Emailing our make up artist

What we sent:

Her Reply:

Emails to the cast

With one week to our shoot day, we wanted to email our cast to make sure that the main artist knows her words and the dancers have the dance sorted. The DJ needs to make sure that he brings in his equipment. Blue cards are needed for only three of the artists as they are in their last year of school and it is crucial for them to have permission to miss school. Our shoot date is Friday the 4th of November. 

Costume Research

Above are a couple of ideas that we had regarding the costume for the artist and the dancers. The dancers would both have red trousers/trackies of some sort. We thought that the male dancer would have red addidas trackies and the female dancer would have more stylish unbranded red trousers. The artist will wear either a fish net top or mesh see through top and black jeans or leather black jeans.

Test Shoot

Today we held auditions for our lead singers, each one of our contestants have a similar age and have been chosen to fit the image and style that we want our artist to have. After the video we had a group discussion about what we thought of the auditions and who we thought would be our lead singer. We came to conclusion that we are going to have Genny Lewis, who was the second girl in the video. During our discussion we thought that a very important factor would be that the singer has to be comfortable with performing and we thought that she was the perfect fit for this. Below is a video of our test shoot.

Inspiration for our website

This is a perfect example of what we want our website homepage to potentially look like. We like the shadow capturing at certain angles as it is similar to what we have in our music video. It is important to remember to have correlations between the artist in the video and how they are portrayed in the website. However, there is the possibility that it might come across as slightly boring, which is not the image we want to give to our artist. 

This is a polar opposite example to the previous one. This is very animated and vibrant which we like as it makes the artist stand out. I also like the idea of having the cartoon drawing of the artist as it kind of proposes mystery. As well as this, I like the moving boarders at the side as it again attracts the audience as it is almost impossible to ignore. 

This is a third example of the website homepage we might potentially use. The black and white scheme is similar to our video which is important as we want to keep certain themes the same. I also like the abstract artwork as well as the artist as it stands out. 

In all the websites I have seen which are similar to our artist's image, they all seem to have recurring website layouts. 

Almost all of them seem to have a section that focuses on their videos. These often are their most popular ones or most recent so they can promote further.

They also all seem to have a section that focuses on merchandising. This is again so they can promote it and make more money. 

They also seem to all promote their social networking. In this particular example, AlunaGeorge is promoting Instagram. 

There is always a section focused on tour dates and links to where someone can buy them or Share them. 

Lastly, there will almost always be a promotion of their latest album or of their music. 

By Eloise Roitman

Album Covers Research

We have looked into different album covers which have a similar look to what we are going for. Above is a a photo of Sia and because she is standing facing her back to the audience it kind of brings a type of mysterious and closed off element to it. If we were going to go for a similar type of look, we would be able to have our artist be in the dark but she would look back and the Album Cover name or the artists name would play on the top or would be embedded around her. 

Below is Azealia Banks album cover and this could potentially be a possibility of the the actual image of the cover. Although, we would pick a different type of font as it doesn't fit with our artists image. 

Above is a very particular album cover which closes off the audience from direct contact with the artist. This could be a potential idea for our artist, as our music video is harsh and dark. 

Here are a couple more ideas:

Set Design

During our lesson today we had a meeting with the set designers to discuss the making of our sets and how whether they are realistic or not. The first set was the light corridor and in it we want to have the artist lip syncing. The second set is the set for the dancers, it consists of blinders and pixel-lines between each one. The third set consists of the DJ set and when discussing the set options we decided that instead of making it a 360 degree perspex DJ set, to make it go 180 degrees, as this would make things less complicated for building and filming purposes. 

Final Written Concept

After having problems with our concept, we felt it was important to sit down and come up with a concrete concept. Our track was an intense drum and bass remix by Baaeur of a Disclosure song called You & Me. With this in mind, it will be important that the intensity will be displayed through our song. This could be done through intense dances and club-like lighting. As well as this, we also studied the lyrics. After doing so, we picked up ideas of entrapment and isolation through a love struggle. As the song was quite personal, and the intensity of the beats represented this, I felt it was important to show this through our conceptual choices. Our choice of sets will demonstrate this. For example, the light corridor trapped the artist as it was a confined space. The lighting, in the corridor, changed throughout the song to correlate with the intensity of the music. During the slower bits, the artist was lit with beauty lighting, however in the intense bits it was strobing; to uphold the club-like atmosphere. The beauty lighting would be important to keep throughout the video as we want to sell our artist mainly on looks, instead of talent. It also would help to emphasise that she was the main selling point in the video which would be important as we are going to ensure that the DJ will feature less than her and be less charismatic. The DJ is also important for fulfilling our concept as we will use him as a reflection of this club-like set up. Finally, to ensure that the love story will be shown through the video, we will have a dance that will reflect the lyrics. The story of the song will be reflected through the dance, therefore meaning the concept of love will be displayed.

Written by Eloise 

Our Artist

In our song, we will have two artists, one being a DJ and one being the singer. The main artist will be the DJ as stereotypically it is the DJ who writes the music and then has a featuring artist on their song. However, the video will mainly be focused on the singer as opposed to the DJ because of the lyrics. The image we want for our DJ : We want our DJ to seem as though he is very experienced with what he is doing. As our set will be a 360 degree mixing desk, we need the artist to uphold the image that he is very talented. The image of the artist will be similar to Jamie XX and DJ EZ. They will uphold the image of being cool, edgy and confident. For this particular artist, their target audience will be aimed towards around 15-25. This is both because of the music as well as their image as it aims towards this particular age group. We want our singer to have quite a few elements to her. We want her to have sex appeal and seduction to fit with the intensity of the song. As well as this, we also want there to be a lot of confidence as the lyrics in the song have very dark meaning that need to be shown through the performance. This is a cross between Haliee Stenfield meets yolandi. The idea to keep her the only person in all of her lipsync helps to keep the idea that she is strong as well as having a fame element. For this particular audience it looks to the 15-25 year old male and female with the men finding her attractive while the women wish to emulate her with a Beyoncé esc feel to her fame. Lastly, we want her to have an element of darkness. This is to give the artist an edge. The target audience for this artist will probably be between the ages of 15-25 as well. This is because of the look as well as the talent.

Copyright License for the music video

Today we sent a email in order to try and gain copyright for our chosen song Disclosure You and Me (Baauer Remix)

Ben and Haydon emailed Disclosure's record company to ask for permission to use their track.

New and Improved Timeline

Time	Lyrics	Screen
0:00	Home is where the heart is, and I gave it to you in a paper bag	Medium shot of artist under spotlight. Everything else black. Light capturing in strange ways.
0:06	Even though it's tarnished You told me it's the best you ever had, You got my...	Close up on artist. Same set as prior.
0:13	secret combination And I don't be giving that out easily, With my...	Wide shot of two dancers walking closer to each other in front of blinders
0:20	deep dedication You can tell that you were brought the same for me	Medium close up of artist under light. Artist moving neck and hands in a provocative way, then looks back at camera.
0:27	*Music build up*	Wide shot of dancers performing whilst blinders start to flash to beat.
	*Music build up*	Medium shot of DJ mixing on perspex strobe box. Camera track down to level with mixing desk.
0:39	So please don’t	Close up on artist’s lips under spotlight.
0:40	Let go, cause you know	Wide shot of dancers in front of white screen performing dance.
0:44	exactly what we’ve found	Close up of DJ mixing.
0:46	So please don't let go, my darling	Wide shot of artist in light beam corridor performing towards the camera and camera follows back.
0:50	you keep me hooked up underground	Close up of artist where light is bouncing onto her.
0:53	ground (repeats)	Letterbox between wide shot of dancers and close up on artist’s lips. Dancers in the middle and artist split on the outside.
1:00	Gonna be you	Letterbox moves so that only dancers can be seen performing.
1:06	In you’re big house on the hills	Long shot of artist in light beam corridor, camera slowly zooming in
1:09	Where(repeats)	editing used to make artist look as though there is a malfunction.
1:10	you keep your dollar bills	Camera still zooming in to artist comes to a stop.
1:13	And you stashed my heart somewhere in the dark	Wide shot/Close ups of dancers performing dance. Moving from slow motion to normal pace.
1:17	Keep it safe I know you will	Medium shot of Dj mixing. Camera moves consistently took keep the beat.
1:20	know you will, know you will	Camera following artist in light beam corridor. Artist is looking over her shoulder and walking away.
1:25	I know you will...meant to be	Medium shot of dancers in front of blinders.
1:30	*Music*	Editing done in such a way it cuts to black on every 5th beat. Cuts between dancers and extreme close ups of artist in spotlight set and DJ mixing.
1:43	Rolling with the punches So they won't get inside our happiness	Medium close up of artist under light.
1:48	uh (repeats)	Cut looking like a malfunction between artist and black smoke filling cube.
1:49	Love is always hunted But you're white rose is soaring through my tear	Birds eye view of DJ mixing.
1:54	Cause you know you give me something Yeah you give me exactly what I need	Wide shot of artist in light corridor. Lights are flickering more.
2:01	Got my blood pumping  You know you always draw more blood, I bleed	Intense shots of dancers.
2:07	*Music build up*	Close up shot of artist under light and strobe starts to appear.
2:13	*Music build up*	Close up to wide shot of DJ Mixing. Mixing is becoming more intense
2:19	So please don’t let go, cause you know	Wide/close up shots of dancers
2:23	exactly what we found	Close up of dancers doing something intimate.
2:25	So please don't let go, my darling	Medium close up of artist in light corridor.
	You keep me hooked up underground	Medium shot of DJ Mixing. Camera follows his movements.
2:32	ground (repeats)	Letterbox between medium shot of dancers and medium shot on DJ. DJ in the middle. Dancers on outside.
2:38	Gonna be you	Letterbox moves so that only dancers can be seen performing. Strobe lights start to increase.
2:45	*Music*	Cuts to shot every 3 beats otherwise black screen. Moves between close up of artist, DJ going crazy and dancers.
2:58	you and me	close up under spotlight of artist.
3:01	gonna be everything you ever dreamed	Medium shot of artist in light corridor
3:04	gonna be you and me	Canted angle downwards on deck and DJ. DJ looks like he is closing the song off.
3:08	gonna be everything and everything we’re meant to be	Wide shot of dancers in front of blinders together and blinders turn off screen turns off. End.

By Eloise Roitman