Possible Shots

Eye dilating shot to make the drug taking scene more subtle and implied more than stated.





The shot revealing the wall at 1:42 without the interrupting wedding scenes. Click link on video for YouTube



Ryan Kearney

Locations

For our scenes in the office we will be using the office building shown below:

9 Lanyon Place, Belfast

For scenes in the "crack house" we will be using the abandoned house shown below:

1 Abercorn Lisburn

We will be using this location for the scenes with the homeless character:

59 Bridge Street, Lisburn

Luke Clarke

Filming schedule

1st day of filming: Walking to Abandoned house
 05-02-12              Inside Abandoned House
                              Homeless Man grabbing at foot
                              Looking in mirror scene
                              Homeless Guy killed at night
                              Walking in town

2nd day of filming: Office Scenes
                               Car Scenes

3rd day of filming: House Picture Scene



Ryan Kearney

Our Main Characters

The Yuppies

Played by: Liam Mackel, Ryan Kearney, Darren Campbell, Connor McGowan, Eoin Carberry

Yuppie (short for "young urban professional" or "young upwardly mobile professional") is a term that refers to a member of the upper middle class or upper class in their 20s or 30s. It first came into use in the early-1980s and largely faded from American popular culture in the late-1980s, due to the 1987 stock market crash and the early 1990s recession. Yuppies are made fun of for their conspicuous personal consumption and obsession over social status among their peers, which is seen as vain and materialistic.

The Homeless 

Played by: Luke Clarke, Damien Earle, Ciaran Chambers

An individual who lacks housing, including one whose primary residence during the night is a supervised public or private facility that provides temporary living accommodations; an individual who is a resident in transitional housing; or an individual who has as a primary residence a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.

Luke Clarke and Ryan Kearney

Focus Group Results

1. Overall Rating - Average rating 8/10 
2. Is it too dark - 5/6 No, 1/6 Yes.
 Those who said it wasn't too dark said:
 It isn't too dark, it is as dark as is needed to have impact.
 Isn't too dark but could be risky if mistakes are made.
 Those who said maybe said: Music videos should be uplifting, this isn't.
3. Can it be realistically done - 7/8 Yes 1/8 Maybe.
 Those who said yes said:
 Yes, as long as the group has total commitment.
 Yes, Shots aren't overly complex.
 Yes, as long as props and casting can be done well.
  Those who said maybe said: 
 The high angled shot  requires one take and if a mistake is made the       
 film will lose effect.
4. Do you agree with our decision to have no script - 7/7 Yes
 Those who said yes said: 
Actions speak for themselves.
Visual impact is so strong, no dialogue is needed.
I am confident your group will be able to portray the story without one.
Simply enhances the mystery of the main characters secret life.
5. Do you agree with our use of drugs - 5/5 Yes
 Those who said yes said:
It is relevant. There is no reason to not, it will only reduce impact.
As long as it is not glamorised.
As long as it is subtle, not explicit.
Fits with the main characters delusion.
6. What is your favourite/ least favourite thing about it:
Upbeat song, haven't tried to please a mass audience, don't go with the norm.
Office scene, fast shots unconventional but interesting.
Storyline, storyboard could have been better, six wheels?
The match of the audio with video fits del.
Exciting storyboard + idea, directs your group and is all you need a storyboard for.
No lyrics in song is bad, song choice could have been better.
7. How do you think video matches the audio: 5/6 Good, 1/6 Bad
  Those who said Good said: 
Dark theme, Dark song.
Alternative song fits alternative events.
 Song builds up as events in story do.
Both Dark.
  Those who said Bad said: 
Too upbeat of a song for dark events.
8. What will be our greatest obstacles: 
Getting subtle drug use and violence x4
None                                                     x2
The shot variety                                   x2
9. Does it have potential to gain high marks - 5/5 Yes
   Those who said yes said: 
Your group is creative and committed                  x2
As long as is taken seriously                                   x2
As long as it does 'Justice' justice
Your group is good with shots, unconventional, good at editing, A* material.     
10. Does it interest you as an audience member - 7/7 Yes
 Those who said Yes said:
 Looking foreword to it.
Interesting collaboration of audio + events, very interested to see results.
Drug abuse and violence are always interesting in media.
Love its originality.


On reflection our group feel we have established an idea which may break the normal conventions of modern music videos, but at the same time produce great interest, show great creativity and have the potential to make a high achieving music video. 
Our biggest worries after doing this survey are our violence and drug use. We will not take it out completely as it is vital for our character development, plot and imagery. However we are now working to adapt our story and use more subtle drug/violence use. 


Ryan Kearney

Animatic

Darren Campbell

Focus Group Feedback Form

After presenting our idea and showing our animatic, we will ask these questions.

Overall View:  /10
Do you think it is too dark? Explain
What are our weakest points?
What are our strongest points?
Do you think the use of drugs is acceptable?
Do you see potential?
What obstacles do you think will hinder our progress the most?
Do you thinks are plans are realistic?
How well do you think the music will match the video?

Ryan Kearney

Project Schedule

Schedule

Our Schedule consists of the :

Design and Planning process: This is where we come up for the initial idea of the project, all required assets needed are planned out and we also budget the project. Actors, locations and lighting are pre-planned and sketches are made of the scenes we have imagined. The script and dialogue are also developed leaving a detailed basis for us to follow.

Shooting Process: This is where we take on the practical part of the project, actors and props are used along with lighting and mise en scene.
Post Production: This is the process of editing and putting all our footage together. Adjustments will be made the most in this process as we are using a multitude of different shots.
Physical Production: This is where we will develop the digipack and the dvd used for our project.

Based on the weather forecast we are going to have to change some of our filming dates as it will be simply unsuitable to film whilst for example it is snowing heavily.

Darren Campbell

Animatics Examples

Ryan Kearney

Actors, Locations, Budget, Props, Lighting and Make-up

Actors:
Main character (Liam Mackel)
Yuppies including boss x4 (Connor McGowan, Ryan Kearney, Darren Campbell, Eion Carbery)
Secretary (Lauren McGarry)
Drug addicts, Homeless Character x4 (Luke Clarke, Ciaran Chambers)


Locations:
Office
Car Park
Car
Street
Abandoned house
House
City Centre

Budget:
Aprox. £0

Props:
Flipstick
Poloroid Camera
Pills
Car
Headphones

Lighting:
Bright, artificial (almost sitcom yellow) light while in the office to reflect the artificially happy mask the character hides behind. Lighting will change drastically as soon as the car door shuts to mirror the main characters drastic shift in personality.

Make-up
Some make-up will be needed to scruff up the drug addicts and homeless side characters

Luke Clarke

Storyboard

Ryan Kearney

Risk Assessment

Identify the hazards-

• There are potential hazards in the filming of our project. While shooting the scene where our main character kicks the hand of a homeless character, there is a possibility that the actor playing the homeless character can get injured. 
• We plan to use a high angle and ceiling shots which will entail the camera operator standing on a table or chair which could cause them to fall and injure themselves. 
• While filming some of the scenes out doors there is the danger that passers by could misconstrue the acts of violence for reality and try to intervene, putting them and our actors at risk of getting injured.

Who might be harmed?-

• The actors are in danger of being harmed either by each other or the public whilst filming as some and the camera man/director may be harmed whilst performing certain shots.
• The location of some of our scenes are out doors most probably in Belfast town, late at night which carries certain dangers which the whole crew are open to. 

Precautions-

• To avoid these dangers, precautions will have to be taken. These include, filming as soon as it gets dark rather than waiting until late at night, using the suggestion of violence to avoid having to film real violence which could escalate and cause harm and using something stable to stand on whilst filming the high-angle and ceiling shots. 

Luke Clarke

Justice: Background

Justice is a French electronic music duo consisting of Gaspard Augé  and Xavier de Rosnay. Formed in 2003 they have been entising listeners with their heavy metal inspired electronic style ever since they burst onto the scene with their remix of Simian's track "Never Be Alone". Their debut album † was released in June 2007 to critical acclaim, vaulting them into the spotlight with a nomination for a grammy among a host of other awards. Their style combines cut-up bass lines with a compressed and distorted synth sound and often includes bass slapping. Their unique sound is said to have bridged the gap between the stadium-ready house of Daft Punk and the more mindless blasting of beats favoured by a rave generation. 


Their heavy-metal influence has helped to brand them more as rock stars than DJ's and their iconic illuminated cross which often accompany's them on stage acts as a recognisable symbol for fans to latch onto. 

Luke Clarke

Justice - Video Idea's

Our Song - Justice - Phantom 2

JUSTICE - PHANTOM II HD from Pedro Mendes on Vimeo.

This video below is another video by Justice which follows a group of kids walking through town vandalising things and assaulting people. From watching videos like these and past projects we decided to avoid filming a band or DJs playing as it usually seems badly done and cheesy. We plan to use the music as the backing to a short story as the video below demonstrates. The events are still undecided. 26/10/2011


Jus†ice, Stress from ROMAIN-GAVRAS on Vimeo.

Spending the time since the last update we have came up with numerous new and equally unique ideas the finished idea is still under discussion.

Spagetti Western

Priest Rave

Amateur DJ playing gigs, thinks he's good.

House Party that turns bad.

Geek real world role playing war.

Ninjas fighting.

Superheroes fighting

Supervillans fighting.

Dinosaurs fighting.

DJ Hero front room.

Throwback Bank Robbery.

Farmer dancing with his sheep.

Pacman chase through town

8/11/2011

As of now we have decided on a video of events not mentioned in the previous update. Our events will focus around a wealthy businessman who's only shown flaw may be vanity as he doesn't allow for his colleagues where he works to see him as if he has a lower status than they do. He is motivated by selfish gains which include having a false relationship with his employer to increase his promotion prospects. He appears happy, content and strong when faced with his equals, behind his smile he is sadistic, his smile is noticeably false to all but his colleagues who have only ever seen his created self. The audience has seen his real personality from the opening scene and are immediately weary of him. It isn't until we see him leaving work that he fully removes his mask and his darker side comes through. Throughout the remainder of the video his contempt for those in a weaker financial state than him is shown, he hates those who are weaker and see's no reason for their living. From this conclusion he uses his opinions of those to decide who he should enable himself to be completely honest with before he eventually kills them. 

There will be no script and the opening 10 seconds will have only diegetic sounds.


Shots


0-10s: Opens with the protagonist looking in a mirror, he fixes his hair and fixes a fake smile. Shot over the   shoulder with his reflection seen in mirror, no music is playing, he closes over his bathroom mirror and the music starts.

10-20s: Consists of 7 shots which match with the first 5 seconds of the song, those 5 seconds are edited to last 10 seconds to accommodate the shots of him:

• Standing at a water cooler with colleagues 
• Laughing with his boss
• Flirting with female colleague
• Taking a phone call
• Checking looks in mirror
• Relaxing, listening to music
• Getting into his car (end of working day)

20-45s: Base kicks in as he enters his car, he is being driven. He loses his smile and has a sinister, uninterested look on his face. The camera shows his face from the side and a homeless person can be seen through his car window. The extent of the class difference is seen but the protagonist does not look at the person. In the car he snorts narcotics, further emphasising his darker side coming through.

45-60s: Exits car and begins walking through a lower class neighbourhood with tramps and abandoned houses, he enters one of the houses looking out of place.

1.00-1.40: He enters a den of drug addicts. They look scared, close ups of their face. He keeps his disgusted expression and is then shown through a high angle shot against the rule of thirds as he reaches deep into his pockets and with insane happiness throws countless drugs (pills) into the air. The drug addicts stumble over each other to grab the most and eventually pass out and foam from their mouths. As they die the main character dances over them for a while in slow motion, fixes his hair and leaves.

1.40-1.50: As he leaves the building a homeless man grabs for his leg and the main character stumbles to avoid him. He then kicks his hand away from him.

1.50-2.10: Walks through town at night, insane expression, loving life.

2.10-2.34: Sees homeless guy at night and is seen flipping out his flipstick. He walks up to him dragging the stick on the closed store shutters. As he gets closer he hides the stick behind his back and makes him stand up, teasing him with money. He fixes the homeless guys torn coat and unexpectedly (to the hobo) headbutts him, hobo falls, character beats him with the stick although this is not shown on camera.

2.34-END: Song slows down as he arrives home, he walks in and pins the picture on the wall, giving them a rating of 6/10. Camera begins to zoom out and exit the room slowly. This gives a greater view of the wall he is facing and there are a lot of pictures covering the wall, door closes. 

14/11/2011

After an email to the chief examiner about our use of drugs, we have adapted our story as to still include drugs, but not show the use of them or any deaths as a result of them.
16/11/2011


Ryan Kearney

History of Websites

Websites have been the major form of every internet based venture since the introduction of mainstream usage from the late 90's. Website design has changed and evolved through out the past decade being written in new and more complicated languages bringing an overall more immersive experience for the end user.


Websites in the late 90's consisted of basic html and had minimal user interaction compared to todays websites. Graphics were extremely low resolution to deal with the slow internet speeds that people had access to. Music and video on the internet was practically a myth as the file sizes where too big for streaming purposes.

Nowadays websites are more immersive and consist of rich multimedia and interactive user interfaces. With the introduction of new website languages such as css, flash and html5 websites can be fully customisable to produce the best results.

Many people can simply create a website in the comfort of their own homes and have minimal knowledge. This is due to the fact that websites give more publicity and can allow creators/owners to interactive with their audiences in a quick and simple way.

Here are a couple of website examples from site nowadays:

Justice the artists we have chosen take a less traditional route in that they do not have their own official website. They use social media for communication and publications to their fans. The major it of their online content can be found on their myspace page and their Facebook page.

On their website you can listen to their music via streaming, look at photos and publications, by tickets and see when the next shows are on. People can give feedback on tracks and pictures and overall have a better interaction with their artists through this medium.

History of Album Art

Through history album art has been used to influence a consumers first impression of the music and help create the bands image.

Jerry Lee Lewis - 1950's


Beginning in the 1920s, collections of empty sleeves with a plain paper or leather cover, were sold as record albums that customers could use to store their records. These empty albums were sold in both 10" and 12" sizes. The covers of these bound books were wider and taller than the records inside, allowing the record album to be placed on a shelf upright, which protected them.

Bob Dylan - 1960's
In 1938, Columbia Records hired Alex Steinweiss as its first art director. He invented the concept of album covers and cover art, replacing plain covers used before. After his initial efforts at Columbia, other record companies followed his lead. By the late 1940s, record albums for all the major companies featured their own colorful paper covers in both 10-inch and 12-inch sizes. Some featured reproductions of classic art while others utilized original designs.

Boston - 1970's
The cover became an important part of the culture of music at the time. Under the influence of designers like Bob Cato who at various stages in his long music career was vice president of creative services at both Columbia Records and United Artis, album covers became renowned for being a marketing tool and an expression of artistic intent.

Talking Heads - 1980's
With the increasing popularity of digital music downloading service and the inflating cost of conducting business, the purpose and prevalence of the album cover is evolving. While the music industry tries to keep up with technological and cultural shifts, the role that packaging will play in consumer music sales in the near future is uncertain, its role is changing, and digital forms of packaging will continue to surface, which, to some degree take the place of physical packaging. Both MP3 and WMA music files are able to contain embedded digital album artworks in jpeg format. As of 2008 physical music products, with a physical "album cover", continue to outsell digital downloads.

Blur - 1990's


















Ryan Kearney

History of the music video

History of the music video:

• A music video is a short film or video that accompanies a complete piece  of music, most commonly a song .

• Modern music videos were primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings.
• Music videos are often called promotion videos or simply promos , due to the fact that they are usually promotional devices. Sometimes, music videos are termed short-form music videos to distinguish them from full length movies pertaining to music. In the 1980s, the term "rock video" was often used to describe this form of entertainment, although the term has fallen into disuse.
• The earliest music videos or music promos were filmed in the mid 1950’s, however, before then, as early as the 1920’s, films by animators such as Oskar Fischinger were accompanied by musical scores labeld ‘visual music’.
• The defining work in the development of the modern music video was The Beatles ' first major motion picture, A Hard Day's Night in 1964 , directed by Richard Lester . The musical segments in this film arguably set out the basic visual vocabulary of today's music videos, influencing a vast number of contemporary musicians, and countless subsequent pop and rock group music videos.
• The key innovation in the development of the modern music video was, of course, video recording and editing processes, along with the development of a number of related effects such as chroma-key . The advent of high-quality colour videotape recorders and portable video cameras coincided with the DIY ethos of the New Wave era and this enabled many pop acts to produce promotional videos quickly and cheaply, in comparison to the relatively high costs of using film. However, as the genre developed music video directors increasingly turned to 35mm film as the preferred medium, while others mixed film and video. By the mid-1980s releasing a music video to accompany a new single had become standard, and acts like The Jackson's sought to gain a commercial edge by creating lavish music videos with million dollar budgets.
• In the information technology era, music videos now approach the popularity of the songs themselves. Enthusiasts of music videos sometimes watch them muted purely for their aesthetic value. Instead of watching the video for the music, (the basis for the artform), the videos are appreciated for their visual qualities, while viewers remain uninterested in the audio portion of the performance. This is a normal sociological reaction, some say, to the increasing trend in the music business to focus on visual appeal of artists, rather than the quality of the music. Critics say that the corporate music managers, over the course of logical and calculated business decisions, have sought to capitalize on the sex appeal of females in music videos rather than in choosing less profitable musicianship-based music.

Here are some outstanding examples:

By Luke Clarke

Research into similar products: Grunge music

Grunge music is a genre first seen in the 80's which was influenced by the punk rock and indie rock of previous years. Some of the most influential bands to come out of the era are Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots and Pearl Jam which all followed the conventions of the genre.

Conventions, Style, Audience, Brand


Pearl Jam - Alive from La Buena Musica on Vimeo.


The conventions of grunge music are closely followed by the two bands above, which is to have minimalistic videos which centre around the band.

Rap research

The genre of rap and hip-hop music has evolved over the years however many of the conventions and normalities remain today.

The style of rap is closley linked with it's conventions, again with "bling" often taking a central role. Below we can see an example of what would be considered a sereotypical rap music video. There features lots of examples of rapping down the camera and slow motion shots of scantily clad women with the back drop of a super car. We also get the very unsubtle mention of their wealth with slow motion shots of money literally being thrown at them.




by Luke Clarke

Research into Similar Products: Pop Music

Pop music is commercially recorded music which through the years has adapted to appeal to young culture. Pop has been known to be influenced by every genre and depending on the trends of the time however some genres influence pop more than others. Simply, pop music aims to attract a mass audience rather than a sub-culture, encourage dancing and put an emphasis on recording and technology rather than live performance.

Conventions, Style, Audience, Brand


It is relativly easy to identify if a music video is of the pop genre when you see one. The camera movement and angles is most commonly focused on the artist.

3OH!3 Feat. Katy Perry - Starstrukk from M2-Stil on Vimeo.
 This is an typical pop video which meets the criteria of a large emphasis on the artists with a young sound which encourages dancing. It meets the demands made by their audience and is also of a high quality.
Lighting used in pop videos changes depending on the tone of the song often black and white for sad songs usually concerning breakups or enhanced colours for those which aim to be uplifting. The above has very bright lighting and enchanced colours which shows how it aims to be lightly taken.
Costumes also play a large part in pop music as they do in every genre. Within pop music however, the costume mirrors the current fashion trends of the time and shows how pop music includes a variety of things such as modern fashion, modern interests and anything else modern to appeal to their young audience.

Ryan Kearney

What makes a strong brand ?

The word brand when used as a noun, can refer to a company name, a product name, or a unique identifier such as a logo or trademark. Branding today is used to create emotional attachment to products and companies. A strong brand therefore can be one that is easily identifiable and also one that can be seen as reliable to consumers. A strong brand can influence customers choice of purchase and shapes the ownership experience. Branding creates trust and an emotional attachment to the particular company that owns the brand in the first place. 

How is a strong brand created ?

A strong brand cannot simply be created in a short amount of time, brands take years to become "strong" through customer interaction, advertising and heavy marketing schemes. A strong brand is one which the consumer can relate to and have an emotional connection.

Give an example of a strong brand

An example of  a strong brand would be the Beats By Dre venture. 

The Beats brand was formed via a collaboration between Dr Dre and inter-scope records chairman

Jimmy Lovine. The original Beats studio headphones where released in 2008 and they where the starting point for the brand. More and more artists began to market the headphones in their music videos creating a consumer want for the products. The product line expanded and so did the amount of artists endorsing the products. Lady Gaga, P-Diddy and Justin Bieber, three of the biggest names in the music industry each have their own versions of the product which are sold globally.

An example of the Headphones being used in a video:

We are also seeing a lot of conversion with the brand as now HTC and HP have started integrating their products with the beats audio trademark.


HTC + Beats by Dre from Oh, Hello on Vimeo.

Darren Campbell

Differently Branded Artists

Kanye West

Throughout his career Kanye West has had to alter his brand and identity multiple times in an attempt to avoid going into decline and continue making music. He began as a typical rapper with a similar music and upbringing to most. For his first 2 albums he retained this persona but for his third when engaged in a sales war with 50 Cent, took a risk of rebranding in order to beat him. This involved collaberating with artists such as Daft Punk and Chris Martin, which also included various accounts of singing in autotune. Before recording the album he toured with U2 in an attempt to combine his hip hop background with a new genre. 

Kanye West then edged more towards the auto tuned indie sound and changed his appearance to suit during his forth albums release. He began to put greater emphasis on the background music and chorus rather than verse vocals and edged further away from rap. His image changed to the furthest above image and people saw him as an original recording artist. 
After multiple mistakes in dealing with press, fellow artists and bluntly giving his views, Kanye West declined in the public eye as sales began to diminish. He then uses his most recent album 'My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy' to complete his new image and apologise. He has now been renewed within the music industry and continues to move further away from the rap genre.


The Stone Roses

The Stone Roses one of the 80's leading madchester bands had a branding strategy which was very different to Kanye Wests modern branding strategy.  Their strategy was basically to have no strategy or at least appear not to, dress in baggy clothes and be openly blunt in their opinion of the modern music of their time. Said to be influenced by bands like The Smiths, their music is based on the indie music of the time collaborated with a newer acid house sound which many other madchester era bands based their sound on. Unlike Kanye West The Stone Roses didn't change their branding with time and were distant with the media, displaying no interest in the business.  However it was things like these which allow their brand influence to carry through today.


Cee Lo Green/Gnarls Barkley

Cee lo Green has been in the public eye since 1992, first as part of the hip hop group 'Goodie Mob' (Shown Above) which attained moderate success within their genre supporters. It wasn't until he removed himself from this group to be a solo artist that he received critical acclaim and grew in status. However in 1998 he began to collaborate with DJ/producer Danger mouse on the 'Gnarls Barkley' album 'S.T. Elsewhere'. He received international notification with this album, in particular with the 2006 single 'Crazy' which charted number 1 in 8 countries. This success was not only the highest point of his career so far, but marked a drastic change in style from his rap roots. As his music changed his image changed to the furthest above picture. 
Alongside his collaborations with Danger Mouse, Cee lo began to work on new solo material which was released in 2010 with the single 'Forget You', surpassing the success seen from his 'Crazy Single'. 


Ryan Kearney