Update On My Progress - 29/04/10

Well guys....Prince William is getting married today which means bank holiday - which for me means an action packed day of.....MEDIA!!! I haven't been on the blog for the past week, as I have been busy editing the music video, and creating the ancillary texts. I have been using Final Cut Express on my Apple Mac to edit the music video and have been using Picassa by Google, and Photoshop by Adobe. At the minute, I have created some rough ideas, and will upload them in the coming days.

Until the next time!

Z.Afsar - LDN Town Productions.

Source of Inspiration: Dontae "Taydoe" Kidd

Dontae 'Taydoe' Kidd, is a music video producer from Los Angeles, he predomninantly works in the Hip-Hop genre and is signed to multi-platinum US rapper The Game's 'Blackwall Street'. He has produced several music videos for artist that are afiiliated with and/or are signed to The Game. The thing I like the most about Taydoe, is although he doesn't have a huge budget in comparision to someone like Hype Williams he produces good quality music videos. In addition to this, each music video Taydoe creates all have different themes, and misc-en-scene. He also created the video for the song "400 Bars", the song in it's entirety is 14mins long, and the video for it is split up into two parts. Therefore the video must be good, in order to keep the audiences attention for that long period of time.

Shake - The Game (Directed by Dontae "Taydoe" Kidd)

400 Bars - The Game (Directed by Dontae "Taydoe" Kidd)

400 Bars Pt 2 - The Game (Directed by Dontae "Taydoe" Kidd)

Source of Inspiration: Hype Williams

All Of The Lights - Kanye West (Directed by Hype Williams)
6 Foot 7 Foot - Lil Wayne (Directed by Hype Williams)

Hype Williams, is a big influence of mine when it came to making the music video, he is an innovative hip-hop video director, and is somewhat of innovator within his field. He has been producing since 1991 and his signature style is described as combining 'a center camera focus on the artist or actor's body from the torso upward and a solid color background with a soft different-color light being shown in the center of the background', so as to give a sense of illumination of the background by the foreground subject. The above 2 videos, are arguably the two videos of 2011, and the year isn't even out yet.

Obviously I don't have the budget of Hype, but would draw an inspiration for my ideas from what he does.

Rough Ideas/Designs for Ancillary Texts - FIRST ATTEMPT

This is a rough draft for the anicllary text, I took this photo in the tunnel and liked the way the photo showed the misc-en-scene in the background. I edited the picture using Picassa, and changed it into Black and White, the purpose of changing it into B&W, was to make the picture darker, and represent the dark feel of the song. In addition to this the white writing is used on the grey colour of the picture to stand out, and I believe it suceeds in doing this. However upon asking people for their opinions on this promotional piece they believed that it was 'too dull', and they 'wouldnt really be that impressed' if they saw it in a magazine as there isn't much on the poster itself.

Above are two rough ideas, for my ancillary texts which are required of this project. The first one is a 'magazine advert', and I created it using Picassa by Google. I chose the dark colours, as the song has a dark theme to it, and I believe this is represented by the colour scheme used in the advert. The white, used in the font nicely compliments the rest of the design, however I believe from this to my final ancillary of the 'magazine advert', changes can be implemented to make it a better advert, and I will endaveour to do this in the coming weeks.

The second is the possible CD Cover, I did this as a basic template and was mainly testing how it would look and the capabilites of the programme. From this, I now know I will most likely have to use Adobe Photoshop, or another program as Picassa is no good at creating CD Cover templates, as shown by the result above. This has been a good learning curve as part of the project.

Filming Shots (on Location)

Above are the pictures, from the set of my music video - these were shot whilst shooting the video. At different locations, in and around Windsor, (which I have discussed in my locations post). From what I have captured today, the finished video should be ready in approximately 2 weeks time. I have had problems in filming today, but hopefully anything I need to re-do, I will reshoot when I evaluate what I have.

Location Shots

The reason, I picked the 'Windsor tunnel' is because it has an urban theme to it, it is well lit. It is the kind of thing you would expect in a Hip-Hop music video. The fact it is secluded also made it easier to film in, as there wasn't the worry of a constant flow of people walking by. The bullards, also reinforce the fact that it is a street location, which is good to use. The 'No Entry' signs on the floor, are also useful as it fits with the genre of music, that the song is categorised in.

Shooting around the river-side is an idea of mine to try, and juxstapose the typical codes, and conventions that are associated with a Hip-Hop music video. The location is easy to film, and if I film there at night, it gives the sense of isolation, along with a good backdrop of river water. It also has street lighting which could help, as I will be filming when it is dark, around this location.

The use of street signs are also very prominant in UK Grime videos, they are usually used to represent where the artist is from. This is why I think filming near a street sign will be good.

I will be trying different angles around the river front, in order to seclude the main character of the video, and show a different persepective to 'life' itself. As the song is called life, I did not just want to portray one image of life.

These are shots of Windsor Town Centre, I wanted to film here as it's easy to film here and gives the image of a professional video, with again juxstaposing what you would typically expect from a Hip-Hop music video.  In addition to this I am picking Windsor Town Centre as it has a constant influx of people and therefore I want to record people walking past to show a different aspect of 'life', before speeding it up in the video.

These are the backstreets of Windsor, upon going location hunting I liked these, as they were easy to find, and film in and they offer a different sense of misc-en-scene and the fact they are the backstreets means no-body really walks down here much, which makes it easy to film in and around.

All the above pictures, are what you would associate with "ghetto life", they are something the urban audience can relate to, and the fact they are all locations, which are secluded from mainstream videos and something you would expect to find in a Hip-Hop video make them even better.

Above are possible locations, I am considering using for the music video. These where found when I went location hunting, around Windsor, and having taken a wrong turn I accidently stumbled upon this alleyway, and tunnel.  The fact the tunnel, is well lit also helps as it is going to be shot at night, and because it is on location, it is not easy to take a 3-point lighting kit with me, so it is a bonus the tunnel is well lit. In addition to this, having listened to my audience during the primary research I believe these locations fit the 'stereotype', and also this is the type of location, which has an "urban", theme to it which the audience of the video, and listeners of the genre, and the song can fully relate to.