Representation in Music Videos:

For our music video "Hate This Part Right Here," both Khushel and I have decided to have one main protagonist who is going to be the singer and lead dancer in the performance and narrative. However, when observing and watching already made music videos, it becomes noticeable that woman are usually depicted into two very different and unappealing choices, the first being the innocent, girl next door stereotype who is seen as the most appealing choice in videos, for example 'Taylor Swift' in her video "Mine."



Whilst the second role model is depicted as the promiscuous, raunchy and seductive woman who often exploits and takes advantage of their sexuality in order to over power their partner in videos and what’s more draw in their target audiences, for example Rihanna in her video "S&M."



Additionally, in music videos that are created in today’s climate, the genres that fit the characteristic of R&B, Hip Hop and Rap, are often known for how they represent woman through the lyrics and main footage in their videos. Women are portrayed in a negative light - as sexual objects by dressing semi-naked and wearing minimal clothing as they move and dance in a circular motion around the artist seductively, flaunting their body to their audiences. This scene is a cliché convention which has been re-used over and over again to exploit woman’s sexuality in music videos and can be seen in Mohombi ft Nelly's video "Miss Me."



We have decided as a pair that we don’t want to be another group that exploits woman in music videos in order to draw in our audiences. We want to be able to take hold of audience’s attention by the talent and aptitude of the artist. We want the artist to feel as though their fans and audiences know them for who they are as a respectable and highly regarded singer and not for the exploitation of their sexuality and being known as “the hot one.” What is more, is that we want our protagonist and artist to be portrayed as someone who is well thought-of and decent and if anything an artist that encourages teenage girls and young adults to imitate and respect their idols. For instance Jordin Sparks in her video "Battlefield."

Special Effect Emails:

As part of my research, I decided to email producer Ray Kay and director of photography Anders Flatland who helped to produce and edit Cheryl Cole's "Fight For This Love" music video, due to the fact that I am fascinated in finding out how they created the special effects for the scenes where Cheryl appears against a textbook backdrop with doodles and lyrics printed and moving around the scene as this is something that I would like to experiment with and perhaps incorporate into my own music video. Below is a print screen of the email I sent to Mr Ray Kay.


The email I sent to Mr Ray Kay - producer of "Fight For This Love"



Along with the full email that I sent to Mr Anders Flatland.

Dear Sir,

My name is Yasmin Amey and I am currently an A2 Media Studies student at Park High Sixth Form. I am currently working towards filming my own music video as part of my media coursework and I am interested in using similar special effects that were created for Cheryl Cole's "Fight For This Love" video, that is, when Cheryl Cole appears against a textbook backdrop with doodles and lyrics from her song.
I have tried to create these effects on 'Final Cut Express Pro' but have found difficulty in doing this. I was wandering whether you could inform me as to how i could create these effects or provide me with the details of the person who created the special effects for Miss Coles video.

I would appreciate any information you can provide me with.

Many Thanks,

Miss Yasmin Amey

Sadly, I did not recieve a reply from either Mr Ray Kay or Mr Anders Flatland, so I never did find out how they created the special effects that they used for Chery Coles 'Fight For This Love' video.

Possible Costume Ideas:

Costumes: on Prezi

Audition Poster:

Considering the fact that both myself and Khushel will be incorporating a choreographed dance scene into our music video "Hate This Part Right Here" during each of the chorus's in the song, we decided that what better way to find our dancers than create an audition poster and sign up sheet for years 11, 12 and 13 at Park High School. This will allow us to audition students who have a passion for dancing and want to receive credibility for appearing in our music video. Directly below is the music video audition poster and sign up sheet that we created using Microsoft Powerpoint.

Poster

The behind the scenes of Pixie Lott and Alexis Jordan showing how to film dance sequences:

As part of my research into music videos I decided to look into how producers and directors film choreographed dance scenes using different camera equipments, different shots and how they use lighting to make sure that the scene is perfect and filmed correctly for the artist and her dancers.

The two videos that I came across whilst researching on the internet was the behind the scenes of Pixie Lott’s 2011 single “All About Tonight” and Alexis Jordan’s 2011 single “Hush Hush.” Each of these videos were a real eye opener for me as not only was I given an insight into how directors prepare to film a dance sequence, making sure that it comes across in the best possible way, they also focused how they create and set up the set decorations for each scene of the shoot. Additionally, they took us behind the scenes of the make-up and wardrobe showing audiences what they do to prepare for the shoot.

The scenes that I found fascinating throughout the entire music video was when the artist took us behind the scenes of her dance rehearsals for the choreographed dance scene that she is preparing to perform in her official music video. What is also great is then being able to see the transition from practising the sequence to actually performing the dance, made up and dressed on set with the directors, producers and dancers as this is the moment when everything comes together and everything that the artist and choreographer have worked hard towards is finally becoming a reality.

Digipak Research:

I have decided to analyse each of these digipack albums for the reason that I am hoping to gain ideas when creating and commencing my own design for my artists digipack album covers. Below are the three digipack albums I found on the internet that represent the genre of music that our artist fits into, that is, R&B. The artists we chose, "Beyonce, Christina Aguilera and Rihanna" are all R&B artists, so by researching and looking into their digipack albums we realised that this would help us a lot when wanting to design our digipack album so that it would fit accordingly into the R&B genre.

Beyonce's Digipak

Christina Aguilera Digipak

 Rihanna Digipak

Although I like this particular format for the digipack album, both Khushel and I have decided to create a DVD digipak as we both prefer this type of format as the CD format looks like it is too squashed down and it can be quite difficult to read the text.

I have also attached my first inital idea drawings that I sketched out as a possible digipack for my artists album cover. When designing this digipack I took notes from the digipacks showcased above when creating my own one. One of the things I noticed with the albums above is that in each of them there was always a photograph of the artist posing in somesort and this was usually inputted onto one of the inside panels, so I sketched out an image of the artist holding a microphone and posing to the camera in order for her to promote herself on the album. The inital ideas of my digipack are depicted below.

Whole of Digipack:

Front Cover of Digipack

First Inside Panel of Digipack

CD for Album (Second Panel of Digipack)

Back Cover of Digipack

 

Moodboard of Genre and Wordle of Initial Ideas with The Pitch - "Hate This Part Right Here" - The Pussycat Dolls and Feedback:

Displayed above is my moodboard which illustrates the genre characteristic "Pop/Electropop" and in particular RnB. I decided to create this moodboard in order to show audiences how dynamic, pulsating and energetic the colours, fashion, album art and music video is in relation to this genre. Not only have I selected album covers and music accessories, I have also decided to focus on fashion, which clearly plays a major role in the music industry as you have to constantly look your best. In countries such as America and the United Kingdom there is a huge RnB and pop fashion scene, where clothing is all about tight clothing i.e leggings, jeans, tops and short dresses as well as wearing killer heels. All of which is worn to express the artists individuality and personality.

Here I have created a wordle of camera shots, angles, editing techniques and media terminlogy all of which will be used throughout my music video and analysis of my research and initial ideas.

Here is the pitch I have created presenting my inital ideas for my music video "Hate This Part Right Here."

"Hate This Part Right Here" Pitch on Prezi

The Pussycat Dolls

Feedback:

• Think closely about what costumes the singer and dancers are going to be wearing throughout the video.
• How are the dance scenes going to be filmed? Think about maybe using a contrast between close ups/mid shots/long shots.
• Another thing my class suggested to me is that both myself and Khushel thought about tracking the singer walking down the street and we were told to think about two things: one being that tracking someone walking down the street may be difficult considering the fact that streets are uneven and could make the footage bumpy so maybe try to work around this by attaching a camera to a stick or broom to see whether this would make any difference. The second being that filming on the street will  include passers walking by and will be exceedingly busy so maybe think about a location a bit more secluded.