Evaluation - Chip James

A04 - Unit 18 Evaluation

For unit 18 we were tasked with creating a music video, which would be released to promote our short film from unit 23. We worked in smaller groups for this task and as such I worked with Bo Kelly and Bryony Pearce, with Olivia Robinson joining in with our group for meetings and discussion of ideas as she was working on our own, this meant that my group would help her set up and film certain scenes as a part of her crew, or aid her in any decisions she was unsure about with her own project. Within this group I was tasked as the chief editor, while Bo and Bryony were co-directors and cinematographers, however overall we each partook in every element of the production.

I feel our video is effective in creating meaning and meeting typical conventions of a rock music video, such as the use of the band for the majority of the footage, using a lot of close ups of the main singer and instrument shots and showing the band performing the song. The use of professional lighting and the HD cameras worked well to create stylistic close ups of individual musicians and the overall lighting and colours used conveyed the messages we were intending to convey, namely love and mystery, with the light getting darker during the darker sides of the narrative and song.

The shortcomings for our vide are in some lip-syncing moments where the footage is synced properly but due to how the singer was singing, looks slightly out of time, despite on playback he is saying the same words, to fix this problem we would have needed to set up the entire studio and organise the band again for a reshoot, but because of deadlines this wasn’t possible for my group, however in future projects I will ensure that filming gets organised sooner so there is always this option if it arises again, however as Unit 18 is the last practical unit on the course, this will be a lesson I will take forward with me to university and any projects I take on there.

Another shortcoming is the fact our video doesn’t use a lot of our original short film footage, this was a group decision as we felt we could work better with fresh material that had links to our original short film, as well as including its name and directly promoting in specific sections of the music video. We also felt the original footage wasn’t of a high quality, which was an aspect we wanted within our music video, where we focused on using the HD industry cameras alongside professional lighting to give the raw footage we captured the best and most professional polish possible.

When we handed out questionnaires our target audience (who are late teenagers aged 15-25) specifically said they preferred rock music, this aided us into the decision for our chosen song. There are also similar genres featured within our short film, meaning a link could be made through the genre of music. Our target audience also said they mainly watched music videos on Kerrang, as such my group researched a lot into Kerrang’s house style and the style of the videos they show on the channel. From this we incorporated certain elements that we found from these videos, namely the use of professional lights for band shots, in particular having the lights in shot to give it a ‘studio’ feel. We also featured a love story narrative with a twist at the end of the couple breaking up, as Kerrang’s typical target audience are late teenagers (15-25) having a narrative around love will appeal to them as they are forming relationships themselves around this age, a further link can also be made through the ages of the actors we used, as all of them are around 18, teenagers will be able to relate to them through their appearance and mannerisms.

I feel that as a group we worked effectively, although we came across a number of obstacles during the production process. The most notable of which are the wait we had for song permission, as all the bands we had contacted before Christmas, still hadn’t replied to us when the process began, meaning we had to plan general ideas and held back storyboarding until we had a clear plan of action and a song we could use. One band had contacted us requesting money for song permission, but as we are on a low budget we had to decline. To overcome this we simply had to use a song without permission but not post it publically on public video sharing sites such as YouTube, however for the sake of the course there is an unlisted option on YouTube now, meaning we could post it copyright free for the purposes of our blog. However in professional practise we would need to secure song permission, but this could have been organised as professionally we would have had a budget for the production, meaning we could pay for song permission.

Another obstacle we faced was securing musicians and equipment for the band shoot, as we organised a time to film, we had the permission to use a drum kit revoked from us as it was being used for someone else’s coursework, and the band members then didn’t show up to the shoot anyway, despite us deciding to carry on without a drum kit. However we overcame this obstacle by persevering and getting permission to borrow a drum kit from a friend of the groups and organising the musicians so they definitely knew about the shoot and knew to show up. This led to an efficient shoot, which ran well and looked good on camera.

For the band scene, we decided to film with a 3 camera set up, one on tracks, one on a tripod and one hand held, we ran 4 separate takes of the song so we could capture as much of the band as we possibly could for the video. We did this for the purposes of efficiency as well as to practise professional filming styles, as in reality a multiple camera set up will be used to shorten shooting time and aid continuity as the same actions will be recorded but from different angles. When filming the narrative sequences however, we opted to use Bryony’s personal HD camera, this was to add another style to the overall footage and help divide the band and narrative shots through the style of filming as well as how the different cameras capture footage.

In further projects I will ensure that filming is planned properly days before the shoot is planned to take place, to ensure that actors and equipment are secured before filming, this will save time that could be better spent on other elements of a production. I will also continue to use professional lighting for this desired artistic effect, however I will take into consideration the text I am creating to make sure the professional lighting is relevant.

In conclusion I feel this unit was successful, with obstacles to face as there are in all projects, as a group we overcame every one, be it a problem with song permission, or organising for a shoot, and eventually created a professional looking music video that follows the conventions of our desired genre of music. One key area for improvement for our video would be to make the video more apparent that it is promoting our short film, rather than referencing it a couple of times and using themes from it.