Music Video Professional Project Review Blog Post

I believed initially that the song was about a man who loved a woman, yet did not want her to love him back, believing that he was not enough for her. He loved her so much that when she asked him to stay over, he told her to get some rest. This implies he did not sleep with her, though he may have stuck around her house to ensure she was safe or something along those lines


An element that we could use is the filters and lighting. An element that we used was the filters and also having leaves on top of a person, but still being able to see that person.


The creator did well in explaining the story to the audience and tugging on heart strings to get people to listen to the meaning and what the artist is trying to explain and his feelings on how he got there. I believe they could have used some color instead of making the whole thing black and white specifically when the guy is saying to the girl that she lit him up.


https://genius.com/James-arthur-say-you-wont-let-go-lyrics
This is what the lyrics mean if you wanted to get a better understanding of what the artist is trying to express with each line that he is singing.

K. CAS Music Video

The concept of this music video was to show a guy replaying his emotions and what he remembers about this girl throughout their relationship before everything goes wrong and they get in a fight. The song we used was "K." by CAS.




Pre pro- Our group and I first decided to come up with a song that we all wanted to do. After we picked the song, we looked at each line and saw how the story came along. Once we did that we wrote down ideas that we envisioned and put it all together. By doing that, that is where we found our locations and decided that we wanted the video to be almost all down town for the affect that we were trying to achieve. Then came story boards which came easy to us since we already had a step by step plan that we wanted to create.




Production- We decided to use a girl who was already in our group to be the main actor since she fit the role perfectly. With the locations, we decided to scope it out in pre production and so when we were there we had so much extra time to think of new ideas along with our old on the fly.




Post Pro- editing went smoothly. We ended up reediting it 4 times to make sure it was perfect ad listened to each and every ones input to make our video that much better.




Along the way I learned that trying to capture a sunset is extremely hard when you're in rush hour. I also learned that it goes by fast and you have more fun when you're in a group of people you enjoy being around.


5 guarantees- We used collaboration a lot to change how we wanted our video to be. Project management we used as a key and got everything turned in and filmed by the given deadlines. Leadership skills is the most important one. With out this our group would run out of daylight in time to film for this.


What I would do different is add a guy actor because it would have more of an affect that the story would have


What I would do the same is still have the locations that our group used because it ended up looking very nice.


Experiences would be to work with the people you are comfortable with and know every ones strengths and weaknesses.


General thoughts- I was lacking the passion with video and anything for awhile and by doing this project made me have a new love for film and to be passionate about something again.

McDonalds Experience

Product

The product my group and I decided to chose was the "Big Mac". The concept a guy that comes in with his friends and looks over at a “girl” and gets excited while looking in her direction. The guy walks over to her and she turns around and the she ends up being a guy. The guy says something to him and grabs the big mac and takes a big bite.

Process 

First we had to come up with multiple ideas on what we wanted our commercial to be. We finally, as a group, decided to go with the Big Mac. After that, we figured out what exactly we wanted to achieve in the story and so that became writing our script. While we were writing our script we were also drawling out our storyboards with each scene that we wanted to do. Then came acting, but that part was pretty easy since we were able to have the people in our group be our actors. Then we had to scope out and call our local McDonalds to ask if we could film there. One of them said no, so we had to ask our next closest one and they ended up saying yes. The next couple days our group went over all the details like costumes and what time we would all be arriving and things like that. When we got there, my role ended up changing to the DP. We filmed for about 2 hours and we were able to have fun, but still be serious about the film that we were creating. We finished filming and the remainder of the days we helped our editors with ideas to make our commercial better.

Roles

My role was DP and along the way I learned that not every shot will be perfect, but the more you shoot different shots the more ways you can go back and edit later. In other words, it gave the editor more of a variety to use later. 

Professionally 

In our group, the most technical skills that we used was communication. We talked a lot and each and everyone was listened to and respected with the ideas that they had to make the film better. Project management wasn't our fault with being that our editor did not have the software at home, but came in everyday to work on it. Also, wasn't able to stay after one day because the sub went home early. 

Different 

What I would do differently would probably pick a new product to show and produce. The lighting and it being McDonalds wasn't what I was trying to achieve, but my group all wanted it and so I went with it. 

The Same

What I would do the same would be to collaborate more.

Objectives 

We all focused on what needed to be done with these. Lighting most definitely should and could have been better. Audio wise there was a lot of nat noise which that could have been fixed in order to have a better out play on our commercial. Editing was interesting because like I said before he was limited on the amount of time he could come in and approve this. I think we kinda rushed to get this done and if we really took our time we'd be able to make it look more professionally done. 

Conclusion 

I'm excited to work on other projects to better myself.

Semester 1 Final Exam

PSA

Our first project this year was a PSA. It took about two weeks to complete our finial project. The biggest struggle that we faced was finding an adult actor to play a specific role for our film. Along the way I learned that groups are better than working on a film by yourself. It was nice being able to get other people's ideas involved to make the film better than it would. We struggled a lot with the lighting and we couldn't make the camera film darker so that there wouldn't be a glare to our video. Feedback was defiently to change the lighting and make it better. We changed a lot of how we edited the PSA the first time. Overall, I was proud of the PSA. It sent out a great message for online safety in a serious way.

 

 Short Film

Our next project was a short film. This took about 4-5 weeks to complete. We faced a lot of challenges along the way. We changed our script three times. We had to write a new script because the other ones were not able to execute the way we wanted it to be. We only had one day to film due to our part not using our time wisely. Along the way I learned to be calm in every situation because everything will work out if we all calm down and talk about what we need to do like adults. We changed our script and actors last second. Overall I wasn't as proud of this film as I wish I would have been. 

 Project management 

I could have used my time more wisely in the first quarter. I was able to get all my projects done on time. This quarter, however, I was able to use my time wisely and got what needed to be done on time.  I worked on my menu items when I was finished. If I had extra time on a project I would be asking other people for suggestions on editing etc. Also I would look up videos on youtube and see how I can make the video better. Outside of class I don't do as much as I would like to with my busy schedule. Over the summer I would like to make my own short films because I have a whole bunch of equipment just sitting around not being used.

Strengths

A strength of mine would be able to compromise and get what needs to be done, done. Also, a bit of editing. There is a couple of things that I should work on to be a better editor for myself and others. 

Improvement

Planing things better. It sucked not being able to know what exact days we were filming, what scenes we were filming, etc.. To improve I need to be more of a leader instead of going with the flow if things aren't happening. 

Guest speakers

I learned from both speakers is that, if this is a passion for you, to never give up because there is room for everyone. I learned about equipment and how it is used,which was really cool. I also learned that in scripts if the action takes longer to say then filming the action, you don't necessarily need it.

4D Experience

E-Comm, entertainment kids, took a field trip to B & B theaters to watch justice league. I learned how they used different shots to make the film feel more alive to make it more appealing to the audience. New technology will definitely make the films better and more will want to watch. 

Summary 

The most thing I loved about this semester was being able to work our way to creating a feature film. I would change how we did a short film and PSA instead of working right away on our feature film. Overall, I learned that team work is important when creating something. My goal next year is to keep getting better and better. My final thought is that I'm excited for what things have to come.

Merry Christmas

Dexter menu

    For my menu I chose to do my favorite episode on Dexter, which is season 4, episode 12, "Get away". This episode personally to me had the best writing I have ever seen in a television show. The scene starts and Dexter is trying to hunt down a killer in his town. He tries to be friends with him first so that he is able to gain his trust, so he has the opportunity to kill him because he meets all Dexter's rules. The biggest rule for him is that he can only kill the people if they have killed or harmed anyone. The second biggest rule is to never get caught. Dexter goes over the top and tells the "Trinity Killer" basically he wants him dead and he will be dead. Trinity goes to where Dexter works (Miami-Metro Police Department) and kinda starts to tease him and gets into Dext's head. Meanwhile Trinity has much more in store. 



I really like the cinematography in every episode just because of the fact that it is so different. They use all these shots and it perfectly explains what Dexter is feeling in that moment, which is awesome because I can feel more of the characters emotions (even though Dexter is a psychopath). In this scene to my left Trinity is teasing Dexter by saying basically to stop trying to get me alone I know you want to be the one to kill the "Trinity Killer". This is showing how much hatred that Dexter has for this man. He wants him dead and he's willing to go into extremes to make sure that happens. In this scene I see Dexter in a way excited. He sees him as a challenge / a game and he's very eager to play.

Short film Seperation

I used my script. I got the concept from a song. It basically shows the struggles between parents falling out of love and kids having to deal with the pressure. Our process didn't go quite as plan. It fell apart. Originally we were going to pick another girls script, but things fell through and we ended up not having enough/ the right actors for hers. We planned everything out, meaning locations, costumes, dates, and etc. We did not have time to do storyboards because of the fact that we only had three days to complete this whole short film.  My job was the editor. Their are a couple things that I would change, for one the volume levels and also some of the shots that I had no ability to change.

I was not able to film due to a soccer tournament, however I did find actors and allowed my group access to my house. When I got back home I regretted not being there, but there was nothing I could do about it. I was told that our director Shelby was in charge of watching the dogs by our DP Franchesca and AP Ryan.  That definitely was not okay and to me it felt like Shelby shouldn't have even came. Another thing that went wrong is that my group (DP) decided to use two different cameras. Why on earth? I have no clue. The cameras are two different qualities and looked completely different. I got home and had 30 minutes until I had to leave for my final game. Franchesca had to leave because she got called into work. She took her camera and so I called her. I asked her why she didn't at least leave her camera and her reply was that her mom wouldn't allow her to do so. I had a camera that worked perfectly fine and a way better quality than hers with a tripod and a microphone attached before I left the first time. Little things like that set our group up- for not quit for failure, but definitely in the wrong direction.

What I could do differently was to plan out more. If we did the story boards we'd know every shot to do and not lose track of time. We'd also make a plan to put the dogs into a friends house, so that wouldn't be a problem. I'd also make sure we'd use one camera and film over a period of time, not all just in one day. I'd use the same actors and the same director because I think it'll work out better.

Music Video

This project was to create a music video of my choice.  The music video took about two weeks to create.  My group (Jordan and Darby) wanted the music video to have cinematic feel to it.  Some challenges along the way that as a group we faced were; not being able to all be filming at a specific time and we had some actor issues to coming to the "set" all at once.  All the way I learned that communication is everything. Without it we wouldn't have been able to create what we did. I was given feedback that it was really well done and looks like this would be something a college student would create if not better. Next time I would change some of the editing in the end to make it fit the beginning and then also make my own song to have people come in and help create. My overall opinion about this music video is that it went really well. 

Movie Trailer 

Our project was to recreate a high school movie trailer. My group (same as above) chose to recreate The Breakfast Club. The video took about a week and a half to film and edit. We would have gotten the video done sooner, but we did have complications with some of the actors due to extra-curricular activities.  Along the way I really learned that storyboards are really important. I couldn't imagine how this video would have turned out if we didn't use them. Feedback I was given was that it was well done. Next time I would probably use a different location and older looking actors. My overall opinion about this video was that it was good, but I feel like it could have been better.

Short Film

Our project was to create a script to then crete a short film out of. This took about 3 weeks to create. Some challenges along the way was that we had a group member who wanted to do everything, but was a slacker actually filming. She got actors and everything, but claimed she was too busy to film and couldn't for the first I'd say week and a half. I offered to film for her, but she said she wrote the script so she has an eye for what she wanted. Along the way I learned that you have to take charge even if you are really shy towards people you don't know. Overall, I wish to do a different short film. 

Class Reflection

This semester I used my class time to my befits. The times that I got done early with my project I went around to other groups and in a way joined and helped them out with ideas. I would also look on youtube for ways to make my video look better. To enhance my video if I finished an hour early, I would ask others for opinions that they might have and then also go on youtube for inspiration in editing in a certain way fora different kind of video.  Out of class I do other videos on the side, I just chose not to post them anywhere unless it's perfect. 

My areas on strengths are editing and filming. I maximize this strength by creating more and more videos so I can get faster at editing and see what kind of shots that would work for future films that I produce. Improvements for me is probably getting my ideas out there more instead of holding back what I would have to say

Summary

The most thing I loved about this semester was all the people around me. I feel like we were all a kind of family. No one was excluded in anything. The best video I created would probably be the music video. I liked how that turned out. I would change only one thing about this class. Have the students chose who they want to work with because they probably know who they do and don't want to work with. For example, a group member who is controlling might work for some people, but not for others.  I learned so many things this semester. I learned a lot having to do with editing and working with certain people. One goal next year would be able to just create better projects than the year before. My final thoughts about this class was that it was awesome. I loved being able to come from a long day of learning to video class (not that I'm not learning). It was really relaxing and I always felt comfortable here. I also loved our video teacher Mrs. Smith. She really cared about each and every student, which in all my years of school have only seen her and another teacher do that. :)