Production Schedule

Filming Days

26th July 2015 - Rochester; On Sunday, we plan to film the majority of the breakup scenes. We felt that Rochester would be a great place to film as there is a lot of facilities that we can use such as the 'deaf cat' cafe in which we aim to film Nova sitting by herself looking 'heartbroken'. In addition to cafe scenes, we agreed that the castle gardens and cathedral would make for some picturesque footage. The weather is forecast to rain, however we have decided to take advantage of this and feel that it will add to the dark, unhappy mood we are going for.
Actors: Millie Laing
Props: We only plan on using very basic props on this day such as a magazine for Nova to flick through. Similarly we want a cup of coffee for Millie to sip from during the cafe scene whilst she is sitting alone to highlight her being alone.
Equipment: Camera and tripod to film establishing and long shots.
Costume: Usually when people go through a break-up they aren't too bothered as to what they look like. Because of this, we would like Nova to wear a very relaxed outfit. We agreed on a hoodie and Converse with no makeup to emphasise the casualness of this scene.
Shots:  The image (left) displays a long shot of the artist sitting at the table in the cafe reading a magazine, this is the type of shot we would like to use as we feel it will capture her vulnerability and isolation as well as the location that she's in (in the background) which will of course set the scene for the audience.

23rd August 2015 - Whitstable, Some of the Beach/Seaside Scenes;

Actors: Millie Laing and the 'mystery man'- we do not plan on actually using a male video in our video as when considering the idea we concluded that using actors outside of our group could cause reliability issues. Because of this, we will instead use on of our arms in the point of view shots to act as the 'boyfriend'.
Props: We will not bring any props to use in this video, only props in the natural environment such as a pebble to throw in the sea.
Costume: A rain coat (potentially as there has been rainy weather predicted) and dungarees and a floaty, white gypsy top in other scenes to emphasise her bohemian style.
Equipment: A tripod to film some establishing shots & a camera.
Shots: An example (first above image) of the point of view shots we want to film shows the 'boyfriends' arm holding onto Nova's hand as she looks onwards towards the sea. This type of shot will make the video appear more personal and intimate which may appeal to our target audience and most certainly likes to our theme of relationships.
The next long shot shows the artist sitting on the wall at the beach lip syncing. Our plan is to keep our artist to the far right of the screen in order to ensure that the background is also in focus. This is a theme we would like to keep up throughout the video in order to show consistency.

 13th September 2015 - Faversham, Bonfire scenes; We plan on filming a bonfire scene in which Nova would be featured toasting marshmallows/having fun with her friends/boyfriend. We also want to use sparklers as this could create quite interesting visuals.
Actors: Millie Laing & Tamzin Sellar (Myself). We wanted to use another actor in the bonfire scene to emphasise the presence of friends and their activities throughout summer.
Props: Sparklers, Bonfire, paper to throw into the fire to represent the destruction of her relationship.
Equipment: Camera & Tripod
Costume: We aim to use a couple of different outfits in this scene. Firstly, we would like a more casual appearance (such as a jumper and jeans) for walking in the nature reserve and a slightly more dressed up outfit for the bonfire, which could give more of a relaxed yet classy look for the video.
Shots:  The image (left) shows the POV/long shot of Nova with a sparkler by a bonfire. We feel that this particular shot would be successful as the composition is very busy. This in turn means that the visuals are both very vibrant and intriguing to the viewers- making them want to continue watching.


26th September 2015 -  Brighton, casual scenes; We intend on filming lots of casual scenes at Brighton. This could include just walking along the pier/the lanes as the background will have a lot going on- with that by itself creating an exciting atmosphere. We plan on getting a lot of lip syncing scenes done here. 
Actors: Millie Laing
Props: We plan on playing on the fairground game props/arcade machines- so we would need money (Such as 2ps).
Costume: A floaty dress as we associate seaside towns with summer.
Equipment: Camera and tripod.
Shots: we would like to get a establishing/long shot of Nova walking around the beach by Brighton pier. Again, this type of shot is important to set the scene of the video. Lots of locations used means more of a variety of visuals which is very intriguing for an audience.

17th October 2015 - London; We felt that this would be an effective location to film the scenes of our artist looking around London's famous landmarks and art museums. We will be able to get quite a lot of footage on this day as the city is so busy and has a lot of creative sites to experiment with.
Actors: Millie Laing and other members of the public (showing the hustle and bustle of the city).

Props: A sketchbook to make it appear as though Nova is drawing what she is observing at the gallery. A Bicycle to ride around the parks of London, representing her sense of freedom- much like the motorbikes used in Lana Del Rey's 'Ride' video.

Equipment: Camera and tripod

Costume: Yet to be decided as weather can be unpredictable- however we plan for our artist to have a smart casual outfit and sophisticated coat- a classy outfit like this can make a video look more professional.

Shots: This is another POV shot of the artist walking around the gallery observing the artwork. We liked the idea of incorporating art into our video as it would present more of a modern and contemporary feel which is something needed in order to stand out in the competitive music industry.

14th November 2015 - Local Park; Our local park hosts a lake and woodland areas/fields. This is a good opportunity for us to film our artist lip syncing with a natural background.

Props: We don't plan on using any props, just the natural landscape- such as flowers in the fields. Flowers can be seen as very symbolic (such as roses representing love), which is a look that we think could be particularly successful as it hints to the audience what is going on.
Equipment: Camera and Tripod
Costume: Shorts and a kimono as the bohemian look would match the natural environment. 
Shots: Here is an example of a shot we would like to film at the park. It is a tracking, long shot of Nova walking and lip syncing towards the camera down a path. As the path gets more distant in the background, it creates a leading line meaning that the viewer's eye is naturally led towards the artist which is our main goal.

• Editing will be from the 16th November onwards 

Storyboards



 

In order to ensure we gained some structure for the filming of our music video we created a storyboard. Making a storyboard allowed us to create a basic plan of how we want our video to look and also to help us decide on which sort of shots we plan on using. The story boards also gave us a rough idea on the amount of scenes we needed in correlation to the lyrics and which scenes look best with what lyrics. As an overview, the storyboard will act as a guideline for us and keep us on track of what we need to film. Due to the fact that it is only a guideline, some things may change as we are creating it.

 

 

 

 

From the images above you can most probably gather that we plan on using a wide range of shots. We have decided to do this as we feel it will make the video appear more varied and hopefully make it more entertaining to watch. We don't want our video to be boring or repetitive and so have mixed up the types of shots we wish to use. We are also hoping to experiment with different ideas such as holographic lighting and tracking shots. We want to at least try these things as we feel as though they are different and will show our skills.

 

 

 

 

Similarly from the above images you can see that we have written the lyrics we would like to lip synch next to the frame that we want to lip synch these in. This is so that when we come to the editing stage of our music video, we can easily piece the clips together.

Location Research

As a group we have concluded that we want to use mainly outdoor locations. Our reasoning for this is that we want the video to have a theme of nature. Similarly, we want Nova to appear as a down to earth type of character, therefore a literal locations of places outside will visually represent this.

Considering we have taken large inspiration from Lana Del Rey for both our character and overall video, we felt it would be appropriate to research into the types of locations Lana herself uses within her videos. 

Ride

In Lana's music video for Ride, a mass variation of locations are used in order to create a dynamic video. The main location present within the video is a desert. I feel this particular location was selected to indicate a sense of vulnerability and confusion - she is lost within herself, and this is represented by her being alone in the desert. I found this location intriguing as it is not a location you would necessarily expect, especially considering Lana usually uses extravagant, glamorous props and costumes. The location was effective in terms of delivering that 'shock factor' that will keep the audience watching however I feel the location does not particularly match the meaning of the song, which of course creates an interesting juxtaposition but it also means that the visuals do not match the lyrics, potentially confusing the audience.

Blue Jeans

The locations for Blue Jeans are far more minimalistic. The main location is a swimming pool. I feel the implication of the pool is her loss of an extravagant lifestyle as well as her loss of a partner as the song focuses on the closure of a relationship. The use of a pool as the main location is effective in the fact that it represents Lana as being glamorous and living the 'high life' motifs that I feel are regularly apparent within her music videos. In addition, the location allows for a range of different shots to be captured, both in and out of the water. Yet once again, the lyrics do not relate to the location, which may be frustrating for some fans who want to see a visual representation of the lyrics.

 

 

 

National Anthem

 

The video for National Anthem uses a range of locations yet the one that stood out immediately to me was the use of the flower field. The boldness of the red flowers caught my attention, making me quickly associate the colour with its meaning of love and passion. This is a clear link to the lyrics which appear to show Lana deeply in love and wanting to be adored by her lover the way that she adores him. I feel the use of the flower field helps to enhance the retro sort of feel Lana was clearly going for with the video and makes it appear feminine. Although it looks nice on the eye, I am not sure whether it holds much depth. If my group wanted to use a location similar to this I feel it would only be in the video very briefly, perhaps in snapshots.

 

 

 

 

 



Video Games

Video Games is potentially the most simple Lana video out there in terms of location. A majority of the video is just a montage of old clips so there is no one set location. However, the clips of Lana lip syncing are filmed in the corner of a room against a plain wall. I can understand why they chose this location, as they didn't want to take away from the meaning of the clips they had chosen. However, it is very simple and not very enticing. I do not feel that we would use a location like this within our music video as it wouldn't bring anything to it, nor would it be a visual representation of the lyrics.

 

 

 

Summertime Sadness

Summertime Sadness uses one singular location - the edge of a cliff which looks over the skyline of the city that she is in. I feel this use of location is successful because it manages to look professional whilst capturing Lana's true emotions, you can see her reminiscing on a summer love she once had and her emotions seem raw and genuine as she is by nature. Due to the fact I cannot fault this location I think it is a location that me and my group will consider for our own video.

 

 

Born to die

 

The location for Born to die is one of Lana's most extravagant. She is mainly in one location throughout the entirety of the video. It appears to be a grand hall within a castle or something similar. She is sat on a throne expressing her views on herself, she feels she is a strong, important female and this is something we want our artist Nova to present herself as. However, she is wearing a flower crown rather than an actual crown, indicating that she is still down to earth regardless of her fame and fortune. I feel this is one of Lana's best locations as it represents her in terms of the music industry - she is very popular and looked up too. Regardless of this, I do not feel a location like this would be appropriate for our video as 1) it is not accessible to us and 2) our artist, Nova, is just starting out in the music industry therefore this type of location would not be very fitting.

 

 

 

 

In conclusion, as group we have decided to have a mixture of both indoor and outdoor locations. Saying this, we would prefer to feature more outdoor locations as we feel they are broader and allow for a mass range of interesting shots to be collected. The link to our Prezi I have inserted below entails the locations we are hoping to use and our reasoning for picking them.


https://prezi.com/ppr-l4ebpqvb/locations/#

 

Andrew Goodwins Theory

As an overview, Goodwin's theory implies that music videos have a set structure that all artists should follow. In this blog post I am going to go into detail about each the 6 individual rules.

1) Genre stereotypes - For example with grime music; videos may often display themes of gangs and violence. Alternatively, a female pop group are likely to include things such as preppy dance routines. The genre of our song 'Without You' by Lana Del Rey is classed under 'alternative/indie' and so in our planning we have focused primarily on including things we consider to be alternative, e.g. retro effects and bohemian/edgy types of clothing, this obviously links well with Goodwins theory as we are trying to represent our genre through our music video.

              Skepta's "Shutdown" video is a good example of the stereotypes of grime music.

2) Voyeurism- this is the act of looking (especially secretively) at a male or female who is being portrayed seductively for your own personal pleasure. 
Goodwin suggests that voyeurism is mainly used in order to help sell the artist's music or gain popularity by sex appeal. Voyeurism can be portrayed in multiple ways, even through the use of props. An example of this is the scene in Miley Cyrus' 'Wrecking Ball' music video in which she seductively licks a sledgehammer, making it appear sexual whereas usually we would not associate a sledgehammer to this type of behaviour. 
In relation to our own music video, we plan on keeping voyeurism to keep a minimum as we feel that within the music industry females are already frequently objectified and we want our video to be different to those already out there. In addition, our artist is a young female and we want her to be able to be seen as a role model for the younger generation. Our artist is sophisticated yet edgy at the same time so sex appeal is not really needed as it does not match up to her character.
One aspect of voyeurism that we are planning on including within our music video is direct eye contact with the audience. We feel that eye contact is very personal and including it within our video will enable the artist to almost build a relationship with her fans which is something we feel is very important in the music industry. Similarly, by including direct eye contact, the '4th wall' is broken, meaning that the sensed divide between the artist and the fans is broken, they appear on the same level. 

 

3) A relationship between the music and the visuals - The implication of this is that the lyrics of the song should match what is going on within the video. We agree with this rule of Goodwins theory as we feel having the music and visuals matching makes the video run smoother and it looks generally more pleasing on the eye. Although we do want a majority of the video to match with the music, we do not feel it is necessary for the entire thing to match. We feel that having a bit of a juxtaposition between the two creates a contrast which will appeal to the audience and keep them involved. In addition, having something a little bit different within our music video fits well with our alternative genre.

4) The demands of the record label- a large majority of record labels have certain demands in regards to how their artist should be represented. For example, female artists are often made to appear 'sexy' in the hope of attracting a male audience. As a group we personally don't feel it necessary for our artist to be represented as over sexualised, instead we would rather focus on the actual quality of our video and ensure that it looks the best that it can possibly can. In a majority of Lana's videos she looks extremely glamorous rather than particularly 'sexy' and this is something we would like to interpret into ours. 

5) Intertextual References- These are references to existing forms of media such as television, films and even books. Goodwin infers that the audience like being 'in' on the reference and it generally makes the video more likeable. We don't plan on using intertextual references in our music video as the song we have chosen has no particular link to any other form of media.
An example of an intertextual reference is Plan B's 'Ill manors' video which makes direct links to the london riots which obviously were reported on heavily on a mass range of media platforms, e.g. television, the internet and the newspaper.

6) Performance based, narrative based or concept based? A narrative based music video focuses on telling a story. A fragmented narrative is when the story has no particular set order, showing both flashbacks and flash forwards meaning that the audience would piece it together themselves. We decided to go for a more linear narrative as although we want our video to tell a story, we aim to show it in chronological order. We feel as though this would be more successful as it shows consistency. A concept based video is where a certain theme or idea is presented. This sort of base is what I would say we are most likely to go for, however ours is set to have a more vivid story so wouldn't fit exactly into this category. Performance based videos have less camerawork, normally featuring closeup and wide shots of the band/artist playing. Although this sort of video gives the viewers a very raw, truthful type of video I don't personally feel it is the most appealing nor interesting and feel as though the artists talents could be showcased in a variety of other ways. It also doesn't enable the lyrics to be given much meaning as not much is represented within the video. 

                                 

    Marina and the Diamonds 'Forget' video is a great example of a performance based concept.

In conclusion, I feel as though my group has been influenced by Andrew Goodwins theory and we certainly will be applying some of his recommended structure to our music video as we feel a majority of the rules will make for an almost perfect video in technical terms. However, we will not be applying all of these rules to our music video as we want to break free from the stereotypes of alternative music videos and make our video individual. 

Process of creating a character

As a group we have begun creating our character - not only are we incorporating our own personal ideas but of course, we are strongly influenced by the indie music scene and Lana's own fashion and persona. During the process of creating our artist we have thoroughly discussed topics such as names for our character, her look and even her background so that we can create a successful artist that we feel represents the indie genre well.

Creating a name

As you can see from the above image, we brainstormed a mass range of names that we would consider 'alternative', we came up with names that were slightly unusual but also names that we knew would fit the persona we were trying to create within our character. After much discussion, we narrowed the names down to a final four names; Isla, Nova, Fern and Aria. Before we even got to the stage of fully analysing our contenting names we decided to drop the name 'Isla' as although we liked it, we didn't feel it was as unique as the others, nor as memorable and obviously we want our artists name to be memorable.

Nova - Nova was one of the names that massively stood out to us. It has a very unique ring too it and was a name we had never heard of before. It also has connotations of space, almost like a 'supernova' (supernova - a stellar explosion that briefly outshines an entire galaxy) We found this particularly interesting and even noted the fact that it could be representative of our artist, just like a supernova, she has an impeccable talent that makes her stand out from other upcoming artists, she 'outshines' them. 

Aria - Aria is a name that is slightly more well known. We took inspiration from the character of Aria from the hit show 'Pretty Little Lairs' as it was a name that we all thought sounded different and feminine, two characteristics we want our artist to portray. In addition, In the show Aria is presented as being quite artistic, which is a quality we are looking for our character to have. The only issue with using a name that is already associated with a famous character is that the public already have a perceived perception of what the artist might be like, which is something that could potentially cause some problems.
In music, 'Aria' is described as 'any form of expressive melody', this links directly to our artist as, obviously, she is in the music industry and her songs will consist of expressive melodies. 

Fern - Fern is a name frequently associated with nature, and considering we have discussed involving features of nature within our video, we thought this name could be quite fitting. The name is also appealing in the fact that although it sounds relatively feminine, it is not too feminine and still has a sort of grungy feel towards it.

After a lot of consideration, we settled on the name 'Nova' as we felt that out of all 3 names, it was the most unique and it was just a name that particularly stood out to us as being something different and edgy. 

The background of our artist

https://prezi.com/glkxd2iopycp/nova/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

Nova's Look

As our artist is based primarily off of Lana Del Rey we took a lot of style inspiration from the star herself. However, although we took inspiration from her we didn't want to 'copy' her as we want our artist to have her own individual style.

Whilst researching Lana and her fashion it became apparent that even though her style frequently changes regarding her surroundings, e.g. attending events in comparison to her 'street style', one thing that doesn't change is the clear 'retro' look she aims for. She has a very distinctive style that many admire. Lana has also been known for matching her outfits with her album, for example her hawiian type dress links to her 'Paradise' album, which is tropically themed - this could be something we consider when creating our digi-pack.

Lana also often wears denim which is something that we could really play with for Nova. Denim is very versatile and can be either dressed up or down, it is also very accessible to us in comparison to some of Lana's more vintage gowns and outfits. I think this side of Lana's style is the one we will take the most inspiration from as it is classy yet has an edgy vibe to it too.

We have already started to play around with some looks for Nova based off of this look from Lana. We chose this outfit for Nova for a potential 'break up scene'. We  went for a really casual look for this scene choosing mom jeans to achieve a 90s  type vibe paired with converse. Lastly, we then selected a plain black crop top and an oversized grey sweatshirt to finish the outfit - this keeps the look casual yet still stylish. 

Here you can clearly see we have taken inspiration from Lana's bohemian style, which as mentioned before is a style that we feel really fits in with our music genre and is also reflective of our artist. This off the shoulder floaty white top paired with black dungarees and a pair of converse connote an effortlessly stylish persona who is playful and these are both qualities that represent Nova.

Lyrics Analysis

As you can se in the above images, we decided to pick out certain parts of the lyrics and write possible ideas for those parts of the song, by doing this we gained a deeper understanding of the song which will in turn allow us to produce a very professional looking video. The parts we highlighted in blue show which parts of the song we thought might work well for lip syncing. Analysing the lyrics reminded us that lip syncing can actually be very difficult to do successfully and so we decided that we want to try and keep the parts that are lip synched short, minimising room for mistakes -  we also feel that lip syncing can look un professional sometimes when it is a student video as we aren't properly trained so again, the shorter the sections, the more professional it will look.

Target Audience Questionnaire

We decided to do a questionnaire in order to grasp a deeper understanding on what our target audience look for within indie/alternative music videos and what they expect from the artist. We asked around 20 people, allowing us to get a range of different perspectives. Below I have attached some images of the questionnaires the responses given... 

Upon asking 'Do you think this song is appropriate for our music video' roughly 75% of the audience said that they thought the song was good to use and that they believed it had great potential. Alternatively, 25% did not like the song, stating that it was 'boring'. Despite the mixed reviews; due to the fact that the overall majoirty said that they liked the song, we came to the conclusion that we are going to stick with our original choice of 'Without You' by Lana Del Rey - Although it doesnt appeal to the entirety of our audience it does appeal to the majority. We didn't expect for everyone to like it as everyone has their own certain tastes but we just wanted to ensure that a large selection of our target audience did like it otherwise it would have been pointless. 

                                                  

When it came to the editing side of things, our group wanted to show a variety of fast and slow paced editing in order to express that we are skilled in this area. We asked our audience what type of editing they would prefer and again, received mixed reviews. However, a large majority of our target audience swayed towards slow paced editing rather than fast. With this being said we have decided to focus primarily on slow paced editing. However, to ensure we still appeal to those who wanted a mixture of paces or just fast paced editing, we have planned to incorporate little snippets of fast paced editing alongside the slow editing to mix it up.

While listening to our song it became apparent to us that we hadn't thought of a main theme to display within our music video. We asked the audeince what theme they would like to see within the video and found that the theme of 'Love' was a frequent suggestion in nearly all of the questionnaires. We did expect this theme to be the most popular as we also felt it was a theme that fit well with our song choice. Some of the audience suggested we incorporate the theme into our video through a breakup or heart break or maybe a reflective video; these are all things we are going to consider.

Upon asking which type of style our audience feel our artist should have, Words such as 'Unique' 'Edgy' and 'Bohemian' became apparent, popping up multiple times from different individuals, therefore when creating our character, this is the route we would like to go down. We discussed the idea of denim pieces, monochrome colours and flowy dresses or skirt. All of which will fit all three of the proposed words. 

When planning it dawned on us that we need to use interesting locations in our video in order to grasp the viewers attention and so we asked our audeince whether they thought it appropriate to include multiple locations and what type of locations they thought were best. The results made it clear that multiple locations would be the most successful as it will create a variety of interesting scenes and will ensure the audience stay interested throughout the entirety of the video. We also noted that a lot of individuals stated that they would like to see towns or fields within our video as they felt they be good, different locations that fit in well with our genre.

As for the age range for our target audience we felt that 16-18 was an appropriate  age range as these are the sort of ages that can relate to the types of themes we want to involves in our music video. However, we discovered that some people felt that this was too narrow. With this being said, we decided to make 16-18 our niche audeince and then extend the wider age range to 16-22 in order to appeal to a larger majority of people.

Lastly, we asked the audience what parts of the song they feel are best for lip synching. Most people suggested the chorus yet some others recommended just using random little snippets of each verse and chorus in the song. We decided on lip syncing multiple parts of the song from each verse so that it pleases the whole of our target audience.