Planning and Production
The theme for this project is "Surfaces". I have created a Mood Board and Mindmap on this theme to help define the term "surfaces" to myself and give me an idea of what path to take during this FMP.
The theme for this project is "Surfaces". I have created a Mood Board and Mindmap on this theme to help define the term "surfaces" to myself and give me an idea of what path to take during this FMP.
The brief of this explains that we have many options and much freedom to make a product of our choice. We have been asked to create a Digital Image, Music Video, Short Film, Short Documentary, Digital Journal, or an Advertising Campaign.
Initial Ideas
To give me the choice, I have decided to come up with initial ideas for 4 different briefs.
Short Film
My inital idea when I saw this option was to create a film I thouht up at GCSE level. It was a horror film called "The Brook". It is the story of 3 teens who stumble upon an abandoned warehouse after being followed and toyed with by the red-faced, hooded creature. As I have already came up with a plot and a script for this, I would be a very good starting point for this brief to create something to be proud of.
Digital Image
I could make a film poster at professional standard of a Superhero film. I could create a character and persona and portray a storyline through the backdrop and cadance of the poster. I can include explosions, skyscrapers, large fonts, and bold vocabulary to grab the audiences attention. I have done something similar to this at GCSE level to I can bring my skills from then and my developed photoshop skills to this breif to give me a good head start.
Music Video
This breif will allow me to continue developing my video editing skills on after effects and will be most beneficial for my aspirations for after college. I could record a video on an original song or I could chose a song that already has a music video and instead represent the song in a different way than the already created music video. Put my own spin on it. I can take inspiration from Cole Bennett and Nicholas Jandora who created "Lil Skies - Lust" music video.
Documentry
An idea I had when seeing this option was to create a documentry on an urgent matter. It could be about global warming, litterling, mental health, recent politics, racism and sexism and more topics like this. Doing this would take a vast amount of research and preperation before I go into the public and ask the civilians as I would not want to offend anybody with my lack of knowledge on all topics.
I have chosen this example of a short film as I believe it represents what you can do on a small budget in a short period of time. There are no extraordinary special effects and big budget quality, however, the illusions are still very effective, the transitions work, and the video is a good, enjoyable watch. If I was to make "The Brook", I would take inspiraiton from this video by keeping the budget low and keeping the effects to a minimal to create a sense of realism. Which in a horror film, is very effective in getting the audience frightened. The target audience for this type of video would be young adults on platforms like YouTube, Reddit, or Vimeo.
These examples symbolise the perfect stereotypical superhero poster used in the main stream media. Large explosions, fire, dramatic colours and tones, large fonts and well known characters that lure the audience in to wanting to watch the full film. When creating my own, I will stricly stick to these conventions to make sure that I can keep the epic cadance that these professional creators manage to give off. I will do research into what fonts they use and how to write credits for posters as well. Using rule of thirds in my poster as well is a great way to align and take the focus of the audience. The target audience is anybody who is interested in the Marvel, DC, or superhero world. This ranges from young kids to even pensioners.
I have chosen this music video as in my opinion, it is the best storytelling video I have ever seen. The lyrics tell a story from one persons perspective, while the video tells a story from the other persons. The cinematography and camerawork is very well done, and the mix of closeups, medium shots, and long shots are all very effective in portraying emotion within the video which is important when the lyrics speak about serious mental health problems and how it affects others. I especially enjoy the shot of Quadeca in the rain as it clearly shows how much he struggles with what he is talking about and how much he doesnt care if he gets wet or ruins anything around him. The target audience for this would be young teens who are struggling with mental health but also like listening to Hip-Hop/Rap.
I like this short documentry as it talks about a very interesting topic that we barely ever hear about. As it is sometimes hard to film the faces of the prisoners, I like how they have still included their voices as you can hear the mass amount of emotion in their voices that makes the audience realise how well off they are and might even make them feel a bit of sympathy which these types of people rarely see. If I was to make my own documentry like this, I would take inspiration by makng sure I portray emotion as well as I can and put as much information in as sort of a time span as possible. The target audience for this would be a slightly older age range as it is about something more mature and children wouldnt take it as seriosusly as it should be taken. Adults.
The Idea
For my final FMP, I have chosen the music video brief. I have chosen this as it will give me an opportunity to keep practicing my video editing skills and using effects specifically for music videos. I believe my transitions needs more work especially so this brief is the best one for that as well. This brief gives me an opportunity to delve deeper into after effects to create a more stylistic effect with colours and transitions. I will embrase the theme of surfaces by trying to use mirrors and water reflections in my video as well as making it widely available to watch on multiple platforms and devices. The song I have chosen an original song called "I Dare You". Its a song about the theme of: if you had the chance to do it all again, I dare you to do the same thing to see what happens, and who comes off on top. Its a large metaphor to emphasise how much the character has grown over the last couple months. Its written in the perspective of victim talking to the source of his problems. I will keep this storyline and perspective in mind when storyboarding the music video as I plan to create this story portrayed throughout the video. This will be engaging for the audience as I believe this is a subject many 16-18 year olds can relate to after a childhood heartbreak or something similar. The storyline and deeper meaning implemented in my video should strike my audience well.
To help remember my inital ideas, I decided to storyboard my first 6 scenes that I would like in the video.
DUE TO COVID-19...
...the chances of me completing this inital idea and plan is very slim and unlikely because I am unable to go outside to these locations with lack of travel services and obviously the quarentined lockdown. Therefore, I am going to have to adapt my ideas so that I can complete something within the comfort of my own home.
I will do that by reevaluating what I already have. I would really like to stick with the Music Video idea however, with the song chosen, I belive I will not be able to create a suitable video for the cadance of the song. Rather than 'I Dare You', I am going to be using a song called 'imalreadyinhell'. I have chosen this as my backup song as it is a very dark, and emotional song and to create a music video for it, I can do that simply using shots with dark backgrounds which I can do at home without the need to leave my house. To keep some of my original idea, I am going to stick with the theme of reflections in mirrors and water. The new song is about a similar topic to 'I Dare You' as it highlights the themes of heartbreak and the causes of emotional and mental barriers/abuse. The artist explains feeling hopeless and seeing death as the only option. Judging by the lyrics, we can see that the artist believes that life is the equivalent of being in hell. I will want to convey this message in my video by using very dull and lifeless facial expressions as well as using dark colours and backgrounds. The darkness can be portrayed as seeing inside of the artists mind and stepping into his shoes. I want to make the viewer feel like this. I believe my video will keep its relevancy within my target audince of 16-18 year olds as this is around the age most people have their first heartbreak, lose friends or have experiences that make them feel a similar way. I will not keep the idea of a storyline in my video as this will be an extremely hard task to complete using my house as the only location. I will keep the video very simple to show emotion to hopefully make the viewer feel something.
I decided to listen to the song and storyboard my first inital ideas:
As I had some spare time, I thought that I could get a headstart and create draft video shots for these panels:
This shot was created out of pure coinsodence. While trying to create the last shot, I stared into my camera lens while it was too zoomed in, I looked at the viewfinder and I really liked the shot and thought the dramatic style would work amazing in my video. I storyboarded this addition afterwards (hense the 0.5 instead of the 1). I like this shot so much that I am going to keep this exact scene for my final. I also added text that fades in and out that says "#imalreadyinhell" and "by MAVA". This is going to act as the introduction to my video and will be used at the start, before any singing/rapping has started.
This is the mirror scene. I like the idea of a mirror seeing two of me. As this is a draft, I did not bother to animate/draw a devil on my shoulder. In my final shots, I want to use the paint tool to draw a little devil sitting on my shoulder in the mirror to show off my skills in after effects. It would also be a relevant idea based on the lyrics talking about the devil. The problem with this shot is that I want it to be very dark, but I still need to be able to see myself in the mirror and if it is too dark, my camera will pick up too much noise that the scene will be unusable. I will mess around with different ways of lighting this shot when I go to record it next.
The shot of half my face is a good way to symbolise insecurity as only half of my face would be showing. I will keep the same stylisation of the darkness in the background, however, I will need to also use lighting in this effectively to brighten and bring out the colours and contors of my face appropriately. This is another scene that I will reshoot and try different methods with. But so far, I am happy with my ideas and will be continuing to develop them with improvements as i re-record.