Our media brief was to plan, create and produce a music video for a song of our choice, along with ancillary products inclduing amagazine advert promting the album release and a CD digipak - Album front cover, album back cover, disk print and lyric book.
Our initial ideas were based upon a music video by 'Ellie Goulding: Your Song' because it was a music video that we all liked the style of.
We like the homemade feel of the video, as it displays a subtle, natural vibe which is reflected in the song.
This is achieved through:
- out of focus shots
- shots of her hometown Hereford
- shots in parks and woodland areas
- shots with friends
- footage of her in the recording studio
Before we started with the planning of how our music video was going to look we had to decide on the song that we would use, as a group we looked at and discussed some songs that we liked and felt would work well with the genre we had chosen.
Song Ideas
Our initial song ideas for our own music video:
'Skinny Love' by Birdy
'Hey Soul Sister' by Train
This is an unofficial video we found for 'Hey Soul Sister' made by fans:
We liked the style of the video which was achieved through fast editing/choppy effect of cutting out letters from a magazine in order to create an animated effect.
The country folk appeal of this song really appealed to us, its old and new all at the same time but in the end we decided against it as we couldnt think of any shots to coordinate with the lyrics
Music Video Research
After listening to different song ideas we began to research exisitng music videos in a hope to get more inspiration for our own video, see what works well and what doesnt work as well.
Ellie Goulding- Your Song
- We liked the initial feel of the video and they way it made us feel about ourselves.
- Overall it was happy and the sentimental value of the lyrics mirrored the sentimental value of the video, expecially as a lot of the video had a "home video" feel to it.
- We also liked how at some points during the song Ellie sang, this shown that she was the artist as well as this actress.
- Many of the singing shot were 'talking into space' which let us have our own ideas of who she was singing to.
- Also, the out door location allowed the natural light to make the video feel natural and not set up or fake.
Ed Sheeran- The A team
- We liked how this video was in black and white and it mirrored the sad lyric sof the video.
- One thing we have decided we would like in our video is a story line to go with the music video as this makes it more interesting for the audience as they have something to follow.
- As the video does feature a story we line we liked how the beginning showed the ending so the audience were interested as to what is going on.
Lady Gaga-You and I
- Even though this video isn't exactly how we want our to look like, we like the characterisation used in it.
- We liked how there was one female used throughout it so the audience can clearly tell who the main person is.
- As the scenes changes alot (which is something that will happen in ours) the outfits and mise en scene changed with it. This allowed the audience to be able to tell clearly what had ahappend in each scene.
- The opening of the video was really good as the character faded in which made the audience wonder what was going to happen.
Birdy-Shelter
The thing we liked most about this video was the location. The forest made it seem depressing and added to sad theme.
The passion that she had when she was singing made it believable, this is something we realised was really important in order to maing the music video look professional.
Rihanna - We found love
History of Music video
A music video is a short film usually 2-3 minutes long integrating a song and imagery to make artistic and promotional effects- usually to help marketing for a new releaed song.
They came into promience in the late 1980s when MTV used a wide range of styles of film making techniques including;
animation,
live action filming,
documentaries,
and non-narrative approaches such as abstract film.
Many music videos do not interpret images from the song's lyrics, making it less literal than expected.
The Appeal Like most media striken buisness' today the idea of music videos is becoming more and more abstract and technical as it seems the industry of music and our generation today are not satisfied with the basics and we want to see more.
It seems that long gone are the days were bands
could simply stand infront of the video camera
and sing their song with their instruments
and band mates like The Beatles 1964,
who featured in their very first music video
'A hard's day night' which was shot in black and white.
Although bands such as the 'Artic monkeys', 'The killers' and 'The Foo Fighters' have a hint of the Beatles style of music video in theirs by having the whole band playing an almost 'band practice' on screen, however there is also some sort of class and high tech about their performance. For example, the Crying lightining music video by the Artic monkeys released in 2010 has a lighting effect throughout with flashes of the lead singer Alex Turner playing the guitar behind (as seen above). It amost seems as though the industry toda,even the simpliest of bands like this band in paticular feel that they have to make there music videos interesting and appealing to this modern day audience to make them be interested in their product (which is the fundemental reason for the music video in the first place). Suggesting that our generation no longer just listen to music but we thrive of watching it too- it excites us.
It's all about glitter, dancers and colourful images! From girl bands to solo artist (male and female) music videos in the last five years have seemed to emphasise on the cheese and high technology effects and colours to create an interesting and exciting outcome attracting the most popular age group in our country- 13-21 year olds.
The most obvious being Katy Perry;
who arrays herself in sweet style costumes, crazy coloured hair and surrounded by dancers
male and female in her lively upbeat music videos -
'Calfornia girls' and 'Teenage dream' which create
a girly, upbeat and funfilled video's combining with the
song to create succesful colobaration products creating
great advertisement for her releases and appealing to
a specific fan base- teenage girls 10-18 years.
Another obvious artist who uses her personality in music videos
to really entise the advertisement package and to appeal o the popular fanbase that is teenage girls is Lady Gaga.
Nowadays I get the impretion that the sort of music fans which the sort of 'band practice' music video (like the beatles)
DETAILED ANALYSIS OF "YOUR SONG" by Ellie Goulding
DETAILED ANALYSIS OF "YOUR SONG" by Ellie Goulding
Another main them encapsualted by the video, is the lush scenery. Farms, fields and forests are the main locations when filmed for Your Song:
Your Song originally sung by Elton John, and covered by Ellie Goulding is our main inspirtion behind our coursework; it is the focal point upon which we base our ideas for our own Pop Video.
Location shots establish the setting and place for example Ellie's video related to her hometown Hereford
The video also displays a variety of natural shots, filmed in the studio or at home where Ellie is in her natural environment. Her character is relaxed and non-staged. A feel that we want to emulate in our own video, although we are aware that we run the risk of producing an amateur, lazy video which is far form what we intend to do.
Use of natural light in the video, is just dreamy. Creating a angelic, homemade feel. the way sunlight has been position in relation to the camera illustrated the a 'hazy british autumn' which comes across beautifully. See the pictures below as examples of how the light is captured and used to produce effect:
