CD cover analysis - Motion in the Ocean

I have decided to do a CD cover analysis from the album Motion in the Ocean by McFly because this is the album in which we have picked our song for our final music video off of, and it may help to find out which target audience the song/album was aimed at, and what genre it is. 

Character profile - boy

Carol Vernallis video editing theory

Props

The probs we are thinking of using include:

A globe, which we will be using in the chorus of the song, when the lyrics "ugly is the world were on" are used, demonstrating how we are matching the visuals to the lyrics as stated in Goodwin's Theory. We also thought that this was a good globe to use as it is more 'vintage' looking than other ones we had seen therefore, we though that it would go better with the 'spooky' element to our music video, rather than a brightly coloured globe.

Secondly, this is the top that we are planning to use to be the clothing of the male character, after he has been killed and the female protagonist finds it in the woods. We chose a flannel shirt because it might make it easier for the audience to understand that it is supposed to be the shirt of the male character (It looks more masculine).

Target audience mind map

Mood board

We decided to create a 'mood board', by adding pictures of some of our most iconic ideas for our final music video. This helped us get more to grips with how we want the music video to look and how we want to portray the 'spooky' feeling to it along with the 'typical teenage girl sleepover' style at the beginning.

Here is a look at what we have created:

As you can see, we've added things such as the candles that we plan to show first in the music video and possibly them being blown out at the end of the music video. We've also shown a picture of a handwritten note which is something that is left by the girl. Another thing that we added was a picture of a torch (which adds to the 'spooky' feel with regards to the lighting) as well as an outdoor location where there are trees (where the girl finds the boys shirt on the floor). The broken heart represents the story in which we have based our music video around, and the book and cat are just some other things we may add into the quick cuts of the video. 

Costumes

Today, me and my group decided that Elsie should play the lead role in the music video, as she is the one who we decided would be doing the 'story telling' within the verses of the song. 

With regards to the costumes during the sleepover part of the narrative, we decided that we are going to go for the more stereotypical approach and are going to be wearing a more informal and comfy dress code. Therefore, we came to the agreement that we will be wearing onesies, as shown below:

However, we decided that for the serious narrative Elsie should wear something more formal, so she decided upon this black and white dress. We wanted to do this so as the audience are able to recognize that there is a contrast between the different narratives within our music video.

Evolution of our band logo

Today we completed our band logo which Laura started by drawing a falcon in Paint. When it came to the colouring Laura suggested that we added oranges and reds as it fits into the theme of fire, which ones again reflects our bands name.

Here is the complete drawing Laura did:









Then Elsie had the idea to make it look more like a logo with a red background circle shape behind it with a yellow outline.

Here is the development of it:










Finally, we had to think of the typography on the logo. I did some research and sent some ideas of what we could use. Here were some options that I thought would look good with the falcon drawing:


Font choice 1




Font choice 2




Font choice 3




Font choice 4


We all decided that we liked font choice 2 the best. Therefore, Elsie tried to find a font most like it and she chose Kristen ITC. However, then we had to decide on its placement.


Option 1




Option 2




Option 3

We came to an agreement that we like it inside the main red circle at the bottom. Here is our final logo:

Developing are merchandise

As mentioned previously, we changed our band name from 'Firelight Foxes' to 'Firelight Falcons'. So, as we have changed our name, we decided that we needed to get going with some new merchandise ideas for our website. Today, we came up with 2 rough draft t-shirt designs that we will later develop and make more professional if we stick with that idea. Here are the 2 t-shirts (They both will be made available in black and white).

Click on the images to make them larger:

  

We nominated Laura to do a quick sketch as she is the best and the creative side of a project, she took some inspiration off some images found online of different types of easy to draw Falcons. We also decided that this might come in handy later on with more merch ideas etc.

Here is a brief look at the sketch she did:

A change in our band name

Today we realised that someone out of our class has already used a fox as their band logo as well was within their band name. 

Therefore, as we want to be more original, Laura, Elsie, and I have decided to come up with a new name. However, we are still going to keep 'Firelight' within our name. For our new band name, we have decided to use the name 'Firelight Falcons', instead of 'Firelight Foxes' to make sure that we are different to the other group using a fox as their logo/name.

Therefore, we will also start to develop a logo, some merchandise, and other things for our new band name.

We have already found some inspiration for our logo, as well as some of our merchandise (we found these on Google images):

Here is a bit of inspiration for what sort of thing we might like to use for our band logo. We like how it is simple, yet effective, and also relates to our bands name.

Here are a couple images that we found which we think would look good on a bracelet, which can be something that we sell on our website. The shape of the falcon on these images will also be a good fit horizontally on a bracelet.

We will now be working on maybe sketching some things up from what has inspired us, and we'll also keep updating and developing our ideas.

Finding a band name and thinking about merchandise

Elsie, Laura, and I have been thinking about a band name (as we have decided not to use McFly to make it more of our own) and we settled on the name 'Lightfire Foxes'. We chose this as we believe that it represents the band's genre well and also believe that we could use an intertextual reference to a fox maybe in our final music video (making it more personal to the band that we are creating, as well as their style). As at points in our music video, settings will be more gloomy and dark, therefore, we decided that it would be a good idea to maybe include a fox here).

As I said, we have also been trying to gather some ideas for some merchandise that our band would sell (That we can add onto our website). We also tried to make these so as they would fit with our band's name and the overall concept. 

These are the colours which we have decided to sell the wristbands in:

We decided no to make the colour range to vast as then some colours may not be liked by some audience members. However, we decided we really wanted/needed to add the oranges and the red as it fits in with the idea of the fox.

Here's a look at 3 of the ideas we have so far for our wristbands. As these are rough drafts, they shall later be made to look more professional and more variations should be released (along with other pieces of merchandise).

Case study - How YouTube is changing music industry

Music Director analysis

Production company/Record Company logo

My group and I thought that it would be a good idea to make a production company/record label logo to help make up our overall package. 

We decided to go with the name 'LET Studios', firstly because it's the letters of our first names (Laura, Elsie, Tammy), and because we generally liked how the word 'Let' sounded in the title (it makes us sound productive). 

So here is what we came up with. To make this logo we used https://www.graphicsprings.com/start-your-logo

Band website analysis

One requirement of our course is to create a band website so that we can show how we would present ourselves to the public. Therefore I have done an analysis of an already existing band website so that we could get some inspiration. I chose to analyse McBusted's website because they are very much like the band McFly, in which we are making a music video for, for one of their songs.  

One page pitch video

Here is the clip from the filming of our one page pitch for our music video ideas.

Michael Jackson applied to the star theory

Michael Jackson was undisputedly a star in the world of pop, and still is. He changed the music industry in many ways: he was controversial, unique, and extraordinary. But does he conform to Richard Dyer's theory?

A Commodity 

It can be argued that Michael Jackson is more of a commodity now, after his death, than he was when he was alive. For example, the singer moon-walked across a Las Vegas stage in a nationally televised hologram performance; A new album debuted at No. 2 on music charts; and a traveling Cirque du Soleil show based on Jackson’s songs has logged nearly 500 performances worldwide. The result has been an estate that has earned more than $600 million since the King of Pop’s untimely death at age 50.  
(http://www.reviewjournal.com/entertainment/michael-jackson-hot-commodity-5-years-after-his-death). 

Although there are probably hundreds of people who's job it is now to dress up as Michael and perform at parties, no one could ever recreate him, which just shows that he is star quality as he is truly one of a kind. It can be argued that in the time of Michael Jackson he wasn't a star just by being a commodity, even though some people are willing to pay a ridiculous sum of money for one of his gloves. 

A Construction 

“Everyone wears two gloves; I’ll wear one and make them pay attention.”

I believe that Michael Jackson could defiantly be seen as a construction, but a construction made by himself. He was widely known for his iconic dance moves, music videos and outfits. He made-up many dance moves such as the moonwalk and the smooth criminal. These moves are a direct association with Jackson and if someone else were to do it, it just wouldn't be the same. Michael could also be associated with his outfits, such as, the crystal, bejeweled, silver glove, the red 'Thriller' jacket and the many different military jackets, with the same black sunglasses.  

An Ideology

Michael Jackson's style isn't specific to a certain genre, he is somewhat his own ideology. However, there are some aspects we could relate to the pop brand. For example, the bright and glittery clothing. He also includes aspects of rock in his image, such as, long hair, black sunglasses, and a unique, sometimes questionable style. The sunglasses in particular gives him an air of mystery as we can't see his eyes so therefore we may feel less connected with him.

Paradoxes:

Ordinary - a star must be like us so that we can feel connected with them. Michael shows this through his devoted family life as a father and animal lover.

Extraordinary - a star must also have something that makes them special, and reminds us of how great they are. Michael Jackson has sold more than 750 million records worldwide, as well as eight platinum albums and thirteen number 1 singles.

 

Present - a star must exists as a part of our lives to the extent that we talk about them in social situations and know stuff about them, like we know them personally. Michael definitely got people talking about him and we even knew all about his personal life. However, sometimes he didn't want that shared, but when you're a star that's something that comes with it.  

Absent - Michael Jackson isn't within reach of people, we may know him and his personal life but he doesn't know us. He is the one on the stage and we are the one in the audience watching him therefore he is absent from us.



Richard Dyer - Star Theory

Copyright permission

Here is a copy of the email I sent to McFly's record company asking for permission to use their song for our music video.

One page pitch for music video

Textual analysis of a music video

Official music video https://youtu.be/Tu7HoGZaspo 

Genres and sub-genres mind-map

Genre and sub-genre mind-map
This is a mind-map exploring the different sub-genres around Pop music. I chose Pop sub-genres because this is the genre in which we are thinking about basing our own music video off, specifically Rock Pop.
You can click on the picture to enlarge it and if you would like to see it closer the link in the title will take you to the sight showing a more detailed version of this mind-map which will be easier to read from. 

CD Cover practice

 Object #1 - Original image 

Object #1 - Edited image  

 Object #2 - Original image 

Object #2 - Edited image

 The 'i'm a lot of fun' one - Original

 The 'i'm a lot of fun' one - Edited 

 The 'not looking at the camera' one - Original

 The 'not looking at the camera' one - Edited 

 The 'serious artist' one - Original

 The 'serious artist' one - Edited 

 'I'll smash your face in' one - Original 

  'I'll smash your face in' one - Edited 

 'Your mum will like me' one - Original

 'Your mum will like me' one - Edited 

'Tortured artist one' - Original











                                                                                                                                                  'Tortured artist one' - Edited