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.