Padd Solutions

In this post you can see some of the pictures taken during the making of the Digipack, they demonstrate the set up of the shot and some of the equipment used to assist us. Enjoy!

With our album artwork we wanted to create something that can distance itself with our actual music video, the aim of the cover is to create a total juxtaposition of who AAF actually are which relates to the kind of cynical humor which has got them so known in the first place. Our digipack artwork can be seen below.

Front Cover


Inside Panel


CD Panel


Back Panel

Recently we've been developing some ideas for our Digipack and Advertising campaign, we felt it was important to not try focus on our actual music video too much in the artwork because we didn't want the album to just reflect one song. We decided on a idea playing off the actual name of the album "Anthology", a anthology is normally associated with a collection of literature or music etc so we wanted to include some sort of homage to the word. This is where the idea of a collection of old fashioned books came in alongside a Gramophone in-keeping with the old fashioned theme.

We recently decided to take pictures of all the equipment we have used over the course of our project to just give a little insight into what we have used. The slides include pieces of important equipment such as the Canon 5D and ranges to less important but still vital pieces of equipment such as the SD Card's etc.

All the equipment can be seen below:

A few screen shots of our calender can be seen below, we used iCal on Mac to try and organise our time as best as possible.

Below is a draft of one of our poster ideas, but we also feel it could be adapted for use in the Digipack:

Some photos of filming along with a commentary from Dan & Oli:

In this video you have a little insight into our group as we are filming, enjoy!

In this presentation we look at a little bit of info about AAF and also examine how they have used their music videos to promote themselves.

 This week we finished our storyboards that will give us a guide when we are filming, take a look below.

Alien Ant Farm are punk/pop band formed in the late 1990’s. They were later signed to “Dreamworks SKG” record label in 2000. The bands comedic charisma has enabled them to create quirky videos with many influences from modern film, music and culture.

The majority of the modern day Punk audience is male and this has been the case for many years, of course there is a female contingent but it’s not as prominent now as it has been in the past. We will be targeting social classes B, C, and D. This is because this is the same audience that Alien Ant Farm would be trying to reach. Much like AAF’s videos we will be including references to influential media and culture of today. Where AAF used wrestling in the late 90s we will be using our own cultural reference in Little Big Planet (a modern symbol of culture). Our primary demographic focus will be on young males of ages 11-18. Around 75% of our audience will fit in this age and gender bracket. The rest of the audience will consist of males aged 19-25 (10%) and all other demographics e.g females (15%).

The video will also be largely aimed at a straight sexuality audience, along with Black, Asian and White being the main majority races. Looking at Psychographics we expect the film to be aimed at strugglers seeking escape and the resigned looking for survival. Finally looking at lifestyle we concluded that we would be aiming the film at “Yaks” (young, adventurous, keen and single), “Dinky’s” (dual income and no kids).

With our target audience identified we can make sure the content of our music video will appeal to our specific demographic. We will be including popular modern media references in Little Big Planet and our overall themes will appeal to our mostly adolescent male audience. The technique of combining real time footage and video game material allows us to create a sense of synergy. By doing this we ensure our video is effective as it can be and will in turn be more successful.

Hi again.

This week in the vlog we decided to quickly shoot (ignore the bad framing on TV shots!) something that explain some of the ideas we had for our music video but also address a few points that we feel might impair us throughout the course of our project.

We are currently hard at work designing and creating our levels on LittleBigPlanet for our music video. Each level takes a large amount of time to build up a quality desgin and feeling so we won't be unveiling any creations until we feel that they are presentable.

Soon we will show one of our level ideas, the idea behind it and how it will feature in our music video. But for now I'll give you a little sneak peak as to the theme we are going to be showing, enjoy!

In this first brand new shiny episode of the Pixelesque vlog, we give a brief insight into the game that is LittleBigPlanet and basically show what it's all about. We felt we should do a general video because for people who don't know about the game it provides a basic idea as what it is etc. Keep checking back for more updates and Vlog's soon!

Hi again!

We now have a final idea! We decided that we are going to stick with our orignial choice of song "Movies" by Alien Ant Farm and are going to create a Machinima style music video with real life footage as well.

Our basic idea is that a character will enter a house through the front door and then a fast style montage similar to those used in Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead will create a temporal ellipsis of him getting home, grabbing a drink etc and then sitting down infront of the sofa with his freind. It's at this point our main character and his freind realise that they are missing the television remote and cant change the channel away from the boring programme on the TV.

This is where the Machinima part of our film begins, our characters fall asleep and after a "dream style" transition they appear to take the form of "Sackboys" from the Playstation 3 game LittleBigPlanet. After a breif dialouge where they realise they must chase after the remote inside the game, there is a white flash and our heroes take the form of a certain movie, this is because the track we are using is Movies by Alien Ant Farm. Our characters will travel through various movie levels designed by us until they finally reach their end goal of finding the remote. When this does happen the remote is pointed at the viewer and the video ends.

At this time we have many ideas for the levels we want to desgin to represent all the different movies but we don't want to give them away just yet!

Thanks

Ethan

So over the summer we have been discussing numerous ideas over what we wanted to do and we finally settled on a music video. We then came up with a basic outline idea of a love story, this was elaborated to a underdog type of story where his love seemed out of reach. Along with this idea we had basic plot lines and locations etc but with more investigation we realized the logistics of actually filming our desired idea wasn't going to be practical.

So at this point we are re-assessing what exactly we want to do but we do have other ideas knocking about so I will update more when we decide something more concrete!

For the time being,


Ethan

Ethan Wroth

Gorillaz - Stylo

Gorillaz are a English band created by Blur’s Damon Albarn and British cartoonist Jamie Hewlett. There original creation of Gorillaz was fronted by a group of animated characters that used to present all aspects of then band albeit Music Videos or Live Performance. Since their third album “Plastic Beach” the animated characters still remain although Albarn and co have taken to the the stage to provide a new live performance element. In this analysis I will be looking at their 2010 single “Stylo” from their recent album “Plastic Beach”.

Stylo opens with a unique style of shot that could be described as a POV/Tracking shot hybrid, the shot shows us a view of a road and its apparent that some sort of vehicle is traveling down this road due to the diegetic sound of the car in the background. We can tell very quickly that this vehicle is speeding because we are showed zoom on shot of a police radio moving accompanied by a medium shot of the Policeman outside his car, this is followed by a zoomed shot of the police mans donuts on his front seat which is fairly stereotypical but also indicates the laziness of the police officer outside the car. As the police officer finally hears his radio the muscle car shown with "Stylo" on the front accelerates past the officer and leaves a trail of dust and the police officer struggling to get in his car in time.

It is at this point we are first introduced to the characters driving the "Stylo", in typical Gorillaz fashion the occupants of the car are there animated characters who for many years fronted their stage shows and music videos. "Murdoc" is driving the car accompanied by "2D" in the passengers seat and "Cyborg Noodle" in the back seat, as the characters are shown it becomes apparent that there is a gun-shot through the windshield which suggests they are being chased. As the car continues through the desert we see "2D" singing along to the song taking on Damian Albarn's voice. The mix of the CGI characters with the real time speeding car is an interesting and fairly surreal combination and they focus on this point by just showing shots of the car traveling with its occupants for around 30 seconds.

Once the police officer finally catches up with them "Cyborg Noodle" leans out and begins shooting towards him with a shotgun, this then suggests that the band members are fleeing the authorities. "Noodle" then shoots out one of the police officers lights causing him to swerve and crash through a billboard with a "Super-Fast Jellyfish" graphic which is a inter textual reference to the future single on their album Plastic Beach. The gang then continue as they were through the desert along the dusty road.



It's at this point we are introduced to a new character when a silhouette of someone smoking a cigar is shown, as the "Stylo" car passes this man he proceeds to chase them along the road although his car bears no resemblance to any law authority. We are then shown a shot through the windscreen of the unknown car to be shown it is Bruce Willis taking on the role of the vigilante, this is then followed by the introduction of a CGI storm above the two vehicles. As the the vehicles speed down the road we see Bruce Willis again in his car but this time acknowledging the audience by staring straight towards the camera in some sort of cameo role. As Willis catches up with "Stylo" his intentions become clear when he produces a revolver from his passengers seat, Murdoc then realizes this and a reaction shot is shown to emphasis is horror. Willis begins firing shots and shunting the opposing car obviously trying to end the pursuit, as Willis leans out and shoots at them he is shown laughing in an almost mad fashion.



We then cut to shot of the policeman with his wrecked cruiser as he crawls towards the remnants of his doughnuts, this is a use of parallel action. As he continues to crawl, a CGI character rises from the ground baring a striking resemblance to the Grim Reaper. The black creatures approaches him and smashes down into the ground appearing to make the policeman disappear.

When we re-join the pursuit the diegetic sound of the engines is slowly increased in a crescendo that emphasizes the pursuit is getting faster and more dangerous, the "Stylo" car then drives off a cliff and Willis manages to stop his car in time. Willis exits his car, revolver in hand and shows some kind of sick enjoyment that his prey have crashed into the ocean. At this point it seems it is all over as Willis returns to his car, but the last shot of the video is of the car transforming into a submarine meaning that despite earlier thoughts the Gorillaz characters have lived another day.

I feel this music video is very unique because it's mix of realistic CGI along with real life footage makes it a fairly surreal experience to watch. The cameo from Bruce Willis also adds to the appeal of the video because it draws more attention due the appearance of a A-List celebrity.

We're back after a whole summer of brief sunshine and a lot of rain! This year we begin the A2 part of the course and I am looking forward to what's in-store over the next year. This year me and Dan decided to move on from FlatlinePictures and form a new group with Oli Harkin formerly of Rattrap Productions to form a brand new super group Pixelesque!




As a group we now have many different ideas knocking about as to what we want to do so keep posted for all the developments along the way!

Thanks

Ethan

Hermeneutic and Proairetic codes are two guidelines that every film needs to follow. Hermeneutic codes are something that is unexplained in a film, this is used to make the audience question what is happening and why, this is also known as a narrative enigma. Hermeneutic codes are most frequent at the beginning of a film because they can shape and outline the rest of the film, this is important because it makes the audience question the same thing over and over from the beginning of the film until they eventually find out. Proairetic codes are normally a plot action that holds no real significance, it normally acts as a middle ground between a previous event and a future event e.g. A man walking down the street. Although not as dramatically significant as Hermeneutic codes, Proairetic codes still have a job to do and can be important to the audience understanding whats happening in front of them.

To give a example of Hermeneutic and Proairetic codes I will be writing about the opening sequence to the 2009 British crime Film 'Dead Man Running', it was directed by Alex De Rakoff and produced by Rio Ferdinand and Ashley Cole.


The opening sequence of the film shows a character entering a Rolls Royce after getting of a flight, this is then followed by a establishing shot of Central London at night, as all of this is happening we see the credits are accompanied by translucent graphics of money watermarks that cover certain parts of the screen, this gives a suggestion that thew film is money based. As the Rolls Royce travels through Piccadilly Circus we see the character inside reading a copy of 'the Economist'. This can be considered a example of a Proairetic code, it doesn't really raise any questions but it shows information that allows the audience to start forming a opinion of this character.

The car pulls up by a club and the main character played by 50 Cent enters the club accompanied by his entourage, establishing shots of the club are used to show the wealth within it e.g. Champagne, cigars, strippers etc. 50 Cent then approaches a door guarded by two bouncers, this provides one of the first Hermeneutic codes because the audience questions as to who is inside due to the security outside. 50 enters the office and is greeted by another man. 50 then sits at the other mans desk connoting a sense of authority, when questioned how his flight was he doesn't reply, this is another Hermeneutic code because you want to know why 50 has flied to London, and also from his lack of response you feel he is not happy about the matter.

Just from looking at the opening two minutes of this film we are given one main plot device that is presented in the form of a Hermeneutic code and this is accompanied by a Proairetic code.  This illustrates how important these codes are to a film because they really indicated and guide where the film is going.

So as much as I love doing this media blog I have been doing other things during Easter that have seemed to distract me from updating this amazing page, including football, work and various other things. Sadly this also included my Laptop breaking for a while and Old Windsor's internet going down for about four days due to some mug who cut all the wires to the village. So anyway below is a few pics that I took including the new PC that has replaced the broken laptop!



Anyway, back to the serious buisness of Flatline Pictures and our film!

We finished the editing of our film before Easter (not including sound) and uploaded it on YouTube;



So most of the video editing is done but we hope to get the video sound edited so we can take down the traffic sounds within the video. We also have someone working on a sountrack to accompany it which will hopefully be with us very soon. Once the sound is tweaked and the soundtrack added we have to add titles in LiveType and then we should be finished!

Anyway, hope this update was helpful even if a bit overdue.

Thanks!

Ethan

Episode 2 including some colour filtering practise and a little how to guide.

Ethan

We are preparing to go and hopefully shoot our opening tomorrow. We going to be starting early at  around 8:45am at Virginia Waters to try and minimise the amount of people in the park!

Wish us luck!

A video compilation of a few bits we tried recently just for research and testing puposes.

Enjoy!

We have finally settled on Virginia Waters as the location for our film. Our decision to use the lake as our setting was based on many aspects. We felt that the forest around the lake would be perfect for our 'campsite' type setting because it would look very authentic. We also hope due to the size of the area we will find it easy to avoid contact with the public which would make our filming process much easier. Although with these positive reasons there are some drawbacks, the main one being if we encounter a warden, we agreed that if we see a Warden we will ask permission to film, but otherwise we will continue to film.

Thanks!

So today we finally finished drawing up our storyboards (Yay!). This means we finally have a pretty solid plan when it comes to filming our opening sequence. The storyboard includes the types of shot we hope to use as well as some of the sound effects we want included, so it provides us with a good guideline during the filming and editing process. Obviously the storyboard won't be follwoed religously due to many different factors that can change during filming and editing but this is the plan we hope to stick to as much as possible.

You can see the scans of the storyboard below!

Let's talk about a topic that is very important and extremely enjoyable, it's a major part of our project that we all look forward to with anticipation over weeks of building up. Yes, I am indeed talking about Health and Safety.

All jokes aside, Health and Safety is a pretty important aspect of our production because we have to acknowledge certain risks and consequences that may come with the filming of our production. We have to try and asses these risks beforehand so that we can prepare for them as best as we can. As a group we created a risk assessment sheet to look at all the problems that we may encounter along the way. This included things such as;

• Being caught by Wardens in a Royal park
• Falling whilst navigating certain terrain
• Getting fake blood in open wounds/eyes
• Setting up the set (Hammers, knives etc)

Even though we decided that all of these were fairly low risk it was still handy to point them out just so that we knew to be a bit more careful during filming.

That's enough Health and Safety for now I think  so I'll leave it there, although if you really do enjoy it, the scan of the risk assessment can be seen below!

Thanks

I decided to do a little research into the kind of target audience Flatline Pictures would reach out to should our film ever make it to full production.
Using the Peal & Dean Film Planner (http://business.pearlanddean.com/filmplanner) I was able to compare our film with others of similar of themes and from there gather data as to the age, sex and social class of our target audience. Using the films shown below I was able to get a rough idea of what our audience would be.



By using the film planner I was able to get a good idea for our target audience by assessing what audiences other similar films aim towards. Our film would hold most appeal to the 15-24 age bracket around the C1 social class, this is due to the film being a fairly simple plot compared to a political film for example that may attract a older A and B social class audience due to it's complexity. Our film would also appeal more to a male audience in my opinion.

This would most likely be down to the more graphic and action filled content of the film that appeals to a younger male audience compared to the factors that appeal to a female audience such as Romance and Comedy etc.

It's helpful looking at the target audiences of films similar to ours because it can influence the type of content we have in our film to suit the audience we want to be associated with so the research was very useful.

Thanks!

Before filming our Preliminary task we had to first develop a idea, this included thinking of a plot/storyline, planning when to use certain editing techniques and also creating a storyboard for the film. The storyboard included factors such as dialouge, costume and location and these were all important things to know before we started to film. For our location we chose to use the English corridor at School, this was mainly due to the fact that it was close and avalible at the time, our task didn't need to be a convincing piece of film but instead include various techniques so the actual location of the film was the not the most important aspect, this meant the English corridor was a suitable option because it was quiet, empty and avalible for us to use.


Although the filming went smoothly it was infact the second time we had filmed our task because the original film (different location), was wiped off the camera by someone else before we had the chance to back up the files on the MacBook's. This was a minor setback but still frustraiting. Apart from that we didn't face any other major problems, we did encounter a few small problems on Final Cut during the editing process but these were simply corrected and mainly down due to lack of knowledge of the program at that time.

As I've mentioned in previous post's I feel that although our Preliminary isn't a amazing spectacle, it still provides all the factors it is meant too such as continuity editing, shot-reverse-shot and match-on-action. As a film it is simple and effective and as group we were happy wih the final result although we acknowledged a few points that we thought could be improved if we done it again.

These points included improved costumes, better location, more dialouge and more variety of shots. All these factors would of been fairly simple to implement but due to time constraints and equipment restraints (e.g. only be able to use one camera) we didn't have the chance to include them in our film. All this means is that next time we will be better prepared and have more planning before we start so that we can produce a better film. I felt this experience was rewarding because it allowed us to get to grips with planning and actually making a film and this knowledge can now be used when we create our main film.

Thanks for reading!

Ethan

Here's a low quality version of our finished preliminary task, it contains some basic editing tecnqiues as well as a small simple soundtrack.



Our short film was about a man visiting his Doctor. Our main character is seen walking up a flight of stairs towards his office, this is accompanied by a simple non-diegetic score, we felt the music had a slight 'hospital like' feel to it so we decided to make use of it. As the man enters the office a match on action was used to create a feeling of continuity. Our  main character then shakes hands with the Doctor and the both sit down at the desk. At this point we used a dissolve transition in Final Cut to represent a passing of time.

Shot-reverse-shot was then used to show the brief conversation between the two characters. As the man enquires about his test results the shot cuts to outside of the office before you hear what the doctor says. THis hopefully creates a question in the audiences mind as to what the Doctor had to say. The camera then starts to move away from the main focal point and the shot then slowly fades to black.

I think that the film demonstrates all the required specifications fairly well and the plot is simple enough to be understood by everyone. This version of the film is very low quality due to time constraints when exporting it but hopefully we will upload a higher quality version soon!

Thanks

Ethan

Last week we had to refilm our preliminary task due to the HD camera being completley wiped(Nobel prize for whoever was responsible!) so this meant we had to search for a new location to film due to our old one being occupied. We finally decided on a location and began filming.















We used different techniques while editing, such as the pen tool to cut the clips into sections, dissolve effects and also a tool that allowed us to fade to black. These tools were very helpful because they allowed us to edit our film very easily and quickly to create the desired effect we wanted. We then used GarageBand to create a simple soundtrack to accompany the footage.















So our preliminary task is now complete and I'll upload it soon, so keep checking back for more updates!

Thanks

Ethan

Shrooms is a 2007 film by Paddy Breathnatch; it’s a Horror/Thriller about a group of American students who travel to Ireland in search of hallucinogens. They travel to a forest in search of psilocybin mushrooms referred to as ‘Shrooms’, with their Irish tour guide, who from the opening sequence we learn is the main characters love interest. The film opens with a camera following a girl running through some foggy woods; the camera follows the girl at pace creating a feeling of panic. There is diegetic sound of the girl breathing heavily as she runs, but it is combined with non-diegetic music of chords which enhance the feeling of suspense and panic. The scene then cuts to a view of a ruined house, the following shots show blood over walls and what appears to be a dead human hand next to a pool of blood. The music continues as you see a hooded character and a character with a sack over their head, this creates a plot device for the audience because they don’t know who these characters are.

As the non-diegetic music goes into a dimuendo, the scene slowly fades to black. You are then shown the names for the two production companies in a blood red colour font, as this fades out you are then met with a change of setting. You see a ‘fasten your seatbelt’ sign and you can instantly recognise that this setting is a plane. As the shot focuses in on two girls (Tara & Lisa) sitting in their seats you see Tara looking through what appears to be a diary, there is a picture of her with a man. Lisa looks over and says she likes him, which the Tara denies. It becomes apparent to the audience very quickly that there is a love interest involved with this story, and you soon learn they are not just going to Ireland in search of Shrooms, but also pursuing Tara’s love interest. From the conversation between the girls you also establish some character traits of each one, Tara is more the nice girl type whereas Lisa comes off as the slightly more arrogant and malicious type.

From these first two minutes of the film we are given a fair amount of information. We are provided with plot device in the respect of the ‘scary house’ as well as the girl running in the forest, these two aspects of the opening sequence give us a indication as to the genre and type of film that is going to follow. We are then introduced to the two main characters; we are given a insight into their personalities and also the reasoning behind them going to the setting of the film. For the first two minutes of a film a lot of information is revealed compared to many other films that try to leave the audience questioning what is going to happen. This still happens in Shrooms but slightly more information is introduced than usual and this could be criticised because it doesn’t allow for much tension to be built and those types of factors are pivotal for a horror/thriller film. So in some respects the opening of Shrooms isn’t stereotypical because you are shown a lot in the initial sequence, but it doesn’t give away too much. I personally feel the opening is lacking because it doesn’t create enough tension because your shown the main ‘evil’ character in the first part and it ruins it to a degree although this underwhelming feeling is constant throughout the whole film.

A idea for our opening credit, still a work in progress.

So, erm, hi!

This week we've had a few technical difficulties this week involving the HD camera and the uploading of the Prelim task, so while these issues are being sorted we've been working on a few other bits such as; Idea development, Storyboard development, Group name ideas, practising with different bits of software etc.

We've finally settled on a group name and I will update the blog soon with the announcement and hopefully a logo!

Few pics from this week:

This week the class broke into groups to develop and work together on our preliminary tasks and main coursework. My group consists of me, Dan Beattie, Josh Welbelove and Lewis Sloan. We've already developed some ideas for our main coursework and began to start drawing and constructing the storyboards, had some great ideas and a few questionable ones (i.e. the cameo appearance of Shaniqua from N-Dubz' video Ouch).

We filmed our Preliminary task earlier this week and I hope to have some photo's up soon showing our final setting etc.

Anyway, this post is getting a bit lengthy so I'll cut it for now and update soon with some more info and some photos hopefully!

For our preliminary task we were given a objective of creating a short film including a few different camera techniques. These include techniques such as Shot-reverse-shot,Match on action and the 180 degree rule. While developing our idea we took a few pictures to jus get a idea of what we wanted to do;

Welcome to my new blog for Media AS Coursework, more to follow..