Final Music Video

This is the final cut of our music video. We have responded to the feedback we were given on our second rough cut in order to get the best out of the video. One issue that was pointed out with our rough cut is that a certain shot was too hard and it was hard to read the wanted poster, making the meaning of the narrative unclear to the audience; We designed an improved a wanted poster that was easier to read and added more lighting to the setting and re-shot those parts. We then edited the new shots in a new layer over the old ones, making sure our match on action was still present. With the new footage, one part of it was inappropriate and with our own initiative we created a censor image to go over the top of the taboo footage. There was an issue with one of the shots being too long. Over the breakdown, the lead vocalist and the bassist are shouting the lyrics at each other and it is one continuous shot for almost a minute. This is an issue as it is the fastest part of the song and therefore should have more shots cut to the beat. We have resolved this issue by editing a lot more shots into that part, so that the shots change to the beat. There is a drum roll towards the start of the song and we have added a lot more shots into that as that is another really fast part of the song so its taking the thought beats into account. Another piece of criticism we got was that some of the shots were too similar and repetitive, we changed this by adding more shots and angles to go along with the song and also taking the thought beats into account such as the breakdown as i have shown earlier, we have took different shots and angles of them singing and then as the music gets faster the editing to different shots gets faster also and eventually ends up with close-ups so the audience didn't get bored of the same shots as shown in the feedback. So all in all our final cut has taken into account all of the criticism that was given by our peers and teaching body and adapted it to our finalized product to create a well structured, funny and appealing music video.

Final Magazine Advert

The magazine advert was not as time consuming to make as the digipak, but equally effective. The aim of the advert is to interest the target audience and potential fan's attention, and I thought it was important to capture the same essence as the digipak, which is why I included the same plain white background. I also used the images for the band name and album title; I wanted the theme to stay very close to the digipak, and as these are the biggest pieces of text, it was vital that they were the same. I used the photo of the band members with their arms crossed in this also, not to remain continuity, but because it was best suited. The photo looked the most professional and represented each band member as equals, as well as fitting perfectly above the text. The small description is the key selling point and is multi-functional as it lets readers know that it is a good album, and what genre it is etc. The 'OUT NOW' is there to replace the release date and inform the reader that the album it already out and can be bought in shops. This is also a vital piece of text, hence the large bold font. The small features at the bottom give the digipak a realistic feel as they are the features that most magazine adverts contain nowadays. As facebook is the largest current social networking site in the world, it is vital that the band would promote themselves and their album via facebook, which is why I have included the link at the bottom of the digipak. The smartphone barcode is also a vital part of modern technology if the band want to keep up with other competitors within their genre. I think that the theme of the advert suits the music video and digipak perfectly whilst still maintaining the unique features of a modern day magazine advert.

Final Digipak

This is the digipak we have designed via photoshop to go along with our music videos. In order to make our digipak look professional, we decided to have a band photoshoot rather than just use screenshots from our video. After our photoshoot, the next step was to find a digipak outline on google images that we could use. Once we had the outline, we thought it best to start on the front cover of the digipak as it is the first thing the audience would see. We used the website 'dafont.com' to find appropriate fonts for the band name and album title, we then used screenshots of the text and imported them into photoshop. 'The Automatic' was filled in with the same blue as the cookie monster in order to link the style with the video. We used the same fonts on the spine with a cookie separating the band name and album title, this again linked our digipak with our music video narrative. The next step on our front cover was to include some photos from our band photo-shoot, this would keep the CD cover looking original and unique. We includes a shot of each band member holding a frame and pulling a face, using the quick selection tool to delete the background. The back cover was the most complex part of our digipak; we included a shot of the band sat on a couch, but most of the background had to be deleted using the rubber as the quick selection tool wasn't accurate enough. We also had to reduce the opacity by a considerable amount so that it didn't overpower and take attention away from the track listing above. The track listing was also time consuming as it was difficult to decide on a suitable font that was comical and suited the light hearted theme of the digipak, as well as fit the longer song titles on the page. The font I chose was again taken from 'dafont.com'. The most difficult part was fitting the correct copyright information, logos and barcode onto the bottom of the page without it looking cramped and jumbled; but I think we have chosen the right arrangement and it looks pretty realistic. We decided to leave the CD holder side blank as we didn't want it to look over crowded when the disc was in, we wanted a contrast as the CD is designed to look like a cookie (again linking the digipak to our music video narrative.) The other sides are unedited photos of the band from the photoshoot with a clear background, this idea took influence from the booklet that comes with Lostprophet's 'Liberation Transmission' Album. This band are of a similar genre and the booklet includes photos of the band with a plain background, but it looks very effective. The first side that will show when the Digipak is opened will be the one with the four band members stood with their arms crossed. I think this creates a good effect as it is different to other band shots and looks good on its own. The photo of the band crouched down and the other photo of the band on the couch take up a similar amount of space and make the digipak look quite symetrical as well as filling the digipak out to make up for the plain center. Overall I think the simple but effective colour scheme and use of images such as cookies put a young and almost immature feel on the album cover, which will appeal to the teen audience.

Evaluation Question 1

Evaluation Question 1 on Prezi

Evaluation Question 2

Evaluation question 2

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Evaluation Question 4

Evaluation Question 4 on Prezi

Band Merchandise

This is our band merchandise and has come in the form of a band t-shirt, using the theme colour blue of our company logo and the wanted poster of our music video of the cookie monster i have created a t-shirt to with our album and advert It will be on a white and black t-shirts so its a variety. It will go on sale shortly and will be disputed to the UK from 1st March, it is a leading song from the Automatic's recent album 'Monster' which is called Monster to co-inside with the album and music video. This is only a release of the t-shirt and only will be on sale for a limited time only.

Rough Cut Feedback

We have showed our peers our second rough cut in order to gain some feedback. This is what they said:

Some shots need more lighting - There is some shots of the narrative where it is hard to see some of the props, making it difficult tick depict the storyline. We are going to resolve this by re-shooting the scenes that are too dark and replace them with the new shots.

Some shots are too long - Some of the shots in the second rough cut last too long and on screen it really makes the video drag. We are going to resolve this problem by editing more shots into the video so that it picks up the pace and cuts to the beat.

Some shots are too similar - Alot of the performance shots included in the rough cut are at the same angle and look very similar. The issue with this is mainly timing, we ran out of time to add more various shots into the video before the deadline. In our final edit we plan to include alot more of the footage that we shot in the video.

Final Wanted Poster

This is the wanted poster we will be using our narrative. We used a handmade one in our second rough cut, but have decided the footage is too dark and it is hard to read the poster; this is why we have designed one in photoshop using a black and white image of the cookie monster, added text and put an effect over the top to make it look old and worn. This will have a positive impact on our Mise en Scene and make it easier for the audience to understand the storyline. After printing the image off, i have also crumpled it up to give it even more of a creased effect and to look more realistic.

Editing the music video 2

This is our work space within final cut express HD, this is our footage left and below and as you can see you have 2 lines of footage of which are performance shots shown in our first rough cut and narrative shots. I froze the performance footage, so it cant be tampered or changed, so we could just simply put our narrative in the top row as the top row is played first and where there is gaps, it will play the below footage. This was a very good technique as we could establish where the narrative fits best and to fit it all of the narrative in and in order, so it flows better. We have left gaps in the narrative so the band shots aren't totally lost and so the music video doesn't get to boring. Our second rough cut is much more advanced than our first as we have included our narrative shots so it has a story to follow within the song but with the band shots also; this is key as we don't want our audience to get bored of the video but we want it to have added meaning and humour influences in our music video and i think we have through the footage we have produced in our second rough cut. Here is a link to our second rough cut which is of good quality and hopefully become a very high quality final cut of the song 'Monster' by The Automatic. The tabs in our work space [as shown above] separates our footage so we know where our footage is, this really helps as it makes the editing process very organized and more structured. So all in all i think our editing of our music video is going very well.

The Automatic - Monster Rough Cut 2

This is our second rough cut. Our video has improved greatly as we have incorporated all of the narrative footage we plan to use alongside the original performance shots. We have structured the narrative shots around the performance and feel that it flows very well. The narrative shots we have included are based on our storyboard, although we have changed our ideas slightly to enhance the viewing pleasure of our music video. All in all we believe that the second rough cut is a great improvement from our first, based on the added narrative and tighter editing, however; there is still alot of room for improvement for our final edit.

Editing The Music Video

This is me editing our music video into final cut express using the right and left screens effectively as the one on the left shows our footage in the drop down tab's which we have filmed and imported through I movie, and the one on the right shows the actual movie I have made to the music track which is 'Monster' by The Automatic as you can see the wave form below. I have cropped different types of shots together to make a continued footage throughout the song and a preview of this can be shown in our rough cut on youtube. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Phbo-thOgcM) this is our rough cut link and can watch it in full, But this is only a preview of what we have filmed and doesn't include our narrative shots that will come in the second version of our rough cut.

Above is our work space where we can listen to the track imported from youtube this track has been frozen so it cant be cut or anything as when I am piecing all of the footage together along with the videos when I shrink them down the track doesn't it stays the same, a handy tool so I don't have to worry about the track as much its just the lip sync really. In this rough cut I have only used band shots as we don't want to give to much of our story away in the first preview of the song but as you can see on the left screen is some of our narrative footage which we will include in our second preview. I am using a technique of using the top line of footage as the band footage and the space below is going to be the narrative footage and then cut and delete it into place so it makes yet another full music video.

The Automatic - Monster Rough Cut 1

This is our first edited version of our music video for the track 'Monster' by the Automatic, it includes band shots at a variety of angles and at two locations, close up's of guitars and basses and meat shot's of singers lip syncing the song. I had edited this bit by bit to go with the song and sometimes cutting on the beat of the guitars and drums but mainly a different shot for each line of the song. We used a Sony video camera along with a tripod to film this and used our initiative with our own clothing and equipment used in the video. I used Final Cut Express HD to edit the pieces of video to the song 'Monster' and tried to get everything in good order so it flows easily.

StoryBoard Animatic

This is the storyboard animatic, it includes the track monster by the automatic and also includes our storyboard which we created to kind of get a feel of what we want to with our music video and what shot goes where, its a rough idea and may change in the real video but its a starting block and will help the filming run more smoothly and fluently as a kind of guide to our programme of what goes where in the music video.

Shooting Schedule

This is our shooting schedule for our music video we have included, the number of shots, shot type, action and mise en scene. This will be crucial as this provides a outline of what our music video will consist of.

Primary Audience Research

This is our primary audience research using 5 participants asking about our chosen genre of indie, we wanted to gather information on other peoples thoughts on the genre. We established the particular kind of dress a indie style of person would wear, this includes jumpers, skinny jeans and plimsolls. We found out that people like narrative and performance based music video's but also found out that the typical props in the indie genre is a band performance which in including guitar's, drums, bass guitar's and keyboards. Indie style of clothing also consist of wearing sunglasses even though its not even sunny. So in our music video we will adapt these features to it and use the costumes and props which have been said in this short video on primary audience research such as skinny jeans and jumpers; we will also have the use of instruments of a typical band of guitarist, drummer, bassist, and a singer so we will incorporate this in our music video.

Initial Ideas

Lyrics Breakdown

Music Video Analysis

This video by two door cinema club which is I can talk is within the indie rock genre. The music is quite jerky and fast paced and can runs under the heading of amplification as it symbolising what the music is intending to symbolise. Firstly i has fast cuts at the start of the song to symbolise the speed of the lyrics being said, also the opening sequence has a kind of film start feature as it looks like a start of a film as it says I can talk in big yellow bold letters and copyright which is typical of start of films. Throughout the music video there is flashes like when a camera takes a picture, spinning camera shots, zooms, close ups of guitars and meat shots , fast paced jolts and movements with the camera. It has some aspects of switching between narrative and the performance as it has just the lead-singer, lip syncing the lyrics then in the chorus all of the band are singing the song while playing the instruments.

In his book Dancing in the Distraction factory, Andrew Goodwin points out characteristics and features that can be found in music videos. Firstly music videos demonstrate genre characteristics, In I Can Talk there is a certain genre such as flashes and showing them playing the song in the chorus which is typical of indie music not like metal videos showing them on stage or a dance routine for a girl/boy band. There is a relationship between the lyrics and visuals is shown when the lead singer walks down the stairs and says 'coats' and his coat flies off another Andrew Goodwin theories of music. Another Andrew Goodwin theory is the relationship between the music and visuals, the tone and atmosphere is fast paced with flashes, twists and shakes all the way through the song to go with the tempo of the track as its quite fast paced, and when the pace of the song speeds up in the chorus from the verses so does the editing this also shows the relationship between the music and visuals. The demands of the record label is clear as it clearly focuses on the main singer Alex Trimble, as through the verses he is the main piece and its shows him getting changed and singing into the camera with loads of meat shots and close-ups; but in the chorus it focuses on the others as well as him so i think the record label are more interested in the front man than the others. There is a inter-textual relevant prospect in the opening scene of the music video to a film as it has opening credits like a film. One of the opening credits is 'KITSUNE presents' this shows it has a reference to a film.

Music Video Analysis

This is a music video for teddy picker by the arctic monkeys which falls into the indie genre too. This video is mainly a band rehearsal getting an in-site of the time in the studio and how they record there tracks which would be on a day to day basis for them, it is like behind the scene footage of this famous band, such as seeing his lucky crocodile head. The editing cuts are fast paced at the start of the video like one every second and slowly slow down, the camera shots have loads of meat shots as they are showing the emotion of making the track and them performing/ Alex singing, as the record distribute demands it as it will sell the song. The mise en scene is very weird as they are all wearing different clothes, like Alex the singer is in a shirt and trousers, but the drummer and bassist are in casual clothes like jeans on a t-shirt, but the guitarist is in smart casual a mixture of the two. The full music video is like a first person narrative of their everyday life, such as the studio and the pub, the camera shots are shaky and use of some blur and could signify dancing and closing eyes.


The media conventions of Teddy Picker, can be viewed through Andrew Goodwin's theories. One of them is, the relationship between music and visuals such as when they are pointing at the top 100 songs as they want to be there, this is illustrative as its illustrating the relationship between the visuals and lyrics, there is a lot of thought beats throughout this Arctic Monkeys track such as when the drummer pauses and then hits the snare and tom to start the verse. Another one of Goodwin's theories is the relationship between the lyrics and visuals, like when Alex starts singing the next verse the camera starts focusing on his face with a meat shot, with a shaky action. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics, this is true as there dress such as hair style and what they are wearing like shirt and jeans will signify the indie genre, also this video signifies the genre as it has no dance routine like in pop girl/boy band or stage performance in metal videos, but its in the studio and very common through the indie genre. The demands of the record label is present as there is a lot of close-ups of Alex singing, and the instruments being played to sell the song and image of indie. the visual style of this video is relaxed but formal as we are sitting in on there performance.