Production: Vignette effect

This is one of the clips that I applied a vignette effect to in order to darken the edges and make it appear more cinematic:

For the entirety of the music video, I wanted to create a cinematic feel. This was inspired by the analysis that I did on Lucy Spraggan's 'Dear you' music video. The low level lighting in this music video was used to connote the idea of depression and other negative emotions surrounding suicide. Given the nature of my own music video, with the themes of alcoholism, this same lighting can be applied and replicated with the same dramatic effect.

I looked into ways of editing the lighting in PremierePro to create this effect. The most effective method seemed to be to create a vignette effect across all of the shots. I have previously used a vignette effect in Adobe After effects to create the ident for my media AS project. Therefore, I knew how this would work to darken the edges of the shot. I applied this effect in PremierPro using the 'colours' bar, where I found an option to add a vignette effect to any selected shot. I wanted there to be continuity throughout in regards to the colouration of the shots where I was trying to create a certain feeling, so I noted down the various effect controls that I had applied and used these among all of the shots.

Here are the settings that I chose:

These settings gave me the option to make the vignette more or less rounded, darker or lighter and more or less feathered as it reached the central image. I chose not to make the edges too dark as I wanted the shots to look naturally cinematic, rather than obviously disrupted by a visual effect. Overall, a comparison between the shots before and after show how the vignette effect makes the shots appear more dramatic:

Production: Sound

I have screen recorded the initial work that I have done towards the sound aspect of my music video. I used 'Quick Time Player' to do this. I uploaded this screen recording to YouTube where I've inserted this above.

For my music video, I needed to obtain music that was legally sourced and of a good quality. I did so using a website called convert2mp3.com. This website allowed me to obtain a link from YouTube to the music that I desired, input it into the website where it converted the document found at the link, into an mp3 format. The website produced a document that I could download and insert into PremierPro. From here, I cut some of the audio and deleted it in order to accompany the other audio that I am using. This other audio, I found at the start of Lucy Spraggan's 'Dear You' music video. I did the same with this audio as I had with Jamie T's 'They Told Me It Rained' video. I inserted this audio (of children playing), into the start and finish of the main music, applying an 'Exponential Fade' audio transition to fade the two audio clips together. I tried to obtain approval for the use of these clips from both Jamie T's and Lucy Spraggan's email links.

Practice Shots

I filmed a collection of shots that relate to the first few scenes of my music video. I used my iPhone 7 Plus to record the footage, so the quality doesn't match that of the quality of the camera I will be using for the final footage. In addition, I removed all audio from the clips as this is irrelevant for both the practise shots and the final product (as I will be overlaying music onto the footage). These shots are roughly inspired by the Shot List that I have produced, therefore they aren't in the exact order or style of the final product but as close to these as was possible in the time frame I had to film. These are for my own personal use to develop my ability to film and to create a materialised version of my ideas. Also, this was helpful in giving my actor an idea of how I want to translate my ideas from paper to footage.

We didn't use any of the props or costume that was planned as I wanted to focus this filming time upon the shots and confirm the continuity was correct, as oppose to including these finer details.

Lastly, I edited the footage on PremierePro - the same software that I will be using for my actual production. Doing so gave me a chance to revise the skills that I had learnt in the AS coursework. I then had a go at using some of the special effects features like reverse and time/speed duration alterations - something which I will be using for multiple shots in my final music video. I was skeptical as to whether this would work or not, but doing this confirmed that it would. 

Shooting Schedule