Molly La Fosse's Media Blog

I found the process of researching similar media products really helpful because it gave us lots of new location ideas for our music video, a planning aspect that we were struggling with. We made a list of all the different locations that were used in the various videos, which I have typed up below... Bar Dressing room parisian apartment, streets of paris The metro Bedroom, in the bed Bathroom, in a bath Outside, in a field or something  In a car Streets at night, lit by car headlights High school Lit studio - pink lights, pink and white walls Tennis court (retro) Pink bicycles Open road by a desert (Texas - obviously not achieveable for us) Next week, in Monday's lesson, we plan to finally decide on a solid location for our video, using those similar media products to inspire us. 

This week we conducted research on music artists of a similar genre to our chosen artist - Joni Payne - and studied their music videos, looking for similarities and differences between them. To do this we decided the genre of the song Hold Ya, which we are using for our music video, is alternative pop. We then used Spotify and YouTube to research different artists of the same genre and their music videos, analysing the use of camera, props, sets, costumes and more. Each person in our group studied a different artist and looked at 2-3 videos each. Personally, I looked at the solo artist Jorja Smith. She is similar to Joni Payne in that she is also a female solo singer whose songs are a similar style of soulful pop with jazzy beats. The results of our findings are recorded in the Prezi below : We found various aspects that were present in all 11 videos that we researched - such as lots of close-up and tracking shots, minimal makeup and a lip-syncing element.

Today our group had to pitch to our idea to Luke to see if we would get the green light from him so that we could go ahead with further planning, casting etc for the music video. I found this process very helpful as Luke gave a lot of useful advice, highlighting the problems with our idea etc. We took notes of his comments and we also recorded an audio note of everything he said so that we could reflect accurately on his feedback. Luke's Feedback We used prezi to make a treatment to help us pitch the idea. That prezi is shown below... Phil and Luke agreed that currently our idea could go down one of two paths - either go completely with a fun, young and playful feel, or stick with the more sensual, feminine vibe that is present in parts of our current idea. Aspects of our idea such as the pink balloons make our idea seem more playful and fun, and possibly juvenile. We don't want to create a pop video or a pop artist - we think the song is more alternative than th...

In the lessons this week we have continued preparing a treatment in order to pitch two ideas to Luke, our favourite one and then one back up. We spent some lessons researching locations. We want to have a location in the Hold Ya video to keep it interesting instead of setting it all in the studio. We did some research on fun, bright, preferably pink locations in London. We found one place called Frank's Café that has amazing pink stairs and a pink room as well as a rooftop garden. I emailed them to find out more info about the possibility of filming there, but they said it would be £300 per hour + VAT and we all agreed that that would be too expensive.  We were also looking at locations for the back up idea, an indie rock performance. Since the majority of it is just shots of the performance, we knew it was important to have a cool setting to keep the video interesting. We researched various options - at one point we all thought a beach would be a great idea but quick...

Garden City Movement's video for their song She's So Untouchable was directed by Mayan Toledano, a photographer who is one of the inspirations for the aesthetic of our video.

In today's lesson Luke came to talk to us to give us various tips and tricks for a successful music video. I took some rough notes throughout the lesson, which I have typed up below... Remember you are promoting a new band, they have no fan base. Not an established artist. Try to do less literal, more 'symbolic' sets - don't have the time to create a perfect, literal set i.e. a classroom. Only cast professional people - i.e. an actual bass player to play the bass. Pop video should have three strands and they should all have the same tone and colour palette. The three strands should all be both thematically and visually linked. Making sure there are 3 strands stops the video from getting boring. The strands have to have an arc - a movement, development. Once you have the rushes back cut the performance base first Don't try to create the video completely based on the lyrics - they're still important but the shots shouldn't completely revolve around th...

This week we were organised into our groups for making our music videos. My group consists of myself, Vova, Daisy and Anais - here's a picture of us ! : For our first lesson as a group we had to short list 2 concepts out of the total of 9 ideas that we had between us. To do this we wrote out everyone's 3 ideas. Any that we knew wouldn't work, because of budget or location for example, we eliminated straight away. We assessed all the ideas left to see how much we liked them all. We made notes of any thoughts we had, for example that although we liked the concept for Daisy's 'Run Boy Run' idea, the song itself is too popular so we decided to keep some parts of the idea but change the song. At first our two ideas we selected to develop further were.... 1. For the song 'Stay' we wanted to incorporate the aspect of a green jungle set, as in Daisy's idea, and the pink lighting from my 'Hold Ya' into one idea.  However in the second ...

Now that we're back at school, we all got to present our three ideas to our class. Each student then gave some feedback and constructive criticism on the ideas - I filmed these responses and the video is embedded below. In order to present my ideas I made use of photos I had found that best expressed the look I was going for with each of my ideas as I thought this would be the most effective, visual way of getting my ideas across to the class. For example for the Hold Ya video idea, I showed them lots of photographs that were taken in pink light by the photographers who had inspired my idea.  I also briefly explained the different elements I planned to have in the videos, e.g. wether the idea was more performance or narrative based, and gave examples of music videos that had inspired me. Furthermore, I played the class each song and defined the genre of the music in order to inform their view of what the video should look like - e.g. indie rock band naturally means da...

For the purpose of this task I came up with a fictional name for the band, The Fences. I used Canva, a graphic design application, to create a digipak for the fictitious album Prague.  The front cover Back cover I chose a black and white picture for the front page because it is in keeping with the band's look, as they are of the indie rock genre. Their hair and clothing in the picture also have that indie rock, alternative vibe. I  also created a homepage for the band using WIX, which you can view  here . This is the band's homepage. I chose the background of a dark, expressive oil painting because it keeps up the dark colour scheme but with a splash of expressive colour, keeping the website interesting and showing a more artistic side to the band. It is also the same image on the back of the digipak that I created. As you can see from the top of the page, there is a clear navigation menu which means its easy and simple for visitors to th...

To create a design and visual theme for my artist's digipak, I used a graphic design app called Adobe Spark Post. The album's front cover The back page of the digipak. I came up with a fictional artist name, Chloë Beam. I used pictures of the same girl for both the website and the CD digipak. For the digipak I kept up the theme of pink that is present in my music video. The font is in pink on the front cover and the picture I picked is very in keeping with the aesthetic of my music video idea - bright, fresh, and shot by the photographer Petra Collins who, as mentioned in my blog post titled Music Video Idea 2, was one inspiration for the look I want for the video. The same with the back page - I used a cool picture of a sparkly pink skirt from the same shoot that the front cover picture was taken in. I also highlighted all the fictional song names with a pale pink colour, similar to the front cover. I used Wix to create the homepage, which can be accessed ...

In order to create the perfect digipak for my fictional artist, who I've called Raf Jones,  I used an app called 'Canva' which I found really helpful. It has a section specifically for designing album covers. Keeping the same vibe for the artist as was present in the music video - happy, bright, playful. I used the website creator WIX to make a homepage for 'Raf Jones' , which can be accessed  here For the homepage, I used a quirky, funny picture of the artist with a yellow background, because, as mentioned in my initial Idea blog post, yellow will be a key colour in the video. It is a very happy, bright colour which mirrors the sound of the song Sunflower. I also gave him an 'About' page :

This idea is for the song Prague by British indie rock band Blaenavon : This idea is going for more of the typical indie rock boy band video, based on shots of the band performing the song rather than following a particular narrative. Examples of this type of video done successfully are  the Hurtwood music video from 2015, 'Jungle' :  and The Strokes' video for Reptilia : One line in the chorus of the song Prague is 'you keep running through my head' . When the lead singer sings this, I would want the camera to slowly zoom in to an extreme close up on his face, right to his eyes, and then cut to a shot of a girl running through a dark forest - to give the idea that the camera is literally showing this girl 'running through' his head.  There is also a theme of wilderness in the song - 'longing for the wild...a tribe...blood red skies.'  which is what made me want to show the girl running in a forest. She would be wearing a plain w...

The song for this video idea is Hold Ya by Joni Payne  : https://soundcloud.com/jonipayne/holdya I think that this video could be set entirely in the studio. The song is all about a girl telling her boyfriend to open up to her and let her look after him therefore I would want the video to tell a similar narrative, through dance - two dancers, one male one female. - I don't know anything about choreography but sure any of the talented dancers at Hurtwood could help us out. PINK - pink costumes, pink lighting. Lots of sparkle, glitter etc. Early 2000s vibe.   The other part of the video would be one girl lip syncing to the song - surrounded by pink/purple lights, similar to these in the  'Glowed Up' music video from last year : via GIPHY The colour scheme was inspired by parts of Charli XCX's video for Doing It - the bits shot in pink light : via GIPHY   From the 1975's video for 'UGH!' Make up like this for the singer :...

My first idea is for the song Sunflower by Rex Orange County. This is an upbeat song of the alternative pop genre. There doesn't yet exist a music video for this song. The artist is a 19 year old boy who's music is similar to Cosmo Pyke/Mac DeMarco/Tyler the Creator. His songs are highly emotional and confessional, so ideally I wanted the video to be set outside but have decided that since I want a happy, sunny mood it won't work because we're shooting in November when its very cold, raining, gloomy etc. The song's lyrics focus on the artist's love for a girl who seems to have helped him to be a happier, better individual. it is a very youthful song and so I would want the protagonists of the video to be teenagers, saying 16/17 years old. I would want one male and one female protagonist. One inspiration for this idea was Tyler, the Creator's video for his song Perfect : This video has a clear colour palette of pinks, yellows and blues. This is ...