Outline of Ancillary Task

The outline or plot of the music video will skip between singing and narration. The song does not begin at the very start of the video. The video starts without the music as the main character or artist is shown climbing out of a sleeping bag in a loft. There is then a shot of a clock reading 7 o'clock. There is then a close up of the artists hands clipping on a store name tag. This is were the song begins. There is then a long shot of the artist entering a store. Now there is a series of shots switching from the artist singing and narrative scenes with the song dubbed over them. In the song performance shots there also a guitarist stood behind the artist in various shots. The narration shows the artist working in the store but he gets fired and by the end of the song and narration the artist walks out of the store.

Daniel Collinson

Hardware and Software Needs

Software - 

The software that we will be using is called Final Cut Express. It allows us to edit, cut, paste and add effects to the movie that we are going to make. Another is Photoshop, we will be using this to make a c.d front cover for our single. Dreamweaver will be used to create a front page for the webpage for the "Discount Store" song.

Hardware -

We will be using a camera to shoot different photos e.g. location shots, we will also be using a video camera to shoot the video. We will also be using a Mac to edit the footage that we have shot.

Ashley Hartley

Final Cut Express

This is our practice piece using the industrial standard editing program Final Cut Express. We have learnt how to import clips and audio, render clips and audio, edit the clips to make them into continuous shots and also add text for opening titles and closing lines. We have also learned the names of the different applications of the program and how to use them for instance viewer and the canvas. The viewer allows you to view your whole project while being able to edit and remove useless scenes and shots with the playhead. We now know how to edit which will be very beneficial for our project. We also know how to use the timeline which allows us to select different parts of the project, from changing the clips position in the film and placing the music in the right location. It also allowed us to choose the volume of the music, it allowed us to heighten it or lower it to our specific needs. This will be very helpful in our project because we will be able to calculate how loud we will need our soundtrack.

Final Cut Express project by Blake Blackburn. 

Text by Daniel Collinson.

Institution - creating a video

There is a process to follow to make a chosen single into a music video. If EMI signed our artist then the record company would pay a video production company to make the video and it would then be made. This is done in a number of stages, here are the stages below;

Number one. The label, artist(s) and management agree what to release as a single.

Number two. The video commissioner  makes a shortlist of possible directos.

Number Three. The video commissioner sends the track with a broad brief, summarising ideas for the project, to the shortlisted.

Number four. Directors provide outline treatments to the video commissioner.

Number five. A Director is chosen and budget and deadlines are agreed.

Number six. The director develops the idea with storyboards and location photos.

Number seven. An art director, wardrobe people and director of photography are enlisted, locations are booked, sets are designed.

Number eight. The sets are built.

Number nine. All personnel are on site for the shoot (usually one or two days).

Number ten. Shooting complete, the film is transfered to the tape for editing.

Number eleven. The editor produces a rough-cut, which usually takes about three days.

Number twelve. The label, artist(s) and manager view and comment on rough-cut.

Number thirteen. Changes are agreed and made before visual effects are added.

And finally number fourteen. Online finished video is passed to label for release to TV stations and airplay in advance of single release.

Obviously the video production company plays a big part in creating the music video because it is not the record company who makes the videos it is the video production companies. An example of a video production company is Poisonpen films, who have made videos with artists such as funeral for a friend, Fightstar, The Holloways, The Young Knives, The Pigeon Detectives and The Answer. The director for Poisonpen films is Paul Morricone.

Daniel Collinson

Institution

Our product belongs to the music video institution. Music Institutions are split into two groups, Major and Indie (minor) record companies. The major record companies are usually international and within the major company there are many more smaller companies. Most famous artists will be signed to a major company. There are now four main major companies in the world; Sony-BMG, Warner music group, EMI and Universal music group. There used to be five because BMG was on its own but it merged with Sony for financial reasons.

Indie labels are smaller record companies that distribute artists which are less well known. They also usually have a particular genre and have artists which have smaller audience. Examples of Independant labels are Warp records and Giant Electric Pea. Warp records main genre of music is electro rockpop, whilst Giant Electric Pea's genre was Progrock.

Looking at the major record labels, if our artist had to be placed in one of them, it would most likely be EMI records because of their past artists and their genre. Since our artist is under the genre of Rockpop it was easy to place him with EMI because it already has artists that come under that genre. However sometimes rockpo can be the artists sub genre.

EMI artits include ; The Beatles, Lily Allen, Beastie Boys, Coldplay, Kylie Minogue, Katy Perry, Pink Floyd, queen and Robbie Williams. Obviously the genre of rockpop is more clearer in some of the artists than others.

EMI was established in London in 1897 by Emile Berliner, however it started off with the name 'The Gramophone company and by the end of the year it had many subsidiaries across most of europe and a few years later it was across all of europe, Russia and the Middle East, as well as Australia, India, China and parts of Africa. EMI is now the last existing British major record label. However it does not matter that the artist is American, because EMI is a major record company, it is international.

The traits of this institution do lean more towards the pop genre of music, and so the company will have a wide audience already. If our artist was to be signed to EMI records, he would probably do well since it is a major record company plus of his genre. The Rockpop genre has a huge audience, one because Rock and Pop are the two main genres of music at the present time and secondly because his genre is a hybrid so he will have fans for Rock and fans for Pop.

Here is the link to EMI.com below:
http://www.emi.com/page/emi/EMIHistory/0,,12641,00.html

Daniel Collinson

Feedback 23/11//09

Good research group - good links and references to videos/images etc...

You need more on branding - see pack - quotes and ideas etc...

Try to include the conventions of music video in relation to media critics - you need to reference the ideas of Andrew Goodwin and Pete Fraser - see packs -  more on this required - include quotes etc...

Also what are the conventions of the indie music video subgenre - your genre? What makes them distinctive from general music video conventions?

Target audience - you need a secondary audience that is wider but you need a more specific target - dont forget to use Young and Rubicon for your psychographic profiling too. 

Dont forget to put your audience questionnaires and results on here also. - graphs and pie charts are a good way to do this comment on what you find in this primary research.

Now move on and look quickly at your other key concepts and we should be starting to see some planning - location shots/casting shots/ storyboards and animatics etc... 

Remember to outline your artist/band  and brand image you are trying to create/push through your products.

Genre

Music Conventions

This type of hybrid genre are usually actual stage performance of the artists with a small narrative connected to the song which creates audience interest and appeal. This is what we intend to do with our song, we will show the artist singing and then add a narrative the song. The typical characters in this particular genre is usually the artist or frontman of the band who takes the role of the protagonist in the narrative. The ideologies of this genre are usually about love lost, or about just having a good time. There is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals, the visuals are either illustrating, amplifying or contradicting the lyrics. The lyrics are of a general good feeling and some key main lines play a part in explaining the narrative however they rarely video mirror all the lyrics of the song. Also the editing is paced in time with the pace of the song. The camera movement in this type of genre is generally accompanied by the artist or performer either walking and singing or performing on stage. Music videos often use something which the audience will be familiar with to create nostalgia and intertextually (J. Stewart says that intertextuality in a 'Music video as incorporating, raiding and reconstructing'  e.g. Robbie Williams with the song 'Let Me Entertain You', in this song he dresses up to look like a member from the rock band 'Kiss' as shown below.



And Blur with the song 'End of a Century'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thuSTF8-dyI 


The popularity of the Rock/pop genre is ever growing. It has a large audience since it is a hybrid and has many established artists such as Michael Jackson and Bon Jovi. Rock/pop became very successful in the promos of the 1960's and 1970's, with the rise of MTV and now it can be said that many successful artists can be placed under this particular genre.

The Beatles (1960 - 1970) are another band that can be said to be of the rock/pop genre. They were mainly pop i their early years, but as time progressed they seem to lean more towards the rock genre.

Here is the Beatles with the song 'Help' made in 1965.



Our product will follow the hybrid genre of Rock/pop. It is a hybrid because it aims to target more than one audience the rock audience and the pop audience. Also because the instruments used are from the rock background i.e. acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass and drums. It  is also a pop genre because of the steady pace and beat of the song and the lyrics rhyme and lyrics in most pop songs rhyme.

Daniel Collinson

Audience Research

Our target audience are both male and female teenagers (15-19) and are looking at all races. We are also targeting the lower working class (Group D) and also the subsidence group (Group E) as these are the most likely to both get the humour of the discount store song and video and also listen to this genre of music. We have choose these two sections because these are the more likely to listen to the pop/rock genres that our song contributes to, and they are always looking for new music to use and enjoy. They also have the most disposable income.
By using Maslows hierarchy of needs we can see how the song appeals to our target audience.
*Please click to enlarge image

By using the image above we can see that the song can appeal to the Esteem and Love/Belonging groups as it makes the listener belong to a group or social group.

For example Michael Jackson had a wide based audience with his pop music genre, these include adults all the way through to children. But aimed his music at what was then the teenagers/adults. Another example is Bon Jovi who as the same of Michael has a wide range and large audiences.

Our secondary audience are adults as these have the greater income and listen to the music genres that we are providing. We are looking at the socio-economic status of the skilled working class (Group C2) down through to subsidence (Group E). According to Young and Rubicon's work on pshychographic profiling, we are targeting two groups, the mainstreamers and the individuals. we are targeting these groups as the mainstreamers take up 40% of the market and individuals what to be like none else and will therefore will be more likely to buy our product then the other three remaining groups.

We have done some research on our target audience by doing surveys and questionnaires, the results can be found further up on the blog.

The genre that we have choosen is quite popular. We can see this through past album charts, for example Bon Jovi has a number one album four times in the 1990's and once in 2000. Another example is the comeback of Michael Jackson, in the 1990's he had four albums that reached numberone throught the whole of the decade and also in the 2000's when he announced the comeback tour his albums went back to number one with four more albums reaching the top of the charts and kept there for a number of weeks for example in 2009 the album The Essential was the number one album for seven weeks.

Ashley Hartley

Dan Bryk - Discount Song Lyrics

I’m going to the discount store
yeah i’m going to the discount store
can’t afford what i used to afford and i hardly even noticed

i’m going to the discount store
yeah i’m going to the discount store
can’t afford what i used to afford and i hardly even noticed
know this
knowing that the world’s an awful great big place
and i am awful small
it really shouldn’t come as much of a surprise
to find i don’t really matter at all

mom and dad don’t let me waste your time
mom and dad don’t let me waste your time
i know you’ve got to be at work by nine
to keep food upon the platter

mom and dad don’t let me waste your time
mom and dad don’t let me waste your time
i know you’ve got to be at work at nine
as if it really mattered
mattered

mattered that the clock needs punching
the man is watching
and the union’s gone for good
with all this freedom how come there’s no fun left in the neighborhood

A&R woman has central air
A&R woman has central air
every day i walk up three flights of stairs
and it’s getting hot this summer

label president has got health care
label president has got health care
every day i walk up three flights of stairs
and it’s really hot this summer
bummer

bummer that the world’s a great big awful place
and frequently unfair
it really shouldn’t come as much of a surprise
that there’s just not enough to share

Here is the link to jamendo.com, the creative commons website where we found Dan Bryk's song Discount store.

Ashley Hartley

http://www.jamendo.com/en/search/all/discount%20store

Research National Media Museum

We have recently visited the National Media Museum in Bradford,West Yorkshire. We then went onto having a presentation from Paul Morricone who is part of the Poison Pen Films team, Poison Pen is a new team that helps create music videos for both well known bands and bands that are just starting up on a minimal budget. He went on to talk about how he started within the industry and that he at first called in a lot of favours to friends already within companies. He started by building up a portfolio of different music videos that he did for his own band and also other new bands that have not yet been discovered. He looks at the song and lyrics and decides what ideas he gets from them and pitches ideas to the band. Once decided they then start filming.
He showed us some of his videos that he has done, which range from Fightstar to The Young Knives, and then started going through the process of which they go through to get the end product. At first Paul looks at the song and decides what ideas he can gather from it and what comes to mind. He then starts to film the band. He tries to make the music video fit to the song, for example if the song goes up in dynamic and gets faster then the video will then become more dynamic and will consist of faster shots. Paul then went on to tell us about the 'quality triangle'. The triangle consists of three points, one is money the second is time and the third is quality. He then went on to say that a lot of money but no time can still create a quality product and also a lot of time but less money can still create a good quality product, but nobody ever has all three points. While filming with the bands that have a low budget of sometimes £5000 he has to call in a lot of favors for him to finish with a quality product.

During filming of the video not everything can go to plan e.g. the band may not like doing a certain thing but would prefer doing something different, this can sometimes make it better. Also while editing it is a good idea to mix things up and keep looking through it as different versions can look better in a different sequence. We then finished by watching a few more music videos to get information from then and to see dirfferent styles and ways of editing it all together.

Ashley Hartley

Developed genre and persona

Michael Jackson's branding and genre was developed as well as his persona. His early songs were about love and life however his songs then did become more towards the rebellious side with songs like bad and smooth criminal.This link will take you to youtube.com and show Michael Jackson 'Smooth Criminal' and it will Michael Jackson's branding (suit, tie and stetson hat).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex30DYwQlHU


Daniel Collinson

Branding

We are making a music promotion. Branding is important to the music industry. Branding is a particular make of a topic. It is about creating an image that people link to a particular type of product, topic or artist. 'Brands need to provide customers with consistent compelling experience in order not to confuse them, as confusion leads to doubt' (quote taken from mudvalley.com). Artists have there own brands which makes there music recognizable. Artists such as Michael Jackson could be recognized with simply wearing one glove, short black pants and white socks.

There has always been a need for branding since the beginning of mass production. Branding was used because the audience had so much choice and so from household items to superstar artists had to be given a distinct personality and make the audience want to buy the product instead of another. as (Naomi Klein) says 'Competitive branding became a necessity of the machine age - within the context of manufactured sameness, image based difference had to be manufactured along with the product.

One of the key elements of creating a successful brand is consistency across the range of products promoted at any one time and consistency in how a range of products are promoted across time. In terms of music this is done through appearance, as mentioned before Michael Jackson has a particular image that is recognizable. Sometimes artists will have the same type of beat in their songs or their videos might look similar.

Brands work because they turn a artist into something unique and special, one artist stands out from another and one band seems different to another.

The Brand we are trying to create for our artist is a cool but chilled out artist. His personality will be reflected through his songs and videos. He will have a certain image which would be stylish fashionable clothing and in his videos he will usually have a band behind him The video would show him singing the song then it would cut to him in a narrative. This will explain the song and make the video visually interesting for the audience. His album covers would be quite simple, usually there would be a picture of him and then a background behind him, usually of a certain place or location.

James Hamill and Daniel Collinson

Outline of Group

This year, our group consists of Blake Blackburn,Ash Hartley, James Hamill and Daniel Collinson. The product we have chosen to do this year is a Music Promotion. We have to complete 3 tasks, the main one being a Music Video. The secondary tasks are to be chosen from; an album cover; a magazine advertisement; or a website homepage for the artist.