Case Study For Print Cd

This is one of my case study for my print CD cover, as you can see this is a print cd cover of Eminem's Relapse album, the reason why I chose this as one of my CD covers as this reflects the dark theme and has resemblance in genres. The subject of this image is a close up shot of the artist him self  symmetrically looking at the camera hence giving the effect that he is directly looking at the audience, this is a very effective technique used in print CD covers as it gives the audience the impression that they are being watched or vice versa where the audience cannot avoid looking. The image itself has been heavily edited with a photo fragment effect which connotes the themes of what you will expect in the music for example a tragedy event that took place or themes of rising from a broken life. The background of the image is black which allows the main image to be vividly seen due to its use in shading as well as the colour black yet again represents the emergence out of darkness as the main image stands out from the background. The parental advisory logo is at the bottom right as conventionally you expect in any cd print covers to be. I Have taken the inspiration of the double exposure effect from this case study as it is a very effective way of portraying two images into one blend, through the perspective of the target audience the binding of two images will effectively symbolise multiple meanings.  

This is the inside of the CD case, on the left side you can see a small body of text as well as a image of an artist who passed away (Eminems close friend), this is placed as a memorial on the far left corner which is very unconventional, conventionally you would find a quote from the artist, list of the songs in the cd or a cover art. On the left cover there is an another image of the artist with a long shot of him sitting down with a hand gesture, the background yet again is black as well as the costume in this image of the artist is red, these two colours have been previously utilised in the main CD cover meaning that these colours are part of a colour scheme.On the right side the colour black is again utilised as the background (sticking to the colour scheme) however within the disk holder section there is image of a cup holding pills in a extreme close up birds eye view shot, it looks as if the cd holder itself is the cup with pills in creating a surreal illusion effect. the symbolism behind the pills reflects the theme of drug abuse in the artist's songs. I would like my own inside cover of the Cd to contain a personal message as well as a medium to close up shot of the artist with minimal editing as it will bring realism and a much closer look at the artist through the target audiences perspective just as Eminem has done in his inside (left) cover.

The disk design itself is very clean meaning that there is the use of the white background and red text on top creating a very bold contrast helping the text to stand out as it is very easy to read it. The name of the album is located on top of the disk ring as a mark of branding the album.

This is the back cover of the CD case, as you can see the institution behind this cover utilised a prescription sticker stating the name of the record company as well as the tracks in the disk, it suits the themes of drug abuse which is represented throughout the disk for example inside the disk cover. The barcode is located at the bottom right as it conventionally should be


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a front cover of the "PLAYING IN THE SHADOWS" album by example, I admire the simplicity of the front cover as the image directly matches the album's title as well as the colour scheme is very striking and vivid with the combination of white, black and yellow. I would like to take the inspiration from this front cover of the use of limited colours as too many colours will make the front cover look very busy resulting to the cover being less appealing to the target audience. The main image of this cover is a close up shot of the artists face with half of his face lit with the dark background and the other side inverted.  

On the left inside panel contains the image of a crown from one of examples concert, the image has a black and white effect which gives the nostalgic feel amongst the target audience, I would like to take some inspiration from this and utilise the gray scale  technique.  

.


As you can see the CD art itself is a huge logo of the letter E stating the artists name from the initials. The colour scheme of the disk art itself follows the whole CD case colour scheme with the exception of the colour white as this CD art only has a two tone colour scheme, the name of the album and other details is located at the bottom of the disk in the colour black from the background colour yellow (from the letter "e"). The right panel of the inside CD cover is just plain yellow which helps the CD art to stand out as the letter "e" has a black outline (stroke) along the border of the CD.

Reflective Analysis

What research did you carry out into similar products?

In this years coursework we researched about music videos where as last year we researched about magazines, In this years coursework for music videos we researched some of the iconic grime songs such as shutdown by Skepta who is a local London Grime artist so both the genre and the location of our case study for this year was inspired by his music video. Furthermore in this years research we even visited a music film festival  helping us further researching in the field of music video via getting ideas and inspiration from the music videos which was something we never did last year so in terms of research we have put more effort this year than the previous year. 

Our music video firstly in the introduction challenges conventions as typically grime music videos do not have a cinematic introduction however we challenged the convention and added a introduction as in our music video the beginning of the songs pace is very slow so the use of an introduction is very justifiable. 

Moreover in our music video we did have an authentic grime look just as any other grime music video such as Shutdown by skepta or Jhus no lie, we utilised urban are with well lit natural lighting so using artificial peripheral lighting was not necessary as well as the location of our music video was at local London street as well as local parks which again gives the grime tone to the music video as grime originated from London as well as grime is mostly shot in London local locations signifying the home of grime.

Final Music Video Feedback

Our Final Music Video

Editing in progress 5

We are in the final stages of editing, we are adding a few more effects before rendering the whole project.

Music Video progress Roughcut Feedback

Editing in progress 4

In today's lesson we utilised a transition effect and we are adding more effects as we have completed the lip syncs.

Music Video - Progress

This is what we edited so far as of now, we are going to show this to our target audience to get some feedback in order to continue our editing with some improvements to make along the line.

Editing in progress 2

This is our music video in progress so far, we have collated all the clips together in order to lip sync them as we are near the end of lip syncing all of them.

Editing In progress

In today's lesson we were able to sync up shots to the music.We added a few effects aswell.

PHASE 1 : MUSIC VIDEO PRE-PRODUCTION PLANNING

MUSIC VIDEO TEAM ROLES

COSTUME AND PROPS

RISK ASSESMENT

RECCES/LOCATION FOR OUR MUSIC VIDEO

Call sheets & Meetings




Release for from the artist

Our Music Video Storyboard

This is our storyboard for our music video as you can see there is a lot of hand gestures and medium to close up shots in the storyboard as we want to signify the importance of the shot type and the action the artist should be doing.

Pitch Feedback

FEEDBACK: -

From our pitch our key feedback was refining our choice of location for good lighting because in estate areas the building block majority of lighting so we need to fin some open urban space in order for us to shoot a well lit music video.

Initial Music video Ideas

Logic - 5AM (Prod. C-Sick) [RAP] -- No Copyright Music from Nika Jiqurauli on Vimeo.
This is a only music video by Logic and the song is called 5AM (Prod. C-Sick) [RAP] — No Copyright Music. This song has a very linear flow hence this will make it easier for us to construct a shot to shot sync with the music, furthermore the rap pace of this song is not to fast so this will make it easier for us to lip syn with whilst recording and editing.



- This is our pitch where Me and Salajee both present out ideas for our music video

3 Coursework analysis: Shutdown - EMINEM - Phenomenal

The artist of this music video is Eminem and the song is called phenomenal,The genre of this Music video is rap and it is a narrative style music video, the whole concept of this video is based on escapism where Eminem has to escape and fight through the odds to achieve what he must (performing on stage). Firstly this music video starts from a hospital where he is lying down in a very dark lighting condition, he then discovers some sort of powers and beats up anyone who harms and threatens him. This music video has many pauses as there are scene in which Eminem is speaking diegetically to other characters, the prop Eminem was wearing was all black as stereotypically rappers are seem to be seen as bold and very powerful people in the music industry, furthermore Eminem wears black in some of his other previous music videos symbolizing that black clothing is one of his icons towards the target audience, moreover in comparison to other music videos such as the Jay-Z one that I have analysed previously he is also similarly wearing black clothing. This music video had intense use of editing such as use of CGI (explosions) and slow motion (jumping off helicopter / punching the helmet of the biker). The setting of this Music video is very unique as he seems to be in an foreign place Hong Kong, This is a very interesting factor to take in consideration as the Chinese Industry (Hong Kong) in the music industry are merging with US music standards and Eminem is trying to merge into their setting, this also helps marketing of this music video as he will reach wider audiences as people from the filming location will look forward to view his music video as it is based upon their area as well as their country. At the End of the Music video He meets up with Dr Dre who is also an Iconic rap artist just like him which again will help this music video reach more audiences as they will seek to view Dr dre in it. I plan to use the artists props such as his dark clothing as in the genre of rap the most common use of colour conventionally speaking is black furthermore there was a strong use of CGI and I hope to use some light CGI if possible.

3 Coursework analysis: Shutdown - Skepta

The song name of this music video is Shutdown by Skepta, this music video's location was set in London so this makes in a very different music video in comparison to the previous two, the genre of this music video is also rap just like the other two. The rapper of this music video was wearing white as well as some people in the background whereas others were wearing black, this juxtaposes the costumes used through the other music video analysis as well as the whole song was based on handheld camera movement which makes this music video stand out as the camera's natural shake mimics the fast pace of the song and the momentum of the artist and the group dancing. In the middle of the music video there was a news report stating "A bunch of young men all dressed in black Dancing extremely aggressively on stage It made me feel so intimidated and it's just not What I expect to see on prime time TV", In this news statement there was a vivid reference between the colour black, aggressiveness and the feeling of intimidation which metaphorically speaking signifies darkness as the rest of the rap songs that I analysed do. I plan to use the cinematography of this music video as all of the shots of this music video is hand held as mentioned giving a very natural tone of the environment to the audience, it almost makes the audience feel like they are present in that music video dancing along with the crowd. More over the location of this music video was set on London streets near buildings so I also plan to use similar location to this music video as well as the choreography of this music video consists of the artist using hand gestures and looking directly at the camera hence directly at the audience which gives the audience the a strong will of communication.

3 Coursework analysis: G-Eazy - Me, Myself & I (Ft. Bebe)

G-Eazy - Me, Myself & I (Ft. Bebe) This is a song by G-easy and Bebe, In this song they talk about themselves and struggle of life, Most of the video is shot in very dark lighting with tint of red and blue lighting upon the rappers face to symbolise the cold feeling of life and red to represent the danger, furthermore the clothing on both the female singer and rapper are black yet again defining a very dark persona of the character scientifically speaking research shows that people who wear black suffer from depression and this fact may be true as this directly reflects the feel and lyrics of the music video. Moreover there were intense use of CGI as there were many clones in the bathroom scenes of the rapper himself imitating his different dark personalities, this also portrays the fact that he is reflecting upon himself as the target audience can vividly see him trying to communicate with his other selves, there were very strong uses of closeup in order to show the target audience the facial expression and the lip sync to bring an element of realism and authenticity. The whole music video had a linear story line building up slowly of the party then the events that took place after the party. Towards the end of the music video the cut rate increased significantly highlighting the tension of the music video building up. I would like to take the inspiration of the lighting in this music video as lighting was a key element in this music video allowing the artist to glow so they can be vividly seen as well as there was a light use of CGI and I hope to use such CGI just to make my music video stand out as conventionally speaking most music videos do not use CGI however this music video did so I look forward to utilise this Idea in my music video.

Overall Production Schedule

Lip sync video practice using Premiere Pro

This is our lip sync music video that we have created using adobe premiere pro as a group. The editing in this music video was quiet simple, we firstly synced the soundtrack with the actual recorded clip, then we added colour correction of RGB colours and we overexposed certain colours in order to give a very unique colour correction. Finally we added black bars to give a cinematic wide screen effect.

Shooting Video Camera Induction

Frame size/rate: 1080p 25fps
Shutter speed :50
Aperture : 5.6
ISO used was 800
Picture style: natural
White balance : AWB (automatic)
Focus: Manual Focus


In this induction we were introduced to DSLR cameras in order to record our footage for the music video, We were recommended to use the 1080p 25fps setting to shoot the video as the resolution is common as well as it is full hd so it provides a full crisp detailed footage, 25fps was utilised in order to film to footage as this is the low bench standard of filming fps, it also allows motion blur which helps to enhance imagery in terms of motion. The shutter speed was 50 as default as moderate amount of light was able to be captured, to long shutter speed will be to slow as well as it will boast the over exposure of the colour white, The aperture was set to 5.6 As this allowed a normal depth of field effect meaning both the foreground and the background are present in balanced perspective view where one does not seem more vivid than another, however this setting allows just a minor advantage for the subject in the foreground as the manual focus that we will also utilise will help the subject to stand out. The ISO used was 800 as there was good room lighting however so as default this was appropriate. If the ISO was lower the room lighting will be visible as natural hence making the image really distorted and not closely distinguishable to the human eye as well as if it was above 1600 the image would be over exposed hence also creating a distorted and glowy image.  For picture style we were instructed to use natural as well as the white balance to be set as AWB (automatic), for Focus as mentioned before we used manual as this provided the best precise focus as one could adjust it according to their preference.

ISO = International Standards Organization (Default chosen sensitivity of light capture, this standard is used internationally)

Jay Z music Video Analysis.

I have watched a Jay Z music video, I have managed to analyse some conventions that have been utilised in his video's Firstly the prop Jay z wearing consists of sunglasses, black clothing, a chain and a hat. These conventions are typical amongst rappers as this is sort of the ethos of props in rap hence for an audience to view Jay Z in such props immediately gives them a idea of what genre the music video will be, Furthermore the music videos colour tint was mostly black and white creating a clear contrast as well as allowing a vivid visual experience, the cutting rate of the whole music was very fast, in some parts Jay Z was rapping and in other segments of the music video you see a lady dancing, an expensive car, a psycho type male character and other clips, these were intentionally used within the context of the rap as he was rapping about money, power and women which stereotypically are values to be seen amongst male members of the society, this music video is also targeted amongst older target audiences as Jay Z is a old rapper due to the fact that he had many hit rap tracks in the 90's.