Storyboarding for music video

I only recently realised I never uploaded my storyboard for my music video. Here is an Emaze I made  showing and explaining all of the storyboards.

White balance

Some shots of my video are very white. I attempted to fix this using the white balance however this just made the footage look terrible. The problem is the light exposure from outside, which I can't do too much about without making the entire shot darker. I played with the colour board and contrast settings on final cut and was able to make the shot less white, however I did not like the look of this.

This is the original footage with no filter. The sky is very bright however this is without the filter.

 This is the version from my video with the "artificial light" filter similar to the one used in the original video, giving it a yellowish hue.

This is what I managed to create using the contract controls on Final cut. The whites are slightly darker yet I think it looks too dark and yellow. I therefore have decided to stick with the middle option.

Class review

I showed the first edit of my music video to my A2 media class to get some feedback on how to improve. Just about everyone was able to enjoy it with plenty of laughs which is exactly what I wanted, even the people who don't know Jack so aren't just laughing at his misfortune. Everybody in my media group is between the ages of 17-19 which fits my target audience of young people aged from 13 to around 20.

The aim of making this video wasn't solely to appeal to people within that age bracket, but to entertain those who have seen the original and either didn't like it, or just find mine funny. I figured the original video would've been seen by young people aged around 13 because that's the age where teenagers start getting into their music therefore when the song was released it would've been very popular with that age group.

Similarly with older young people aged 20, they are internet conscious and listen to the latest songs in the charts, which Call Me Maybe would've been on when it was released. Therefore all the people within that age bracket should recognise that my video is a parody and can laugh at it. The response I got from my class shows that I have appealed to the right age bracket.

The feedback was mostly positive with some ideas on changes to make, as it was only the first edit. Unfortunately due to the unavailability of the actors I have used I was unable to re film, so all the changes suggested needed to take into account that I can only make changes post filming in the editing stage. Certain suggestions such as removing certain clips and replacing them with something slightly better were unfortunately not fulfilled as I have no footage I can replace them with. I have already used the best clips from all that we filmed which included one repeat of a shot, however it is very hard to notice.

I recorded the group giving me feedback and have uploaded it to Vimeo, I will put a link in this post. A popular idea was to record Jack singing the song and replace Carly's voice with his. I had already planned to do this therefore I removed the section from the video because most of it is me explaining how I intended to do it which I have covered in another blog post. Also I had to reduce the length of the video significantly as Vimeo only permits a certain amount of upload-able data to users.

Editing Jack's singing

I asked Jack to sing the song so I could replace Carly Rae's voice with his. Unfortunately Jack's singing talent isn't as good as I had hoped. He had the confidence to do so which made him a good candidate, however I would have preferred someone who could've produced a somewhat nicer to listen to version. Sorry Jack.

I did ask someone I know called Toby Watts who has performed in several drama productions, including the production of Grease at my school. He is a good singer, however he was unavailable when I needed him. Furthermore I wasn't sure if having someone looking dorky would go well with a talented singing voice. Conclusively I decided Jack singing as well as he could would be a good fit.

The downside of this is that the acting he did, and the editing I had done prior to recording his voice, was all synced with the original track. Regardless of Jack's voice not being that of an angel, he also wasn't able to exactly reproduce the song with all the perfect timings, not that I expected him to. In addition, the instrumental version I had downloaded was not the same length as the original, meaning it was slightly out of time. This led to a large task of re editing all of the audio for the video to line up with the footage. Unfortunately I was unable to fix the original lip sync issues with Jack's acting, and if anything they may be slightly worse with Jack's singing as well.

I can't re film now as Jack is unavailable for a time period I would need him for, and I cannot re film with someone else otherwise I would need to re film the entire video which would prevent me from meeting the deadline.

Word/text effects

In the original video there is a scene in which Carly is in a "fairy-tale world" where the background is a pink sunset and both characters are dressed like a prince and princess. In this scene above their heads is the title of the song, and below is Carly's name. I attempted to recreate this through the use of text features on final cut, however there is one element I am not happy about. 

The original was undoubtedly created through the use of a green screen, meaning both the background and the text are behind the characters. Whereas I added the text in post production therefore it is over the heads of the characters. As far as I can tell there is no way I can edit the words to be behind the characters, not without using a green screen. 

Can't use the effects I need

One shot of the original video contains a focus pull which we were unable to produce with the camera as it was not complex enough. Without access to a camera capable of a focus pull I had to make do with the shot we have. The shot in particular is framed by my character and the inside of the car with Jack's character in the background trying to get my attention. The original video uses a focus pull to re focus on the male character, however the camera also pans slightly so he is centered in the shot. We were able to film a shot similar to this however there is more emphasis on the pan, as it lacks the focus pull.

Representing Homosexuality

In my music video one of my main characters is a gay man which breaks stereotypes as in the past it would have been unheard of to have a main character be gay. To avoid being offensive I chose not to portray the character as incredibly camp and "obviously" gay because I don't want to offend anyone by conforming to certain stereotypes of gay people. Furthermore it wouldn't have fit the role for the character to be overly camp, I wanted to be somewhat true to the original with the acting.

Filmed

Yesterday on the 3rd of December I managed to get all the filming done for my first edit of the music video. I still need to record the sound which will be Jack singing to Call Me Maybe, and add that in in the editing stage. It was very cold but we still did all the outside shots in the same outfits as they had in the original video. Safe to say I now have a cold.

Not yet filmed

I was not able to film on the sunday because some people were suddenly unavailable, and also the camera I wanted to use was unavailable. This is a problem because now I need to find another date which everyone is free on and where the weather wont be atrocious which is going to be difficult as we enter December. It will have to be on a weekend as the people I need are at sixth form during the week, same as me. I will do my best to get it filmed as soon as possible. I am ready to film with the storyboard complete, and the props I need.

Filming... Hopefully

Hopefully filming should begin on Sunday 23rd Nov. I have asked people to help with he production e.g acting, filming etc. The original person I asked to be the camera man is busy so he can no longer come. This is annoying because he is a good photographer and knows plenty about cameras and how to film/ take pictures. However my new camera operator is also a photographer so she should be able to do a good job.

The cast consists of 5 people including myself, the jobs include acting and filming. I will not need anyone to be a sound operator as I am going to add in the music to the footage along with the lyrics, therefore the footage needs no audio supervision. I will be acting as a main role, however shots which don't have me in them I will be switching with the camera operator to film, as they will also be acting.

The original issue I had with weather is no longer a real problem, as I have accounted for it and planned the video to be indoors mostly rather than outside. I don't yet know how the weather will be on Sunday, however providing it isn't raining all day we should be okay.