Creating My Magazine Advert

The first website I used to create my advert is Fotor. With this website, I changed the filter of my picture to black and white and added the text. Luckily, I managed to find a font very similar to the font I used on my website.

After I had imported all the text I wanted onto the advert, I then used LunaPic again and used their 'merge image' tool in which you can add a photo on top of another. I imported the edited image I created on Fotor and then uploaded the record label image and re-sized it to fit into the bottom left hand corner. 

I then had to re-save this image and re-import it so I could add the social media logos that I took from my website.

As I was unsure on the lay out of the magazine advert I asked two 17 year old girls to help me decide where all my text should go. This ensure that it will appeal to people of my target audience. 

Motion Animations

Aside from using Motion for animated lyrics, I wanted to experiment turning still images into animated ones. A shot we thought this would work is the one where our performer is looking at a picture of her ex boyfriend. This clip is framed using the rule of thirds and is to the far right of the shot (see below).

To follow conventions of indie-pop, I decided to work with girly shapes and used a star, arrows and hearts.

Once I had found the images I wanted I could then add them into motion. As I was using Motion on a MacBook and our music video has been edited on an iMac, my co-director sent me a screenshot of the clip we were using the animation for so I could ensure the animated images were in the right place when creating them in Motion.  I will then remove the screenshot so the background for all the animations is transparent and can be 'greenscreened' onto the clip.

Experimenting With Motion

After experimenting with VideoScribe, my co-director and I found another peice of text software called 'Motion'. This software allows much more animation with text, which gives us the freedom to put our preferred lyrics in whatever formation we so wish.

We're going to replicate Cher Lloyd's 'Swagger Jagger' video as we used her animated lyrics as inspiration for ours. To do this we downloaded the music video from YouTube and saved it as an mp4. We then imported this into iMovie and cut the video down so we only have the clip of the animated lyrics 'shoutin' at me'.

Once we saved this clip, we imported it into Motion so we could 'trace' the movements of the 'swagger jagger' lyrics for our lyrics. 

The lyrics we want to use are 'to being along again' and we want the words to appear on each beat. 

We are going to continue working with Motion to achieve the clip we have envisaged. Once we have got the shot we want, we will save the clip as an mp4 and upload it to our music video. 

VideoScribe

My co-director and I found a software called 'VideoScribe'. This allows you to input any text onto any background yet have a hand holding a pen, and letters appear one by one, as if it has been handwritten. We are going to play around with this software and see if it would work in our music video.

Below are our favourite fonts we picked out to experiment with:

Lyrics in Music Videos

I have researched and watched numerous pop music videos and it seems as though it is quite common for the song's lrics to appear in the video at some point. Whether it be appearing on the screen or the artist interacting with the lyrics.

For example, Cher Lloyd's 'Swagger Jagger' video has the lyrics popping up in different animated ways. A lot of the time these lyrics appear on the beat of the song. She also interacts with some of them too e.g. pushing the line 'get out of my way' to the left and the words leave the shot as if she had actually pushed them.

My co-director and I want to find a software that'll allow us to do similar animations of the lyrics in our music video so it follows conventions of similar music videos. 

Editing 11/4/16

As it is the Easter holidays, my co director and I met up for an editing session at my house to edit the footage we shot on 4/4/16. Watching the footage back revealed some good shots we had taken and below is our favourite.

We are unsure what colour background we should have but we like the last clip being black and white against a bright background. These drum shots turned out exactly how we envisaged them to!

I have saved these clips as an mp4 clip so we can transfer it to school.

Filming 4/4/16

Today my co-director and I filmed some more shots for the music video. We filmed the shot of our performer crying over her ex boyfriend whilst eating ice cream in her pyjamas, close up of her putting her slippers on, ripping the head off of a 'be mine' teddy bear, angrily scrolling through pictures of her ex boyfriend with other girls and her beating a drum thats covered in confetti. The shoot was successful and we shot the clips we needed.

Crying Shot

We dressed Imogen in pyjamas and sat her on the ground with screwed up tissues as if they had been used.

We dropped eye drops into her eyes to make sure her eye make up ran down her face. 

We asked her to pretend to cry dramatically whilst eating ice cream.


Teddy Bear Shot

As it was too difficult to rip the head off, I had to cut some of the stitching so it was easier for Imogen to rip off. I unstitched the side of the head so it couldn't be seen.

Drum Shot

For this shot we used a drum from the drum kit at school and poured confetti on it so when Imogen hit the drum the confetti would bounce. We hope to edit this shot with a black and white filter and slowed down.

All in all, the day was very successful and we took all the shots we needed. We learnt from past filming days to leave the camera rolling between shots so we could get some natural laughing and dancing shots.

Intro for the Music Video

In our music video, we want a clock to tick from 2:55 until it gets to 3 o'clock. However, we wanted to speed it up so we used the fast forward tool in iMovie. We placed a big clock on a green screen on a table and set up the camera to record.

After we filmed this we added a YouTube sound clip in iMovie of a clock ticking and an alarm bell for when the clock got to 3 o'clock.

Below is our filming set up:

This turned out well and we gave the clock a girly pink background. 

Once the clock got to 3 o'clock, we added a close up shot of our performer suddenly opening her eyes as if she has just woken up. 

Starting Ancillary Task 1 - Artist's Website

My co-director and I decided to create two separate websites for our artist so we could design it how we wish. However we both brainstormed together to come up with a name for the artist and the album name. We decided to use our performer's first name 'Imogen' for the name of our artist as it is short and easy to remember. We got our inspiration for the name from artist's like Adele and Beyonce. We also decided to call the album 'Moving On'.

Here is what the website looks like so far:

These are the text settings. I need to make note of these to enforce synergy when creating my magazine advert.

I feel like the black and white filter on the picture and simplistic white text makes the website look sleek and professional. 

Photoshoot 3/03/2016

Yesterday we did a photoshoot of our performer to enable us to start our ancillary tasks (website and magazine advert). We used a Canon camera so the pictures would be high quality and my co-director and I took it in turns to take the pictures. We used the green screen and the studio lights to enhance the quality.

Here was our set up:

The shoot was a major success and we took some great photos that would be perfect for our tasks! We felt the black and white filter made the pictures seem more professional. Below are our favourite: 

3AM Kate Nash Lyrics

The main reason we chose this song was due to the lyrcis telling a story and us as directors, being able to link visuals to the lyrics. This is important as Andrew Goodwin said it is one of the '7 Key Conventions of a Music Video'.

3AM LYRICS

How did it get to 3 am?
I wish that I could call
But I know that you're probably asleep.
Do I really have to get used
To being alone again?
I wish that you were here
You must know that you aren't my best friend
Do we really have to dream?
I'm perfectly happy here
In reality, I'm wide awake
I think about the things
That I can do tomorrow but I'm trapped
Cause it's so dark outside and everybody else is fast asleep
My hand is glued to the remote
The TV has already said
Good night, I'm frozen in my seat
I want to move but I'm afraid
I suffer from anxiety
And I don't want to be alone!
You see, I want to be with

You
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
Yeah baby

You are the one I think of on a night
And on a night it feels so right
I miss your arms
The way you kiss me
The way you pull me in so tight
It makes me sick the way we fight
When I want you so bad tonight
Yeah baby
You are the one I think of on a night
And on a night it feels so right
I miss your arms
The way you kiss me
The way you pull me in so tight
It makes me sick the way we fight
When I want you so bad tonight

I want to change my need to want
My desires, change my route
Passion is tricky, love is tender
Love is sweet, it hurts, it's you and me
And in one fatal jump she's
Cut off my electricity
And now I'm really stumped
I'll make forever, take forever
Leave the house, it's laugh or cry
And if you cry, you're taken out
There won't be room for mistakes here
I'm afraid this is all or nothing
And I haven't got a hope
At least I thought I had a friend
Turns out I was just a joke
I'm holding on to what I've got
I'm tryna get just what I want
I'll pick the pieces up tomorrow
Cut the pill and take my chances with a half
Yeah baby

You are the one I think of on a night
And on a night it feels so right
I miss your arms
The way you kiss me
The way you pull me in so tight
It makes me sick the way we fight
When I want you so bad tonight
Yeah baby
You are the one I think of on a night
And on a night it feels so right
I miss your arms
The way you kiss me
The way you pull me in so tight
It makes me sick the way we fight
When I want you so bad tonight
If only...

You
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh
You ooh ooh

New Song Choice

After much deliberation myself and my co-director agreed on the song '3AM' by Kate Nash.



We wanted to keep within the genre of a pop song and we feel this song suit the style we want for our video too. We wish to include elements of stop motion and green screening. Now we have decided on a song we can start working on the content of our music video and the shot types etc.

Slight Change of Plan!

After our inspiring trip to the BFI conference my co-director and I came to the joint conclusion that, after seeing other well done student music videos, we weren't too keen on our initial ideas and/or the song choice. We knew it would be a big risk, time-wise, to scrap all ideas and head back to the drawing board but we felt that our original idea wouldn't demonstrate or allow us to use our much developed editing and directorial skills.

My co-director and I now have to come up with a better video idea that we are both happy with.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Filming Locations

We intend to base our music video around the idea of the performers being at 'high-school' and it being a high-school crush. For this reason our main filming location will be our own school. We hope to use corridors, the front entrance and I have had the idea of maybe even a classroom - these locations will hopefully set the scene for our audience.

Our second location is for when Imogen undergoes her make over. My co-director and I discussed this scene and both agreed that it should be set in a girly bedroom. We will ask one of our other cast members, Alicia, if we can use her room to film as it is big, modern and girly.