Storyboard for my Music Video

First Shot: The main character is seen laying in bed and wakes up. The shot will be a wide shot to show not only the main character but their room as well. The main character will be in their pajamas in their bedroom.

Second Shot: This shot will show the alarm clock with the time slightly after 12 to match the lyrics. The shot will be a close up. Ideally, the alarm clock will be pink and sparkly to match the main character’s personality.

Third Shot: This shot will be an extreme close up of the alarm clock, zooming in from the previous shot.

Fourth Shot: This shot will be an aerial shot of a breakfast meal. This shot will be in the kitchen, but it will not be clear in this shot.

Fifth Shot: The next shot will be another aerial shot but will show more. The main character will push the plate away. The main character will still be in pajamas. The kitchen will be more shown in this shot.

Sixth Shot: This next shot will be a medium long shot of the main character in the bathroom. The main character will be in their pajamas with slightly dull lighting and will duck down right before the shot ends.

Seventh Shot: This shot will show the main character coming back into frame. The main character will be in regular clothes with makeup on and a fancy bag in their hand. The lighting will be slightly brighter to establish more of a difference. This shot will be another medium long shot.

Eighth Shot: This shot will be a long shot of the main character and her friends. They will all be dressed to go out and will be at the front door of the main character’s house. The lighting will ideally be bright, but it will be dependent on the weather that day.

Ninth Shot: This next shot will be of the group of friends driving to the mall. Since none of us are legal drivers, the car will not be moving but the friends will act as if it is. The shot will be a tracking shot as if the car was actually moving.

Tenth Shot: This shot will be a long shot of the main character opening up the dressing room door and stepping out in a fancy dress. This scene will take place in a store in the mall. The goal of this scene is to show off the characters having fun at the mall.

Eleventh Shot: This shot will be the same as before except it will be with one of the friends.

Twelfth Shot: This shot will be the same as the previous shot but with a different friend.

Thirteenth Shot: This shot will be a wide shot of all the friends in the pool having fun. There will be pool floats in the pool and all of the friends will be having fun. The friends will all be in bathing suits.

Fourteenth Shot: This shot will be of the friends walking toward the living room for their sleepover. They will all be dressed in pajamas with dim lighting.

Fifteenth Shot: This shot will be a four shot of all the friends sitting on the couch watching a movie. The movie will not be seen but the light reflecting from the movie will be shown on them. They will be eating popcorn and other candy.

Sixteenth Shot: This last shot will be of the friends with pillows having a pillow fight.

Planning for My Music Video

• Song: Perfect Day by Hoku

• Props: 

• Fancy Bags for us to use at the mall

• Pillows for a pillow fight at a sleepover

• Sunglasses we will be at the pool/beach

• Car Keys to show off a girls trip

• Costumes: 

• Party Dresses to try on at the mall

• Crop Tops & Jeans/Shorts for shopping at the mall

• Bathing Suits for the pool/beach

• Pajamas for the sleepover

• Schedule

• 11/17 start to storyboard

• 11/23 go to the mall and start to film

• 11/24 go to siena’s house and film

• 11/30 start editing

• 12/2 finalize project and submit

• Locations

• Siena’s House to film the sleepover scenes, pool scenes, and getting ready

• Mall to film us shopping and trying on different extravagant clothes

• Beach to film us swimming and having fun

• Backup Plan:

• If we cannot film at Siena’s House, we will film at Camille’s

• If we cannot film at the mall, we will prolong the other scenes

• If we cannot film at the beach, we will film at the pool

• If we cannot film on the specified dates, we will find other dates and adjust our timeline

  

Research Blog: Music Video Conventions

To research our music video, we first watched the music video made by Hoku. The music video had many different cross cuts with scenes from Legally Blonde. There was a split screen of the singer from Hoku and the character Elle from Legally Blonde to show how the two are similar. There are various medium long shots, medium shots, and medium close ups to showcase the singer of Hoku as the stereotypical perfect girl. The setting in which the music video is taking place is constantly changing, from the singer getting her nails done to shopping to walking on the street. A frequent setting shown is all of Hoku in a grassy area to show the band playing. The use of different costume changes, makeup, bright lighting, and props truly establishes this singer to have the perfect life and be the perfect girl.

The second video we watched was Legally Blonde’s intro featuring Perfect Day. Just like Hoku’s music video, the intro establishes Elle Woods to be the perfect girl. The intro shows different parts of Elle's life (her college campus, her friends, her sorority, her dog) to showcase her having the perfect life and having a perfect day. In the intro, there is a letter being passed to Elle. There is a tracking shot of a girl on a bicycle with the letter. The intro features several closeups of Elle: brushing her hair, putting a necklace on, shaving her legs, and many others. The girls in the intro all have costumes and makeup that match the sorority girl image. 

The final video we watched was the opening scene of Clueless. Similar to the other videos, the opening scene shows Cher Horowitz having an amazing life. There are some pan shots, tracking shots, and zooms to show Cher’s fast moving life. The opening scene shows an aerial shot of Cher and her friends driving. Cher has a voiceover in this to explain why her life is so amazing. 

All in all, the conventions in these videos establish the featured girl to be the perfect girl with the perfect life, where the perfect day is basically every day. 

Forming the Group

On the music video I am part of a group of four. I am working with Kaitlyn, Sofia, and Camille. We decided to work together since we are all in the same friend group. We all have similar interests, making us a great group for this project. We can easily collaborate to make this project. 

For our music video, we decided on the song Perfect Day by Hoku. It was Kaitlyn's idea. She suggested the song and we all agreed to it. Kaitlyn came up with the idea from the movie Legally Blonde. The song is the introduction song of a popular early 2000s teen movie. This allows the research portion to be easier.

Our group is taking the same class, but we have it different periods. This will make the project more difficult. We will have to find other times to talk about the project and work on it. Although, we won't be able to do all of it during class.

We are all excited to start the project. There are so many ideas of ours to add to our music video. I am so happy we are all able to work together. I can't wait to start working on the project. It will be so much fun for all of us.

Back to the Beginning

Hello to my lovely readers, today is the day I start my music video project. I'll be posting lots of different blogs to update you throughout the process. After the last project, I feel confident and ready for the music video.

The music video is a chance to work on a different type of product in the film making industry. This project will be much more different than the last. The project is longer, over double the length. This means the storyboard, filming time, and editing time will all be longer. Although, the projects have their similarities. Both projects have the same process of creating them. From research, to planning, storyboarding, filming, editing, and reflecting, the process is the same.

The music video will hopefully be easier. After the commercial, my film making skills have developed. I now understand the process and can do it all again for this project. Going back to the beginning is a second chance.

I am very excited for this project. When I was younger, I would make funny, childish music videos with my friends. They were nothing serious and all for fun, but I loved making them. Getting the chance to make a serious music video, would be very fun and exciting.

Starting over in the process is interesting, it will give me a chance to fix any mistakes from the first time. All in all, I'm ready to take you all along this journey with me.

Reflecting

1. How does your product use or challenge conventions AND how does it represent social groups or issues?

Before making the commercial, we did some research to look at other commercials and look at similarities as well as differences between them. A common theme was focusing entirely on the backpack and show that the backpack is durable, basically not having a storyline at all. The commercial that my group made had a storyline, but still the primarily focus is on the backpack. The story shows a faulty backpack that does not work and allows Jansport backpacks to look like a better backpack. The commercial takes place at a school, where a popular issue is bullying. In the commercial, two girls walk by making fun of the girl with the faulty backpack. In the end, the commercial has all three girls with Jansport backpacks walking away.

2. How does your product engage with audiences AND how would it be distributed as a real media text?

Our commercial was for a school project, so there was no need to advertise or distribute it. However, writing these blogs has been a way to engage with audiences. Detailing every step of the process for the commercial: storyboarding, filming, and editing has been a way to connect with the audience. If it were to be distributed, it would be shown as a commercial in between a television show/movie or as an advertisement on a YouTube video either before, during, or after.

3. How did your production skills develop throughout this project? 

The process of making this commercial allowed myself to understand the film making process and to really learn what the different camera angles and movements are. There are a lot of different steps that come as preparation to a commercial, something that I was not all aware about before. Since I was part of a group for this project, not every production still developed. For example, editing the project which can include adding audio to the video separately or adding transitions between different scenes. Using different filming techniques such as camera angles, camera movements, costumes, and props have developed. Knowing how long a shot should be and how many takes is also important and something that improved for me with making this commercial.

4. How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project? 

Majority of the technology used in this project was in the editing, the part in the commericial where I had little involvement in. Technology was also used in filming by the director, but I was an actor. The only other places in the process involving technology were research and blogging. For research, I was the one who found the videos for the group to look at, which were online at YouTube. For the blogs, I wrote the group blogs as long as my own individual blogs, using technology to type them up.

Our Final Commercial

Welcome back to my lovely readers, I know I said that previous blog was the last one about the commercial. However, I was wrong that was not the final blog. Throughout this process of this commercial, I have learned so many different things. When I first made my group, we started research and planning nearly immediately. Storyboarding was the next step, when we filmed I learned to make sure to plan your story board exactly as you want. It is best to stick to your storyboard and not change it during filming, the storyboard is created for you to know what will happen in the commercial. While filming, the lesson learned was to just go for it. The thought of filming made me nervous but just diving right in was the way to go. In the editing process, even though I wasn't the one to do most of the editing, I learned to have a plan of what you want to be edited. Even if it is a loose plan, it's still helpful to have. This commercial has helped me to be prepared for the future projects, it allowed me to understand the filming process and truly know how it works.