Blog Reflection - Week 8

Week 8 of production was half term week. But in this week my partner completed the shooting script (http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/shot-list.html), whilst I completed the location recci (http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/location-recci.html) as we have been completing the tasks that we assigned to each other in our job allocations blog post. During this week we also met up to complete some extra work specifically about the mise-en-scene of our music video. Individually I completed some extra blog posts. One of these is about our branding inspiration. This is about the artists we felt were similar to ours - Kim King and how we used these similar artists to inspire the branding of Kim King. I also done an artist profile, this is a fact file of information about Kim King.

Shot List

Blog Reflection - Week 7

Lesson 1: In this lesson my partner and I finished filming our vox pop and then completed it by editing all of the footage together.

Lesson 2: Individually I completed the treatment (http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/treatment.html).

Lesson 3: In the third lesson we started our shooting script. This required a lot of thought from both me and my partner as we had to think about shot types, angles, graphics that may or may not appear, the duration of each shot and what exactly is going to happen in each shot. We also had to consider any cut away's that we plan to include. My partner then completed it at home.

Lesson 4: This lesson consisted of me and my partner discussing our magazine advert flat plan and our digipak flat plan. We planned them out, gaining inspiration from album covers of similar artists to ours (Kim King) like; Mariah Carey and Ciara. We also gained inspiration from an existing flat plan of Rihanna's as we could see how clearly branded her products were through the mise-en-scene including; the colour scheme, costume and make-up. From this my partner and I decided that our artist would be branded by a specific colour scheme consisting of white, black and red. Also that her make-up would be both natural and extravagant to portray both her normality and the more urban glamorous side of her. 

Blog Reflection - Week 6

Lesson 1: In this lesson we planned the questions that we wanted to ask people in our vox pop (http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/vox-pop-and-analysis.html). We thought about these questions very carefully as we wanted to gain as much useful feedback as possible, feedback that would enhance our ideas and increase the enjoyment of the target audience when watching the music video.

Lesson 2: Unfortunately I had a migraine and was unable to attend this lesson. 

Lessons 3 & 4: All of these lessons my partner and I dedicated to mapping out what was to be written in the treatment and then I made a start on it (http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/treatment.html).

Location recci

Bedroom

We chose to use my (Lorelle) bedroom as it is a good size for filming, this allows us to easily obtain good shots, movements and angles. Another reason we decided to use my room is because it is local as it is less than 5 minutes away from school and is always available for use. This set can also be manipulated to maintain our colour scheme of white, black and red.

Bedroom Corner

The bedroom corner is made to look like another location in our music video but it is just a corner in my bedroom. To achieve what seems to be a separate location we will move the bed and film against the cornered white wall behind it.

Kitchen

We have also decided to use my kitchen because it is spacious which gives us the ability to produce more creative shots as we will be less restricted with camera positioning. This will also allow us to enhance the composition of the shots, as there will be more space to place the artist and her boyfriend. This particular location in the home emphasizes the couples relationship and how much they are in love, especially because they will be cooking together, play fighting and taking pictures with/of one another in this location.

Bathroom (Bath)

We have decided to use Kalkidan's bathroom as her bath is bigger and because it is her house it's available and only takes 15 minutes to get to her house by the bus from school. In this location the artist will be enjoying a candle-lit bubble bath, scattered with red rose petals. We chose this location because we felt that if we had the artist in the bath and created a romantic atmosphere it would produce an element of sex appeal through fragmented body shots of her legs in the water yet still signify the theme of love. However, we still want to make the action in this location very appropriate, therefore we will ensure that there are lots of bubbles in the water to protect our artists modesty.

Black Screen

We are using the black screen in the media department at school. This location is very easily accessible because it is in the school and if we pre-book it for the necessary dates it will be made available. This location is only going to be used for various close-ups of the artists eyes and lips. We chose the black screen in particular because the colour fits our planned colour scheme of black, white and red.

White Screen

We are also using the white screen in the media department at school. Again this location is easily accessible because it is on the school premises and by pre-booking time to use it, it can be made available. This location is going to be used to have the artist performing, looking glamorous and surrounded by spotlights. We chose to use the white screen because it also fits our colour scheme of black, white and red.

Treatment

 Artist

The artist we are working for is named 'Kim King' from Philadelphia in the USA. Kim King's passion for music became apparent at the age of 11 when she realized she had the ability to sing. As she matured she faced many challenges such as her mothers death at the age of 21. She states that her mother was her 'best friend' and through this heartbreaking experience she found a way to channel her emotions through her music and I quote her music is, 'real and from the heart'. Kim King's music solely revolves around the genres of Soul and R&B as she has been raised listening to artists such as Jill Scott, Boys 2 Men, Musiq Soulchild, Jasmine Sullivan and Will Smith, from whom she has gain inspiration as they were also born and raised in Philadelphia. All of these artists appear to be Kim King's role models as they also once experienced the hardships of living in this urban environment and they have all managed to escape it and have been able to thrive in the music industry. Therefore Kim King aspires to be like these artists in the sense that she can make it too and is striving to accomplish the American dream for the sake of her 3 children.

Kim King is represented as a classy and respectable woman through her soulful music but she also has an urban vibe, this is evident through her more R&B styled music such as songs like; 'Getcha money girl', 'Fuck outtah here' and 'Get on my level'. Kim King can also be viewed as a role model to many females, because even as a single mother she is working hard to gain a stable career within the music industry without neglecting the needs of her children. She is also very independent and clearly has a great deal of determination, this appeals to many females because they will aspire to also have these qualities.

Audience 

Kim Kings target audience is predominantly females ageing from 18 to 35. Our artists music solely appeals to
women of or within this age range because they can personally identify with the topics she sings about, the main ones being love and romance. Women that are of these ages are able to identify to Kim Kings songs as they are more likely to be engaging in romantic relationships and or may be in love, therefore they can understand what is being sung about. Where as females that are under the age of 18 are stereo-typically less likely to know what true love feels like and therefore probably have not experienced it yet. They also may not have engaged in a more physical romantic relationship yet so they wouldn't be able to identify with what Kim King sings about as it would have no personal appeal or relation. Women that are over the age of 35 are typically currently in long term relationships and dominant ideology in society is that the love in these relationships is more dull and less obvious as each partner doesn't make as much effort to maximize the pleasure of their partner like they would have in the early stages of the relationship. However this does not mean that the love no longer exists but the romance wears out making the love less clear to see. Therefore these women may not enjoy Kim Kings music as she is celebrating a relationship full of romance and these women simply can't relate to this. The women within Kim Kings target audience are of various ethnicity's, because love and romance may be defined differently across cultures but it is experienced in   different ways through all ethnicity's. This target audience are interested in reading, fitness and art. These women enjoy reading romantic poetry as they will find it inspiring and influential when reflecting on their relationships. They will also like to read gossip magazines, including; Ok, New and Now as they find entertainment in the lives of celebrities. These women are interested in fitness as they are still young and want to stay fit and in shape for their own personal health. They also maintain fitness in hope of preventing their partners from looking elsewhere as their partner is likely to be of a similar young age and stereo-typically young males find it hard to remain faithful. Art also interests these women as they find it very therapeutic and good for the soul. So they may regularly visit art gallery's or exhibitions as well as constructing their own pieces of art in the home environment.

Knowing some of the target audiences interests, we will try to appeal to them as much as possible in our music video. Firstly by casting our artist as someone who is within the target audience so that they gain basic identification and also a female that is in good shape to connote that the artist is also interested in fitness, this will cause great appeal for the target audience. We will choose locations that can be related to such as the home. We will include elements that portray a very calm, relaxing and therapeutic feeling similar to the feelings that art gives this audience. For example we may have our artist enjoying a bubble bath with scattered rose petals and lit candles to appeal to the audience.

Our vision

Our plan for the music video to Kim Kings song 'Amazing' is to have the artist singing about her love in various ways through different locations and a mixture of both performance and narrative styles. As the song is soulful we feel that it is important to include performance elements to show how strongly the artists feels about her boyfriend and to highlight how passionate she is. To do so we want to set most of the music video is the home, but through a variety of locations including; the bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. In each of these locations there will be different things happening. For example, in the bedroom the artist will be laying on the bed singing to the camera at birds eye view whilst touching her body clearly thinking about her boyfriend. This is to portray the more sexual/romantic side of her relationship. Also on the bedroom we will have the artist writing a letter to her boyfriend, the letter will consist of the lyrics she is singing at the time as they are relevant to him, we wanted this to happen as it shows how serious and committed she is to this man and that she does really want to keep him. In the kitchen as narrative, the artist will sit on the surface whilst her man is cooking and he will feed her food. We believe that this highlights the love within their relationship and how comfortable they feel with each other and we think it's important to portray this because of the context of the song itself. We wanted to use the bathroom as another location is our music video as we want to have the artist in a candle lot bubble bath with rose petals to again connote the romance in her relationship and to connote a more mature theme of sex within her relationship. There are two more locations outside of the home environment that we want to use which are a black screen and white screen in the media department. The black screen will be used to solely take close-ups of the artists features including her eyes and lips, objectifying her body to show the more glamorous side of her as she will be wearing a lot of make-up. The white screen will be used to show our artist again performing, but dressed very elegantly surrounded by spotlights. We hope that all of these locations together will create a great music video for a song within the R&B/Soul genres. 

Our magazine advert and digipak will be branded using the colour scheme of white, black and red. We wanted to use a very bold, bright colour (red) against two very basic colours (white and black) to make our products grab the audiences attention. We decided to use red in our products as we feel that this colour best connotes the themes/topics that our artist sings about in her album, which are love and romance. We also chose to use the colours white and black because our artists album 'From the heart' consists of songs that are about the good times and bad times in her relationship. We felt that the white signified the good times in her relationship as it is a light colour that connotes purity and happiness and the black signified the bad times in her relationship as it is a dark colour that connotes the sad, unhappy moments. The red is present to connote that although the artists relationship has many ups and downs the love is still there, the red is a constant reminder of this throughout the branding of all products. These colours will also be transferred into the music video, to leave the same meaning. But because the particular song 'Amazing' is one of many on there album that focuses on highlighting the positives of the relationship there will be less black present in the music video and more white and red. 

We plan to have the artist on the magazine advert laying down from a birds eye view, dressed in all white on black bed covers holding a single red rose. This is to connote that she is a nice person with a pure heart that is in love but there is trials in the relationship that test the love of both her and her partner. 

The digipak is going to consist of multiple images including a rose covered disc, three panels will be long shots of the artist looking cheerful, the front cover will be a close-up of the artist and the back cover will be a mid-shot of the artist playing the piano. Like all of the other products, the only colours being featured will be white, black and red. All of these images together will connote that yes the artist experiences ups and downs in her relationship but in the end they are always alright. 

The artists brand will be heavily represented through the mise-en-scene in the music video as the locations will not be glamorous, we will not see mansions, pools and clubs as we have subverted these typical representations of music videos within the R&B genre, instead we will see the artist in more basic locations like her bedroom, kitchen and bathroom to make appeal and identification for the audience possible. This is because she is branded as a classy, respectable role model therefore we feel that the audience need to be able to relate to her in order to look up to her. We didn't want to make our artist look materialistic, as they commonly do with other R&B/Sole stars so we have tried to not include many possessions and just have the artist singing. 

Technology use

When in production we will be using video cameras on a tripod and sometimes hand held to film all of the footage needed for our music
video. 

When editing our footage we will use iMovie to cut and order the shots and add transitions. We will use Live Type to create our graphics and Final Cut to edit our graphics into our music video.

We will use a camera to take the pictures needed for the magazine advert and the digipak. 

We will exploit technology available to make the most of each device in order to produce a high quality music video.

Logistics

We have casted Kalkidan Brook as the artist because her availability is much more than others considered. We will be filming in lesson time in the media department using the black and white screen to do certain shots and we will also film after sixth form at my house (Lorelle Thompson) as it is local and frequently available for filming. We didn't need permissions for either location which is why we chose the sixth forms facilities and my home facilities. 

Vox Pop and Analysis

What do you typically expect to see in an R&B/Soul music video?

•  Dancing &singing 
•  Attitude & emotion 
•  Crazy fashion 
•  Half naked girls 
•  Good music/beats/environment 
•  Artist goes back to their roots 
•  Girls dressed provocatively 
•  Cars/money/drugs/parties/flashing lights 
•  Sophisticated & relaxed
•  Narrative.

Our intended audience seemed to picture more of an R&B/Hip-hop music video rather than R&B/Soul as they mentioned the typical conventions that would appeal in a hip-hop video such as money, cars and naked girls rather than a more emotional, meaningful and relaxing music video. Therefore when it comes to making our music video, we will ensure that we use memorable elements within the mise-en-scene to connote the themes as well as the soulful side of the genre. For example, we will use a romantic setting where the artist is situated in a candle-lit bubble bath covered in rose petals.

What interests you about music videos within the genres R&B and Soul?

•  The dancing: if male artist the girls dancing and vice versa 
•  The glamorous scenery
•  The story. 

Our audience seem to like both performance and narrative styles within music videos. From this we have manipulated our idea to ensure that we include a bit of narrative but it will mostly revolve around performance, for example our artist will be performing in front of a white screen surrounded by spotlights. The artist’s body language in these shots will be very expressive to signify a sense of passion to connote our theme of love for whom she is singing about.

 How should we portray our main theme love in our music video?

• Candles & roses/rose petals 
• Show the couple’s relationship, their ups and downs and have them together in the end 
• Only one girl & one boy in the relationship 
• A girl and boy declaring their love for one another  
• An obstacle between the pair, but they break through it in the end. 

The audience suggested romantic elements that they thought should be included in our music video, this was very useful feedback as we have incorporated some of these suggestions such as; roses, rose petals and candles to enhance the romantic atmosphere. This feedback also inspired our branding across all three of our products (music video, magazine advert and digipak) as we decided to use roses because we realized that this is symbolic of love. Along with this symbolic feature and colour we have accompanied it with black and white as we feel that these colours in combination signify an experience of ups and downs within the artists relationship.

What do you think of our chosen song, ‘Amazing’? 

•  ‘Yeah that’s really good’ 
•  ‘Yeah I like it’ 
•  ‘Yeah man it’s nice'. 

We gained 100% positive feedback from our target audience of our song choice, this puts us in a good position because this is the audience we are aiming to appeal to. The fact that they enjoy the song in encouraging.

After listening to the song, what do you expect to see in the music video? 

• Champagne 
• Flowers & hearts 
• A boy madly in love with a girl.

Again the audience have suggested ideas that connote the themes of love and romance in our music video. We have incorporated the idea of a boy being madly in love with a girl. We see this through a scene in our kitchen where the male is feeding his girlfriend. This also subverts the stereo-typical view that men do not carry out what is stereo-typically viewed as womanly household duties as we see the male cooking.

Which location would you prefer to see; bedroom/dance studio/stage? 

• All said bedroom – more realistic & appropriate.

Originally we had planned to use a dance studio to show an emotional soulful dance done by the artist. But none of our target audience seemed to like this idea, therefore we removed it in order to increase their viewing experience as they all preferred to see the bedroom as the main location.

How would you expect our artist to dress; glamorously/classy/sophisticated?

• Glamorous 
• Casual (more popular).

Although we hadn't stated ‘casual’ as an option the majority of them said casual because they felt it best suited the locations in the home environment. This has influenced our costume choices as we was planning to have the artist dressed glamorously in the bedroom scene, but we have now opted for a more casual look as our artist will be wearing her boyfriend’s shirt. But they did want to see some glamour therefore when our artist is performing in front of the white screen she will be wearing an elegant dress, emphasizing the powerful and meaningful lyrics.

What do you think of our idea? 

In the verses our artist will be in her bedroom laying on her bed dressed in a sexual way singing to and about her boyfriend. The boyfriend will not appear in the music video. In the chorus’ the artist will be performing a choreographed emotional dance that expresses her love for her boyfriend. 

• Boys think it’s sexy when a girl wears their shirt and the girls will aspire to be like the artist. 
• Its good, it symbolises love 
• It explores their relationship and how their relationship is
• It really good, it shows the emotion between the man and the woman.

Our target audience enjoyed our idea but they gave us some improvements. From this we have changed our idea and it is now influenced by the feedback given. Our new idea is to have our artist in various locations situated in the home setting including the kitchen, bathroom and bedroom. As well as having the artist positioned in front of a black and white screen for the more glamorous shots of our artist. We have now included the artist in the kitchen location as the audience wanted to visually see the relationship between the couple as the song lyrically revolves the artists love for her boyfriend.

Music Video Analysis

Digipak Analysis

Magazine Advert Analysis

Audience Profile

Survey monkey - Audience questionnaire

The survey was answered by both females and males of different ethnicities who were aged 15-23. The variety within our sample means that we can cater to our target audience’s needs, using their feedback about their interests and ideal artist as help to make products they will enjoy because they can relate to it.

The most popular genre of music seemed to be R&B as well as Pop and Rap. This makes sense as these are the genres that get the most attention within the music industry – they are the most recommended on music platforms such as iTunes and YouTube etc. Therefore the audience know of it and listen to it. Furthermore, my sample is quite young and young people are typically known to favour mainstream genres such as R&B because it’s fun, upbeat and they can personally relate to the artist(s) as they sing about issues that the audience may have experienced, for instance themes such as love. This works in our favour because our chosen artists music solely focuses on the genres of R&B/Soul, therefore Kim King will appeal to it target audience as she produces similar music.

Male artists such as Kendrick Lamar, Drake, ASAP Rocky, Miguel and Chris Brown seemed to be the most popular, whilst Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Sevyen Streeter, Aaliyah and Keyshia Cole were the most popular female artists. These artists focus on either the genre of R&B, Rap or Pop. Furthermore the target audience is from the UK but interestingly, American artists seem to appeal to them more then British artists. This works in mine and my partners favour as our artist Kim King is American and is also an R&B/Soul musician – our artist fits the criteria of our target audience’s favourite artist as she is very similar to the ones which they mentioned.

The female audience seemed to prefer shopping at places like Topshop, River Island and H&M, whilst the male audience liked shopping at places such as Superdry, JD and Footlocker. These are all high-street brands therefore when dressing our artist we will make sure she wears clothing from the high-street. This may appeal to the audience as they will recognise the clothing and therefore buy it because it’s affordable - they see her as a fashion icon and may want to aspire to be like her.

The target audience have many outside interests. Females seem to like activities such as shopping and males like sporting activities, specifically football.  When it comes to making our music video I will try to include these interests so that the audience have something they can personally identify with. For example, I may have Kim King (my female artist) going shopping or even just chilling with her friends. Alternatively, I could I have the artists love interest playing sports while Kim King is watching him on the side-lines. Doing this will make the audience think ‘oh, I play sports too’ or ‘wow, she loves shopping so do I’, therefore they will connect with the artist as they have common interest.

The target audience preferred watching music videos on their phones and on platforms such as YouTube. Since my sample is young, it is not a surprise that phones seem to be the most popular option to watch their content on. Additionally, in mine and my partner’s idea we plan to include a scene where Kim King talks on the phone to her boyfriend.

The female audience watched music videos approximately 6-8 times a week and the male audience watched music videos 0-2 times a week. These results are very surprising especially the males. Therefore when it comes to making our product, in particular the music video, we have to be very creative and unique so that the male audience will really want to see the video for out chosen song ‘Amazing’. This will be difficult as our chosen song highlights themes such as love and romance which males might find sappy. Therefore we have to steer away from the cliché love music video and make sure that we think outside of the box.   

The theme of romance was popular amongst the female audience and partying was favoured by the male audience. This is not surprising as females are known to be hopeless romantics and males are typically known to live the fast and exciting lifestyle. In order to satisfy both genders interests, we may include flashbacks of when the couple first met at a party and how it was love at first sight, therefore appealing to both genders of out target audience.

Both performance and narrative were liked, however when taking a closer look males liked performance more whereas females seem to like narrative more. Our idea consists of possibly having the artist dancing in a studio (performance) this was inspired by the music video for ‘Halo’ by Beyoncé and at the same time there will also be a story through the use of flashbacks (Narrative), which was inspired by Keyshia Cole’s music video for her song ‘Trust and Believe’, which also uses the technique of a flashback effectively.

When asked to describe their ideal artist in five words, words such as cool, young, fashionable, diva and fun were very common. I have to consider these words when constructing my artists brand as this is what will attract the audience to Kim King. We will also attempt to further connote these words in our products, in particular through the mise-en-scene, for example our chosen artist will be very fashionable and will be positioned in vibrant settings which are exciting and cool. Moreover, the performance will establish the artist as being a diva as her body language and facial expressions will connote her fierce personality.   

Pinterest

https://www.pinterest.com/kalkidanb/amalgamation-of-artists-brand/

Job Allocations

Blog Reflection - Week 5

All lessons: In all of the lessons of this week our teachers allowed us to continue the pre-production work we have been doing with our partners, including; our magazine advert analysis, digipak analysis and music video analysis.

Magazine advert analysis: http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/magazine-advert-analysis.html

Digipak analysis: http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/digipak-analysis.html

Music Video analysis: http://lorellefayethompson.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/music-video-analysis.html.