Learning Photoshop

Learning Photoshop

I had a go on photoshop today, and I quite liked it! I found it quite difficult to come to terms with at first, but picked it up really quickly. I made a small tester, which is rubbish, but obviously, I wasn't trying to make anything spectacular. I used all of the basic tools that you can use, and dipped into the more complex stuff, but didn't delve into them in too much detail. Below is what I done ... 

What I came up with!

Update

Update 28/11/13

Today I have added the keyboard shot that I said that I needed to do yesterday. I think it actually looks alright as its in time well with the music, which has been a problem for me, plus, it answers the question of "Who is the driver?"; well now he's the keyboard player!

The house that I was planning to film in (the yellow house that features) was my house, which was up for sale. Well, as luck would have it, it is now completely sold and I do not have access to the house; this therefore deems a couple of my shots useless because you can see it in the shots. This means I now have a little bit of re-filming to do as well - which also means having to re-film my favourite shot, which was really hard to time right! Also, I am wondering where I am going to be able to use the techniques that we learnt, ie colour manipulation and key framing? I can only imagine that the 2nd half of the narrative will open up an opportunity, because it will be several party scenes, where loads of wacky stuff can be done, and gotten away with, as seen from previous music videos (Last Friday Night, Katy Perry - Which I done an analysis on! :D ) 

Other than this problem, its all coming on quite well. I'm starting to feel more confident in the video as time passes and more of the intricate editing takes place. I am now debating whether to split-screen the intro or not? I will have to decide soon; maybe asking people after watching would be a good idea? 

One of the few shots that I now cant use due to the house!

Whether to make the two highlighted shots split-screened or not ... Note: Two more similar shots will be added up to 16s (yellow marker) to make up a 4 way split screen

Editing Update

Editing Update

Since I last done an update, I have added my performance shots and completed the basic editing of them (size and timing) and it looks okay at best. I'm not too happy with the lip syncing, its a bit out of time, and some of the notes are not help long enough etc ... There's not much I can really do about this, except from replacing it with some other clips of either other performance, or I'll add some of the narrative that I still need to film.

I also realised that there is a keyboard in the song, I don't know how I missed it, but its extremely annoying. I think that it's vital that all of the instruments get a mention, because otherwise it comes across as a mistake and looks stupid, so I will go and film that very soon; it wont be hard to do at all!

Other than that, there are no major catastrophes to report, and it doesn't look too bad, so I'm quite happy overall. Everything that needs changing, can be changed fairly easily without causing too much of a problem. 

Filming - Day 2

Performance Filming

Yesterday evening I began and completed my performance filming. It seems as though it went well, although I haven't watched it back at all yet, so I am ready to be disappointed when I see it in a moment when I upload the new footage. My biggest concern is the fact that none of my actors can actually play instruments at all, so I hope this doesn't come across too bad on screen. 

I will now start to edit the footage, and see how it looks!

Filming Day 2 (Plan)

Performance Filming

Today I will be filming my performance section of my music video. This equates to roughly 60 seconds worth of footage. I have made a quick, rough plan to help me do it all efficiently. Luckily for me, I have a good amount of actors to perform, with one person on each instrument needed. There is a section that uses a xylophone once, and a different section which uses a tambourine once, so the person who plays the xylophone, will also play the tambourine. Hopefully all goes well! Below is the list I made up; I thought it would be worth putting on here:

My plan

Update 15/11/13

Update 15/11/13

Without having any new shots, I am running out of things to do! However, I have finished my last axillary research task. I have done one of each for both past students and real ones. 

I will be speaking to various people to see if they could be in my performance shots; however, I do worry that if it's not the same people that's in the narrative shots, it would look totally random? With this in mind, I will ask Steven if he will be the singer. He done some lip syncing, and it was pretty good, so I'm sure he'll be happy to do it!

Digipacks - Real Examples

Real Examples Of Digipacks

Update

Editing Update

Today, I spent most of my time tweaking shots and putting them in their perfect positions. I haven't got any more shots since yesterday, so had nothing new to add at all. All of the shots that I put in and edited yesterday are all now in their place, and its looking alright! I have added a bit of colour corrector to some shots, because a couple were too dark, and I tried to lighten them up; it seems to have worked! 

Editing

Editing - 1st Attempt

We're now at the end of the lesson, and with a bit of editing, I am so much more happy with my filming! It's quite surprising what a little bit of work can do to some shots. I had to crop one shot, as I noticed my arm crept in, this was easily done however, and the image does not look 'out of place' at all. One continuity error noticed was a fence panel when everyone gets out of the car - A fence panel had blown over in the wind, and managed to get into shot without me realising. I picked it up and continued filming. Obviously this annoyed me greatly! This problem was fixed after I decided to speed up the shot, to try and distract the attention of the audience away from this error. It actually panned out, that speeding the clip up made it work perfectly in time with the beat; which I did not expect! Never would I usually speed a shot up to x 500, but in this case, it actually worked!
Overall, I am really happy with how things went today. A couple of errors are there, which will need sorting - but the majority of the filming is good and all of it was useable, meaning it looks like I wont be re-filming anything, which is great. Hopefully the party scenes and the performance scenes will be as enjoyable as today's shots were

Filming

1st Day Of Filming

On Saturday I done my first little bit of filming. I ended up doing the car scenes, and the first few scenes; because these were the easiest shots to do. 

Unfortunately, I was highly time-bound, because Luke (the driver) had to attend a family party, therefore only allocated one hour to me. Most of the shots seemed to be good when I watched back on the television, however some did not look good at all. This may be due to rushing it! However, possibly with some editing, these shots could end up being alright. 

Also, two of my original actors could not make it, so I replaced it with one other actor, and only had three, as opposed to four. Steven (the main character) was great, as expected, but my two other actors appeared to be very nervous and camera shy; I hope this doesn't come across too heavily on the edited edition.

Today I will be editing what I've got, seeing whether the shots are good enough, and whether or not I will need to go out again, and get some more shots.

Past Student Example - Magazine

Magazine - Past Student Example 

The Magazine Page

This magazine article is quite clever. It links quite well to the video and uses a similar format throughout. 

The use of leaves as a border was quite clever because in the video, we see leaves as quite a prominent thing, as they come up a lot, as they walk through a woodland type area, and then throw leaves around etc. The use of them around the border is quite cool. I think the colour of the orange leaves does not clash too bad with the image at all, which would be quite a problem. 

The image itself is something that I quite like. It shows the two characters that feature in the film either side of a tree, apparently oblivious to one another. The narrative behind the video is the two characters finding each other, and due to the fact that they are literally doing the same thing throughout, makes it appear as if they are closer to each other than they know. This image backs that theory up, because they are next to each other!

Something I like about this poster is the use of a QR code. I haven't seen it used in any other one, so the originality is quite good, and its use is somewhat unique; the designer has come up with that idea themselves, as opposed to just copying each and every code and convention out there! Something that does irritate me is the fact that it over-laps the border, the same with the universal logo. Its not really a major problem, however, for some reason, it really irritates me. Another thing that I don't like is the way that the letters with 'holes' are filled in. I just think this is kind of a childish approach. It doesn't loom bad at all, it's just something that personally, I would avoid.

Past Student Website

Website - Past Student Examples

Home page

This is the home page to a student example that I found from last year. 

This website includes all the vital conventions that is needed from a band's website. We can see that it has the band's name prominently displayed with the recurring font that this person has used throughout their work. It also uses a image which we see in the video a lot. The director of the video has been very clever, as this image is highly relateable to this video, however, it is the formation of the lads that is familiar, because the particular image is not actually used - Just the formation occurs lots of times in the video. He has also incorporated the music video itself in the top right corner, to create an even greater awareness for the video. The maker of this has also included fictional tour dates into the page to add to the realism - this feature is highly used in band websites, to keep fans 'in the know'. One last thing that I think is good, is the use of the social networking logo's, right at the bottom of the page. This is more and more popular in websites and the creator of this has 'jumped on the bandwagon' well! And to top it off, the links actually send you to pages created by this guy, associated to the band. This is a class homepage in my opinion!

Video Pages

This page really caught my attention as well. This is a page where the bands new and existing videos can be viewed. What I really like about this is the fact that as well as incorporating his own music video, he has included videos that the real band have made (as far as I am aware) which is really cool. It keeps up the realism of the work, and makes it look very professional, and also keeps it looking linked to the real band. The format of the page has stayed very similar to that of the homepage, minus the image of the lads together, which I think is a good thing, because it does not over kill the image. Keeping the same format between pages makes it look more professional as well. If the colour schemes, or the fonts or anything changed much, the effect would be lost and the work would look somewhat childish.

Gallery

The final page of the website I am going to talk about, is the gallery page. Its not so much the idea that I find interesting (a gallery page is somewhat mainstream) its the images themselves that I think are clever. They all show this reoccurring image of the guys in their lined formation with brick walls everywhere! I don't know what the brick walls are all about, yet I find them really cool and I think their use is highly effective, in this instance. I also like the fact that all the images have been slightly edited in different ways via colour manipulation. I think the way the pictures seem to be quite religiously similar shows that the student has been very careful and precise throughout the planning of this video, and his organisation skills have been exceptional! Something I did notice was that the order in which the guys are lined up does differ in some of the pictures. I don't know whether this is intentional, or a mistake - although I thought if the formation would have stayed exact, it would have looked even better. This is the ONLY criticism I have, and to be honest, I don't think it even matters at all!

Overall, I think this website is totally awesome, and it really sets the bar at a massively high standard. It really gives me something to aim for. The constant links between the website and the video is very clever, and done to the tee every time, which adds to the professionalism of this guys work. With this website in mind, I think it is highly important that (like this one) I keep all of the format the same, and link my website heavily to the video to try and gain the same effect that this one has. I think the reoccurring features are what makes this piece of work as good as it is. 

Digi packs - Student Examples

Past Student Digi Packs

Unfortunately, prezi is being very awkward at the moment and is not letting me embed the work at all! Instead, please find the link below which SHOULD(!) take you directly to the prezi. 

My Prezi - Digi packs

Update 7/11/13

Update 7/11/13

Again, filming during the half term was unsuccessful. I was going to do it, but unfortunately my actors couldn't find a day where they could all do it. Luckily, all my actors are free Sunday, and it IS going to be done! I have got a few location shots where I filmed shots with no people in them, but really I had no intention on adding them in. However, if I do have some gaps to fill, they would come in handy; and it gave me a bit of practice with the camera and equipment and also saved me from doing nothing at all. My main shots will be done on Sunday, as I have a car available - which has been a big issue, one that has been stressing me out quite bad! Editing will begin Monday, and I look forward to it greatly. 
Right now, I shall continue doing some axilliary tasks that I started last lesson.