Storyboard Process

A storyboard is a plan/guide line which you would draw when producing a music video. A storyboard is a graphic representation of how your video will be seen, shot by shot. 

This video below shows a man who is drawing a storyboard, however he is not very good at drawing. In this video he explains how you can make it nice and good with out having great drawing skills

In order to make it a swift and easy filming process, we created a detailed storyboard to help show and indicate what shots and when we need to take them. Every three seconds we changed the shot, this would then help to make it interesting. We were given templates in order to draw our ideas on. They looked like this

This is a description of a storyboard, there is a box to draw the shot in, and then you are able to write a description underneath it. For example how long the shot lasts, and any additional sound. The small description tells you a little about the shot, which would accompany the picture if it was not clear enough.

However when the storyboards are complete they look like this 

This is an example of a storyboard that is completed. They have drawn images and then written a small description underneath them. 

                                       While researching the storyboard process i found this

This is from a website that I found, it gives an idication and guidelines about how to produce a storyboard

Emily Tedrake

Last week during the lesson, Emily Tedrake a video commissioner of Polydor Records came into our class to discus her job role, and the responsibilities that she has. 

Polydor records is a record label owned by Universal Music Group based in the Uk. Emily Tedrake is in her seventh year working there, now possessing the role of a commissioning editing. Emily studies fine art painting, and originally wanted to be a photographer, however she then did an unpaid internship at Polydor records.
Emily commissions music videos for artists as big as Ellie Goulding and James Blake, she has also done work for Take That and Lana Del Ray. Emily sends out requests to directors for treatments, with a small budget she will usually ask around 10 directors, however she does not think that it is dair to ask a lot of directors for treatments with big budgets. Emily also works closely with Artsits and Repertoire and researches directors.

- A few other points that Emily pointed out was that the artist should be in the video, if you can't get them on the day then you can always do it in post production. This will then help to promote the star image.
- All starts like different things, consider if your audience is a niche market or a wide main stream artist
- Each video is part of a campaign
- It is important that the video synchronises with the image

Target Audience

In order to find our target audience the music video i checked at the BPI website to help me establish audiences and their institutions. It gave me a clear insight into what target audience would be most appropriate and how i would be able to reach that target audience. From the research I found that Pop music appeals to the majority of the audience. I also established that sales in CD's are bigger than sales online, i thought this could be because some people still like to buy CD's because they can then play the music in their cars or in a stereo, and also buying CD's can mean that you can still download the music onto any digital technology, therefore you get both options. However by just purchasing the material digitally it means you do not have a physical copy. 

Above indicates the digital distribution that was most used, and also what sources used the streaming services. For example albums made a revenue of 41.5%.

 Here it shows the digital income of money coming in per million and also the amount of digital share that there is in the market

Here it shows the age and the gender of the consumers who purchase the materials. 

This backs up what I mentioned about those who buy either CD's (a physical copy) or download it (digital downloads)

Here it shows how much consumers are willing to pay for the materials, and how well digital distribution does.

As a result of this i think my target primary audience would be males from the age of 17-27. I think this ten year age gap would help to bring in a variety of consumers, who would pay for our product and hopefully share and advertise it with their friends and others.
As i know that music can be instantly advertised via the internet. Digital methods would therefore help to advertise our video, therefore i thought that the target market could be those who would use these media social sites. For example and album came out and within that same day it was number one in the charts because of all the social media advertising.
I think our audience would be middle class, therefore they would be able to buy luxuries and watch music videos as they would have access to the music videos via the internet.
There lifestyle would be a school boy, or university, or even the early start to a job. We would look for a more alternative looking audience, for example 'hippies or skater boys', this would therefore cover a larger variety of audience members. Our target area would primarily be the EU, because we could therefore reach France, Germany and the UK. However we would also aim to target the US because of the stereotype of the teenage boys. We would look at experiences, rebels, drifters and trendies. These would be our main target audience. This would then help us to target a mass audience.
We would also look at a secondary audience as being females from the same ages, who have a similar lifestyle.

Treatment

Time Lines

C2C - Down the Road audio

click this link below to listen to the song
 https://soundcloud.com/c2cdjs/down-the-road

C2C - Down the road lyrics

"Down The Road" Oh-oh-oh-woo. Mmmmhmmm. Have no place to go. Have no place to go, darling. Have no place to go. Have no place to go. Goodbye baby. Yes, I'm going. Ahhhhh, Yes, I'm going. Goodbye baby. Ahhhh, Yes I'm going. Have no place to go, mmmmm. Have no place to go, darling. Have no place to go, ohhhh. Have no place to go, darling. Goodbye baby. Yes, I'm going. Ahhhhh, Yes, I'm going. Goodbye baby. Ahhhh, Yes I'm going. Down the road I go. Down the road I go. Down the road I go. Down the road I go. Have no place to go, mmmmm. Have no place to go, darling. Have no place to go, ohhhh. Have no place to go, darling. Have no place to go, mmmmm. Have no place to go, darling. Have no place to go, ohhhh. Have no place to go, darling. When that train rode up now, I come walking out, Come walking out. When that train rode up now, I come walking out, Come walking out.

Final concept

We would begin filming in central London, firstly with the man walking up from the underground. He seems all confused as though he has never seen anything like this.

We would show London through his point of view so he would look around the city. This would be to emphasise the hustle and bustle of london. 

At 0:18 he would then put the headphone on an begin to walk through the city. 

We then thought that something strange could go on behind him while he has his headphone on, and then when he takes his headphones of it all stops. For example people dancing behind him.
A shot of him almost falling into a taxi and sitting in the taxi. However we would then show the drive through his point of view.

Planning our music video

Lesson with luke

Lesson with Luke

During the lesson Luke came in and gave us some tips that would help us to produce our music video. He suggested a few things that were essential, for example:
- He suggested that we look into a song that was produced by a band, and our objective was to make the video look as though it was produced by the band
- He said we should ensure that we understand the image of the band and the style, this would then help us to identify the target audience. It would also mean that the style of the song would synchronise with the band and then therefore the music video
- He also said that we should make sure that if we were using a band that the people who we would use to act out the band, would know how to actually play the instrument. This also means that the singer would already know the lyrics, so we would not be wasting time teaching them the lyrics on the day of the shoot.
- We should involve three narrative elements, a performance element which the label think would be vital. A lip sync, someone singing while being filmed. And then a narrative element, therefore an interesting story line which would be influenced by the style and genre. We would then use editing to create excitement
- We should try and create a hypothetical fan base via marketing

Planning our idea

During the lesson we explored the context of the song 'Down the Road' by C2C - we looked at how we could incorporate a jazzy and blues tone to the music video. We suggested a prison brake, and then i thought this could work well with him then running away and being joined by others (like in the forest gump scene). However we were ver cautious that there were not enough lyrics. Therefore we would have to find a sequence that would take up 3 minutes.
I researched into the band and worked out what audience we would target. However after having doubts this early on - we decided we were only going to go through with this decision if we have a good story line. 
We looked at several different ways to interpret the context, we explored ways that we would be able to make the video interesting for 3 minutes. I suggested that we may struggle to do this as the video does not have a lot of lyrics, therefore it would involve more action that just filming someone singing. We looked at several different concepts:
Firstly we suggested a prison break theme - this would then involve building a set to look perhaps like a prison cell. I suggested that we then just film the person walking out of the prison however this may not have been clear that he was braking out. We looked at the lady Gaga video of her in a prison cell - we would not however film it about him being in a prison cell, we would film it about him braking out. The reason for this is because the lyrics are 'good bye baby, yes i'm going' therefore we thought that the video would involve someone going on a journey, however after looking at this idea, I thought we could think of something that would be a bit more interesting. 

After deciding against this concept, however we may use some of the influences in another idea we thought that we could do something based on someone taking a journey through a city. We looked at the Wrangler jeans video for inspiration and thought we could use the idea of someone driving through a city and being bombarded with billboards and advertisements. However I could not think of a reason why he would be bombarded with this. I liked the idea of driving through a city and having the camera looking through the perspective of the driver, rather than film him driving.

After looking at this idea we then suggested that it could begin with him walking through the city with headphones on, and around him are people dancing, however when he takes his headphones off everyone stops and starts acting normal. I liked this idea as I thought we could do it in a sixties style. 

After pitching our idea to Luke I thought that we has a positive reaction. The feedback was good, however we needed to consider what we were going to do to make the video interesting.

Third concept for a music video

I saw a photo that gave me an idea to create a music video that could also include elements of the photo. The photo was black and white and it was a collage of pictures that looked as though they ha been taken in a photo booth.
I was not sure what song i could use for this video, therefore i was still open to suggestions.

The song would be sung as though it was from someone else's perspective like Mr Brightside, or the music video 'made in the USA' by Demi Lovato, where there is a main singer and then a story or someone else. 

I thought that a pretty girl could feature in the video, she came from a wealthy family and looked after herself. The boy she is with looks alternative, he is dressed in darker clothes with messy hair and a piercing. However in the photos they look extremely happy, with photos of them laughing together and pulling funny faces. I thought that the video could illustrate a story which comes from a girl who has good education and potential to do well in life. However she meets this boy, at first they are just messing around. Then it becomes more serious and they fall in love. However the girls parents do everything they can to try and separate them, the parents cut her credit cards, and take away her car (all superficial things - that you could live without). Finally the girl and the boy run away together. Then it begins to go downhill, the girl drops out of school, i thought we could show this by her storming out of a classroom after having an argument with the teacher, we could show shots of her then walking down the corridor laughing to herself (mentally she has become weird and perhaps unstable). She then has an argument with the head master and begins to trash his office by throwing papers up in the air and jsut watching them fall. From this i thought we could expand on this and then perhaps show how much she has changed. She could be living in a grubby house (like rihanna's video - we found love, towards the end) and she begins to argue with her boyfriend. Perhaps they could start physically fighting but this may be a bit to cliche. I thought then towards the end of the video, I could create a montage of the black and white video, they would begin with her and her boyfriend smiling as though they did when they first met, then it would go to her arguing with parents, then with the teachers then leaving school, she is then fighting with her boyfriend and crying etc. The video ends with her crying to herself in a small confined space.

this video idea is however a bit to cliche, but it may appeal to a wide audience. I do still however like the idea of using the black and white photo booth pictures. 

Second concept for a music video

Sam Smith is a British singer/songwriter, he became known when he sang on Disclosure's song Latch. However this song that I am reviewing is the acoustic version. The original song is faster and aimed at a bigger audience, however this song is not as well known and it is a slower and more dramatic version, which is aimed at a more alternative audience. 

When I watched the video of Alt J, the song breeze blocks, I felt drawn to it as it was edited so that the video was backwards. I like the idea of this and therefore I though I could interpret this into this video. I would begin this video with a boy crying with marks on his face. This would then move to him in a room smashing things around, based on the video (wrecking ball). With editing and camera shots I could make it in slow motion, therefor this could look interesting and appealing. It would also mean that the audience could be drawn into the character and feel sympathetic towards him. We would then move to a shot with the boy fighting with another boy, they would be young boys, at the age of perhaps 18. Therefore this would take place in a school area. where other kids are surrounding the two boys fighting and encouraging the fight. There would be shots here that would also be in slow motion to emphasise the fight. This would then move to them shouting at each other. This then moves to a video of the two boys being close together. All the action that takes place it played backwards. 

Another video like this is The scientist by Coldplay where the whole video is played back wards. 

First concept for a music video

The song that I have chosen to look at is 'Down the Road' by C2C. They are a French turntable group, who formed in 1998. There are four members in the group; 20Syl and Greem, Atom and Pfel. They were formally known as Coups2Cross.

Concept:
The idea for this video would be to attract some Jazz or Blues looking material, which we would then enhance into the video. For example clothing and the scenery. This idea came from other video's with a similar style, for example Get lucky by Daft Punk as they also introduce an electronic backing sound. The beginning of the music sounds like it would be in a western bar, with country people sitting around and perhaps socialising. The music then moves into a faster tempo, I had the idea of a small bar fight that began and then as the music speed up the person would run out of the bar, however he would be smiling, not angry. As though he was just trying to cause a scene but he was not actually angry with anyone. Slowly I thought that he could joined by more people who are running along side of him, I got this idea from the film Forest Gump, where he is joined by people as he is running.
I thought while he is running through the his point of view there are some things that he is hallucinating. This is to show that he is perhaps high on drugs. I got this idea from the stereotype of the 60's. The video then ends with him being running over

Beggining our Research

We began by forming our groups that we wanted to work in, in order to produce our music video. I was in a group of four and we all thought that we would like to look at alternative music, and perhaps aim for an alternative audience. During the lesson we looked at artists who are controversial, for example we looked at Lady Gaga's video Bad Romance where she acts as a vulnerable female who is being targeting and auctioned off. We then looked at Miley Cyrus, where she acts as a drug addict and partying with people have tattoos and piercings. 
We also looked at 'I think your freaky' which is very weird and perhaps makes the audience feel uncomfortable. 


We brainstormed ideas about potential music videos that we could create. We began by separating our ideas into genres, therefore establishing the target market. We find ourselves attracted to songs that had a jazz or blues theme to them. 

 

We liked the song down the road by C2C as it is upbeat and Jazy and has a good contextual background. 



We looked at Alt J and liked the editing of the music video as everything was played backwards.

Class note

Emily Tedrake:
She's a commissioning editor for Polydor records which is a sub label of Universal Music group which is owned by Time Warner.  

Emily studied fine art painting then she got into photography and then she interned at Polydor and she stayed there indeed end until today.  

She commissions Music video for music artists (including Ellie Gouding, Lana Del Ray and ETC), and she put out tender to directors who once selected will submit a treatment (which is the basic story line of the music video).  Emily may have contact 10 clients who may want to shoot, depending on budgets/concept.  She also works closely with artists and directors.

Commission Process:

Budget is set from £1,000 to £100,000.

This is based on how much sales the record label is expecting and what they are using the music video for, e.g James Blake.  The music video is a promotional tool, a part of the marketing campaign and this money would take a while to get back.