Magazine Adverts

Last lesson we were set our coursework ancillary task two which is to design a  magazine advertisement for our music video promo. I've been doing some research into other magazine adverts from my genre (electropop) and came across the ones below which i thought are good examples to upload on to my blog which will help inspire some ideas and allow me to analyse into the different magazine adverts in my genre.

Whilst doing some research into magazine adverts in the electropop genre I came across one of Jessie J's and thought this was a perfect example to upload onto my blog as not only is it from the genre I have been creating a music video to but it also fits in well with the theme i went for when creating my digipak with its quirky bold style.

Framing: You could say that the image of the artist is boxed however, i do think that it covers most of the poster and because the image is at the top of the poster and consists of bold colours it draws the audience's attention to the artist before the text. Jessie J looks quite dominant, bold and loud in the photo reflecting the album title in a way and giving the audience an idea of what the songs may be like.

Font: Gold coloured fancy font used for the artists name which is also in bold and is the largest sized font on the whole advertisement. This is to show the importance of the artist and also to represent dominance and power with the gold which is seen as luxurious.



Filmimg at Southend

On Monday Andrea and I went up to Southend to finish off our filming as Southend is one of the main locations in our music video. We have now finished all of our filming which means we can now focus on editing our music video and spending time getting all the lip syncing to fit in time with our chosen song.

Before we made our way up to Southend we went into Enfield Town to get some balloons for our 'Don't let me go' scence which is where we let the balloons go as we walk by the sea. We bought two packets of balloons one pack blue and the other pink but we only got eight of them blown up with hellium which meant that we had two trys at filming them.

When we got to Southend we put our wellies on amd took all our equipment and set up by the sea. We shot our balloon scene first in order to get that out of the way. First we set the camera up as we were both in this scene and then we filmed the balloons drifting off. I also filmed Andrea sitting on the rocks by the sea with the bubble machine on which looked really cool.

When we previously filmed in the snow we drew a heart in the snow but when it came to filming it we didn't really like the look of it as it doesn't stand out enough so we tried this at Southend which was our original idea. We drew the heart in the sand and waited for the sea to wash it away and luckily we managed to get a couple of shots of it and I think it looks much better and more interesting than our previous snow attempt.

After we finished filming everything by the sea we went for a stroll down Southend to see what else there was for us to take advantage of. As we were walking down we came across lots of arcades and thought it would be a good idea to go in get some shots as our music video is about having fun so we thought that an arcade would be a good place for us to express this. We went in and got some shots of different games, funky lights, shots of us messing around etc.

We also came across an area of little fountains which we also took advantage of. We set up the camera and just messed around for a bit, ran through the fountains and just filmed us having some fun.

I also got some shots of funky shop signs such as 'Adventure Island', we did this to express fun and also to show what we've been up to and how we may be going through a break up but this won't bring us down whcih is what our song is basically about.

We managed to film loads of different shots and are happy with the amount of footage we managed to film. Now we are excited and can't wait to upload everything onto our MAC and get editing.

Below is one of my favourite songs but i never really took notice of the music video and as i was watching today i noticed the shots of the shop signs so i thought i'd put it on my blog as it is something similar to what we done at Southend.

Filming Day

Today I am going over to Andreas house to do some more filming for our music video. We're going to be filming a studio shot as Andrea's parents have the equipment for us to do so. Our songs original music video has a studio shot in it already and I think it works well with the lyrics, we're going to play on this idea and come up with something maybe in a similar style but with different and more interesting elements.

R.I.P

Whitney Elizabeth Houston, pop singer, born 9 August 1963; died February 11, 2012.

Although an official Whitney Houston cause of death has not yet been released by the Los Angeles Coroner’s office, sources allegedly close to the family reportedly say the singer probably died of a mix of drugs and alcohol. Whitney Houston was found dead on Saturday in the bathtub of the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Despite reports that the pop icon was found underwater, she allegedly did not die of drowning.

Whitney Houston died on Saturday, just one day before the 54th annual Grammy Awards, where Jennifer Hudson paid tribute to the fallen singer with an emotional performance of “I Will Always Love You.” Houston had been scheduled to attend and sing at a pre-Grammy Awards part hosted by music mogul Clive Davis on Saturday night.
Houston was reportedly found partially underwater in the bathtub by her aunt, Mary Jones, according to various media reports. Some earlier reports had indicated the singer was found by her bodyguard. Jones allegedly laid out a dress for Whitney Houston to wear and then left the singer alone in the bath for approximately half an hour. When Houston did not come out of the bathroom as expected, Jones entered and found her partially underwater and unresponsive. Jones reportedly pulled Houston from the tub and began CPR as a 911 call was put in. This led to speculation that the Whitney Houston cause of death might have been an accidental drowning.
Sadly, it was already too late to revive Houston and by the time emergency personnel arrived, she could not be resuscitated. An autopsy on the singer was allegedly inconclusive, but put under a security hold at the request of investigators. Toxicology tests are still pending and will not be complete for four to six weeks.
Sources close to the family have allegedly stated that she probably died of a drug and alcohol mixture, not from drowning. According to TMZ.com, Houston’s family has told by the Los Angeles Coroner’s office that there was too little water in the singer’s lungs to indicate she drowned. Family sources are allegedly reporting that the Whitney Houston cause of death was more than likely due to a combination of prescription drugs mixed with alcohol.
Houston had reportedly been acting erratically in the days leading up to her death and allegedly consuming large amounts of alcohol. The “Waiting to Exhale” actress also reportedly had a habit of taking the anti-anxiety drug Xanax on days that she was scheduled to perform. A combination of too much alcohol and Xanax, with the possibility of other drugs also in combination, could have very well been lethal. Xanax, along with several other prescription medications, were allegedly found in Houston’s hotel room.

On Sunday Andrea and I got some great footage, we filmed more than we needed to so that we have a lot to work with and choose from. First, we done our petal scene which goes with the second verse of our song, Andrea done the first verse so this time i done the second verse as we are taking things mainly in order. The petals look really pretty and we're glad that we chose to buy real petals rather than fake ones because this may have looked a little tacky and unprofessional.

After we completed filming our petal scene using different camera angles and shots so we have a vartiey we can work with we had a break whilst my camera charged and then we took my camera and tripod outside so we could get some shots in the snow. We filmed eachother and also set up the camera so we were both in the shot so we could get some scenes together. We particularly like the footage we got in the snow because it's natural and not staged like the first and second verse. This is good because it's the look we wanted in our chorus. Our chorus is about us having fun, being silly, girly and natural and the footage is exactly that.

In yesterdays lesson we uploaded all of our footage onto our iMAC with my camera SD card. It didn't take extremelly long to upload so we were able to play around with some of our footage in our Final Cut Express tutorial lesson. The main skill we wanted to learn was how to create a split screen effect. The visitor who came in talked us through how to use the software to create this effect. Andrea and I both experimented with the software and finally we managed to create an even split screen.

After the lesson we both stayed in the media room because we were really excited about our new footage and wanted to get some more editing done. We stayed through our frees and managed to get quite a lot done which we're really happy about. I think it looks really good so far!

I will be uploading our video so far on to YouTube in Friday's lesson after we show our teacher what we've done so far so we can redo or fix anything we haven't done.

SNOW!

Today Andrea will be coming round mine so we can do some more filming for our music video. We were hoping that it would snow and luckily it has so after we get our second verse (petal scene) done we will be going outside as i live right by a forest/park to do some filming in the snow! This will look really good in our choruses and also in the verses where we were hoping to film at a forest.

All we are going to need for our second verse are some petals which i already bought off eBay (dried rose petals to make it look more realistic), my camera and tripod and also a white sheet to use as the background. Four our choruses we are going to set up the camrea so that we are both in the shots and have a snow fight, build a snowman and try out different things that will look good and fun for us to use as part of our music video.

I will also be taking some photographs throughout the day to show you what we've been up to!

Last lesson Andrea and I were preparing for our next filming day by making a plan of what we need and what day we will be available to film. We decided to get all our small scenes out of the way so we can concentrate  on the larger parts of our music video. Next, we are going to film our second verse which is supposed to be an overhead shot on a white background. So, we will be spreading a white sheet on the floor and spreading our dried rose petals around the artist (me). Last lesson i ordered the dried rose petals so i'm hoping i'll recieve them sometime this week so we can film on sunday.

The petal idea was inspired by the American Beauty rose petal scene, we were planning on just having the petals spread around but i really like the idea of having them falling so we migh have to try both and see which works best for us.

Here's the video: