Filming a band

Today we filmed a year 10 band and had them perform along to a song that they had previously recorded in the studio, the song was a cover of "Slow Cheetah" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. As a class we were split into two groups and then alternated in the filming roles, both groups took two takes of the band with four separate cameras all filming at once. We had a static camera which got a shot of the whole band from a front view, then our second camera was on a wheel chair which we used as a make shift dolly, the dolly camera went behind the static camera and got shots from both the left and right hand sides of the stage. Our next two cameras were both roaming cameras, we had camera three which was being used to get more artistic and creative shots such as bits of instruments being played. Our final camera was positioned behind the stage and was another roaming camera that got interesting shots of the back of the band, this camera would have a heavy focus on the drummer. The camera set up we used is shown in the diagram above. We found that people who did music videos at GCSE compared the way they filmed to the way we did today they realised that filming with multiple cameras rolling at once gives you much more creative freedom and is also easier.

In this workshop we also learned how to direct the band as well as film them, it is important that when we direct and film them we are as energetic and positive as possible, this is so the band can feed off our energy and apply it to their performance. We also found out that the more takes the band did the more comfortable they got in front of the camera, however it is important to recognise when the bands performance is as good as they are going to get as otherwise their performance would start to decline and as a result the shots achieved would not be as useful as previous ones. 

Creativity and how we will use when we come to doing our own music videos was an important part of today's workshop and we found out that the filming of a music video is much more spontaneous than filming movie opening sequences, like we did for our AS coursework. Unusual shots of limbs and instruments are just as useful as standard shots, if not more so. From what I have learned today I will try to include more unique and artistic shots in our music video to broaden the interest of the video. 

There will be a few differences between the way we film the performance aspect of our music video to the way this one was filmed, this is because they are two different genres. This was in the style of a Rock performance which meant you could expect over the top actions and stereotypical camera shots like an establishing shot of the band at a flat angle. The main things that we need to change when filming for an Indie video is a slight change in the Mise-en-scene making the band appear a bit more formal than the average rock band, we should also consider using a smaller stage if we go for the whole live performance idea as the smaller stage would make the band seem more intimate with the audience. Another thing worth considering that could be changed is the use of the camera, much like the instrumentation in Rock the music videos are  much the same being very straight forward and very few have more than a handful of interesting shots, when filming we should be more creative and try obscure camera angles that wouldn't work when filming for something such as an opening sequence.

Music Industry - Arctic Monkeys - Web Design

Like the majority of Indie websites the Arctic Monkeys have a very simple website with two major contrasting colours which makes heading and text stand out from the background. The use of the two simplistic colours relates to the genre of Indie music because it's a genre that isn't heavily focused on by the mainstream. 

The design of the website is very simple and couldn't really be considered a sophisticated style by members of the audience. This is because everything is positioned in a very linear manner and a lot of negative space is left on the right hand side of the page. However just because the design isn't sophisticated it doesn't mean the website is necessarily bad, due to the very linear manner everything is laid out in a very organised way and all the information can be seen a read very clearly. 

An interesting feature of the website is that the navigation bar will always be at the top of the page even if you're looking at the information at the bottom of the page. This is something that is common amongst social networking websites as it allows easy navigation around the website, and very uncharacteristic for an Indie webpage as it "conforms" to the way other major websites are designed.

In terms of production value the website looks of a high quality and designed by professionals, not ammeters which connotes that the production values the studio have trusted with the band are high, which would make us assume that the band have a big existing fan base. 

Another feature of the website that provides evidence that the site is of a high level of professionalism is the small logo in the bottom right of the webpage. The logo represents the company that produced the website and when you click on it you are presented with all the other websites the company have created. They are a company that mainly focus on music artists and record labels which means they are specific to that area of website creation and as a result know a great deal about it, which explains why they have created so many high quality websites for so many artists.

An interesting feature about the website, when taken in context with the genre of the band, is the way the bands social networking details are presented, on the right hand side of the screen there are two small buttons that when clicked will either like the band on Facebook or Follow them on Twitter. Indie music is usually a genre that is quite "underground" and not considered as "mainstream" so the bands often have to find alternate means of publicity, these will often come in the form of social networking sites. So as an audience we would expect the website to put a heavier focus on the bands social networking sites and have more than just Twitter and Facebook.

There are several landing pages linked to the website that allow fans a chance to look at the shop, see new tour dates, find out about the members of the band, register with the fan forums and look at photos and videos of the band. These additional features of the website are likely to increase the fans interest in the band which links to the Blumler and Katz theory of surveillance for why people are more likely to consume media texts. 

Lickert scale and Indie charts

Today I composed the first of our two Licket scales that we plan to incorporate into our questionnaire, the Licket scale focuses on how popular the audience finds certain Indie artists. As a group we decided that we should add two other artists that do not fit into the category of "Indie" to see if they are, in general, more popular in the opinion of our audience when compared to the Indie artists. This will give us a general idea on who would be the most beneficial to include within our focus group and get the most helpful feedback possible.  

Whilst searching for the two placebo artists to include in the Lickert scale, I looked at the UK top 40 singles chart but then I looked at the UK top 40 Album charts and there is a drastic difference in the genres included in the different charts. Indie artists only appeared twice, within the top 18, of the singles chart which when compared to the album charts where at least four Indie artists appears, shows us that there is a difference in the buying habit of Indie music fans to Pop fans. This correlation tells us that Indie artists don't need to worry too much about selling their singles as the majority of the money they would make on the sales front comes from their album sales and not their singles sales.  

Music Iconography - Coldplay

Music Iconography Coldplay

Richard Dyers Star Theory on Stevie Wonder

Richard Dyers Star Theroy Stevie Wonder

Song Choice

Today we chose the song that we are going to create our music video for. We chose the song Space Elevator by a small underground Indie band in America called The Smiling Lies.

We registered with a social networking site for music called Reverbnation where we then asked if we would be able to use their song for the creation of our music video.

Lip Sync

Today I lip synced to the song "Dude Looks Like a Lady" by "Areosmith" in preparation for the creation of a music video that I am going to create with a group in the near future. The first process I went through was getting the lyrics to the song and making sure that I roughly knew how to mouth them. After I got the lyrics to the song I then took a shot of me lip syncing normally looking at the camera. Once I had completed my first take I then did an incidental take that could be cut up and inserted in the editing process to make the lip sync more enjoyable to watch.

After I had my two takes done it was time to move onto the editing process, the first thing I had to do was insert the music track into the time line, when the I had imported the track I then had to import my first take. When I finished importing my first take I had to line it up with the song and make sure that my mouth movements were in time with the singing in the song. The next process I went through was inserting my incidental take and also lining that up with the song on a second editing track. My original take was imported into a editing track that is automatically prioritised higher than the incidental track which means that when Final Cut plays it plays the first track opposed to both the first and second. To incorporate the incidental shots it means that I had to cut the first track so that the incidental track would automatically play when there was a break in the first track. Once I had everything editied the way I wanted I added a slow motion effect at then which helps signify the end of the song.