Reflection on second feedback

Since my last blogging health check i have improved a lot! I still have a few more blog posts to add and complete, but i am happy that i am at a C+ grade, hopefully i can keep up with the blogging and push up to a B. I still have to embed a lot of my blogs and keep up with all the blogging for every time we edit. Below is a screen shot of my progress.

Reflection: On Feedback

Below is a screenshot of the results of my 1st blogging health check, as you can see it is as a D grade, as I only have 28 posts. I am disappointed by this low grade for my work so far, as I should have around 45 blog posts by now, which also means i am behind.

So to improve I will make sure that I catch up with all the missed blog posts, these are as follows:

• analysis of previous student work
• indie v mainstream label analysis
• analysis of three influential music videos
• synergy activity
• when moving into the filming and editing stages to make sure that I blog individually after each filming/editing session giving an overview of what I did and what I felt went well and needed improving. 
• making sure I am reflecting on my own individual skills, development in research, planning, filming and editing. 
•  also that all my posts use ICT 
• lastly as a group to make sure that the 'audience 1' and 'theory' posts from the pitch are completed properly - as some things are missing from them.

By the next blogging health check I want to have completed and added more blogposts, have at least 60 or more post too and to also not be behind or fall behind again.

Proportal

 

Proportal is a software that my college uses to keep students aware of how much progress they're making in all of their subjects. When I went on to Moodle I was disheartened to see that the current grade I'm working at is a D/E. However, I understand complete why this is the grade my teacher gave me. I should have at least 45 blog posts by now but I only have 28 which is just over half.

 

 

Rebecca (my teacher) has given me a list of things I need to improve on and they are as follows:

 

1.) I need to complete most of my individual research tasks including (Analysis of previous student work, Indie vs Mainstream label, Analysis of 3 influential music videos, Carol Vernallis research, synergy activity and our song short-list)

 

2.) Make sure that I'm not posting text based posts (Use visuals/ICT in each post)

 

3.) Post my own overview of how the filming and editing sessions go, along with a list of improvements that I feel are necessary.

 

4.) Keep up to date with the blogging checklist.

 

I will definitely be taking action for all of these targets and aim to complete them all promptly as I am aiming to get at least an A in media and don't want my lazy attitude towards blogging so far to be the reason I get a low grade. I guess I have a lot of work to do!

 

Behind The Scenes

Reflection on filming

Even though we had a production schedule and we knew what we wanted todo It didnt go as planned as we hoped for but these things happen when filming and its a good lessin learned and hopefully if we need to re-film we can make sure to pick a day when the weather is good ect.

Overall I think we worked well as a group and we were all willing to do what we needed to make sure we get to film what was needed and we got all the footage we needed and filmed many retakes no matter how long it took.

Hopefully now when it comes to editing it goes as planned.

Quick Filming Re-cap

WEDNESDAY

We had originally planned to film on Wednesday afternoon, at Shoreditch, but had to put it on hold as it was raining heavily and we didn't want any rain in our shots also we had to think about the safety of our equipment. Also we had decided to use my camera (Nikon D1500), instead of the college one as it was of better quality and was significantly lighter, only problem was that meant that we couldn't use the fig rig.

THURSDAY

We had decided the day before we would meet at a later time as I wasn't available in the morning, so we would meet for 2 pm to start filming. We all arrived and Antonia started on my make-up, we didn't expect it to take so long, as it was already dark outside wen we wanted to film. we don't want dark shots in our music video, we had planned for everything to be in day light or natural lighting (when in a studio).
So that day was another let down for us, so we decided to start bright and early the next day.

FRIDAY

We started doing my make up before 10 am, and we started filming by 11:20 at shoreditch. We were filming at shoreditch until 3 o'clock, the weather was great that day for us to do our street shots, except the sun interacting much more than we had wanted it to. As we were filming in the street, we were interrupted by cars a few times, but not as much as people who kept coming directly into our shots or walking and stopping directly in front of the camera, this was a bit annoying but there was nothing we could do other than re-do it.

After we had shot the Shoreditch scenes we went back to Antonia's house to pick up all we needed for Lift (were we shot the rest of our scenes). we headed over to lift and started setting up for the purple scene, whilst we were preparing for the purple scene we had to also make sure our extra, who plays the role of the boyfriend/lover, was there. He wasn't. This was of annoyance to us but we found a solution, one of the boys at this youth club offered to fill in for us. It was awkward as we didn't know him but we had a music video to get done and also it was getting late. By the time we had finished it was already past 8 pm and we had clear up and head back out to Antonia's to drop the equipment.

SATURDAY

We were going to use this Saturday to film some extra shots but the lift place is close, so that would be hard for us to do anything and also it rained so that was a no go for us as well.

31st October-Filming

On Friday 31st october we started filming a bit delayed from what we origionally planned as it took a bit long for Antonia to do Bernices make up as soon as she was done we headded to shoreditch to film there. I carried the light and the batteries in my bag as it was too much equipment to carry so I put it in my bag whci was so much easier but really heavy. 

we built a set up for the purple background which was my bed sheets and flipped two tables and put the bed sheet on it like a bed, it looked really good on the footage when we looked over it. Antonia filmed and I wasnt the light person this time as there was already enough light and it looked like a spot light, instead Antonia said why not have a fan to make the bed sheets move to give it a nice effect but the man at lift couldnt find a fan bvut luckily bernice got a newspaper so i had to be the fan person and make the wind(which was very tiering).

after many hours of filming we decided it was time for a break and we had to to have lunch as we were very tired so we went to subway near lift so we could eat at lift. Someone in the building accidently set off the fire alarm so we all had to be evacuated and the firebrigade came this wasted our time and we needed to film as soon as possible. The guy that said he would be in our music video didn't turn up so luckily another guy over heard antonia asking the man at lift and he offered himself to be filmed which was great. 

Friday filming with pictures

video and pictures from filming today

Filming: Day 3

Filming process 31st Oct 2014

Today was a HUGE success. We all decided, learning our previous mistakes, that we were going to wake up and start filming early as well. Bernice came to mine at around 10am. I made a start on her makeup at quarter past 10 and finished by quarter to 11. Jessica arrived at 10:30am and we left my house at 11:30am prompt. Our first location was Shoreditch which is only 10 minutes away from my house by bus. We took the 135 to Shoreditch and as soon as we got to our first location set up straight up away. (Thank God we had learnt how to use the equipment on Wednesday or else we would have been stuffed!) Our first location was a dead end road, and we had no problems filming until we realised that the road wasn't long enough for our artist to sing the whole song through till the end. So we decided to use the pavement instead as it was longer. After we finished filming in our Shoreditch location we headed back to my house we dropped some of our bags in exchange for lighter ones and then made our way to our next location Lift, in angel. The good thing is that I live in central London so it is pretty much easy to get to all of our destinations. Before entering Lift, we made a quick stop at Subway (There's no way I was skipping lunch just to film. I love food way too much) When we got to Lift, we quickly had a break and ate our lunch before resuming to our filming. We brought along all of our makeup kit so that I could touch up our artist's face, rearranged the room we were using, hung our purple bed sheet cover over two tables and began to film our purple scene. I came up with the idea for Jessica to use a newspaper as a fan and stand beside Bernice waving the newspaper up and down so that Bernice's hair could move. I got this idea from many of the  R and B music videos I researched where most of them seem to have a scene where there hair is blowing for added effect. We shot this scene in fast, slow and normal motion. After spending an 2 hours doing this we were ready to shoot our next scene. However the boy who agreed to film with us yesterday hadn't even turned up! We began to panic. I went to the common room of Lift and began to ask around. In the end a boy who had said he couldn't do it when we asked him yesterday agreed to be in our music video. I then filmed the couple scene and we finished filming around 8pm.

29th October- Filming

The day we picked up the equipment on the (29th of october) we didn't get to film as planned because it was raining but we went to antonias house to re-schedule everything so that the next day we knew exactly where to film and what we were going to film.

On the 30th october Antonia done bernices make up and filmed around 5 for a bit outside but the footage was too dark and it didn't go with the rest of the scenes we have and it would have been too much of a contrast if we did put what was recorded in tot he film. Even with the dedo light that i was holding it just looked like a spot light and you could see our shadows and it didn't look right. I couldn't stay too long because I had to go to band rehersals which was changed recently in september, so I left at 6:30pm.

Filming process 30th Oct 2014

Today we planned to film our street shots of the camera tracking our artist as she walks down the pavement. We planned to start filming at around 2pm but because Bernice had an art trip and I spent way too long doing her makeup we ended up being ready to shoot at around about 5pm which was way too late as it was beginning to get very dark as you can see in the pictures below.

When we did get round to filming properly it was 6pm as we had to walk to our location and set up. But, Jessica had to leave at 6:30pm for her music class. I did attempt to film Bernice as well as hold the dedo light with its stand but that obviously didn't work out. It was a DISASTER! We were very frustrated especially myself as I had spent time and effort doing Bernice's makeup beforehand. We went back to mine and put all the equipment back. In order not to let the day we decided to take pictures that could potentially be used for our digipaks so as not to let the day go to waste. We then went over to Lift (one of our chosen locations) to confirm with Ian (a worker there) if we could still use the premises and decided to also look for a boy for our music video whilst we were there. After some persuasion, a young guy who uses the gym at Lift agreed to meet us at lift this Friday to film our couple scene. RESULT! Turn's out today wasn't such a disaster after all. From this, we definitely realised that if we wanted to get a successful day of filming down we were going to have to start filming a hell of a lot earlier.

Filming: Day 2

Production Schedule Update

We planned to film 29/10/14 but due to the weather we had to cancel these plans. Instead, we used the day to talk about the changes we had to make to our production schedule. Another problem we faced was that we didn't have a boy for our music video. So what we plan to do as our back up plan is ask around at one of our filming locations (Lift) to see if there are any boys available.

Thursday : (2pm - 5pm) Old Nichol street
                  (6pm - 9pm) Lift

Friday: (11am - 1pm) Barbican
             (1pm - 2:30pm) Lunch
             (3pm - 5pm) Scenery shots
             (6pm - 9pm) Lift

Saturday: Re-shoot shots (If necessary)

Filming: Day 1

Filming process 29th Oct 2014

Today as the weather forecast had predicted it rained. Bernice and I went to college to pick up the equipment whilst Jessica met us there. We picked up a fig rig, tripod, dedo light, dedo light stand, dedo light batteries, the college camera, the college camera batteries and  our memory cards. We then headed back to my house in hopes that the rain would stop and that we could get a bit of filming done. NO CHANCE! It didn't stop raining till about 6pm by which it was already pitch black outside. We didn't want to let the day go to waste so we decided to get ourselves familiar with all the equipment. In fact, I'm quite happy we didn't film today because the amount of time it took us to work out how to attach the dedo light onto it's stand and switch it on would have meant we would have probably started filming well past all of our bedtimes! Hopefully, we have more luck shooting tomorrow.

Research: Cultural Appropriation

Cultural Appropriation within music videos. Over the years music videos have

Weather

I decided to check the weather for this week over the weekend just so that we could make a final decision about when to film. Although we stated in our pitch production schedule that we wanted to film on the 29th, 30th and 31st of October we didn't have access to the weather forecast for this week. But now that we do, we won't be filming this Wednesday as it's going to be raining. Even though it's not going to be raining for the whole day, we don't want a situation where we are filming and the weather looks quite dull in comparison to our other shots from the other days. Because of consistency we want our shots to look relatively the same. On both Thursday and Friday, it is going to be partly cloudly with a bit of sunshine so we plan to film on these two days but due to London weather being very unpredictable we will still be taking our umbrellas with us on these days and will allow for an extra day of filming as backup (Saturday).



Weather 2

testing the camera

today we did some practise shots before we actually film so that we are prepared and so that we know how the music video will look using the college camera but the quality wasn't that good to be honest so we decided to go allong with bernices camera as her camera was much better quality as it was more focused and the colour of the film was better too. 

this is antonia filming bernice doing some practise shots that we will use in our real music video. we chose to film in this white brick wall because in our real music video we want to film on a brick wall as this is seen frequently in RnB music videos.

this is a quick behind the scenes video of us testing the camera of how it would look if we did film with the colleges camera

Reflection: On Progress Blog

This is just a quick note on how I think I am progressing with my blog. So far I haven't got as many blog posts I intended to have. have a lot of drafts saved, as the work is not fully complete, so cannot be published, i am hoping to catch up ASAP, as we will be filming next week, so I will have to focus on creating new blog posts for Music Video(filming and editing).

Planning: cast/actors/extras

Below I have created a fake actors cv

Akiva  Samuel

Height: 5'10    Weight: 169    Hair: Black    Eyes: Brown

 

Pitch Feedback Video

This is our pitch feedback video

Pitch Feedback

We got good feedback on what we could improve and mostly what we've done well. From the feedback and questions we got it was very good too as they made us question made us reflect on what we have and haven't thought about.

The good things about our pitch were:

- We have a back up plan incase we don't get certain locations and a male actor.

- Costume is detailed

- Ideas from other videos in other genres

- We have many close ups so that the artist can build a connection to the audience

- There's a pause and we'll have a black out

- Audience research

- Overall very detailed

To improve:

- re-do record label as we need to be on an independent label

Before the Pitch

During the pitch. Bernice presenting.

Planning - Pitch - Synergy - Jessica

We are going to have big earrings and body necklace that will be seen quiet frequently as it is part of our synergy and in our digi-pack. We will make an album cover, music video, advertisement some where(billboard, magazine ad)and promotion trailer.

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Planning- Pitch- Post Production- Jessica