Planning - Pitch Feedback and Ideas

  

Feedback

• Have 'Jean' be cheered up by something simple, such as her friend giving her a flower instead of being cheered up by material things such as designer shopping. Designer cloths being a source of happiness may come across as tacky and superficial, and will go against the authenticity of the band.
• Think about the aesthetic of the band and how it's represented in the website. Also how you will introduce the members and their identities on the website.
• Need to think of an idea for the 30 second audio visual feature on the website. 
• Many women remove facial hair but do it in an ironic way where its funny. Instead of facial hair have her shave her leg hair.
• Simplify your ideas.

Ideas:

• You make an intertextual reference to Mamma Mia where the main character fails to shave her legs and comes to her mother for help. This would work well as in this scene the main character is worrying about her appearance just like 'Jean' is when she goes out to buy branded cloths.
• Change the Narrative to Jean waking up and deciding to buy a new wardrobe of designer cloths, which my aspirational middle market audience would want and be able to do. Once she has bough all these cloths she goes home and realises that they didn't make her happy, what did was something simple like someone giving her a flower, possibly the band.
• I thought I could possibly have an interview with the band saying why they partnered with the mental health charity and why they care about mental health,.
  

  

  Shaving Scene from Mamma Mia

Planning - Logo Mock-Up

Logo is a visual pun of a silver lining going through a cloud. Having the silver lining be the bands name connotes that the bands music will help listeners think positive and be positive. The fun font connotes cheerfulness and the simplicity of the logo makes it memorable and recognisable. I can use this logo on the website and on my planned social media accounts and possibly place it in the opening card of my music video to help contribute to the cross media convergent nature of my two products.

Planning - Mock Band Poster

This is a mock poster of what I will produce to a higher quality later on in the process. I will have an actual image of the band in a field instead of stick figures.

The bright green field and blue sky matches the mise-en-scenes I plan to use in my music video which helps connect the two products and goes towards the overall cheerful branding of my band.

I chose the band name 'Silver Lining' because it matches the message of the song to "cheer up" and put it in front of a cloud as a visual pun.

I plan to have this poster be hung in "Jeans" bedroom to assist in the digitally convergent nature of my music video and website. It also gratifies the audience who go onto the website and see the poster on there and in the video. I could, as another option, use this an one of my two original images for the website.

For the final poster I plan to use a low angle shot of the band in a field filled with flowers and the sun and sky be a prominent feature above them.

Inspiration

UPDATE 25/7/22

With this poster I tried to make the intertextuality as explicit as possible to gratify a vast audience.

Planning - Mise-en-scene's (Shooting Locations)

Location:                                         Shots/Safety:

Bedroom

 Used for opening shots of the video as "Jean" wakes up. Lots of   opportunity for intertextuality.

 Risk of objects falling down on actors and I will need to have a keen   eye of what is in the mise-en-scene.

Field

 Shots of Jean walking through field and possibly have band there for 'cut' shot.   Happy bright full of nature. More for narrative shots and making "Jean" look good in   the natural light.

 Make sure that the weather is sunny and that there is no one else in the shot.

           

Flower Hill/Path

Long shot of "Jean" walking on the road whilst band stands on the hill and gets ready to perform for the 'cut' shot. Sunny shots with flowers adds to happy branding of the band. More for narrative shots.

Risk of long shot being shot far near a road, I will need to watch out for cars and that I don't step back into the road trying to get a shot. Also people on the path walking past and making sure they are not in the shot or I bump into them. 

Performance Space

 Used for the performance aspect of my video, my video. Fits in with   the bright happy aesthetic of the other mise-en-scenes.

 Once again be very aware of the objects in my mise-en-scene.

 

I plan to use at least two different mise-en-scenes, meeting to the brief.

Planning - Brand Mood Board

I want to present happiness and cheerfulness as aspirational to the audience and thus through my branding encourage my audience to aspire to be happy, appealing to my aspirational audience.

To emphasise this on my website and in the opening I plan on having my fictional band partner with a mental health charity and state that "a percentage of the revenue made from this music video will go towards the charity". This emphasises my brand and adheres to the Sony Brand Values where my band earns trust for the Sony brand through ethical conduct.

Planning - Cast of Music Video

"Sleepy Jean": 

Name: Kate Wells 

Costume: casual darker branded clothing, t-shirt, cargo pants light jewellery, wavy hair down, drawstring bag, pride pin.  

Band Member 1:

Name: Purnoor Fatima 

Instrument: Piano

Costume: bright colourful shirt and skirt with boots, colourful eyeshadow

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  <-- Inspiration

Band Member 2:

Name: Evan Brading 

Instrument: Guitar 

Costume: colourful short sleeved button down shirt and loose plain tie, jeans or other trousers.

<-- Inspiration (less 'edgy' and more colourful)

Band Member 3:

Name: Milly Fane 

Instrument: Lead Singer

Costume: dungarees, glasses, white shirt.

<-- Inspiration

By making intertextual references to other famous musicians iconic outfits (especially Green Day) the audience is gratified through recognising the references and the 'star' status of those musicians is carried over to my band through association, and this appeals to my aspirational audience. "Jeans" outfit is branded to also appeal to my aspirational target audience.

I plan to use at least two different characters who represent at least two different social groups. Band Member 1 represents South East Asian communities. "Jean" represents the LGBTQ+ community, signified by her pride pin. Also, half of the cast is female and half of the cast is male. This plan adheres to the representation requirements in the brief.

Planning - Storyboard

The general narrative idea for my music video is following a girl named Jean, like in the song, and her journey from being grumpy in the morning having to wake up early to meet her friends, to realising the joys of life and that she should cheer up and realise that her life isn't so bad. The audience follows Jean doing various 'fun' activities, such as shopping with her friends, where she will buy a designer item of clothing just like my aspirational audience would so this would appeal to them. I realise that by presenting Jean as gaining happiness through buying designer items could be seen as taking on a consumerist ideology, however I hope that this translates to the 'bands' 'fans' having a consumerist ideology when it comes to buying their music. As the main purpose of music videos is to help sell the artists music.

The plan is to make the visuals match the lyrics as much as possible in the verses as to adhere to the conventions identified by Goodwin. Thus we see Jean shaving when the song states "My shavin' razors cold" and so on. I realise that it is unconventional to represent a woman in a non-voyeuristic and unglamorous way by showing her shaving, however I think that my younger target audience would apricate a realistic representation of women. Also my glamorous representation comes from the representation of the band itself so I still appeal to my aspirer audience.

I want my brand to become one of "finding happiness in the everyday" or something along those lines and thus have chose the narrative of Jean finding happiness.

Personally I believe a narrative is more satisfying when it comes "full-circle" and therefore have chosen to parallel some shots from the beginning of the video at the end, such as the sunrise and sunset, but still create a story that has a clear beginning and end to it. 

I wanted to try and connote that the artist is an intrusive thought that belongs to Jean. I want to connote that she is telling herself to "cheer up" because she realises that she can find happiness in everyday situations. I hope to achieve this by having the band show up in places where Jean and her friend are, and then by cutting to a performance space where they state "cheer up sleepy Jean" this connotes that the performance

space is Jeans head. I have planned this feature to be shown frequently in the video so I hope this comes across clearly to the audience as it is an established piece of my video. Even if the audience does not understand this, it still links the narrative and performance aspects of the video effectively.

I chose a band of 3 as when listing to the song I heard three distinct instruments, a guitar, piano and a set of drums. I plan to find and use three individuals who can actually play these three instruments so the band looks authentic in my video. 

Planning - Annotating Song Lyrics

 

Daydream Believer - The Monkees

Here Comes The Sun - The Beatles

Move Your Feet - Junior Senior

From this exercise I have concluded that the song that has the best music video ideas is "Daydream Believer". As I have ideas for a strong performance and aspect, a clear narrative and a way of appealing the video to the target audience.