Morris Minor: Lighting and Camera Work Summary

 The Morris Minor, as of now, is our main performance location. This is because after trialling the Band Room location, we felt that something much tighter, varied and professional needed to be used. The two posts have already been seen (below) but they help to show potential lighting set ups for the car. The diagram above shows potential flood lighting set ups and camera angles from the exterior of the car.

Ancillary Task: Magazine Advert Idea 1 Sketches

These are initial sketches for our magazine advert. This has taken influence from our album cover designs, and merging the ideas together has provided some very striking visuals.

Ancillary Task: Digipak Idea 1 Sketches

These Digipak sketches take inspiration from both the music video's themes and also takes inspiration from the simplistic style of the indie bands' album artwork. This set of sketches will give us a feeling for what we want to create as part of our finished product.

The sketches always include the 3 astronauts and also include the use of the Morris Minor which helps to serve as a constant reminder of the themes of exploration.

Ancillary Task: Digipak Inspiration

For our digipak design we have taken inspiration from lots of indie bands and their album art. Normally it bares very little apparent link to the songs inside and instead the artwork has been designed to be striking and eye catching. This is a similar route which we want to go down, as this is a convention of an indie band. Some of our inspirational album covers come from great indie bands such as the Foals, pictured below.

Mood Board for Ancillary Task.

Ancillary Task: Magazine Advert Inspiration

For our magazine advert we wanted to create something eyecatching and quirky. We want the feel of the digipak to flow through the whole advertising campaign, so we may end up using either images of the band and their space helmets or something much more artistic. These are all magazine adverts we have looked to for influences and inspiration.

From what we can see here, the adverts either include an abstract visual style, or the performers. These are both equally as iconic and attractive to consumers, so we could take our ancillary task in any number of directions.

Final Storyboard and Shot List

The final storyboard shows a more detailed look at the shots we are going to use, the locations, props, feel of the scene and the order of scenes that we are aiming to use for our promo video. At this point we have decided to utilise Sam's car instead of the band room so we can show a shot of the band driving into the distance. The final idea will use both outdoors narrative and indoors narrative as well as chorus performance set within the car.

The first shot is the astronauts walking towards the transporter lift. This will help relate the video back to the song and provide the link between the performance and narrative. The astronauts will get into the lift, put their helmets on and transport to the Maxey Lakes location. The astronauts will proceed to explore, and investigate a mysterious shipping container. There will be a performance section for the chorus and then the explorers will transport into the supermarket, in which they will explore the shop with a trolley, mess around with wrapping paper and using it as a lightsabre, inspecting the toy shuttle and other items. A final performance section will take up the back end of the promo, and the final shot will be the band driving off into the sunset.

Shots attached to panels. (number one, top left)
1. Medium shot of Astronauts, close ups of faces, tracking shot easing back with actors walking forwards.
2. Close up, long shot. Foreground: Actors arms, background: the lift. Follows with them walking.
3. A multitude of shots from within the lift, showing details like helmets, the band together and costumes.
4. A close up of the button being pressed, then reaction shots as the actors fade out.
5. The astronauts suit up. Dramatic close ups to show the helmets going on.
6. Fade in! Establishing shot showing the astronauts fading in at Maxey Lakes.
7. Shots of the astronauts exploring. Close, medium, long, pans and match on action.
8. Shots where the explorers find the container and investigate. Close, medium, long and focus change.
9. Performance! The band playing in the car, Tight framing and lots of close ups and interesting angles.
10. Performance! Possible medium shots of the band playing with the car as the backdrop.
11. Medium shots of the astronauts fading into the supermarket. Low angled.
12. Medium/Close ups of the astronauts walking into the main store from a low angle. Sped up (quirky)
13. Close up from within the fridge. Fisheye lens used.
14. Exploring the shop. Tripod + Trolley for big sweeping tracking shots.
15. Mid shot of astronaut using the props, spinning a wrapping paper roll around.
16. Mid shot of an astronaut being confused by the tv. Quirky and humorous head scratch!
17. Close up of trolley pushing from within the trolley. Sped up for added humour.
18. Astronaut playing with space shuttle. Close ups and a mid shot.
19. Performance within the car continued, see previous.
20. The car driving off into the distance.

Final Cut Test Effects

Effects we have practiced and trialled on final cut.

We have used a fade in effect on final cut to give a sci fi like impression. This is like on Star Trek, when Captain Kirk and Spock beam down to the planets to explore, and idea we initially thought of using for our pitch. We also used a two video in one frame effect to give a distorted sense of time.

Actor Planning and Briefing

For our actors we needed the astronauts to be played by the performers so that the video shows some kind of consistency. The idea of a quirky, humorous video could be achieved with the band members actually doing the exploring. This would help tie the two significant parts of the video together and make it feel like a whole package, theoretically. We needed people who could play instruments and also people who have lots of confidence in this area. Fellow group members Sam, Niall and Luke are all musically competent and would all look making fools of themselves in the countryside and in a supermarket.

Luke’s confidence would make him a perfect frontman for our makeshift media band. He would provide the bass musical performance and also the vocals for our performance sections. Niall would play the electric guitar as this is the instrument he is most comfortable with, and this sort of natural confidence should come across really well on camera, as it did during our preliminary task. Sam would take on the roll of the drummer as he owns and uses a drum kit regularly which would help to bring the percussion element of the performance to life.

These actors would help to supply the performance aspect, but the idea of having the band members as astronauts is also feasible. These actors would have to act during the narrative sections of the video too. As they take on the roll of astronaut explorers, they would have to treat every single thing with bewilderment and awe when acting. This would help to solidify the idea of our society being abstract and bizarre to outsiders and would help to provide a comical element. In order to achieve this, the actors would have to wear their makeshift space helmets nearly all of the time. In order for the actors to be recognised apart from each other they will be wearing different coloured suits, in order to make them stand out and look different from one another.

Shooting Schedule

Day 1:
All narrative locations.
9am-12am - Setting up and Maxey Lakes
1mm- 4pm -Hills and Holes
6pm+ -Market Deeping Cooperative
8pm+ -The Boundary Fish and Chip Shop

Day 2:
9am-12pm- organising instruments and clearing the room
12pm-1pm - Lighting and setting up instruments
1pm-8pm - filming performance

Potential Day 3:
If the weather stops us from filming outside locations we shall film the Sunday after the Thursday and Friday shooting days, as the whole group has a day free then.

Shot and Effects List

“Space Elevator” Music Video

Shot list

Pre Song:
Establishing shots of the lift and the corridor.
Medium and close up shots of the “astronauts”
High angled shots from within the lift
Close ups of pressing buttons

Verses:
Potential close ups from within the lift
Establishing shots of landscape and locations
Long shots of astronauts exploring
Medium Shots of the individual astronauts
Close ups of eyes, looking around
Close ups of objects
Panning and tracking shots to help tie together the different characters and objects

Chorus:
Tracking shots of the band
Low angled shots to give the impression of stardom and awe
Close ups of the guitars and instruments
Close ups of performers
Lots of medium shots of the band performing
EDIT: A final shot of the car pulling away and performers on the car.

Effects:
Splitting shots into two, so they move at different speeds or could be manipulated.
Fade in effects through two videos, to give the impression that something is materialising!
Using Final Cut Pro to combine multiple shots onto frame. We are also thinking with using stop motion effects, and other elements such as slow motion, speeding up footage and splitting frames.

Making the Space Helmets

 

Space Helmet Creation:
In order to keep the low budget, quirky and humorous feeling we are looking for from our music video we decided to create our own helmets from paper bins, tin foil and spray paint.

First we bought several waste paper bins to create the main section of the helmet. The bins are lightweight and sturdy and have a conveniently placed visor flap lid.

Next we cut the bins down to a more manageable size, and also so the actors could see out of the lid. It would be a serious health and safety risk to have no visibility  so they would just have to make do with reduced visibility instead.


We then masking taped the visors' edges and sprayed them black to give the sleek look that Space helmets visors usually have. The masking tape stopped the rest of the lid being sprayed black. Several coats were applied.








The rest of the helmet was sprayed white multiple times to give the pristine white look commonly associated with space helmets. This will help to create a semi authentic feel while keeping the quirky concept.

The final helmet with customised effects and "space damage" so the band members have different features on their helmets.

   

Prop Planning

Props form a major part of a music video, and mise-en-scene can be used to really sell the atmosphere in the promo. Because of this we will have to choose our props carefully. The storyboard illustrates random landscape features or items being used throughout the promo. The thinking behind this is that the Astronauts are exploring the familiar as the abstract and alien, and in theory it should come across as quirky and humorous. The locations we are planning on using will be a supermarket and some rural areas, one with an abandoned container present.

Firstly though, the astronaut actors will be wearing space helmets. By making our own low budget space helmets for the main narrative characters, they can help bring the low budget and somewhat comical feel intended for the promo to life. These helmets will be made from rounded bin lids and tin foil and their creation can be seen on a separate post.

The finished helmets: Images coming....

Co-Op Props:
These props will be your general supermarket items and some quirky things that normally you would walk past. These would include wrapping paper, which could be played with as swords or telescopes to investigate what they do, A small toy space shuttle which could be closely inspected and a reference could be made about it's size, spare bin lids which could be tried on as a new hat and toilet rolls, which anything could happen with. These are all things we generally take for granted, but how would an alien or person from another world react to them? This helps to connote the idea that our society makes no sense at all to outsiders and we as humans are not very straightforward beings. This along with the upfront comical aspect will help to give a deeper meaning to our promo video.

 

      

 

Exterior Location Props
Props for the exterior locations, such as Hills and Holes and Maxey Lakes could be anything. A abandoned shipping container is at Maxey Lakes, so that could be used as a quirky set piece for the footage shot there. The promo is all about exploring what we take for granted as the unknown, and this would be a perfect prop to investigate. Other items that would be taken to the outdoor locations would be a football and a sledge. These items would need some serious explaining to an alien creature, and they could be used to get some comedic footage.

Performance props:
For the performance, instruments and a microphone would be used to help keep this part of the video grounded in reality. The electric guitar would be played by Niall, the bass by Luke and the drums by Sam. The fact that you would be able to see the performers playing the instruments would help to give the video an authentic feel.

Lighting Planning

The locations we have chosen, both rural and urban, are already well lit. The rural shoots will be shot during the day, as the light decreases quickly in winter. Because of this, the majority of indoor urban shoots, like the supermarket shoot, will have to be done at night. Lighting is not a problem for these locations, as the artificial light from these places is more then enough to allow the camera to be utilised to it's potential.

In the band room however, if we do decide to use this space, we will have to artificially light the interior. 2 desk lamps would be used to light the performance from below, to help create massive and quirky shadows against the blank white walls and a strobe light will be added to add a obscure effect to the scene.

I have used the 3d modelling programme Google Sketchup and the image manipulation package GIMP to simulate the potential lighting effects we are planning on using in our promo video. The top left image is a recreation of the band room we are planning on using. It has been cleared out and has rough models of the band members and the instruments in it. The top right image has had a semi realistic shadow effect applied. The bottom two images show the lighting we want to use for the majority of the performance, and then the effect we want the strobe to deliver when switched on.

These types of lights are certainly going to be used in our performance. The strobe light, top right has previously been discussed. The Desk lamp, top right, will be used to light certain features from below and give a sense of depth to the performance shots. The bottom lamp will have the lamp shade taken off it and will be placed at a low angle. It will be a static light that will be consistent throughout all performance shots to add a sense of continuity and familiarity whilst the strobe and the quick shot changes are taking place.

EDIT: The Band room idea was trialled and there just was not enough space for the shots to work effectively. In that case we are going to change the idea and location. Instead of being restricted because of the small space, we are going to use Sam's car which is tiny, and frame the shots really tightly. This will add a quirky and comical element, because everyone will be crowded in, but we are going to light the car from the exterior using flood lights. This is going to give a really crisp and professional look to the video and should raise the quality of the performance shots.

We wanted to give the music video a quirky narrative which is balanced out by a more serious performance. The inclusion of bright, strong lights will help to give the band shots a much more professional and high budget feel in contrast to the narrative which we are making for it to specifically look low budget.

Location Ideas and Planning

Co-operative, Market Deeping
Our initial ideas had us visiting supermarkets, quarries and beaches and some of the choices we may have initially had, under scrutiny, have become unrealistic or unavailable. After contacting the local Co-Op, we are allowed free run of the shop floor after 6pm. This is a great turn of events, as one of the major locations we wanted to film in was a supermarket, and having their full cooperation will have made our task much much easier.

Emailing the manager.

Maxey Lakes:
Our other ideas included the use of a beach, but realistically, a road trip to the cold sea side isn't "fun". The use of the local lakes at the village Maxey could potentially allow us to create a similar feel. After scouting it out there is also a container alongside the shore, which could be integrated into the storyboard. If the container was to be treated as an alien concept it would help to add to the humour being generated from the scene.

Quarry:
Another location would be an abandoned quarry in Edenham. We have scouted it out already and have taken a location video, however, we are struggling to get permission from the estate owner. If we were to use this location, performance could be really well done here, instead of a band room as it is enclosed and alien in feel because of the limestone backdrop.

Hills and Holes:
Hills and Holes, Barnack, was suggested as well for another rural location. Because of the unique, bumpy landscape, lots of quirky and humorous adventures of the Astronauts could be filmed here. This location would be ideal for some quick shots in the main video, and in theory should be quite fun to film in.

The Fish and Chip Shop:

Another Urban location that was suggested would be the Boundary fish and chip shop in Market Deeping. The shop has a bright neon sign outside which would add to the quirky feel, and the idea of 3 astronauts buying fish and chips is comedy in itself. The shop is well lit inside so it would be suitable to film in at night, and this location would be another great, humorous filler if we need to add in more footage!

As mentioned before, performance was originally planned to take place within a band room. This room is in Niall's garage, and has white walls and a wooden floor, and has ample space once the furniture has been moved out. If the quarry does not work out, we would have to use this space. Another very real option is to use Sam's morris miner car, as this is a retro and quirky. Lighting it from the outside would make the interior look very very stylised and unique, and some incredibly tightly framed shots could make the promo video appear very slick indeed.

The interior of Sam's car. These photos have given us a rough idea of what space we have to work with and will help us to plan camera angles, lighting and performance.



Costume designs and Planning

Initial Sketches

Realistic looks at the different costumes

The use of suits and home made space helmets is the idea we decided to go with. The space suits we were thinking of using initially, turned out to be too thin and flimsy, and the Star Trek costumes were too expensive to buy so we took space suits literally. The helmet helps to add to the quirky, home made feel, and this whole concept could help to deliver a comedic element to the light hearted video we are planning on making!

 (The space helmets are pictured above, along with me lurking in the background....)

For our music video we are doing a comical and quirky narrative alongside a serious performance. We decided upon merging all of our different pitch ideas together, so that there would be a serious performance aspect and a quirky narrative which merged the idea of space helmet clad explorers, funky suited band members, the Star Trek cheese and humour. Because of our merged ideas, and the difficulties of telling people apart with white helmets on, we decided for all of the band members to suit up in different coloured suits. This would help to tell these people apart, tie in the funky suit idea and would also add a serious element to the performance, as the suits would be kept on.

Mood Board and Wordle and Inspirational Images

The moodboard I have created for our project helps to illustrate the comedic elements we wish to showcase, along with the space exploration theme that underpins our project. The arctic monkeys were a big inspiration for the band we are using, and so some of our influences will come from them. Alongside this, the Beastie Boys, the Automatic and space exploration will all help to shape our promo video. The use of a fisheye lense will be key to creating the quirky atmosphere and the television head imagery will play a key roll  in the video.

Initial Storyboard Idea

Theories

Music Video Theory

Post modernism is a key theory which ties into popular music and pop culture. It is the basis of how we consume entertainment and is key when marketing and constructing promotion is concerned.

Post Modernism states that…

      Faith in science, history, progression of society and religion has collapsed. These things are called a grand narrative.

     People constantly change and update their identities.

     Buying and consuming products helps us to create ourselves.

     Information Technology and society converge into Social Networking and online activities.

     There is very little distinction between real life and simulated life.

Andrew Goodwin identified 4 recurring features present in most music videos:

      Music videos feature characteristics from metal, rock, pop or dance genres, featuring dancers, shots of the band, crowds etc.

      Lots of close ups of artists, bands, and instruments. These are because of the record label’s demands and certain styles and iconic features can recur.

      The ideas of looking, and also sexualising the female body.

      Intertextual references!

Intertextuality: Referencing other media.

Exhibitionism: Showing off some sort of sexual gaze and body and such.

Theories:

Steve Archer’s Theory:

<    There needs to be a strong, logical connection between performance and narrative.

      Dancing or an extra visual aspect to add a need to watch the video again.

      Music video will cut between narrative and band performance.

John Stewart’s Theory

      Lots of close ups of the artists face and thorough lighting.

      Contains elements of TV adverts.

      Intertextual references from possibly anything, including cinema and photography.

      Incorporating, raiding and reconstructing: Using the familiar to make your work even more recognisable.

      The video allows the viewer to be closer and more personal with an artist then a live performance.

      Mise en scene can be used to emphasise themes and lifestyles that we might aim towards.

Music Video Pitch

As a group we have pitched 3 main ideas. Two of these ideas have been designed to be lighthearted and upbeat in order to fit with the song. The other idea is a more serious approach, and this also could make a plausible and funky video. The three ideas have been constructed so that the