Complete Shotlist

Shot List

1. Opening establishing shot of town lights in a photographic term named ‘Bokeh’. Shot to pan across lights.

-         This shot will give a feel for the overall video due to the amount of night orientated shots we have which contain a shallow depth of field which blurs vibrant lights and images in the background.

2. Medium long shot of Amy lip-syncing in the studio.

-         This acts as an establishing shot as to where Amy is. This scene will be revisited throughout the music video and will allow the audience to understand where she is without being confused if the studio shots were placed randomly without introduction. Can be deemed as a master shot due to the closeup of the same scene cut with it.

3. Close up on Amy lip syncing behind the microphone within the studio.
4. Long establishing shot of the outside of Costa Coffee. Also a master shot due to several different varied shots following.

-         This shot allows the audience to understand a change in scene and also a change in time. At this point, Amy is thinking about a previous time where she was with her boyfriend.

5. Medium shot of Amy and Ryan opening the door to Costa Coffee. Cut with previous master shot.
6. Two shot of both Amy and Ryan
7. Over the shoulder, shot reverse shot pattern between Amy and Ryan.
8. Mid-Long shot of Amy resting against a tree in the park and lip-syncing.
9. Close up of Amy in same park spot lip-syncing.
10. Long to Mid panned shot of Amy and Ryan walking through Piccadilly Gardens.
11. Ground level shot of their feet walking by, gradually see all of their bodies.
12. Slightly low angle, close up of Amy lip-syncing in the park
13. Gliding track shot of pool game, close up, pool table level.
14. Mid-Long shot of Amy changing the song at the Jukebox
15. Mid shot of Ryan handing Amy pool cue, slight pan that follows them to the table.
16. Close up on Amy lip syncing behind the microphone within the studio.
17. Bokeh effect lights used as filler
18. Mid shot of Amy sitting on wall lip-syncing with heavy shallow depth of field lights within the background
19. Mid-close up of Ryan strumming guitar. Focus on Top end but gradually focuses into his hands strumming.
BRIDGE
20. Extreme close up of stirring of Costa Coffee cup.
21. Pool balls being broke.
22. Unusual moving Bokeh light effect.
23. Close up of Amy within the park, eyes avert downwards.
24. Line of guitars becoming out of focus.
25. Two shot of Amy and Ryan in Costa Coffee.
26. Extreme close up of Amy’s eyes looking upwards.
27. Flickering bright Bokeh lights.
28. Long shot of Amy walking down alley, looking backwards but abruptly looks away.
29. Small focus in of extreme close up on mobile phone which reads “I miss you...”
30. Mid-long shot of Amy and Ryan walking the opposite way through PG.
31. Flickering Bokeh lights due to people walking past.
32. Mid-long shot of Amy and Ryan in the Pool House/Diner playing a game of pool.
33. Close up of Ryan splashing his face with water in the sink.
34. Long shot of Amy walking towards camera beside pond in park.
35. Close up of Ryan strumming guitar.
36. Mid shot of Amy sitting on wall lip-syncing with heavy shallow depth of field lights within the background
37. Mid-long shot of Amy and Ryan in the Pool House/Diner. Ryan setting up a game and Amy watching him whilst Lip-syncing.
38. Mid shot of Amy sitting on wall lip-syncing with heavy shallow depth of field lights within the background
39. Mid shot of Amy drinking alone in Costa Coffee.
40. Closing shot the same as opening light shot yet panning the opposite way.

Calendar of Events

We decided to construct a calendar which consisted of all the days we used for Pre-production (Research and Planning), Production (Filming) and Post-production (Editing, Digipack and Evaluation). From this we can see where we may have improved if we were to do this task again; We see that in the week starting October 17th, we had nothing specific scheduled for that date which could have pushed back filming by at least one day and made the editing process less of a rush as it took us one week in November to be able to complete the editing of the video. We see this pattern again throughout the weeks starting 31st October and 7th November. If we had properly planned, we believe that we could have pushed back the time it took to film and edit and given us more time to work with the video. Despite this however, I believe that given our very short time frame to start and complete our production, we were able to create it to a high standard.

October

November

December

The challenges of A2 production compared to AS production.

As a group we believe that our A2 production work came with minimal challenges that we had to face compared to each individuals AS production work experience. At AS, the majority of us had either no knowledge or limited knowledge of Final Cut Pro and may have struggled with the organisation and research and planning. However, due to any mistakes made at AS and prior knowledge gained from our foundation productions, we were able to minimise the amount of challenges we faced at A2.

Research and Planning
At AS we believe that this is an element we all faced challenges with research and planning. As a collective we believe that this is an element that we initially assumed that was not important however when faced with tight deadlines and re-filming days, this was something to reconsider for our A2 production work. At A2, we do believe that we were slightly complacent and laxed to the urgency of planning however overall we believe that compared to AS we were much more organised and were able to complete our video within the deadline to a high standard. Research in both years as a whole was relatively easier for all of the members due to all having advanced knowledge on how to utilise the internet for research findings.

Camerawork
The challenges we faced I believe were more heightened at A2 due to the different camera that we used. In AS, a standard video camera was used and we needn't have done more than press record and stop, however with the DLSR used at A2 we had to make sure that each member was aware of how it operated. This, we realised after a crucial filming date where a member was not told how to correctly focus the lens to which we had to label the majority of the shots from this day as bad.

Editing
There were definitely much less challenges faced at A2 when it came to editing compared to the amount of challenges at AS. There was a very limited, if any, knowledge of Final Cut Pro at AS meaning that it was crucial to be guided and instructed by teachers for specific elements such as adding transitions. However at A2 we were able to add to the timeline, cut shots, add transitions and construct the whole of the music video with little to no help. Elements of editing to which we found challenging was the constant need to render files and also an initial error which dropped frames from our sequence. Despite still constantly having to render different clips, we were able to remove the dropped frame error with the help of a teacher. At one point when adding transitions we had to gain aid from a teacher due to the fact that when we added some transitions between two clips, it would not fade in properly or was not long enough. Once taught however, we were able to continue independently.

Overall we believe that there were very few challenges that we faced at A2 as a whole and compared to the production work of AS.

Magazine Advert Analysis

Katy Perry is the first poster I am going to analyse. I decided to analyse this pacific poster as the mise en scene of Katy Perry reflects the stereotypical view on Pop music which is the same genre of Pixie Lott. The bright pink of her name reflects to mischievous attitude which reflects how pop music is pursued. The use of props creates an innocent feeling to the cover. Including a paddling pool, pretty flowers, quiet locations and a pretty white fence reflects this innocent atmosphere. By using these props explains Katy Perry’s aims, which is to attract her audience which is a young audience. All these props and her clothing reflect a young girl wanting to have fun. The clothing worn by Katy Perry is quite revealing, but doesn’t make her look too inappropriate. She has to fit the theme of the song which is mischievous behaviour as the song ‘I kissed a girl’ reflects this, but she has kept the outfit to an appropriate standard. Her facial expression makes her look unapproachable and as if she's hiding something. The stance Katy Perry is in reflects the attitude further; she has one hand behind her back as if she’s misbehaving, with a large red love heart lolly in her hand which is almost an innocent act to how she really is. Her facial expression makes her look unapproachable 

The second poster I decided to analyse is a Pixie Lott poster. I decided on this as this is within the same genre of music as Katy Perry which is Pop. I also thought it would be a good idea to analyse one of Pixie Lott's posters as she is the artist we have produced out music video on. In contrast to Katy Perry's music poster, this one is much more toned down and plain. The colours used are all subtle greens/greys which doesn't suggest the stereotypical view on Pop music. As in the Katy Perry poster we can see the naughty stereotype of this genre of music pursued, but in Pixie Lott's here we can see a different approach. The tittle of the song 'Cry me out' maybe the reason why, as this isn't as mischievous as Katy Perry's song 'I kissed a girl'. The picture of Pixie Lott comes across as a un-tidy image, her hair isn't tidy and neat as we normally see her hair. The use of mise en scene from past music images and videos of her is totally wiped away in this poster and is strictly focused and serious on the name of the song. The look on Pixie Lott's eyes suggests she's worried and thinking about problems. 

Our CD Cover Analysis

After analysing three CD cover's we decided to create our piece for our chosen song. All three CD cover's I looked at were quite simple covers, but they were all very effective. Through facial expressions or a small added feature made the CD cover's attractable. We tried to pursue these aspects in our CD cover, by using a simple image of Amy, the main character in the music video in the centre of the cover. We've used a off white colour in the background and Amy has a white dress on. By using plain colours makes the artists name stand out, as well as the song tittle. We decided to include the song title in a subtle pink colour, at the top centre of our CD front cover as this is the song we covered. On Amy's white dress there's a pattern design of butterflies, so we inserted an extra butterfly to the right of the last 'T' on Pixie Lott's name. This is a small added feature which helped the balance of the CD cover, so it wasn't too plain but had little detail which had an effective impact. We used Pixie Lott's original signature name which is on here 'Turn it up Louder' album, but we edited it ourself. We did this to create a realistic CD cover but added our own effect to fit our cover.

The back of our CD cover was also produced in a simple way, but we included the same features from the front cover which has an effective impact. We used the same 'Pixie Lott' signature we used for the front cover, but in a smaller size at the top centre. We used the subtle pink as the background this time, instead of the plain white. We did this so there was a varied colour through out, but we used colours that combined well and didn't contrast. We included faint butterflies around the thirteen song titles which are another example of a simple added touch. We included the credits and the barcode at the bottom of the CD cover to give the realistic look. For the inside of our CD case we decided to include the lyrics for leaflet, this is because people who buy CD's would generally want to learn the lyrics and this would help being included. As the song we covered in our music video was 'Use Somebody' we included these lyrics as it is the most important song of the album for us. We used the same colour throughout our CD cover for the background. The writing colour used is the faint grey colour, which is the same colour as the butterfly's we have used. For the part of the cover where the CD will be placed, we simply used the circle design to create the image. We then used several line of the song which we all felt were of some significance to the song, and used these are the circle shape. Again we used the same simple butterfly's which gave that extra touch to the realistic look of all the pieces. 

Goodwin's Techincal Code Theory

1. “Music video should demonstrate genre characteristics”As our song choice is a Kings of Leon cover who is an indie/rock band, covered by a female pop singer Pixie Lott. Therefore we picked visual genre features such as darker colours to help refer back to the KOL video while using contrasting images such as floral clothing and bright props that create a ‘pop’ genre mise-en-scene. (INSERT ARTIST PROFILE PHOTOS)

2. “Should be a relationship between the lyrics and visuals”We chose to have a story line to our video which would amplify the song lyrics. Also by using a girl-meets-boy relationship story line it conveys a stereotypically pop/girly video. Using shots and angles such as ‘over-the –shoulder’ gives a personal vibe and invites the audience into the story.The lyrics “use someone like you” speak of needing someone who is caring and someone who is dependent. Our video successfully portrays this as it shows various shots of the young couple going on different dates and laughing together as the story of the lyrics is told. However the video finishes with a shot of the female alone in the same place the couple once had enjoyed a previous date. At this moment the lyrics narrate, “Always looking down” – at this point the female looks downwards towards her coffee cup; a memory she once shared with her ex.

3. “Is there a relationship between the music and visuals?”We edited certain shots for dramatic effect such as transitioning from black to a close up as the beat and lyrics begin just before the first chorus. (INSERT STILL) Another shot we also especially edited was the bridge to the song. The bridge is the part of the song about half way through when the melody of the music shifts and the lyrics read “I’m ready now, I’m ready now” the tempo speeds up and so to display this we used short (1-2 second) snippets from previous footage that wasn’t used anywhere else in the video. This visual bridge worked as a break up from the slow story telling of the other parts of the video. This part has been commented on by all members of our production group and peers in our class as “effective and slick”.

4. “The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work. Does anything like this feature in the A2 video?”When looking at the Pixie Lott and Kings of Leon video’s we noticed that there were many close-ups; especially in the Pixie Lott video. Obviously this helps establish a new artist and gets them recognisable to the public. (INSERT STILL)Due to this, we opened our video with a mid-shot and a close-up of me. This makes me recognisable throughout the entire video as the female character in the storyline as the audience has seen a close-up facial shot right from the start. Additionally the close-up of me using the mic, highlights my eyes as they open. We noted that Pixie Lott is famous for her fabulous legs – my eyes are noticeably big and serve as my main feature. This close-up shows off my eyes and are then featured in other facial close-ups and extreme close-ups of my eyes such as in the bridge; there is an extreme close-up of my eyes opening and looking up.

5. “Does the video reference to the notion of looking such as telescopes or screens within screens? Or is there any particular use of voyeuristic treatment of the female body?”After we looked at various Pixie Lott videos we noticed the use of mobile technology such as featuring shots of text messages on a mobile phone or emails from a computer monitor. Due to this we used the originality of the text from the smart phone and used an Iphone as a prop and had a CU of a text message reading “I miss you” which also features in the fast visuals of the bridge.Furthermore there are few shots in our production that highlight the female body. However, shots such as me walking down the ally in Manchester city centre highlights the shape of the female body with low lighting and shadows that highlight the body shape.

6. “Does the video feature any intertextual reference?”There are plenty of ideas we thought of due to the analysis of other KOL and Pixie Lott videos such as the fast shot of Ryan washing his face which also features in the bridge; this was an idea taken from the fast shot of Caleb, lead singer and guitarist from KOL in the shower in their Use Somebody video. Also the ally shot and mobile phone screen text were ideas taken from the “It’s all about tonight” Pixie Lott video as she dances on a dark, outside location and views a text message on her smart phone.(INSERT STILLS FOR COMPARING) Other Pixie Lott intertextual references were also from the studio shots, from her Use Somebody cover video. We made sure we used similar shots and positions such as mid-shots from the side and facial close-ups to make the female character recognisable and build motifs just like most real artists do throughout the video.

Full Digipack