Music Video Director - Prano Bailey-Bond

AT the BFI Music Video Conference there was a guest speaker who was a music video producer and director called Prano Bailey-Bond (www.pranobaileybond.com). Here is her director's showreel featuring clips of her work from music videos to short films and film trailers:



She is a multi-award winning director and editor and has created videos for the likes of Imelda May and Morcheeba. Her works has been recognised at events and festivals including the BFI London Film Festival and the UKMVA's.

"Her works invokes imaginative worlds, touching on magical realism and fusing dark vocabulary with eerie allure, revealing how beauty resides in strange places. She is fascinated by life's ironies and contradictions."

Here is her most famous piece of work:

BFI: Making Music Videos Conference

On Thursday 26th November, my media studies class and I went to the BFI Southbank to a conference about the making of music videos. It was a really helpful day for us and gave us a lot of inspiration for our own video. Here are the notes I took:

Music Videos - What is it?

• Length of a song or longer
• Usually features the artist/band
• Can tell a story
• Has to be visually memorable

History Of Music Videos

1930s - Colour Box

• Colourful 
• Patterns in time with music
• No people in video
• Lights, textures and scratched films

1940s - Frim Fram Sauce

• Artist present
• One location
• Black and white
• Introduces the idea of a sub-story (imagination)

1950s

• Artists had their own music TV shows to perform their music
• Most artists had a film career too e.g. Elvis

1960s - These Boots Are Made For Walking

• More of a narrative
• Black and white
• Wider range of camera shots (hand held shots too)
• People i.e. dancers around artists to make them seem more popular
• Scoptiones introduced - jukebox for videos
• Narrative slowly introduced
• Simple
• Mainly filmed in studio

1970s - Bohemian Rhapsody

• More advanced
• Layered shots to add variation
• 2 different stories
• Lights/textures

1980s - Rat Race and I Want To Dance With Somebody

• MTV introduced in 1981.
• Narrative
• Artists 
• Studio
• Different locations
• Wider range of shots; low angle, pans, zoom ins, zoom outs etc.
• Reference to song title (Rat Race)
• Whitney Houston's video was the 56th video ever played, also first black artist's video on MTV

1990s - Drop

• Bigger budgets - only 40 videos hit the $1 million price to make. 
• Scream by Michael Jackson costed $10 million to make
• This video they had to learnt the lyrics backwards
• Used dollies to film.

2015 - Hello

• 485 millions views
• 27.7 million within the first 24 hours
• Fastest video to reach 100 million views in 5 days
• Different types of phones to represent the 'hello'
• Extremely detailed close ups; the steam and fire on the stove
• POV shots as flashbacks

Case Study: 'I Wanna Dance With Somebody'

• 17 out of 21 shots
• 21 seconds screen time (shots per second)
• Conventions; dancing, exhibitionism, close up and extreme close ups, irregular framing/fragmented bodies, looking at camera
• Colour changing backgrounds 
• Bright colours
• Different scene for verses
• Slow mo hair flicks
• Several costume changes
• Dance routines

Conventions

• Genre characteristics 
• Relationship between lyrics and visuals
• Relationship between sound and visuals
• Sells artist as a star
• Voyeurism 

Relationship: Lyrics and Visuals

• Dance partners
• Night time
• Key symbols - throw guys away

Relationship: Sound and Visuals

• Look changes to music to music - heat = warm colours (orange, red, yellow)
• Editing paced changes with temp

Sells Artist

• 'Lonely heart song' - object of desire
• Romantic obsession
• Obsessive close ups 

Voyeurism 

• Frames within frames
• Looking over fence/through window
• Fragmented and objectified bodies

Intertextuality 

• Film strip
• Multiple dance genres
• Costume/set changes

Making Music Videos

• Same frame, different shots
• One position for lighting and camera
• Repeat use of props
• Consistent theme/genre of characters
• Green screen/ studio performance.
• Do one idea well
• Simple narrative
• Controlled environment
• D-SLR camera
• Lights - grease proof paper to soften and gel rolls
• Fans, confetti, wind, glitter etc.

10 Steps To Making Music Videos

1. Start Performance

• Technical kit
• Locations prep
• Props/costumes
• Time frame

2.  Warm Up

• Lip sync practice 
• Photoshoot with artists
• Ancillary task practice

3. Recce

• Limit locations 
• Take photos
• Make sure location has access to lights and power
• Risk assessment

4. Pitch

• 'Treatment'
• Moodboard 
• Ancillary task (advert and website) 

5. Planning 

• Plan your ideas, don't get carried away
• Re-plan to ensure idea becomes reality

6. Plan Everything

• Story boards
• People, places and props - in advanced
• Shoot schedule 
• Technical prep - SD cards, batteries, lights
• Shoot early - not near the deadline.
• Make sure performers are rehearsed

7. Shoot

• 10 times with different set ups
• Have plenty of cutaways
• Shoot extra angles and lighting changes
• Get lots of close ups
• Motivate performers

8. Editing 

• Sync all clips
• Paper edit - storyboard
• Rough cuts and get feedback

9. Evidence 

• Show all research
• Photos of the shoot
• Behind the scenes 
• Screenshots

10. Evaluation

• Make it exciting
• Directors commentary, 'DVD Extras' 
• Interviews on Director's website

All information from this day can be found here: http://projectmusicvideo.blogspot.co.uk/

My co-director and I have had some ideas about changing our music video's story and we will meet and discuss the ideas and inspiration from the conference to finalise our ideas.

Here are some picture of us at the media conference:

Outside the BFI.

Sat in our seats.

Green Screen Error

When editing our green screen footage for our 9 frame shot, we discovered that there was a shadow in every clip to the right of the shot. This is most likely due to our performers standing too close to the green screen. However, we overcame this issue by using the 'touch-up' tool which allowed us to erase the shadow.

We also experimented with the colours in the clip, resulting in our performers looking much less washed out by the green screen and the colours appeared more 'sharp'. This resulted in our green screened shots looking a lot more professional. When we next use a green screen we must ensure to tell our performers to stand further away from the green screen.

Editing The 9 Frame Shot

After we imported all our footage from filming on 17th, into iMovie, my co director and I were keen to figure out how to achieve our aim of using a 9 frame shot. Neither of us had ever used this type of shot before so we had to experiment on iMovie to find how to achieve our aim. Aside from just experimenting, we also watched many YouTube video tutorials on how to do it. We came to the realisation that this will be a lengthy process but will be worth it when we see the final shot all put together. Here are the steps we had to take;

1. Firstly we had to choose a background for our green screen, to just experiment with, we chose a white one. At this moment in time, we are just focussing on the 9 frame shot, so only added a background to the shots for this.
2. Then we had to export all our clips (including footage we won't be using in the 9 frame shot) and save it as an MP4 file.
3. We had to then create a new project and insert a screen for text. This is a plain black screen that has a textbox reading 'text here.' We got rid of the text so we were left with a plain black background. This background is meant to have text that goes over clips. This background allows us to then place our own footage on top of it.
4. In the new project, we then inserted our MP4 file and deleted the other footage that was not needed for this frame. We then placed the greenscreened clips (with the white background) on top of the black text background, in the iMovie 'timeline'.
5. Then we clicked on the white background footage and selected 'picture in picture' and the clips then appear on the black background. We re-sized and moved the clips so the girls were in the middle column and in a line; Alicia on top, Imogen in the middle and Emma at the bottom.

My co-director and I, both learnt new skills when editing this frame and when it is complete we will upload this onto YouTube.

How Filming Went - 17/11/15

Today we finally started to film our music video. My co-director, Imogen, Alicia, Emma and I all stayed after school until 5:30pm to film both the opening few shots of our video and the whole song sung by the girls before Imogen's makeover.

My co-director and I were looking forward to finally being able to start our music video after months of researching, however, for me personally, filming didn't go as well as I planned. We had less time than we initially thought, due to some performers having prior arrangements, not all the lyrics for the song were learnt, meaning we had to stop and start filming, rather than filming the song the whole way through and we didn't have the costumes we planned to use - due to them being forgotten.

This being said, we did manage to get some good footage that can be used for our music video and we even got extra shots of Imogen singing the song by herself and dancing. She started to do this without being recorded and my co-director and I thought this would look good in our video so asked her to do it again so we could record it.

This filming day has allowed us to learn from our mistakes. Next time we will;

• pick a day when all our performers can stay the whole time so we don't have to rush
• provide costumes ourselves so our performers can't forget to bring them and
• give our performers the lyrics at least 3 weeks in advance of filming.

Lighting for Filming - 17/11/15

My co-director and I agreed we wanted to use studio lights to make the green screen shots look more proffesional but we had to decide whether we wanted to use the over-head main lights as well. Luckily for us we have the choice of using either just the right hand lights or left.

I stood in front of the green screen and we filmed a short clip, experimenting with all the different light possibilities and I said which lights were turned on and which were off. When we uploaded this to iMovie we could then see which of the lights worked best.

When watching the clip back, we decided the best light combination was to use the studio lights and to turn off the over-head right lights off and have the left ones on. We decided this because it made the green screen look the greenest - the greener the green screen, the better it will work with a background. The other combinations were too light, too dark and only lit up half of the green screen. To make sure the lighting worked with the green screen we put a picture as the background and all-in-all worked well. The lighting did not create the 'fuzzy' outline which only occurs when the lighting is wrong.

We will use this lighting set up for all our green screen shots.

Filming Set Up - 17/11/15

In our lesson we set up the green screen and our lighting. This is how we set up the room;

We decided to put our studio lights either side of the camera so they would provide sufficient lighting for our filming area. However, when looking through the camera, the lights seemed to produce a white glow coming from both sides, rather than lighting the whole area. We decided to play around with lights to get the preferred amount of brightness.

This was how the lights were originally positioned.

The final light position. We raised the lights and rotated them so they were in more of a 'portrait' style.

Planning for Filming - 17/11/15

When filming on Tuesday, we will need the following;

• Cameras
• Studio Lights
• Green Screen
• Tripod
• Laptop/iPad/phone playing the song
• Printed Song Lyrics
• Performer's costumes

We agreed that to make the lip syncing seem realistic, our performers would have to actually sing the words to the song.  The performers are not natural singers so my co-director and I agreed to sing along with them so they don't feel embarrassed - this doesn't effect the footage as we will mute the sound of the clips anyway.

For costumes, we told the three performers if they owned any clothes that could be put together to create a 'geeky' outfit. We agreed to style Imogen's hair in a low ponytail, Alicia will have bunches and Emma will have a low plait. We also want Imogen to be wearing glasses. 

Filming - 17/11/15

We have finally decided on a day where we can film with some our performers. We decided after school on Tuesday 17th November. My co-director and I decided to film all our green screen shots on Tuesday meaning we only need Alicia, Imogen and Emma. The green screen shots being filmed are the ones where Imogen is still 'geeky'. We aim to film the girls individually for the 9 shot scene like our storyboard;

We also want to film the whole song with the girls singing and dancing using the green screen. This is so we can use this when editing and can add the shots of the girls singing in between the narrative story. Filming the whole song ensures all the shots look similar as they have been filmed on the same day, using the same camera, same costumes and same natural lighting. Also, filming this all now will save time later when editing if we come across a part in the music video where we wanted shots of the girls singing and dancing in front of the green screen.

Artist's Website Research - Mobile View

Whilst researching the artist's website, I came to the realisation that most of the websites seemed as if they worked best when being used on a smartphone. I thought this because of the simplistic layout and the landscape format was designed to fill a computer screen but can be easily adapted into a portrait view for phones. I think more and more websites are becoming mobile friendly due to the rise in people using their mobile phones to browse online, 63% of mobile phone owners use the internet on their phone.

I looked at the same websites on my phone to show the difference when viewed in a portrait format. Here is the result:

When looking at Adele's website on a desktop computer, the page for purchasing her new album shows the album cover on the left and then the links on the right. However, on the mobile version her album cover is above and the links are beneath.

Using this as research, my co-director and I should aim to make our artist's website compatible for mobile phones.

Artist's Website Research

As part of our Ancillary Task, my co-director and I have to create a website for our artist/girlband. Again, to ensure we follow conventions, I have done some research looking at other artist's websites before creating my own.

1.  The first artist I looked at Adele's website and I really liked the simplicity and monochrome colours. This is the first thing you see when visiting www.adele.com.

Following the release of her new 'come-back' single 'Hello', this welcome page is heavily promoting this, providing links to where you can purchase the single. After you have seen this page there is a 'Enter Website' button that takes you onto the main website, where you can view; tour dates, videos etc.

This website was easy to use and the colours worked well together and very pleasing to the eye.

2. The second artist's website was Taylor Swift's. Below is the page you are greeted with;

The front page promotes her new single and music video 'Wildest Dreams' and provides a link directly to the video. There is a menu pane with links for news, tours, and merchandise. Below the advertisement for her music is a unique feature of using a banner in the style of a slideshow to show a collage of pictures from live shows and backstage at concerts.

3. Lastly, I looked at a girl group's website as this would help me relate my ideas for our girlband's website. Little Mix's homepage looks like this;

Unlike the other websites, this is the only screen visible, if you scroll down there is nothing else to see. The menu tabs are accessible through the universally recognised menu icon. This then opens a new window displaying the tabs for their social media links, tour dates, the band members, merchandise etc. This is the menu window that appears;

In conclusion, the main convention for an artist's website seems to be a simplistic design and simple colours. The website must be easy to use with information under obvious tab titles. Using this research I aim to create a mock website for my made up artist. 

Album Cover Magazine Research

For our Ancillary Task we have to produce a magazine advert and a website promoting both, the artist and their new album. To make sure our magazine advert looks similar to others and professional, my co director and I have been looking at magazine adverts that are out at the moment and looking at the typical conventions used.

I created a powerpoint presentation and uploaded it to SlideShare to show some of the magazine adverts I have found and created a word mind map of all the conventions used for most/all the adverts I had found.

I wanted to use a programme called 'Wordle' for my mind map but the software was not compatible with my laptop. To overcome this issue I researched into websites that offered a similar service and stumbled across worditout.com. This allowed me to create a collage of all the different conventions used.

Here is my presentation on SlideShare.

Photoshop Experimentation

After researching into magazine advertisements for artist's and their albums, my co director and I thought that we would experiment using Adobe Photoshop to create a mock advert. Neither of us had ever used photoshop before and it was definitely an experience! We decided to do this task separately so we could experiment and show each other how to do things the other hadn't discovered when creating our girl band's advert.

This is the advert I created:

I had to come up with the artist's name, album name and a release date. I also thought it would be good to link the artist's website so readers can find more information online if they want to.

I wanted the advert  to be simple and without much going on. The simple black font stands out and is easy to read. However, I wanted the artist's name 'Forever Lily' to be a larger font size and a thicker outline of the letters. I found that once I had typed what I needed and clicked off, you could not go back and edit what you have previously typed. I am sure this is possible and I will carry on experimenting with Photoshop to ensure that my co-director and I produce an advert of high quality that can be printed in magazines.

Filming Set Backs

Unfortunately, due to our (quite) big cast we couldn't all meet on the decided date to film as some people had made other arrangements prior to agreeing a date. This has set us back slightly but we aim to have our video filmed and edited by December. This extra time allows us to plan more precisely and plan the exact shots we want to feature.