Daisy Gilbert A2 Media Blog

MY PLAN. Our Plan so far: RESEARCH: To start off our A2 media coursework we did some reserach into existing professional and student made music videos for inspiration. From looking at these we realised that the music videos that had the most impact were ones with a mixture of storyline and performance, as it helped give the song and band an image for the consumer to associate with them. Some of the music videos that we thought worked the best also made the audience feel something in what they were trying to portray, whether it was happy, sad or even just interested by the content. The best examples that we found were:  Ok Go - This too shall pass ,  The Lumineers - Sleep on the Floor , and  The Strypes - Behind Closed Doors.  THINGS TO AVOID: From our research we leart what makes a bad music video as well. In the student  made videos we watched it became obvious that the easiest things to do wrong were lip syncing , as this can look really unprofessional if d...

Which brief am I choosing for my media coursework and why? For our A2 media coursework we have the choice of either creating a short film or a music video. Music Video: Pros: You have more creative license as you don't have to worry about a story line unless you choose to include that as part of your video. You get the opportunity to film live music or create an image of performance. You don't have to worry about a soundtrack as that will just be the song you're creating a video for.  Cons: You have to contact the band to clear the soundtrack which could lead to potential issues. Lip syncing is quite hard to get to look good. You are limited with the amount of footage you can use as it has to end with the song. Short Film: Pros: You get to make a full narrative without any limits that a music video has. You get to develop characters further. You have the choice for more than one song in your soundtrack if you wanted to include it. Cons: It...

OUR PRACTICE TASK EVALUATION What went well? Whilst filming, numerous things went well. Firstly, the weather was perfect for our idea. We had planned to film outside, so a rainy or windy day would have been bad for the film and the   camera. It was hugely sunny and hot, so the lighting was perfect for filming. Our idea revolved around a relationship, and was generally happy, so bright, sunny lighting was perfect. What didn't? The main problem we had with our filming was organisation. This was in many forms; first of all, it was difficult to choose a date and place that was available for all of us. Some of our group don't live in Wymondham, so it was difficult for them to get to the location. Moreover, the task was just before our mock exams, so it was a rather busy time, so we struggled to organise a time to meet. Once we did meet at the location, we hadn't created a proper plan of our video, let alone what we were doing on that day exactly. Because of this, ...

OUR PRACTICE TASK FINAL CUT After some consideration, we decided to change our original ideas slightly and join up with another group to create a full music video that fits our idea but uses our own shots rather than just simply copy the Lumineers video. We joined with Megan, Noah and emily to create a video with two friends on a day out which still has our initial concept of wanting to capture the relationship between two people. We decided to do out outside of school time as it meant we could use more locations and focus more thoroughly. By doing this we were able to enhance our skills more by creating a longer video, like our actual coursework would end up being.

What's in the news? 100 Women: ‘I dye my hair brown to be taken more seriously at work’ The screen shot displayed to the left indicates the story that i have chosen from the news. Put simply, the story tells that 100 women dye their hair brown to be taken more seriously.  "Eileen Carey is a successful CEO, in her early 30s, with glasses and brown hair.  But she didn't always look the way she does now.  "The first time I dyed my hair was actually due to advice I was given by a woman in venture capital," she says.  Carey was told that the investors she was pitching to would feel more comfortable dealing with a brunette, rather than a blonde woman.  "I was told for this raise [of funds], that it would be to my benefit to dye my hair brown because there was a stronger pattern recognition of brunette women CEOs," she explains.  Pattern recognition is a theory which suggests people look for familiar experiences - or people - which in turn can make...

I've watched a new film  Rain Man Rain man is an American road comedy film produced in 1988, directed by Barry Levinson and written by the author Barry Morrow and Ronald Bass. It tells a story of an selfish young Wheeler-dealer, Tom Cruise who plays the character of Charlie Babbitt. Babbitt discovers that his estranged father has died and left all of his multimillion-dollar estate to his other son named Raymond who is played by the actor - Dustin Hoffman. Hoffman plays the role of an autistic savant, of whose existence charlie was unaware. Whereas charlie is left with only his father's car and collection of rose bushes. 

I've read a book  Teenagers and Teenpics  'Teenagers and Teenpics  tells the story of two signature developments in the 1950s: the decline of the classical Hollywood cinema and the emergence of that strange new creature, the American teenager. Hollywood's discovery of the teenage moviegoer initiated a progressive "juvenilization" of film content that is today the operative reality of the American motion picture industry. The juvenilization of the American movies is best revealed in the development of the 1950s "teenpic," a picture targeted at teenagers even to the exclusion of their elders. In a wry and readable style, Doherty defines and interprets the various teenpic film types: rock 'n' roll pictures, j.d. films, horror and sci-fi weirdies, and clean teenpics. Individual films are examined both in light of their impact on the motion picture industry and in terms of their important role in validating the emerging teenage subculture. Al...

POST 7: LIP-SYNC PRELIMINARY PRACTICE   Lip-syncing  move the lips silently in synchronisation with a pre-recorded soundtrack. It is used i n the music industry when lip-synching is used by singers for music videos , television and film appearances and some types of live performances. Also, Lip-syncing by singers can even be controversial to fans attending concert performances who expect to view a live performance, but singers choose to lip-sync.  Because the film track and music tracks are recorded separately during the creation of a music video , artists usually lip-sync their songs and often imitate playing musical instruments  as well. Artists also sometimes move their lips at a faster speed than the recorded track, to create videos with a slow-motion effect in the final clip, which is widely considered to be complex to achieve. Similarly, some artists have been known to lip-sync backwards for music videos such that, when reversed, the singer is seen to sin...

POST 6: PRACTICE TASK - KEY MUSIC VIDEOS TIMELINE    This research is to discover the key turning points in music videos in the last century leading up until now. Before we started, the only inclination we had was that Michael Jackson's Thriller music video was important and was a major turning point with creating a storyline with the music video so it was interesting for all of us to see where it originally came from and who influenced the creation of music videos all of the world.  Our online presentation for the Key Music Video Timeline can be found:  HERE.   LR

I have done a few videos of people describing how they normally consume music videos and what their idea of a successful music video is.  Here they are:  Ciara and Evie explaining their views on music videos:

Our practice task planning  Our plan for our coursework We have updated our task slightly due to the fact we have made some progress with our idea for our actual coursework; so we decided to do something that would be more beneficial to our end result. Therefore we decided to recreate the first 30 seconds of a music video that has inspired our plans for our own music video, which is  ' Sleep on the Floor'  By the Lumineers as this would give us some idea of how to recreate the style we are going for and some initial practice of trying to capture those kind of shots. Plan: Potential settings:  All of our potential settings are based at our sixth form due to the practicality of being able to film in school time and also having all our group in the same place so it is easy for as all to be there and help each other. It also means that we can use our friends as cast as they will be there as well, making the whole construction of the video far easier. Setting 1: CLC ...