I totally agree with you josh, really good original idea it was just flat, watching it back was in fact a little boring. But hey we have created something quick and fast, it's so much more visually engaging with the new footage and of course the fast edit, which has been proven since we have had positive feedback after putting the video on YouTube, people really like the "double me" final cut part. I'm pleased we decided to film the "double me" footage in the end even though we had a little doubt as we were pushed for time it’s a great shot!I think this whole project we have been a little doubtful, changing what beastie boys song to work with at the start I remember thinking that we hadn’t picked the right song. Then spending a whole day in London shooting, bringing it to the computer and editing then a couple months later deciding to chuck 90% of the music video out.Even though we have been a little bit daring (stupid) in the project I feel the reason it has worked so well it down to our planning and enthusiasm as a group, and although getting rid of 90% of the original video is somewhat disheartening I believe it has shown us how working on such projects really work and how they are constructed into a great final piece.Its been great fun and I feel it's definitely the best media production I have been involved with, now all we have to do is write about it, oh yeah!!!!

Finished...

Well today was a great day, as we finished all editing on our video and created our custom dvd menu. We are all extremely happy with the video and the new footage along with some snazzy editing has made the video more visually engaging than the london edit ever could be.

We still put the london edit on the dvd as we had enough time, and it was really interesting to watch it back. We dont dislike the footage we got, i actually really like it, it was a really good concept and its a shame we lost that in favour of the new stuff, but this sort of mirrors what happens with music videos in the real world it cant just be a lovely concept, It needs to be snappy and visually engaging and i think thats we achieved with the final edit.



















Peace out

Happy New Year!

After the festive period i would like to say happy new year and just post to keep you updated on our project.

After multiple attempts at filming in the holidays and gaining new footage today we have definitely come to the decision that we aren't including any of the original footage from london. This may seem like a big mistake, however even tho we aren't using the exact footage the whole day influenced our actual video greatly. He saw what worked well and what needed to be improved. After analysing the positive and negative points in our initial focus group we think that the new video gives the audience what they want. We will be burning both videos on our disc as this shows progression. 

I personally, and i think i speak on behalf of the whole group, that the new video is more dynamic, professional and engaging. It contains more cut on action and has more hip-hop influences. The video has been said to 'lose its narrative effect' with the removal of the book end shots in the house and to 'lose its comedic effect' through the lack of the costumes and hairstyles. However, the video still contains three young males seeming to have a laugh although it is presented in a more conventional way and seems more naturalistic. 

It would be interesting, after both videos are finished to get a vote from as many media students as we can on which video they prefer. This could be an option if we get it finished in time.

Why do I have so much work to do!

Although I was a little apprehensive at first with the decision to change our video, editing and cutting large amounts out and reshooting, since seeing what Josh and Adam had done in their free periods without me, cheers guys ;), I can say now with a little certainty that I’m looking forward to seeing what we come up with. However I do believe we need to plan our new ideas in terms of what costumes we shall wear, where we will shoot around Bury and WHEN!

Time, we no longer have as much now. Although we were ahead of the game planning excellently for our trip to London we seriously need to think when we shall shoot as Christmas holidays are not far away.

I’m pleased we are reshooting as I feel, and so too do Adam and Josh, that our most recent footage is both stronger in performance and editing, consequently making it look and feel more like a Hip Hop video. I do however feel a little disappointed that we did not manage to get sufficient shots when in London as we did shot at some great locations. Nevertheless we may be able to find ways in which to keep old and new footage together, and I suppose it’s all part of our practical journey hey?

Dwell on the could haves, we must not. Focus on the solution, we must....

Thanks Yoda, and thanks josh for such an enlightening post. 

Here in fact is the exact responses we got when we showed our first rough cut of our london footage.

Pro's

Street performers x 5

Location x 3

Changing Of Scene x 3

Energetic Performance

Costumes x 4

Well shot and framed x2

Choice of Track

Fit the part of Beastie Boys (in character)

Con's

Continuity at start

Bury train pulling off 

Not looking at camera x 2

Lip sync x 7

Train at the end

Punk outfits- James’ Hair

Camden tracking shot

Lyric learning x 5

Shot is too long at the end x 2

Needs More Edits

update / A new direction?

wow this thing hasn't been used in a while so ill give you a quick update.

After uploading the footage and editing it we have our selves a pretty sweet video. From the feed back it all seemed dandy but when we asked for opinions certain answers kept cropping up:

Train looked stupid, takes where too long, lip sync in south bank scenes was crap.

Well we re-shot the southbank / G boy shots in the urban capital of the UK, Bury st Edmunds And took the train out. However we stuck by the long shots for a long time as we liked the idea of the movement towards the camera and the skill required to do one constant take without any muck ups. We also saw that in beastie boy videos alot of the time its quite long shots of the three of them rapping to the camera.

THIS CHANGED TODAY!!!!
After agreeing that most music videos cut alot to keep the audience intrests we made a new video with the old footage only cross cutting more between differnt lines to difernt angles or locations. We also put in shots of just us without any lip sync. The result was Great it was alot more visually engaging and the few people who have seen it liked it.

So where do we go from here? the current plan is to get alot more footage from differnt locations to cross cut inbetween but save it as a differnt project so we can always go back to our old one. This is a massive advantage to us being well planned at the start as we have time to effectively shoot two videos (even if they share alot of footage).

Hope this goes well and ill update this when we know more :-)

Filming in London Town!

So this tuesday myself, Adam, Josh and camera man Ben B set of to London to put our final idea for a Beastie Boys music video together. Our idea involved us dressing in three different costumes that represent and portray three different elements of the band and music industry(which you may have gathered from previous blog entries). Although it was an imaginative idea and an idea i feel worked well worked we soon found the problem of where to leave the bags of clothing when filming, luckily adam knew the manager of a small cafe' located in bond street, Don Vitos,

We decided to shoot us dressed in smart suits first so we headed down to bond street. Filming went well since the location we were in looked good and the camera work went well with tight positioning of me adam and josh, which effectively made it feel more like a video of the Beastie Boys. This was the case when shooting for the punks in Camden town and the G's/beastie boys in southbank, however when shooting in south bank lip syncing was a bit out due to some people not knowing their lyrics! Concentration there was also hard to keep especially when you have to watch out from being 'shanked' because you find yourself caught up in the middle of graffiti artist warfare!

Overall I feel that they day was a big success, we planned ahead so we knew exactly where to film our footage and had our costumes ready. We also had some fantastic luck coming across street performers which has added further enjoyment into our music video but still following the conventions of a hip hop music video and of the music artists beastie boys.