Group: rough cut 2

TW: After Effects Post-Production- RGB Split

These clips show the progression from the original clip to the edited clip using After Effects. This was done by adding the motion tile effect. Then using the slider control effect with the wiggle expression so that at a certain point the clip shakes. In addition using the shift channels effect I could isolate the clips into either the red, green or blue layer. Then I could make each layer "wiggle" separately and this is the outcome.

Group: recording sound

Today Tyla and I used one of our study periods to record the prelude to our production and the audio of the main characters that will play over the top of our sound track at intervals.
 We wrote a script but we quickly discovered that if we read the script the audio would sound fake and literally as if we were just standing in a booth recording a pre written piece. Because of this it took longer than expected but eventually we discovered that 'Thom' the main skate boarder and I should have a free flowing conversation and try and incorporate our narrative into the conversation which produced excellent results that showed that there were actual meanings behind what we were saying rather than it sounding as if someone were just reading a script.

Group: Rough Cut Feedback

From our audience research of our rough cut the comments we received were

• Needs more narrative to drive music video rather than being all action shots
• Especially more upper body shots 
• Even though it hasn't been cut perfectly yet the cutting rate in the different sections good cutting rate
• People liked to use of special effects such as film burn and RGB split
• When cutting from locations would be good to use the film burn transitions from locations like at the cut to the sunset

Group: Update on work

Research on vimeo
after effects
prints

Group: Film Burn Research

We want to use film burns and light leaks in our music video but at this point we do not know how to use them. So over the weekend I did some research into how to use them and how to create them.
This video was the one that was most useful. He showed me that its just a case of overlaying an already made clip of film burn and reducing the opacity of the burn to allow the main shot to show through.

So I used his link he shows to get free film burns to use, I then found a lot more so that we are not repeating the same film burns throughout our production. This is an example of one.

The two shots to the left show how film burn can be applied to a normal shot.

Group: Grosvenor shoot

Tomorrow we are going to do a quick shoot at Grosvenor Skatepark. After the Porc shoot went so well we don't need too much footage but what we do get needs to be of high quality. Thom will be our main character at this shoot however once again we will use footage of whoever is at the location. With the sun being so low at this time of year and with the shoot taking place between 10 and 12 we will get some shots to contribute towards the early morning shots.

TW: Sunset Location Reccie

As the plot of our music video progresses from morning to evening it is conventional to have a sunrise and a sunset to mark the beginning and the end. Max has the location for the sunrise so yesterday I went to find a location for the sunset.
I did some research using suncalc.net to find out what direction the sunset would be in. Using this I found what I thought was a good spot, (centred on image) overlooking some fields.

I then checked to see if the field was higher or lower than where I was standing so that I knew whether the view was clear. From this image it shows that the fields descent away from my viewpoint.

Group: Concept Development

Today Tyla and I have discussed the ending of our production, we plan on using a time lapse of the sun setting shot near our porc location, this will make our footage look continuous and will signify the day ending as we plan on recording the last hour of daylight at this location. Yesterday, the 13th of November Tyla went to this location and captured around 12 minutes of the sunset as a practice shot which worked well but we have both concluded that for our time lapse to look professional we need to shoot at least an hours worth of footage to shot the scenery changing. We also both agreed that if possible the shot should be framed so that there were no trees close by as when watching the footage sped up at 10,000% the branches would move around violently and meant that the shot no longer produced the cinematic experience.

We have also discussed the prelude that we want to play in the background during the first 15 seconds of our production, Tyla and I have decided that Wednesday next week we will come in at lunch time to one of the schools recording booths with a script that we are currently writing, we will  then record the voices of the people featured in the production to act as our prelude. One idea that we had was to have our actors record the same speech and then we will edit the different segments together using cross cuts to produce one continuous prelude.

Group: Grosvenor Bmx shoot

On Monday the 18th of November we both plan to shoot the BMX segment of our production. This part of our production will be shot at Grosvenor skate park in High brooms located about 15 minutes from school.        We are fortunate that on this Monday we have break time, a double lesson in media and then lunch giving us a total of 3hours and 15 minutes in which we can shoot during the school day.

 For this shoot we will be using my friend Will who rides BMX as our main subject and then others who regularly go to the skate park. I am also going to bring my BMX to school as when shooting it proves to be a very valuable recourse acting as a platform to follow other riders on when travelling at speed. The photo to the right demonstrates how we use skateboards to smoothly follow moving targets without being restricted to a straight direction of movement like when using a track.

Group: Call Sheet

TW: Short Edit From Porc Shoot

At the moment we need to do another shoot so that we know how our footage will fit together. So I though the most effective use of our time, in terms of editing, would be to make a short edit using our footage from Porc. This would be useful as I could try out the techniques we are going to use in our actual video, for instance the title at the beginning of the track as well as the development of friendship and camaraderie. Another technique that I practiced was the use of slow motion, trying different ways using the slow motion such as ramped slow mo and a whole clip in slow mo. As we at Porc for the whole day I was able to use the footage to show the progression from morning to evening.

 

 

The feedback that we received from this edit was extremely positive. Points that were made included.

• Editing to soundtrack worked extremely well
• Filler shots were very effective
• Sense of friendship and camaraderie developed
• Location worked well
• One shot that showed someone getting out of car didn't work because it didn't look like it was at the same location



TW: Video Inspiration

Over the weekend I took some time to do some researching on the video sharing site Vimeo. This site has more professional videos than that of Youtube and so is good to look at some more experimental and stylistic video production techniques.

The video 'Dogboarding' has some shots in it which I think would work really well in our production, in addition the use of slow motion in this video is what I would like to match in ours. The video develops on my idea of adding something which is out of the norm to make it more visually interesting.

In these two videos the use of fancy dress is something that we might like to incorporate in ours however what I like more about these two videos is the sense of camaraderie between the people and enjoyment of the event.

I really like this video because of the way the friendship between the two characters is shown through handicam of a low quality video recorder. The diegetic sound can still be heard but it does not overpower the music. I think this is a technique that would make our video much more effective by cutting between a high and a low quality camera to give our production a more personal feel.

TW: Digipack/ Advert Ideas and Research

We decide that we are going to do a digipack for an EP because it is conventional of our artist genre to release a number of tracks to create a buzz for the album. For example Adrian Lux himself has released lots of EPs and singles before his album, similarly Calvin Harris, before his most recent album, released a number of the tracks as singles and EPs.

From research and these two examples, EP covers are simple normally contain one iconic image with the only text being the artist and track title.

From advertising research these are the conventions I have identified.

• The image on the advert is the same if not very similar to the main cover of the digipack so that the audience will recognise the album artwork
• In addition there is more text than on the digipack, however not too much so that it is still quick and easy for the audience to read 
• The information usually given by the text is the artist name, album title, release date, reviews, singles from the album and where to purchase
• Another convention is the use of a single colour for the background

We need to reproduce these conventions in our advert to make a professional and effective product.

This is our first image idea for our prints. It would work well with the advert as the text will fit nicely next to it. Furthermore the solid colour in the background attracts the eye and follows the convention of the advert.
Furthermore the rule of thirds can be applied to this shot, more so when the text is applied.

This is another shot that we could use for our image, with a similar idea to the first.



















Our other idea for what our image could be was some sort of group shot. These are some test shots that we took on our shot at 'Porc', personally I prefer the action shots we have as they are more iconic and have space for a better layout of text. however these would be good shots for the inside covers of our digipack, adding to our ideology of camaraderie and friendship.

Group: Reviewing Shoot Footage

Today I decided that it would be very useful to dedicate a lesson to looking through all of the footage that we captured during our first shoot at PORC as we had over 9.5Gb's.

We had a large amount of footage which we captured so we both knew that it would need condensing into folders as to make it easier to import the correct shots into premier elements when we begin to make our production. I spoke to Mr Fiveash who suggested that because we had a large amount of shots I should use a system that labelled the different shots A,B or C with A being the best 'meat' shots ,B being high quality filler shots and C being clips which didn't really work but could be used if needed.

The shot above is one of the shots which we felt worked really well, it took a few attempts to set up correctly due to the fact that I was jumping into the camera but once we had worked out the timings correctly it worked excellently.


The shot below is also one of our favourite 'group' shots which we decided to put into out B category as the light makes the shot look very attractive and elegant.

Group: Font Ideas

The font we have envisioned to use was of simple handwritten style, with slightly thin tall letters. A similar font used in the 'Young Blood' video by 'Young and Famous'. 

From research on 'Dafont' and '1001 fonts' we found these fonts which appeal to us. The first two being most similar to our original ideas and the third being a more of a scribble that we still like.

However we then found this font which we liked because it has connotations of innocence and playfulness contradicts the connotations of teenage crime. As well as we also liked how it looked which is the main purpose of the font to be another way in attracting the audience.

A problem that we had to overcome was that we want to place our title over the sunrise time lapse at the beginning of the track. The idea was that we use a simple font so that the image behind can easily be read but this font would draw the eye away from the time lapse. So if we decided that if we do use this font we will cut out the fill of the font in photoshop so that the footage is viewable through the text.

Group: Shoot Reflection

In the half term we did a shoot at 'Porc' which is one of our main locations for the action footage.

The roles undertaken by the team were

• Max: director, actor and camera operator
• Tyla: director and camera operator 
• Thom Espach and Dan Warren: actors
• Extras

We feel the shoot went extremely well as we were delighted with how the shots using the track turned out. In addition the weather was sunny with some cloudy spells so we made sure that we filmed in the sunny intervals. The only disappointment with the shoot was that there was not as many people riding as expected and therefore we have lots of shots of Dan and Max riding rather than a vast range of people.

Our next step is to film the early morning scenes and then a small shoot at Grosvenor Skatepark.

Group: Animatic