Film session 24/01/14Evaluation Part 1 (micro)

With this scene i filmed to film the french lyrics to the song. Again this is similar to the last filming session I did as it is on a white back drop however it was a different costume. The lyrics I filmed are below:

(2:57-3:02)
Mon amour, je sais que tu m'aimes aussi
(3:02-3:04)
Je tuerais pour toi
(3:04-3:07)
Tu as besoin de moi
(3:07-3:11)
Tu as besoin de moi dans ta vie
(3:11-3:13)
Tu ne peux vivre sans moi
(3:13- 3:16)
Et je mourrai sans toi

I also filmed a scene for the second chorus
1:00-1:02 Her minds like a diamond

These are the shots from my story board I began filming today..

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In these shots I didn't use any props.

Costume
For the costume i chose to go with a simple look of the black leotard. I chose to go with the black as it connotes misery and depression. However this contrasts with the way she is presented in her makeup and hair which shows her making an effort. This way it shows her 2 sides in one picture.

Post production
The way I edited these clips together was in the same way as I did it before for the scenes that were similar. On the post 'Next session filming 20/01/14'. This is because I wanted to recreate the same effect.

What would i rethink about?
Again I had the same problem in the filming session 20/01/14. The shots where not filmed in the same position which ruined the effet and stopped the continuity. I also lost all my footage so I need to be mroe careful where i save it. It was hard to lip sync so if i did it again I would maybe change it to dancing.

Tutorial

I want to make my actress look natural because in some of Lana Del Rey videos she looks innocent and isn't caked in makeup. This is the help emphasise the scene where she is the happy side of her life. To help me do this i found a step by step tutorial how to do it.

I also however want to create a smudged makeup look which makes my actress look quite sinister and unstable which is for the negative side of her. However there isnt a video showing this but all i have to do is smudge the mascara. The smudged makeup could also represent how messy her life actually is like her makeup.

Next session filming 20/01/14 Evaluation Part 1 (micro)

My aim today was to film the scenes with the white back drop.

I did it for the first and last shot which was the clapperboard to emphasis the fact it was when on tv for the world to see (0:00-0:01). I also did a scene where she had her finger to her mouth to symbolise 'sh', basically to say she keeps quiet about her negative other side(3:56-3:58). Along with the lyrics below which had the same style and effect as the clapperboard shot. The lyrics where:

(0:28-0:33)

She says, "You don't wanna be like me
Don't wanna see all the things I've seen

(0:38-0:43)

She says, "You don't wanna get this way
Famous and dumb at an early age

(1:38-1:38)

She says, "You don't wanna be like me

(1:45-1:50)

She says, "You don't wanna get this way

Streetwalk at night, and a star by day

These are the shots from my story board I began filming today..

PUT STORY BOARD IMAGES

No props where used in these scenes.

Costume

In this part of the video I made my actress naked. I did this because it is stereotypical of a lot of music videos for the actress to be naked and backs up laura mulveys theory of the male gaze. I also wanted to do it so it gives a similar meaning to what Miley Cyrus wanted to portray in her 'wrecking ball' video which was an earlier post. She speaks about her she wanted to represent herself as pure and innocence.The way i have put it in my video is ironic. In the other shots of her doing drugs etc. she is no seen as pure and we have different representations of her. Whereas in this video she is seen as pure and innocence. Again differentiating between her 2 lives of how she wants the world to really perceive her as this innocent girl but how the world really would perceive her if we saw her behind closed doors. The natural makeup and plain straight hair was also done in a way to help create these connotations and representations. To show her natural beauty and again when we see natural it gives us connotations of pure, which again she is not. 

Post production
Here i added the clips to the rest of my movie. I made sure that when the artist was mouthing the words it went corresponding with the song lyrics. Again i used the same effects as before to keep it consistent throughout and added another slow motion shot to it. I did this to help emphasise this part of the song lyrics 'dyin' as it is quite a dramatic word. However in my last 'filming session' post i decided to rearrange some affects round. Instead of having the effect 'frame' throughout the video I decided to change it so only the scenes i filmed above did. This way it would look more like this was her on screen and how she wants the world to percieve her whereas the scenes without the frame show her behind closed doors. I still kept the effects '50's Tv' and 'aged film' on all the scenes i have done up to now.



What I would rethink about?
If i was to film these scenes again I would make sure the shots that were repeated in the same style. The shots being the ones to the right. For example in the first paragraph the video shows a close up which is the one the right of her mouthing the words then the paragraph after  shows another close up. But its not in the same position and shows more of my face then the one of my mouth. The picture of this shot is shown below  The result of this meant my video lacked continuity. Another thing when filming this again would be that i'd make sure that her eyelashes were stuck on properly. They look a bit uneven and falling off. This doesn't make my video look very professional. Suppose this could also be a good think to represent her life being uneven. Like she can still make herself look nice but cant hide behind her eyelashes to show how uneven her life is.

First filming session- 15/01/14- Evaluation Part 1 (micro)

My main aim of filming today was to sort the beginning of my music video, he sliting wrist scene and the drugs scenes.


0:01-0:28 seconds

Darlin', darlin', doesn't have a problem

Lyin' to herself 'cause her liquor's top shelf

It's alarmin', honestly, how charming she can be

Fooling everyone, tellin' 'em she's having fun

0:33-0:38 
i'm dyin', I'm dyin'

1:38-1:45 seconnds
Lookin' for fun, gettin' high for free
I'm dyin', I'm dyin'"


(3:59-4:02)
Problem, lying to herself 'cause her liquor's

These are the shots from my story board I began filming today..

PUT STORY BOARD IMAGES

Props

• Ibuprofen (placebo drugs)- To make the audience believe that it is actually a dangerous drug as we can see it with out own eyes and that is how we expect the drug to look like.
• Sweetener grains (fake mephedrone)- To make the audience believe that it is actually a dangerous drug as we can see it with out own eyes and that is how we expect the drug to look like.
• Credit card- The credit card symbolizes wealth of the character which goes into more detail on the point below.
• £20 note- This prop was used to snort up the mephedrone. The fact it is a 20 pound note is to prove that she is not money deprived or living in poverty. It is again to get my original message that anyone could be living like this not just the people that fit into our stereotype.
• Bottle of liqueur (disarano)- Drinking a spirit straight can be very dangerous about the body. This shows she doesn't care about herself. Drinking straight spirit can be seen as an extreme, again this could hold a message of how extreme her life is behind closed doors. Making a statement.
• Empty bath bubble bottle- To place ibuprofen in to make the drugs look more realistic found in an unlabelled bottle. The audience don't know what she is taking so we assume it is illegal.
• Black nail varnish- Black connotes death and depression. It holds negative connotations over all.
• Red checkered shirt- Lazy baggy shirt.Again showing to us she isn't dressed for anyone to see us. people usually refer to clothing like this as there 'lazy clothes' that we wouldn't actually leave the house in. Proving we are not meant to see this side of her.
• Smudged makeup- not impressing any one at this time proves to us that we aren't meant to see her living in this negative life of her doing drugs etc.
• Messy plain hair- not impressing any one at this time proves to us that we aren't meant to see her living in this negative life of her doing drugs etc.
• Perfume bottles- To represent that she does care about herself and is a luxury women by wanting to smell nice and buying expensive perfumes, however it contrasts with the action in the scene.Showing both her 2 sided lifes in one scene.

Smudged makeup- However the smudge makeup could counteract mulveys theory because although there isn't a lot of clothing on the actress she doesn't look in a very attractive state in her face so men would not see her as a sex object. I chose to make her makeup smudged because again it makes her look lazy and her pretty side is broken and messy behind doors. The smudged makeup is to symbol how messy her life is. Also when people do drugs it can make them sweat more so it can show her makeup  was smudged for this reason making it more realistic.
The plain hair- I chose to go with this because it shows the actress is not really bothered with the way she looks behind doors AKA a different person to who she is to everyone else.Again helping me show the contrasts later on throughout the video.

Mise En Scene

I chose the black nail varnish because of the negative connotations it holds. The song is meant to be about a girl who seems happy to everyone else but behind closed doors shes not, shes broken. The black connotes depression which shows this theme in my video. It will also be later contrasted in a few of the upcoming scenes with a different nail varnish to represent her when shes happy. You will also see in a later shot of the same previous shot but with the different nail varnish. Helping us contrast between the two. Showing her living 2 life's.

Costume

My costume was in mind of my previous post on stereotypes of drug users.

Mans Shirt- I chose a shirt as the top half of the costume because in other music videos of the same genre a lot of the actresses are wearing shirts. This is to represent her feeling quite lazy by not being bothered to get changed. The mans shirt is also to represent a lover she once had and the only thing she has of him now is this because he’s left her. I have also chosen this costume because it links with Mulveys ‘male gaze’. This is because just wearing a shirt shows minimalistic clothing which attracts males. Also with a bra that is underneath that is slightly visible, underwear is seen as sexy and provocative.  Here are some images that prove this point that shows mulveys theory. Also the story line that is happening when she is wearing this costume is showing the girl as weak and lonely which we could also argue this display of women is how men think they should be perceived, independent on a man.



Post Production
As you can see i tried to cut the shots corresponding to when the music plays giving it more of an affect and helping them link together. Using final cut pro it gave me effects to play around with i used several on my music video. To give it the blurry black and white effect i used '50's TV', in the stylize section of effects i picked 'aged film' this makes it look like it has been done with an old video camera. The last effect i chose to use was frame to again make it look like it has been filmed on a video camera. The reason i chose these was because they corresponding with my storyline and was a typical convention of Lana Del Rey videos. They are often in black and white and filmed with old fashion cameras because it represents her genre. Her genre is what we would expect to see back in 50's. The slow motion effect was used on one of my shots when i was pouring my pills out into my head. The reason i did this was to make it more dramatic.

What I would rethink about?
If i was shooting this scene again i'd think to get more ibuprofen to fill up the full tub instead of half, this way by making it more realistic. Same with the disarano. If i could i would also get some lighting from college to make it a bit darker to help set the scene and show depression. There was also the point where i had unscrewed the disarano but had a few second where there was a pause at the end. When I filmed the knife spinning it would of been better if the object was central in the shot however it was hard as it kept moving when i span it.

Health and safety

Main costumes

Film Schedule

After discussing with my actress what the best days and times for her would be to film certain scenes I have devised a schedule below for when we shall be filming:

Lyric analysis for carmen

Tutorials- Help me add effects

Before i started my A2 media coursework i had never been on a Mac computer before so i was very unskilled with the software on it, especially final cut pro. When i was editing i wanted one of my shots to be in slow motion so i googled a tutorial which would help me do it. This was the tutorial below.

I also wanted to add effects on like black and white etc. so i googled another tutorial to help me do so.