Prelim Edit - The 1975 - Girls

Here is the final product of the footage from the shoot day, edited/graded by me:

Audition Video

Here is Maisie and I's audition video, where I audition for the guitarist and lead role:

My Costume

My Costume

Describe or list the specific costume/look you are aiming for

The bassist, Ross MacDonald has quite a 'cool', 'rockstar' look, dressed in all black with a low cut t-shirt and leather jacket, skinny jeans and plimsoll shoes with white socks.

Do you have the items you need or are you planning to beg/borrow? Is there anything that may need to be bought?

I have the jeans only, and have so far arranged to borrow a shirt as well as shoes. Myself and the other bassist actor (Josh) look to purchase a leather jacket somewhere between our slightly varying sizes so that we both fit it reasonably well for the shoot.

My Role

My Role

Describe your role, how you feel about it

My role in this music video remake is to act as the bassist for a particular scene. I don't have doubts as to whether I can do it, however I would have liked a more challenging role in terms of performing, and one with more significance and screentime. Rather than having a small role in acting I could benefit much more greatly from taking more technical responsibility, and not being behind the camera. This would have pushed me more, however I still have some opportunity to do this when I am not in shot.

What does the performance actually consist of?

Mainly starring in the shots by the pool, I am playing the instrument sitting down on a chair by the other band members and the models. There is little to no movement apart from casually playing the instrument and occasionally smiling, and in some shots simply sitting without the instrument.

 

Is this a challenge for you, or something within your comfort zone?

The performing role in itself is quite mundane and not challenging at all, apart from playing an instrument I am less familiar with than a six-stringed guitar, which I must do right handed whereas I am left handed.

Personal Achievement

Personal Achievement

What did you personally want to get out of the whole A2 Prelim experience?

I look forward to having completed a product, hopefully one to a high standard and one I feel I played a significant role in. Lighting, camera and other technical aspects are areas I would like to learn more about and involve myself in.

Is it a challenge for you, or within your comfort zone?

I have experienced much of the music video process once before in helping former A2 students with their own video and starring in it, so more comfortable than I would have been without this experience, however pretending to play an instrument I cannot actually play, right handed (I'm left handed), is challenging and uncomfortable.

Have you achieved or learnt anything so far?

The importance of focusing to the camera when performing is key in music videos, as I learn more throughout, whereas previously when acting on camera I did not have to focus on it or face it. I've also found this experience far different from performing 'live' with instruments like we are pretending to.

1) Did you enjoy the workshop day? What were your best bits and why?

I thoroughly enjoyed the workshop, increasingly so as the day progressed and as I got involved. Perhaps the most rewarding part was completing the final shot and celebrating a result of the hard work and preparation that we slightly underestimated would lead up to producing a music video. It gave me a sense of achievement and also the joy of being involved in a high quality media product. The fact that the experience was completely all conclusive was another one of the best aspects; you couldn't laugh at others for wearing make up regardless of gender because everyone was in the same boat. Anyone unsure of acting was in good hands with the guidance of crew members with experience of being on camera and the 'community spirit' of the department helped keep everyone positive and with enough energy to last a long, hard-working day.

2) What have you learnt from participating in each of the prelim tasks?

This task has refreshed and further enlightened me to the level of effort and preparation required in the industry to produce anything of high quality. On the day there was certainly no lapse of effort and it will show in the final product the degree of professionalism with which we completed this task.

Tasks 1 and 2: 
Audion video and rehearsals - filming a short audition video gave me an incentive to learn some of the lyrics in advance, as well as how to lipsynch convincingly. It also helped me get into the spirit of performing, and I realised the importance of this in the latter stages. Despite not having a role that was particularly heavy in performance, the fact that everyone auditioned and everyone acted on shoot day was vital in reinforcing our confidence. To have any success in media it helps massively for all cast/crew to feel comfortable with what they are doing and I implemented this knowledge in auditioning with a peer with less confidence on camera than myself by acting eccentrically so that she could not only feel light-hearted and high spirited but more comfortable in knowledge that she would not be laughed at as she feared, if we all took the same attitude towards this task.

This continued into the rehearsals, where the crew (which partially consisted of trained/training actors) aided us in losing our inhibitions with acting exercises to prepare the whole cast for the camera. I improved my acting on camera in music video context by being taught the importance of eye contact with camera, which is very different to performing to a group of people on a stage as I had done with guitar on other occasions. Most importantly, as a class we have learned that a motivated, relaxed and happy workforce in any context in life means things run smoother and this is evidenced throughout our final video where most would not expect the actors to have been largely untrained and previously uncomfortable with the idea.


Task 3:
Planning and organising costume - although this was not the aim, getting people in costume even just to try them on prior to the shoot actually had a great effect on confidence. I and others felt an excitement in getting into role in anticipation of the shoot. Fortunately not from my own experience but that of others I found you cannot always solely rely on friends to borrow costume as they may forget or when you finally get to try on the item of clothing they offered, it might not fit well or look right; it accentuates the value of good planning and organisation, and the need to always have a backup plan.


Task 4:
The Shoot - by taking a little more responsibility on the technical side, my learning came largely from this area, but I also learnt about attitude, and as well as this found myself thinking about the music industry as a whole and how these productions reflect it.

Lighting - Just as I have every single time I have produced and been involved with any visual media from posters to film intros to music videos - I have been reminded of and further learned of the complexity of lighting. Even a simple plain white set up with infinity backdrop requires a great deal of effort and skill. I had experienced a very similar experience a few months ago in assisting an A2 group with their own coursework video, also characterised by high key lighting but their video only used one single lighting set up, whereas there were multiple arrangements in this remake. The pre-constructed lighting set ups were something new for me to be exposed to, having only my basic lighting knowledge and experience and previously lighting shots at the time of shooting them, but given the intricate nature of the red and blue lighting in particular, I could understand how important this was, especially in a remake where accuracy against a professional music video is difficult to achieve. 

Camera - another learning I made was that different lenses were used on more advanced cameras for different shots, such as the 35mm for group shots and 85mm for our closeups, both of which we used frequently, whereas before when I have worked on more simple cameras such as the Canon Legria HV30 which do not require this. Even with this great attention to detail in achieving high image quality there were still minor issues on some shots with focus such as the shot of 'GIRLS' spelt out on a white background.

Music Industry - one person being late has the potential to delay or damage a production regardless of their role. In the real industry you would be fortunate to get even one chance as well connected organisations can find someone else. Punctuality and good attitude on set are vital in any successful media production.

Having guys wear makeup and well planned lighting to be as flattering as possible to the cast (which we achieved with success) opened my eyes to the artificial nature of visual media. Presenting a group of people whether it be a band or model is done in a way which provides the most positive impression possible, all with the objective goal of promoting a product and maximise profit in the process, something which is interesting to philosophise.

Task 5:
The edit - I further developed many key skills in editing and learned new ones throughout the process of editing our remake. My confidence in editing went in leaps and bounds especially when halfway through I was separated from my group to edit alone, a challenge which I triumphed with, and was very pleased with as I had rarely edited with much independence before. By creating a performance bed and implementing non linear editing by set ups I could edit with more time efficiency. This technique taught me how different editing a music video is from other productions I have previously worked on, as all the audio was separate and far more cross cutting was involved. Grading faster and with more conviction was another important piece of progress for me as it will aid me hugely at A2, and grading in combination with key-frames to create the 'flash' effect has opened a lot of possibilities and ways to use grading creatively such as changing colours mid shot. 

3) Are you pleased with the footage and your edit? Is it how you expected it to look?

Footage
Despite the occasional grievance with a small number of particular shots, overall we obtained excellent footage on the day, especially when you take into consideration that most of the cast including myself had little to no acting experience, and many had reservations and lacked confidence prior to shooting. We only had one day to take footage and with cast and crew with varying professional experience, so the quality of the results reflect an excellent attitude to the task by all. Most real music videos have longer to shoot - often a few days - and all have planning far more in advance. Some of the setups we took footage from had to be altered towards what was available to us, so for practicality reasons we could not get a car upstairs in our school's studio, but luckily with connections of the department we borrowed a motorbike of a similar, 'vintage' style.

Edit
The edit started well, in a group of 3 where most were pairs generally meant we would have individually edited for slightly less time overall however we all contributed well and with a lot of time. After not being observed as being as hands on as my group I was separated to finish the edit alone - a big challenge but one I relished given how far my confidence in editing has come in the past 3 years of media studies. I am generally pleased with my edit given the limited time available to complete it. Without being overly perfectionist I reached a good standard of grading as well.


Expectations
It is how I expected to look and better; I have grown to expect an excellent standard in work from our school's media department. The hardest part to meet high expectations was with the grading, which I was more new to than the rest of the editing because although I hadn't edited in the same way before with performance beds and synching with separate audio, it came to me quite naturally and used principles I already knew well - whereas previously I had stayed away from editing out of lack of understanding and confidence with it. This was the first time I had really graded independently but I picked it up quickly and exceeded my own expectations in making our footage look more accurate. This can be witnessed below with my graded footage compared with the real video, where the colour in the footage has been improved quite significantly from the original footage.

4) How do you think your prelim experiences will impact on your approach to next term's music video coursework?

In the next academic year when we take on our own music video project I will take a very strong approach to planning, as our remake's success owes a lot to it. Planning to shoot by setup and great timekeeping meant we knew what we should be doing, when, and who should be present; a detailed planning model which I would like to emulate. 

I intend to explore multiple costume options as we have in this remake, in order to ensure backups if certain items of clothing are unable to be obtained or there is any kind of issue with a person lending something. 

I will also be impacted by my technical learning, meaning I will plan the lenses to use for each shot and construct lighting in advance of the final shoot.