Mince's filming tips

Mince is a famous director within the music industry and has worked with artists such as The Saturdays. In the past he came into our school and taught the students how to make a good quality film; our teachers showed us a presentation showing all the tips that he gave to students so that we could use his advice to improve our filming skills. 
Below is a list of all the tips we received:

• Hold tight - have the film camera in one hand and with the other hand hold onto your arm which you are filming with, this keeps the camera steady and avoids loss of grip or balance.
• Have your elbows in for stability. 
• Know your way around the camera - find out where the record button is so that you can press it without looking for it.
• Have somebody standing behind you to guide you as you move around whilst filming so that you don't trip or shake the camera whilst looking where you are going.
• Practice the shot before you film the real thing.
• Direct your actors - use markings on the ground so that they know where to go and tell them exactly what to do.
• Count down from 5 to show when you will begin filming and everyone knows that they have to be in character.
• Use sentences such as "Quiet on set" to show that everyone needs to be quiet and in character.
• Film more footage than you need - you can always cut and you will want to have choices when it comes to editing.

These tips will be very helpful when we come to filming our music video and will help me ensure that our video uses qood quality steady shots. It has also shown me that it is essential to look after the cast and crew, for example by having somebody to help guide and protect the person filming.

Reception Theory

When making a music video it is important to consider how the audience will interpret it, for this reason I have done some research on Reception Theory...



This theory is widely accepted and is believed to demonstrate the way in which people consume media products. As it suggests that a persons interpretation of a text depends on their age, gender, personality and experiences, it shows that people do not just passively consume texts, as the hypodermic needle theory would suggest; instead the interpretation of a video will be different depending on the person watching. This is the way I believe our audience will consume our music video; for this reason we are going to aim our video at teenagers as they are likely to have experienced similar situations to the scenes in our video, therefore they are most likely to connect with the characters and understand the storyline. Whereas a younger audience would not be able to bring the same views of experiences to our video and may therefore struggle to fully understand the plot as they may not be able to connect with the heartbreak or loneliness which will be featured within our video. 

Experimenting with editing

Over recent lessons we have been experimenting with iMovie and learning about how to upload footage, cut it and put it all together. I also explored changing the speed of footage, changing the colour and brightness, changing the speed of transition and he different transitions which can be used between shots. I have also learned about inserting text into the video; this will be useful for the title and the credits. 

Within our video we will be using a lot of transitions between each shot such as cross dissolve and blur. This will ensure that the shots flow well and that the video looks professional. In addition it is conventional within many softer rock music videos to use short transitions between the majority of shots in order to create a swift and smooth change from shot to shot, however these transitions are usually barely noticeable due to the speed of the change. 

I also experimented with the speed of shots. In our video we may slow some shots down, as slow motion is a technique often used in indie rock music videos during scenes of people being active (running, dancing, walking). This can create tension, make a shot more emotive, or highlight the way people are feeling. Within our video we are going to experiment with slow motion when Jess and Tom are in the woods and in the forest; we aim for this to highlight the fun they are having and show a loving relationship. In addition slow motion will allow more time for the audience to notice their facial expressions. We will also try using slow motion for shots of Jonny walking in the rain as this will emphasise his loneliness.

Scripting

As we are creating a music video we will not be including any speech within it as this would draw attention away from the song and the final product would probably not be as successful. However there will be some points in the video where the couple are talking to one another as this is important within a relationship, however there will be no diegetic sound of them talking as speech does not conventionally sound good and flow within a music video because it would break up the song. We plan on letting the actors talk about whatever feels natural and fits with the scene around them as this will seem more natural and will not look as though they are just reading a script; it is important for the couple to look comfortable around each other, look like they're having fun and communicate well.


In addition we have asked Jonny (playing the ex-boyfriend) to learn some of the lyrics (mostly from the chorus) and the basis guitar rhythm so that he can play/sing some parts for when we want to film him in the field. We have given him a copy of the song and highlighted the parts he needs to learn so that it will be easier to sync his lips with the song.

Props

Here are some of our images of the props that we are planning to use within our music video:

Guitar - Through parts of the video, we are planning on having clips of the ex-boyfriend miming to some of the song lyrics and pretending to play guitar. He is going to be in natural locations when playing the guitar, such as in a field or in a house, this will help to make it look more realistic. When he is paying the guitar, we are hoping to try and capture his emotion, to really emphasise how much he is missing his ex-girlfriend and how much he wants her back. The use of guitars is common within rock videos, where there is normally a whole band performing: singing, drums and guitars. Because our genre is pop rock, we thought it would be good to use an acoustic guitar.

We are planning on having the ex-boyfriend looking back at an old picture of him and his girlfriend when they were together. The image will show him and Jess embracing in the woods. We plan on using an over the shoulder shot for this scene. We are thinking of using polaroid pictures as they look more old fashioned, which could connote how long they were together and showing all the good memories they shared; polaroid pictures are also more appealing to our target audience than normal pictures as they are more interesting and seen as 'cool'.

Target audience

Last month I put a poll on my blog asking wether viewers believe that our chosen song by A Rocket to the Moon is most suited to a target audience of females between the ages of 14 and 20. From this I found that out of 11 answers, 10 people agreed that this target audience was ideal, which shows that our audience is most likely to be teenage girls. However one person believed that our target audience should be the same age range but both genders instead of just females, after taking this into account we realise that we will need to make our video, poster and album cover appealing and suitable for both genders as we should not limit our audience because if this was an official video then it would be essential to reach a wide audience in order to create a buzz about the video, bring in viewers and make a profit.

Cast

This Jess, she is 18 and will be playing the main girl in our music video. We chose her because we both get on well with her and therefore we will feel comfortable asking her to adapt her acting and she will hopefully feel comfortable as she won't be embarrassed to act in front of us. She is confident and will fit the role well as she is average height, so she will be shorter than both boys; this is not particularly important in real life however we hope to make our music video as balanced and appealing as possible and the couple will look best together if the boy is taller than the girl. Jess will also be good at this role because she is the conventional idea of pretty  and although looks are not the most important thing in a relationship, we want to represent a girl who is fun, feminine and pretty, but still a normal girl, so that viewers will be able to relate to her and aspire to be like her. In addition most people prefer to watch a video with attractive actors/actresses in it, and as she is slim and attractive she will also attract the male gaze as the music genre we have chosen is listened to by both male female audiences; within the industry using good looking actors is conventional because it is likely to make the video more appealing.

This is Tom, he is 17 and will be playing the new boyfriend in our music video. We chose him because he is a bit taller than Jess and as I said above this will make our video as appealing as possible. In addition he is attractive and fits the role of a 'cute' boyfriend and will therefore appeal to the female audience. We want him to represent an average teenage boy so that male viewers will be able to relate to him and possibly want to have a relationship like his character does in the video, we do not want viewers to feel as though he is one of the popular crowd, as this would not have the same effect; we want to show normal teenagers who can be self conscious that they could have a relationship like his character. I feel that he represents a normal teenage boy because he has a simple, yet attractive haircut and he wears popular brands of clothes, such as Superdry and Hollister which are usually very causal, in addition he likes similar things to a lot of boys such as music and going out with friends. He and Jess get on well and should feel comfortable acting like a couple around and being close, this is important within a music video because if the actors are laughing or look awkward then it will not look believable. 

This is Jonny, he is 18 and will be playing the ex-boyfriend (who will also be the singer / guitarist). Similarly to the other actors we chose him because he gets on well with everyone and will feel comfortable. He also used to play guitar so he will be best at pretending to play along with the song. He too taller than Jess and is also in good shape and will appeal to a female audience. Similarly to Tom, he represents a normal guy, he dresses similarly to many other guys and enjoys hobbies such as cycling and xbox. We wanted to ensure that Jonny and Tom seemed to be a similar level of popularity in order to show that Jess' character did not leave Jonny's character for Tom's because he was more popular or 'hot', but because she liked him more as a person; I feel that this is important because if Jess' character had split up with Jonny for the wrong reasons then she would not be a very good role model or icon for our target audience of teenagers.