Narrative in our AS piece of coursework

For our AS piece of coursework we made a 2 minute film opening which we named 'Leyla'. We had a clear idea of the narrative involved within the film however it may not have been particularly clear to the viewer from the opening, though they would have got the jist of it.

Our idea was actually a second attempt at our coursework as before it didn't go as well as we had hoped. We filmed our coursework and the concept was probably influenced slightly by the film 'Se7en' which we had watched in class. The idea was based around a young girl's stalker and her abduction by him. There was going to be a lot of camera shots in the photography dark room at school but other than this it was a very vague idea on the whole.

Our new narrative proved to work much better whilst filming. The narrative involves a young girl waking up in a field following a flashback which is what is shown in the opening. As we restarted our coursework we were very unsure of where we were heading with our coursework piece as our confidence was lowered from the bad attempt beforehand. We decided the flashback being shown would have effective camera shots that would certainly grab the viewers attention. We brainstormed and decided that the items shown in the flashback wouldn't make sense to the viewer at the beginning of the film, but as the film continues, the objects will be referred to from the flashback. Eventually all the items shown would reveal why the girl ended up lying in a field.

The voiceover used in the opening is effective because it is a police interview between the girls mother and a policewoman. Though the viewers do not know it yet, it is involved in our narrative that it is infact the girls mum who put her child there in the forest.

Storyboard

Here is our storyboard that we have made into a video to go along with our song, 'Charmer'. Some of the shots look like they would be very long but there will be a lot of improvisation from the storyboard as we realised last year filming our AS piece of coursework. The storyboard however gives us some structure and makes it easier when we are filming. By following these guidelines it will ensure that we do not forget to film any important camera shots, etc.



Here are some pictures from our original storyboard that we made before making this animation of it:

Aha - Take On Me

This video for me is one of the most iconic music videos and definitely one of the best. The video was directed by Steve Barron. The video features a pencil-sketch animation and a live action combination which is called rotoscoping. The live action footage is traced over frame by frame to give the characters realistic movements. Around 3,000 frames were rotoscoped, taking 16 weeks to complete.

The theme of the video is a romantic fantasy narrative. The girl featured in the video, played by Bunty Bailey, is reading a comic book. As the girl reads the hero of the comic winks at the girl and his animated hand reached out of the comic book inviting the girl into it. She gets taken inside into the comic book and she appears animated too. There is then a fight with two thugs and the hero tears a hole in the wall for the girl to escape. She's then found outside a dustbin where the waitress from the cafe placed her comic. The hero is then shown seeming lifeless and she begins to cry. But he wakes up and attempts to break out of his comic book frames. At the same time his image then appears in the girls hallway, torn between real and comic form as he is trying to break his barriers. He manages to escape the comic book by becoming human. The final scene is based on the 1980 film, 'Altered States'.

The music video won six awards at the 1986 MTV Video Music Awards. The awards it won were:
Best New Artist in a Video
Best Concept Video
Most Experimental Video
Best Direction
Best Special Effects
Viewer's Choice

The video was also nominated for two others which were Best Group Video and Video of the Year. It was also nominated for Favourite Pop/Rock Video at the 13th American Music Awards, 1986.

Music Video Practice

Molly and myself were sitting in our free periods at school with very little to do when we realised we could practice lip syncing as we knew it was fairly difficult. So with the help of another media student, Dominique, we filmed a practice music video to a song we were introduced to at the Richmix trip, 'Funky y-2-c' by The Puppies. We enjoyed watching other students music video to this song and decided we'd give it a go ourselves.

We used various shots that we are hoping to use in our actual coursework piece for 'Charmer' such as the close up's of mouths. I think the editing in this practice piece is very good and all looks in time, other than the first line which is slightly out of time, but practice makes perfect!

Can't quite believe I'm putting this embarrassing piece of work up but here is the video we made itself:

Ben Newman

I really like this music video as I think the content involved with the skipping ropes goes really well to the beat of the song. I think the video captures the neighbourhood feel as all the people are gathered together. The video is directed by Ben Newman who has also directed some other videos I am quite fond of for artists such as Wiley, Bombay Bicycle Club and Example.

Here is an example of a video he directed for Example:



This video was nominated at last year’s MVAs in one of the Best Budget Video categories for 2009. His music videos from the past year have shown the promising talent he offers as a director working with music videos.