27th September - 30th October: Shooting the life cycle of a rose, Brooke's Bedroom.
24th September: Filming the original narrative footage of Christie and Sarah, Cullercoats Bay.
1st October: Filming of the original performance footage of our band, Drama Hall.
30th October: Filming more narrative footage of Christie and Sarah, Cullercoats Bay.
7th November: Filming of the characters as children, Whitley Bay Beach.
19th November: Filming new band footage, St Marys Lighthouse, Whitley Bay.
Wednesday 25 November 2009
Editing the rose using Premier Elements
For the first video I imported the clips into premier elements, clip by clip. I then exported the whole video as one. I opened a new project and imported the movie. To get the rose to open and die quickly I had to speed up the video from 6.00.00 minutes to 00.13.00 seconds. This made the rose look jerky and created the effect I wanted. This is shown below
I then explored the effects on Premier Elements; I found no effects that I could use to make the video look a authentic old film. I then looked further and found a effect on Windows Movie Maker. There were several different effects that I could chose from, including different styles from different Eras.
I found two different effects that I liked, these are shown below:
After lots of discussion with our group we decide to use effect 1 this is because it showed the detail of the rose, where as the older effect look away all the hard work we put in when editing each picture.
This is the final edit:
At the end of our music video we decide to do a rewind of all that happens in the video, we then rewound the rose footage to Finnish the music video off. I did this by selecting the time stretch key and reversed the speed, from forwards to backwards. This rewound the whole opening of the rose. So the rose died and came to life.
I then explored the effects on Premier Elements; I found no effects that I could use to make the video look a authentic old film. I then looked further and found a effect on Windows Movie Maker. There were several different effects that I could chose from, including different styles from different Eras.
I found two different effects that I liked, these are shown below:
After lots of discussion with our group we decide to use effect 1 this is because it showed the detail of the rose, where as the older effect look away all the hard work we put in when editing each picture.
This is the final edit:
At the end of our music video we decide to do a rewind of all that happens in the video, we then rewound the rose footage to Finnish the music video off. I did this by selecting the time stretch key and reversed the speed, from forwards to backwards. This rewound the whole opening of the rose. So the rose died and came to life.
Editing the Rose on Photoshop
To follow the theme of our narrative we have decided to put the rose in black and white except the rose head this fitted with the ‘arty’ look that was constant through our video.
For the photos of the rose to look professional, I have decided to edit each photo one by one using Photoshop. This required a lot of patients and hard work.
First I uploaded photo 1 onto a new blank background. I then using the magic wand tool select the outside of the rose and used the erase colour tool, this on a short cut was: Ctrl Shift U. I did this to make it quicker than pressing on the colour settings. This erased the background colour which left me with an off black background.
To make the stork and leafs of the rose in black and white. I had to select the area using the magnetic lasso tool, making sure that I did not select the rose head as this was staying in colour. Then when selected I used the Ctrl Shirt U key to erase the colour this left the rose stork ad leafs grey. I then zoomed into the photograph using the + sign on the keyboard to find any areas that I did not select. I used the magic wand to correct the areas I missed.
This is the before and after of editing the photographs
Before
After
After editing photos 1-131 I imported them into Adobe Premier Elements
For the photos of the rose to look professional, I have decided to edit each photo one by one using Photoshop. This required a lot of patients and hard work.
First I uploaded photo 1 onto a new blank background. I then using the magic wand tool select the outside of the rose and used the erase colour tool, this on a short cut was: Ctrl Shift U. I did this to make it quicker than pressing on the colour settings. This erased the background colour which left me with an off black background.
To make the stork and leafs of the rose in black and white. I had to select the area using the magnetic lasso tool, making sure that I did not select the rose head as this was staying in colour. Then when selected I used the Ctrl Shirt U key to erase the colour this left the rose stork ad leafs grey. I then zoomed into the photograph using the + sign on the keyboard to find any areas that I did not select. I used the magic wand to correct the areas I missed.
This is the before and after of editing the photographs
Before
After
After editing photos 1-131 I imported them into Adobe Premier Elements
Changes between Rough Cut and Final Cut
There are significant differences between our rough cut and the final edit of our video. I feel these have hugely improved the quality of the video, the storyline and impact that the video has upon the viewer.
The issues that were raised when we previewed the rough cut to the class was the blandness of the performance footage and the fact that the narrative wasn't particularly clear. We brain stormed as a group to come up with solutions to these problems. It was evident that we were going to have to collect a lot more footage. To start with we got extra footage of Christie and Sarah on the beach and in the caves. We took some footage of them walking along the pier to show the characters being lost and we also took some footage of key lyrics from the song written in the sand, helping to link the song lyrics with the visuals. I wrote these key lyrics in a script-like font to help connect this to the DVD cover and advert.
In order to make our narrative make sense to the viewer we decided the best idea would be to get footage of younger girls, showing our characters when they were children and emphasising how their friendship and been lost and rediscovered. We took the younger girls down to the beach and got footage of them playing together. We wanted to convay to the viewer that this footage was in the past, as the narrative was already in black and white we needed to think of another way of giving an old fashioned, nostalgic effect. We decided to use the same technique as we were using for the rose footage, stop motion. We took still images of the children and put them together on premier elements to create a moving image. We wanted the "note motif" to be slightly clearer without being too obvious and whilst maintaining a certain ambiguity. To achieve this we took photographs of the children holding and passing the note, these were then fitted into the video next to the footage of Christie and Sarah passing the note to help emphasis the relevance of the note.
As well as this we were also very unhappy with the band performance footage that we had, we came to the conclusion that we were going to have to re-shoot it. The main problem with the band footage was the setting and the lighting, to change this completely and to link the performance with the narrative we decided to shoot the performance at the beach outside of St Marys lighthouse, as well as looking effective the lighthouse also adheres to Goodwins theory and the notion of looking. This is particuarly relevant to our video as it represents being lost and being found, as if a fog has lifted.
We went down to the beach at 7.30 am and set up the band and camera equiptment. We took footage from various different camera angles using a variety of different movements. The lighting was perfect as the sun was beginning to rise in the east. This footage was so much better than our original footage, we were all very pleased with it and confident that we'd beable to edit in a way that would greatly improve the video. I feel in the end we have done this.
The issues that were raised when we previewed the rough cut to the class was the blandness of the performance footage and the fact that the narrative wasn't particularly clear. We brain stormed as a group to come up with solutions to these problems. It was evident that we were going to have to collect a lot more footage. To start with we got extra footage of Christie and Sarah on the beach and in the caves. We took some footage of them walking along the pier to show the characters being lost and we also took some footage of key lyrics from the song written in the sand, helping to link the song lyrics with the visuals. I wrote these key lyrics in a script-like font to help connect this to the DVD cover and advert.
In order to make our narrative make sense to the viewer we decided the best idea would be to get footage of younger girls, showing our characters when they were children and emphasising how their friendship and been lost and rediscovered. We took the younger girls down to the beach and got footage of them playing together. We wanted to convay to the viewer that this footage was in the past, as the narrative was already in black and white we needed to think of another way of giving an old fashioned, nostalgic effect. We decided to use the same technique as we were using for the rose footage, stop motion. We took still images of the children and put them together on premier elements to create a moving image. We wanted the "note motif" to be slightly clearer without being too obvious and whilst maintaining a certain ambiguity. To achieve this we took photographs of the children holding and passing the note, these were then fitted into the video next to the footage of Christie and Sarah passing the note to help emphasis the relevance of the note.
As well as this we were also very unhappy with the band performance footage that we had, we came to the conclusion that we were going to have to re-shoot it. The main problem with the band footage was the setting and the lighting, to change this completely and to link the performance with the narrative we decided to shoot the performance at the beach outside of St Marys lighthouse, as well as looking effective the lighthouse also adheres to Goodwins theory and the notion of looking. This is particuarly relevant to our video as it represents being lost and being found, as if a fog has lifted.
We went down to the beach at 7.30 am and set up the band and camera equiptment. We took footage from various different camera angles using a variety of different movements. The lighting was perfect as the sun was beginning to rise in the east. This footage was so much better than our original footage, we were all very pleased with it and confident that we'd beable to edit in a way that would greatly improve the video. I feel in the end we have done this.
Photos from the making of our final music Video
In order to make our music video clearer we used younger characters to show their developement, and how their friendship has grown. We chose to take still images of the children in order to add to the nostalgic feel and to emphasis that it was in the past.
Twins
setting up of the Rose Photo Shoot
I used a Nikon D200 SLR and I also used a tripod and remote.
The background was simply a black piece of material which was pinned to my wall.
To hold the rose in place I used oasis in a jug of water.
I had to make sure that the camera did not move at all, so the photos would not be different. To make sure that the camera did not move and go out of focus I used a remote to take the photos so that even the vibration of the camera did not move the placement.
My photography of the group setting up for the performance footage:
St Mary's Lighthouse, Whitley Bay - 7.30am
Twins
setting up of the Rose Photo Shoot
I used a Nikon D200 SLR and I also used a tripod and remote.
The background was simply a black piece of material which was pinned to my wall.
To hold the rose in place I used oasis in a jug of water.
I had to make sure that the camera did not move at all, so the photos would not be different. To make sure that the camera did not move and go out of focus I used a remote to take the photos so that even the vibration of the camera did not move the placement.
My photography of the group setting up for the performance footage:
St Mary's Lighthouse, Whitley Bay - 7.30am
Tuesday 24 November 2009
Our Band Performance
After sorting through the footage we had of our band performance and looking at the different camera angles and shots that we had we came to the desicion that we were going to have to reshot the footage. The setting of our performance is what we felt made it boring and ordiniary. We wanted it to fit in with the narrative and concept side of our music video. After much debate we decided as a group that we should film our band performance on the beach outside of St Marys lighthouse. This gives reference to the notion of looking, adhereing to Godwins theory. It also links in with alot of the motifs and hidden messages behind our video.
Sunday 1 November 2009
Class Feedback
After completing our rough draft of the music video we showed the class a preview and asked them all to list a few positive points and a few negative points about our music video. The two main criticisms that kept cropping up were:
Needs more shots and cuts of the performance, using different camera angles
Narrative could be a bit clearer
Both of these points we had already considered however hearing it from the class made us realise these were things that we definitely need to improve upon.
During the filming of the band performance we took footage from many different camera angles using both the tripod and a hand held camera. Despite the fact we had a variety of footage the shots that we choose to use for our rough cut were all very similar, this was due to both time restraints and our judgement. When creating the final draft of the music video we should definitely use all the different camera angles we have and use a lot of fast cuts in time to the beat of the music, this is what our target audience have requested therefore doing this I feel will make our video more popular.
We had already had discussions within the group about whether or not the narrative should be clearer or not. As we want our video to be concept based we felt that the ambiguity was a good thing. Looking at the feedback from the class some people have said that they felt the narrative was clear and others said that they liked the fact it was unclear, however the majority of responses said that the narrative was unclear and confusing, because of this I feel we must add to it. We should shoot a lot more footage which will explain the storyline better and show the separation of the two characters and hopefully make it clear that they are lost and lonely and trying to discover each other. In order to do this we have considered getting footage of younger actresses, showing the characters when they were little, representing the strong bond and friendship that they have. We should also capture the moment when they are separated from each other, which will hopefully make things a lot clearer for the viewer.
Other comments we received were:
Needs more shots and cuts of the performance, using different camera angles
Narrative could be a bit clearer
Both of these points we had already considered however hearing it from the class made us realise these were things that we definitely need to improve upon.
During the filming of the band performance we took footage from many different camera angles using both the tripod and a hand held camera. Despite the fact we had a variety of footage the shots that we choose to use for our rough cut were all very similar, this was due to both time restraints and our judgement. When creating the final draft of the music video we should definitely use all the different camera angles we have and use a lot of fast cuts in time to the beat of the music, this is what our target audience have requested therefore doing this I feel will make our video more popular.
We had already had discussions within the group about whether or not the narrative should be clearer or not. As we want our video to be concept based we felt that the ambiguity was a good thing. Looking at the feedback from the class some people have said that they felt the narrative was clear and others said that they liked the fact it was unclear, however the majority of responses said that the narrative was unclear and confusing, because of this I feel we must add to it. We should shoot a lot more footage which will explain the storyline better and show the separation of the two characters and hopefully make it clear that they are lost and lonely and trying to discover each other. In order to do this we have considered getting footage of younger actresses, showing the characters when they were little, representing the strong bond and friendship that they have. We should also capture the moment when they are separated from each other, which will hopefully make things a lot clearer for the viewer.
Other comments we received were:
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