Research 1 (Song Choice)

As seen in my brainstorm, I've taken on board a variety of considerations, concepts and ideas. In this part of my research, I will go more in depth.

To begin with, in the process of choosing the song I want to make a music video for, my decision boiled down to three choices. Which are; Kendrick Lamar - The Art Of Peer Pressure; Weeknd - Thursday; Tyler the Creator - Her. The reason it came down to these three songs is because they all have completely different themes, moods and they're all from genres that are affiliated with Hip-Hop.
_________________________________________________________________________________

Kendrick Lamar - The Art Of Peer Pressure

The artist: Kendrick Lamar is an example of a classic hip-hop who is on the rise to success. However, the character he portrays and maintains is a very humble and popular one, unlike a lot of rappers. The typical rapper would have more of a boastful and flashy personality but not him. Kendrick Lamar is a unique character because he is the type of person who would let his words do the talking for him rather than portray a false image of himself. He has a down-to-earth aspect about him, therefore, his fans are more likely to be 'Hip-Hop heads' [see audience profile post] because his image is based on authenticity.

The song: 'The art of peer pressure' is a song is orientated around the artist's childhood, growing up in an impoverished and ghetto area. The entire idea of the song is contradiction because the lyrics are a short story on how the artist is usually a good person, but when he is around his cousins and his friends he turns completely ruthless. This involves scenes of him in a car looking to cause trouble with his 'homies' and and in his journey he comes across different situations. At the end of the journey him and his 'homies' commit a house robbery.

Advantages:  Its a song with a fairly straightforward story line I could use as a template for my music video. Advantages of the song's story are that I have a car I could use as a prop for my music video and willing participants to represent his 'homies'. Furthermore, the car I can use is a Toyota. This is good because in the song a Toyota is mentioned as the car the main character is riding in. In addition, I have in mind a variety of locations which I could use to film this music video to make it as ghetto as possible (e.g. buildings and flats that are run down, car parks, staircases, a house (for the robbery) and an underpass). I think I would be competent enough to portray the oxymoron mood of this song by incorporating suitable costumes and applying witty camera angles.

Disadvantages:  The disadvantages of trying to make a music video for this song would mostly be trying to force such a ghetto image in the suburban town I live in (Harlow). Also, trying to direct the main character to behave in such a vigorous manor would be a bit tricky.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Tyler, the creator - Her

The artist: Tyler The Creator is an artist unlike no other. His persona revolves around the idea of being a 'walking circus' meaning that nothing he does is taken serious because 99% of everything he does is a joke. He has a kind of personality where it seems as though he is stuck in his childhood. This is because he does whatever
he likes. His music is mainly alternative rap and he is viewed as 'the joker' in the hip-hop world. He associates himself a lot with skateboarding therefore his dress code is predominantly skateboarding clothes (cap, shorts, vans shoes and completely random t-shirts). Tyler's fan base consists of mainly white teenagers aged 14-19 and these people are attracted to his free spirit and his unorthodox rapping.

The song:  'Her' is a song is a song about a fictional character who is a stereotypical 'looser' teenager who has fantasies about his friend (a girl). Throughout the song there is an extreme stalker kind of mood as the fictional character gives a disturbing and in-depth description of his affection for his friend and this mood only gets creepier as the song continues.

Advantages:  The advantages of using a song like this for my music video would be: how easy it is to manipulate the dark using a variety of camera techniques and tricks to best portray the dark and boarder line predatory theme though out the song.

Disadvantages:  Unlike the first song choice, this song doesn't have a particular story line. It has more of a series of events therefore it would be more difficult to make the video flow and stay exciting to the audience.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Weeknd - Thursday
The artist: Weekend is yet another artist who doesn't fall into any stereotypes. He is an artist who is more of a lady's man. This is purely because virtually all of his songs are love songs. The genre that Weeknd represents isn't particularly hip-hop, its more RnB, however he is widely recognised by the hip-hop culture . He comes across as a character who is more down-to-earth than the typical man and his music is jam packed with feelings and emotion. His image is slightly scruffy because of his messy hair but, other than that, he mainly wears
regular urban clothes.

The song: The song is very intimate and slow. Noticeable, the there are aquatic sound effects which give the song a dreamy and surreal mood to it. Its about how the character in the song has a girl for every day of the week, however the girl for Thursday fell in love with him. The entire song is just sexual reference telling the girl to be ready for Thursday.

The advantages: The advantages of making a music video for this song would be the fact that I can use utilise special effects to compliment the surreal sound of the song and I could also experiment with a few camera filters. In addition I could use some slow motion effects to capture the intimacy between the characters.

The disadvantages: The disadvantages of making a music video to this song would: finding willing participants to play the role of the main characters (boy and girl) and setting up a sexually romantic theme.

Conclusion

In conclusion, after weighing up my options I have decided to make a video for Kendrick Lamar - The Art Of Peer Pressure because I think it would be a more practical project in terms of locations, costume and acting. And above all, I think I would be able to incorparate all of the essential aspects of a well thought out music video and lastly, I would enjoy it because I know the culture like the back of my hand.

Brainstorm

Audience profile

To begin with, the audience profile for the my song selection (Kendrick Lamar - The Art Of Peer Pressure) would be people who indulge in Hip-Hop culture to a certain extent. However, these people can be categorised into into two personas. 

 First Persona (Hip-Hop head) - I can describe the first category of audience as being Hip-Hop heads. Hip-hop heads are people who religiously follow the genre without fail. These types people evolved during the 90s when the genre began to get recognition. These people go as far as assessing each lyric in search of a meaning/reference. Hip-Hop heads completely refute the idea of mainstream hip-hop (hip-hop which is usually on the radio) because they perceive as being 'fake' for not having any meaning and being transparent in terms of musical content. Hip-Hop heads are very conscious of how the tradition of hip-hop is being maintained and whether the Rapper/Artist lives the life they say they live in their songs. In relation to ethnicity, started off being dominantly black, however, as the genre got more exposure, white and asian people joined the fan base, but, they still remain mainly black. With reguards to their age, this can range from as young as 14 to as old as 55. Lastly, their hobbies consist of literally just music and the fashion within music.

Second Persona (Generic fan) - I can describe these people as more generic because they these fans of hip-hop have a more lenient take towards the culture. These people are more inclined to listen to a much larger range of music, as well as mainstream hip-hop, usually music thats in the charts. I would class these people as trend followers because they listen to what's in fashion at the time. In addition, people like this would listen to a song because 'it just sounds good' without taking any considerations over the content or artist. Generic fans are, more or less, the majority of the general public who have hobbies like going out clubbing and they're not a particular race or age

Preliminary task (Part 2 of 2)

Evaluation

 

The picture above is a screen shot of the part of my ancillary task. This is an example of a medium close up in the video and what we learnt from this shot in particularly, is the fact that lighting plays a big part in recording music videos. The room we used for this clip wasn't bright enough for the camera to clearly pick up the lip-syncing. We also learnt to block out irrelevant props in the video because the mis-en-scene is important in terms of making the video realistic.  

In this part of the video we see our actor, Joe, at a low angle camera shot. This type of shot connotes superiority and furthermore, we are able to see Joe's hand gestures from a better perspective. We can also see that a black background works well with the lighting. From this clip we learnt how dark and light colours can contrast, either in our favour or against us.   

In this part of the video, we see Joe at a medium close-up and from this clip we learnt of the importance of moving the microphone slightly away from the actor's lips so that the microphone isn't blocking Joe's lip-syncing.  

In this part of the video we see Joe in another medium shot, however the fact that its at another angle it keeps the video from being boring and one dimensional. Also, the use of frequent cuts make the video have a natural flow as opposed to clips which are more than more than 5 seconds long.

At this point in the video the group was experimenting with high angle shots and we figured that this shot is beneficiary in terms of putting emphasis on the background environment .

Us as a group faced challenges trying to lip sync this part of the video because our group were unfamiliar with the entire lyrics and they arrangement of the verses therefore we learnt that its important to know and understand the lyrics of the song first before making the music video otherwise we can face troubles editing.

In this clip we experimented with a mirror shot.The challenging aspect of filming a clip like this is trying to hide the reflection of the camera in the mirror, however after a few tries we accomplished it.

_________________________________________________________________________

In conclusion, the preliminary task was necessary because it strengthened the basic skills we need to construct a decent music video.



Preliminary Task (Part 1 of 2)

In order for us to gain a better understanding of constructing together a music video, our class was put into groups and we were told to create an improvised music video using the available resources around the school site. We drew up a storyboard for the song Michael Buble - Come Fly With Me. The story board consisted of extreme longshots, Long shots, Medium shots, Close-up shots, extreme close-ups, Medium shots, high angle shots and low angle shots. We settled with using the school stage and a pond near by school. To make this video as professional as possible we tried to take as many shot variations as possible so when it comes to editing we can make an educated judgement whether a shot works good or not. My job in all of this was filming, Paul's job was editing and Joe's job was acting. However, we were all conscious of what was going on in the group (in terms of filming and editing) and we made sure everyone in our group understood the decisions that were made.