Tom Jones

The video above shows our experimentation with lip-syncing. We used markers to help us cut to the beat, a technique we learned from our pink panther exercise. 

Meeting 6

In this meeting we discussed who would do what in order to complete all the necessary work.
We have divided the work into 3 equal loads and given to a person based on what they want to do and what they feel they are best capable.

Victoria was assigned to quantify the questionnaires given out after our pitch

Emily will do the BARB research

Aisha will then create an audience profile

As a group we will complete storyboards and our visual timeline

As well as our own individual posts.

Analysis of Questionnaires

After showing our Pitch to the class, showcasing our main ideas on what the video will entail, we handed out a quick questionnaire to each student. They were asked on their opinions of the video idea, costume and make up related questions, questions on the narrative and so on. This is what we obtained.

When they were asked if they would change or add anything to enhance the theatrical theme of the video in terms of costume the majority said no, our ideas are fine. However one or two made the suggestion to contrast old fashioned clothes with bright, modern colours to give an extra 'shock factor'.
We also wanted to know if they found the make up choices of ours theatrical enough also and they all agreed that our ideas for make up worked well with our theme.
When questioned about adding any more shots/ideas to make the video more memorable or exiting many said it didn't need anything added to it. However one person suggested that more black and white aspects could help portray the idea of childhood.
All those questioned agreed that the narrative is strong enough without being over exaggerated but we were warned that we must make sure that its clear enough in the finished product.
We asked if this type of video would work well as highly conceptive piece or strong in narrative or performance, we got mixed replies in that some said a strong narrative will work better, however others suggested a strong and strange concept will make the video more interesting, so I think it will be best to include both conceptual ideas as well as a running narrative.
The majority agreed that our location choice is good and appropriate in fitting with our ideas and like the relation between the house and a dolls house.
They also agree that our colour theme of contrasting bright and vintage is appropriate for the video.
And finally the majority agree that the conceptual idea of having adults play the roles of children is good as it seems to show irony and will give the video a uniqueness and edgy feel.

Inspiration

This picture of Rihanna from her 2011 Vogue shoot has inspired me in a small way.
Though this is a seductive frame, it has been compared to look similar to cartoon characters such as Jessica Rabbit and Ariel (the little mermaid). These images are, however innocent and are for children.
I would like us to obtain a similar feel from our video, a serious first image with layers beneath it that portray the child hood feel so that each audience member gets a different feel from the video.

Inspiration. Beyonce - Countdown

Beyonce is a major icon within the pop genre which we are going to portray as best as we can within our video.
This music video in particular inspires me for the music video in terms of the use of bright colours, variant locations along with costume and make up that you wouldn't necessarily see in everyday life.
From watching this video I have realised how many costume and location changes we should include within our video so we should get as much filming done as quickly as we can so we can have good amount of time to edit and make sure we include all our scenes in such a short space of time.

Inspired. Jessie J - Price Tag

The video to Price Tag by Jessie J inspires me for our music video.
As the song is performed by the same artist that we intend on shooting our video to and she has some signature aspects that we would want to include in our video, including her daring and edgy outfits, interesting mise-en scene including lots of child like props similar to what we would want to use in ours.
The centeral use of the teddy bear used in this video is similar to an idea of ours to use a teddy in our video with stop-motion animation so signify childhood.

Inspitation

For the video I felt particularly inspired when I saw this house as one of our possible locations.

I believe that the house is big enough to do many creative things with, as well as it being detached meaning we can get a number of different angles when shooting the house.

I also fell in love with the house as, to me, I find it resembles a classic Victorian dolls house. I think that this connection will help portray the idea of childhood throughout the video and help create a strong narrative.

Inspiration

This group of images gave me inspiration for the music video. The stereotypical idea of young girls and what they do are images I would want us to include in the video in some way or another.

The idea of young girls whispering represents the closeness of the friendship between the characters in the video. The girl having tea with the bear could represent the typical young girl along with the ballerina or could also show her being alone and having no one else to play with as she lost a friend.

Inspired

Rihanna- Only Girl (In The World)

The way this music video has inspired me is via the outrageous mise-en-scene. The overly large flowers and balloons, this is an aspect I want to add into my own music video. As I feel it will give it a strong conceptual idea as well as aesthetically pleasing visuals. The edits that have been used on this music video to make the whole area have a pinkie feel is something i may put into consideration for when we come to edit our music video. 

Inspired

Katy Perry's - Last Friday Night




Aspects of this video that may be influenced into my own will be the use of flash backs. Not only this but the costume and Mise-en-scene, it's very childlike a theme which runs throughout our whole music video.
I was also inspired by the establishing shot of the household, a scene in which i may use for my own music video.

Kevin Godley Q&A

A group of students went to the O2 to watch in on a Q&A of Kevin Godley on 13/10/11, YouKnowJack Productions attended. He gave us a lot of advice and spoke about his experiences working with top artists such as U2. I found it very helpful and a good insight into the real working media world. A quote that I will take with me throughout this project is this; ' Do something unusual, innovative, original and different, from the heart, don't do something you've seen already and make it exciting for your audience. And wear comfortable shoes.' Amen.

Kevin Godley talk

Myself and a few other media students went to a talk by Kevin Godley. Kevin has directed many music videos for a number of different artists including; Ronan Keeting, U2, Will Young, Blur and many more.
He spoke about his experiences with music video and how advances in technology had him change the way he edited and shot videos.
He showed us all a number of videos he directed and told us about how the ideas came about for them.
We also got to see some rehearsal footage for his most recent video with Gavin Friday for his new song 'Able'.
I think the talk was very useful and helpful in order to see how the creative mind works in the professional world of music video making rather than just students doing it for a piece of coursework.
At the end we could as questions, when Kevin was asked for advice on making a music video for the first time he simply said to do everything that you wouldn't normally do and go out of your comfort zone with it and to most of all have fun with it.

Textual Analysis of Katy Perry E.T

Katy Perry Music Video Analysis

Katy Perry is an artist famous for her “bad girl” attitude and desire to always try something different. Her music video “E.T” is a prime example of this. The song has a pop, electric genre with a very unusual and twisted conceptive music video. The film was directed by Floria Sigismondi, well known for her dark, feminine work. The main concept of the video is that Perry has fallen in love with a foreigner.

The film begins with “Where in the World Can My Lover Be?” by Midge Williams, according to Andrew Goodwin’s analysis form his book “Dancing in the Distraction Factory”, there is always a relationship between the music and the visuals; the audience can only see large piles of old rubbish. Therefore, this tells the audience that we are watching a video set in the future, a future surrounded by waste which amplifies views of a large percent of the population, including Katy Perry.

Then the music video really begins to demonstrate the twisted, theatrical characteristics of the genre; a large Sputnik like spacecraft then appears soaring through the sky and a close-up shot is shown onto Kanye West. Goodwin’s analysis explains how the demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close-ups. Kanye West is a famous artists with millions of fans; by having an immediate shot directly on his face singing, it captures the attention of the audience as they can see someone they recognise. Richard Dyre’s “Star Theory”  expresses how different stars align themselves with ideology or their own individual trademark style, in this case, it is Kanye West and his bis sunglasses.

The spacecraft then moves away as Kanye West finishes his verse, although the audience at this point is expecting to see Katy Perry, the director adds a twist to the music video as we see a strange, floating alien wearing layers of light fabric. Again, there is a connection between the lyrics and the visuals in which she sings the bridge of “your from a whole other world, a different dimension”

Throughout the video (after she is finally revealed) Perry wears heavy cosmetics such as colourful face paints, she wears cat-like and reptile-like eyes and large headdresses. This is done to show her as an alien to make a large connection with herself and the song. The inspiration for these costumes and intertextual reference were said to be from the greek myth of Perseus and Medusa; the snake-like head is even shown during the video.

“The Male Gaze” by Laura Mulrey expresses a theory by a feminist how the audience positioning is assumed by the record label to be consisted of heterosexual males. However, as this music video was directed by an extreme feminist, the objectification of Katy Perry is not shown in this video. However, during the middle 8 section of the song, Katy appears in the waste wearing a gladiator styled costume (again this is an intertextual reference to the myth of Perseus). This costume shows Perry’s silhouette and it can be said that this is a small glimpse of her as a sexual object. This is again shown after she has found her lover.

Emily Phillips