One Minute Extract Analysis.

Cinematography.

Our long shot.Original long shot.

Our minute extract of A Million Ways did not include much camerawork. As the band did, we used one continual long shot which was wide enough to include all four of us, plus some scenery of the garden to show location. Our long shot was successful because it achieved the same as the original video had.

Mise-en-scene.

The only elements of mise-en-scene we had to consider were costume, setting and actors. We tried to get our costumes the same as theirs, but obviously we could not get the exact clothes. Our locations were also similar. We couldn’t find four guys that would do it for us, so me, Hannah and Livvy had to do it instead.

Sound.The only sound we had to worry about was the music over the dancing. When editing, all we had to do to our video sound-wise was mute the clip and put the track over the top.

This was surprisingly quite hard, because we had to put the track on the exact right moment with the dance, or it would have been out of time.

However, I think that we got it right, because the dancing fits in time and doesn’t look wrong.

Editing.When we were learning the dance for this piece, we found it a lot easier to mirror what the band were doing, and then flip it when editing it in Final Cut Pro.

This is what our shot looked like when we filmed it. It’s the wrong way round because we just mirrored the video we were watching.

This is what our shot looked like after we had flipped it.

As you can see, it is now the same as the original video.

Editing was important to us, because it meant we could just mirror the band in their video and then flip the video. Our use of editing made the video the right way round, so I think it was quite successful;

Lighting.

Our lighting was natural, as we filmed in the daytime.

Their lighting was also natural; however, they filmed theirs on a slightly darker day.

I feel that our lighting was quite successful because it was quite simple. Their lighting was natural, so it was very easy to re-create.

Direction.

This is how it was meant to look. This is how it came out.

Our direction was hard. We got a lot of it right, but the part shown in the pictures was a part we just couldn’t get right. Our direction was probably the weakest area, because there were parts we got wrong.

Organisation of location.

This is Hannah’s garden, the location we chose for filming. We chose Hannah’s garden because I do not have a garden, and neither of the other two had gardens big enough.

This is the location used in the original video. In the original, they are standing on concrete; however, none of us had a concrete garden we could use, and the line of concrete in Hannah’s garden was too narrow.

Overall, I think that our location was quite similar to OK Go’s and so was quite a successful choice.

Organisation of cast.

Our organisation was initially very good. We planned out dates for filming and re-filming if we needed to. However, I had to be sent to hospital the night before filming, so we didn’t get to film that day, plus I was still ill the next few days so we couldn’t film then either.

However, we got it sorted and arranged other dates, so we got the filming done with enough time to edit.

Organisation of cast.

Our (slightly female) cast. OK Go’s (all male) cast.

We have terrible friends who were unwilling to help up film this, so instead of having an all male cast, like the original, we had to use three females instead.

What I found easy.

Based on our work from AS, I found framing the piece very easy.

The framing of the piece was very easy, because it was just one, continuous long shot.

We also found organising everybody to get together easy, because we were used to having to change dates etc. when filming our film opening for AS.

What needs improving on.

Our direction needs working on, because some of it did not go right.

We also need to work harder to find the right cast. This will be especially important in our music video, because if we cast a wrong person, it will look wrong.

Elements I’d consider using.

We could use the element of dancing in our performance element for our music video.

This would make it interesting and, if we went for a comedy video, it could be quite funny.

Elements I’d not consider using.We probably wouldn’t consider using the dancing as extensively as OK Go did.

We’d also want to add in a narrative, rather than make it purely performance based. This is so that it would be interesting and have depth to it, rather than just me and Hannah jumping around.

We also wouldn’t want to do one continuous shot, because that would make it harder to infer a meaning, because we wouldn’t be able to do a lot with just one shot as a narrative.

Overall conclusion.

• Overall, I think our first minute extract was quite successful; however, there were things we missed that we didn’t even realise until we started this analysis.

• For example, our cast was mostly the wrong gender, something we didn’t realise would be wrong until we started to analyse.

• However, I do feel that we got the cinematography, location, mise en scene and most of the direction right.

Five things gained.

• Pure performance only works in a music video when it is entertaining and different.

• If we use a dance routine in our video, it is going to be hard to co-ordinate/organise.

• Simple things can be just as effective as complex things.

• How to use the self-timer on the camera.• The importance of location.