Friday, 15 October 2010

Green Screen

This is a screen-shot from Final Cut that shows us putting together some footage that we took last FRiday so that we could get use to the green screen and the programme. We basically erased the green screen from the background of our performers and added me layers and effects that created something that we thought fitted the genre of the song that they were lip-syncing.

Here is a clip of the final product of what we came up with after playing around with the footage that we had and the programme's that we were using!

Questionaires 2
















Questionaires 1
















Edited Photo

This here is a edited picture of our group, it only has 3 of the 4 members because i was taking the picture however we edited it just to get used to the programme and its effects so when we come to making our album covers and our poster it comes more natural and we can do it easier and have a really good design.

Band Image

This si one of the pictures we toook during a lesson when we were given a camera to take some shots and try to create a band image for us. We took many shots because there was a few with just one or two of us in or shots with all four of us in them, a fellow student took this picture so we can analyze it and possibly make it into our album cover if we can edit it right and get a good background.

I think that this image is good because for one it has all four of us in the image and the other reason i like it and chose it to be analyzed is that its pretty simple and has just one background so to edit it and start the process of album covers/posters would be good and easy so we can move on to more important things.

My Favourite 2 Videos

CEE LO GREENF#CK YOU

My favourite video that I watched out of the 10 on the guardian website was Cee Lo Green’s ‘F#ck You’. The first reason why I liked the video was because that it was different to many of the Pop music videos of today; what I mean is not related to sex! It was good to see three different characters to which the audience could relate to (young, teenage and man) and not just a man or a woman prancing around in skimpy clothes and a 100 backing dancers.

Another thing I liked about the video was that it linked in with the lyrics and wasn’t just a random video that promoted the artist singing it but didn’t actually have anything to do with the song that they were singing. For example, when he uses the line ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t afford a Ferrari, but that don’t mean I won’t get you there’ the video replicates this by showing ‘Little Cee-Lo’ with an old green truck and another boy with a red Ferrari.

Finally the main reason why I liked this video more than the other nine was because, to be honest, it is also one of my favourite genres in music. So the main factor for me as well as enjoying the video to the song (best bit was the link to girls over 3 generations) was that I actually enjoyed listening to the song as well.

RADIOHEADLIVE IN PRAHA

The main factor for me liking this music video is that it showed that what Radiohead are doing in the specific music genre is working well & people are appreciating it. This is shown because before they even start the song their crowd are screaming and cheering for them, getting excited to see what of their favourite bands play their favourite song.

Another reason why I liked this video, is that although its not my type of music to listen to, it shows that the band can perform live as well as in the studio. Many artists/bands these days are auto-tuned by a programme and struggle to please their crowds on live shows, so to see a band release live footage as a video is pleasing and I liked it because it proves there worth their money and good live as well as pre-recorded.

Finally, the other thing that I liked about this video was that it shows the band playing their instruments quite a lot and I think it shows that their multi-talented and not like many pop/RnB artists who can just sing because they can do two things at once. This for me is also my favourite part of the video because it shows that they have a real quality in music.

Friday, 1 October 2010

CD Cover Research


Record Label Research

Boy Better Know (BBK) are a British grime record label run by Skepta & JME based in London, England. Originally run by those 2 artists & Wiley, Wiley ‘quit’ BBK over Twitter in 2010 saying he needed to move on.

Members of this record label include


Ø Skepta

Ø JME

Ø Frisco

Ø Jammer

Ø DJ Maximum
Ø Shorty
There are other members of the record label however these are the most known.
Although there individual artists within the label, they all form one group; BBK. So as well as solo singles and albums they’ve also released songs as BBK and are currently working on their debut album as a group. Boy Better Know have worked with famous UK artists to boost their profile such as Jay Sean, Chipmunk & Tinie Tempah.

Tuesday, 21 September 2010

UK Music Video Rules

  • Casual clothes
  • Flash-backs
  • Lip syncing
  • Pointing to viewers
  • Montage editing
  • Close up to show emotion
  • Sunglasses
  • Establishing shots
  • Ma. 3 costume changes

Friday, 17 September 2010

UK Grime Moodboard



When creating my mood-board for UK Grime I gathered a background picture of a run down estate because that’s a stereotypical setting for UK video. On top of the estate I have pictures of well known Grime artists such as Professor Green, Chipmunk, Wiley, N-Dubz, Roll Deep + Tinchy Stryder. Also on my mood-board I put the little ‘Parental Advisory’ sign because a lot of the songs these artists make have inappropriate words in them.

UK Grime is not very commercial within the UK because the lyrics use a lot of slang words that an older generation wouldn’t understand so songs don’t tend to be air-played or make the UK Top 40.

The artists tend to be on the own in videos unless it’s a collaboration and the videos don’t have a lot of narrative, there more performance and on the own singing directly to the camera, with many of the shots mid-shot or closer and focusing on the artist lip-syncing.

Another thing that tends to happen in UK Grime videos is that either in the lyrics or through the video they promote something that is close to them/making them money. For example Tinchy Stryder promotes his own clothing range ‘Star in the Hood’ by wearing the clothes in all of his videos. Another example is in N-Dubz’s song ‘Papa” they talk about their new album coming out a few weeks after the single is released.

Albums don’t really get sold by UK Grime artists because they wont sell much copies, so they tend to go commercial to sell and produce albums like Chipmunk and N-Dubz. So the analysis a album cover for Grime artists would be hard, it usually tends to be just a picture of them and the album name.

The colours in a UK Grime video are very dark and sinister. All these ‘artists’ came from run-down areas and are now making it out of the ‘slums’ so there sticking to the root and letting everybody know where they came from, and the show that in videos by glumness and not very bright poppy colours.

However the negative side of UK Grime is that it is a little bit repetitive in everything that it does. All the artists market themselves in the same way with a ‘bad-boy’ image and all the lyrics are the same such as they talk about drugs, guns and that or growing up in a run-down area and now making it as a star. Also they tend to be in the same locations as each other, either on a run-down estate (background on mood-board) or within a club-scene so there promoting there song that it’ll make a big song for them to play to a lot of people.

Vernallis & Goodwin Theories

In Devlin’s new UK Pop/Grime video ‘Runaway’ you can see that the people who directed that video applied Carol Vernallis theory of MTV style editing to a pop video.

Many times in this very good video there’s frequent quick cuts between different types of shots, angles and scenarios that involved Devlin himself or the guest singer Yasmin. Also within the video you can see that there is disjuncture because as well as the video cutting off beat between the narrative and performance he also sings the lyrics off beat as well to match it sometimes.

Also like many music videos these days the editing of it is much much different compared to a film’s editing. The editing doesn’t flow it just jumps between different things that are happening in the video. Finally the last way you can apply the Carol Vernallis theory to Devlin’s Runaway video is that no one element (music, image, narrative) ever gains the upper hand it always combining two or three at a time, and keeping us equally focused on the video/lyrics, lyrics/image or another certain combination.

However Andrew Goodwin’s theory is that ‘pop’ videos can be categorized into 3 different types, these types are:
Illustration – Music cuts on beat + image represents the lyrics
Amplification – Music cuts on and off beat + maybe a narrative; image amplify lyrics
Disjuncture – music cuts off beat, unrelated images in video – this is usually done by well-known artists/bands.

In this video by the UK band N-Dubz you can clearly see that you can apply Andrew Goodwin’s theory and the specific part of a ‘Illustration’ video. This Is because through-out the whole video of their new song the music cuts on the beat and the whole video matches what there talking about in the lyrics and that you ca rule out ‘Disjuncture’ because the images relate. They are also dressed how there supposed to so they’ll fit in the genre and acting how people from the same industry do in their videos (flash clothes, boats, houses; all glitz + glamour).

Album Cover Analysis

Friday, 10 September 2010

2 UK Music Videos

For our music video were chosen the UK Music genre of pop/grime and our chosen song is Example - Millionaires. So before we start planning and thinking our ideas for our music video, these are the common conventions of UK Music videos. The two music videos i looked at were Tinchy Stryder Ft. Taio Cruz - Take Me Back & Chipmunk - Oopsy Daisy.

- Not a lot of narrative
- Most of video you can see them lip syncing
- Spend majority of video on there own
- Promoting themselves/product
- Sunglasses
- 3/4 costume changes
- Montage editing
- 'Pricey' things to show their money/fame
- Cuts on the beat of the song

Friday, 9 July 2010

Bordwell & Thompson

Bordwell and Thomspon are 2 theorists that came up with their 4 corners theory in 2001. In their theory there are 4 different sections; Graphic, Rhymtic, Spatial & Temporal.

Graphic Editing
  • Graphic Match - Shots link together by similar graphics
  • Graphic Continuity - P.O.I remains constant throughout everything
  • Graphic Dis-continuity - Play around with different footage, color etc
Rhymtic Editing
  • Different shots and cuts have different effects
  • All shots are the same length
  • Shots with good length are steadier
  • Shots can get shorter and shorter
  • Longer or quick, rapid shots
Spatial Editing
  • Continuity editing & establishing shot
  • "Kuleshov Effect" No establishing shot but still know where it's set
  • Cross-cutting or parallel editing in different locations


This here is a example of Spatial editing because it cross cuts between two different locations.



Temporal Editing
  • Order - Things can be manipulated by reverse shots, time sequences or flash-backs
  • Duration - Punctuation, empty frames or cutaway (ellipsis alteration)
  • Frequency - Repeating things can be powerful

Tuesday, 6 July 2010

Chipmunk - Superstar

Mise-En-Scene
Different Locations
2/3 Costume changes
Setting matches the genre of song

Performance
Concert footage
Photos of his past-time
3/4 minutes long

Camera
Close ups of him & props
Camera angles make it clear he's a solo artist
Changes to long shot when he's with other people (Wretch 32)

Editing
The video cuts to a different shot on the beat
Chipmunk 'Superstar' has montage editing
The style/production makes the video match the song genre



This part of the video he's in a run-down estate showing relation to the genre (UK Rap)




Sound
Lip syncing
Backing track



Fugative - Crush

Editing
Very quick cuts
Montage
Video match's the genre

Performance
Loads of girls = conventions of Rap/Grime
Lip syncing
Eye contact
3/4 mins long

Mise-En-Scene
Costume changes
Various locations
Women in skimpy clothes

Camera
Close up on artist whilst singing
Long shots when he's with the dancers
Camera makes it's clear he's a solo artist

Sound
Lip syncing
No sound effects
Backing track

Long shot of Fugative whilst he's with his dancers.

Drake (Young Money) - Over

Sound
Lip syncing
No diegetic sound
Backing track
Constant backing track

Editing
Montage
Quick cuts
Video match genre
Cut on beat

Performance
3/4 mins long
Lip syncing
Eye contact with audience
Negative lyrics match genre of song

Camera
Clear it's a solo artist
Close up when he's singing

Mise-En-Scene
Costume changes
Various different
locations
Dark clothing relates to lyrics

Drake giving eye contact with the audience

Conventions of A Music Video

There are many different conventions for a simple music video that audiences watch as a visual to go along with their favorite songs. These are:
  • Lots of different camera shot
  • Various different locations
  • Costume changes
  • The artist/band will lip sync
  • Montage editing
  • Video cuts to the beat
  • The video is 3/4 minutes long
  • Will somehow or some-part refer songs lyrics
  • Eye contact with audience
  • Clear if it's a band or a solo artist