Analysis of other Radar Love videos

Having watched each other's Radar Love videos together as a class, there seemed to be some definite collective positives and negatives.

In the case of almost everyone's videos there were times when the action wasn't quite synchronised correctly with the action and when single shots were held for too long. There were also numerous instances of the incorrect guitar being used (a lead as opposed to a bass), as we had originally done, and the volunteer performers not displaying enough energy.

All of the videos featured some sort of innovative shot, with split screens and tracking shots in particular being used to great effect. Mise-en-scène seemed to have been considered quite thoughtfully by most groups, which was maybe something myself and Josh could have thought about as it was pointed out, correctly, that a bottle of washing up liquid could be seen in one particular shot where I am playing the tambourine. This sort of thing of course one would expect to pick up upon when location scouting, some of the more finer parts of the production process that we did not carry out for this practice task.

Radar Love - Final Production

This is our final video. Unfortunately we weren't able to spend as much time editing as we had wanted due to technical errors in converting the files we filmed. In any case, as a first attempt at producing a performance video I am generally quite pleased with with we managed to produce.

Elements particularly pleasing include the effort put in by the performers, which helped to give the video a certain energy, and the choice of instruments and innovative shots, such as the close up of the foot tapping, which were a major part of matching the tempo of the song with the action. Together these points meant our video was quite successful in meeting the needs of the audience.

Things I would pick out to work on include the length of the shots, as on occasion they were held for slightly too long which took away from the energy of the performance, as well as the framing, which sometimes didn't give the full picture, and therefore the full energy of the performance.

Radar Love - Reshoot

After getting our footage back to the editing suite, we decided, after discussion with our teacher, that there were some basic technical elements which we could improve upon in our video. The elements we picked up on were quite minor details, like locating a proper bass guitar to make the video more realistic. These sorts of things we will have to be mindful of when producing our actual videos. Having got our filming done quite quickly we decided we had time to reshoot.

Here is the further correspondence I had with Mr. Broadbent then, in order to organise a second shoot

Friday lunchtime would be better, we will be full tomorrow.

MrB

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael JARVIS
Sent: 12 October 2011 12:43
To: Mr Broadbent
Subject: Practice Room

Dear Mr Broadbent

Myself and Josh Leek used one of your practice rooms a couple of weeks back to film some shots for our Media Studies project and wondered if there might be the opportunity to film some further footage either tomorrow or Friday lunchtime?

Thanks
Michael Jarvis

Due to the unavailability of one of our performers from the last shoot, Josh found another, meaning we had to reshoot the whole performance.

Radar Love - Production Photos

Radar Love - Location Organisation

Myself and Josh decided that I would organise a location for us to film in and he would round up some volunteers to star in our video.

Here is the dialogue, via email, that I had with Mr. Broadbent, the Head of Music, at our school. The first correspondence  is at the bottom.


Ok - come over at the start of lunch and we can find somewhere.

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael JARVIS
Sent: 28 September 2011 13:10
To: Mr Broadbent
Subject: RE: Music Video

We would indeed like to film on Friday if that's possible.

Thanks
________________________________________
From: Mr Broadbent
Sent: 27 September 2011 11:58
To: Michael JARVIS
Subject: RE: Music Video

All the music rooms tend to be very busy at lunchtime - your only hope is for Friday when I might be able to find some space. Let me know if you want to pursue this option.

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael JARVIS
Sent: 27 September 2011 11:39
To: Mr Broadbent
Subject: Music Video

Dear Mr Broadbent

My name is Michael Jarvis. I am writing on behalf of both myself and Josh Leek.  We are Y13 students currently planning a music video shoot as part of our Media Studies A level and were wondering whether it might be possible to film in a music room one lunchtime? If at all possible we would also like to use a drum kit, electric guitar and tambourine as props.

We hope this seems reasonable and your cooperation would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks
Michael (13NMA)

Radar Love - Storyboard

Radar Love, Golden Earring

Over the last few weeks updating my blog has been taking secondary priority in order to produce a performance video to the first 31 seconds of Radar Love, Golden Earring. I have been working with Josh Leek from my class, going through all the stages we will have to when filming our own videos, including storyboarding, taking location photos and so forth. In a sense we have been producing a preliminary task like last year. Anyway, I am now going to post the various stages we have been through in filming and editing our video. If you are  not familiar with the track, here is the section we have been reproducing

Genre Conventions

This is a comparison of my AS level video and The Taking Of Pelham 123, films of the same genre. I produced this using Adobe Illustrator. As you can see it is not perfectly formatted as this was my first use of the program, which may well be required to help with the production of my ancillary tasks.

The comparison is a small one but practice for something I may need to do in the exam at the end of this year.

Jennifer Lopez, Papi

I saw this new pop video, Jennifer Lopez, Papi on MTV yesterday and thought that there were a number of codes in this video similar to other pop videos I have seen, suggesting that I have a knowledge of the conventions of a pop video should I decide to do a song from this genre.

The most obvious is the big, group theatrical production, like something out of a Michael Jackson video, the 'King of Pop'. Another is the setting. It's somewhere urban. Many pop videos seem to take place in more urban areas. I also picked up on some cultural codes, which I have also picked up on in pop videos studied previously in this blog. The one that popped into my head immediately was of the Lynx advertising campaign, where the male appears irresistible to women after spraying himself with deodorant. In this case the gender roles are reversed and the cookie is representative of the deodorant.

Video Sharing

One member of my class has been sharing videos with the rest of us at the start of each lesson, telling us about the particular aspect(s) of that video they like. This practice has been helping to develop my knowledge of a range of music genres and the codes typically found within their videos.

Tomorrow I will be sharing Ed Sheeran, You Need Me, I Don't Need You

I find this performance video to be fascinating viewing. The most outstanding and striking feature is that the performer is someone concerned only with fast hand movements, whilst Ed Sheeran does not actually appear on screen until the closing seconds of the video. The camera cuts away rarely to make some loose cultural references, though other than this the audience is shown just the performer from a few different angles. Normally I don't think such a production could work but the unique performance makes the audience interested in what is going on. Of course the video is also shot in black and white which offers connotations which have been discussed in previous posts.

Similar

I also want to make a quick comment on this video Will Young, Leave Right Now which my teacher shared with the class. The video is similar to Ed Sheeran's in that it is a performance featuring one main character on camera throughout. The difference between the videos though, is that it's what is going on behind Will Young in his video that captures the interest of the audience.

These are two different ways of filming a one-person performance and will be very useful going forward should I decide to produce such a video.

Audience Theory

Today my classmates and I considered various theories related to audience including: -

- Hypodermic Needle Theory

We are all affected by the media in the same way.

- Reception Theory

Text has no inherent meaning because meaning is created by the audience during consumption of a text.

- Two Step Flow Theory

'Opinion leaders' influence the thoughts and interpretations of media texts by others.

- Uses and Gratifications Theory

The audience is very much active and can determine their own interpretations of texts.

What I found interesting in relation to creating a music video, hence why I'm blogging about this, was Blulmer and Katz's four purposes that might make an audience consume a text. These are: -

- Diversion - to escape from everyday problems and/or routines.

- Personal Relationships - using a text for emotional and other types of interaction.

- Personal Identity - finding themselves reflected in texts, helping them to learn about their own behaviour and values.

- Surveillance - retrieving useful information such as weather updates and news bulletins.

I feel these four purposes could be particularly useful in the research and production stage of my music video. Taking these into consideration could help to determine the audience our video is aimed at, which in turn could help us come to decisions about the design of our ancillary tasks.