HERE IS THE FINAL LINK TO THE FINISHED VIDEO ON YOUTUBE!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvzTVsobV7Y

ALSO HERE IS THE INTERVIEW WE HAD WITH THE BAND AS PART OF OUR AUDIENCE RESEARCH.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=v2HqmhujaWI&feature=channel_video_title

Here is just some photographic proof of the group working in class and some screen shots of the programme, IMovie, which we used to put the video together.

Other information on the video is:
the overall cost of the video was £16
there were some disagreements within the group about what should go into the video
all members of the group are very pleased with the final outcome.

Q.4 How did you use media technologies in the construction and research planning and evaluation sheet?

During the research stage where we looked at a number videos from our chosen genre to try and get an idea of what normally goes into them. the main sources I were Youtbe , as it is free and easy to access, and Kerrang TV as it a devoted TV channel only showing Rock and Metal videos and so was of great use.

I also had an advantage when working on this genre as it is a genre of music i listen to a lot and so had a good choice of bands and other videos to draw inspiration from.

To actually film the music video we used a Sony digital recorder (more than one in some cases). This was better than other recorders as it record onto an SD card rather than a tape. However it seems these recorders do not like loud noises as when we were filming the concert for the live footage the camera i was using kept freezing when i moved closer to the speakers were the music was coming from.



The printing was done by a professional printing company. This made the finished poster and CD cover a much higher quality than it would have been if we had done it ourselves. To edit the images for the print work we used a combination of the programmes Photoshop and In Design on the Apple Mac computer. These programmes were very easy to use and so this cut the time it took to finish the project.

Finally there were a number of bands in particular we sued as inspiration for our video, the main ones we focused on were:
Black Veil Brides
Bullet For My Valentine
Black Stone Cherry

Q3. What Have You Learned From Your Audience Research?

These are the graphs showing the results of our audience research.
The first question was Would You Watch A Metal Music Video?

We got mixed answers for this with the majority saying that they would not mind watching one if it came on but would not actively go and seek one out. Others gave a categorical yes or no answer which references to the idea of Metal being a love or hate music genre. Many bands often play on this idea of love and hate by making themselves very outlandish. this will make them appeal to a smaller but more devoted fan base and will show that metal bands as a whole are still a cult or have cult like qualities. Recently a band that has become known for this is Black Veil Brides.

Question 2. What is your opinion of the Metal music genre?

This is very similar to the first question and the results show that. Again as with question 1 the majority of people were indifferent and said that they would listen to it if it came on but would not choose it out of preference. the other people we asked were split 50/50 of loving and hating Heavy Metal Music. This ties in with the results from question 1 as Heavy Metal being a love or hate genre and having a cult like status. normally it is easier to tell someone who is into Heavy Metal (such as Myself) as they will often wear T shirts of there favourite band, its a bit like the Hells Angels VS the Outlaws or rivalries between football clubs, except without the violence.

Question 3. What Is Your Favourite Music Genre?

This was a much more general question and so gave a clearer idea of how large our Target audience would be for a Heavy Metal video. We found the most popular genres to be multi-generic or rock. This apparent liking of Rock gave us an impression that many people who like this would also listen to some Metal Bands. This shows that while Rock is still one of the most popular music genres but Metal is still lagging some way behind. I find this odd as Heavy Metal was spawned out of Rock and Hard Rock Genres so you would think that the fan base would have remained the same. I think one reason why it hasn't is that heavy metal bands tend to focus on volume and look as well as their music and so some Rock fans found this hard to get used to. Two Metal bands that this applies to are Black Veil Brides and Slipknot.

Question 4. What Would You Expect To See In A Metal Video?

The most popular answers for this question were shots of The Band and motifs of fire. I  guess this is because many people assume Metal is very fact paced and aggressive. A Cd cover that follows this Idea is Set The World On Fire by Black Veil Brides, which has been mentioned before in this blog. Not many people thought metal videos would contain female representations, meaning that the male gaze would be more to with fire and more action related themes. However if the band contains a female then the video will tend to focus on them more than the other members, two example of this are Evanescence and The Agonist. However Black Veil Brides go along with these facts with the music video for their song Knives and Pens, which contains no female representations.

Question 5. Do What You See In Music Videos and Bands You Like Influence You?

This was a question designed to see how much music meant to our potential audience. there was a straight 50/50 split between people answering yes and no. Personally I am very much in the yes category. This question also links to the first 3 questions as it shows how much of a cult status Metal and Metal bands have. What we see and enjoy will influence all of us no matter what it is. Even if it does not change the way we look it might change some of the ideologies we hold about life ad other topics.

TO GO ALONG WITH THIS HERE IS AN INTERVIEW WITH THE BAND AS GODS WHEN WE WENT TO FILM THEM LIVE FOR TEH VIDEO

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2HqmhujaWI&feature=channel_video_title

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

I feel that both parts of our practical project, (The music video and the print based work) are very effective. The video is very unnerving as we do not know the character behind the mask until about 3/4 of the way through the video. Also the idea of a character being chased by themselves is a very odd idea and suggests not only a sense of guilt but also an unstable metal state causing their own mind to project other forms of themselves, this is very similar to the film Fight Club.

 The poster and print work give a very haunting look to the audience, again as a means of unnerving them. The idea of the mask is the main motif for the video and so was the obvious choice as the backdrop for both the poster and CD cover. Below is the finished poster.

This poster is similar to the cover for the film, The Decent, which uses the idea of a face, in this case a skull to unnerve the audience and hint at the film itself, much like our entire project. There is an interesting point here as from this it looks like our poster is more influenced by film posters. the way our poster looks is very cinematic and so this is why we found it easier to use some of the techniques from them as opposed to more music based posters. Another thing was that we found it very hard to find CD advertisements that used the same sort of style as our own. Most Music advertisements, no matter what the genre is will feature one of two images. Either they will feature the same picture that will appear on the CD cover or a picture of the band/logo itself.

The CD cover is very similar to both this film and our own poster as it uses a similar image.

1. In What Ways Does Your Media Product Challenge or Develop Conventions Of Real Media Products?


I feel that first and for most both the music video and the print based work have been a massive success. To begin with the music video does go along with many normal media concepts from both metal music and music videos and also films in some cases, an example of this is with the trunk shot that we used as part of our video. The main example of this is when we used a Trunk Shot, which is shown below. This shot was a favourite of Quentin Tarentino and as well as our own, many examples of his have also been shown.

Here are some of the other shots we used from the scene where we see why the main charcaters conscience is chasing him in the rest of the video.

The actual base for the video was to use both a narrative and live footage of the band. this worked very well and it also goes along with many other music videos of a similar genre, for example:
Black Veil Brides - Rebel Love Song
Bullet For My Valentine - Tears Don't Fall

The Video did also challenge some aspects of media products as well though. The use of handheld camera is very rare in music videos and also the fact that no green screen was used, meaning all the footage was shot on scene.

Much the same can be said about the print work. the CD cover featured motifs from the video such as the mask and also contained band thanks and the song lyrics. The poster was simple and yet very effective and also featured the mask motif used in the video. Below are the main images that represent the video, CD cover and poster.

You can also see on these images that they have been through a process of editing, for this we used Photoshop and were put into the correct shape and size using In Design.

The CD cover itself is very similar to the Album Slipknot by Slipknot as it uses masks to hide the identity of a person. The different here is that this the band hiding their identity rather than a character in a music video, which is the case with our work.

The poster isn't really similar to anything in particular but it does use the same techniques and similar photographs to the CD cover which shows they are from the same group. The poster is shown below.

All of this put together shows how the package we have put together does for the most part keep to media concepts as this is what has shown to be successful particularly in the world of Heavy Metal Music.

Well the practical work has now been finished and so we can begin the uploading of evidence to the blog. The video link will be posted at the end of this post and the images used in the print based work will be uploaded once they have been gathered into the correct file type. the video itself comprises a mix of live performance and narrative.

The live performance was filmed at a local concert hosted by As Gods in Bristol. The band played Faith and so this made it easier to put the right sections of song with the right sections of video. The live performance has been separated in the video as it is in black and white while the narrative is in colour.

The narrative part of the video depicts the story of a man who has to live with the guilt of killing someone else. we used this guilt to great effect by portraying it as a masked character. This also goes along with the idea that Heavy Metal music as a sinister and nightmarish edge.

The idea of the mask was also used to great effect in the print based work as it become both the CD cover and image for the advertisement poster.

Here is the link to the Video:
http://www.facebook.com/rosie.may.green/posts/142534599184261

there has been quiet a major change in plans for the music video. we decided the song frozen was too long and so have to had to change it to a song called faith. luckily it is still be As Gods and so no other information will need adjusting. we have also started work on our print based work and have decided to take inspiration for one of the shots from the album cover of Saints of Los Angeles by Motley Crue .

Below are some the designs we came up with ourselves:

We have since doing this decided not to include the idea of the cross as we felt it did not link enough to our video and overall product.



music video 2011/2012 (7)

we have now completed the narrative part of the video and are ready to shoot some live footage of the band at a concert in the near future. The photographic stuff has also all be planned and some initial shots have been taken. In addition to this we now have some audience research questions and some questions for the band as we hopeful for an interview with them after the concert.

An issue we have found though is that the length of the song means we need lots of footage. we are talking about changing the song but the other song would still be by As Gods and would still fit the video we already have.

This is the album Set The World on Fire by Black Veil Brides. The Album cover contains many traits which are common in metal covers and less conventional features.

The album is very brightly coloured which could go against the assumption that all metal is black and dark and satanic. However the colours do come from explosions and fire which are quite violent artistic ideas and so this could be linked to metal which is supposed to show an all out rebel nature against society.

Another common trait of metal or rock bands is to have a band logo on the cd cover 

Music Video 2011/2012 (5)

The filming has been commenced and the first 1:36 has been fully edited and put to the music. This means that we are, at the moment, well ahead of our shooting schedule. The band member that i work with has given full rights to Frozen and is in the process of sending the proof of this through on e-mail. The filming was done in a local church and we did need to get spoken permission to do it but there were no foreseeable issues.

music video 2011/2012 (4)

As Heavy Metal is still quite a hush hush genre (where people either love it or want to kill it) it is very hard to find reviews and even places to view most music videos of this genre. The main magazine for heavy metal in the UK is Kerrang, however the magazine's website is blocked in school for some reason and so this makes it very hard for to do research in school time. The research i am able to conduct at the moment is watching a limited number of music videos.

Music Video 2011/2012 (3)

The band i have chosen to use for my music video is the metal band As Gods. I got permission as i work with one of the band members. At the moment i have a choice of two tracks Frozen and Faith.

A brief history of the band.

Formed in late 2008 in Hampshire, England, As Gods fuse melodic, anthemic vocals with classic songwriting and progressive ideas to breathe an epic life into modern rock and metal. In summer 2009, the band began work on their debut album The Journeyman, previewing material at a number of intense and unforgettable live shows. Described as "contagious... infectious music ", the album bursts with energy, concept and passion, and settles immovably in the listener's consciousness. With a sound all their own, a stunning live show and a relentless work ethic, As Gods is one of the UK's most exciting bands.

Music Video 2011/2012 (2)

A history of music videos:

1930: Screens Songs were introduced

1965: The Beetles use promotional films

1983: The most influential music video of all time (Micheal Jackson's Thriller) is released

1984: MTV is launched

2005: YouTube gives people access to millions of world wide music videos

2010: Number of viewed online music videos reaches 34 billion.

Music Video 2011/2012

As evidence to the research into music videos, in particular those of a Metal Genre here is a presentation on the Music Video for Knives and Pens by Black Veil Brides.

About the band:

Lead Singer Andy Six started the band when he was only 17 and wanted to recreate the metal bands of old such as Kiss and W.A.S.P.

Part nu metal, part heavy rock and part glam metal the band are still in their early days. Despite this they have still gone through an enhancement in image between the two albums they have so far released.

This is video has particular meaning to lead Singer Andy Six as he was bullied has as a kid at school.

The video consists of two different entities. There is the band performance (which is similar to most metal videos) and the story of an outcast “emo” who is subject of bullying.

This story represents how metal is consistently going against what is considered acceptable in normal society and is about rebellion and freedom.

This video is in the bands early days and show they have not got the black make up and wild hair and costumes in which they now present themselves.

 

The Use Of Colour

 Colour is used to contradict the band more than the lyrics. The band is shown all in white which is the opposite as their name implies black and darkness.

However the band is also shown in black which goes along with the name and theme of the song which is a dark theme of loneliness but still having something to fight for.

The best use of colour is used in the final seconds of the video where the band, again dressed in white are covered in blood. This blood symbolises the blood of those who suffer and who have been subject to harm.

How does the video comply / differ from normal metal videos?

The video does show the band  performing live which is normal for most metal videos. However it is not on a stage it is on a set which reflects the bands image of performance rather than just producing good music.

The video also features a storyline however. This is not normal in metal videos and gives the song more of a meaning. The story is of a bullied kid which does reflect the childhood Andy Six went through, this means the kid in the video could represent him.

The Notion Of Looking

Although the story in the video only has one example of looking when the boy is looking the video we are watching on his computer screen, there are many notions of looking when the band are shown.

Firstly there is the bands image itself which is very head turning. Also the lead singer is constantly looking directly down the camera as if playing to only us watching the band.

 

Female Representations

NONE !!!

 

Inter textual References

 The video itself has no direct influences on themes or particular shots. In my opinion the band want to be as original as possible while taking on the image from older bands.

However there are some other videos which also use a mix of story and performance.

For example: Tears Don’t Fall                           

 by Bullet For My Valentine