Journal - End of Post Production

In response to our feedback, we revisited the footage we first shot in order to fill the gaps we had towards the end of our music video. We extended the mirror shot (our reference to notion of looking) and the shot of Isla wearing the flower crown as our sample group felt that sometimes our cuts were too quick, to the point where they had no time to process the shot before it cut to a new one.

We tried to include shots from all three of our locations -- Isla's bedroom, the arcade and around London -- as our video climaxes in order to summarise our music video by revisiting all our locations.

In regards to the gaps we had throughout out music video, the shots we have added in are:

Another mirror shot, instead this time with Isla singing a different line, to extend our reference to the notion of looking. The mirror shot provides a voyeuristic feel and also keeps the focus on Isla, our selling point.

We also included a shot of Isla singing with a polaroid to communicate an artistic, vintage feel. The polaroid also incorporates long exposure, linking back to our digipaks along with being visually appealing. Again, it has a doubling effect like the mirror and references the notion of looking: the polaroid Isla is holding features Isla looking through a vintage camera.

We also replaced our previous shot of Isla inside the simulator with a brighter one so that our subject matter (Isla) is clearer and it looks more natural. We also used this shot towards the end of our music video to represent our arcade location.

Before

After

Similarly, we used this shot of Isla by the window at 2:42 as a way of revisiting our first location before ending our music video.

We added in more text so that it became a reoccurring characteristics throughout our music video, as opposed to a random appearance. The use of this text makes our music video more visually engaging, though we have made the text smaller and positioned it lower down on the screen so it does not distract from the main image of our shot, be it our artist or an establishing shot of London.

We ended our music video with the shot of Isla closing her eyes (that is featured at the beginning) but in reverse. We did this because we felt the sudden action of Isla blinking mirrored the sound of the symbols in the song (link between music and visuals) but also as it appropriately closed our music video bringing the audience back to the beginning and climaxing the video.

As the song increases in pace towards its climax, we made our editing more choppy and used lots of quick cuts. Problems during editing included small, second long gaps but we resolved this by speeding up outtakes we had of Isla laughing and using them; these shots keep the focus on Isla as a selling point whilst also communicating a fun atmosphere. The last four photos we included were selected for their locations; the audience are reminded of the time in London and in the arcade before the music video ends where it started -- the most personal location, Isla's bedroom.

Overall, I am very happy with our now finished music video. The editing has matched the song very well, mirroring the pace whilst subtly remaining focused on Isla and marketing her as an artist. Despite its purpose as a marketing tool, our music video remains engaging and fun to watch, reflecting the initial purpose of our moodboard.

Journal - Music Video Post-Production

We have exported our unfinished music video to showcase the editing we have done so far.



As storyboarded, we began with the long exposure shots of London. In order to ensure that these shots were not on screen for too long and did not become boring, we added in bold text that swiped on screen in time with the music. The text used is the same text from my digipak - Harbell - as I think it resembles handwriting yet remains easy to read and bold.

We kept the opening shots of London the same speed so that the long exposure would have more of an effect -- the purpose of the suddenly sped up shots is to reflect the sudden pace in the music. The majority of our editing is fast-paced to match the speed of the song.

The pan of the hair is to match the build-up in the music, almost leading up to a grand reveal of our artist.

As soon as the music begins, the first two shots are of Isla on her own and are close-ups/mid shots. This is to bring the focus on Isla from the very beginning of the video. We sped up the footage of Isla and her friends walking as the shots at normal speed were on screen for too long and contrasts with the fast-paced nature of our song.

Though we include shots around London, we deliberately kept the bedroom shots at the beginning as they focus solely on Isla and so establish her dominance within the music video. The bedroom shots also showcase more sophisticated editing skills, such as reversing our clips, and so ordering these at the beginning immediately attracts the audience.

We decided to split the line "here and now" into two different clips as we thought it would be a good way to introduce our second location of London. It reflects the lyrics as it the location changes as soon as "and now" is sung. 

Here

Now

We decided to use the singing shots of Isla on the bridge overlooking the Thames and by the London Eye as the backgrounds are the most picturesque, however we did have to lighten these shots to make them more visible and less dull to look at. The shot of Isla on the bridge, in particular, is one of my favourites as the lighting behind her creates almost a lens flare effect that looks artistic and links in with my digipak.

We brought in our text again during the chorus as we didn't want every shot of the lyric "youth knows no pain" to be Isla singing in case it became too repetitive and boring. We paired our text with the iconography of London as the scenery looks high definition on camera. The font size and colour also attracts the eye of the audience, keeping them engaged even towards the end of our music video.

We shortly returned to the arcade as we had some remaining shots of Isla on the dance mat that we wanted to include and we wanted to summarize all of our locations as we bring the music video to a close. Again, we sped these up to match the pace of our song.

We included our shots from China Town and Trafalgar Square at the end to ensure that we have a variety of locations. The arcade shots are visually more stimulating and so it made sense for the middle of the song to consist of these shots, whilst the less bright shots with quicker cuts to be positioned at the end as our song's pace increases towards the end. Again, many of these shots had to be sped up and we used jump cuts during the climbing and telephone box scene to keep the shots snappy and engaging. We chose Trafalgar Square, China Town and the telephone box as they are significant landmarks within London that will be recognized internationally. As our artist is a British artist, it also reflects her personal life.

Trafalgar Square

China Town

Again, we wanted to include an artistic, vintage vibe to our music video and, as we used polaroid photos at the beginning of our video, we revisited our quick cuts of photos again. Towards the end of the song, the beats increase and we felt it made more sense to show quick snapshots of photos (considering some of our footage shows Isla with her polaroid camera) rather than to show moving footage where the audience would not have time to register what they had seen. The presence of Polaroids provides artistic, vintage connotations.

I am very happy with how our music video currently looks. Though we have still gaps, it heavily resembles our storyboard and suits the pace and fun mood of our song.

Having edited the arcade scenes earlier this year, they are discussed in detail in my previous posts:

Arcade post-production

Other post-production

Journal - Music Video Post Production

We decided to add in some effects to the shots we filmed on Monday. The white background provided some professionalism to our shoot but the lighting is very minimalist. Initially experimenting with brightness and contrast, we soon discovered a video effect under "Eight-point Garbage Matte" called "feather". Turning this up to the highest setting provided darker corners around the edge of our shots, aiming the focusing on the middle of our shots, i.e Isla's face.

This shot has been instrumental in bridging the gaps we have near the beginning of our music video, just before the bumper cars shot. We took out snippets of this shot where Isla is laughing or smiling to fill in the one second gaps we have.

We also began experimenting with playing shots in reverse. The editing in our music video is mostly fast cuts so we wanted to try and include some more sophisticated editing techniques. We used the reverse option under the speed options in Final Cut Pro on our polaroid clip (Isla's hands going through the polaroid) so that it matched up with our beats. We also used it for a shot of a hat being thrown onto Isla's head  to emphasize the fun, spirited vibes of our music video.

Journal - Music Video Post Production

The shots filmed in the arcades make up the vast majority of our music video so our music video has really started to come together since filming at the arcades. To keep up with the fast pace of our song, we have purposefully kept our shots very short and used several quick cuts, often resemble photos being taken and/or to match up with the beats in our song.

We cut these photos quickly to reflect our beats

However, after watching our shots together with the music, we realized that the pace or length of time on screen sometimes does not fit with the speed of the music. To resolve this, we not only used quick cuts but also adjusted the speed of our some clips to 200% rather than the default 100%. This has helped ensure that our music video flows and will engage an audience, rather than bore them.

The main focus in the arcade is Isla and her friends on the bumper cars. This footage actually turned out better than we expected and we had more footage than we needed -- to the point where it was difficult to narrow down the clips as we wanted to use all of them. To link in with Goodwin's analysis, we picked the shots that were focused the most on Isla however have included a few shots of her friends to communicate the fun, care-free atmosphere that reflects our track. Again, we kept these shots short and snappy.

We framed this shot so that Isla is the main focus, yet her friends feature

We incorporated jump cuts into our music video, particular in the arcade, to ensure that it remains engaging throughout.

We experimented with the contrast of our clips, but the lighting of the arcade looks very good on screen -- particularly in comparison to the bright, white background of our previous shots in Isla's room -- so we eventually decided to leave the contrast as default. 

We have also taken care that we have a good amount of shots that detail Isla singing the song so that our music video feels authentic. We did this by not only including the shots of Isla singing in the arcade but also by cutting back to previous shots in her bedroom.

However, there are still some gaps in our music video. We still have to film the last 40 seconds of the song (which we plan to do next weekend) but there are also short gaps that last a few seconds that we need to fill. In order to resolve this, we have decided to add in another location to our music video. Originally we had Isla in her bedroom, then in the arcade and then around London but we plan to film our artist singing the entire song with a white background behind her -- we can use this shot to fill any gaps we have to avoid the arcade sequence becoming tedious. This shot will be a close-up to sell our artist as a commodity.

Overall, editing has so far been successful. We feel like we are matching the pace of our song with suitable cuts and action and our filming has genuinely been very accurate to our storyboards, however we have played around with the ordering of our shots.

Journal - Music Video Post Production

We began sorting through all of the clips we have shot so far, editing the ones we needed in Final Cut Pro. We purposely filmed different takes of the same shot to get the best possible shot, however this meant that it took a while to sort through and pick the right shots.

Though we still have more filming to do, we ordered all the shots where they are supposed to go in order to see if we had got the pace right. Most of our shots have fit perfectly and worked well, though we have found some gaps (i.e certain shots, like the pan of Isla's hair, do not work for the length of time we originally storyboarded because it goes on for too long and slows down the pace of our song).

We purposely ordered these shots at the beginning of our music video as it is our first location before building up to the arcade and London. This means that the focus is immediately on Isla and she is established as a selling point from the beginning of the video. Also, we included Isla singing the first line of the song as that it is a common characteristics of music videos.

We cut the shots of Isla with her polaroids very quickly to match the fast-pace of the song. In particular, we used jump cuts during the shots of Isla making her way to the mirror and applying lipstick so that it remained engaging and did not drag. The long shots used during this sequence allow the audience to take in her outfit and fashion however they also do not dwell on shots that her face isn't in. The act of putting on lipstick is a feminine one that we included to emphasise on her femininity, common for female artist in the music industry.

Experimenting with our clips also allowed us to play around with settings on Final Cut Pro, such as brightness and contrast, to enhance our lighting as we want our music video to have a warm atmosphere to it. However, we found that most of the other effects were too drastic. For example, we used the colour corrector tool on the shot of Isla applying lipstick but found it looked too superficial and created an orange tint.