Working on the Digipak

Here I have added a glow to the writing. The way that I did this was duplicating the layer, I then blurred and smudged the added layer to create a glowing affect but also a shadowing affect. My group and I had discussed this idea and we all liked it. I think that it makes the name stand out a bit more which is what we wanted - we wanted there to be more colour. It is quite a subtle change but we all think that it works for our product.

Also thinking about one of the panels which has the CD on we thought that this image would be underneath a CD which is black with Lola Mae's logo on it. This is quite simple but we think it will look more affective than having a picture of her printed onto the CD. It's more sophisticated and again goes with our main idea of it being 'about the quality of the music' instead of just the artists beauty. This image is very glamourous and pretty which goes with our star image. This is a more posed photograph compared to the album cover - and compared to the other photo in the Digipak which will be her in a recording studio.

Here is what the Digipak looks like so far. I have made the black CD opacity low so that you are able to see the image underneath - and to see if it works. I think it does as the images are totally different but still have the same 'vibe' to them, and show the same sort of artist - sophisticated, cool and modern. We all think that the black and white works as it makes all of the images link - by adding a colourful photo it might not go with the theme of the whole Digipak. However I am going to experiment after the photoshoot in the recording studio to see if a bit of colour adds or takes away from the whole product.

Editing

During the past two lessons my group and I have been working together to edit our music video. This is because we all want an input into this product and we wanted to make sure that we all had the same idea for what we want the music video to finally end up like. After the feedback we got from the focus group we had a chat about the narrative and we decided that we should start our edit again. This will enable us to make sure that the narrative is clear and that the main singer is clearly the only singer (which is something the focus group picked up on). We made 'bins' of all of the different shots that we wanted to use and labelled them 'lip sync blue', 'underwater dance (2 girls)', 'close ups of Georgie' etc.. This made the editing process a lot more managable as we were able to look through all of the footage and decide which shots work and which don't (because we had quite a lot). This way of editing was very confusing and hard for us because we wanted it to be quite continous - the only way we could achieve this was by going to a lip-sync inbetween shots of the dance because otherwise we would have jumpcut shots which we didn't want. This made most of the video be lipsync which is definitely not what we wanted as the dance bits were the best part of the video and really wanted to draw them out and use lots of them because of how beautiful they look. However we realised that it should be more abstract than that and it didn't have to be a continous video. We cut some of the video - using blue lip syncs as we decided to not use the orange ones as they aren't very elegant even if the colours were changed. Here is picture showing how the timeline of this version of our video.

After doing this for a day we came up with the idea of getting shots of the underwater dance and dissolving them one after another. This would create a base to which we would add the pond shots and the lip-syncs onto. To do this we first organised on the timeline all of the shots we wanted to use. We split them into seperate catergories e.g Sasha alone dancing, close-up shots of Georgie, the girl dancers together, material shots etc.. This way we got rid of some of the shots that were really similar to eachother and kept the shots that were more affective. This narrowed it down which we needed as we had so much footage. Having looked and sorted out the shots we have seen how a lot of the underwater shots are really elegant - this is something we aimed to capture and by us having so many we wanted to devise a way that would show more of these instead of more of lip-sync shots of Georgie as this isn't very interesting to watch over and over again. Here is an image showing the way that we organised the shots. We have moved them to the right hand side of the timeline so that we can drag them to the part of the song. The reason we have done it this way is because we don't repeat any shots and also so we can compare each similar shot to eachother quickly.

During editing we can see how this has already created a visually beautiful video and we are able to see which particular dance shots match which parts of the music. This is a less confusing way of working because before we were worried about jump-cutting but this abstract way of creating our video allows us to place shots which are different next to eachother and it still looks affective. It also makes it more about the shots instead of the narrative which also draws you to the song as we have edited them in a way that they fit with the music. By fading the shots in and out it creates a magical effect which really goes with the music and the shots. We haven't finished this edit yet as we haven't put the lip syncs up, but we are all working on it so that we all get an input and so that the final product is something we are all happy with!

After the feedback..

After the feedback session we decided to change the template of our website as we decided that this one was a bit more interesting as a homepage as it had more information about the artist on it. We changed the picture from the picture which was considered classical to one which is a bit more modern - also she doesn't look sad in it which is something we wanted to make sure wasn't an element of the photo. Although black and white is the main theme, the colour light blue as the title works as it adds a bit of colour - along with the pictures which also create a more exciting look to the homepage. We will have the track from soundcloud playing as it will be her 'newest track'. Some of the photos will be more personal whereas others will be studio shots.

One idea I have had for a photo shoot is to take Georgie to the recording studio at school and make it look like this is where she recorded her album (the track). I feel that if we got a good one this could be one of the two images in the Digipak and also can feature on her website as many artists have these kinds of photos. Here are two pictures showing two female artists from different genres both in recording studios - the reason I have shown both is because I aim to get photos similar to both - one where she is posing, one where she is actually singing. I will make the singing one look realistic by getting her to actually sing.

For the Digipak I have edited the writing to make it blue like the website. I spoke to the other girls in my group and we decided that the writing would be blue for the artists name and track list. Here is what it now looks like:

Feedback

Here is a video showing a focus group that are students studying media giving us feedback on our rough cuts. We have edited it so that there are only clips showing their feedback and making it a bit more affective as a video.



Some of the feedback we got about the rough cut.

• Unsure whether it was a band of three girls or one girl.

This taught us that the shots that we used need to be shown in such a way that makes it clear that the underwater girls are just for in the video and that the main girl is the singer. We should use less close ups of the girls underwater as this makes the audience able to see them in detail - therefore they recognise them as different girls - whereas they should only really be focusing on the artist. This makes the editing process a key to the affectiveness of our video. It should be clear that the song is just one singer and the other girls aren't part of her act. This is definitely a point that we have taken on board and are going to adjust our editing accordingly as it is so important that it is clear who our artist is.

• The narrative was a bit confusing as some of the underwater shots of the singer were at the beginning before she went in.

This is important because we want people to want to watch the video again. Sometimes when the narrative picks up questions for the audience it makes people watch it more than once - one example of this is one of Two Door Cinema Clubs music videos 'I Can Talk' and fans liked the confusion of this video - however ours is different as we want our audience to focus on the beauty of the video and the song. (Our artist is a completely different genre to Two Door Cinema Club which is a quirky boy band). If our narrative is confusing and doesn't make sense at all then this won't attract people to watch it as they will think that the editing was done in a bad way - instead of it supposed to be looking confusing and a bit odd (like 'I Can Talk'). We do want there to be a dreamlike affect to the video but also for the audience to understand that it is underwater and that the singer is getting beckoned in by the other girls.

• The shots in slow motion of the dancers looked really amazing.

This is important feedback because it shows us that something is really working in the music video. Also it's good that it is appealing to females of the age of 17-18 which were the ages and gender of our focus group. We were glad that the slow motion was picked out on and this is something we want our video to mostly consist of because a whole song of lipsync will not create an interesting video. We want there to be a 'wow' factor to the slow motion shots as they are stunning and an element of questioning - 'how did they do that?'

• Some shots were too long.

This again is something we need to look at when editing. Because we do have some stunning shots we want to drag some of them out but others - such as the beginning when she walks - shouldn't be slow motion as there needs to be a differentiation between some of the speeds of the shoots. We knew when looking at the beginning that it was more affective at normal speed.

• The shot over the shoulder in the middle of the song stood out and didn't work because of the difference in lighting and the colour (being really white).

We are going to get rid of this shot as it clearly doesn't work. Not all of our group had as much input into the roughcut because of the fact that we all were working on different products. This made us have a product we weren't all 100% happy with. After seeing it and talking about it together we have decided to all really work as a team to create a product we are all happy with!

• Bit too many lip syncs.

After watching it with the focus group we agreed with this point made. Although it should be focused on the singer, we can do it in other ways than making the video mostly lip sync - for example making her enter the water a bit earlier so we can use more of her beautiful underwater shots - or even just less close ups of the other girls faces so that we don't need to use as much lipsyncs to make sure that the audience understand who the artist is.

• Sometimes the lip syncs and shots jump cutted.

One thing we took away from this feedback was that it shouldn't be a continous video - it should be a bit more abstract. The shots do need to link and be smooth but they don't need to make perfect sense next to eachother. One way that we could get over this is by editing it less like a film and possibly using fade in and outs to make it more of an artistic video.

• The make-up (glittery lips) and costumes looked really good.

It was good that they commented on the costumes as it was something we took a lot of time perfecting. The make-up also added a girly element to the video as when the girls were dancing or the singer singing you could see their lips glistening which again added a bit more of a magical effect. Also this is something that will appeal to the artists female audience as they might want to follow this trend as a lot of girls want to be like female artists.

• However because the make-up and costume were so similar with all of the girls it needs to be clearer as to who the singer is.

We did want the girls to look similar so that they all looked good together and that tehre was no clashes with the singer and other girls - as this goes with the narration as we didn't want her to be seen as being left out. Obviously thinking about this point it might have been a little clearer if there was something different to the girls - however the white coloured material worked well on both, the hair really added some depth to the shots - so by getting rid of an element which was so important in our video it might have made it less affective visually but more clear with the narrative. So this is definitely something we have been thinking about as there are positives and negatives with the feedback that we got. Also this is not something we can change - whereas the editing can be adjusted.

Website feedback.

• Linked very well to other products.

This is really important because if the products didn't go together then it might not be clear who our artist is. Also it is good for us because it shows that we each know who our artist is - what sort of music they sell, what their stage image is and who their audience are. Its imporant that each of the products go well together and don't clash because its easier for their audience to recognise who they are - also it makes them more memorable.

• The picture used as the homepage made the artist look like a classical singer.
• Looks like an artists website who is similar to Adele (sad songs), which doesn't go with the Numb track.

The first comment was from one of the girls in the focus group which was something we had never thought of - it is quite a classical picture which doesn't go with our artist. This is something we have thought about and we are going to change the homepage image to make sure that it fits with what sort of music our artist produces. The second comment is similar to the other one but it is more about the link with the song that we have used. Its important that each product looks like from the same genre so that the artist is understood by their fans but also by people who have never heard of them so that they get an understanding of whether they will appeal to them. Our song that we used for our music video is a 'remix' on the album but you can still hear in her voice in it - she is less depressing than Adele and bit more modern like Ellie Goulding. This should come across in the artwork, website and all of the products.

• Black and white theme is nice as its sophisticated but the light blue really works as it brings out a bit of colour.

Black and white is quite Adele - which is more classical music than what our artist produces. We do like the black and white but by adding some colour shows that she has an edge to her. We had already thought about this and by everyone saying this as feedback we have realised that it is definitely something we should keep.

Digipak feedback.

• Black and white looks good but make writing light blue like the website.

This would really work as it would link the website with the album cover which would really make all of the products work together which is something an artist needs. By adding a bit of colour (like the website) it shows that she is less classical, and is a bit more 'cooler'. We want to steer away from the 'Adele' impression that a few of the focus group got from initially looking at the Digipak and website. One of my group members and I had already spoken about the idea of adding the light blue writing but decided to show the black and white to see if any of the focus group picked up on it - by them picking up on this point it definitely showed us that we should change it to the light blue as it would make all of our products go well together.

• Looks quite depressing music (like Adele).

Again by adding the light blue writing it will modernise it and get rid of the 'depressing song' impression. Which is what the focus group also said after speaking about the writing colour. The picture looks good as it shows she looks like a singer/songwriter. However the whole black and white feel makes it very much look like an artist similar to 'Adele' whereas ours has an edge - and colour will bring that out.  

• Looks like a singer/song writer

This is something we wanted our artist to look like - so by having the focus group picking up on that it shows that we have created the impression of the artist that we wanted. They said this was shown through the photograph of her looking down as it shows its not all about the look of the artist but actually also the quality of the music - it also gives a 'home' feel which shows that she writes her own songs. Also by her being a singer/songwriter it shows that she isn't just a pretty face but is actually a talented musician - and this again is something the image gives.

• Looks like an organic artist - not manufactured.

This feedback also draws upon the kind of artist we wanted to create. We wanted the artist to be a singer/songwriter who is modern and cool. By them saying that she looks like a organic artist goes with the idea of her being a singer/songwriter as she makes her own material - she isn't given all of the songs. This creates a more thoughtful artist which is something that we wanted.

'The Making Of Our Video'

Here is a video that we have edited together of clips taken throughout the day showing the making of our video. We all had the camera we created this on at certain points in the day so that we all got to be shown in the video and had a chance to document the shoot day. This will be able to be used on the website to show the artists 'Making of Numb'. Because this is behind the scenes footage fans will be interested to see shots of the artist when she is getting shot - but with the cameras that we were shooting on being visible. This makes the audience feel like they are there with her therefore they feel that they know the artist just that little bit better. This gives them also a bit more knowledge as to how this visually beautiful video was created.

Some shots show the actors being themselves and having a laugh showing that they are having fun with it and enjoying making this video - showing the artist to be a normal down to earth girl who doesn't take herself too seriously (same with the other girls too). This makes the people watching more able to identify with the girls as they are shown to have personalities. It also shows at the end of the 'making of video' that some of it was shot in a pool - this shows how much time and effort went into it but also how if some of the artists fans were intrigued or wanted to do something similar themselves (to copy the artist) they would be able to.

If I could make this video again I would have photographed Georgie getting ready and have clips of her sitting on the side waiting or her actually shooting something. We didn't spend much time making this whereas if we had thought about how great this would have been then we could have shot something really great. We could have commentated on it which would have made it more affective as it would be a real diary account of the day and how it was progressing. Fans would love to watch this as they see the artist being herself and get a glimpse into her life- which they may aspire to be like her. I looked on YouTube to find some and a lot of the big artists have them - Beyonce, Katy Perry etc.. I have embedded Katy Perrys one for 'The One That Got Away' because I feel that this one is good - it has a lot of clips of Katy Perry but also took us through the days events and we get to see a lot of how it was created - which is something we don't get from the music video itself.




As you can see this video has had 2,420,667 views which shows that it is something that fans of Katy Perrys want to see. Although this is a lot of views - her actual music video got a staggering 147,634,121 views. This shows how the 'making of' isn't as important as the official video. But it definitely does add something -and fans love to see it.

Editing photos for our products

At home I decided to edit the photo that we have on the album cover at the moment. Although we aren't sure whether we will use this picture or not I feel that it was worth editing as it would probably be shown on the website in the gallery of pictures. I don't have Photoshop at home, but I do have Picasa which is another photo editing programme. I used this to edit her skin as I find it easy to do. The way you do this was by getting the original image into Picasa. (print screen below)

 

I then changed this to black and white, and edited the shadows and brightness. This made sure that the shadow on her face was still visible and also that each ripple in the hair could be seen. And I then retouchesd the skin to make her skin look perfect - without any spots or skin that wasn't smooth. This is what the image ended up looking like which I am happy with as it still has shadows, the hair is floaty, and the whole image looks soft. However it might be a bit too similar to an artist like Adele which is the not what our artist is about - it might be a bit too depressing looking which is not something that we want. We want it to be thoughtful but also quite 'cool'. Here is the image that I edited.

 

 

Another image that I have been editing is one that might be used as our homepage on our artists website. I did the same as the image before - changing it to black and white, shadows and contrasts and then editing out the imperfections. Here is a print screen of doing the retouching to get rid of the crinkles on her forehead, and the spots around her face.

 

 

Here is the image that I ended up with after the editing process. This is a lot better because of the smooth skin and our artist would be happy with this being shown whereas the one before with the creases on her forehead and spots she would have been less confident as having that one uploaded to the website.

 

 

Another photo that Evie decided to put as the homepage on the website was this photo which I decided to edit to get the skin flawless, get rid of the hair on the sides of her face and just to make the image a bit more imroved. This is something all artists similar to ours have done - eg. Ellie Gouldings images always make her skin look perfect!

 

 

Digipak

Here I have put the two images onto a Digipak template that I got off of the internet. This was to get a rough idea of what it would look like as an album. I did this in Photoshop because I find Photoshop easy to add text onto images - its easy to change fonts - add lots of layers which this did involve. Its also where I edited the image as it isn't just a one click black and white tool that I used as this creates a dull image which has no depth, but I adjusted the tones and colours to make it impressionistic and added shadows and brightness to accentuate her check bones.

One of the most unique and beautiful aspects about both of these covers is the hair, its subtle but I wanted to make sure that it was visible - which was something I had to make sure I didn't overdo (e.g the shadows weren't too dark). The hair on the back of the album cover is subtle but definitely adds something. Also the sparkles on her lips was something I wanted to make sure was something we could see as it added that touch of her being girly. I have decided that our Digipak will have 4 sides - front cover, back cover and two inside. This is something I have to think about photography wise. We do have some images from the photoshoot that I could use but I am also going to make sure that I take others- so I will scheduele a photoshoot with Georgie sometime and have a think about how I want to photograph her.

Album back

Today I have been working on the album cover back. I have had ideas for the front but need to make sure that the back ties with it well. We decided that the track numb would be our 12th track on the album as it is a remix. Here is a print screen of the tracklist that me and my group came up with:

In photoshop I have been creating album back covers. I started off with a black square which I then cropped the image of Georgies hair swishing in the wind to cover the square. I then wrote out the tracklist onto it, and the credits at the bottom. By looking at similar artists I experimented with the positioning of the track list. Here are two print screens of the backs I came up with in Photoshop. The first of them has the tracklist central (below).

Then to the side. (below). I did like both of these, but I prefered the central because it was a bit different and also looked quite girly as girls are stereotyped as perfectionist, and with it being bam right in the centre it shows this perfection going into the product. I added the things that are essential to album covers (bar code, copyrights etc..) to all of these.

I also decided to add track numbers because I thought that this is helpful to the audience because they can immediately see which song is what number without having to go down counting them. I am really happy with this one. Obviously it could change but by me making these just as ideas it is really bringing our product together. Also the website is very much black and white which is why I made sure the album colour followed that look. Its feminine, understated and sophisticated which is something we want for all of our products.

Website

We talked about taking some natural photos for the website. Looking at artists similar to ours on their websites they have photos that they took on Instagram. Here are a few photos that I took of Georgie (with friends in some of them). I sat there with a camera when she was with friends and took some of her really laughing - these looked like spontaneous laughing photos which are quite natural. I then edited all of these as the colours of them were quite orangey which was not what we wanted as we wanted them to look really pretty and also mature photographs. A few of them I got them to pose in which I haven't uploaded because they didn't work. However the one with her boy thats a friend makes quite a nice photo as it is showing her as a real down to earth person. These photos contrast with all of the artwork as they are not posed, we did not put make-up on our artist or dress her - it was totally just her being herself. Only a few of these can be used but I feel that they are nice photographs but not all of them work for our artist as some of tehm are quite young looking which is not what we want.

This one is my favourite because her smile is just beaming and she looks so natural and happy which is something people that listen to her music will like to see as they can identify with her as she looks normal and friendly.

Album Cover

Today I have been thinking about the album cover for our artist. I am doing a shoot with her hopefully later today but have decided to just create some experiments with the pictures I took and edited. One of the main things to get right is the font for her name and the albums name. This is something I have been working at in PhotoShop. When going through different fonts I have realised some are really not the sort of thing we are looking for (like this below).

This font looks childish (the bubble writing), too girly (the hearts) and is really wrong for our artist as she is trying to be cool but mature. I have decided for this experimentation for our artists album name to be 'Behind the Key' as it sounds like a song name of what someone like our artist would sing. I am also thinking of having the font white - or a pale grey as this is sophistecated next to the black and white of the image.

This was the first album cover idea that I made. There was something about this photo that I was immediately drawn to - especially after I had edited it. I made the font on this look almost hand-written as I thought that this went with the star image of this artist being a singer/songwritter and someone who girls inparticular can relate to. The one problem with this photo is because of the soft effect that it has most of the photo isn't actually in focus - this actually I think is what makes it such a beautiful photo - however this wouldn't work for an album cover I don't think becuase of the lack of focus. I liked this however I wanted to see what other images looked like too.

This is another album cover I played about with. I changed the font to see what it would look like. I however do not like the font as it seems too sharp and not very friendly. I will use a photo that I have edited out the creases in her forehead if we do use this photo as this will make the photo more affective and I'm not sure that the artist would be happy them showing. I like the hair a lot as I think that the shadows make it really interesting. However the eyes looking into the camera might be a bit too intense for our artist.

Here you can see a print screen of me working in photoshop. I firstly edited the photo from colour to black and white changing the tones and shadows. I wanted it to have contrast so that you could see the hair but also be bright enough to see the light and dark shadows on her face. I really like this image because it is thoughtful and mature which is something our artist is. It's also girly, and has an impression of being a singer/songwritte cover because of the eyes being down (this shows that its about the quality of music as well as her beauty). This is the strongest album cover I think I have created so far.

Just a few photos

I've been thinking about artwork for the Digipack and I have edited and picked out some of the best photos taken on the day and made a powerpoint of them. Some of them after editing have come out really well - which surprised me with a few as in the blue colour they weren't as affective. I have made them all black and white which is something we want for our album cover - especially as if we used colour for any of these it would be tinted blue which really doesn't work for our artist or look very affective. We want the photos to be thoughtful, modern, sophiscated but youthful. I feel that I took some strong photos and with the editing as well its made them more powerful and we could definitely use one of these - but I think it is still a good idea to do another photo shoot cause we might get even better photos.

Here are some print screens showing how I edited the photos in PhotoShop. So I got the original photograph uploaded into Photoshop. I then changed it to black and white but not in a one click way in a more specific way where you can change the tones in black and white. These photos showed exactly what I did to each photo, although I didn't change the tones all the same in all of the photos. Lastly I edited the spots out of the photo on the 'healing spot' tool. This makes her skin look flawless which is something we wanted - similar to Ellie Goulding.

 

Looking at Ellie Goulding

Young female artist is less about their image and more about their intelligence. Our artist is very similar to Ellie Goulding as she is feminine, confident, naturally beautiful and its all about the quality of the songs. She has similarities with Adele but our artist is more 'cool' and has an edge to her. She is a song-writter, but her songs are less classical. I had a brainstorm in class today to try and really get to terms with what our artist is. Here are the words that I wrote down and my group agreed on:

• Youthful
• Sophisticated
• Feminine
• Modern
• Confident
• Understated
• Quality of songs

This brainstorm really helped me as it enabled me to really understand who our artist is, and what artists she is similar to in todays world. I'm really going to focus on basing her around the artist Ellie Goulding as this artist has the same audience as ours.

Looking at Ellie Gouldings album cover I have seen the sort of style and what themes she uses. All of her album covers feature a picture of her on. Which is something I wanted, however my group didn't. I have decided to do a photoshoot with Georgie to get some other shots. Also I don't feel that our artist would have a blue tinted picture of them as an album cover - plus I think this is too similar to the video and doesn't look as good as black and white. Black and white is cool, sophisticated and there is a beauty about it which are definitely things that we want. I'm thinking of making the writing a colour -particulary gold is a colour that I have been thinking of using. Looking at her album covers they are stylish rather than glamourous. And quite understated which is something I want to capture in my photos that I take. I'm thinking of doing the photoshoot outside first - of her hair blowing - possibly using fans. I want her to be wearing a dark coloured plain top and minimalistic looking make-up with possibly red lipstick. I would then edit it to black and white and change the tones, contrasts and colours so that it was a striking image which looks very stylish. By having the hair blowing it is similar to our video - this makes the product work all together. Also we saw how successful it looked in some of the pictures so I'm wanting to do it again because its elegant and interesting. The picture on the right is similar to something I am thinking about but in black and white - like the left. I want it to all be about the hair and her skin. She might possibly have her eyes open though because Georgie has very pretty, big eyes. One thing I need to make sure happens is that I put make-up on her to make her skin look flawless.

Photos

Here are a few photos that we took on the shoot day of Georgie, Sasha and Annabel. We wanted to take some in the blue light as it looked really pretty and just to get some stills from the shoot.
Here are a few of the better ones from Evies camera.
 

 
Here is a picture of Georgie which has not been edited at all. I've left it blue becuase her eyes and the shadows on her face in this colour look really nice - plus its nice to keep some of them coloured as this goes with our video. Here is a picture of Annabel which is slightly blurred but I like it because of the focus on the eyes. Also the blackness of the background contrasts with the soft greys that have been edited in.

 

These two pictures of Sasha are very different yet the facial expression of her is similar in both. I took the above one, which I like because it is quite dark yet detailed. Also her eyes look amazing. One thing that does not come out of this photo is the sparkle of her lips which I kind of wish was there as this really adds a magical touch.
 

This photograph I find quite interesting. It was taken by Evie. I like the blue effect however the fact that it isn't focused on her eyes makes it not as strong maybe as some others. Although I do like that it is focused on the hair - which is very pretty as it falls really naturally but looks full of life. Her facial expression is quite neutral which goes with the idea of feeling numb (like the song).

Account of shoot day

Our day started by us all meeting in the studio with Georgie the singer. We set up the lights, and set - which we decided to get rid of the plastic sheets that we hung behind the table that the girls would stand on as we wanted the background to just be black and any elements we thought it was missing could be added, whereas it would have been very difficult to get rid of the plastic sheets if we decided we didn't like them. We met with Georgie and talked her through what we wanted her to do - this was the shots into the fish tank, her looking down into the camera, whilst the fans are on her. We then gave her her costume of the dress, tights, underwear. I then did her make-up. I used powder to make her skin look flawless and pale which was something we wanted. And we then decided that we wanted her lips to be glittery. So I used concealer on her lips and put some silver glitter which we had on top of this as this made it possible for the glitter to stick to the lips. Here is a picture that I took of her lips, and also a picture of me putting on her lip glitter.

We then took shots of her lip syncing through the fish tank. All of my group and I changed round positions, sometimes we were on the camera, another holding the fans in the right place and another on playback. We did these shots in blue light, but also we decided to take them in yellow light as we knew that in the location there were road lamps which were tinted yellow. So we took wide shots and close ups in both lights. We all prefered the blue light so much more than the yellow as it was more beautiful and really added that underwater magical affect. Here is a picture of Georgie doing this lip-sync. One problem we overcame was the fact that in the studio there were lights above her head and these were visible in the shots, so we covered the lights with black material to black those lights out. We also had one of our group pouring water into the tank whilst she was lip-syncing, this created movement in the water which emphasised the fact that she was singing into the pond. It looked really good having the ripples, especially in the blue light.

We then took some shots with a goldfish (Trevor) inside of the fish tank. This was to create the effect of her looking into a pond with life inside of it. This was just an idea to see whether it would work. Trevor swam around the fish tank which looked good as he swam infront of Georgies face so was he visible in the shots. But unfortunately that did not last and he kept swimming close to the sides of the fish tank which made it difficult for us to see him. Sadly poor Trevor won't feature in the video! He however did enjoy himself and it was interesting to work with him :) Left is a shot of Georgie doing a lip-sync which you can see Trevor is in.

The two girls who are our underwater dancers - Sasha and Annabel - arrived. Here is a picture of them on set, they are in their dresses with their coats over the top to keep themselves warm as the fans can be slightly cold. They were enthusiastic all day which was so good as this meant that they were up for doing the movements we wanted and we had to make sure that they kept positive otherwise we might not have got the best shots as possible.














They got changed into their dresses and both looked really good in them, and then I did their make-up. This time I made their lips gold and glittery  - which matched their buttons on their dresses - the lips looked amazing. They too had pale powder put onto their faces by me to create glowing, clear, perfect skin. We got them up onto the table individually as we wanted to get some good single shots. We decided to start by tracking these shots. I really enjoyed directing the girls, and telling them what movements to do. After every shot we were able to see what they looked like on the monitor which was very helpful as we could see if we could move on to the next shot or try and do the same one and perfect it!

Here is a picture of Sasha, you can see the fans are on her. The tracking shots that we took of her are going from left to right, and right to left. This worked well because the lights were made sure that they were out of sight so that it was all a black background. Inbetween shots we turned off the fans so that the actresses didn't get cold, and I really liked telling Sasha what movements to do. She was great as she used to dance a lot so her movements were very balletic. Some of the most beautiful shots were of Sasha alone doing the movements.
After taking shots of the girls alone, we decided to take some shots of all three of the girls because Georgie had an exam after lunch so we needed to get shots of all three girls before she had to go. Below is a picture of the three girls on the table - you can also see me in the shot directing them.

We took some great shots of the three girls. We started off by doing zooming in tracking shots which not only were used as establishing shots but also showed the big entrance of Georgie being in the water with them. The movement that we decided to get them to do was the two girls either side would turn before Georgie - slowly going out of the shot - to reveal Georgie in the middle. We took this shot a few times as it was quite hard to get it perfect, and we had done the first shot almost like a tug-of-war however I really felt that the more graceful movements went better with the music video and was what we wanted. We used different levels and distance to create the idea of them filling the water. It was best when the girls had neutral faces looking straight into the camera - as this went with the song 'Numb'. We did tracking shots of Sasha being nearer the camera swishing her hair into the direction of Georgie, which really led us up to the singer who is the main focus.

After doing this we had lunch - yum. Then we got back to filming the two girl dancers together. We did some shots which were not tracking shots, as these would be easy to edit in and we really needed some shots like this. We also did some tracking shots with both of the girls - going from right to left. One of the best shots I thought was when Sasha led the camera by leading her arms around her body and through to the direction of Annabel. These shots looked really impressive especially because of her eyes as you could clearly see them looking straight into the camera which created a beautiful shot.

Throughout the shots of Georgie we took some shots of her in the blue lighting as this was a really appealing light which looked great with her make-up etc.. Here are a few pictures that I took (the first I think is really pretty) these can be put onto the website of our artist to show some shots taken on the day of her music video. I think the top one is the most affective and powerful photo because of her eyes looking straight into the camera. The lighting creates really good shadows on the face and the hair. I think that the texture and wind on the hair makes it even more beautiful.

I have slightly edited the two black and white photos. The reason I edited both of these two into black and white was to see if the eyes look as impressive (top right) which I think they do, however the skin doesn't look as good in this one. But the one beneath, looks quite good in black and white because of the shadows. Also you can see the sparkles on her lips which is quite a subtle but nice touch. By her looking down and her hair being blown up by the fans it really creates a thoughtful and pretty image - similar to what Adele has for her album covers and it is all about the songwriting and music to her. You cans see the image of Adeles album cover (right). Obviously there are harsher shadows which we could do as it was just an experimentation of editing.

THEN IT WAS 3 O'CLOCK AND WE WERE OFF THE LOCATION. 

When we arrived at Evies house we let Annabel and Sasha do some work inside to keep themselves warm as they were not needed in the next shots. Georgie was in her onesie when we were not shooting and working out what shots we wanted next. Inbetween shots we were on hand to give her her clothes as it was such a cold night. We took shots of her looking into the pond - from the side - this matched the shots we took in the studio as only half of her face was lit up, whereas the other half was in shadow. She didn't do a lipsync by the pond in the end as the lip-sync in the studio looked so good and we didn't want her getting really cold as it was soon we were asking her to get into the pool. Phil positioned his car to face Georgie as we did some shots from the other side of the pond zoomed into her. This created more light which is what we needed. We were worried it might have been too bright, however it wasn't and it worked well. We decided to order some pizza for all of us - which all of the girls were very excited about.

(pic of phils car)

We had a quick tea break after doing this. Whilst we were setting up the pool the girls sat inside eating some pizza and getting warm and ready for getting into the pool. Evie went into the pool to lie down the black lining at the bottom of the pool, which were weighed down with some weights that we had. Here is a picture of her in the pool, and in the right hand corner of this picture you can see just black which is where the pool had been lined with this black material. We all stood on the black lining at the top to stop it from falling into the pool. The temperature of the pool was 32 degrees which was good as it was warm for the girls. 

Here is a picture of the girls sitting at the side of the pool. They insisted on staying outside 5 minutes before they went in as they were very excited about going in! Even by them just dipping their legs into the pool we could see that the dresses were going to work underwater and float about which was something we really wanted. Also with the blue lights being on inside of the pool it made their dresses slightly flourescent which looked magical.

We then got the girls in and did some shots of Annabel and Sasha being underwater - doing some dancing movements. It was hard to look back at the shots as the camera was in a plastic casing and we wanted to get the shots as quick as possible so that the girls could get out and weren't waiting around. One of the main shots we tried to get was of Georgie being pulled into the water - we tried this out with Annabel being the girl being pulled in. However when she entered the water it didn't look very graceful so we needed to make sure that Georgie would make less of a splash and really try and do a dive. We didn't want it to be a 'tug' in but more of a willingness of Georgie wanting to go in. We wanted the hands being connected and also the dive of Georgie going in however this was quite challenging for her as she was still holding onto Sasha. We decided to do the shots seperately - first recording the hand, then focusing on the dive. We managed to get this in three shots. We didn't get Georgie out of the pool until everyone was inposition. We had to make sure that Sasha wasn't blocking Georgie either so that we could see her entering the pool. It looked really good as Georgie was able to dive and straighten her legs which is what we were aiming for. Here is a picture of this shot:

We decided to call it a day after we had gotten the girls to do this three times. They were getting cold and although they said they were fine we decided that we had got the shots we wanted. We put them straight into a hot shower to make them warm - which they wanted together! You can see that they still have smiling faces on them which was brilliant!

So a hard long day of filming came to an end! (Sasha below) (All three girls in the shower above).

I think that one of the main things that we achieved was really looking after our actresses. They each said to me afterwards that they really enjoyed it and were sad it was over. We gave them food, made sure they were warm, made sure that they felt comfortable and this was something that I personally enjoyed about the day. Also making sure that they recieved a lot of praise and positvity was something that I made sure I succeeded at.

The only thing I think we could have improved on was the time that we took on the shots by the pond. Due to weather it was really cold and we should have spent more time on these shots. I feel that we did get good shots we could have got a lip-sync by the pond too. Apart from that I feel that we got everything that we wanted and hoped for.

I did their make up and made sure their clothes were in the right place. We obviously knew how important it was that they were positive and happy so I really made sure that they were throughout the whole of the day. Also directing I felt like I did a good job at making them feel comfortable and telling them simply what we wanted them to do.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the underwater shots, and how the slow motion looks. I'm really hoping that they all look visually beautiful which is definitely something we aimed for. By seeing it on the monitor we saw some of the slow motion shots and that gave us a rough idea of how they will look - and it was very promising! :)

I feel I have learnt the importance of keeping your actors happy. Also skills of directing which I really enjoyed doing. I also loved the photography aspect as I studied it last year and really feel comfortable with a camera in my hand. I feel more confident with taking shots, whether these are tracking or not. Also I have learnt how much I really wanted this video to look good and how much of a perfectionist I am which I didn't realise before - this came out when I looked at the monitor and didn't quite like what I saw so I would direct the girls and ask them to maybe try out a different movement etc.. Overall this experience has been very enjoyable, I'm sad it's over but I can't wait til we had edited the final product!

The most successful part of the day I think was when we did some shots with  Sasha as I think Sashas movements were so graceful and looked amazing in slow motion. As a team I feel we worked really well together as we all helped out in any area - we all gave our input in directing, all had a go at operating the camera, and looking after the girls. There were no arguments or disagreements, we all just got on really well as we all wanted a good end result. At all times we were on the ball and not one of us was unenthusiastic during the day. This was important as energy breads energy. I think personally I looked after the girls most and made sure that they were happy.

HAPPY TIMES.