Results From Vote

Considering the votes came in as even and all voters gave valid reasons for their choice, I decided to combine both to get the perfect product.

I took the photo from my second idea as it allowed me more space underneath her face than the first photo and then I put the lettering in the layout from my first idea on top of it. It meant I could do the repeated line shape at the bottom of the image rather than having one banner which looked too random to me, but now I can incorperate the layout I wanted and the banner by simply changing the photo. I think I should have planned for this by taking my photos further away to plan to crop once the image was in InDesign rather than trying to get the photos perfectly framed because ideas can change and things might not work out how you wanted them to

 

1

 

 

 

2 (Origionally taken for my poster)

Reflection on New Dance Footage

Unfortunately, after preparing for filming and getting completely ready, I was told by a security gaurd at focus that I wasn't allowed to film here as it was private property (apparently I had been lucky that noone was around the first time I filmed). Luckily, I had planned for this and so we used a different site which was only a couple of minute walk down the road and it worked out just as well.

 

 

My friend that did the dancing for me this time was such a good choice. She was a great dancer, looked great in the clothes and meant that I could move about the whole time I was filming to get some great tracking and panning shots. Even though I used the tripod last time so that I could position the camera how I wanted it, by holding the camera and being able to reposition it when filming my friend dancing I could get the precise framing that I had origionally wanted. This is an example below of one of the moves I wanted but in the video of myself, I had accidently cut my feet out of the shot but made sure I got them in when filming my friend as the point in the framing was to have a whole body shot.

From looking through the clips now I can already see that they will work better than the videos I had of myself dancing but I only realised these weren't exactly what I wanted when putting them into Premier Elements so I am eager to try them out.

THEORY REFERENCE
This section of footage worked perfectly for me. It helped my video meet Laura Mulvey's Male Gaze theory by showing a girl dancing and strutting around, a chance for the audience to enjoy her beauty and appreciate it. It also challenges Angela McRobbie's theory that women are always portrayed as being weak and quiet because this shows her as being confident and powerful, and aspirational image to attract the target audience of young girls and offer them a role model. The opposition of this footage against the shots I have of my artist singing fits into Laura Mulvey's theory that women are shown either with the Virgin image or Whore because my artist is shown in delicate, elegant clothes, peacfully enjoying her music where the dancer is dressed seductively and shown just as seductively dancing.

Reflections on New Song

After practicing with my sister with the new song and seeing how well she could remember the words, I eventually went back to the orgional song, On a Mission, as she has already become very used to the lyrics of this and will only need a few takes to get it all right.

I just need to make sure I cover every word of the song so I am not left with unneccisary gaps. I will be making sure that this time she moves a bit more and looks more comfortable as you could tell she was nervous in the first shoot from her stiffness.

Reflection on Editing

Realising how difficult it was to make my sisters miming sync with the song, mainly because she didn't know the words, I decided to change the song to one she may find easier to memorise.

KATY B - EASY PLEASE ME

The one I have chosen is by the same artist so that the style remains the same and the target audience. It is the same tempo of song so I can use the same type of video, the same styling, the same digipak and poster ideas. I will be able to use some of the clips I have already taken that don't include her miming any words because I am still using the same idea. This will also give me and oppourtunity to film more clips of her in my favourite outift that I wished I had more shots of her in. By chosing this song which is a bit livelier than the first, it even more accurately fits the theme I wanted associated with my aritst.

My new song choice

Reflection on Premier Elements

The first time I used Premier Elements was when putting my video of my pitch together which gave me a chance to get used to the programme and practice cutting the different clips.
It was a completely different story when I then started editing my video as I then I had to take into account alot of other things, like it being in time to the song, the most difficult part being the syncronising of the lips to the words. I also then had to consider whether things looked good together, what order to put things in, what clips to choose over others, and regardless of the fact that I believe myself to be creative and know exactly what I want my video to look like, it is very difficult to make decisions about what to do next!

From this practice, I found that it would be a lot easier to already have chosen the best clips so that all I had to do was order them. I made folders named "Dance" for the clips of my dance shots, "Lyrics" for the shots in which my actress mimed words and named each clip after the words she said, and "Time Fillers" which mainly included shots of my actress walking which I will be using to fill time in which no lyrics are said and a dance clip has already been used.

I also learnt that I should have saved my video at various point along the way, naming them slightly differently when I thought what I may do next may completely ruin the video so that I could go back to the last saved point.

Reflections on Dance Shots

When put together with the footage I filmed of my sister, the shots I filmed of myself dancing using the tripod, they do not look how I wanted them to. Even though, using the tripod, I was able to position the camera exactly as I wanted, thinking this would be a good method, I wasn't happy with the footage in the end after I saw how noticable the handheld camera effect was in the shots of my sister and how it completely contrasted to the completely still shots that I cut to of me dancing.



By using my friend Chloe as my dancer now, it will allow me to see the shots as I film them and adjust them as I go along. I will also be able to move around with the camera rather than just staying focusing on one point for each shot. Now I will be including some camera tilts, pans, some tracking and some more handheld effect shots to create a variation and the exact look I want.

Relection on Cast

I found it easy to think of lots of dance moves to include, some routines for long takes and other short clips to fill spaces in the video. I also played most of them back in slow motion to make sure they looked how I wanted and I they worked well. I'm quite pleased with this section of filming and but am not sure how this will look all together with the slow motion tracking shots of my singer.

Knowing that my sister didn't know the song very well when we had only just started filming, I didn't try to make her lip sinc too much. I gathered lots of shots of her walking and moving, including various shot types and angles that I will cut to throughout and use to fill gaps when not singing. My sister did this very well, even though at points she struggled to keep a straight face when trying to take it seriously (right).
The outfits looked really good too so not only did it look good in the video, it helped her to feel confident and therefore she also looked good and did exactly what I wanted. Perfect.

Reflections on Locations

I purposely chose these locations because I was considering Blumler & Katz's theory of uses and gratifications, my favourite being that people use media to make personal connections and to find someone on the screen in a similar position to themselves, offering them someone to either judge or to aspire to and feel as if are similar to them. I did this by choosing a location that is widely populated, an urban environment that I think the majority of people live in, especially my target audience, choosing streets and alleyways that children/young people "hang out" in and would recognise as somewhere they spend a lot of time.

By filming my music video here, it puts a positive spin on the life that comes with these kinds of areas, council estates and alleyways that are usually populated with lower class/working class people. It supports the Marxist theory that the media, commercial companies full of the ruling class, attempt to make everyone beleive society is equal and that everyone is happy in their own lives. By having my actors dressed in glamorous clothes, dancing and singing as professionals and ignoring the fact that most people are scared to walk down the street in these areas, it fits into Baudrillard's theory that people often enjoy watching things like this that are hybrids of social realism but commercialised as it provides a hyper reality, better than their own.

Reflection on Branding

I decided that this font didn't suit my idea as it wasn't girly enough. Instead, I want the letters to be bubbly and rounded.

I played around with a different way of writing the name Katy B, and realised I could simplify it to just 3 letter which, when ready out, sound exactly the same as Katy B; KTB. With this, I can focus on making the letters look a cool shape with different layouts and how to fit a heart in, as I know I want to include one somewhere because it's a girly shape.

My favourite of these is the one in a square, I will have to try out how the heart will look on the programme I will be using to make the poster and digipak, called InDesign, as it may not work as well as I plan it to.



I have also decided against using one colour as the brand theme as I don't want my limit myself to only one colour. Instead, I want the brand theme to be that there are lots and lots of colours, this way, all of my products can be multicoloured and have the lively effect I had always wanted.

Reflections on research

Although from the existing artists of silmiar genres I found that most have very basic styles and branding, I would like my artist to have a much more "pop" style. I'd like to ditract from her existing garage style and head towards the girly side of her music as I think this better suits the song. I think this will be easy to do as I agree with Robert Stam's theory that genre doesn't exist, that it's an invented concept that we can manipluate through taking conventions of others in the genre, opposingly supporting Rick Altman's theory that everything in one genre looks the same so trying to make sure mine looks like other pop videos.


 This is her existing album cover. Although this simplicity of the cover clearly fits into the garage style like other garage artists, I'd like to make her look more like a pop artist by: changing the way she dresses, I don't think she looks girly enough in this photo, by changing the way that her name is written, this font is boring, and by including more colours as I think her song is alot more lively and bold than this cover makes it seem.

Instead I am going to look at some existing pop artists and how they promote and brand themselves for ideas of how to design my digipak, poster and video model.