This image in the bathtub is appearing in this music video too, it's nicely shot and although it's a shot thats used in a few music videos I feel that it'd add to our video also. As she looks peaceful I think we will have his facial expression similar.
The music video consists of a girl walking through idyllic and weird places, we are using this idea but having him singing also. The band and their music appear to be quite similar to Crystal Castles, but a bit less dark, however the male isn't as seen as much within the videos and the girl takes centre stage. They are an influential band that we can hopefully look at and gain ideas from if we ever run out of inspiration
Rhianna's and Calvin Harris' new music video has the same elements of shots and styles that we've been wanting to create. Throughout the planning and shooting we may refer to this video for inspirational help. Although it's a different genre the video captures a working class love which we would like to involve, with many shots that we had imagined within our own video, with the same sort of narrative showing the good and bad shots of the relationship especially similar with the fast pace cuts and images. They have used similar colour ideas within every shot that we will apply to our video once on the computer.
The different shots that look effective and similar to what our video should incoporate;
The shot of both female and male in the bath fully clothes, we came up with this idea anyway but the way they've framed it looks nice. To adapt it to our own video we will frame the shot similar but have the male by himself, fully dressed in the bath.
This shot is based outside like our idea but they nstead have a firework in the background, if this is possible to do we will do something similar but if not we will work alone with the sparkler idea. It's well framed and I hope that with this as inspiration that we could do something similar.
Seeing this shot we thought it was quite clever, as it's known that dialted pupils reveal an attraction for another person. Putting this within our own video would mean that in a 'happy flashback' we would get a face shot and then zoom in to reveal a dialted shot of the pupil. It'd just add a little extra detail and make the video that bit more experimental.
This is Rihana's version of the party scene we have in mind, I like the high angle framing and the sqaushed party theme. With the main characters squashed into the centre of the image, we will try and capture this within our party scene.
Here is a short shot of Calvin Harris who creates the music behind the singing, like the Crystal Castles in our music video, so we have decided that we could get two people to dress up like the male and female in Crystal Castles and be in a short clip or two like Calvin. To address thier apperance within the music, this would work well with the idea of the band anyway as they like to be mysterious and illusive towards their fans anyway.
This shot is quite clever and 'romantic' in a new working class style, so to create the same scene with our characters would be appealing to the target audience.
This was one main shot idea for our leading guy to make himself go under the water, as it looks eerie and different, which is what we want to make the audience feel at points whilst watching as it links well with the target audience. It conveys his emotions perfectly and thus the music video isn't as tedious as it also creates a shock factor.
This shot we will create but to make it our own they will have a flour fight in a kitchen instead of a fizzy drinks fight in a super market. We thought that the flour idea would work well as it will go in the air infront of the camera and puff up and look quirky and it's a more likely circumstance for the working class people baking a cake.
This scene takes place in a feild but with wheat which is yellow, we have got a location that has a green with grass and flowers which we believe will work just aswell as it appears to be quite magical.
I liked this shot of them having fun with the simple prop of the shopping trolley, if we could create something similar then it would just add to the 'new romance' of the modern generation and how we observe fun and loving moments to consist of. We will ofcourse make it our own somehow maybe vary the angles and shots but the idea will be used.
This shot involves the use of sparklers which are a key element within our video but they spell out a word with the use of it, if it's possible for us to do something similar then we will try and create that, but if it's just not possible we will still use sparklers and hopefully capture a shot that will work well for our music video.
Overall the music video is surprisingly helpful and we will refer to it if some inspiration is needed.
The Conventions of music videos in our chosen genre (Electro-Indie/Witch House) compared to other TV Texts are:
•Quick cuts
•Varying shot lengths and types
•Short shot duration (Typically 2-3 seconds)
•Instruments not often seen, due to electronic nature of music.
•Focus on concept and it can vary between narrative and performance.
So throughout our music video and preparing the step outline we will never make a shot last longer than 5 seconds. The lack of instruments is because they're are none/very little instruments used to make the music, it's mainly done on synths and computers, so in our video the only element of performance will be through the male singer. We understand that throughout the video we will have to use straight, quick cuts throughout.
These images are taken from the English film 'Submarine' they really capture the essence of love within the shots, which are framed perfectly within the nights sky and the sparklers create a magical feel. To take this idea and make it our own, we will get the guy and the girl holding sparklers together in a feild like location and have various shots like this, in both the evening and nights sky. The bottom shot shows the couple running together, we will capture this but not from the side profile they have, we thought it'd look quite nice to have them both running past either side of the camera into the distant feild. This clip will be apart of his 'happy flashbacks.'
Cutaways of locations and glimpses of Male and Female.
Verse 1 (0:15-0:55)
Male wakes up in warehouse (implied madness)
Initiate lyrics with visuals and flashbacks (I.E. “We were lovers” cut to clips of male and female together)
Various shots of Male singing lyrics(“When you coming home?” Shot at window staring out)
“It’s cold outside” cue line to start walking back + sing.
Chorus 1 (0:56-1:11)
Not In Love – fast cuts to various shots of people in tunnel singing chorus (turning to camera)
Verse 2 (1:12-1:51)
Male walking in reverse to party through locations
Arrives at party.
Shots of him ‘mad’; Male in regular speed, everyone else faster.
Including flashbacks and cutaways to the ‘past’.
Chorus 2 + Breakdown (1:52-3:47)
Various shots of ‘party’ scene and male going ‘mad’.
HEALTH inspired cuts (rapid cutting) of different people faces (close ups) singing “Not In Love”
Final shot: Two shot of male turning around (still in reverse) to face female lead.
We haven't decided the details upon each section but we have roughly guessed what we want in every verse. We worked together to create an idea that is achievable yet visually entertaining to our target audience. We have decided that the main story with the 'Robert Smith,' is going to be going backwards as our conceptual element, throughout he will have flashbacks to happy times with a woman which will be the narrative and throughout he will perform by singing the lyrics. Combining the different elements will allow for real entertainment. It helps that myself and MItch are quite inspired by the song and thus we are both passionate about creating it to a high standard, with all our ideas.
The colours used in the video are quite nice, they seem to be brightened and I feel that within the happy flashbacks of the man and woman in the video, using these colours and enhancing the contrast will create a similar happy vibe. The colours make the scenes in the videos appear to be quite magical and as we'll be trying to capture the ideas of love we will need similar vibes of the magical essence. The location in a field where the music video takes place, in our video we could use this as a picnic or the couple cuddling in our music video.
This video was quite inspirational as I liked the idea of the girl being chased in the woods looking a mess. It works quite nicely with the type of music and as Health are very similar to our band i've taken great inspiration for a section in our video upon the idea. The location is quite dark which at points in our video we want to involve to, the contrast with the happy loving bits and the dark bits will engage the audience. The shot types are quite nicely framed, the sidewards angles, the tracking shots of bodies, feet and faces and the long shots and close ups combined in the scene works quite nicely.
So creating this and making it our own will entail the guy and girl in a flashback having an argument in some woods after a happy moment and then she starts to run away from him, which we will capture in similar shot types to the beginning of the health video but we wont see her face, until she turns around for a second and her face will be covered in makeup, mud and face paints covering her face to look scary. Which will be shocking and thus engaging to the audience as it's quite a conceptual idea.
Costume; a casual black t-shirt on the girl and the drummer who is the male part of the duo is masked, which is visually interesting but it reveals little of him but he does appear to wear a leather jacket and hoodie underneath. There is no change from what they're wearing and no camera direction at costumes either, again supporting their blase feel towards fashion.
Eye contact; half the shots the female singer Alice does not look at the lens but in the other half she does but it's got a lot of effects and fast editing makes it hard to see straight into her eyes. Creating the mysterious appeal to the band.
Posture; the postures stays the same throughout from both performers upright either dancing or on the drums. The lack of different positions does get a bit tedious after a while.
Gestures; the singer head bangs and jumps, the gestures of a performer quite into the music herself. The only slight efforts at a gesture are at a point when she puts both her hands on her head and swings her head around.
Facial Expressions; She has an agape mouth when not singing but her face remains at a constant throughout.
Space (use of space in location - distance of performers to camera.) The camera remains on close ups and sometimes extreme close ups of the female and the male has extreme close ups (within the mask) and mid shots on the drums.
This video again does not meet all of the non- verbal communication conventions but meets a few to engage us and their mysterious ways seem to appeal to the audience anyway. Every little change of gesture we see as we are constantly craving to want to know more.
Costume; no costume change from the long black dress suggests that she doesn't like selling her body for the camera. One costume throughout shows how blase she is about image.
Eye Contact; throughout the video she never looks directly into the lens, instead every shot is of her walking or singing looking besides the camera as if the cameras not there. She's not performing for the camera but appears to be in her own little world it seems natural which suits the image of the band.
Posture; mainly she has an upright posture whilst walking, slightly leans on a wall but still quite upright or lies on the grass but again not sprawled out quite straight. As a band they are quite composed, they don't like to give too much away so being always very straight backed keeps the idea that they're not giving much away.
Gestures; they're are no gestures throughout, she isn't trying to sell her performance but the music.
Facial Expressions; no facial expressions are given just the blank look whilst singing.
Space (use of space in location- distance of performers to camera); mid tracking shots and head shots are close enough to see her singing and the performance but not to close to reveal every detail of her face. The closest we see her is when she is laying on her back towards the end of the video which is nice shot that reveals a little bit more than before.
Voice - change to pitch/tone; the pitch and tone of the singer is continuous throughout it does not change.
It appears that she is trying to challenge the conventions of a typical music video as she doesn't reveal much and play to the camera like other musicians do, which creates her unique image.
We've decided that the Crystal Castles song is the best song choice to go with, as it has the male singing throughout which we want the male actor who will be in the narrative to mime the lyrics to throughout. We just need to think of a good idea for a narrative surrounding the boy and girl within the lyrics and that's it.
The band themselves are young, cool and are the sort of band we would like to portray as they are into the grunge scene, meaning that they are not into the typical celebrity status and red carpet events. They like drinking and smoking like normal ordinary working class people like to do to. Within our Digi-pack we would try and capture this image also, as it's very relevant to the young culture and we feel that we could do this and well.
We are just looking at lots of possible ideas of songs and brainstorming some ideas;
King Blues- Underneath this lamp post light (^fan made video) Its a band that both myself and Mitch like, which is a very Working class band, which we could work well with the mise-en-scene's around Nottingham. The band uses lyrics like 'I know you smell of fish but you look beautiful tonight.' The story within the video can show the lyrics as it tells a do-able story of a girl who works in a fish and chip shop, we'd just have to find a fish and chip shop that would let us film there.
Crystal Castles- Not in love ft Robert Smith There is two different versions of this song, one with a female voice and one with a male, we decided that we both prefer the version with the male. We thought it's very different so we can play around with different effects and come up with a cool idea, but the lyrics tell a story aswell but not a typical love story as it's about not being in love with a woman. As it's upbeat we would need lots of quick shots so an exciting narrative is essential.
Bloc Party- This Modern Love This song has a clear band singing which would be nice to film if we had them playing in a 'cool' location. We would want to play on the lyrics and have a narrative throughout would be essential around a modern love, maybe have 'robots' fall in love. The beginning sings about them in a forest which would be nice for a location, with shots of the band integrated throughout.
Arcade Fire- We Used To Wait A male singer with an interesting piano beat throughout the song, which we could have a pianist playing but have a twist on him maybe with face paint building up over the video, or different masks. The narrative would consume some of the clips going really fast when he sings 'now our lives are changing fast.'
Myself and Mitch are deciding upon which bands we like and have got a real passion to create a really good music video for.
So far we have been looking at Bombay Bicycle Club;
We like their style, they're diversity within the band and how the individual band members have different styles which appeal to a variety of people. Their target audience would be males and females of our age range -15-21, which we would be able to capture easily as we know what's expected of the band. We would also be able to get a band replica that would look very similar to the actual band, as their distinctive looks will be needed to be reciprocated. We liked their songs; Shuffle off of the new album the best but it already has a video which is a shame because we felt it would be the best one to work with off the new album.
We also thought about doing Bloc Party as their image is very different and unique and so is the music, as it variates slow with fast, with touching lyrics that we could base a lot of our ideas upon.
We do both like the 'indie' genre but know that we want to pick a band that's slightly different from the normal 'indie' category so that we can be inspired by different things and make it without having the typical indie characteristics having to stay in mind instead we'll be able to play with ideas and mix it with other aspects of genres slightly.
