Magazine ad- draft one

Large photo - Band performance. Central album cover text below. record label. band name above like this. Scrap logo. coloured lighting.

For this draft I wanted to use a typical digipak genre convention of the genre I was working on and base my magazine advert around symbolism of the album as oppose to iconography of the band. I used stills taken from video production for the base image. Establishing a link between the digipak and video. This created more continuity across each aspect of my marketing campaign, linking the three products together. I wanted to create interest for the band through creating identity enigma. By using the car as the symbol of the album giving no implementation as to who the album was by the audience would be more intrigued by the advert and therefore more driven to listen. This obviously has a flip side and it is something I did take into consideration, that having no band identity would potentially miss an audience interested in the band. To counter this however, I included the band logo over the main image to help promote the band identity and link the album back to the band its self.

This advert is based on a minimalist concept. I didn't want to add too much to my magazine advert as it may have become crowded and lose its professional sense. I felt that to help link to my theme creating enigma, less was definitely more. Using the same fonts from the Digipak I titled the ad. Editing the main photo I used a faded film filter which helped create contrast between the photo and digipak cover below. Making the cover stand out.  

The Tunnels- Digipak Final

Front

For my front cover I wanted to make a link to the video as oppose to it focusing on the artist. I felt this linked the genre of music i am working in as often you will see more "indie" albums including symbols as their front cover making no reference to the identity of the band. This is evident in my research of existing Digipaks. By using a reference to the video it would also help to market the album as the only visual reference an audience would have to the song would be the car and the band. Being that the car is the main subject of the narrative within my video I felt it made more sense to use this as the front cover and main symbol of the album. It would allow potential buyers to associate the video with the Digipak, making finding it a lot easier. I also made reference to the animations within the video by outlining the headlights using white circles in photoshop. I felt this accented the car bringing it out from the shadows which is essentially the story of the narrative. When choosing a font to represent the band I wanted something that looked almost handwritten or painted in order to suit the music genre I was working on. I wanted to create a retro styling similar to the Bruno Mars video 24k Magic. I really liked the aesthetic this video due to its retro colour grading and filmic look. On editing the photo I had in mind that I would use band photos from gigs throughout the rest of the Digipak so I would have to edit the front cover in order for it to appear seamless with the rest of the album. On grading all 4 photos I found there was a lot of lens flares and use of coloured lighting. To create a similar aesthetic in my front cover I decided to overlay a film burn overlay which simulated the lens flares and coloured lighting in the gig shots but gave a more realistic feel to the cover. Continuing with my use of retro fonts I used a blocky retro poster font in order to create the title of the album  I experimented a lot with font placement and style however felt these two fonts worked really well together to create the retro appeal I wanted to create throughout my video, Digipak and magazine advert.                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Back

For the back of my Digipak I wanted to use the band to create a sense of iconography to link to the front cover being a symbol of the music video. By using an image of one of the band members for the back cover I was able to split the focus of my Digipak so it focused on both the narrative of my video and and iconography of the band. To create the back of the Digipak I firstly chose a photo from a band gig I had previously photographed earlier in the year. I thought this shot worked really well as it was out of focus meaning there would be more attention placed on the song titles and details on the back of the album. This is due to the bokeh of the photo contrasting with the definite lines of the text. I chose to edit the photo to match the front cover so it created a seamless transition between the two. I first increased the brightness and contrast within photoshop in order to create depth to the photo, giving less detail to distract from the text. I next adjusted colour balance to suit the front cover giving a more orange tint to the frame to contrast with its darker blues in the shadows. This gave a more rustic and distressed look to the photo which linked to the style of car the narrative focused around. I further increased the clarity of the RAW photo in Photoshop giving a more washed out and defined look to the final edit. I then adjusted the blacks to give a slightly washed out look to the shot which is in fashion with the indie scene at the moment due to film and polaroid photos becoming increasingly on trend. I then used the same font to title the back with the band name, this font further enhanced the distressed and home made style look I was aiming for across my media products. I used a thinner font which I increased the kerning of the text which created a sense of contrast giving an equal emphasis on the brand logo and song titles within the album. To finish the back I added the production company logo in the bottom corner within Illustrator and then placed a barcode in the opposite corner where it is normally placed. Overall I am very happy with the back of the album as I think it is understated in contrast to the front meaning the buyer is drawn to the front of the album before flipping it to look at the back so the album is then read chronologically which is what I intended. 

Inside Left

For the inside left cover of my Digipak I wanted to take a minimalist approach. I did this by using a still taken from the bands performance and not including any extra information. I felt that the purchaser would only come into contact with this area of the Digipak after purchasing it so there would be no need to further sell the music by including further information. I thought it be more important to put the focus on the CD and the music its self as oppose from distracting from the listening. The music created by Tunnels primarily focuses on a more positive environment so on opening the viewer would be greeted by a smile from the lead singer Becca Clarke instantly evoking a positive feel good tone to the music to follow. Indie bands are also known for being very heavy on live performances so by referencing this it creates a connection with the live performances the Tunnels will often do, giving the music increased energy when listening to it. To edit this photo I followed the same process as the back cover in order to replicate the same look I wanted to have throughout. I feel this inside cover really helps to compliment the disc its self and the rest of the album and does not distract too much from the disk which is the main subject in the inside of the Digipak. 

Disc and Inside Right

For the inside right cover I wanted to continue with the performance photos using photos from the same gig meaning the lighting and photo style were similar so I was able to edit each shot so the inside cover appeared to be a single photo. The inside right cover photo is of one of the lead guitarists. This photo needed to be subtle as it would be obscured mainly by the disk when not in use. I did not want it to distract from the disk its self.

For the disk I wanted to create something that had a memorable texture and look to it so the buyer would remember the disk. It is based primarily off the same photo as the album cover however I decided to edit the photo using a tri-colour split. This was achieved in photoshop by duplicating the layer and then adjusting the colour balance drastically before overlaying each shot in a lower opacity and slightly offsetting each layer to give a glitchy and animated effect. By creating an abstract styling to the disk cover it would hopefully mean the image would not be lost within the viewers mind and the disk would stand out as often a buyer will have a collection of disks. This means the music would be remembered in greater depth as the disk would carry a poignancy to it making it more enticing to play. To finalise the disk design I brought it into Illustrator where I used a clipping mask in order to

Rough Cut Three- animations added

From analysing my previous rough cut I felt that I needed to create a greater sense of personality from the narrative and find a way to tie in the Indie genre and music and the grunge narrative together. The way I wanted to do this was by hand drawing animations over the frames of the video in both the narrative and performance elements of the video. This style of animation helps to enhance the presence of the overall video and is currently on trend with hyper edited videos as it helps enhance the visual elements of each shot the animation is implemented in, essentially bringing it to life. I first became aware of this animation style through watching travel videos created by a YouTube content creator JR ALLI. Below I have linked one of his pieces where he implements this to show how I was inspired. 

To achieve these animations I used Adobe After Effects where I used the brush tool to draw over the video frame by frame, creating an overlaid animation which I felt helped to bring the visuals and performance to life. I did not want to inundate my piece with these animations as i felt it would distract from the visuals as the audience would become detached from the story in anticipation for how the next animation would influence the shot. I used animations in 4 instances in order to create a burst of vibrancy within the shot. Firstly I wanted to enhance how the performance and song its self were connected. This was done by animating a short explosion from the bass guitar as it was plucked. I felt this subtle animation really tightened the connection between the soundtrack and the performance as it almost directly linked them as, as an audience you would be able to gauge how the track is being created and how each instrument has its own impact and significance within the track.

My second animation was to create an aesthetic enhancement to the subjects of the narrative being Oliver and his car. This animation outlined Oliver, who is the main protagonist, and the car, separating them from the cluttered background. I felt this drew the audience attention towards the two subjects provoking a greater interest and viewer connection with the narrative. The audience is instantly made aware of the importance of these two aspects of the narrative and thus their attention is drawn towards these aspects focusing their mind and attention towards the meaning of the story. I also thought by crafting these animations within both the performance and narrative sections of the video it bridged the gap between the two making the overall product more cohesive. Giving the overall video a better flow.

The final instance where I implemented this animation style onto the video was creating an emotion for the car. Initially this had been the only animation I planned to do however after experimenting a bit with the impact it had on the video clips I then create more examples within the video to give an enhanced atmosphere and emotion to specific moments within the song and video. When planning my idea using an animatic I had always planned to shoot a ext close-up of the car appearing sad. When the final version of this shot was placed within the video I didn't think the expression sadness came across as predominantly as I had hoped so I therefore thought of the possibility of animating a subtle expression over the top of the video. By animating in this style you get a lot of variation with the look of each frame which gives a sort of unstable, hand draw appeal (which quite frankly was exactly what the animation is) however I wanted to avoid the animation looking like it was made to look realistic. By drawing over the top of each frame the audience is made aware of the emotion i'm trying to convey without finding a superimposed failed animation humorous which would then distract from the overall video. Overall i'm very pleased with how overlaying animations have affected the final product as I think it helps further link my video to the indie genre I am working in

Rough cut two

For this cut I focused mainly on colour and correcting shots I did not feel worked as seamlessly or carried as much impact within the video its self. I wanted to create a more coherent flow within the piece which I felt could be achieved through colour grading. I wanted the transition between narrative and performance to be a lot less harsh so by colour grading each sequence to portray a similar look which meant the shots would fit together a lot more smoothly reducing its potential to disconnect the audience from the video. By having footage that looks similar colour wise means the audience does not get distracted by harsh colour changes. The idea of a music video is to promote the sound track its self so the video does need to maintain a focus on the soundtrack, something harsh colour transitions could distract from. 

To grade the footage I used a cinematic style grade in the sense I tinted the shadows to a more teal colour and the highlights to an orange tone. This created a nice cinematic feel to my overall video which linked to the style of video I was trying to create being very filmic and heavily visually focused. To enhance the depth of the video I then increased the contrast across the shots as being that I shot primarily in low light conditions it was very important that I did not have too much contrast within frame or I would start to lose detail within the shot which could give an under exposed appearance. Being that the genre of music the band works in is indie rock I wanted to give a slightly retro look to the shots within the video. I did this by adding a slight faded film look to my shots, achieved through the faded film filter in Premiere Pro. In some cases I found this feature to cause some irregularity with he blacks within the shadows which meant I had to reduce the amount of fade I implied within the each shot. Because the song aspires happiness and hope I wanted to give a warm feel to the image so made sure each shot had a slightly warmer feel to it than it was initially shot with. This meant the exterior shots of the car driving appeared less hostile and more welcoming and warm. Overall I am very pleased with the aesthetic of my video and feel by grading each shot individually it has lead to a more convincing and professional looking product.

I have changed some shots within the video towards the end. This is because I do not think their aesthetic matched the rest of the video. Being that a shot some footage on a GoPro I found that it was a lot less capable of dealing with low light conditions so on reviewing the footage it almost has a different picture style to the overall look I wanted the video to have. 

Overall I am very pleased with how this video is coming out to look after a few adjustments. As mentioned previously in research and my pitching ideas I would like to implement some aspect of overlay within the final product so my next steps are to experiment with animate overlays to help bring the storyline to life and bring a greater focus to the soundtrack meaning. 

Music Video rough cut one - no grade

This is my first rough cut for my music video. Overall I have quite happy with how it has turned out. I feel that I have done a good job of bringing my storyboard to life and I think this video represents what I had in mind for the video to look and feel like. I really like the structure and progression of both the narrative and performance elements of the video and feel they build really nicely, giving the video a really nice rhythm and dynamic in relation to the music. This cut was only to establish the story of the piece and get a rough idea of where I wanted shots to be fit in and to get a sense of the overall feel of the music video. Overall I'm happy with how the video looks visually however there are some things that need fixing, for example there are moments within the video where the lip syncing is out of sync. These will need amending before moving onto colour grading. To colour grade these clips i want to create a sense of night to all the shots so this will mean colour grading will be quite a large task in order to make this convincing. Another aspect I am unhappy with is some of the Gopro footage as I don't think it is sharp enough however this may jus be down to lack of contrast so I may be able to correct this in post. I want to create a continuity between the performance and narrative colour grades also so the video flows a lot smoother. I am contemplating a title for the first shot as I have seen in in some of the music videos I had researched prior to shooting. I have altered the beginning of the video as the long tracking shot I had planned and shot was just too dark and unusable however I do feel this intro works just as well and could be enhanced by putting a title over the first shot. My next step would be to produce the final video including shot corrections and fixing lip syncing.

Ed Sheeran magazine ad analysis

This is an example of an advert which does not follow the same form as the previous ones I have analysed. It consists of a large photo of the artist which helps links to the iconography of Ed Sheehan, being the face of his own brand. The advert however still focuses on a minimalistic form using a large photo as the primary focus followed by text which provide further information about the album and where it can be purchased. The main photo has a slight orange tint which relates to the colour of the actual album which is positioned within the advert in the lower right corner. To link to Ed's style of music being very down to earth and linking to his "everyday guy" brand style a more vintage, typewriter style font is used which creates almost like a home made style to the advert and this links to the music within him album being very humble and addressing real life scenarios his audience could be facing. His line of view is facing the album cover it self which draws the eye to the album and text surrounding it. Overall I really like the layout of this design as I feel it focuses more on the iconography of the artist over the album its self which could help create a sustained brand image which would help continue the buyers appeal to future albums linking to the same style branding. 

Production Log 2

2/2 shoots complete for the narrative section of the video. For this part of the overall music video I wanted to lift the oppressive tone I had crafted within the narrative for the build up to the chorus. I wanted to create an overall sense of success and prosperity as the protagonist finally started his car along with his friends help and they finally get to drive it through the lovely country roads surrounding his house. I wanted to set this section at dusk to allow us to get a sense of mystery within the area which is then burnt away by the warmth of the cars headlights. I felt this would really help tie in with the visuals I will also aim to create with the band in the studio shoot. With the band working within the indie genre you will often hear the music primarily played at night or within the winter months and I felt shooting at night really suited the tone and rhythm the song had. I feel this shoot was a success as I was lucky enough to be shooting on a day with really dramatic and cold weather which contrasts to the mood within the car, giving the overall message that friendship and hard work can face and beat any problem which gives a nice overall message to the song its self.

Initially I had planned to spend a lot more time shooting this section of the narrative however instead of working shot by shot from the storyboard I decided to go more with my gut when shooting this part of the video taking key shots from the storyboard and making sure they were shot before collecting additional shots I could place within the video should they be needed. I wanted to shoot in better light conditions so I could make the shots seem more into the night than they were and this would allow me to retain more detail within the frame. My next step is to create a rough cut along with the footage I will obtain from shooting the band which will be done tomorrow 6/02/17.

I decided to take more photos on this shoot but only for social media purposes so I could promote the progress of the video giving people a sense that it is soon to be released. This will create an interest leading to the release of the product which will hopefully be the end of the week. I aim to use existing band photos I have taken along side the front shot of the car in the garage door in order to create the digipak and magazine ad as I feel this would suit the aesthetic of the band and overall tone to their music more.