Jessica Grundy

Evaluation

For my music video final edit, my chosen song was by an artist called Bakermat and their famous song One day. Bakermat’s song featured lyrics from Martin Luther King’s famous speech, which was remixed with jazz and house music. The song is about bringing people together of all ages, genders and ethnicity groups. The song was a fairly hard genre to film footage for as it fell under the deep house and jazz genre. When researching I found that this genre stereotypically featured upbeat and happy scenes usually of the protagonist dancing.

The narrative of my music video is about two girls who are best friends and have dreams when they grow up. The footage shows that even though they have dreams when they are older they are not really focusing on that right now but are just having fun and enjoying being young and being best friends. I think the song goes with this footage because some areas of the song are fast paced, however, the lyrics with help from the footage tell the viewer a story.

When looking back at my music video I can evidently see the camera techniques I have used and featured in my final edit, such as; various mid shots, close ups, long shots, Etc. I chose these types of camera techniques because they are commonly used and I think work very well in my music video. When working with this genre it was very difficult to film scenes to match the music however, we decided on fast paste scenes as our chosen song featured a fast tempo.

However, another quality I liked about my footage was the contrast of colours that was featured. I felt that the mood of the song was upbeat and happy therefore, wanted to show the same thing in the footage and felt that the contrast of colours did this very effectively. Although, I didn’t have to edit the contrast as it was naturally filmed. I also feel, not only does the contrast help with the mood of the song, but also tells you visually who the camera is focusing on and who the protagonists are.

Throughout my music video, I decided not to add any transitions that affected the way that each piece of footage changed to the next. I decided not to use any effects to do this because I felt that it would have changed the mood of my song and wouldn’t have made it very effective. Also, I think without these transitions it changes smoothly to the next scene without over doing it but making the footage look more natural and less edited. Another thing I decided not to change was the order I originally put my footage in for my draft music video, as I really liked the placement as I felt it told a story about the two protagonists.

Although, to make my music video effective I decided to try and use effects that I thought would interpret the meaning and the mood of the song. Therefore, I chose to use the mirror effect which I decided to only use on 3 pieces of footage. I decided to use this effect as I felt it went really well with the genre of the song and gave it a really upbeat feel to it. Another reason I chose this effect was because it evidently shown who the camera was focusing on and what the protagonists are doing throughout the scenes.

Another effect I decided to use throughout my music video was the slow motion effect, on multiple slides I set the slow motion to 50%. I did this so it went at the same paste as the music and didn’t influence the mood in anyway and also this helped you evidently see what the two protagonists were doing in each scene. Where the jazz music was being played I activated the slow motion effect, so like other stereotypical music videos, the two protagonists are portrayed as dancing to the music.

Other strong points, I believe was the use of zoom shots and pan shots I included throughout the music video. A lot was featured during the music video and I think a good use was used as it made it very effective. I believe these uses made the music video very effective because you see a lot of movement rather than just being stood in one place you got to see a lot of the location, which is inviting the viewer in.

On the other hand, a weakness I feel that could be improved would to be to include a few more effects as I feel that my music video is too simple even though it gives off the message that I want it too; which is bringing people together and to focus and now instead of worrying about the future. An improvement that I would have liked to make would have been to include the rewind effect as I felt that it would have made my music video more effective and would have helped make my music video look less simple however, I decided not to include this effect as I felt it wouldn’t have gone with the genre of music therefore, not maintaining a upbeat and happy mood from the song.

Overall, I am happy with my final music video as I feel even though it doesn’t include a lot of effects I still feel as If it is a strong piece of work because it gives off the mood and story that I want it to, however I do feel some improvements can be made but don’t feel they have to be made.