Vernallis Theory

Carol Vernallis looked at music videos and how they where made eg props location camera angles editing/software. She suggested that editing was more common in music videos than in the big screen movies of today and older. One of her points and evidence was when a music video is played or shown there are very common transitions in it such as slides faded and wipes to change the scene, backgrounds and other aspects such as people who are in the shot in the video. Another part of her theory is that music videos are shorter than films/movies but stick to the narrative and get to it an awful lot quicker and more concentrated than a film making jump cuts very common and widely viewed in any music video. An example of a music video with a lot of jump cuts is Slayers Repentless music video. As well as keeping the jump cuts quick and fast it sticks to the narrative of the prison riot and is still easily recognisable and understandable.

Here is a link to Repentless by Slayer : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjb0j9l1sz4

The cuts go hand in hand with the fast pace of the Delete repeated word

Vernallis' theory is included in our video as we have a lot of fade transitions like when Danny A is on the roof of the library and he looks sad and it fades to black to connote the sadness of the lyrics in the part of the song he lip synced. This worked well because it makes the video look deeper and more emotional to an audience with the black fade as the colour black can be associated with depression, sadness, death or loss.

Codes And Conventions Of My Album Cover - Chosen

I chose the album cover Boots and Braces by Skrewdriver as it has all the connotations of a skinhead band but yet does not stand for what skinheads stand for and are extremely racist and have very right wing connotations whereas they still make good music and are very good musicians. Personally im not about what they believe in but I do really like the music they uphold and made in the 80s. the boots on the front automatically symbolise the connotations of skinhead culture as they are the main thing a skinhead is recognised for.

the writing is in a very distorted fashion which looks kind of edgy with the writing being in black to go with what the rest of the album cover has as the rest is black and white and plain yet captures a very edgy fashion. the boots look great as they are the centre piece of the album cover representing the boots being the centre piece of skinhead culture. The use of the boots being the largest and most centre piece of the album cover portray it as a big part of skinhead culture in which it is and look rather aggressive and sturdy which also connote skinhead attitudes and views on certain situations as skinheads are renouned for being aggressive and for fighting, especially with other subcultures such as mods, punks and goths. They are also renouned for fighting at football matches in the 1980s as hooliganism was a large on-going theme around that time of history.

Music Video Questionnaire

Music Video Questionnaire

Age

16-18 19-21 22-25 26-30 31+

Gender

M      F

What Genre of music do you most listen to?

______________________

What other type of music would you listen to that you haven’t yet?

______________________

How often do you watch music videos?

Never     2+times a day    2+times a week   2+times a month     2+times a year     always

The most important features in a music Video (rate 1-5, 5 being the most important and 1 being the least)

Camera Angles 1   2   3   4   5

Actors 1   2   3   4   5

Dancers 1   2   3   4   5

Singer/Band 1   2   3   4   5

Lighting 1   2   3   4   5

Relevance 1   2   3   4   5

Flashy 1   2   3   4   5

Transitions 1   2   3   4   5

Other________________________________

What Colours would you associate with “A day in a life”?

  Red Blue Green Pink Purple Orange Other ______________________

In “a day in a life” what would you expect to see as the music video?

____________________________________________

What comes to mind when you hear “a day in a life”?

__________________________________________

This is the first questionnaire, after some fair feedback we have started to improve our question to gain a more accessible from whoever we ask to fill in our questionnaire to gain more information on how to improve our music video and get an idea of what our audience will want to see from us. Some of our questions to the public did not make sense and had to be reformed and improved upon such as

What other type of music would you listen to that you haven’t yet?

______________________

The question was far too vague and confused the audience as they did not understand the question they had been given in turn some of that question where left unanswered in turn not giving us the information we needed to obtain to address our target audience with our progressing music video.

Email Back From Apple Corps

Just a Quick Update

Just a quick update up to where im at. Im finding media a lot easier lately as im getting back on top of things in lesson and out and have been blogging/posting from the comfort of my own home which i enjoy because i am doing my work and progressing in my own time. i haven't been as stressed and can honestly say doing these more hours after school has helped me progress and calmed me down a lot because i know i am improving even if only a little, but hey its better than nothing. 

The group work for the music video is working and i am paying my contribution to it, i emailed apple corps today to see if i could use the song A Day In A Life by The Beatles for our music video with Dan and Marcus which is challenging to be honest but very enjoyable and i think it has brought us together more as friends and peers at the same time so it is really a win win. 

Although i do have to go on the group blog and but my initials on the post i have put up today of the screen shot of the email i sent to apple corps as i had forgotten to in lesson which was a bit careless.

My next post will be about album covers i find connote the genre of music it is associated with and what the cover and songs on it are trying to portray to the target audience, i am going with the album "London Calling" by The Clash because of Joe Strummer (lead vocals and rhythm guitarist) who died a few years ago, may he rest in peace the legend, but yeah i am going to do that album because of Joe Strummer smashing his guitar on stage and how much that portrays the aggressiveness of punk as a sub-cultural ethnicity and overall background of punk as a whole. 

So things are going well at the minute, id like to thank Mrs Mcdonald for giving me a kick up the backside when needed haha.

You Know Me - Robbie Williams - Intertexuality

You know me is the second official single from British hit sensation and ex Take That member,Robbie Williams. Released on the 6th of November 2009 and was directed by Phil and Olly also known as Diamond Dogs. Robbie is dressed in a white rabbit suit like the one from Lewis Carroll's Alice in wonderland from the novel and film. this creates intertextuality between the music video and the film or novel itself. He uses his facial expression to imitate that of a rabbit to get into character more and make it more psychedelic. The rabbit is linked to Alice in wonderland of course but there has been many twists on Alice in wonderland very drug related. i thought this might relate to Robbie Williams as he was addicted to drugs. The psychedelic feel of this video has gave our music video group. Ideas such as the very big flowers and animal costumes. 

Auteur Comparison Video Link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uucwD681Kss

This is the link to my auteur comparison video on the two songs.

Auteur Comparison Video Link

https://www.blogger.com/blog-this.g?n=Autuer+Comparison&source=youtube&b=%3Ciframe+width%3D%22459%22+height%3D%22344%22+src%3D%22https://www.youtube.com/embed/uucwD681Kss%22+frameborder%3D%220%22+allowfullscreen%3E%3C/iframe%3E&eurl=https://i.ytimg.com/vi/uucwD681Kss/hqdefault.jpg

This is the link to my auteur comparison video on the two songs.

4 Album Covers : The Exploited Beat The Bastards

The Exploited. One of the heaviest and amazing punk bands every to exist producing songs like Sex And Violence, Punks Not Dead, Blown To Bits and Sid Vicious Was Innocent. All songs that contribute to the punk rock style of the 70s and today. They made a brilliant early album called Beat The Bastards which contributed to their success.


One thing I liked about the album cover when I first saw it was obviously the skulls because of how amazing they looked with bone Mohawk's coming out of their head. It really appealed to me as no one had really done that or thought about it before. The idea for the album cover was illustrated and thought up by lead singer Wattie Buchan a very loud and punk Scotsman who has a large hatred for Margaret Thatcher. 




The background really contrasts with the bright red font that is the exploited logo and caught my eye straight away which was already a good sign. It is absolutely fantastic and worth a view. Another thing I like is the idea that Wattie had of the sharp bone teeth protruding from the skulls mouth it really caught my eye and sent chills down my back because of how edgy and scary looking they are which connotes to the aggressiveness of The Exploited as a band, their views and the punk lifestyle they live.


The colour in the background works well as it is a murky colour of green and grey and looks like a sort of fog or mist which is quite rarely seen on punk albums as they are normally really bright and hectic and all over the place but this one seems to capture the nice and mysterious background put still manages to capture the horrible and extreme punk attitude with the bleached bone coloured skull which the sharp bone teeth protrude from the mouth of it.

4 Album Covers : Skrewdriver Boots And Braces

 The Skrewdriver album "BOOTS AND BRACES" was a very controversial album but still very appealing to me. The reason people didn't like it was the fact some songs have very strong right wing white supremacy connotations but my work is about the album cover and not the songs on the record.


The album cover appeals to me purely because of how simply and well done it is. It gets straight to the point. It is an album cover designed to attract Skinheads because of the way the Doc Marten boots are positions as if they are stood on someone and wanting a fight like every skinhead seems to like.


The font of the band name seems very distorted and gets to me as the skinhead life style is a very smart look with cropped hair big boots braces sta press pants or Levi jeans. All very smart clothes. However the title and band name looks very chaotic overall and quite edgy to a new viewer of the album as it isn't what you would expect from a skinhead band.


For example I am in a skinhead band and play some Skrewdriver songs from this specific album and our logo is very smart and professional as a skinhead should look and be so for Skrewdriver to have a fuzzy and edgy title for the album denotes that of skinhead culture which I respect and I believe it looks pretty cool.


ORDER 84


This is my bands Logo, it looks very smart and professional. My band consists of 3 members, 2 skinheads and a mod (an early version of a skinhead) I play bass guitar and adopted lead vocals when our singer Connor (a hard-core punk) left out of personal reasons. My best and good friend Tom Harvey is our brilliant guitarist and Bebe (the mod) is our drummer.


The band came about because we wanted to be like the bands we listen to such as Cockney Rejects, Sex pistols and Cock Sparrer. We have adopted the attitude they uphold as a band and have an intimidating look about us. We all dress very smart in sta press pants, fred perry polo shirts, a smart jumper, braces and a pair of doc marten air wair boots preferably above 8 holes high, I like either 10 eyelet or 14 eyelet as they look smart and intimidating which kind of defines our attitude and what we sing about.


We do, admittedly, try to get a reaction and annoy people out of our songs with our first single being a song called "I HATE MANCS" so it fall in well with what we are about yet again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=By6KeqBzObo 

That is a link to our band playing Victimised by Chaos UK, the quality is poor overall but I don't mind also like our band on facebook.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X5e9thfWJ0          


This is the full album for skrewdriver

4 Album Covers : Motorhead Snakebite

Snake Bite Love: Motorhead














Despite Snakebite Love being one of my least favoured albums by my favourite band, Motorhead, I cannot fault the amazing artwork put into the album cover. It is fantastic.




Normally the common Motorhead symbol is Snaggletooth (the big with the spiked helmet and the horns around its nose) but this time it was adapted into a reptilian like figure what looks like lives in a volcano or somewhere with a lot of fire and molten lava.




It heavily appealed to me by the cool array of colours and the two smaller cobras coming off of the bottom of it. What also appealed to me is the simplicity of it with the font used as it is the common font used on every album from Ace Of Spades to Bomber to Overkill to Orgasmatron, the font has stayed the same and nobody has gotten bored of it evidently as it has stayed on every cover.






The name of the album heavily connotes to the artwork on it who has been fabulously illustrated by Joe Petagno who has contributed and made the Snaggletooth pig head what it is today and how well he has adapted it onto Snake Bite Love and the whole serpent idea instead of a rough looking fighting pig.

Repentless To Goya

This is the work of Francisco Goya and Slayers newest album Repentless. As you can see it looks quite based off of Goya's work with the whole idea of a shock factor to make the audience shocked and somehow stunned at what they are looking at. Slayer got away with putting a picture of Jesus being burned alive crucified and stabbed to death on an album which shows how far the music industry has come along as bands like Iron Maiden made albums such as Number Of The Beast which was a blatant reference to Lucifer and Satan or whatever name he has been given over the past years.

4 Album Covers : Slayer Repentless

Slayer Repentless:

Slayers newest album cover is probably to most scariest yet and contends with the album, haunting in the chapel which name even sounds as creepy as it looks. But the edge does have to go to Repentless purely because of how abnormal paranormal and scary it looks.

Evidently it is Jesus dying on the cross with his eyes completely blackened maybe to connote that he is being possessed and how much power the devil has over Jesus and God, well thats how i imagined it and what it meant as a viewer of the cover.


Even the T in the title is in the shape of an upside cross in which St Peter was crucified as he felt he wasn't worthy to die in the same way as the messiah which shows the illustrator of the cover (Howard Schwarzberg) has a good knowledge on religious history.


The album cover overall looks strongly linked to the work of Francisco Goya. I will post a picture of his work and show the resemblance of Goya and Schwarzbergs work on his pictures and the album cover. It heavily portrays the savage of man, madness insanity and heavily brings to ind schizophrenia in my opinion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY5op2tst3A

Music And Me

When I was little I used to listen to a lot of slower stuff such as the Beatles, Genesis and Pink Floyd. The first CD I was given was a Beatles compilation album with two discs however with age I started to grow out of the slow music and get into harder stuff so I would say that slow music was like gateway music.

My favourite band of all time is Motorhead lead by Lemmy Kilmister. Of course the first song I heard by Motorhead was the first song everyone hears by Motorhead which is the Ace Of Spades which is undeniably one of the most mind blowing songs in heavy metal that will get anyone's head jolting up and down. I had heard Motorhead during weekend I went to HMV to purchase my first album ever "Motorhead : Ace Of Spades".
As well as having the Ace Of Spades on it, it had other songs I got into after Lemmy hit his first bass note such as Fast And Loose, Jail bait and Love Me Like A Reptile.

I think my taste has changed for the better as I am so far into my music now I don't even look back and it has always made me happy and in a good when I listen to the likes of Motorhead, Slayer, The Ramones, The Clash etc.
I believe the person who influenced my taste was my best friend Tom because he was into Motorhead and he w "you should give these a listen yno they are class your stuff is too slow haha" so I gave them a listen and now they are my favourite band also the lead singer of Motorhead was a big influence because he just had that attitude of not caring and drinking and playing class music.


 I have realized that this taste in music is with me for life now and I don't think its going to change anytime soon because I like what I like and thats all there is and ever will be to it and no one can change my opinion on something I feel passionate about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVecmhNYbuQ

Review Of My First Year Of Media

Intro

Last year was the first time I had ever done media and it was so much different to what I had expected it to be. it was very difficult and challenging as it was largely computer based and I found it hard as I am more of a practical worker overall. that was the main challenge I had to come across in the first year, getting the jest of technical work on a pc. I had never spoken to my two teachers, Mr Dougan and Mrs McDonald and I had never had to adapt or deal with their teaching style and having a new teacher is always a risk because you wont know if you will get on with them until you have been taught by them. However I get on with my teachers brilliantly. overall I didn't quite know what to expect.


Software

The software I had to use to get tasks completed was obviously blogger what this post is on, word, PowerPoint and Photoshop. I was fine using all of them except Photoshop I found using that very difficult and hard to get the reigns of. for example using bits of software like the lasso tool and certain tools to manipulate and get certain images into the shapes I wanted and how hard it was at first was ridiculous and it frustrated me because everyone else was very good at it but I wasn't a very technical worker it really got on my nerves to see me falling behind. however after a lot of work put into trying to make images my own and get them to do what I wanted I can work Photoshop very easily and have a lot more experience in it after this whole year.


How I Developed As An Individual

Coming into a new A level course is always going to have its ups and downs and this one did but mainly ups which is always good. I was really worried at first incase I knew who anyone in the class but I had nothing to worry about because a few of my friends where in there eg Boj Marcus Owen etc. Another thing that was worrying me was that the course would be largely computer based and I was kind of right to worry about that because it is largely computer based, still is. I was worried I would fall behind and have a lot of arguments at home because of letters and phone calls etc. but I was fine and Mr Dougan aided me through a lot of computer work as I didn't know what I was doing half of the time I would say miss helped me too but she was off due to illness. I got the hang of managing my time and work and how much the work load was on top of my other work for other subjects eg English and drama. the whole course has made me more confident as a person and feel like I can ask questions about software issues or issues in general without feeling embarrassed


How I Developed My Theories

A theory I learned about was called Props theory.  delved deeper into this theory and saw it is your stereotypical hero villain and damsel in distress story which I found interesting because I thought to myself that Props theory could be applied to so many modern day dramas movies plays and all kinds of productions in todays films and entertainment industries. An example of a movie that follows props theory is clash of the titans with Percius trying to save Andromeda and Hades trying to kill Percius. this whole theory made me question how much of a heavy influence Props theory has on everything ever written there always seem to be a hero or main character and a character everyone seems to dislike which mainly applies to every production ever made so his theory has heavily influenced a lot of plays and movies or at least followed the steps of his work and connoted to his theory.

Auteur Comparison

Later today I will sit on my own and record myself doing a commentary on the two music videos I picked to do the Auteur comparison on.


The two videos I will talk about and the director are In My Darkest Hour by Megadeth and Coma White by Marilyn Manson as they are rather similar as I will explain on the video I post in just over an hour after my lunch.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mW0Ao9r2zkY - In My Darkest Hour




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQPJYnr48yU - Coma White

Representation In Music Videos

People are represented in music videos in different way and made to portray certain ideologies. for example in the Megadeth song Wake Up Dead.




Front man Dave Mustaine and the rest of Megadeth are performing inside a cage with the fans trying to get in. This could be Portrayed in different ways, one way is the Megadeth are like caged animals and the hard-core trash metal they are playing is like when a caged animal gets aggressive and angry and starts snapping and roaring or even trying to attack the people on the outside of the enclosure but their aggressiveness is played with guitar drums and bass with a heavy distortion on the guitars to sounds more aggressive.


Another way I saw this represented was as if megadeth are too big and famous to be with the "normal" people who are the fans and they are trying to enclose themselves and show how much more status they have in the heavy metal  society than the fans however I would more go towards to representation of the animal as it is very unlikely megadeth want to portray the fans in a bad way of rioting outside their cage and trying to break it to get in.




Link to where I got the screenshots to Wake Up Dead from:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kSvN1dQjxc 

Sassy The Sasquatch - One Love Evaluation

I  found the lip sync as a whole not too challenging as a task but to be honest I found the timings hard. The song one love has back up vocals which was hard to deal with as the timings where hard to time and get spot on.


 I should have included more mouth positions so it looked like sassy was pronouncing certain letters like the T's I should have got a mouth with the teeth together to make it look more realistic despite sassy being a cartoon. To be honest I think I should have chose an easier song to do with easier words so the mouth would fit better to it.


I looked at my teachers feedback and was told to do something better about the transitions with the mouth e.g. the fact the mouth fades instead of just changing shape which I think is fair as even though it was my first attempt I look back at it now and it looks rather rushed and poor and unsmart to an audience.


My friend Marcus also gave me some advice about the mouth pieces. Some of the mouth moves on the back up vocals which looks a bit stupid so he said that I should change it to when just Bob Marley sings and not The Wailers (the backup vocals)

What Makes A Good Music Video

many things contribute to a good music video. one main thing that contribute to a good music video is the camera shots. the shots are crucial because without any shots how is there going to be a video. a good start would be an extreme close up and then bringing it out to reveal the whole face as they start singing, another idea is to have an establishing shot and then zoom in on the singer as they start singing.

Another thing that makes a good video is a spot on lip sync and wide variety of angles and edits such as fading in and out of the shots and appearing when having to sing on camera which looks quite edgy and can connote so many things such as things like emotion or people leaving someones life or passing away. there are so many great things you can do with fading to make your audience feel a certain way which is what you want.

for a good music video you have to have a good sound narrative which tells a story and lets the viewer/audience understand and get what the music video is trying to connote and tell them or get a certain message across to them. This is all in the narrative of the piece.

4 Music Video Analysis - P.I.L Rise - Music And Me

Rise – Public Image Limited/ PIL

      Costume

-          Johnny Rotten/Lydon, former sex pistols frontman and current PIL singer has always had a brilliant dress sense when it comes to punk and the punk scene as a whole way of dressing and expressing your emotions. In PILs most famous song he is seen wearing a grey suit which is ripped up he has his usual bright ginger spikey hair the still add that touch of punk rock look to his outfit.

Genre

-          The genre of the music video is again punk rock but a slow kind of punk rock as it talks about world/global problems so you must hear what he is saying when he sings to get the whole point of the song across. Certain toppings discussed are that of fascism in Britain, IRA terrorism in Britain, and pestilence and famine in Africa and how we should all unite to help stop whatever happens in the world and join as one.

       Lighting

-          The lighting in Rise is always bright and colourful to resemble a brighter future and change for everyone. However towards the end as Johnny is singing the words “anger is an energy” there is huge flashes of light all over set to resemble the bombs in the terrorism with the northern Irish in London and other places in Britain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vq7JSic1DtM

4 Music Videos Analysis - Marilyn Manson The Dope Show - Music And Me

Marilyn Manson – The Dope Show

Costume

The video seems heavily based around Manson being an alien in society due to heavy drug addiction so it is played on and his costume is that of an extra-terrestrial/humanoid creature. However in other shots he is seen in a sparkly cherry red suit and high heels putting a twist of sexiness on it.

Genre

-metal/metal influenced. Manson does not completely come under the metal genre of metal as he is not Iron Maiden, Motorhead or slayer type music but an eerie voice sounds quite creepy which can come under the metal genre.

Lighting

The dope show video has a variety of colours in it. For example a lot of bright colours are used to portray the happiness the drugs are giving to Marilyn Manson which is possibly why he is dressed in a bright shiny red sequency suit. However many mood setting colours are used. Manson’s skin is bleach white maybe to connote his drug abuse or his alien like character.

Sassy The Sasquatch - One Love (Bob Marley Cover)

https://youtu.be/c5dO0dwn6FM

this link is to my animation i made of Sassy the Sasquatch from the Big Lez show singing One Love by Bob Marley

I will post screenshots in a later post.

Introduction to A2

My first year of AS was a tough one. I had never learned anything about media in my life and took it for AS for a new experience and to expand my knowledge as I have taken two other subjects that interlink with media studies (Drama and English Language). I am still on the race for a challenge as believe with my acquired knowledge of last years coursework (Magazine) I can be more proficient and utilize technologies better to my advantage and learn more about the topics I am to study. I am going to research and plan my way through this year and constantly stay on track and course as I want to achieve a better grade than I did for my AS level as it will boost my confidence and make me progress more into getting a qualification as well as expanding my general knowledge of media studies. I'm aiming a lot higher and for greater things this year.

Cartoons For The Lip Sync