Location Scouting

Today we looked at locations into more depth. For the stage idea we went to the school hall and had a look at the stage. We turned off all the lights apart from one set, placed a chair out in the centre and we borrowed an acoustic guitar from the music suite . I took pictures with my camera from several different angles. It looked really effective because the chair was alone, with no props or any fancy editing effects.
Due to difficulties with my phone, I am currently unable to post any pictures just yet, but as soon as I figure out how to, I shall do

Costumes.

Today we looked in the drama studio for costumes that our performer could wear, however we could not find anything that was ideal to suit our artist. The group thought about using a fur coat, but I thought that we shouldn't use it as our artist is in to nature and therefore may be against using animal fur as it would be promoting a false image. We have decided that our performer will need three different outfits, one for performing on stage, one for in the woods and the other for when she is in the pub and in her room, all of which will be dresses and when she is in the woods, she will be wearing red wellies.

Planning, location and lighting

In todays lesson we decided that we would defiantly use the school hall as one of the locations for our music video. We went to the school hall and experimented with the lighting that was already installed. We decided that we would use the main stage light and have the rest of the school hall in darkness by shutting all the curtains as this gave the best effect. To make it look even better we are going to experiment with spotlights. We borrowed a guitar from the music department and bongos and a vintage looking chair from the drama department. We decided that these were the only props that we needed on the stage as the effect was good even though it was simplistic.

Locations Hatfield Forest

Here are some images of Hatfield Forest. They are some locations which we may use in parts of our music video.

Audience Profiling

Looking at various posts on our blog such as the questionnaire and the research compiled on YouTube, we now have a very specific target audience.

Demographics

Female

25-40 age range

Married

Has children

Detached House

Has a Dog

Lives in the country

Psychographics

Listens to Radio 2

Likes going on walks

Enjoys television dramas

Is part of a charity

Background Information on Acoustic music

This is a Synthesizer
An Electric Guitar
An Electric Organ
An Acoustic Guitar
A Bass Guitar

Acoustic music comprises music that solely or primarily uses instruments which produce sound through entirely acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. Acoustic music appeared after the advent of electric instruments, such as the electric guitar, bass guitar, electric organ and synthesizer.

Performers of acoustic music often increase the volume of their output using electronic amplifiers. However, these amplification devices remain separate from the amplified instrument and reproduce its natural sound accurately.

Lyric Listing

Today we have printed off the lyrics of our song. We then decided on our locations which are Hatfield Forest, The Fairycroft Saffron Walden and we have The Swan Public House in Great Easton still to book. We also are going to use a bedroom for some of the scenes as the lyrics seem to fit in with what we have in mind.

We carefully set out the timings of the lyrics in relation to the song. We found that we have 15 seconds either side of the lyrics to work with to set the scene and finish the narrative. We also discovered that there is a guitar solo between the second chorus and the final end chorus. This gives us an opportunity to break some boundaries with typical folk/ acoustic conventions, and possibly show the artist in familiar surroundings, but in very specific places. We have the ability to do some close up shots, and use editing to enhance the mise en scene with focus pulls and fade outs/ins.

Influences

A list of folk/ acoustic artists who we are looking at for inspiration for ideas or conventions

1. Katie Melua
2. Norah Jones
3. Eva Cassidy
4. Laura Marling
5. Lisa Hannigan

We have chosen theses artists for inspiration because some are well known, some not so well known. This I think shows how large this genre is and what sorts of things we hope to achieve with the music video. We might want to make the video very complex with lots of special camera tricks, but as this is a folk/ acoustic song, I think the video needs to reflect the sounds from the song

final album cover

evaluation of contribution

Before Filmimg

Evaluation of contribution

Locations

We talked about where we wanted to shoot our video, so we made a list of al the locations that seemed possible and linked o the genre. We have 3 choices of setting which are; A forest; an empty room; bar/pub. We found possible sites for all of these settings using Google and our own knowledge.

A Forest

This could be filmed at either Hatfield Forest or somewhere in Langley Upper Green, as it is very rural.

http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-hatfieldforest

An Empty Room

The Fairycroft in Saffron Walden is ideal for this as it is very bare, spacious, bright and we can easily get permission to film there as Henry knows the people who run it as a Youth Centre.

Bar/Pub

We again have 2 options. 1 being The Swan in Great Easton. This was suggested by Suzy as she works there and knows he location very well.

http://swangreateaston.co.uk/

The second option is again in Langley Lower Green, in The Bull

"The Bull, Langley Lower Green, Saffron Walden, Essex. The Bull has a Beer Garden.

This victorian pub is popular and welcoming and meals can be arranged with prior notice."

Laura Marling is a female artist who plays similar music to our chosen artist Beyond Victoria. I have watched some of her videos to get inspiration for our music video. A common effect with this genre is the use of long cuts and fade ins and outs.

Florence and the Machines- dog days

here there are a few screen shots of the music video and the stats , there is a few comments as well from viewers, the music video is experimental and unique suiting the laid back sound and image

Audience Profile Questionnaire and results

We designed a short questionnaire, the purpose was to find out what our selected audience expected from an artist and video of that genre. There were only 4 questions after listening to our chosen song, this would give them a better idea as to what kind of music genre it portrays. We approached 25-50 year old males and females. The questions were as follows;

1. Now that you have listened to our track, how would you picture our artist to look?

(I then wrote down all the key words that they told me, these included dress, blonde hair, soft features, organic)

2. What kind of setting would you imagine her in a video?

a. A stage b. In the woods c. At a fair ground d. From another persons perspective as a story

(Most said that they wouldn't see her at a fairground, but would see her either in the woods or telling a story)

3. If the video was to tell a story, what would it be about?

(The most popular answer was the the singer would break up with a guy, then seeing him in emotional pain as she is doing just fine, but feeling sorry for him at the end of it)

4. If you were to buy the album, what would you expect to see on the cover?

( Trees, sunshine, animals, countryside, guitar ).

Audience Profile

I have gone onto YouTube and looked up several artists of our genre. I found that in the statistics and data link that most of the people who watch/listen to this genre are in the 45-54 age category. 

This video is most popular in: 

More

Less

Audiences

This video is most popular with:

Gender	Age
Female	13-17
Male	45-54
Female	45-54

This gives us a clear idea of who is interested in this music. This particular music video is of Katie Melua's "I cried for you".

From this we can gather that its targeted at a female audience, as they can probably relate to Katie Melua's lyrics, and the fact that she is a woman enhances the appeal even more.

The second example is of already mentioned "Sunrise" by Norah Jones. This video has many more views than Katie Melua's, but that's because this was released before her song and was extremely popular.

Audiences

This video is most popular with:

Gender	Age
Female	13-17
Male	45-54
Female	45-54

This video is most popular in: 

The third example is of Eva Cassidy's famous song "Songbird". This has surprising results as most of the views has been accumalated by middle aged males.

Audiences

This video is most popular with:

Gender	Age
Female	45-54
Male	45-54
Male	55-64

This video is most popular in: 

From this I can determine that women still listen to her music, and as a whole, are the main focus and target audience.

Genre Research

Here are some album covers which I have found. These artists are of the same genre as our artist Beyond Victoria, many of the same characteristics are shared within this genre. Many artists in this genre have  a picture of them on the album but also usually their guitar with them ,this is because they love music and they want this to be shown through the image they are giving. On most of the covers natural lighting is used, this is because many of the artists of this genre want to be seen as loving the environment and the world and gentle. Colours that appear frequently on album covers of this genre are colurs like greens blues and browns as these are all very natural colours

Original Song

Our original song for our music video 'carousel' by Sydney Wayser, found on "Jamwave" said that it was an unsigned song, so we wrote an e-mail to her asking for her permission to use the song. However she did not get back to us. Whilst we were waiting for a response we looked her up on "Youtube" and we found that she had got a music video. Therefore we could not use her song in our music video as she was obviously now signed. So we had to start from scratch again and look for another song that we could use to fit our planned genre.

The song Lyrics for our song 'Stronger Women'

Why the feeling

Nobody knows

It says so many things inside

It doesn't really show

You told me so many lies

I tried to keep my distance

So you can't hurt my pride

Or led to control me, no

You say you want me

And you can't have me now

You had your chance but you blew it

Now your out of time

Because I have grown and grown and now I say

I'm a stronger woman, woman

Since you've been gone

Ive had nothing to feel

I can't stop thinking about you

Do i need you here?

Everytime I see your face

I remember the pain

I made a difference by mistake

It won't happen again, no,no,no

You say you want me

But you can't have me now

You had your chance but you blew it

Now your out of time

Because I have grown and grown and now I say

Im a stronger woman, woman

You say you want me

But you had your chance but you blew it

Now your out of time

Because I have grown and grown and now I say

Im a stronger woman, woman

Because I'm a stronger woman, woman

Because I'm a stronger woman, woman

Because I'm a stronger woman, woman

Because I'm a stronger woman, woman

I'm stronger now.

song useage permission

This print screen shot shows that we have permission to use the song "Stronger Women" for our music video

Video Coventions

We took a look at several videos by artists of our chosen genre, for example, Katie Melua, Nora Jones, Eva Cassidy. A common convention is the use of soft focus and colour filters. We found that it commonly used colours like blue, green, brown or yellow. These colours represent a calm atmosphere and are often linked to nature. This is important because the genre of music is usually all about playing acoustic guitar, being in a rural setting and singing about emotions. We think this is a good basis to work on for the music video, as this is what the audience are going to expect.

The settings usually portrayed in this genre are in the forest or countryside. For example in the video "Sunrise", Norah Jones walks into a apartment in a busy city, only to find that she is in a setting of a fantasy world. She is surrounded by paper owls and giant flowers. This creates a fairytale and girlish environment, and seems fairly appealing and calm. This reflects the genre of music, which too is very calm. The common use of green and yellow also gives the message that it's natural and friendly.

As the camera zooms up onto Norah Jones' face, her costume and style changes from reasonable business attire to a dress and styled hair. The filter has changed from grey to a warm red, to give some colour to her appearance.

We plan to use conventions such as this, as it links directly to the song we have acquired, and in turn the genre.

photo montage

  This is a montage of photos i put together with the chosen song

Audience Research

We have come up with a list of ideas on how to research our particular audience.

- We are currently looking on YouTube at music videos belonging to the same genre that our chosen artist is from, for example, Katie Melua.

- As we look at the videos we look at the Statistics and Data link to discover which age range, nationality and gender view these videos the most.

- We will also ask people such as our own parents and their friends, what elements of a music video are expected to be included by a typical artist of this genre. We will mainly target people within the age range of 25- 40 year olds as this is who we are aiming our video at.

Digipack

This promotional poster of Kate Nash portrays the artist as unique as the photo has been taken spontaneously. The font in which her name is written, is the style of writing she likes to use and over time has become synonymous with her. The dates that she is performing are in the summer, making the performances more available to her fans, as the younger ones won't be at school. Her target audience are people aged thirteen to thirty-five.
This is Kate Nash's debut album cover. She is looking over her shoulder flirtatiously which gives the impression that she is a doll and the house is a doll's house with the sculptured animal bushes giving it a fairytale like quality.

The title, Kate Nash, is larger than the album name as it is making a statement and tells the audience that Kate wants to be recognised as it is her first album.

starting up

Today we created the blog a new email address and a youtube account