good looking zombie horde. I have now made a facebook event to promote the day, on the 4th of february, where lots of people will turn up to be made into zombies and run around the forest and get us some footage.

This is the screenshot of the event we have made labelled 'zombies day out'

We are also going to involve my band in the music video shoot and syncronise this with the music we are making a video for; queens of the stone age: medication.

Blog 7 - Copying An Existing Video

For our media production lessons we have been recreating the music video for 'Wheatus - Teenage Dirtbag'. For these lessons I played the lead singer of the band and we reproduced the scene in the school corridor, the scene on the stairs and the scene of walking to school. The corridor scene was relatively simple, all it involved was the cameraman walking backwards to film me walking forwards in a mid shot. At the same time two syncronised bystanders walked through in the background. This had to be timed carefully and it was important to use appropriate levels of depth of field to ensure that I was in focus and the background was out of focus, but in focus enough to see the image of the two walkers. Soon after this, in the same corridor, we recreated the scene of the lead singer being shoved. We did this by using the same angle as before, using the same method of backtracking shot while 2people walked into me and one of them shoved me.

On a later date, we recreated another couple of scenes from the same video. The first of these was the shot of the lead singer asleep on the stairs, which is the establishing shot for the Teenage Dirtbag video. I played the main charecter again, so it was an easy job for me just having to lay on some stairs quite stationary. There was a lot of people in our group and this created a type of 'too many chefs spoil the broth' type of effect. This meant it was difficult to keep everybody quiet at once, and not everybody had a job. There was only the job of operating the camera, operating the clapperboard, directing and starring. We had about 8 people on the set and this prolonged the staircase filming process altogether, and produced a few dud shots. However as it is a music video, it does not matter if silence is not present. This will be the same case with our main music video project, but overall care and discipline will still be nessecary.

Editing the shots was a much more lengthy process than actually filming them. We used an Apple MacBook, with the 'Final cut pro' program. This also had a lot of people around one piece of equipment, with only one person actually able to operate it at any one time. This led to some members of the group learning nothing about editing, and none of us with any real experience of editing an entire stream of shots from start to finish.

Blog 6 - Video Analysis

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcHKOC64KnE
This is the video for Queens of the stone age - Go with the flow. This is clearly a video aimed at a male audience in every aspect. A pick up truck, a very male orientated type of vehicle carries 4 men playing instruments at high speed. Speed, rock music, men backgrounded by a red sky will definately appeal to men in every way possible. Soon afterwards, a woman is presented to the camera wearing skimpy garments to appeal even further to the male mind. She is spread across the hood of a pick up truck on a long, straight american road. The main storyline of the video focusses on the band, while the sub plot focusses on the woman. After a while the 2 sub plots meet, and a car crash unites the lead singer with the woman simultaneously. This creates exitement for the audience and after all this concludes there is a massive animated explosion to signify sexual desire and crashing at high speed.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s88r_q7oufE
This is the video for 'No one knows'. This also features the band in a moving vehicle, however it also uses a standard, standing up setting for the band playing while the sub plot focusses on them being transported in the truck. The song plays along while not a lot happens to the truck or the people inside it, until it hits a deer. This is a common situation in american media, and queens of the stone age put their twist on it by making the deer come alive again, and attack the band. As all this is happening and the scene is livening up the music is speeding up and graduates into the chorus. I have no idea how the video content relates to the message put across in the song. This is the same case as the first video. Perhaps the video content just needs to look cool and appeal to men in order to be functional for my chosen band. Maybe the interpretation of the song and lyrics should be left to the listener as opposed to being fed on a plate to them by the video I make.

Blog 5 - Target audience

The target audience for Queens Of The Stone Age is very broad. Rock music is one of the oldest genres and probably the most popular of the last 20 years. The standard band setup that the band uses of 2 guitars, one vocalist, one bass guitar and a drum kit is a common phenomena. They are the most commonly played instruments and people who play them often aspire to become rock stars not dissimilar to Queens of the stone age (or QOTSA as they are commonly referred to). When I went to go see the band perform live a large proportion of the audience were male (around 70%). This could be for the fact that the enterity of the band is male, therefore it is produced to a male taste. The music has metal influences, using a lot of songs with heavy guitar solo's in drop D with fast, metallic drum beats to get the crowd moshing.

I believe the band was signed not because they sound good as a recording model, but because listeners are going to be the kind of rock fanatic that like to visit gigs. This is a band that you will listen to and think 'they would be good live'. This is because of the frantic nature of the music provided by the tempo and slanderous lyrics sung in a shouting fashion. Medication is a perfect example of this, with repetitive heavy parts on all instruments being played throughout the songs progression. Looking at the bands facebook page shows that they have played a lot of festivals throughout the summer. This gives them the same target audience as the festival industry (16-30) although the band has been around for a while and probably has a lot of older listeners too who can appreciate a good rock song, possibly evolving from the rock generation of the 60's, 70's and 80's.

The audience of our video should syncronise with the content of the song. If the lyrics are appealing to the drug taking, teenage anarchists that listen to Queens Of The Stone Age then perhaps the video should relate to this topic accordingly. This could be a video of a teenager from our video group beginning a slow descent into addiction, or perhaps describe the results of taking a large dose of a certain narcotic, illegal substance. The model of our video should probably be male, to relate to the target audience, or female, to appeal to the target audience of leather clad beardy males who like powerchords and cocaine.

Blog 4 - Permission

This is the printscreen of the email I sent to the record company that signed Queens Of The Stone Age. It specifies the details of the project I have been assigned and requests the permission to use the song 'Medication' for an independant music video for non profit purposes.

They have yet to reply.

Blog 3 - Song choice

The song me and my group have chosen is a song by Queens Of The Stone age, 'Medication' taken from the album 'Lullabies to Paralyze'. It is a short song, at one minute fifty four seconds. This is part of the reason we chose it as we can concentrate on making it short and sweet as opposed to long and possibly unfinished. It is a song to my taste, a band I have seen live and off an album I own. The lyrics of the song are as follows;

Medication, for us all, it is a new way
& we're gonna take it cos we love it
Dont you know?

Is the dose you've been dreaming of?
A revelation from a gun
Doesnt matter
Overtaken, mine was yours, now overthrown

Just copulation in a song
Im so contagious, can i cum?
in the new way
all of us cast asides became what has become

Medication for us all
You think you know me, well you're wrong
Doesnt matter
All of us cast asides became what has become

These lyrics are clearly not specific, and can be interpreted as many things. Research on the songwriter, Josh Homme, specifies that he has been through multiple stages of drug enthusiasm and addiction. "is this the dose you've been dreaming of?' clearly relates to a drug of some sort. The whole song is quite scandalous and talks about the relationship between drugs and sex and what it makes people become. Seperated from reality perhaps, specified in the last line of the last two verses. Although the vague content of the lyrics is hard to interpret, and could be related to love (often referred to in 'dosage') or a close friend or family member dying. The video content could be about whatever we want and we could probably relate it to the content of the song however we want. This song gives us leverage in both our options for what we include in the footage, and how long we have to produce it (being it a short song)

Blog 2 - Exploring music videos

The first of these 4 music videos i am going to analyse is by Wheatus, and the song is 'Teenage Dirtbag'. We went through this video in a media studies lesson and it is the type of video that is syncronised with the clear meaning of the song. This means that the video is about a teenager with a low self esteem who dreams of going to an iron maiden concert with a girl in his year. The song is the same meaning and it is a direct coincision with the content of the video. It is clearly a professionally made video and has 18 shots just in the first 10 seconds, during the introduction of the song before the lyrics even begin. This video focusses on the lead singer of the band, as he is the one responsible for putting forward the meaning of the song to the audience, who in this case would probably be teenagers going to college, who could empasise with the situation of the singer. Because of this, the video also features multiple eyeline matches, close ups and over the shoulder shots both of the singer and from his perspective.

The second video I have analysed is by Gorillaz, and the song is 'feel good inc.'. This uses the animated medium to create a sequence of fictional shots. They are fictional because the content of the video is not based on anything in real life, it is a fantasy world that is a concept by the video designer. The video relates to a corporation, as is hinted in the title. The song is designed to be both feel good and mechanic as an industrial tower is, eg that of which is featured in the establishing shot of the video (a large tower that resembles a factory chimney). The video and song appeal to people of all ages, the band has a very broad audience as they have been around for a long time but also lead a lot of contempary music, so a modern video manufacturing technique fits in perfectly.

The third video is by Dr Dre and the song is still dre. The video focusses on wealth and success of a rap star, and appeals to the rap audience that listen to contemporary urban music. The establishing shot shows us a close up of the rapper, blowing out smoke. This will appeal to smokers (of ciggarettes or cannabis) that will make up a large majority of the target market for the song. The whole video, in syncronicity with the lyrics, simply foccusses on the success of the rapper, and can be viewed to inspire jealously, motivation or admiration. The whole idea of it is to big up the artist, and make him seem as seamlessly cool as possible. If I was to make a video with this message put across to the audience, then I would have to put a lot of planning towards the kind of character that I would focus the video on with things like costume, expression and cinematography. For example angling the camera up to someones face from the perspective of a waistline would provide the 'big me up' effect efficiently and simply.


The fourth and final video I am analysing is 'escape artist' by Sage Francis. This is a video that tells the same story that the song puts across. It is a visual representation of what the artist wrote a song about, in this case an artist of escapism. The video involves a man dressed in black trying to escape from Sage while the pursuer raps the song. This content is what I would like to follow, simply correllating the video with my groups interpretation of what our chosen song is about.

Blog 1 - Introduction

My task for A2 media coursework is to create a music video. I have until around easter time to finish this, alongside 20 blogs updating my progress with the task and logging my ideas. Last year I created a music magazine using indesign and photoshop and the skills I developed for this task will be passed on and used for this task. This will both involve the software side moving onto video editing software from photoshop and indesign, and the hands on interactive skills being adapted to using a video camera as opposed to standard cameras for the photos needed for the magazine. The skills used for the photos will help with things such as composition (framing), angles and other areas of cinematography that will be useful throughout filming the video. The things I learnt about demographics in music will also help me syncronise the target market of the song with the content on the video. The blogs used for my previous project can be followed here;