Testing Animation

Now we have decided to use animation we spent an hour testing out how it would work and talking out the sequence. We are definitely using post-its to do our animation and we have decided to use them to create images that reflect lyrics of the song. We will be showing them on a wall behind Jack, but we have also decided that we don't want Jack to be animated, because of the issue of lip-syncing. Therefore, we have decided to record him separately playing the song the whole way through in different shots, (ms,cu,ls) on a blue screen then doing the animation separately, again on a blue screen, then layering them in edit. That way it will look like the animation is happening on a wall behind him, but he will still be live action.

We have tested out animation using post-its on a fairly small space and now know that when we actually come to film it we will need a big floor space for the animation, because of the size of the post-its and the shapes that we want to make. So now we have to find a space, (which will probably the lecture theatre) where we can set up and film our animation. Hopefully, we will be able to get the room for an entire day so that we can do it all at the same time, so it all looks consistent and the post-its don't get moved.

The post-its will be done on the floor on some blue card (instead of blue screen, because it needs to be completely flat to work properly), as we feel that this is probably the easiest way to do this. Therefore, we need to get the camera up high, which hopefully won't be too difficult to do as we think we can get a tripod that will reach the height we need.

One of the next things we need to do is work out timings for each image and how long we need them to last in order for them to appear in the right part of the song. 

This is a tester we did:

From this we now know that when it comes to filming the actual animation parts, we will have to do it on a much bigger scale, because of the size of the post-it notes. For the tester we worked with two frames for each image and we think that this is the speed we need for the animation. Apart from this, we are fairly happy that the animation won't be too difficult to do once we figure out what colour post-its we want for each image and how the images will flow into one another. We may have to do a few more test shots before the filming of the actual animation just so we can work these things out properly.

Storyboard

This is our storyboard for our music video. Animation is going to be used for a majority of the video, and so will be one long continuous shot as the animation happens behind Jack. There will be long, medium and close up shots too of Jack so that the artist becomes recognisable. From a label's point of view this is one of the most important things because it gets the artist recognition, therefore makes this a convention of most music videos across genres. 

What we want to do with animation

The animation we are going to do is obviously going to be on a much smaller scale than the Coldplay video. We researched more videos using this style, but on a smaller scale.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ua9a7-PnHUU&feature=related

This one uses mainly Skittles, but also writing and drawing. This is the kind of thing we are thinking about doing. We have had the idea of using newspaper letters to create words or maybe doing drawings like in this video. 

One of the videos we were shown was using post-it notes. We thought this could be a good thing to use, because they are cheap to buy and you can easily buy them in bulk at a cheap price. We researched further into what we could do by using these for the animation. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZtxHOfmhH4
From seeing this, the idea we are thinking about at the moment is using post-its to create our animation, by creating images on a blank wall, much like it has been done here. The images would be references to the song and illustrate the lyrics. 

This is another stop animation video we found that we thought was really effective:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOQJEcHDKGc&feature=related

Stop Motion Animation

We recently had a lesson on how to do stop motion animation in case it was something that we would be interested in. This video we watched is by a South American artist:

After having a lesson on animation, we have decided to consider it for our music video. It has been used in music videos before, close to our genre, for example Coldplay - Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall. The music video uses a stop motion technique and was directed by Mat Whitecross. They use drawings/painting as their medium like the BLU street art and done a mixture of lyrics and images. 

Although the use of animation may not be a typical convention, the video still uses conventions of music videos by having band performance and having shots of them individually and all together. Throughout the video the focus is mainly on the band. Chris Martin is still lip syncing to the camera, which is a typical convention, even though it is animated. They also have their unique designs on their instruments, which has become an icon of the band, especially since this album, Mylo Xyloto came out in 2011.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fyMhvkC3A84 

The performance in this video has two parts; firstly, with the use of stop motion and secondly, with the use of slow motion techniques as well as strobe lighting and vibrant  colours.

We think it could be something different that we could add to our video as not a lot of music videos use stop motion. 

Obviously the Coldplay one is an example of animation being used a a large scale. Also they have decided to use stop motion animation when Chris Martin is singing which is incredibly hard, because of getting the lip syncing right. For us it would probably be better for us to keep the animation separate from the performance, because that will take a lot of time for us to get right a number of test shots. 

Final Song Choice

We decided to go with the second song, 'One Side Of The Story', as we found it a lot easier to come up with ideas for the video and the narrative. The song is in a similar genre, but we think it would now classed and indie rock, however, this does have cross overs with rock and soft rock, so the conventions for music videos are mainly the same. The two videos I analysed in the genre were sometimes referred to as soft rock and other times as indie, so the genres do contain a lot of the same elements.

The next step is to develop our ideas and feedback to the artist. We know that we would like to do a video with both narrative and performance of some kind. As the genre is indie rock, we are not going to try and come up with a massively complicated idea, because it isn't really a convention for music videos of this genre. 

Second song choice (lyrics)

 One Side Of The Story

    Jack Simmons

Verse 1:

Can you hear the whispers? Rumours multiplying,

Everybody’s Talking, Behind your back,

But you only know one thing and thats that you're not alone,

I'm sure Hundreds have been through this

before.

Chorus:

But you only know one side of the story

I know you don't know which direction to take

But you only hear the wrong side of the story

still you judge, you make up your mind.

 

Verse 2:

        This is the worst place to be right now

       Your misery feeds their souls

       You have to just keep you head above ground

     Ignore whatever they say

Chorus

Verse 3:

  Two faced, loose tongues full of lies

 I Hope you are one of a kind

  you really stretch me you can get in my mind

      All I know is karma will get you in time

  Chorus

    Interlude

    
    Chorus (end)

Now you wish you knew both side of the story.

Analysis:

• Written in second person as well as first, unlike the first one, which was more just about him.
• Its quite an easy thing to relate to for the majority, which helps to develop a singer/listener relationship (especially with the question at the beginning, it sounds like he is addressing them) and can establish a fan base.
• Negative syntax throughout, matching genre of soft rock.
• Slightly unconventional lyrics/meaning, because it doesn’t reference love which a lot of soft rock songs do.
• The song itself is at the moment an acoustic song, so the video shouldn’t be made too complicated with a fast pace narrative for example, to match the tone of the song.
• It follows conventions by telling a story which a lot of songs in this genre do.
• I think that it is easier to think of imagery for this song than the first one, so it might be easier to come up with a concept.

Target Audience

Our target audience is people of our age - about 16+. We chose this audience because we found that a lot of people our age are currently listening to new artists like Ed Sheeran and Ben Howard, which is quite like our artist. It is also young people that are more likely to listen to new artists before they have been fully established, because they are also the target audience for a lot of music magazines and they are more likely to go to their gigs, because they are cheaper than established bands playing in big venues. 

For example, Benjamin Francis Leftwhich has currently been doing local shows in Oxford and Birmingham which a lot of people my age that I know have been to. He's currently the new artist that everyone loves and is talking about. When asking some older adults who he was, most of them didn't know. They also said that they don't go to many, if any, gigs anymore or read music magazines, so they don't hear about small, new artists.