Evaluation 1 (Writing)

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

During our research, we viewed many other metal core music videos, mainly by bands such as Parkway Drive and Bullet for My Valentine. During this, we discovered the main conventions of metal core portrayed within these music videos. These included things such as domestic issues such as violence and neglect, a mixture of narrative and performance style of video and dark lighting to convey entrapment etc. Therefore, we ventured to use these very conventions in order to create a music video that would clearly suit its genre.

Dark themes are highlighted in our video through dark lighting and desaturated images. We also felt it was best to show a release from the abuse our character suffers to give some hope to the audience, as they may also be going through the same thing and therefore need some support. Similar themes of abuse and release can be found in the video ‘Cigarettes and Saints’ by The Wonder Years. In which, the female character is escaping from a supposed difficult domestic situation, however this part of the narrative is not focused on as it is in our video. However, other videos by Beartooth do focus on the tougher aspects of life, such as the video for ‘Beaten in Lips’ which highlights the issues of domestic violence.

A mixture of narrative and performance in music videos are also a common convention in the metal core genre which we felt would be a good to carry on, as it both showcases the band’s talent and portrays an effective narrative. The narrative and performance should, however, link in some way, as they have done in the video for ‘Never Lose Your Flames’ by Issues, as both parts of the video have similar lighting, and similar location. Similarly, our narrative and performance link through the use of dark and desaturated lighting, and the setting of a dark alley represents the anger and torment the character feels in the narrative. However, the performance is in the dark whereas all the narrative is in the daytime which separates them to give a distinction between the two so that the audience does not confuse between them.

Our music video develops conventions of other metal core videos in the fact that we use shaky camera to portray a vivid imagery of the pain the character is feeling. We include fast-paced close-ups while the main character is being abused, which is similarly done in the music video for ‘Love the Way You Lie’ by Eminem and Rihanna. To portray a broken atmosphere full of pain and fear. The use of a hand-held camera is common in this genre of music video, as they often portray similar atmospheres and emotions, similar to the movement of the camera in the video for ‘Come out Swinging’ by The Wonder Years. Therefore the use of these movements, mise-en-scene and lighting in our music video is to highlight common features in other videos for this genre and thus make it recognisable to the audience.

Digipak: Roles

	Fern	Alice
Front cover	Composition of front cover - where the titles looked best on the front composed the image for front cover chose the font for the front cover	took the image for the front cover edited the image onto the cover
Back cover	chose the background image and put the image onto the back chose handwritten style font	wrote the copyright note at bottom of page took the image for back cover wrote the song titles on the page
Lyric page	wrote the lyric page chose to use the same background	chose to use the same front
Note from Richard Skerratt	wrote the note from Richard Skerratt	came up with the idea for the note
Image of Richard Skerratt	took the image of Richard Skerratt	came up with the idea of the picture composed the image
Poster	came up with the idea to use the image of Richard Skerratt	edited the poster together

Problem Solutions

Solutions to small problems included:

• Holding up paper with lyrics on for the the verses the performer did not know
• Rescheduling filming dates around illnesses, weather and dates when actors needed to be together.
• Finding new locations for better footage.

Main Problems (Lighting and Weather):

For our issue with lighting, we had to use another location as the alleyway we wanted originally had no street lights and our small torches would not have cast enough light for the footage to be usable. We also had to film twice to improve footage, taking the same lights each time but with a plan on the second date to use more of the street lighting as it provided better footage. We also made more use of a tripod which meant footage looked clearer so that the only blur was created by the lighting, which we could later colour correct if needed. This footage from our secondary filming is significantly better thanks to these changes and by manipulating the light provided, namely that cast by the street light, we emerged with lots of good night time footage. Moreover to even out the changing lighting we added the filter "Cold Steel" which made the footage look more professional and removed any golden glows which would not have suited the rock genre.

Original footage: Filmed without tripod and using
less street light

Secondary Footage: Filmed with a tripod to create
 steadier footage and filmed directly under street light.

Our weather problem was not solved so easily as we could not keep delaying filming certain shots. Eventually we had to film sections at times when not everybody was available, just to get the footage. We also had to adjust the character's outfit to work around the weather as even on days when there was no rain, the ground was still muddy from the day before.  This meant giving our actress Wellies and not filming a scene where she was supposed to trip over so that she did not get too muddy. Fortunately, when we did film the day stayed clear and we were able to get good golden hour footage.

Problems Encountered

Other than scheduling problems our filming process has run rather smoothly. Smaller problems included actors not learning lyrics and not being able to film on the same days as other actors however, we had expected such issued and prepared for them. Our largest issues on the other hand, where not so easily solved, they included:

• Lighting - For the footage filmed at night we had hoped to have small battery powered floodlights to heighten the light around our performer.  However, we were unable to obtain these and had to rely on street lights, phone lights and small L.E.D torches. This created a number of problems as it meant that to have the required amount of light, the source occasionally appeared in the clips. A large majority of our earlier footage had to be scrapped because of this and often appeared dark and discoloured. 

The lighting in this appears very different from the other footage for example,
 as it was filmed directly under a street light.

• Weather - We misjudged how significantly the weather would impact our product. As a large number of clips were filmed outside we had to cancel and rearrange many of our filming dates around the rain.  This meant a lot of our editing had to be delayed as we needed the extra footage to continue with the process. With hindsight, we would have tried to film earlier in the season in hope that the weather would have been better.

This was filmed after a rainy day, the path was extremely muddy and our actor had to wear wellies, which changed the appearance of her costume. We also had to scrap a scene where she was supposed to trip as the ground would have ruined the outfit. 

Techniques: Dolly Zoom

A Dolly Zoom is where the camera is moved backward at the same rate as being zoomed in or vice versa. It is used regularly in films to creates a feeling of disembodiment and unreality, a theme which is used regularly throughout our production to the show the disembodiment of the lead character. 

We really wanted to include a dolly zoom in our product because of this and attempted several dolly zooms within our test footage to add variety to our shots. The result was not as smooth as we would have liked but the trial strengthened our eagerness to include a dolly zoom within our final product.

As you can see the dolly zoom is still very shaky, despite the addition of the stabilization tool in final cut.  This tool made the footage more blurry and distorted but fortunately it does not appear too out of place with the aggressive music. However, in our final product we would still like to have a smoother shot so that the footage appears to glide on.

Famous examples of the Dolly Zoom include:

• Alfred Hitchcock's film 'Vertigo', where the effect was first used by Irmin Roberts.

The two short moments where dolly zoom is used in the film, elevates the fear of the characters and exaggerates the height they are at.  It accurately creates the sense of falling and thus oppose the effect we wish to create in our own production where we want the background to move away from our character to show the character's disjointed view of reality. 

• Stephen Spielberg's 'Jaws'

This is more similar to how we want our production's dolly zoom to appear as it shows the background moving away from the character. However, whereas this has been used to show a dawning realisation we will use ours to show our character's physical and emotional separation from reality. 

Final Video (Fern O'Gorman and Alice Sandom)

We were surprised when we realized our piece was ready to be named a final cut.  We had changed the colour correction, re-filmed some strangling shots and cut and cropped scenes throughout.  With the benefit of hindsight however, we would have like to film more shots with a tripod just so that the shots were more focused and balanced. On the other hand, we are very happy with how the music video has turned out. We feel the choppiness and the interchanging elements enhance the rock genre and we feel that there is a sense of continuity as the shots appear in a subtle pattern.  

Rough Cut

Our rough cut displayed our clips predominantly in the order we wanted them. However, in order to get some clips placed more precisely on a beat, we realized we would need to re-order some of our footage and scrap some of the material.  Our feedback was to:

• Colour correct - We were aware some clips appeared discoloured, but were unsure as to which ones needed the most correction.  Eventually, we decided to focus the majority of our editing on the scenes filmed inside as these had too much of a soft glow for the rock genre of music.
• Crop - In order to give the footage variety it was suggested we cropped the size of some clips so that the performers face was larger and thus the intensity of his singing increased. 
• Shorten - Some clips were too long or off beat. We decided to shorten these clips so that they fitted better with the music and built more tension during chase scenes.
• Add titles - Although our music video is not cinematic it was suggested we added at least a small title naming the song, as this is a convention of music videos that we were unaware off. 

One thing we noticed particularly was how more intense shaky shots appeared off of final cut, this led to us debating on whether or not to remove some footage or to at least shorten it to reduce this undesired effect.