Futher Digipak Editing

I personally continued to experiment with the photos we shot for our Digipak. I was happy with our results but wanted them to look more edgy. After initially trying them in black and white, I then thought I would exploit the 'Noise' tool on Photoshop. This tool adds considerable grain to a photo, something that is visually fashionable today as it gives it an aged, vintage and shabby look. I am really happy with the way this has changed the aesthetic of the photos and plan to carry on with this whenever using photos from this particular shoot. It makes them more unique and also goes some way in clouding the outlines of the cropped boxes making it still noticeable but more seamless as we wanted. I have been surprised with how many people don't automatically know what we have done with these photos, initially thinking that the person just looks "weird, but so cool" as a peer said. 

Initial Website Development

This week myself and Rachel started making developments towards creating our website for the band. We used our preliminary research done on similar bands websites to establish what we should include on the homepage. This included;

- Most recent music video
- Information about the band
- Images of the band
- Merchandise
- Contact details

We decided to use web based design software Wix. We decided against using one of the websites pre-set templates as they limited our creative control in terms of layout.  Below is an image of our rough draft website 'Homepage'. The basic style is simplistic yet bold and takes after some other websites we researched of a similar genre. The background picture is of an oil painting, which we have colour inverted in Photoshop. We also found found a logo for our band that could run through our products. It suitably takes after the band name (Elephant Castle), combing the two. However, we feel this image still needs to be adapted slightly, possibly using Photoshop to make it more simple and take out some of the tonal lines. This is something we will experiment with next.

Below is the beginning of our 'Media' page which we have only just begun to create. We are utilising a Wix template that gives a dynamic 'Honeycomb' effect. This page features some shots that we took on our shoot day. This is ideal but I would prefer the photos to be more coherent in the style they have been edited, so they are less random. We may have to revaluate this. With this website, we intend to maintain our theme of the 'London underground'. It is impossible to see on this screenshot, but the titles for the menu bar embody different colours of the tube lines when hovering over them. This theme will be included more as the website progresses. I would like to change the base layer oil painting to colours that more represent the London tube.

Shooting the Digipak

After getting our key shoot day out of the way, we set about the task of securing our accompanying products. One of these is of course the Digipak. We still maintained our idea of amalgamating the faces of the band into one single portrait. We organised a shoot date with the band and arranged the photography studio accordingly. This was a chance for myself and Rachel to utilise our photography and photo editing skills for a different subject.

The studio was arranged in a fairly simple manor with a small infinity background, with the aim being to make this as white as possible. This would not only make the edit more simple but would also create parallels with the way we shot the video itself. We arranged markers on the floor both for us as photographers and for the band so they would all be standing in the exact same spot, making it easier to blend them together. As the taller of the pair, I took the photos. 

We got a standard portrait of each band member asking for them to look neutral, and directly into the camera. We then did the same but with the back of their heads to create the affect that we wanted. This was a fairly simple shooting process, and we knew that the edit was likely to be the more challenging. 

Once collating the portraits, we then ran them through professional photo editing software Adobe Lightroom. This is a software that I and Rachel are both well aquatinted with from other creative projects we have done in the past. This allowed us to heighten the 'clarity' of the photos, therefore emphasising the density and richness of the shadows and lines in their faces. It also meant we could use the 'soften skin' tool, while also pinpointing particular spots and dimples which we could exterminate with the precision that the software offers. This created four 'hyper-real', visually impactful portraits.

Before

After

Before

After

We then uploaded these photos into Adobe Photoshop where we could convert the files from RAW to JPEG, yet maintaining all the higher quality. Here we could start to amalgamate the photos and contort them with ease. This was an experimental process where we could try lots of combinations and see what we liked best. We started by sticking to the original design plan and chopping the photos into four sections;

This created an affect similar to what we had imagined but wasn't quite as fluid and seamless as I had hoped. We realised that this style is far more affective with three faces, as opposed to four, as it is easier to distribute the features of the face more evenly. We then began to try new layouts, and I came up with the idea of drafting single facial features that have been cropped from a different portrait. This would mean that there would be one 'base' layer of someones face, with other peoples features mapped over that;

Arguably, these photos are far more visually striking and interesting to look at. They distort the face in a very strange way and often change the mood of the original photo, as it begins to look like a different facial expression all together. It has an intentionally messy style which makes it resemble Pop Art in some ways. Both myself and Rachel considerably preferred this method. We are going to go forward with this editing style and try to blend it with text. This should help us make some key decisions on whether we would like to include all four portraits or just our favourite one. However, we still had to do something for the back of the heads so decided we would try a similar method but instead separating the image up into four quadrants, each containing a quarter of each band members head. We chose each quadrant specifically based on the hair cuts of the band so that it looked natural, yet still odd and almost unnerving. We were happy with the way this looked as it creates a small bit of contrast from the front, which is laid out in a alternative way. We found it interesting how well the haircuts actually fitted together as one, which acts as a juxtaposition to the seemingly 'shabby' style in which they have been amalgamated. 

Edit: 3

With all our footage synced, myself and Rachel started the process of making a rough cut of the video. We now began to cut together our footage into a sequence, closely following our original storyboard. This is a challenging process that takes time. Our video especially is difficult to edit due to the need to maintain the chronological order of the cuts, in order to avoid serious continuity errors. We encountered a few problems during this session, but this is largely due to having to adjust to the software and build up speed.



This is what we managed to achieve in roughly an hour and a half. Even at this stage we can see there is lots of things that need to be changed. In the shot of o Joe at 0.12 seconds, you can clearly see that the white balance for the Sony NX5 it was filmed on had been altered meaning it isn't coherent with the rest of the footage shot on the other camera. This is something that can be altered when the rest of the video has been edited. This is the case for a few of the shots in this clip and will be completely overhauled with colour correction near the end of the process.

Although the opening shots are clearly jump cuts as we intended, this is where we want the jump cuts to end so that it doesn't loose effect, becoming dull and unnatural. The fact that the video continues to jump cut at certain stages can be corrected with some simple filler shots in between. This will aid the pace of the video and make it run smoother. Despite having various things to continue working on as we go, I feel we are making positive steps by getting the edit under way. It is easy to procrastinate with the kind of process, but you simply have to get 'stuck in' and see what comes out. 

Edit: 2

Rachel was unfortunately not present today, in our second scheduled session of editing. This left it down to me to complete our current task - syncing our footage. This was a lengthly job and took me roughly an hour and a half. However, now we have all our performance footage completely synced and registered on the timeline. Furthermore, I labelled each clip on the timeline with a quick summary of what the shot was and contained. This will make it considerably easier and more organised when it comes to chopping these clips apart. As it always has been in the course, the editing process is about organisation, efficiency and taking your time. If we maintain these principles, the process will undoubtably take time but with run smoothly. 

First Edit Session and Shooting Pick Ups

Today was our first editing session since the shooting of our video. This was always likely to be  a tedious period in the editing process and we were under the knowledge that we would not have a finished product immediately. When editing a music video, it is important to lay down a base layer of entirely performance. This includes syncing all of the performance footage onto the same timeline with Adobe Premier, something that takes time. However this is common practise in the industry as if a producer were to cut the time frame of a project, it still means that the edit team would have a video to some extent which they could hand over. Furthermore, if one tries to edit chronologically they often accidentally place all their best footage at the start leaving the video unbalanced. Editing in this way gives you a performance foundation with which you can tinker and then filter in your best material at strategic points. Therefore, today involved myself and Rachel regimentally working through our footage and syncing this with the track using the digital clapperboard in each shot. We managed to get roughly half way through doing this which is a positive step, as once we get this out the way we can start making creative decisions. It also gave us a chance to look over our footage for the first time, something that pleased us with the majority coming out as we expected. I noticed that on some shots there is a slight continuity issue relating to the white balance of the camera but I am confident that this can be rectified in the edit. 

In the afternoon, we took the opportunity to shoot the necessary 'pick ups' for our music video. This involved us re-arranging the band to meet us at the schools recording studio - as was originally planned for the shoot day. Me and Rachel arrived much earlier to dress and light the space to make it look more professional and also suitable to film in. We purposefully chose to use different instruments that could be described as more 'understated' to give the impression that the ones the band used in the video had been handpicked and were more for 'show' as opposed to personal preference. This theme carried on with the bands attire as we see them in far more casual outfits to connote that on this day they are not being styled due to them not been in the public eye. This look coincides with the the footage and mood we tried to achieve where the boys are more relaxed, at ease and having fun doing something they genuinely enjoy. On reflection, I am very happy with what we managed to capture in a short space of time. We achieved a mixture of performance footage shot both on a tripod and handheld and will be able to blend this will shots where we see the band joking naturally. The integrity of these later shots is very important, and we originally found it challenging to get the boys to act natural on camera. To combat this, a bulk of the shots were recorded without the band actually realising, to ensure that they were being themselves and didn't feel like they had to perform. I believe this slightly crafty technique will make the difference to the reality this scene and I know that it will make a huge contrast with what we shot previously. I am really looking forward to continuing with the edit, now knowing that we have all the footage to bring the video fully together.

Shoot Day Photography

As was mentioned in my shoot evaluation, both myself and Rachel took pictures of the shoot on the day on two separate cameras. We then collated the images and selected some of our favourites which may prove to be useful in terms of our other products. These have all be edited very simply so far and be altered much more dramatically if required.

Evaluation of Shoot Day

After much anticipation and planning, we finally arrived at our shoot day. On the day prior to the shoot I collated a shot list and organised a shoot schedule in order to ensure we remained stringent and well organised. We also tediously printed out the lyrics onto numerous pieces of pristine white card for our 'lyric card' shots. We purposely selected a font that looked as though it could have been hand-written, and were very happy with the way they looked. When waking up in the morning, I had a distinct feeling of being excited for what was to come but also nervous under the knowledge that despite our extensive preparation things can still very easily fall apart.

We had spent a few hours of the penultimate day before in the film studio attempting to construct our set. We pre arranged the blinders and neon pyramid for the final set up of the video, as these were the most demanding in terms of manpower. We also hung the infinity background onto the rigging at the top of the studio. Having not being able to find one sufficiently large piece, we opted for two single pieces of infinity paper which we would them tape together on the morning of the shoot. In the early part of the shoot day, this was our first task. With our production team we stuck the sheets together and then lit them to an extent where this connection was seamless and invincible as we had hoped. We also prepared a 'GoPro' camera by attaching it to part of the upper rigging, and setting it to its time lapse feature so we had another interesting shot to cut to during the edit. This would run for the entire day and would capture the whole process. However, these jobs took much longer than we expected and unfortunately set us back by just shy of an hour on our shoot schedule. We used this spare time to prepare the band by dressing them in their costumes and briefing them in considerably more detail about the shots we were going to do and in roughly what order. When we eventually started shooting on the first set up (infinity background), we were delighted with the way it looked and the effect it created was perfect, warranting the time we spent aligning it. We knew we had to try and make up some time from here on so we got to work.

Bearing in mind that my group consisted of only two people as opposed to the more regular four, myself and Rachel had a tough challenge ahead of us to balance our time between different responsibilities. In order to this, we assigned each other key roles that we stuck to through the majority of the day. I took on the majority of the filming work with Rachel taking responsibility for the play back and syncing with the clapper board. Since we are both Photography students, we equally shared the chance to take photos of the band in some of the different set ups which may prove useful in relation to the Digipak or website. Personally, I felt I performed well in terms of direction. I am a confident speaker  and felt comfortable vocally directing both the cast and crew to help achieve what we wanted. I had a clear image of each shot in my mind and was anxious to make each one a reality, especially once we saw how well the set was brought to life. Our video was difficult to shoot due to its chronology and need for continuity, with various bits of kit being added at specific stages preventing us from doing many takes of the whole song. I feel I was able to keep the production team and cast organized in close conjunction with the storyboard to make sure we were shooting the right clips at the right times during the song, so that everything was in sync. Overall, I was keen to get involved with everything happening related to the video and was constantly directed towards being pro-active and making things happen so that we did not rest upon our laurels.


During the course of the day, we encountered a few minor problems. Undoubtedly, the biggest of these was the time constraints. Due to the miscalculation in when we thought we would begin shooting, we were behind schedule in the morning period. It became quickly apparent that we would most likely not have time to fit in the shooting of the 'recording studio' section, which we had scheduled for the end of the day. This worried me and forced me into trying to get things done quicker and possibly even taking short cuts. This was not conducive to the quality of the video, leading Luke and I to have a conversation with him suggesting that we could arrange to shoot 'pick ups' on another day. This was heavily reassuring and allowed me to take the necessary time on each shot to achieve the right standard and 'cover every base'. With this pressure off, we maximized the time we had in the studio and ended up shooting in there for a further two hours then we planned allowing us to achieve even more within the day. We did this to the extent that we feel we may have enough footage to cut a video together without the other section. However, despite this we still plan to do the 'pick ups' as the cutaway is important to our video thematically.

There were many things that were really successful on the shoot day. The most obvious of these was the sets. The sets were extremely strong in their design, and there was a great contrast between the initial set and the one we finished the video with. The 'infinity' effect worked perfectly and was exactly what we desired. The final set was vibrant, cool and looked professional. The lighting created a superb atmosphere that was enigmatic and appropriate of the bands image. I believe this is testament to the work we have done into planning and visualising these sets, as they look near identical to our original drawings. Towards the end of the shoot we also unpacked and constructed the filming track to achieve some dolly shots of the band performing in the final set up. We shot the whole song a few times using this technique, and from what we saw it looked fantastic. The motion added energy and zest to the performance and we are really looking forward to editing it. Another positive from the shoot was of course the band. All members of the band performed their roles just how we wanted it and they were entirely believable as a young act. We had various comments from the crew regarding how real they looked, especially the drummer (Ben) as he mastered the rhythm of the song perfectly. This is something we exploited in filming as we could get close up shots of him perfectly hitting the drum rolls of the song. We gave them necessary breaks whenever we were reconstructing set in order to maintain their stamina and energy in performance. Towards the end of the day, when they were understandably fatigued, and it took some vocal encouragement and praise from me so that their playing remained at the same constant level, at what was a key part of the video. The bands performance is reflective of their commitment and the way we cast and rehearsed them extensively so that we could be ready and professional on the day of shooting. In terms of things that could be improved on the day then one could argue that we should have taken more consideration when planning the shoot schedule in order to fit in the cutaway sequence. However, on a hour to hour basis we were extremely organised and stringent in order to maximise the time we had. This was noted by one member of the band, who in discussion afterwards commented on the speed and accuracy with which we ran the day saying we were "completely on the ball".

 

Upon reflection, I am delighted with how the day went. We achieved some fantastic performance footage in a range of scenarios that I am really looking forward to cutting together. Things are likely to alter from what we may think we have in mind, as new creative decisions are always made in the edit, but I know for certain that we have a great base layer for our video. As far as we are concerned, things very much went to plan. I really enjoyed the directing aspect of the day as it is something I can see myself doing later in life. It is a fantastic experience to work in such a professional environment with this array of resources, and on a concept that you are passionate about and can call your own. Much like the day itself, the entire process has gone fantastically and I have really enjoyed working with Rachel. We have a decent working ethos knit together by a great friendship, and I would go as far to say that we have actually benefitted from being a pair and therefore being able to make decisions more efficiently and quickly. We have the same ideas and hope to finish creating something that we are proud of.

Shoot Schedule

This is the shoot schedule we have designed for our up coming shoot day. This gives us a rough idea of what we plan to shoot and when, telling us at what times we should require certain cast members, filming spaces and props. It also gives us regular deadlines to work to during the day keeping us on track and making sure we don't waste time.

Shot List

As part of our final preparation, we prepared a shot list. This is fairly similar to a timeline in many respects but goes into more detail in terms of technical and practical aspects. This can be used as a reference point on the shoot day to ensure that we don't miss any key shots and will be used in conjunction with a 'shoot schedule' that will follow.

SHOT LIST

• Band shots with no instruments - line up. For title print over the top.
• The boys swapping round in different positions. Trying different lead singers and drummers on the stool at the back.
• After jump cuts, lead singer swaps with the lead guitarist to give us the decided line up. With this transition he is communicating/pointing with people behind the camera.
• Microphone is brought on in front of lead singer. Jacket is thrown on. He puts the jacket on while singing.
• Various wide's and close ups of the band and lead singer performing.
• Almost simultaneously the guitars get brought on from either side. Close up shots of them being put on.
• Amps are then brought on at the back, followed by the drum set piece by piece. Jump cuts. Drummer plays what he can.
• Portrait shots of each band member as they play. (shoot whole song like this - making sure they remain fairly neutral positionally. Heads up looking at camera.)
• Stylist walks on and messes with the lead singers hair as he tries to sing. Spraying hairspray in his face.
• Crew member bringing in lights into set.
• Shots of guitar playing the chorus line of the song.
• Make up artist brings on fake cigarette and puts in in bassists mouth. Looks surprised.
• Drummer plays whole song on the green screen set up.
• Lots of cutaway shots of the band laughing and bantering in the recording studio.
• On the music decks. Throwing paper ball into a bin and then turning to camera to celebrate. Camera is of lower quality to pervious shots.
• Close up of singer singing in the recording studio. Head phones on.
• The rest of the band playing in the same setup.
• Lead singer writing lyrics or something down on piece of paper.
• Shot of lead singer framed by the recording studio glass.
• Returning shots of the band in the full light performance set up.
• Birds eye view shot of whole video.
• Shots of lead singer interacting with the girl.
• Shots of whole band in front of green screen.
• Shot of guitarist with the lyric cards for the whole video.
• Fast based stylish shots of band playing in last 30 seconds. New angles, handheld.
• Long shot of singer held for last 8 seconds.

Digipak Designs

After further discussion and brainstorming, we decided we would return to the topic of Digipaks with the intention of nailing down some design concepts, and possibly even creating some draft drawings or images. The first task was to decided what layout we wanted to present our album using. We were told by our teacher that we had various Digipak layout options available to us when sending our designs off to print. After reviewing these, we decided to go for the more simplistic 4 sided Digipak. We chose this more understated layout as we felt that larger ones often lacked in quality and depth due to the amount of empty space which they had struggled to fill with relevant images or text. We aim to create four high quality sides for the Digipak.

Both myself and Rachel still agreed that we wanted to use the distorted faces of our band as a key design motif. We think this is bold and catches the eye with its edginess. However, this is not enough on its own. We knew that we needed a further element to the Digipak to make it more visually intriguing. This is where we thought of a 'London Tube' theme. Throughout the Digipak we could place emphasis on the tube and its strong visual iconography. We could include this on both the front and the back of the Digipak, as well as on its inner. Rachel has experience creating this kind of imagery, having done it as a small part of a photography project on Photoshop.

FRONT
Considering we are yet to shoot the band in this setup, we have used this template face for the digital draft of the front cover. The face is likely to be positioned either in the center, or slightly off towards the right. This is only a template and in reality we might be interested in including less of the tube lines so that it doesn't look so 'busy'. Furthermore, we would also imprint the band name and title of the album in the top right hand corner.

BACK
This is a digital draft of the back cover of our Digipak. Obviously, the positioning of the back of the head would directly correspond with whatever we choose for the front cover in order to give the impression that the two images are connected via the Digipak. We had an interesting idea about utilising the tube stops as places where which we could input the song titles. This would be a very alternative and origional way of displaying the song list. Much like with title for the previous images, we would also add the relevant publishing and copyright details to the bottom of the image, making it look legitimate.

 For the CD holster we thought we would continue our 'London Tube' theme by dedicating this side to the logo. This is a world famous and iconic piece of branding that is easily recognized as 'British'. The white CD would be decorated with a red boarder and a blue strip that would adjoin to a corresponding blue strip that is printed on the side of the Digipak. This is simplistic, bold and works well with the circular nature of this side.

For the adjacent inner side of the Digipak we thought we would include some form of biography for the band. As they are a new group and this is their first professional album it makes sense that they would try to distribute as much information about them as possible. Both of these inner sides are incredibly minimalistic, and exploit the white (negative) space that is featured. However, to continue the continuity of the Digipak there would be a few tube lines arriving out of the corners of the side. This also adds necessary color.

As you can see, these are very rough drafts of our designs that certainly need tinkering. However, I feel we have the base of a strongly designed Digipak. It is obviously heavily reliant on the 'London Tube' motif. However, I don't feel this is a problem. The band would be marketed as a home-grown, London band. This makes sense as we would make it well documented that this is the route of the bands name; 'Elephant Castle'. This only adds to their style appeal as their is very few places more trendy than the countries capital city. It gives us a platform to create from and offers lots of possibilities in terms of designing the website homepage. It will help us to create instantly recognizable intertextuality between our different products.