Draft of Digipak + Advert

Digipak draft 1-


Front cover



As a group we had previously discussed the idea of using the pictures in blocks or squares on the front of our digipak. We took this idea and used it in our draft. We used the images from a photo shoot we did of Tom especially for the digipak. This worked well as we took them in front of a white screen allowing all the focus to be on our solo artist. We also brought the album name into some of the photos as we had a good idea before pohotographing of how we could arrange them on the front cover.




On the front cover we boardered all the images in black, outlining them and defining the break is the different pictures we used. When placing the name of our artist on the digipak we decided to keep the text in the same context of the image box in which it was placed, we did this by putting a slight shadow effect on the text and made it grey scale.
Inside

For the inside case we again used the images from the photo shoot. For the left hand side i pieced together 2 images, one colour image and one black and white. I cut them so they fitted together well, unlike my other tries that resulted in Tom looking like a horse.

Leaving the image on its own left the page a little too bland so we placed some of the lyrics from one of the songs onto the picture, however simply having the text in straight lines did not make the picture better, it blocked the image and didn't look very attractive. I then had the idea of the text all being written in a spiral however this wasn't viable on publisher so we resulted to making circles and moving each one to fit inside the previous circle of text.

For the right side image and CD we used the same picture. We kept a slight outline on the image on the CD and just made the background image slightly transparent. The only writing we applied to the CD was the singers name and the album name, we left the inside pretty basic as its not a focal point of the digipak.

Back cover

For the back cover we decided to crop one of the images from the photo shoot to leave only half of the main image. We edited the image a lot by altering the colour and adding a blurred effect round the edge, i feel this image worked well and is a definite solid idea for our final digipak.


We placed all of the song names in a basic font down the right hand side. We also partly boardered the image and sides with the artists name as we thought it framed the image in a quirky way.
Digipak draft 2-

Front

Again in this digipak we used the blocks/squares of images of our artist. However in this one we used more images and applied then in different sizes to the front, we also put in some pictures of landscape shots to fill it out. For the album name we decided to try and see what effect it would bring across if it was placed in a different way. We toyed with having the pictures containing the album name in different ways other than straight across the middle. We then applied the other images around the album name.


We decided to leave a gap for the name of the artist as we tried placing it on top of the images however it didn't stand out enough so we cropped some of the images to allow us to have a blank space which resulted in the text standing out more.

Back

For the back of the digipak we have gone along the same lines as the other, by using an image that covers half the back allowing space for the song names on the other half. We minimally edited the image as we felt the image itself had somewhat of a warm tone of colours to it. The song names have just been done in a basic Word font in a Navy colour that has been drawn from the image on the back.


The background of the image has been left the same so we didn't have to cut around the image. Even though the colour varies it incorporates the singers shadow into it well, making the image look more professional. We also added a bar code to make it look more realistic.

Inside

For the left side of the inside we used a shot from our music video, the shot may only be of a building and cars but we believed it worked well, and with it being in grey scale it brought a different aspect to our digipak. With the artists name we tried to create it in cloud shape writing, this was tricky to do but i think it works well as it also relates to the album title. We also added a frame to the majority of the picture, leaving a banner like space at the bottom which we filled with some song lyrics.

For the right side we again kept the cloud theme running through this digipak by applying a sort of sky with clouds behind the image on the CD. The CD itself is i replica of the front cover however we added the album title on it again as we thought it would stand out better with more cloud like writing to link the inside pages together.

Advert Draft 1-
We created this advert on publisher as it allowed us to do the most editing of images, text and manipulating of colour. From looking back at our deconstruction of adverts we took the generic features and tried to apply them to our own advert.




I wanted the image to cover at least half of the page, however with just the one image it looked empty and boring so i inserted 2 other little pictures along the bottom and the side, which i deleted the background out of allowing them to sit nicely on top of my original image. Prior to this i had edited and manipulated the images i was wanting to use to make them look more professional. For the 5 star rating i simply used clip art as it was the easiest to apply to my advert quickly.



I also used logos such as 'itunes' and 'HMV' to make my advert look more realistic. I kept with a common colour scheme throughout the text. Those that worked the best when placed on top of the black background, all of which i had drawn from the main images.

Advert draft 2-

We also created this advert on publisher as it allowed the most editing to be done. We firstly applied a plain black background and placed an image that we took on our day filming on top. We left a gap round the edge of the image as we felt the black background worked well as a boarder outlining the image. We put the artist and album in basic font and altered the colour depending on where we placed them on the advert, as we placed the album name over a very light white spot in the image we decided black text would stand out the most, this is in juxta position the the artist name as it is white text on a much darker background.

For this advert instead of using the stars off clip art we just inserted a star shape from the tool bar, we then filled them with yellow. We placed the song names from the album in a much smaller font at the bottom of the advert as they aren't a key selling point. As the image was quite dark at the bottom we made the text white so it would stand out a little bit. We then applied the logos such as 'itunes' and 'HMV' to give the advert an authentic look.

Advert Draft 3-

For this advert draft we kept the image in colour so therefore wanted a coloured background instead of a black one. We used a vibrant blue as we thought it might bring more focus to the image and advert. We went along the same line as our previous advert with the layout as we thought it worked well. We made the stars using the shape tool from the tool bar again as they seemed brighter than the clip art stars.

After previewing the advert with the blue background we decided it was too out there to work well so we changed it into black. Again like the previous advert we added the song names and release date at the bottom of the advert in white.

Planning: Final animatic + storyboards

This is our final animatic we put together to help us with the filming process.



Storyboards:

Planning: Shooting prep

Location
As a group we decided to film the majority of our music video in Milton Keynes Central, a large town in Buckinghamshire. We chose Milton Keynes as we all knew the area quite well and through researching other music videos from our chosen genre we knew we wanted the city feel within our music video.
It takes roughly 50mins to get to Milton Keynes, this is the route we took.


Before setting off for Milton Keynes we already had places in mind of where we wanted to film some shots. The train station with its large open area surrounded by offices and shops would be ideal for our panning shots and some of the main filming.

Here are some pictures from Milton Keynes area.






Equipment
Through using the video cameras from school previously in our filming task, we decided we wanted a better quality camera for filming our final music video, so much so one of our group members especially brought their own camera of a better quality so we could film our final piece with a better quality camera. We will also need a tripod to help steady our still shots that we will borrow from school along with some dolly wheels to steady our travelling shots. For some of the filming we are wanting a guitar to either be played or held.



Weather
Before going to film our music video in Milton Keynes we checked the weather using the BBC weather website and another weather application on the iphone as we didnt think one websites predictions would be reliable enough.



Actor
Our chosen actor is Thomas Blakey who is a member of our group. We chose to use Tom as he is very familiar with this music genre and he also does alot sing in his free time. It was also easier as he was involved in our planning so he had a greater knowledge of what we expected from him when filming our video. Another positive of using a Tom meant that he was very reliable for filming where and when we want to do it. Tom will also help with some of the scenery shots as the actor doesnt need to be present.

Planning: shooting schedule

Thursday 6th January 2011-
We are aiming to get the majority, if not all the filming done on this day. We will all be travelling together to Milton Keynes along with all the equipment needed throughout the day.
We are wanting to leave around mid morning to hopefully catch the weather at its best in the middle of the day.

First attempt - Failed shooting

The original idea of going to the beach came from the many acoustic pop music videos that we had watched when trying to find ideas for our own filming. The vast majority of them were filmed on the beach or in an idyllic location with a girlfriend or love interest.




^Above is the route which we took to Hunstanton that took use about 3hours each way. This was the closest beach to us which i had visited many times before so would know my way around when finding good places to film.



Originally we went to the beach at Hunstanton on the 26th of October as we initially thought the sooner we did the filming the better the weather would be as winter was approaching. Unfortunately this was not the case as the weather wasn't on our side with all the rain and wind while filming in the freezing cold.

Here are some pictures of our unsuccessful day at the beach:

Planning: Directors pitch

Director Pitch/ Treatment For Music Video.

Name Of Artist: J.R.A

Title of Track: ‘Closure’

Genre: Acoustic

Target Audiences: Age of 15-30

Outline of Ideas: What will happen?

There will be a variety of different shots of a young male that is clearly up set about recently losing his female partner and wanting her back in his life. We will film the male character in a built up area to give more emphasis that he is lost and alone. We are having a mixture of performance and narrative based footage. This will involves shots of the male singer with a guitar, without a guitar, with some singing and also much footage of scenery.

Intertextual References? What is it like? What should it remind us of?

The music video is a typical pop video with a male character portraying his feeling through song about a female partner which he has lost. The male character is just a stereotype of a young male which plays guitar being really emotional, also singing about a girl. The aim of the song is to get the audience connected and feel the emotion he is expressing through his song and video. It is trying to put the audience in his ‘shoes’ and make them feel what he is feeling.

Locations

There was much discussion between our group of where we would film this footage and we analysed many areas and looking at their pro’s and cons.

We have decided on the locations of Milton Keynes town centre and Abbington park in Northampton Town. The reasons for our overall decisions consist of many aspects such as the opposite scenery, it diverts from a built up area to what looks like a rural park. This gives us more variety of shots and scenery and doesn’t mean our whole video will be based in the same location.

What Resources are needed?

For the filming itself, we just need a camera, tripod and a form of transport. We also need a car for the filming as we are trying to do steady smooth tracking shots. The car ables us to do this as whilst one slowly drives, another can steadily film out of the window giving us a smooth tracking shot. We are doing this as we need to improvise to get a larger variety of shots.

Key Shots and Special Features

-Low angle long shot of the busy traffic on the motorway from a bridge.

-Shots of male artist in open space out the front of Milton Keynes Central station.

-Need to ensure that the artist has a guitar, however not in every shot.

Justifications of Ideas in Relation to Genre and Artist

Through our extensive research, we managed to discover that many music videos in this genre base their videos mainly on the artist, who also happens to be the actor in the video. This is the main reason we have chosen to do this in ours. Many of our ideas that we as a group have come up with have been through watching many music videos of a similar genre.