Lo4 - Final product

Lo4 - Evaluation

I have created an audio visual for a Sheffield-based, indie band named 'The Stoops'. Who I became in contact with through Sheffield Hallam University's events management department. Because of this, we had access to film in a studio / showroom that was funded by Sheffield Hallam, used by their events and art students. Because our client was a genuine band who we're looking for a serious music video, it was important for me that the audio visual promo was of a professional standard and met all the necessary codes and conventions of both the indie genre and music videos in general, meaning the mise-en-scene, quality, and narrative had to be perfect. Because of the lyrics and theme of the song being about wanting to escape a relationship and have fun being single, our approach to the music video was originally to include both a narrative and performance based scenes in order to tell the story of the lyrics. However, since our band members were in their 30's, some with kids and some too busy with work, this wasn't going to work for them. Meaning, we had one day to film - resulting in us having a solely performance based music video, which despite sometimes being a little repetitive, is very conventional to the indie genre. The audio visual had two purposes, one, to entertain the audience, and two, promote the band and their music. Originally, the band were going to upload the music video to their YouTube channel however they were so happy with it that they also uploaded my version of the video to their Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. Re-assuring me that I met their expectations.


The music video was shot using Canon DSLR cameras, which are of extremely high quality. The fact that we were able to use these cameras benefited the outcome of our music video highly as good quality visuals connote a high-budget production and therefore also professionalism, making the audience want to watch the video as we're stereo typically enticed by luxury products and believe them to be better when made by professionals in the industry. We also used professional equipment such as tripods and a slider again to ensure that our video was up to professional standards. During filming we got some amazing scenes however we were faced with a problem when we realised that the studio lighting automatically went through a cycle of different lighting effects when trying to change to alternate the lighting between spotlights and multicoloured, moving lights. In this cycle one of the settings wade the room pitch black and others had very little lighting. Contrastingly, other settings flooded the room with extremely bright lights to the point where the cameras couldn't pick up the faces of our band members. The lights changed too quickly for us to alternate the camera settings in order to capture the right amount of light, consequently leading to many clips being unusable as they're either too dark or too bright. In order to overcome this issue during editing, I changed the individual colour effects of each clip, lowering the brightness and increasing the contrast if the scene was too bright, and doing the opposite to scenes that were very dark. The inclusiveness of a range of different shot types was also extremely important since our music video was purely narrative based, meaning we had to include a range of different shots and angels between jump cuts and transitions to the beat in order to create a catchy, entertaining video. Therefore we ensured that we brought three different cameras and back up batteries, making the band perform the song around 6 times and using different angels both manually and on the tripod each time. During filming it was hard to avoid getting some of our team members in the clips as we were both walking around filming, this was a huge inconvenience as we weren't able to use many clips because of it. In the future I'dd ensure that we had a set plan as to where and what scenes we were each going to film so that we knew to stay out of each others way.

Again, because our music video was solely performance based, the editing played a dominant part in making the video look professional and conventional to the indie genre. In my original first draft, I was going to leave the original colour of the clips within the video and hadn't included any special effects, sound effects or titles. This first draft didn't satisfy me and I would have felt disappointing sending it to my client as it didn't include anything special or especially conventional to a music video considering effects and editing. After gaining feedback through a survey I sent out, despite knowing that this wasn't the final product, I realised that I needed to use all these elements in order to create both a visually appealing and entertaining audio visual for my audience and client. Therefore I decided to make changes from my previous version by firstly changing the colour of the entire video to black and white. Since, a monochrome denotation is very conventional to the indie genre due to it connoting darkness and feeling down, which are popular subject matters within this genre. I thought by using this colour I'd be making my video look more professional and realistic. However, despite the video looking better than my previous, I found that the use of this effect was again very boring as it made the video look the same throughout in a way hat was boring. I also added a title to this video that occurred through an animation and stayed on the screen during the first four seconds of the first clip, I thought that this looked appealing however it is also quite random how the title is on it's own separate blank screen and the also occurs at the beginning of the music video. I added sound effects such as the sound of footsteps, which I got from a website called free sound.com, I also got sound effects of microphone feedback and a buzzing noise that is typically heard before you plus a guitar into the amp. I really liked these sound effects as they helped tell more of a story and overall made the beginning scene more appealing to watch. However this version doesn't include any SFX. Overall I wasn't happy with my second draft.

In the final version of my music video I decided to change the colour from black and white to have a cool toned, contrasted wash over it. I decided to use colour in a grunge and dark way in order to meet the conventions of the indie genre. I used the three-way colour, to enhance the blue tones within the shadows, midtones to enhance the green tones in the video and highlights to enhance the warm red tones. I did this because not only would it create a cool contest in highlights and low-lights but I also watched a music video called 'Kathleen' by Catfish and The Bottlmen which had an old-school, 3D red and blue effect on it, which I thought looked really appealing and 'indie'. I also increased the contrast and decreased the satiation to get a stronger opposition between tones without making the video too colourful. I think doing this creates an overall professional, defined denotation rather than purely indie based. I think it was a good idea to do this as in my two previous drafts the colour was boring throughout, however because I enhanced different ones throughout the video the aesthetic of the video was much more appealing and enjoyable to watch. 

I also changed the title scene in the video tube on it's own blank screen as I thought the fact that the title also previously carried on playing during the beginning scene looked un-proffesional like I didn't;t know what I was doing. I also added the sound effect from freesound.com of a crowd talking and let that carry in playing during the title scene to build tension towards the start of the song and reinforce that the band were playing in a live studio. Lastly I added SFX such as the 'additive dissolve' and 'non-additive dissolve' transitions as they made two separate clips merge into one another before completely transitioning, which I think gave a visually appealing and conventional indie denotation as it allowed to viewer to denote both the drummer and the lead singer at the same time, reinforcing the unity of their band and genre. I also think this transition was ideal for my music video as I used other effects such as the 'echo'  which created a ghost like / merging effect. Therefore both effects complimented each other well. 

When I received by feedback on the first draft I was informed that the silent introduction of my music video made the viewer feel bored and confused as to what was happening. So I thought that it was important to create an atmosphere and add to the realism of the introductory scenes using sound effects. The sound effect of the crowd talking also helps reinforce the target audience of my audio visual as you can hear young men and women, which is ideal as my target audience is of mostly males, partly females aged 16+. Hopefully my audience can relate to the people talking and therefore want to carry on watching as they could in-vision themselves watching this gig. I wanted to use a footsteps sound effect as not only was I told that this would make the video more entertaining to watch through feedback but I also wanted to add as many realistic sounds that were relevant to the scene i order to create a better atmosphere and allow the clips to make more sense. Since, you'd clearly be able to hear the band members footsteps if you could hear noises such as the crowd talking in the background. Lastly I added a xylophone static sound effect to act as the buzzing noise that occurs when you play an electric guitar into the amp. This effect helped reinforce the fact that the band were using instruments such as en electric guitar and keyboard, therefore connoting the genre of the audio visual to the audience. This sound also helps add to the realism within the scene as we also hear other noises such as the crowd taking and the footsteps of the band members. This noise is something that people who play an instrument will be fairly similar with, which many indie fans do. Therefore hopefully allowing the audience to relate.

Throughout the process of making my music video I was in contact with my client, expressing my concerns for the video and asking him what preferences he had, but he always told me to take the initiative and do what I thought looked best. Which I'm now really happy that I did, since my client is in love with the video, which was what I was aiming for. I think that my music video met the codes and conventions of the indie genre as the shot types and angles used connoted the band in a way that made them look fearless and dominant. For example many dutch angels were used in order to make the band look edgy as the twisting movement of the camera connotes uncertainty shown in that the band are spontaneous and 'dare devils', a stereotype conventional to the indie genre. I also think that the music video met the conventions of a professional music video due to the quality being exceptional in most clips, however some of them are a little grainy due to me having to zoom some of them in to position the band in a conventional way. However this created a distorted looking effect which is conventional to the indie genre regardless. If I could do the whole thing over again I would ensure that we went to the studio previously in order to figure out how to use the lighting correctly as we had no one to show us on the day, and I'd take a wider range of shot types of the singers face from the front rather just showing his mouth on the microphone. Overall i'm really happy with the music video and have learnt a lot about editing and what I can create using software throughout this project. 

Lo4 - Feedback

1) From this feedback I got mixed responses, I think despite this showing that how the video appeals to the audience depends on their personal aesthetics and interests, It does overall say that I the video needs to be improved through editing as I only got one solid yes. Therefore, I will add more special effects such as slow motion and colour grading to fit the indie genre more conventionally by using darker colours and shading. Since we associate darkness and distorted visuals with the indie genre. 

2) Overall this feedback tells me that the visuals are in sync with the beat and lyrics, the one person who said no specified to me that I had used a drumming clip that didn't competently match the beat, which I will change in my second draft. From this feedback I know that I don't have to make any further adjustments to my music video regarding timing and matching the audio with the clips. 

3) From this feedback, I was reassured in regards to my visuals clearly fitting the indie genre. Therefore I don't need to film any further footage, just edit to a more professional standard and stereotypical indie denotation. 

4) The feedback that I got for this question raised many flags and clear issues with my music video that need to be changed. For example, I need to add a title scene in order to create strong brand representation and audience awareness on my clients band, I also need to state the name of the song. I'll do this using CGI title animations available to me through Adobe Effects. I also need to adjust the lighting between scenes in order to make my video look more consistent and even throughout, giving a more put together and professional denotation - I'll do this by changing the brightness and contrast of individual clips throughout my music video. I was made aware that I need to include further special effects in order to add more excitement and enigma to my music video, special effects such as low motion are conventional to music videos so hopefully by using them my music video will look more realistic. It was made clear to me that the introduction needed sound effects in order to create an inviting crowd atmosphere, hopefully making the audience feel more comfortable and involved in the video. To do this ill use sound effects such as people talking, footsteps and noises coming from the instruments.

5) This feedback demonstrates that I have correctly connoted the target audience of my music video throughout my music video as I'm targeting 16-25 mostly males, partly females, which more or less everyone said.

Lo4 - Audio levels

Here you can see the audio levels for the 'Million Things' audio, as you can clearly denote the levels are extremely high. This is because as it's ideal for audio visuals to have loud volume, especially when it comes to music as people often want to turn it up and have the song on max volume. Therefore, I decided not to increase the level or bypass of the audio, since the audience can adjust the sound to be as loud or quiet as they want at home. The audio levels were also conventional to how loud a standard music video's are as I compared it to other professional music videos such as 'Soundcheck' by Catfish and The Bottlemen through youtube.

I got this sound effect from a website called freesound.com. I decided to include the sound of an audience talking in the background in order to reinforce the location and atmosphere of the video. Since, we were in a studio that had a row of seats and area for a crowd to be. I also though that by including the sound of a crowd talking, it would connote that the audience should be excited to listen to the music as the crow seem excited as if they're waiting for the band to come on stage - therefore hopefully making the viewer feel the same way. The sound of the crowd talking also helps reinforce the target audience of my audio visual as you can hear young men and women, which is ideal as my target audience is of mostly males, partly females aged 16+. Hopefully my audience can relate to the people talking and therefore want to carry on watching as they could in-vision themselves watching this gig. The audio levels on this sound effect were very quiet in comparison to my other sound effects and 'million things' audio, therefore I went onto the audio effects of the sound and increased the level to 5.6 dB in order to make the sound louder, this went successfully and allowed all of my sound effects to merge perfectly.

This footsteps sound effect was downloaded from freesound.com. I used the footsteps SFX at the begging of my music video during the 'introduction' where the band are walking out from behind the curtains into the studio. I wanted to use footsteps as not only was I told that this would make the video more entertaining to watch through feedback but I also wanted to add as many realistic sounds that were relevant to the scene i order to create a better atmosphere and allow the clips to make more sense. Since, you'd clearly be able to hear the band members footsteps if you could hear noises such as the crowd talking in the background. The audio levels on this sound effect were quite loud and therefore I had to decrease the volume by going on the audio effects and changing the level to -7.3dB. This made it so that the sound didn't drown out all of my other sound effects and was also even with the audio levels of the 'million things' so that when the song came on it wasn't a shock or too loud to my audience.

This static xylophone sound effect was found on freesound.com and was used to act as the noise that a guitar amp would make whilst you're plugging it in. This helped reinforce the fact that the band were using instruments such as en electric guitar and keyboard, therefore connoting the genre of the audio visual to the audience. This sound also helps add to the realism within the scene as we also hear other noises such as the crowd taking and the footsteps of the band members. This noise is something that people who play an instrument will be fairly similar with, which many indie fans do. Therefore hopefully allowing the audience to relate. The audio levels on this clip were louder than any of my other sound effects and therefore I had to drastically decrease it's levels. I changed the level to -18.9 dB as also known in the above screenshot, in order to make all sounds play together nicely and conventionally to a professional music video.

Lo4 - Drafts

Draft 1 - 20th June 2019

This draft shows the the first finished draft for my music video, which is just pure footage with jump-cut transitions synced to the music. The video includes no colour grading, all colour seen is from the original clips which gives the video a low-budget and un-proffesional denotation as it connotes that we don't have any professional editing software. This video doesn't have a title scene to tell the audience the name of the song or band, which is very unconventional to not only the indie genre but music videos in general. There are no effects such as slow motion or merging of clips, meaning the overall video consists of the same visuals throughout it's entity, creating a video that isn't entertaining to watch and will easily loose the attention of the viewer. During feedback I was also notified that the video is out of sync with little things such as the drumming and singing, which I knew I needed to change. I was also told that I should add sound effects to the video as the silence in the beginning is confusing and makes the video unappealing to watch.

Draft 2 - October 11th 2019

In this video, I decided to make changes from my previous version by firstly changing the colour of the entire video to black and white. I did this a monochrome denotation is very conventional to the indie genre, therefore I thought by using this colour I'd be making my video look more professional and realistic. However, despite the video looking better than my previous, I found that the use of this effect was again very boring as it made the video look the same throughout in a way hat was boring. I also added a title to this video that occurred through an animation and stayed on the screen during the first four seconds of the first clip, I thought that this looked appealing however it is also quite random how the title is on it's own separate blank screen and the also occurs at the beginning of the music video. I added sound effects such as the sound of footsteps, which I got from a website called free sound.com, I also got sound effects of microphone feedback and a buzzing noise that is typically heard before you plus a guitar into the amp. I really liked these sound effects as they helped tell more of a story and overall made the beginning scene more appealing to watch. However this version doesn't include any special effects.

Final Version - December 18th 2019

In the final version of my music video I decided to change the colour from black and white to have a cool toned, contrasted wash over it. I decided to use colour in a grunge and dark way in order to meet the conventions of the indie genre. I used the three-way colour, to enhance the blue tones within the shadows, midtowns to enhance the green tones in the video and highlights to enhance the warm red tones. I did this because not only would it create a cool contest in highlights and low-lights but I also watched a music video called 'Kathleen' by Catfish and The Bottlmen which had an old-school, 3D red and blue effect on it, which I thought looked really appealing and 'indie'. I also increased the contrast and decreased the satiation to get a stronger opposition between tones without making the video too colourful. I think doing this creates an overall professional, defined denotation rather than purely indie based. I think it was a good idea to do this as in my two previous drafts the colour was boring throughout, however because I enhanced different ones throughout the video the aesthetic of the video was much more appealing and enjoyable to watch. 

I also changed the title scene in the video tube on it's own blank screen as I thought the fact that the title also previously carried on playing during the beginning scene looked un-proffesional like I didn't;t know what I was doing. I also added the sound effect from freesound.com of a crowd talking and let that carry in playing during the title scene to build tension towards the start of the song and reinforce that the band were playing in a live studio. Lastly I added SFX such as the 'additive dissolve' and 'non-additive dissolve' transitions as they made two separate clips merge into one another before completely transitioning, which I think gave a visually appealing and conventional indie denotation as it allowed to viewer to denote both the drummer and the lead singer at the same time, reinforcing the unity of their band and genre. I also think this transition was ideal for my music video as I used other effects such as the 'echo'  which created a ghost like / merging effect. Therefore both effects complimented each other well. 

Lo4 - Evidence of editing

The screenshots in the image above demonstrate how I added the transitions to my music video. I used primarily the 'additive dissolve' and 'non-additive dissolve' transitions as they made two separate clips merge into one another before completely transitioning, which I think gave a visually appealing and conventional indie denotation as it allowed to viewer to denote both the drummer and the lead singer at the same time, reinforcing the unity of their band and genre. I also think this transition was ideal for my music video as I used other effects such as the 'echo'  which created a ghost like / merging effect. Therefore both effects complimented each other well. 

In the image above you can see how I created the distorted, trip effect by using the 'echo' SFX. I dragged the effect from the panel onto the clip that I wanted it to be on and went to the 'video effects' section of the clip where I could adjust how I wanted the effect to denote. I decreased the amount of times the clip was repeated so that you could still clearly see what was going on in the clip and and decreased the decay as this added a high expose / bright light to my clip which looked unprofessional and un-appealing. This effect overall helped me meet the conventions of the indie genre as it denoted the illusion of being on drugs / tired, which are aesthetics associated with the indie genre as it seems 'edgy' and 'cool'. Plus the over all distortion of the effect creates a strong opposition from genres such as pop. which is a genre that 'indie people' don't want to bet associated with. 

In the image above you can see how I have colour graded my music video in order to fit the conventions go the indie genre and also simply denote more visually appealing. I mostly used the 'three-way colour' found in the 'colour' effects pannel, however I also used the RGB colour corrector sometimes in order to enhance undertones for colours such as blue and red. Originally I wanted my music video to be black and white as this denotation is strongly conventional to the indie genre however I thought that my second draft, which was black and white, looked too boring and didn't hold my attention the watching it. Therefore, in my final version I decided to use colour but in a grunge and dark way so that I was still meeting my brief. I used the three-way colour, to enhance the blue tones within the shadows, midtones to enhance the green tones in the video and highlights to enhance the warm red tones. I did this because not only would it create a cool contest in highlights and low-lights but I also watched a music video called 'Kathleen' by Catfish and The Bottlemen which had an old-school, 3D red and blue effect on it, which I thought looked really appealing and 'indie'. I also increased the contrast and decreased the satiation to get a stronger opposition between tones without making the video too colourful. I think doing this creates an overall professional, defined denotation rather than purely indie based. However due to the fact that the clips we took were very frustrating to work with in regards to lighting I often had to adjust different clips and play with the lighting in order to get an overall even denotation throughout the music video, I just did this by going on the 'colour' panel and increasing or decreasing both the brightness and saturation. 

In the image above you can see how I cut up my clips and placed them in order. I used the razor blade tool to cut the clips where I wanted them and then just deleted the end of the clip of the right. I often layered many clips below one another so that I won't constantly dragging clips onto the main panel, as the clip below the one I had removed would add a new scene in it's place. Obviously it wasn't as simple as this and I had to experiment with many clips however this technique was definitely helpful and time efficient. During scenes that I wanted to be merged together. I would drag a clip onto of the other and decrease the top clips capacity to 50%, which added a distorted, indie effect. 

The image above reflects how I slowed sections of my music video down in order to create a dramatic, conventional indie effect. I did this by left clicking on the clip, clicking 'speed/duration' and decreasing the clip to either 30% or 50% depending on the clip and time frame I had. I typically added this effect at point in the music video where either an instrument was being played, the lead singer was on his last word of that sentence or if the band members were doing gestures such as jumping. The use of slow motion helped enhance the movement in the video and make it more dramatic as its being denoted more clearly. 

This last image denotes how I exported my music video. I did it at h.264, which is an mp4 file, making it ideal for those who want to listen both on the go and at home. 

Lo4 - Offline edit

This clip demonstrates an early version of my music video with raw footage denoting no special effects or advanced editing. All I have used to form the clips together is a razor blade tool in order to cut up scenes and match them with others. In order to edit these clips, I would use the 'three-way colour' effect found in the colour effects panel, where I would individually alter the brightness and contrast of each scene i order to make them denote even throughout the music videos entirety. I'd also enhance the blue tones within the shadows, mid tones to enhance the green tones in the video and highlights to enhance the warm red tones. I'd do this because not only would it create a cool contrast in highlights and low-lights but I also watched a music video called 'Kathleen' by Catfish and The Bottlemen which had an old-school, 3D red and blue effect on it, which I thought looked really appealing and 'indie'. I'd also increase the contrast and decrease the satiation to get a stronger opposition between tones without making the video too colourful. I think doing this creates an overall professional, defined denotation rather than purely indie based.

Secondly I would use the 'additive dissolve' and 'non-additive dissolve' transitions found in the transitions effects panel as they made two separate clips merge into one another before completely transitioning, which I think gives a visually appealing and conventional indie denotation as it allows to viewer to denote both the drummer and the lead singer at the same time, reinforcing the unity of their band and genre.

I also want to try adding a zooming techniques in my music video that slowly zoom in or to the side on the scenes that establish the entire band as it would allow the viewer to look at each member individually, helping give brand recognition. I'd add way more jump cuts between scenes in order to make the video more in sync with the beat and conventional to a real music video, since the visuals typically reinforce the beat and lyrics.