How we used media technologies in our video

An important tool for creating our media music video was the
use of media technologies, both in our post production and in our research and
planning stages.
The most
important media technology during our planning and preparation was that of the
internet. During our planning, the use of the internet allowed us to find and
catalogue a variety of other music video’s which we used as inspiration, such
as other Oh Land music video’s, for this we mainly used the site youtube.com,
which allowed us free none-copyrighted access to a hoard of music videos.
The internet also allowed us to
search for suitable locations for our music video, a useful site for this
Google Maps, which we used to grab our location screenshots.
Search engines also allowed us to
research into what it was possible to do with editing, and what the typical
conventions of a music video of our genre would be.

The most
important use of media technologies was during the construction of the video.
The video camcorder we used was of a high standard, allowing us to take high
quality shots for our music video, and keep clarity high. We used a tripod and
dolly, which allowed us to take panning and tracking shots with ease.

The editing
software used was final cut pro 5, this highly advanced piece of software
really opened up what we were able to do with our music video. Although the
software got some getting used to, as we got better with it we were able to
incorporate effects and transitions in our video that took it to a new level.
The most basic function it provided was that of time lining our clips, allowing
us to create a chronological narrative.
As our
video was more of a narrative than arthouse, we did not need to use many
affects, however certain ones were still used, and for this we used final cut
pro, such as when adding colour keys such as greyscale to the dance scene. We
also used masking to add certain affects to single parts of the frame, such as
the Gaussian blur on the male character towards the end.
Transitions
were also important, to help make the cuts go smoother we incorporated
transitions such as fades and dissolves, this helped the continuity of the
video.
In addition
to using final cut pro to edit the video, we also used it to edit the sound. As
our sound clip was too long, we shortened it using the trim abilities of final
cut pro, and added fade ins and outs to again make it smoother.

Overall
then, media technologies were extremely important to our music video, without
which we could not have hoped to succeed.

Technology used

The technology used to complete our coursework was a major part to its success. We used a digital camera that was given to us by the college to films of the shots for the music video, it was ‘Legria FS306’ it had all the necessary features such advanced zoom, good storage capacity and also a good battery life but however the quality of the video was fairly poor. We were also given a tripod with the camera. It was very thoughtful as it helped us to shoot good clips without being too shaky. Another digital technology we used was a digital camera to take pictures of the locations, we used a ‘Canon lxus 220 HS’. It was a really good and useful camera as all the pictures were great quality. That was mainly everything that we used to film the actually clips for the music video. Post production After we had filmed all the clips that we needed, we used the software Final Cut pro to the edit the clips together to form a 4minute long continuous music video. It was great software for editing as we were able to do lots of different effects and transitions to our video to make it a really good final product. One of the main use’s of final cut pro was that we was able to slow down or speed up some of the clips to make it flow though the video, an example of this is in one of the dancing part we slowed down one of the clips as well as rewinding it and speed it up after, it looked great and was a great effect. Using final cut pro we was able to add filter e.g. the black n white at the start. We was able to edit brightness and contrast of the video as some of the clips had different lighting to each other because they were shot on different days, so that was a really hand tool. And many more transitions ad effects to make it a good final piece. Another digital technology we used was the software that we used was the adobe Photoshop. It was mainly used to complete the digi pack and the poster. Adobe Photoshop is a graphic editing program developed & published by Adobe systems Incorporated. It was really handy software as it allowed us to edit the pictures, add effects to them and make it better than the original image. Some of its useful features include, blurring, Quick Selection and Refine Edge tools, and also it was useful because it allowed us to add text and filters to the original image. It was really easy to use as well.

Evaluation Question 2

Our main product has many unique qualities about it as do our ancillary texts. For example we use the same protagonist in our digipak as we used for our video to create continuity and so that the female would be recognizable from the music video for potential customers wanting to purchase the CD. We tried to connect the song lyrics to our CD case and so we brainstormed the word ‘Numb’ (being the singles title) and this is how we came up with the idea of the girl in the bath of ice. This represents that her heart is so numb that this then reflects in her body and the numbness takes over. When we began brainstorming for the digipak we initially decided on an Alice in Wonderland type tea party in the woods. The reason we thought of this was because there is an underlying intertextual reference throughout the video of Alice in Wonderland (themes, characters and so on.) However we eventually decided against this idea as we thought it would be extremely difficult to make it look genuine and we also thought that we wanted to make something completely original. I think that the front cover of the CD goes well with the music video because the underlying theme in the video that we wanted to portray is that of mental illness and on the CD cover the protagonist has tape over her mouth and redness under her eyes making her look crazy. We kept the magazine advert simple. By using the protagonist on the posters the public can then relate her to the music video making it easy to spot. The simplistic yet eloquent  effect used and the blue background enhances the cold, lost feeling to the character and also is related to the word numb and also is eye-catching. 

Evaluation Question 1

 

Our media product uses the conventions of real media products according to Craig Davis’ theory. Our music video fits well into the category of amplification, which we attempted to do from the beginning. However, our video challenges Goodwin’s theory of female exhibition and voyeurism, we did this partly because we were inspired by Florence and the Machine and Florence is a strong, talented woman and so does not exhibit herself in her videos and also because it is unlike the genre of music to convey women in such a way. Oh Land’s other videos come across with her looking innocent and very girly, not sexy.  I think that our music video develops the usual conventions by the vast interpretation possible for the audience to have. The surreal narrative is very open to interpretation and almost film-like yet still conforming to the cut-to-the-beat- editing, like a music video. We conformed to conventions of a music video by going on location and using several interesting locations. The costumes that we decided to use were eye-catching and inventive. We did this because music videos are a form of advertisement for the musician and therefore generally there is a memorable quality to the video. Of course, like some music videos, we shaped the mise en scene to intensify the narrative and show the protagonists changing feelings, thoughts and emotions.

Comparing AS to A2

Comparing the AS production to the A2 coursework there is a lot of significant changes. Such the amount of work you have to do in the same amount of time is a lot more than you’d expect, you have to do the music video, blog digi pack and do all of them up to a high standard. Where as in AS all you had to worry about was your video and blog. On the other hand A2 work is however easier because it is fairly straight forward what you have to do, as you have already acquired all the skills you need to produce the video from last year and it’s just the matter of taking it to the next level with the editing and the different approach you go about to do it. In AS what you had to do was film the start of film, it was hard to do because we had never done anything like that before and it was a completely new idea so there was a lot of idea you needed to take in such as the 180 degree rule. One of the main challenges from AS would be getting used to the software final cut pro, it was really complicated when you first use as there is a lot of things you can do with that software e.g. slow down the clips, add effects, filters etc. therefore it took a lot of time compared to A2 to get the editing part done. Another main challenge was coming up with the story board, where as A2 you know what your doing by analyzing different music video AS it was solely based on you and your team as you had to come with your own film, which I personally found quiet hard to do, so there was a lot of planning and research done compared to A2. In A2 our task was to create a music video to the song of our choice. Personally I found this much more exciting and fun to do as there was no limit to what you can’t do. When we was filming AS there was a lot of help from the teacher and therefore there was limits to what we could’ve done as we was always getting opinions on what they thought about it and so. Where as in A2 everything was done by you and the team and teachers didn’t have to help as much, as we already knew everything we need to know. However filming the music video is a lot more challenging than you’d expect. There was lot of time spent on the filming itself and it required a lot of planning and research, such as the locations, how to get people there, any additional actors etc. Choosing the song was fairly easy for us as we all shared similar taste music and we all wanted to do unique music video to unique song. Editing in A2 is easier in a compared to AS as you already know how to use final cut pro and it’s just the matter of using the right transmission at the right place and so. However where as the maximum time for the AS project was 2 min 30 seconds, in A2 we had to aim to complete about 4minutes in total which was a challenge as well. Also the blog had to be a lot more detailed as well, where the minimum amount of posts we had to do was 50 which was a major challenge to achieve. Finally the digipack, it was something we need do last year so it was kind of new to all of us; however it was fairly easy to do. We used the Photoshop to edit the images to their standards and we also had to do a poster to advertise the album/the product we had produced. In conclusion we enjoyed creating the music video much more than filming the start of film as it was much more exciting and challenging

face painting for China town scenes

We had a friend do the clown's face painting. She has lots of experience in face painting and gave a us a fantastic photograph from a brilliant circus book. (picture)

What we learnt from our audience feedback

Audience feedback is crucial to achieving an interesting yet fun and mysterious music video.
When shooting at the yard theatre in Hulme there was a lot of interest in the music video.
The theatre was active with many quietly interested artist/producers.. producing great feed back for us to sink our teeth into! For example one artist mentioned the back lighting in the theatre creating a fantastic background for us to work with, producing some amazing shots.
While shooting the dancer I had many scenes in mind and lots of the scenes worked very well but after a quick chat with the group; artist/producers of the theatre and the dancer, we decided to enhance/change some scenes making a real difference. This taught us how important listening to the audience is to developing a music video. Overall our Audiences (during shooting) feedback was very useful and we were most grateful for their time and idea's.

Once the audience had seen the final music video they immediately asked if there was a CD to buy. This taught us how important music video's are to an artist career/income. The comments overall are outstanding with many congrats and not forgetting a bit of constructive criticism. Giving us much to get excited about in the future.
Here are few interviews from the audience after watching the music video.


Name: Jordan D
Age: 22
1) What did you think the music video was about?
"A woman lost and trying to find her way or maybe her mind."
2) Will you be telling your friends and family about the music video ?
"Yes, I will be as i feel they will like it as much I have!"
3) What age do you think this music video is most suited for ?
"Not sure really maybe 14+"
4) Did you like the choreography in the music video ?
"Indeed the dancing really brought the video together."
5) Did you like the scenes chosen for the music video ?
"Yes, the town scenes bring the story to life and I love darkness."
6) Was there anything you feel we missed or could of improved ?
"Maybe more dancers."

Name: Zia J
Age:18
1) What did you think the music video was about?
"A girl that was lost both physically and mentally."
2) Will you be telling your friends and family about the music video ?

i have and i have shown it to everyone coz its awesome
3) What age do you think this music video is most suited for ?

Teenagers+ because it might not make sense to younger ones
4) Did you like the choreography in the music video ?

yeah, especially the dancing scene as it linked everything together
5) Did you like the scenes chosen for the music video ?

yeah, thought it was really originally and gave a good sense of feel
6) Was there anything you feel we missed or could of improved ?
thought the music could be a bit more up to beat, thats all apart from that it was really good

sian casey

1) What did you think the music video was about?

weird girl running around everywhere, looking for some guy.

2) Will you be telling your friends and family about the music video ?

yes
3) What age do you think this music video is most suited for ?

teenagers
4) Did you like the choreography in the music video ?

yes
5) Did you like the scenes chosen for the music video ?

yes i did
6) Was there anything you feel we missed or could of improved ?
no, it was spot on :)

Location

To successfully produce our music video, there were a lot key factors and one of the main factors was the locations different shots needed to be filmed in. there for a lot of thought was put into this. We went through our shot list one by one and each member of the group was given their opinion on where to film the shots, there were many good and ideal locations but we also had to take in the time limit as well as the costs to getting or even in some cases paying to use the place e.g. theater's. After we had gone through the shot list we had to decide which of the location was best for the music video. We all decided that the first shots would be best filmed in a theater as it would be the best place for it. It had all the space and equipment we needed for it e.g. spotlights, closed walls etc. it was then a matter of choosing which one, luckily we was lucky enough to find one close to college, Hulme cooperative theater. (Pictures of the theater) The next scene is girl running through backstreets of town during daytime. We found a perfect backstreet in town it was just near Chinatown however, it was hard to pin point a date and time to film because of the rush hour periods and the fact it was getting dark very early. Regardless we decided to film on that location and it was the backstreets of St James Street. It was perfect due the scenery it showed as it had stairs, doors and all kind of props that we could use. (Pictures of the back streets) The last scene is the final shot and was one of the hardest to pick a location. As it had to be perfect as it was the vital and the most important shot of the music video. We had a lot of trouble choosing the place. We had lots of idea were to shoot such as South port beach, Heaton park, Fletcher moss gardens etc. It was a tough decision but we all decided the best location would be Fletcher moss gardens as it had the perfect scenery and it was practically free to use as well. (Pictures of Fletcher moss gardens)

 

 

 

Oh Land Shotlist

 

1. ECU of single eye, darkness surrounding it.
2. ECU of both eyes looking scared. (Shot from the left)
3. ECU of both eyes looking scared, looking in a different direction. (shot from the right.
4. ECU of both looking straight on at the camera, again looking scared.
5. ELS of girl up on balcony, holding onto banister, looking around.
6. LS of girl in corner of theatre again looking around scared.
7. MLS of girl behind curtain in theatre, looking out from behind it.
8. LS of girl weaving in and out of pillars on her tiptoes, ballet style.
9. MLS of girl in the centre of the theatre floor, suddenly attempts to run and trips and falls.
10. CU of girls face looking frightened.
11. HAS of her on the floor looking upwards, directly at the camera
12. ECU of her eye. (large pupils to small pupils.)
13. Birds eye of busy central Manchester. Fast zoom in on a busy street.
14. OTS handheld track of the same girl
15. Wide shot of girl running into shot around a corner, pans across and she runs out of shot- continually looking behind her and stumbling.
16. Flash second of a grinning clowns face, complete with striking traditional clown make up.
17. OTS handheld track of girl entering into china town and running down an alley way.
18. CU of clowns face, grinning and licking its lips in an evil fashion.
19. (17)
20. (18)
21. 21. MS of girl from behind down an alleyway attempting to open a door.
22. CU of girls hand on a different door handle across the street.
23. ELS of girl running to different doors and trying to force them open.
24. 2 shot of girl and clown, clown further behind, looks like he’s floating. Girl is looking behind at him.
25. Girl struggles with a door on the left and it swings open. DARKNESS. OTSS.
26. Cu of her facial expression turn from frightened to confused. Street in the background out of focus.
27. OTSS of girl walking into doorway. Darkness around but a faint ghostlike figure of a mans face smiling innocently. She leans in to kiss him putting her hand around his neck but her hand simply slides through the doorway.
28. (from outside) The door slams on the camera. Camera then zooms into keyhole of darkness.
29. CU on clowns face laughing and rotating, black background.

30.  Girl falls into black frame as she tries to stand uporizontal curvy green ‘bass lines’ knock her over and she begins to bounce around and fall on the lines (which will mirror the sound of the music. (ANIMATION)

CROSS CUTTING WITH

31. A ballet/street dance interpretive, aggressive, silhouetted- behind a sheet- dance routine with a guy and a girl- (clown and her_
32.  Animation
33. Silhouetted routine
34. Animation. Curvy horizontal lines straighten out at a declining angle creating a slide for her to slide out of the frame as opaque girl…
35. HALS of girl sliding into frame into tall grassy fields. (NOW IN WHITE DRESS)
36. MS of her on the ground looking around confused. She quickly turns her head to look behind her- deep focus as we see nothing there but green fields.
37. POV shot as we get a glimpse of the same faint guy from the darkness. She begins to get up and starts to run toward him
38. OTSS of her running through the firld (shallow focus) the image disappears (deep focus). 
39. ELS from in front of girl running.
40. LS from the side of girl running
41. LS of girl running through trees
42. Wide shot of a lake- man on the other side, slightly more opaque but still ghostlike. Girl walks slowly into shot. Still camera.
43. Side angle CU of her face, her breathing is heavy.
44. Same wide shot as before. Girl takes jewellery off and cardigan off and begins to walk into the water and swim. Man is out of focus but still in blurry view.
45. Getting out at the other side of the lake
46. (from other side) CU on her face as she pushes up out of the water.
47. OTSS of guy shallow focus, girl walks into frame.
48. 2 shot of them face to face, he touches her face and she moves her head into his hand instinctively. He moves his hand to the back of her neck and then moves the other one too.
49. CU on her arms wrapping around his waist.
50. OTSS of her putting her head on his shoulder.
51. OTSS of her as her head falls into nothingness.
52. ECU of her eyes looking confused. (he has disappeared)
53. POV shot as she looks down to a dark head of hair, looks at her dress, stained with colour and lifts up the childs chin to find a clown child crying.
54. Same wide shot from across the lake but there is no one there with the girl. She is alone with her arms wrapped around nothing.
55. Close on her stained dress with no one there.  Fast zoom out, across the river, though the trees across the fields, to the first shot in the ‘white dress’ scene where she is sitting amongst the tall grass.
56. Close on face with clown make up on it. The girl tilts her head upwards and has an evil smile on her face.

 

Inspiration

Inspiration

 

Once settled on the song, Florence and the Machine was a big influence for the initial thoughts of the music video. In terms of themes and ideas we were, of course, influenced by Oh Land and by the song lyrics of Numb. However, Florence’s music videos also inspired us in terms of Craig Davis’ theory. Florence usually has music videos that fit into the amplification category and we liked this idea for the surrealism involved and the creative interpretation possible.

   We took some general themes from Florence such as the idea of nature and the natural, and the idea of the surreal, which we were certain of from the start.

   Costume-wise, I wanted something shocking and unusual as to uphold the surrealism that the video involves; also something to represent the metaphors and connotations in the video. The costume of the clown for example, the clown primarily, has been used to represent a sign of death. The white make up represents loss of life and the colored make up over the top represents the emotion. Therefore the clown is a combination of both the deceased male in the video and the emotional, deluded female protagonist. Another thing that the clown could denote is society, society looking down upon mentally ill women (big political statement, however, this connotation would be for the past eg. The Rest Cure ect.)

In the first, second and third scenes our female lead is wearing a black formal dress. The black here connotes loss and is associated with death, evil, and mystery. Black is a mysterious color associated with fear and the unknown. It usually has a negative connotation (blacklist, black humor, 'black death').  In heraldry, black is the symbol of grief, which could possibly insinuate (as well as the mysterious white glow of the male) that her assumed husband is dead.

In the second section of the video she wears a white wedding dress. White is associated with light, goodness, purity. It is considered to be the color of perfection. White means safety. As opposed to black, white usually has a positive connotation. Therefore the sudden wardrobe change is to highlight the fact that she is closer to ‘him’ and finally she reaches ‘him’ and is euphoric.

Another inspiration for us was the film Alice In Wonderland, we liked the strange, eccentric vibe to the film and the innocence and naivety of Alice and so we wanted to create this for our female protagonist. Also the theme of confusion and being lost in our video is taken from Alice being lost down the rabbit hole. 

Initial Song ideas.

The first ideas that were brainstormed for the song were Something’s Happening Here by Buffalo Springfield, Indiscriminate Act Of Kindness by Foy Vance and, initially, Heavy Eyes by Oh Land. However we then discovered Oh Land’s Numb; which is video-less and were enticed and interested in the surreal factor that we could portray within it. 

Background information on Oh Land

Background information on Oh Land

 

 Oh Land is a solo artist from Denmark, her original name is Nanna Oland Fabricius. She is the daughter of Bendt Fabricius an organist and Bodil Oland who is an opera singer.  She was born in the capital of Denmark, Copenhagen on the 2^nd may 1985.

Oh Land was originally a ballet dancer but due to an accident which resulted in a spinal fracture her dance career ended suddenly which kick-started her career in music.

Her first debut album was called Fauna and was released in her native country Denmark on the 10^th November 2008 and was published by a Danish independent record company called Fake Diamond Records. Fauna wasn’t a hit or really that noticed around, however her follow up album titled Oh Land made up for that, as it reached 5^th in the charts in Denmark and 184^th in billboard 200 charts in US, the album also served as her debut in US. The album was released in US on the 15^th march 2011. On the 7^th of April 2011 she was given the brink of fame: music artist award in the ‘NextNowNext’ awards.

Oh Land is still a young artist as she is only in her late 20’s, and still got a bright future going for her, she has already toured with some famous people such as Katy Perry who is a well-known and successful artist.

The song that she was most popular for in the US was Son Of A Gun and it was White Lies which was one of her other hit singles and they were both from the album Oh Land.

 

Alternate idea to Oh Land Numb video

 

1^st minute of Foy Vance- Indiscriminate Act Of Kindness.

Extreme Long Shot from her side. Walking down the beach, Long shots, getting dark, windy, starting to rain. Close on tear falling down her cheek as she struggles across the beach. (Handheld) Direct close up on her front profile.  (Song begins).

Cuts to the exact same shot but with a different background, mascara running down her face and her soaking wet. At the door of an old farmhouse/inn. Side shot of her in focus, a door opens with orange light denoting warmth out of focus in the corner of the shot. Framed Long Shot of girl silhouetted before an huge arched door, her head is dropped and light is all around her from the doorway. Old man appears and reaches to take her bags from her, she instantly wraps her arms around herself. He enters and stands to the side beckoning her in.

Over the Shoulder Shot of girl with man a couple of metres away lipsynching “It’s alright I got a room here you ca share mine.” Camera tilts upwards and focuses on mans eyes, lense adjusting as if a Point of View shot from the girl.

“You can change in the bathroom…” Old man indicates upstairs. “A tear came to her eye”, Girl looks back trying not to cry, lip trembles- shallow focus, racks to deep as man stops and turns to see what is wrong in the distance. Racks back as a solitary tear dances down her ceramic cheek. 

Problems we faced

Budget:

When planning our music video an important aspect to consider was the cost. We originally decided on our budget to be around 20 pound, however, we soon realized that to get to the locations we needed, the budget would have to be increased to around 50 pound, the final cost of the production was as follows:

Transport: 20 pound
Theatre rental: 10 pound
Clown makeup: 5 pound
Costumes/outfits: 10 pound
Other expenses: 5 pound

We split the cost between 3 of us and it each paid around 16 pound.

Time:

Time was another factor which went against us, due to conflicting work hours, there was a limited amount of time available where we could all work, therefore we had to sacrifice some filming time to make way for other priorities. Also, as it is the winter months, we had to do all our filming before the lighting got too dark at around 5pm, this again put further restrictions on our available filming time.
These limitations meant we also had to change our original shotlist, we originally intended to have an animated sequence in the middle of the video, however as we had less time to edit as we needed more film time, we replaced this instead with the dancing sequence.
To combat this problem we would next time also plan our time needed and if it seemed unlikely we would have time, make our plan simpler

Weather:

The weather was also an issue, as to avoid disrupting the continuity editing we needed the same weather throughout, this was difficult as the weather proved unpredictable and we therefore couldn’t film on certain days.

Editing:

Editing was also an issue, some of the effects we planned to do proved difficult, and as each of us had limited editing experience we couldn’t achieve some of them, and therefore had to again modify the production plan.

Digipack research

Whilst planning our digi-pack advertisement for our music video, we decided to first research other digi-packs of albums in a similar genre, we therefore chose one of the albums we looked at to be Florence and the Machines’ ‘Lungs’.

(Picture)
The front cover of the digi-pack features a close mid-shot of Florence amidst a flowery background; the image is typical of the indie genre and has a vintage almost hippie-ish feel, which appeals to their typical audience. The gory fake Lungs hanging around Florence’s neck are juxtaposed to the serene backdrop and have a shocking effect on the image, making it striking and eye-catching and helping to promote the album. It is also relevant to the album title, “Lungs”


(picture)
This is the back cover of the digi-pack, it features a song list, typical of most albums, as ours is a single, we will not be mimicking this, besides this the design is fairly minimalistic, with a diagram of a lung (again relevant to the song title). The monochromatic colours keep the minimalistic feel. The illustrated lung is labeled with numbers 1-13 as the album contains 13 songs, each component of the lung a separate song. We liked this design, as it is less invasive and easy to look at.

(picture)
This is the design on the booklets on the inside of the digipack, the dark colours again keep the retro feel and the quoted lyrics on the left side add a poetic touch. Again the picture features Florence with lungs around her neck, her nudity is understated and suggests the freedom associated with her album and type of music, the lungs providing partial cover make sure the image is not seedy.

Florence And The Machine - Cosmic Love music video

Florence And The Machine - Cosmic Love Lyrics

A falling star fell from your heart and landed in my eyes
I screamed aloud, as it tore through them, and now it's left me blind

The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out
You left me in the dark
No dawn, no day, I'm always in this twilight
In the shadow of your heart

And in the dark, I can hear your heartbeat
I tried to find the sound
But then, it stopped, and I was in the darkness,
So darkness I became

The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out
You left me in the dark
No dawn, no day, I'm always in this twilight
In the shadow of your heart

I took the stars from my eyes, and then I made a map
And knew that somehow I could find my way back
Then I heard your heart beating, you were in the darkness too
So I stayed in the darkness with you

The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out
You left me in the dark
No dawn, no day, I'm always in this twilight
In the shadow of your heart

The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out
You left me in the dark
No dawn, no day, I'm always in this twilight
In the shadow of your heart

Florence + The Machine - Cosmic Love video analysis

Category

The category this music video falls into is a performance/narrative category, as the video contains the performance of the artist, lip syncing to the lyrics. It is also narrative because there is a link between the lyrics and the visuals as it follow through, however it is not purely a narrative video as some of the clips is just bizarre and doesn’t fit the story.

Genre of the song
the genre of this song and music video is kind of like a modern indie pop, this is mainly represented by the well known artist as well as the costumes she wears

The artist, song title and genre of music

Artist- Florence + the machine

Song Title- cosmic love
Genre of Music- modern indie/ pop

Music video analysis

The music video begins with a shot of a light bulb flashing. Florence Welch is then seen to walk through some trees with autumn leaves, and a light falls into her eye, making her scream. The video then moves on to show Welch lying on the floor in a black outfit, in a mirrored room filled with different colored lights around her. She then stands up and dances in the room. The video then moves back to Florence walking through the autumn leaves, with blue, green and purple lighting shining on her, and she appears to be lost as she is surveying her surroundings. The scene of Welch in the room of lights then changes to darker lighting, and her outfit changes into a white dress with lights. Later in the song, during this scene, leaves are seen to surround her as she is dancing. The video ends with Florence taking the light from inside her chest, and releasing it into the air, and it floats into the light bulb which started the video.

Technical codes

The music video is most likely to be filmed in a studio as you don’t see any sceneries or the weather outside. Regardless the editing of this music video is flawless as each clips flaws smoothly through the video, there is a lot of jump cuts, close ups and mid shots of the artist, there is also parallel editing as she is in two places as the same time jumping from one to another depending on the pace of song. There is also a lot of use of special effects starting from the floating light to many others including splits screens and so. There is also use of extreme artificial lighting throughout the video to create that ‘bleaching’ effect on the artist to give them that ageless look. There are also use strobes and flashing lights through out the video.

Goodwin’s theory

The music video does follow Goodwin’s theory as it has a clear relationship between the lyrics and the visuals as well as the relationship between the music and the visuals. There is also lots of close ups of the artist due to the demands of the record label to prompt the artist.

Initial Idea.

Our idea begins in a darkened theatre with shots of a girls eyes looking scared and anxious. There will be a spotlight travelling around the theatre. Our female protagonist will then be changing positions in the theatre on each jagged cut. The last shot of her in the theatre will be her falling on the theatre’s main floor and looking up suddenly. Next scene is the same girl running through town’s backstreets in the daytime. Her costume will then become apparent and we will see her in a scruffy white dress. She will continually be looking back and when we enter Chinatown’s backstreets we will see a clown that is chasing her. He corners her down one alleyway and she struggles to find a door that is unlocked (all the while cross cutting between the two characters). She finally finds a door and in the darkness there is the faint outline of a man. As she leans in to kiss the man he disappears and she falls into the darkness. Which then turns into our animated sequence. A black background with green, blue or white horizontal, moving curves. She is turned into an opaque minimized version of herself in the chosen colour. She is being bounced around by the bass waves which will match the bass of the music hopefully. This will be cross cut with a scene of what we believe to be her and another male, who is not the clown, dancing behind a sheet, they are doing a mixture of ballet and street and it is going to seem very interpretive and emotional, they will be silhouetted behind this sheet. The lines of the bass will then straighten out at a downward angle and the animated girl will slide out of frame. The next frame will show the girl falling into shot; which will be our final location of Fletcher Moss Gardens. She will fall into a sea of tall grass in a new clean white dress. The clown is no longer following her. She catches a glimpse of the man in the darkness from earlier and runs towards it, she loses him but continues to run toward a lake where she finally stops as she sees him across the lake. Taking off her cardigan and letting her hair down she descends into the lake, her dress floating around her in the water. She swims over to him and gets out embracing him. As she embraces him he disappears and is replaced by a sad, young child, who is clutching onto her. Her dress begins to become stained by a variety of colours and when she lifts the childs chin, we are shown clown face painting smeared by the child’s tears.

Music video for "Numb" Oh land

As you can see the song doesnt have a music video, therefore our music video will be the first made for the song, this is a good way to get ourselves noticed if we post it on youtube.