Filming - Day one

This post is about our first day of filming, which took place on 29/12. On this day of filming we were taking footage of the shots of the singer singing, which were originally designed to be straight on shots in very bland settings, ideally with shallow focus. On the day, we realised that using the 50mm f/1.8 lens we could achieve a very shallow focus, with good telephoto footage, and use the focus to create interesting effects.

We discovered that focusing the lens at a shallow depth of field in front of lights or LED's, the lights showed up as circles in the picture, which looked great and we decided was an aspect that we would want to include in our production. We set up the filming set in my cellar, having the D5000 on a tripod at about eye level on one side of the room, with the subject, the singer (me) half way down the room with christmas lights arranged and stuck to the wall on the far side. Due to the random colour arrangement of the lights and also the colour of the wall, we decided the footage would look better if we filmed it in chromo-tone. This allows for a contrasting set of shots tone-wise, as well as cancelling out the garish colours which were in shot before.

The pictures below shows our set up of the filming. We had to make full use of the space provided to A) get telephoto footage of the subject as to make it look more professional, as well as B) getting enough space between the subject and the lights in ratio to the space between the subject and camera, as to make the focus shallow enough to make the christmas lights appear as circles on camera. We also needed to arrange lighting properly; we had one overhead light and this provided enough light in shot to make it appear bright enough to come out properly on screen. It also provided enough base-light as to not make the shot appear too high contrast, and bringing out enough of the subjects face which the directional light did not. The directional light we used to put enough lighting on the singer's face, as this is the focus of these shots and to not light it properly would have a negative impact on the composure of the image.


The picture below is a screenshot of the footage we took. We decided to have the subject on the left hand side of the frame, as the negative space served for composition as well as allowing a place for the out of focus lights to take up in the frame.


Overall, the day was a success, as we recorded quality footage and we became more familiar with the camera we are using as well as the lenses, and so we are better prepared for future days of filming.

Storyboard

For our storyboard we have attempted to create the most accurate plan of what our production will turn out like. We have done this to create visually what the product will turn out like, as a document to refer to when filming the video.

In creating the storyboard, I decided to arrange the shotlist so that each shot gives an accurate description of the framing, lens used as well as camera movement, and the song lyrics which are sung during the shot, as to inform the vocalist what to sing as well as to make editing easier. As it is a rock video we are filming, we realise a general convention is to have many fast paced shots, and so our storyboard is approximately 110 shots long, but might change either way during the editing stages.

The picture below was taken after the filming of these scenes, and we had crossed them out to show that they had been filmed, a necessary process when doing so many different shots.

Textual Analysis Summary

Through our research and analysis of other, similar media texts we have been able to identify some common themes and factors which we have identified as being prevalent throughout the 'emocore' genre.

The first, and probably most obvious feature is the expression of deep, previously with held emotion which seems to explode from both the band, with deep, heartfelt lyrics, which are at times screamed for emphasis and the narrative characters, who often find themselves oppressed or isolated from those around them. These characters seem to have, prior to the video, bottled up all emotion, in some cases taking it out on themselves, such as in the video for 'Numb' where evidence of self harm is shown briefly, before an outburst of emotion during the climax of the song, for example in the video for 'Rooftops' where the characters all scream to the point where it smashes objects around them.

This build up of emotion is further shown in the introversive nature of the narrative characters, who are often portrayed as being alone, or being unable to communicate with others around them. This is a way in which these videos heavily relate to their target audience of emotionally unstable teenagers, by mimicking the more generic aspects of their behaviour, meaning that they can all relate to it on some level.

Stylistically the videos are often very dark, often with low key lighting, to reflect the low mood the song is portraying. The band playing are also often dressed very plainly in dark colours, with the singer wearing something brighter or different to make them stand out from the rest of the band and help build up an image that the record label can use to sell the music to an audience, as building up an image of a band or artist is an important part of this process. This idea is best shown in the 'Rooftops' video by Lostprophets.

These videos also seem to use a lot of handheld and shots that involve some kind of movement, be it panning or craning shots. These shots seem to make the video flow along with the tempo of the music, this idea is further shown by the cutting used in these videos, with there being a lot more, faster cuts made during the chorus' and climaxes of the songs.

Even settings are used as an aid in the portrayal of the emotional message or as a way of reaching out to a target audience. This is best shown in the videos for 'Numb' and 'Streetcar' which are both set inside schools, which instantly stands out to a teenage audience as they find themselves in a similar environment for at least five days a week. Furthermore the video for 'Numb' uses this to further push across it's message of isolation and social rejection by having shots of the world around the main narrative character moving in fast motion, while she remains at normal speed, separating her indefinitely from the rest of the crowd within her school. The video for 'Streetcar', although not showing a typical school environment as it is mostly desolate with only a few characters present (which can still link to feeling isolated) does still link the school environment with negative emotions as it has shots of aggression between a female and male character, which, it can be assumed is to do with the male character betraying the female. These videos also shatter any preconceived, idealistic view of a school being a friendly and pleasant environment that all pupils will be able to learn well and be happy in, which may be an ironic look at the general public view of schools and the education system.

British vs American Music

It has been seen in recent years, that while American music has sold very well both in America and over here, British music has failed to make much of an impact on the American scene. This differs much from the 1960's, when british music such as The Beatles heavily influenced the American music scene and arguably started off today's musical culture. It is easy to see this shift by looking at the top selling singles charts for both nations, Britain appears to have a mix of both home grown and American talent where as the American charts are more or less dominated by American artists. This is the case even more so in the modern rock charts, with the very Americanised rendition of popular rock dominating the charts. It would be unfair to argue that the quality of music is better across the atlantic although the catchy riffs and deep, expressive lyrics of the 'emocore' genre originated over there. The has been evidence however, of british bands such as Funeral For A Friend and Lostprophets taking on these characteristics and thus expanding the genre to include original British artists using the 'emocore' characteristics to reach out to an otherwise American dominated area of music and audience.

It has been argued that the reason British music is no longer as popular over the atlantic is due to the capitolist nature of the American media at the moment, with members of the American public having learnt from the media to fear or reject anything foreign and only accept things they believe to be wholly American. On the contrary some British bands have been able to be somewhat successful in America in recent years, one of which being Lostprophets, who on one of their most recent records "Liberation Transmission", borrow heavily from the 'emocore' genre, and have successfully broadcasted their music over to the ever growing 'emocore' audience in America, where the genre began.

British bands do also often deal with issues in their lyrics that are very British, such as our politics or society, which is the main argument given as to why Britpop never really took of in America. 'Emocore', however draws solely on emotion and experiences generalisable to people in any developed country, such as loneliness and heartbreak, which may be why bands such as Lostprophets have found some success with American audiences.

Location Scouting

As we draw to a close with our pre production research, we are in the process of gathering all the information we have found and putting it towards our planning.

One factor we identified as a crucial aspect of how our production would turn out is the locations we used for filming. We have realised through this that in order to acquire quality shots at stylistic locations we need to do recce's (location scouting) of possible locations, assessing their lighting, accessibility, room for camera movement and style.

We plan first to go around our school, assessing possible locations around it. The reason why would prefer to shoot in school is because then actors would be easier to organise, and gear (amps, drum kit) would be easier to move to the shooting location.

As we assess each of the locations, we plan to film them and produce short clips on their pros and cons. The different band shot locations we need to find are:

• The protagonist's room: This is the room in which the main character is thinking and reflecting, and later on in the video thrashing around and throwing around paper and other things. We envisage this room as fairly plain, with stacks of work to do all over the room, and the room not being too stylistic as to represent a boring, average looking room which only represents work and everything the teenager should be. This will probably be either mine or Will's room, for the sake of practicality.
• The band shots location: This is the place where most of the video will take place, and as such this needs to be a really stylistic, spacious and well lit place. Naturally, with zero-budget and strict limitations as to where we're allowed to go, the room will not be perfect, nevertheless we're striving to find the closest to it possible. We are in the process of finding a room which we can make completely dark aside from strong lights on the band, as to create an emo-style feel to it, as well as having the band well lit enough for good quality footage. In these shots especially we identified lighting as a crucial subject in terms of the overall quality of the band shots, and so this is something we feel the need to focus on. We want to get as much portable lighting in as possible, as to create interesting effects with shadows, putting them behind the band for optical flare, amongst other things. We do not have many locations in mind for these shots, but as a compromise to a stylistic room we are thinking more along the lines of some kind of hall that we can light ourselves.

Edit- 20/01: We recognised lighting as a potential problem in filming in a large hall, as we would be providing domestic lighting which would not be sufficient in creating enough light in a room of that size. We thought as an alternative that we could use the sports hall of our school, and have all the lights on. This option would provide most (if not all) of the lighting we would need to film sufficiently. This option would also allow for shots to include the markings on the floor, as well as basketball hoops in the background, as to really enhance the 'high school' theme which significantly contributes specifically to American 'Emo-core.'

Another option is to light just the middle row of lights. This would allow for more stage-like footage, possibly giving a rundown edge to the 'high school' theme, also being more thematic. We could also bring our own light to provide either flare in the background or to illuminate the band more.

• The narrative shot locations: These locations, like the protagonist's room, we envisage as representing everything society expects the youth to be (within the ideas of this song/video), specifically dull, boring, average etc. For these locations we are going to use public streets, footpaths and suchlike locations. We want these to look grey, but also be well lit and colourful enough for good looking footage. If possible we want to avoid having civilians in these shots, as to emphasise the fact that the protagonist is imagining these happenings, and they are fragments of his imagination. The shots where the protagonist is running to where the band shots are will also be of this nature, in contrast to the main character who is in a state of utter distress and running through the various surroundings in desperation.

In a further post, we will put together a video with the locations we have scouted out, analysing them for their pros and cons in terms of style and practicality.

Further Narrative Ideas

Building on ideas mentioned in the previous post about our narrative, we have decided on a basic structure and image for our narrative which is to be intermingled with the band shots we are in the process of storyboarding.

The narrative will be based around a single male character, probably played by myself for convenience of not having to organise more actors and trying to explain the message and style of the video. Some shots will be of this character alone on a bed, looking somewhat distraught and surrounded by work documents which he will scatter and rip up near the climax. Throughout the video we will have a series of close ups of his face where he may be saying the lyrics followed by cuts to the other narrative scene, to make it appear as if they are all in his head. This is the centre point for our narrative and it will be how we display his breakdown, as he is alone and everything surrounding him is getting to him.

For the shots in his mind we have decided to have him singing and sometimes screaming the lyrics (to further convey emotion) to a woman who either was his lover or he has found himself infatuated with while she remains completely oblivious to his presence, as a metaphor for her ignoring his feelings for her.

At one point we intend to have her face him, and then walk straight through him and on to her current lover. We will achieve this by using the after effects editing program on Sim's computer. As the narrative climaxes shots will be cut more frequently to increase the pace until we move to our final shots of the main male character running to the location of the band shots only to find the place empty.

Textual Analysis - Numb (Linkin Park)

I have chosen to research this song and video as they are the embodiment of the sub-culture that is the main target audience for the 'emocore' genre. This song seemingly calls out to those who are sick and tired of being told to conform to societal norms, either by their parents or peers. This is a very 'emo' message to convey, as the target audience of emotionally troubled teens feel that they can relate to it in that they feel those around them try to force them into normality, not allowing them to express their emotional side. This song allows for the conveyance of those emotions in a very powerful manner, with the singer verging on screaming the lyrics in the chorus, which is a popular feature of heavier 'emocore' music. This idea is very much reflected in the lyrics with talk of expectations and 'pressure', also with the singer wanting to be 'more like me and less like you'. The lyrical style is very personal; reading almost as if it is a letter to a parent or peer who the sender is trying to break away from.

Right from the very beginning of the video the main character in the narrative is depicted as being very isolated and alone, with the opening shots being of her alone in what appears to be a very empty city, as if she is the only one there, or she is alone in her own world. This issue is shown throughout the video both at home and at her school or college. She seems to use her art and creativity as an escape from this loneliness and as a way of letting out her stored up anger and other emotion, as is common for people belonging to the target audience of 'emocore' music. This song is easy for members of it's target audience to relate to through this character, as many of them feel as though they are in the same situation. The editing is used to further enforce the idea of isolation, and of being on a different wavelength to everyone else around you when all of the action around her is sped up and sometimes blurred or taken out of focus, while she is left at normal speed, perhaps hinting at a feeling of her current situation getting her nowhere, while everyone around her lives out their normal and care free lives, not noticing her daily struggle. The final chorus sees this characters anger and repressed emotion come to a head as she lashes out at her own creative outlet for her emotion, throwing paint over her own artwork. At the very end she is shown running toward where the band have been playing, only to find them gone and for her to be left alone again to continue in her isolated existence.

The mise en scene for this video varies, with the narrative appearing to be a very normal school or college, with the main narrative character not being dressed hugely differently from other students, perhaps just taking slightly less care over her appearance. I believe this gives the video a certain generalisability, with the school's location not mattering, allowing for audience members to further relate to the video, as it could be something they see happening in their own school. The band shots take place in a what appear to be an empty church, which may be metaphorical in a sense, linking to the lack of faith in everything the narrative character feels, or may be a reference to parents of children like the narrative character, showing, along with other parts of the video, they are to blame too.

The camera work in this video includes a lot of movement, with many pan, crane and dolly shots, especially in band shots or shots that focus solely on the main narrative character. This may be to help convey the emotion with which the music is being played. It also shows the emotion of the main narrative character, with one crane shot moving down and briefly showing the cuts on her arm where she has self harmed, which is an act that is heavily associated with the 'emo' subculture and 'emocore' music. The band shots are clear, giving the audience a clear image of the artist performing, so they can remember them, allowing for a persona to be built up alongside the music that the record company they are signed to can exploit to sell tickets to live shows etc. and make more money. Musically, the editing is similar to other music videos I have seen in that during the melodic verses, shots are often longer, where as in the choruses the editing is sped up, with shorter shots. Although, sometimes in this video instead of speed editing up, the use of speeding up everything except for the main narrative character is used to create a more dramatic effect to accompany the heavier chorus parts.

Things we may take from this video are the showing of the feeling of isolation in our main narrative character and possibly the ending where the main narrative character runs into the location of the band shots to find the place abandoned. We will also use a dolly to create panning shots like the ones usd in this video whee possible.

Textual Analysis - Rooftops (Lost Prophets)

Lostprophets - Rooftops (A Liberation Broadcast) on MUZU.

This textual analysis is of Rooftops, by Lost Prophets. I am researching this video as the meaning of the song is about overcoming oppression and releasing angst and emotion, from a teenage perspective. Hence, this is an emotional narrative and video, and so ties in to the genre of the video we are planning to create.

I have also chosen Lost prophets to research as they are a British band, and because of this I can compare the nature of the video to American music videos. The similarities and differences between American and British Emo music and music videos is an interesting and important issue which will be fully explained in a future post.

The video starts with the band, who are on a helipad at night time. The significance of the helipad is that it is on the rooftop, reflecting the song, and is also a stylistic, well lit location. There are still shots of each member of the band, fading in and out of focus. These show the viewer each member of the band, each looking at the camera. The band shots break up the narrative, and tend to be either handheld or dolly shots, expressing the sense of movement in this sequence. In these shots the band are moving around a lot, expressing emotion through jumping, swinging hair around and suchlike, similar to many videos of this genre. The majority of the band are dressed in black, reflecting the stylistic nature of the Emo genre. The singer is dressed in a white jacket, in complete contrast to the other band members. This contrast highlights the singer as he as the frontman, and the role of the frontman in emo music (arguably) is to represent the emotion of the song, and sometimes the narrative. The role of the frontman in Emo music videos is another issue which will be discussed in a future post.

The narrative follows three teenagers, all fashion-wise following the emo genre conventions, in some way being oppressed by authority, for example parents or boss. The first narrative we see is at a table, where a middle class family is having dinner, the mother and the father arguing over the dinner table. These shots are in slow motion to emphasise the sense of drama and anger, as well as the girl's helplessness within the situation. She is sat between them, caught in the crossfire of their argument, and it is clear that emotion is boiling up inside her. How she is dressed reflects the emo genre conventions, and is in contrast to how her parents are dressed. Perhaps this contrast in dress relates to the differences between their social situations, that her parents fit in to the middle class suburban stereotype, whereas her dress reflects her inner emotions.

The next narrative is in the back of a car, presumably his dad's. He is also dressed in an 'emo' style, wearing a black t-shirt, bleached hair and wearing eyeliner. His dad is dressed in a suit, also reflecting and representing the modern day world. His dad is shouting at him, and like the first narrative his dad's voice is muted, so we feel a sense of isolation from this 'adult' world as an audience, as the 'narrator' does. The teenager is trying to ignore the shouts from his dad, as of the first narrative, trying to avoid conflict.

The following narrative is of, once again, a teenager who stylistically is following the emo genre conventions. He is working in a restaurant in the kitchen, has long hair and 'snakebite' piercings, also wearing an apron. He puts a plate of food on the worktop, but it is obvious that his boss is not happy with it as he is shouting and pointing across the kitchen at him. The teenager looks blankly at him, hiding the pain inside.

These narratives are broken up by band shots. The chorus lyrics are 'standing on the rooftops everybody scream your heart out' and it's as if these lyrics are directed at the characters in the narratives.

These characters finally get the message in a sense after the bridge, in which the singer is singing 'scream your heart out'. At this stage in the video, the video's protagonists start screaming, breaking all the glass and plates around them. This is in slow motion to emphasise the movement, and infer the turnaround of emotion, and of these narrators releasing their bottled up emotion.

The band shots are filmed with a low aperture lens; this is obvious as:

A) The shots are in low lighting (on a helipad at night), and so a low aperture lens would be necessary to capture these.

B) The shots fade in and out of focus often, and are of a really shallow depth of field. This shallow depth of field is a side effect of a low aperture lens. We would seek to do shallow depth of field shots in our production, as these give a great cinematic effect.

All together, this video is a great example of an 'emo' music video, with three strong narratives instead of one, to infer how this suffering goes on everywhere unnoticed. It uses cinematography very well, combining dolly, crane and handheld shots, as well as cinematic low aperture shots. These cinematic aspects I would like to carry through to our own production, although I would prefer to focus on one narrative to make it more immersive.

Cameras

One aspect of our production work that we identified as an important factor was the camera we used. The camera controls many aspects of the visuals of the music video, and the choice of camera has implications on the general quality of the video. Here are some key factors as to what the choice of camera can have an effect on.

• Pixel Resolution: This statistic represents the width and height of the camera footage in pixels, for example 640x400. This can also be abbreviated by the width, for example 720p.
• Aperture: This is depicted by the lens of the camera, which is usually fixed in consumer level cameras. The aperture controls how much light the camera captures. The lower the number, the wider the hole in the centre of the lens, and so the more light the camera captures producing a clearer, brighter picture. This also has an effect on the depth of field; the lower the aperture, the shallower the depth of field.
• FPS: this is how many frames per second the camera captures. This can be an issue when filming fast motion footage such as sports, or when slowing down the footage for a slow motion effect.

Originally we were going to be using the school cameras, but these presented strict limitations to us, refraining us from using particular shots, angles and suchlike. They also limited the quality to that of the camcorder, being about a 640 x 400 resolution.

We sought for an alternative to this, striving for a wider range of focal lengths, better light reception, and higher general quality.

Over the last few years, many D-SLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras have had inbuilt HD movie modes. Though the sound quality is not the standard of the school cameras on these, the visual quality is impeccable as the camera is designed for photography, and the sound quality is unimportant for the shooting of a music video. Photography is one of my personal interests, so I have a few lenses which would fit on a Nikon DSLR, including a Tokina 11-16mm lens. This is an ultra-wide angle lens, and would provide really effective, quirky wide shots of the band. It would also stretch perspectives for shots panning backwards and forwards, creating an interesting, immersive effect.

We have found a friend who we could borrow a Nikon D5000 off; this is the latest standard amateur Nikon camera, featuring a HD 720p movie function.

This camera would allow us to create HD 720p footage, with the quality being the specs of the camera. I have several lenses myself which I could use on this, including the following:

• Nikkor 18-70mm f/3.5: This is a standard kit zoom lens, with a reasonably low aperture, allowing light capture in dark conditions.
• Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8: This is an ultra-wide angle lens, with a low aperture which would be very efficient in capturing low light footage.
• Nikkor 50mm f/1.8: This is a fixed focal length lens, with an extremely low aperture. This allows for telephoto shots in very dark light, and also having a very shallow depth of field, putting the background (or foreground) completely out of focus, an effect we consider desirable in our filming.

All of these lenses create effects that we intended to use in our video, and so using this Nikon DSLR can capture all of these to create a generally higher quality video, with a range of lens based effects.

Textual analysis – Streetcar (Funeral for a Friend)

This music video sets the tone for its genre and target audience unmistakably with the setting being quite clearly a school or college, which relates to the target audience of this genre, which is mainly composed of ‘emotional’ teenagers who will presumably attend some form of college or school.

The mise en scene furthers this, as most of the characters are in school uniform. Also, the band are predominantly dressed in black and red, which are both colours heavily associated with the ‘emocore’ genre, especially the black shirt, red tie and black, skinny jeans. Even the hairstyle of the singer is considered to be ‘emo’, as he has a sweeping side fringe that almost covers one of his eyes.

Lyrics are also tied into this genre and target audience, with the song containing emotional lyrics based around the idea of distance, with the singer telling a magazine the song was about “being so far from friends and family that you feel disconnected from them” which is a subject many members of this target may be able to relate to, with friends leaving school, or if they themselves are leaving to go off to college or university, and are leaving everyone behind.

The visuals used in the video can also be related to the target audience, as the singer is pictured in many shots to be singing in front of a cabinet full of trophies, which is most likely an ironic statement as he is representing the student population who are seen as strange or outcast from normal social groups. This idea of not being accepted may be further echoed in the shots of the girl putting on a bullet proof vest and brass knuckles walking around the school observing, almost as if she is in a post-war environment (walking around after the other events portrayed in the song have happened) and has defended herself from such encounters, although she does not appear to be frightened of this, almost as if her character is portraying the normality of romance gone wrong. This and other narrative shots seem to play on the idea of a school being a form of battleground between both different social groups and between males and females when feelings are involved, but that one party always seems to come out of it worse off. There are shots of couples throughout, with differing emotions, from lust to anger, perhaps showing the varying stages of relationships, and echoing the lyrics “I can’t feel the same about you anymore”. At the songs climax, these shots are put into slow motion in order to emphasise the portrayal of the deep emotion of the various situations, it also cuts between the two couples very quickly directly before the songs climax, with us being brought back to normal speed with a trophy smashing the glass of the cabinet behind the lustful couple.

There is a focus on the band’s performance, with many band shots appearing, of not only the singer but the whole band, in order to emphasise the energy of their live performance, and to almost advertise their live shows to create a greater revenue for them and the record company they are signed to. The focus on energy and performance is particularly prevalent in British bands (which this band are) perhaps because they cannot create as great a revenue as their American counterparts, and need to sell tickets to live shows to remain profitable.

This video could also being either a satirical or ironic view on teenage drama television shows; showing a more gritty, realistic and emotional portrayal of teenage life within a school.

Constructing a Narrative

One of the things we identified as an important aspect of an 'emo' music video is the narrative involved, narrative meaning a story created in a constructive format, or telling the story of the song within music videos.

The vast majority of 'emocore' music videos focus around their subjects, either directly or abstractly, and due to the style which focuses around emotional issues such as break ups, jealousy, depression and such like, the narratives reflect these with often quite controversial videos, the Jimmy Eat World 'Pain' video being a good example, in which the protagonist tries to take away his emotional pain from a break up by hurting himself physically, such as jumping into walls, throwing himself down stairs amongst other methods.

The lyrics of the song 'Pain' are more or less about the pain the narrator is going through from his break up, and 'taking the pain away'. Because of this, we have decided to focus the narrative of our video around these aspects.

Creating a realistic narrative in this style will be hard as the issues focus around self-abuse, depression and drugs. These subjects are hard to tackle whilst maintaining a professional feel to the video.

The reason that these subjects are hard to reflect is because we are limited in the way of actors and equipment, as we are using consumer cameras and actors our own age. Using these alongside with limited time and £0 budget there is a limit to how professionally and realistically we can reflect these issues. We identified this as a problem that we needed to try and overcome, and so we set to finding ways over this obstacle by researching and thinking of what we can do with the equipment and actors we have.

Though we have not constructed a final and complete narrative, we have many ideas for how we could structure it. We decided that we will focus the narrative around a teenage boy, probably around the seventeen to eighteen age region. It will be about his unrequited love for a girl that couldn't care less for him, and his frustration and depression while trying to capture the affection of the girl he loves.

We decided also that for the narrative we could cut between realtime in the protagonist's bedroom as he is getting more and more frustrated, as well as in his head his imaginings of trying to get her attention. Within these shots, she would be going about her everyday life, completely oblivious to him, imagining he is there, so perhaps partially transparent or cleverly framed so his presence is ambiguous. Later on in the song, the guitar solo would start and the narrative would climax, perhaps including the main character having a mental breakdown. The reasoning for this is that I have noticed in several videos that the narrative and the song reach a climactic point simultaneously. An example of this is the Fall Out Boy 'Thnks Fr Th Mmrs' video, in which in the last chorus Pete Wentz starts smashing up the stage set.

Textual Analysis - "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows" (Brand New)

I have chosen to research the song 'The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows' by Brand New as it is a song that has a similar sound and stylistic features to ‘Pain’ by Jimmy Eat World, the music video also contains elements of both a fragmented narrative and band shots; both of which will be used in our music video. The band also has a similar target audience in that it is aimed at mainly teenage, emotionally driven people.

Stylistically the video is very dark, thus in keeping with the ‘emocore’ genre and features. Furthermore the video features an event as its narrative [the car crash and subsequent hospitalization] that in real life can be both a very traumatic and emotional experience. This also keeps with the genre features of ‘emocore’ music. As well as this the showing of mild blood and bruises also fits stylistically with the ‘emo’ genre.

The music video itself is based around a traffic incident involving a car containing two characters (the male being the band’s singer) who we assume are in a relationship. We do not see until the end, as he appears throughout, although he does fade or flicker from time to time which gives the audience a clue as to his fate that the male character dies in the car. The female is then rushed off to hospital for her injuries.

The band shots within this video are mainly very short clips that are cut together to emphasise the pace and intensity of the chorus of the song, which is when most of the band shots are shown. They are also intermingled with narrative shots when climatic events in the video are happening. These events usually coincide with the start of one of the more intense parts of the song, which allows for added dramatic effect. For the most part the band shots are also moving, either panning or just moving slightly as they are mostly handheld, adding to the grit and realism of the band’s performance, and giving it a sense of authenticity. One of my favourite parts about this movement is the way the camera seems to bounce between both singers in the chorus. The band shots also include many close ups of the various members of the band (mainly the singer) which is most likely due to the influence of the record label, who see bands for the media products they produce, and thus try to give the band a stylistic image or persona that will make fans want to go and see them on a live tour or buy their albums, both of which will make money for the record company the band is signed to.

The singer also appears prominently in the narrative, which is fragmented, as is the case with most music videos, with in this case, the audience finding more as the video goes on. The first narrative shots fit nicely with the soft intro, before the song kicks in and it becomes very fragmented, and is intermingled with band shots, giving the strong impression that something dramatic has happened. The narrative has been kept simple but effective, with a car crash, the ride to hospital, and then what happens once in hospital, this has allowed for the director and his team to add to this massively in a stylistic sense without overcomplicating the video. The camera shots are designed to allow the audience into only a little information at a time, such as in the ambulance when only one side of the singer’s face can be seen, which appears to be fine until it cuts to a shot of him head on and we see that the other side of his face is bruised and cut. An editing effect used is him gradually fading away, which is present a couple of times in the video, and gives the sense that perhaps he isn’t really there, and is a spirit or ghost. This idea is further shown by the fact that none of the characters apart from the girl seem to notice him; leaving him in the ambulance and not tending to his injuries. This gives the idea that maybe he only there in her head. Such as when she is being pushed along the corridor in the hospital bed and the camera cuts between shots of just the ceiling, him leaning over her, singing the lyrics, the doctor leaning over her and speaking and shots of her face. The other band members also make a brief appearance in the narrative, in the waiting room, which may be another subtle way of the record label trying to sell them as much as their trying to sell their products.

The music video plays highly on the sound of the song at it’s different points, with longer shots during the slower parts, such as the shots of the singer presumably praying in front of candles during the bridge before the last, dramatic part of the song that begins with the girl’s life monitor showing she has stopped breathing. Equally the chorus’ are played alongside lots of fast paced editing between band shots and narrative that show the emotion created by the situation as well as the energy of the band’s performance.

A member of the band described the meaning of the song as "A little bit about regret. How there can be problems in a relationship and they get ignored. And how that often ends up as a broken home or some kind of bad situation down the road. It's kind of something that if it wasn't overlooked in the first place, you can kind of get through it." I think this is somewhat portrayed in the video as the couple in the narrative do not have a chance to overlook any problems between them as everything ends so suddenly and unexpectedly for them. It may also be building further on this point by imploring viewers not to take their relationship for granted and try everything they can to make it work, as it may soon be gone.

Things I would take from this video and incorporate into ours would be the good mix between narrative and band shots, and also the fact that the singer is not recognised by the other characters except one, as this is similar to an idea we have been thinking about using for our narrative, and the psychological and imaginitive factors that can be explored through that.

Underground and Mainstream music

The term 'underground', first coined in the 1970's, means music that has remained true to it's real and loyal fans, and has not sold out to 'mainstream' culture.

Emo music is a good example of this, as most of it's bands have appealed to alternative hardcore audiences. The movement itself broke off from the mainstream hardcore punk movement of mid-1980's, and was pioneered for several years by bands such as Rites of Spring and Embrace.

Like many other underground subgenres, emocore retained it's own small fan-base for a long time, specifically until the 00's, in which time period bands such as Jimmy Eat World started to emerge and redefine the scene, without being labelled as sellouts. There are a few obvious differences between underground emocore and mainstream emocore, stylistic differences, which can be seen in various music videos.

An example of this is Enter Shikari's 'Sorry You're Not A Winner' video. Though this song is very popular and mainstream these days, the band was small at the time of it's release. Because of this, the video was filmed on a low budget at a friends house, using friends as extras, and on substandard cameras, with mostly handheld shots. This is in stark contrast to mainstream emocore music, and example being Alkaline Trio. The song 'Time To Waste' by Alkaline Trio was filmed in a big empty warehouse, with sweeping camera shots, smart dressing, and general high quality, stylistic footage.

These differences, though perhaps being due to budget, reflect the nature of the band's music, and give real insight into themselves as well as the fan base.

In our music video, we are going to try and create a mainstream looking product, in a similar style to bands such as Alkaline Trio and Jimmy Eat World. We will do this through the means of camera work and mise-en-scene, but also blending elements of underground emocore into it, such as the grungy narrative.

Target Audience

Emocore as a genre has seen a huge surge in popularity since the late 90’s/early 2000’s with many bands, such as Jimmy Eat World, Brand New, Senses Fail and Taking Back Sunday finding success.

Its target audience in recent years seems to have been emotionally driven teenagers who base their taste in music on the degree by which they can relate to the lyrics in the songs as well as the emotions provoked by the thought provoking vocals and dramatic guitar.

Furthermore the traditional audience for such bands would be teenagers that have emotional difficulty and can use the emotional style of music as an outlet for their repressed emotion, often growing very attached to certain bands. An example of this is the exclusive fan group of popular emo band My Chemical Romance, named the ‘MCRmy’ which has thousands of members who consider themselves to be die hard fans of the band, and even claim that their music has helped them through hard times, or improved their life in some way.

Exclusive fan groups seem to be another way in which record companies and recording artists can extract more money from fans, such as the popular pop band McFly who have just today unveiled their new fan site ‘Super City’ which charges a membership fee of £40 a year.

However, as Jimmy Eat World have been signed to a major label for a while now their target audience has expanded greatly to almost all teenagers and young adults, even drawing in some older listeners too. Their single ‘The Middle’, which has been their most successful single to date peaked at number five in the charts and received airtime in several radio stations, along with the video being shown on large music channels such as MTV. This allowed for a greater distribution to a greater audience.

Now the target audience for the music of Jimmy Eat World is very general, simply calling out to anybody that takes an interest in either their sound or lyrics.

As far as audience demographics are concerned I believe our main target audience would be made up of teenagers, who will most likely still be in education and living with their parents. There is no particular gender bias within our target audience. Our target audience will also be single, and perhaps feel alone. I believe the typical psychographics of our target audience will be those who have a low sense of self-esteem and very little confidence. They will be the kind of people that can let their emotions out while listening to the emocore genre of music, as it leaves them in an emotionally charged state. Emocore aims to help those who find themselves depressed often, and need a release from bad emotions.

We aim to draw in this target audience through the emotional charge the song already contains, and by creating a video that reflects this emotion and has a very energetic yet dark feel, with emphasis on repressed emotion being brought to the surface and expressed.

Record Label Research

A record label is a brand that markets music recordings and music videos in order to promote bands signed to the label, and generate profit through the distribution and sale of music through tools such as the internet (music downloads), record stores, radio and television (music video channels). Record labels also manage the copyright of music produced by them and bands signed by them.

After receiving recognition and fame, some artists find that it benefits them financially to release albums and singles without the aid of a record label, Jimmy Eat World being no exception; self-producing their sixth album ‘Chase This Light’ released in October 2007, along with the singles ‘Big Casino’ and ‘Always Be’.

Jimmy Eat World, like many emocore style bands, started out life playing in the indie underground scene in the mid 90’s before being noticed by a talent scout from Capitol Records. Most emocore bands that sign to major labels are seen as ‘sell-outs’ by die hard emocore fans that enjoy the underground scene and abhor the mainstream music culture, style and sound. Jimmy Eat World, however, have found themselves still widely excepted as an emocore band signed to a major label, without being heralded as ‘sell-outs’ or conforming to the traditional mainstream rock band sound. This is somewhat due to the idea of emocore being a very emotional genre, with gripping sound and heartfelt lyrics that are meant to provoke emotion and connect with fans as opposed to just focusing on what will generate a large profit. It would seem apparent that Jimmy Eat World, however, have managed to combine the two by connecting with and relating to what is an ever growing fan base hat they have drawn in.

Jimmy Eat World, like most bands started out releasing singles and EP’s, followed by a full-length album on a small, local, independent label known as ‘Wooden Blue Records’ and will have made the majority of their money through playing their material at live shows in the hope of being noticed. An independent label as one not controlled by a major record label, even if they are part of large conglomerates.

They then signed to major music label Capitol Records, and eventually Interscope Records after Capitol planned to shelf one of their releases. Major record labels are usually very large conglomerate companies within themselves, and may have a parent and sister companies that are also very large organisations. This gives them a massive budget, allowing for them to offer the highest quality recording from world-class recording studios. It also allows them to market their products to huge audiences through various advertisements and promotional material, such as music videos, which can have extensive budgets to make them as aesthetically pleasing as possible, often spending in excess of $100,000. The money spent on a particular artist or band depends hugely on their popularity as record labels are still businesses, and look to maximise their profits were possible.

Jimmy Eat World - Background + Song (Pain)

This is a blog entry about the band we are constructing our music video around, 'Jimmy Eat World'.

Jimmy Eat World are an American Alternative rock band, originating from Mesa, Arizona, formed in 1993. The band lineup is a typical rock setup, being frontman playing rhythm guitar and vocals, lead guitarist (plus backing vocals), bassist (plus backing vocals) and drummer.

The band released two albums through the record label 'Capitol Records', being 'Static Prevails' (On which album the band first started to experiment with emocore) and 'Clarity', within which Jim Adkins took over lead vocals, replacing Tom Linton. On this record label, the band remained on the underground indie scene, attracting attention but still within the alternative music scene.

Jimmy Eat World's main breakthrough was with the album 'Bleed American', on which the band decided to not rely on a record label, supporting itself with touring and by compiling it's previously-released singles on their EP release (singles). This album features a few famous singles such as 'Sweetness', and 'The Middle'. The middle is the band's biggest-selling single yet, reaching #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

In 2004, after lengthy touring supporting the album 'Bleed American', the band started to work on a follow-up album. The band also hired a new producer, 'Gil Norton', due to their old producer's ('Trombino'), unavailabilities. The alubm was released titled 'Futures' in October 2004, with 'Pain' as the leading song on the album.

The song 'Pain' off the 'Futures' album is a song about a broken relationship with an ex-girlfriend, and how the narrator is trying to persuade themselves that they are over the breakup, and is either relating the feeling to quitting drugs or actually taking them, emphasising that it 'takes the pain away'. This song we have chosen to do for our sequence, as there are a lot of stylistic themes within it for us to build on. These stylistic themes are mainly features of the 'emo' conventions, which I have referred to and described in a previous post.

Textual Analysis - Time To Waste (Alkaline Trio)

On May 24th, 2005, Alkaline Trio released the album 'Crimson', which featured the single 'Time To Waste'.

The music video represents the band as a band following the 'emo' music conventions, both through their music, as well as their style. It does so in multiple ways, which I will explore further later on in this post. The overview of the music video is that the band all arrive at an abandoned hangar, in which they set up their instruments and play the song, doing so in smart attire with a gothic edge to it.

I have chosen to research this video is that there is not a narrative, and so the whole video is focused around making the band appear as stylistic as possible, and so there are aspects of it that we can bring forward into the making of our own music video.

Here are the lyrics to the song, which I shall be referring to throughout the post.

There's someone down below blowing you a kiss.

They watch from their windows

as all arms fall to their sides,

and all eyes fix on the death of tomorrow.

And you found everything you need

to make a life complete,

completely revolting and they have safety and relief

For sale down the street.

I see you in line every day

You had time to waste and I'm not sorry,

such a basket case, hide the cutlery.

I had time to kill, it's dead and buried.

You've got guts to spill but no one trustworthy.

These creatures are waking up in these dark trees.

Awaiting like vultures.

Eyes roll back turn white in time to feed

They salivate in hunger.

for you, and everything they need

to make a death complete,

completely unnatural and salvation lies

behind those dead eyes that watch you while you sleep every night, and

You had time to waste and I'm not sorry,

such a basket case, hide the cutlery.

I had time to kill, it's dead and buried.

You've got guts to spill but no one trustworthy.

You had time to waste and I'm not sorry,

such a basket case, hide the cutlery.

I had time to kill, it's dead and buried.

You've got guts to spill but no one trustworthy.

The video starts with the three band members arriving at an empty hangar, all in 3 separate black cars. The band are smartly dressed, wearing smart attire with a dark theme (black shirts, dark suits etc). The camera shots as they're arriving at all smooth panning dolly and tripod shots, inferring the sincerity of the occasion. As they arrive, people are setting up the instruments and equipment, and the band walk in a line towards all the gear. They put on their instruments and are poised to start the song, and as the main riff of the song comes in bright lights come on and they thrash around, playing the song. In this section of the video, all of the camera shots are handheld, naturally to enhance the energy of the band shots. As the song progresses in to the verse, the music has got quieter and the camera shots follow suit, becoming steadier handheld shots as well as dolly shots. As there are bright lights behind the band, the shots of the singer flare behind him and illuminate the back of his head, a very stylistic shot which is something we would want to imitate, explore and develop in our own media production. An interesting factor to take into consideration with this music video is that the band is facing the entrance to the hangar, and as the camerawork is all inside the hangar the entrance is over exposed and appears on screen as bright white, representing the band almost facing the unknown, reflected in the lyrics: "and all eyes fixed, on the death of tomorrow".

The band shots like this continue for the majority of the song, with mostly dolly and handheld shots, revolving around the band and looking at them from different angles, both with the flare of the bright lights behind as well as the overexposure from the entrance to the hangar. In the middle of the song, the hangar doors close and the lights get brighter inside.

In the bridge of the song as all the instruments cut out to just the piano heard in the intro, all of the lights go off in the hangar, shown in a tripod shot facing lengthways down the hangar, representing almost a CCTV like bit of footage, perhaps introducing a theme that what they are doing is illegal, that they shouldn't be in the hangar. The action of the shots slows down to very slowmoving handheld shots. In this bridge, there are bursts of all the instruments to break up the piano, and in these a bright white strobe like light illuminates the whole hangar as well as the band, and this is effective as a huge curtain is falling down behind the band, and with the strobe is appears to be falling down in a stop-frame fashion. This is a great, stylistic and haunting image, but something we would not be able to include or reflect somehow due to our budget.

The band then proceed to play the last chorus, illuminated by these flashing lights, with even more energy than before, and this enhances the progression in the video. The music ends on a sudden note, and the video fades out to black, on a shot of the whole band.

Overall I think this music video is mediocre, but this is from the perspective that it does not include any form of narrative, and so is not very interesting to watch. Despite this, the band shots are very nicely filmed and are very stylistic, with great and relevant mise-en-scene. These elements I would like to carry forward and explore in the making of our music video, except making it our own by adding a narrative.

The 'Emo' genre conventions

The song that we our building our video around for our A2 coursework, 'Pain' by 'Jimmy Eat World', is generally regarded as an example of the 'Emo' genre. To create a stylistic video playing on this theme, we have decided to research the conventions so we can easily express them during production.

The term 'emo' was first coined in the mid 1980's, during the hardcore punk movement in Washington DC. This minor, lamenting form of punk music was originally described as 'emotional hardcore', and later 'emocore'. This movement was pioneered by bands such as 'Embrace' and 'Rites of Spring', and grew very rapidly in popularity, and as other bands sprung up playing this style, it changed and developed over the years.

'Emocore' only really became mainstream in the early 2000's, with bands such as 'Dashboard Confessional', as well as 'Jimmy Eat World' themselves.

As the musical genre has developed over time, it has grown an associated fashion, being based around skinny-fit jeans, studded belts, dark colours as well as the hairstyles, often dark with a side swept fringe. This fashion is based around the ideas of negative emotions, of remorse and lamentation.

Jimmy Eat World is a perfect example of the emo genre, being one of the bands that brought it to mainstream music culture. Their appearance as well as their music reflects the genre, with many band shoots emphasising dark colours and a 'washed out' look. An example of this is their 'Futures' album cover (album featuring 'Pain'), which features a man in a hoody, standing and staring at a broken bus shelter.

Textual Analysis - Thnks Fr Th Mmrs (Fall Out Boy)

I decided to conduct research on Fall Out Boy's 'Thnks Fr Th Mmrs' as this band is a similar genre (emocore) to Jimmy Eat World. The two bands share several similarities, namely their lineup (4 male members), target audience (14-20 year olds), and the ideas they play around with through their songs.

The video on the surface is a romcom/emo style video about Fall Out Boy trying to film the video itself, directed and filmed by a crew of chimpanzees. The video starts in a dark hall, and when the band start playing they are stopped by the 'director' chimpanzee. The video progresses through various humorous scenarios involving the chimpanzees, and also a scene in which the bassist, Pete Wentz, kisses Kim Kardashian.

Through different cinematographic techniques, the video achieves various enhanced effects:

Camerawork: In the intro, the camera is on tracks to get smooth shots panning forward, to enhance the elegant feel of this scene. The lighting in this section is also dark with light only focusing on the band members (which adds to the emo style), and the main light comes on when the chimpanzee shouts 'cut' to intensify the comedic anti-climax. The shots are also smooth rising and panning shots at the end, apart from when Pete loses his temper with the chimpanzees and starts smashing the equipment, at which stage the camerawork is very jerky to intensify the chaotic feel.

Mise-En-Scene: Throughout the video, the band members are dressed in suits, due to the elegant feel that the chimpanzees are aiming for with their filming. They also wear these 'offset' in the video. Props and scenery include the chimpanzee offset buffet (consisting mostly of bananas) to add to the comedy, and also the big 'FOB' letters on stage at the end which add to the show-like feel of the video.

This video works effectively for it's romcom purpose, and is also relevant to the target audience. It does this by adopting the sort of humour which teenagers generally find funny, as well as playing on the public's views of Pete Wentz.

Though the video is fit for it's purpose, the only elements that I would want to carry from it are the stylistic effects, namely the 'emo' feel aswell as the elegant cinematography and mise-en-scene adopted in the opening scene.

Blog Introduction

This is a blog that we (Simeon Lees and Will North) are going to use as an outlet to display our research, ideas, planning and development as we strive to create and refine a finished music video, and ancillary tasks (digipak cover and magazine advertisement).

We have decided to form the music video around the song 'Pain' By 'Jimmy Eat World'. Our reasoning for this is that 'Pain' is a very stylistic song, true to the 'emo' genre of the band. This genre bears it's own fashions which are a great and versatile base on which to build and expand our own ideas, with which we can complete the project with a successful, stylistic video.