Casestudies Research

The three music videos which inspired me for my project are:

Florence and the Machine – Cosmic Love

Taylor Swift – Mine

Katy Perry – The One That Go Away

1-      Florence and the machine – Cosmic Love

This is the opening shot of the music video; it starts off with a close up of a typical light bulb with blurred city light in the surroundings. The colour scheme orange, yellow and red with a dark background gives this warm feeling. The beat of the song goes on as the light bulb turns on off. This creative idea is brilliant because it’s almost like the light bulb could be representing feelings or life as it shuts down and gets back on and not introducing characters straight away which makes us wonder what is going to happen next.

This mid-camera shot is the second scene of the music video where the light bulb turned into this moving mysterious light. Her face expressions show how she could be lost in the forest while lip-syncing and fascinated by the light leaving the audience in this unknown moment on what exactly that light will end up representing almost like there is a connection with the singer, audience is the light. Again the colour scheme is really similar with bright red leaves standing out clearly symbolizing how interesting the place (forest) is.

Feedback from treatment presentation

Today my group and I presented our idea for our music video to the class in order to gain feedback and guidance the majority of the comments were positive but there were 3 key points below that need to put some thoughts into or change which are:

• we wanted to film at night but a really bright 'lighting' in order for the audience to see the character in the music video is something we need to think about.
• permission to film in the graveyard 
• which effects should we be using other than flashback

Treatment - Class presentation

Florence and the Machine are an English indie rock band. We've decided to go for this genre of music because it’s easier to get creative with it, the song lyric offer a variety of details which is why we have chosen the song HOWL. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZweDwbJ_Ic

Storyline

The storyline of our music video relates to the sound and the lyrics. It's about a girl who's running through a forest. She is telling her ex boyfriend that he has turned her into a beast. "if you only see the beast you've made of me I held it in but now it seems you've set it running free". We decided to make the girl represent a wolf as shown in the chorus of the song "howl, howl". There is going to be flash backs throughout the music video of her and her ex boyfriend. We was inspired by Taylor Swift - Mine. There is going to be two different scenes which is a forest and a graveyard. This was inspired by Florence + the machine - cosmic love for example when she is walking through the forest. We have decided to record the music video when there is a full moon because it works well with our theme, with wolves an full moons. 

Location

We've chosen two locations for our music video one will be in a forest and the other one will be in a graveyard. The reason why we've chosen only these two location is because to many location can be confusing and because it’s a sad depressing song and the lyric refer back to the forest and dark sides we thought those two would be best as it also relates to our theme 'wolf'. Our second location the graveyard was chosen because this location relates to the emotions of our character.

Costume

The genre of music we are doing is indie; therefore we decided to go for a vintage look because indie fashion is unique and most indie artist have a vintage style. We are mainly basing the look on Florence + the machine – cosmic love video where she wears a vintage shirt. We want a white/cream lace dress as the colour, so the actress can stand out from our location whilst she is running through the forest. As our theme is about wolves we wanted the character to resemble a wolf too. Therefore adding red contacts in some flashbacks will create the feeling of her changing into a ‘beast’. 

Target Audience

The audience for our music video is age 16+ as this song and video will relate to those ages. 

Characters

We will be using two characters the main character and the ex-boyfriend, however the boyfriend will not be seen, only the back of his head will be seen creating a mystery. Also we want the main character to be the main focus.

Group meeting - Creative Ideas

Today as a group we decided the song we are going to be using for our music video which is Howl by Florence and the Machine. The reason why we have chosen this song is because the lyrics allows us to be creative and think outside the box as a group. Also we have came up with couple of location which are Epping Forest and a Graveyard because the songs shows more of a dark-side and we think the song relates to wolf which is another reason on why we've chosen a forest for our main location. We thought it'd be best to have only two characters in our music video the main singer and her ex-boyfriend which will only appear for a few seconds as a flashback. We only chose two characters because as a group we thought It'd be best to keep it simple so the audience wouldn't confused and additionally if we were to chose a few people then they'll be a high risk of people deciding not to show up. 

Introduction to Media Studies A2

Welcome to my blog, where I will be updating regularly with posts about my progress and step by step process of my music video. I will be blogging about all my research and development, feedback from students in my class or teachers, group meetings on how our project could be better and anything which includes or may relates to the music video. Also other than a music video I will be creating a front and black cover for the CD case along with a magazine advertisement for the packaging which I will be recording the process on my blog.