Symbolism - 'Alice in Wonderland'

Here is a vlog to explaining our 'Alice in Wonderland' symbolism idea that we think would be great in our music video...

The Start of Filming

Finally got the ball rolling and filming started! Before heading out to film, we decided to thoroughly plan as we felt it would be easier and would enable us to get good shots and usable footage for our music video. We discussed various aspects, such as mise-en-scene, cinematography and the location that we all felt would be suitable for the notion we are aiming for. Also, the timing was an important aspect as filming early in the morning allowed the shots to appear fresh, creating a crisp setting.

MISE-EN-SCENE

Our main protagonist in our music video is Rosie, we want her to appear as an individual, dressing differently to her family (as will be seen in the dinner scene) portraying her as an 'outsider' isolated from society and on a journey to find herself. Mise-en-scene is an important aspect in any music video, so we decided that she would wear quirky clothing. As seen in these photographs, the colours appear quite solemn, however the jumper brightens the outfit up, as well as 'Alice in Wonderland' on the jumper being similar to her character.

             

CINEMATOGRAPHY/LOCATION

Various shots were captured whilst filming, here is a preview of one of the many shots. As a group we discussed the fact that the use of wide shots would be perfect for an establishing shot, opening up our music video. As seen in this clip, the location of Forty Hall is very empty, highlighting the fact that Rosie is on her own. Also, throughout the clip, the lighting of the sky gradually changes, illustrating a period of time and creating an interesting shot. Panning shots was another use of cinematography that worked successfully, displaying our female protagonist as well as her surroundings.

Filming Plans

So after waking up around 7 to this amazing pink sky this morning, we decided that tomorrow would be a great morning to film at Forty Hall as hopefully this weather would continue. We plan too get various shots of Rosie walking through the grounds of Forty Hall, as well as close ups and many others. Fingers crossed for good weather! 

 

Music Controversy (Part 2)

Two of the most commonly talked about artists and videos in the previous article, were Miley Cyrus' 'Wrecking Ball' and Lily Allen's 'Hard Out Here.' Both current music videos express a strong message although very different in some cases. 'Wrecking Ball' has caused a lot of controversy in the media, due to the image that Miley Cyrus is portraying, many arguing that it is inappropriate  for our screens. Lily Allen on the other hand, displays a very pro-feminist song and video, it has a gained a lot of negative press. However, although Miley Cyrus and Lily Allen have been slated a lot of in the public eye, they have expanded their publicity, perhaps a purpose stunt. These are all factors that have been discussed in the previous article.

Music Controversy

This article from http://petesmediablog.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/music-video-controversy.html was really interesting to read and gave me a great insight into the controversy surrounding many music videos throughout various eras, especially focusing on the more recent. Pete discusses current issues and the problem that society has with them and the lengths they will go to in order for them not to be exposed to the public, especially young children. However, he also illustrates the opinion of the producers and artists to show what message they were aiming to express to the public. 

Album Task

The task this week we had to have a practice at creating a piece of album art work, the folowing stages are explanations and techniques I used to create my album cover:

 

1. Get a band name: We had to use a random name that came up on a wiki link, I feel that 'The Accreditation Institution' wasn't actually that bad as it could be suitable for a band of somesort.

 

2. Get an album title: For this, again a random quote was presented and we had to select the last four or five words. However, although 'shake hands with a clenched fist' sounds a bit wordy for an album title, I do like it as it doesn't make complete sense as that action would be impossible. This aspect though is quite fitting for an album title as album titles are often quite misleading and strange, 

 

3. Get your image: Again, for the image it was a random choice on Flickr, having to choose the third photograph that came up. This woodland scene was quite easy to use as its simplicity meant that it was appropriate for most album overs and easy to work with, not displaying too much of a notion for the band name and album cover to fit with.

 

4. Drop image and words into Photoshop:We then had to get creative and adjust the image and text how we wanted to. For the image, I decided to keep it simple and just invert the image. I feel this looked good for the cover, as it highlights particular aspects of the image, as well as giving a solemn and eerie feel. This fitted in with the text as the words 'institution' and 'clenched' initially has a negative feel to them. For the text, again I kept it very basic and clear in order to be readible when ontop of the image. Therefore, I used, white bold text, capitalising the band name, yet keeping the album title text small so that the focus is on the band.
 

So here is the final album cover i created, yes it is a bit blurry, but im sure the real artwork will be a lot better!

Lorde - Royals

After watching this music video from Lorde, i found a lot of inspiration from this video, the majority of shots in it are great! I love how simple and basic it is, but yet so effective. The use of still shots in a sequence are so simple, however i think they look great and highlight particular aspects. In our music video i think we should have shots like this as Lorde's concept is quite similar as she is perhaps showing how she's not conforming to societys ideas of what is expected and an outsider to the materialistic world. The bedroom shot especicially, would work really well with Rosie, giving an idea that she is the focus, but alone in the world, these shots illustrating this.