Editing

Today we spent 10 hours on editing and completing our video, we also started and finished the digipack of the album cover (back and front), the inside pages and promotional poster.
We all spent time editing the video to start off with; putting all of our clips together, deciding on which ones to use and when, however after a few hours we decided that we should take it in turns and start on the digipack. Jasmine carried on with editing the video whilst Chris and I started on the album cover. However we both did the front cover and had to do a vote on which one we would use, people preffered my version as it was more fitting with the punk genre and Chris agreed. After this communication problem, and as Jasmine was doing well with editing the video, we decided that Chris would start on the back of the album cover and I would start on the pages to go on the inside of the album. In the last two hours, I finished the poster and helped Chris and Jasmine with the video editing. We added a watermark to it and put the digipack onto the Mac's so that we could burn it all onto one disc. Using iDVD we put both medias onto the DVD and made the main menu fit in with the punk genre.
This was a very successful day as wel managed to finish everything and make sure it was as good as we could make it.

Final Shots

During our free periods today we filmed the last of our shots, for the lyrics of 'it's only as far as the eyes can see' First of all we went to the sixth form block and asked three girls if we could use them to film their eyes, we blocked out the light at the end of the corridor and used the light on the camera. They stood close to the camera and we told them to look around and the back at the camera. These are very shot shorts, but should look effective when we have edited them in.
Finally, we went to the art department and drew one of the eyes on a piece of paper using paint, then brushing over it so that it is not longer visible, when we edit this we will reverse it so that it looks as though the eye appears from the paint. The second eye was drawn on a whiteboard. For this one, we wanted it to look as though it was a wink, therefore I drew it open first, and then closed. When we come to edit this, we will speed it up and make it look as though it is a wink. For the last one, I wrote the letters one by one on a large piece of paper, to make up the words of the lyrics. Jasmine and Chris then filmed each letter and when we edit this it will flow quickly. This will take a long time, but will hopefully look good.

Filming short shots

Throughout the week we have been filming the shots that go inbetween the performance. First of all we filmed me for the shot of the megaphone using the same lighting and positioning as we did for Jasmine's 'Gimme, Gimme' shot so that it all connects and flows. This only took four trys to get lip syncing in time as we played the lyric of 'won't listen pretty mama, won't you hear my plea, got me on my knees' until it was right, out of this we got two useable shots.
After this we filmed the shot for 'your older brother said we're way too loud' using Chris, another group member, again using the same lighting and positioning. We also played the part of the song and got two useable shots.
Two days after these shots we filmed a friend being a neighbour and a teacher being a policeman for the 'might be your neighbour or the crooked 5-0' lyric. We used a policeman's hat from the drama studio and gave Mr Fletcher a long black coat and a shirt and tie, this made him look like a policeman from the original era of punk. For the neighbour we found a long green coat, a hat and a stick so that he looked like an angry old man.
We then went to Bishop's Stortford to film another friend running down the highstreet for the 'now they're runnin after me, like the right hand of the law' lyric. To get this shot, we used a monopod and waited until there were no cars. Olly then ran down the highstreet in front of shop windows as the lights were on, we asked him to look behind him and make it look as though he was being chased.
We will upload these shots on monday and start editing.

Filming the band

Today we filmed the band at the youth centre in Bishop's Stortford. We decided to do this at around 7pm as we knew it would be darker and therefore our lighting behind the drummer would look more effective. We set up the mise en scene whilst the band prepared to play the song by moving the microphone stands and wires so that they would fit into our shot. We wanted the mise en scene to look low budget as when we did the audience research into what they wanted to see, this is what they said. To do this, we used the black sheet we borrowed from the drama studio and hung it from pipes behind the band and found a white cage to put up to add to the punk image. We used an industrial work light and put it facing the drummer so that the camera would not pick up just the light, and the band would be seen. We asked the band to wear a shirt with skinny jeans and maybe a tie or jacket so that it would fit in with the style of punk and I think it looked very realistic as they already have an edge, we just added to their look, we also asked them not to do much with their hair and to make it messy. Using two cameras meant we could get two different types of shot per playing of the song, therefore we only needed the band to play the song twice in order to get four different camera angles.
Overall the day went well and next lesson we will upload this footage to the mac's and hopefully start editing.

Filming Jasmine

Today we filmed Jasmine for the shots with the 'gimme gimme' lyrics which is sang three times within the song, and as it amplifys the lyrics it is quite important to the video. I think this went well and because Jasmine is in our group, she knew what we wanted to do to how we wanted it to look, meaning we got the shots we wanted. We made sure that the drama studio would be private for Jasmine by making signs to go on the doors and checking there was no one in the dressing room for when she wanted to get changed. To make sure the writing would show up on camera we did a test on my arm using two different pens and decided on the thicker one, I then wrote onto Jasmines back, stomach and arm. We will upload these clips as soon as possible and start cutting them and putting them in time with the lyrics.

Summary of filming the first scene

We filmed the first section of our music video on Monday, this went well due to the whole group pulling their weight and all having an input in to the organisation before hand and also during filming, with Clarice and I setting up the scene, and then while I set up the camera equipment and tested the it with the lighting Jasmine and Clarice dressed the numerous actors we had for the shot. Setting up consisted of clearing Clarice's dinning area moving the table and chairs out of sight and removing anything from the room that could get broken. We then placed a few chairs around the room, especially the armchair as it was to be the focus point as it would be where our "goon" would be sitting and so this had to be placed accordingly for the shot. For mise en scene we placed alcholic drinks made up of empty bottles filled with different strengths of tea to achieve realistic colouring and bottles of beer for some of the actors to drink to keep an effective feel to the shot seeing as we were filming during the afternoon.

Camera equipment consisted of my Panasonic SD-10 with a 0.43x Wide Angle lens. The lighting then consisted of blacking out the windows using spare curtains from the drama studio, a strobe light set up behind the camera to give the impression of the party that we wanted and the built in light on the camera to draw focus to the subject. The actors were arranged so that I could still walk through what seemed to be a crowd and still be able to film the vital sections of the shot. Jasmine and Clarice featured in the shots and because of this could give instant feedback on anything that wasn't working from a different perspective. This meant that we got 16 shots, many of which contained usable footage for the important first few seconds of our video.

Evaluation of filming the party scene

We filmed the first part of our music video on Monday, althought it only takes a few lines of the song we had to film a lot as will be made faster. Also as we were using actors we wanted to get a few takes and pick the best.
From research we new what people at the party needed to wear to fit into the style of music, we brought some of these with us, to get people to wear. These were some of our own and some we borrowed from school. For exapmple jackets, skinny jeans and leather.
We also put dark make up on females as well as giving people messy hair.
Although there was one character which had to look different, we did this to emphasise his part.
We used old alcoholic bottles and boxes for props, and a big black sheet for blocking out light. This didnt work very successfully, but we worked around it.
Overall i think the filming went well, we got a lot of good footage ready for editing.

Evaluation of filming the first scene

We filmed the scene of the party on Monday. Chris used his HD camera and I gave everyone punk style clothing to wear so that all the people at the party fitted in and looked similar. However we asked the goon to wear chavier style clothing so that he stuck out and would be noticed as being different. We had the first problem of only having one black curtain to cover the windows, however this was very effective on the main window, we used a dustsheet from Chris' house to cover the other window but saw that it was not dark enough, however we solved this problem but using green tarpauling as well, tucked into the edge of the doors which we then closed to keep it all secure.
I had empty bottles of Jack Daniels, however this was not enough so we asked people to bring some if they had them, which we filled up with tea so it matched the colours of the original liquid, we scattered these around the room so that it would look more like a typical teenagers party, I think this idea turned out quite well.
We put on music from my laptop, played it through speakers and asked people to dance, talk and just act as they would if they were at at party. Chris walked around with the camera using many different angles whilst people were doing this, however we did not tell them that they were being filmed so that it would look less staged and more realistic, hopefully when we edit all of our shots together and fast forward this scene everything will fit.
Overall, I think it was a successful day of filming as we filmed many shots so that we had a lot to choose from, everything turned out as we wanted. We will bring these shots in on tuesday and upload them to the mac's so we can see what we have.