Our Final Video

Alterations made along the way

The finished edit of our video, differed in a few ways to the initial plans that we had. The biggest change was that we had to rearrange our storyboard in a few areas and leave out the alleyway sequence. We could not film this intended sequence due to lighting issues, the light in the alleyway was too dark and could not be seen very clearly, even when we tried to lighten up the shots by using the light effect on Final Cut Express. It was also raining on the only day we could film and therefore this ruined the continuity of our overall video. If we had included the sequence, it would have looked clearly too edited and would have been obviously different from our other shots, this would confuse our audience and we decided that it would be best not to include this sequence.
We also decided to change the image we initially thought of putting behind the green screen. The first thought was to have a sort of concert ending, with a stage background and try to create a crowd supporting the band, this would highlight their success. However, we could not think of a very successful way to represent the intended 'crowd' and so, in order to highlight the more humorous side of our video, we decided to include pictures of famous landmarks from different countries such as the Eiffel Tower and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. This gave a light hearted feel to our video, that we felt the audience would have appreciated. We also used these images as a way of showing that the band are now very successful worldwide and have truly picked themselves up from the rut that they were making of their life and therefore this emphasises the lyrics and overall theme of our video.
These changes, although not intended, have proved to be successful, although we feel that the alleyway sequence would have created a more diverse video, having introduced a new setting, but the shots were not up to the standard that we had hoped and so could not be used in our video.

Ancillary Products- Magazine Advert

After researching several different magazine adverts, we came across what seemed to be a common formula. The picture was either the album cover or a very basic picture showing the artist or reflecting a theme. We decided to carry on these conventions and went with the idea of reflecting the 'No Identity' theme. Having previously created the digipack, we were fresh with ideas and decided, in order to relate both the digipack and magazine advert together, we should use a picture that we had used in the album as the main basis for our advert. We did not want to re-use our album cover because we felt this would show no creativity within the band. The banana would have provided a rather bland advert which, although would have linked to the band, would not have conveyed the information that we wanted. So it was decided, by a process of elimination that we would used the blurred out picture as our starting point for the advert. Although we were not pleased with the overall look of this picture, the advert itself seems to draw away attention from the quality of the picture.

We started with the picture in front of us on Adobe Photoshop. We played around with several different tools and exploited the picture by changing the effects, experimenting with 'Charcoal' and 'Brushed' but we decided that it would be best to stick to the simple original format that the picture was in as it had previously been edited for our CD and we felt that over-editing would ruin our picture and the simplicity we were hoping to give off. We came across an aspect of difficulty when it came to trying to add text. After serious amounts of cropping and then pasting into many different softwares such as Fireworks, Photoshop and Preview, we eventually managed to get rid of the white box that appeared behind out text in every picture. We used a variety of different fonts for our advert to show diversity and each new font conveyed new information about the album.

Targeting our specific audience came through the mention of iTunes. We know that most people nowadays use iTunes to download their music and so we knew that if we mentioned this aspect, we would attract most members of our 15-25 year old target audience. Having shown the Apple logo, we also felt that we should target those who still buy physical albums and so also included the HMV logo. This shows where the album is available to the audience as they will all recognise these well known logos. Another way of showing how modern the band are, was the inclusion of a BBM barcode, where those with a smartphone, specifically a Blackberry, can scan the barcode and will then receive information of the band. We also made a reference to Twitter in our advert, as we know how this way of socialising is becoming more and more popular with many celebrities gaining 1 million followers. So this mention of Twitter is intended to bring publicity to the band by getting as many followers as they can so they can tell people more about their music.

As previously stated, we intend for our advert to be published in 'The Fly', however, most adverts also appear in more social magazines such as Heat, OK and Hello. However, if our advert was published in these magazines, they would not be targeting our specific audience and so we feel that The Fly or NME would be perfect magazines to advertise our album as they will appeal and attract our target audience of 15-25 year old males.

Our magazine advert, we feel, is very successful. It tells the audience the essential things they need to know, tells them where they can download and buy the album, what the album looks like, what the main song in the album is called and also how they can interact with the band itself through their website and Twitter.

Ancillary Products- Digipack

The inspiration behind the message of our digipack came as soon as we decided that the album should be called 'No Identity', this emphasises the idea that in the song, the boy did not have an idea of who he was at the beginning. On that basis we came up with several different ideas that we felt could represent this theme.

Idea 1
We initially came up with an idea that would show a picture of the main character, duplicated 4 times. However, each person would be digitally edited to be a different colour. This would show the confusion which has lead to the boy not knowing who he is and overall, not knowing his identity. After making the sample however, we felt that this was not showing off our full knowledge of the software, Adobe Photoshop, that we were using. Adjusting each individual colour using the tint and saturation effects gave us many different options of how to represent each picture.After much deliberation we found that these colours were the best outcome we would get.

We did not feel that this idea had been represented in the way that we had first hoped, and despite multiple efforts to adjust the pictures, this was proving to be a time consuing task and we decided it would be best to think of other ideas.

Idea 2

The next plan we came up with, again reflected the 'No Identity' theme, but in a comical 'Where's Wally?' type way. We again used Photoshop, however also had help from Adobe Fireworks, and using the eraser tool, cut round a picture of the back of George's head. We multiplied this numerous times and pasted each head into a row on the screen, eventually filling the canvas. Before we had even put the one face of George we were going to put on, in order to show that out there he could find his identity, we had decided that this picture was not what we had thought it was going to turn out like. The hair proved to be a big impact and seemed to take over the whole picture and therefore missing the point of the picture. We did not think this was a very successful idea and this showed that you have to try everything out first before you settle on specific ideas because, on paper they may look clever, but after actually putting the picture together, it may not turn out like you hoped.

Idea 3

As they say '3' is the lucky number, and as it turned out, our third idea was deffinately the most effective and we chose this to be our main album cover. Thinking still along the theme of 'No Identity' we came across the idea of silhouettes. A silhouette shows the outline and shape of a persons body, but not their face. So along these lines, we pasted a picture of George onto paint and used the 'Brush' tool to black out his face, arms and legs, but leaving his white printed t-shirt. We decided to leave this because this shows the band's signature style and emphasises a convention of the indie genre, printed t-shirts. After making one silhouette we decided to make another, but of George in a different pose. We did this three times and evetually after using Photoshop, Fireworks and experimenting with a new software called PhotoPlus X2, managed to organise our pictures showing varying poses that George was standing in. These silhouettes, together created an effective background and we changed the size of some in order to vary this more. After choosing the 5 most successful pictures, we decided to have one normal picture of George, as to not confuse the audience and this will make him recognisable to those who had only seen the video. We rotated one picture of him in order to create a 'back to back' effect and we found that this also reflected the humrous aspect of our video. When choosing the font, we went on Google and came across a website called http://www.1001freefonts.com/. This website gave us a range of fonts to experiment with and in the end we chose a font called 'Ashcan' as we felt this was rather youthful looking, optimistic but also jagged. For the title, 'No Identity', we chose a font called 'Carbon Type'- which is very similar to the font of a typewriter. We used this as this shows an authoritative yet traditional idea.

After we had found the fonts, the last thing to add was the parental advisory sign and also our record label, Cherrytree records, symbol. After finishing this we had completed our album cover, which we felt was a huge success and was the most interesting and creative idea out of all the previous options. The silhouettes help to emphasise the album title and the banana on the t-shirt also adds a humorous aspect to the whole product. We felt that the pictures could have used a little more editing and could have been better quality, but the overal final outcome was successful.

Inside the Album
The rest of the album, of course, was based around the 'No Identity' theme and so each picture reflects either an aspect of this, or an aspect associated with the band. The inside left picture, as typical to most CD conventions, has a thank you note to the fans but is also quite humorous because the image is of the banana that is shown on George's t-shirt throughout the video and also runs as an occurring theme through the digipack and magazine advert. As with several artists, the obvious being Justin Bieber and his purple hoodie, clothing can often represent the band and we felt that this banana could show as a good way of other texts making intertextual links to our band. So we emphasised this banana as much as possible in order to make it memorable inside the audiences heads and therefore they would associate banana clothing with our band.

The image behind the CD shows George, however, his face has been blurred out, which helps to emphasise the 'No Identity' theme. We blurred his face using iPhoto and the 'Retouch' tool which tries to take out any blemishes in a photo. Normally you would use this tool very sparsly, but in order to make the whole face blurred, we had to use the tool multiple times to make the whole face blurred. Although initially this seemed to be quite successful, we found it hard to merge the skin and hair colours together as this created a very dark splodge on the side of his face. To fix this, we had to edit the blurred version and make it slightly softer by increasing the saturation and shadowing. Again we used iPhoto to do this and it made the picture softer, however, we are not that satisfied with it as the outline between the forehead and hair line is very obvious, and if we could change anything about our products, this would be one of the first things. 

The back of the CD, we decided to leave quite basic, similar to the back of Kate Nash and Ellie Goulding's albums, and this simplicity is a convention of the indie genre. Having kept a recurring theme of white throughout our album, it made sense to have a white background. The white could be interpreted in different ways. When searching for what the colour white could signify, we came across this website http://crystal-cure.com/white.html which, on the opening page, explains how white can signify a fresh new beginning, brings about mental clarity, purifies thoughts or actions and also clears obstacles away. All these are very relevant to our overall theme that you can always turn your life around no matter how bad it is getting. So this shows that the white is a real signifier of our meaning and although each audience member will decode their own meaning, the preferred encoded reading from us, the producers is that it reflects a new, fresh beginning. We decided to re-use the font that we had used for our front cover and so went back to http://www.1001freefonts.com/ and again chose 'Ashcan'. In order to comply with typical CD conventions, we included the copyright law and symbol along with the compact disc logo. To make the product complete, we used a barcode to make it look professional and realistic. 

Evaluation

Overall, we are very pleased with the outcome of our digipack. The themes are clearly represented as well as the band, whose identity, although ironic to our album name, is revealed throughout this album with every picture, colour and font having a significant meaning. If we could change one thing, we would try and make the blurred face picture slightly more professional looking, but we tried our best to find many ways of doing this and eventually could not find any so we had to settle with what we had. 

Original Digipack and Advert

We took inspiration from Example's 'Wont Go Quietly' album cover and decided to create 9 different panels of the main singer in varying costumes. Using photoshop we decided to exploit the light and use the glow effect in order to enhance the colours and brightness of each individual picture. We think that this is successful because it reflects the album by having a light-hearted, comedic vibe. It is eye catching due to the brightness of the green colour of the hat and also would appeal to our target audience of 15-25 year old males because of the way in which it is set out and also the name of our band itself, 'The Midnight Beauties'

Our digipack:

The front cover

Inside- left of CD

Behind the CD 

Back cover of the CD

Magazine Advert Research

Magazine Advert Research on Prezi

HMV Research - George

When looking round the HMV Store, we were set the task to of researching album covers of the genre that we had done for our music video ourselves which was indie bands(Alternative). The first album that I saw was Take That. The album had the band standing on telephone wires wire with a plain blue background, this stood out to me in many ways. The first way that i felt it was my favourite was the unusual image of the band grouped together standing on a telephone wire, this stood out to me straight away and is very eye-catching to buyers of cd's. Another

HMV Research- Jo

In HMV, we were set the task of researching different album covers within our genre. As there was no specific indie section, we had to conduct our research within the rock and pop section. Standing in front of a rack of cd's, our first task was to take a quick look and see which album caught our attention. The first album I was drawn to was 'Together We Were Made' by The Feeling. The bright red colours attract your eye instantly along with the white font on the black background. We may use the white font on a black background for our album cover because it is successful in drawing your attention to the CD.
The CD's are located at the very back of the store and spread through the whole width. The latest chart singles and albums are also positioned at the front side of the store so that, if you know you are looking for the latest releases then you know where to find them.


The music DVD's were located at the back of the DVD section towards the side of the store and were arranged alphabetically by the surname of the artist. Around 70 percent of the music DVD's were a recording of a live performance and the other 30 were mainly documentaries of the bands and their backstage antics. The purpose of a music DVD is mainly to show the performance of a band or artist and encourage people to go to their future concerts and buy their albums.

Overall, the most successful and eye catching album covers include bright colours and effective use of font.

We decided to film our research into album covers as a different way to present our work. In the video we look at different album covers within our genres and discuss the strengths that each cover has.

The Fly Magazine

The magazine we have chosen to publish our advertisement in, is 'The Fly'. This is a free music magazine that is published monthly in the United Kingdom and is distributed to record shops, bars and venues around the country. The magazine started as a listings leaflet but in 1999 it went national. The magazines circulation is around 104,568 and is published by the HMV owned MAMA Group.

Within the magazine there are review sections featuring new releases and live concert reviews. The remainder of the magazine is committed to articles and interviews with artists who are promoting new releases and tours. The Fly also features new bands, which is why we have chosen to use it for our poster. It has a history of supporting bands early, having given the likes of Razorlight, MGMT, Muse and Coldplay their first cover features.

 

Magazine History by George

1952:
In 1952 the first music magazine was published.

1960's:
In the 1960's the first musical press was made, this consisted of non critical output towards musicians and the arrival of the Beatles and the Rolling stones.

1970:
in the 1970's glam rock was made, this consisted of T-rex, Sweet, Mud and pink floyd. At this time music magazines became critical, NME changed its styles to meet the punk rock needs. melody maker was made to promote artists like the Police and Duran Duran, this was done through classified adds.

1978:

In 1978 smash hits was launched, this was a magazine that was aimed at a younger audience. From the making of this magazine style in pop became important than the content in the content independent labels wanted their own voice and produced fanzines.

1980's:
In the 1980's readers are deciding to abandon the magazine NME because it no longer writes about normal bands such as, Duran Duran.

Record Label Logo by Jo

We think that this record label would be interested in wanting to sign a contract with our band. Cherrytree Records was founded in 2005 by Martin Kierszenbaum. The label focuses on new artists with growth potential. The label also has an online radio station which focuses on pop alternative music. Cherrytree currently represents artists such as Ellie Goulding, Keane, La Roux, Robyn and The Feeling. They also have an impressive back catalogue featuring a range of bands and artists, from Noah and the Whale, Tommy Sparks, The Fratellis and also Lady Gaga.
Our song would fit perfectly into this record label because our band is new and has lots of potential. Also with artists such as Ellie Goulding and Noah and the Whale, it shows that they successfully represent indie artists and hopefully, in the future, the band would potentially be as successful as Lady Gaga.

Progress

As this was our first time using the green screen, we had to experiment. We chose a picture from Google and, with the help of a YouTube tutorial, learnt how to add the picture onto the green screen. After this, through a process of trial and error, we resized George and moved the background around until we found the best and most successful fit. 

The overall editing of the video is a very time consuming task as you have to be very precise and due to the complexity of the programme itself, it takes a long time to learn how the software works. After understanding the initial steps, we went about cutting our shots using the razor blade tool. Having to edit the shots in time with the music proved to be quite difficult to get the timing right and the having to constantly render the video itself is causing to be another time wasting task. But so far, we have edited over half our video and feel as though we have grasped the essential concept and workings of Final Cut  Express.

Editing Schedule

The majority of the editing will take place in our lessons, however any extra will take place after school. Here is a basic schedule that George has made, outlining the dates when editing will take place. 

Still Frame Analysis by George

The Kooks - Naive

1. Opening Shot: Shot one shows the main character being introduced to the viewer by walking downstairs from his flat. The shot is slow paced, this increases the tension for the viewer. The opening shots slow build up helps to imply to the viewer that the song will be slow paced and that will help the viewer to determine whether they want to listen on.

2. Characters Being Introduced: Luke Pritchard(lead vocals/guitar) is the first and only member of the band to be introduced. He is first shown to the viewer walking alone downstairs of his flat, this shown with slow paced close-ups of the members face shows to the audience that the character is vulnerable, weak and susceptible.

3. Artist's Performance: Luke Pritchards performance in this music video was very impressive. He is very relaxed and always in character throughout the video. The main thing for me that made him stand out was his vulnerability shown throughout. Another reason why I felt that Luke was very impressive was due to the fact that he always makes eye-contact with the camera this help create a relationship and connect with the viewer and makes them want to view more of the music video. Lukes rhythm when walking to the beat is also very impressive, for example, shown in screenshot 2.

4. Setting/Location: In this music video they use urban locations such as, a flat, kitchen area and concert arena. This is shown in all screenshots. From the video being set in urban dark areas this would show to users that Luke(main character) is alone and vulnerable. The whole video is set in dark urban areas, i feel this is due to the fact that it will be easy to film and wont be expensive to be able to put together.

5. Costumes And Props: In the video there isn't many props used only rundown house essentials for example, beds. This would show to the viewer that Luke doesn't have much money. The costumers used in the video are just the average indie wear, for example, black jeans, dark tops and leather jacket. This is shown in screenshots 1,2 and 6.

6. Camerawork and Editing: Throughout this music video there are several different camera types used, these include, long, medium and close ups. The long shots are mainly used when Luke is walking through town. The medium shots are used when Luke is walking through town, meeting friends at parties and a concert. The main camera type used throughout the video is close-ups, these shots are used a lot on Luke to show his emotion and his vulnerability to the audience.

Health and Safety

Our biggest risk will be when we are using the green screen equipment. We must make sure that everything is secure and in the right place so that there is no possibility of anything falling off and breaking. We must also be careful when filming in Guildford that we are filming in a safe area and away from any moving cars. But because we are all sensible people I'm sure we will stay clear of any danger.

Indie Iconography by Jo

Indie Iconography on Prezi

Initial Planning Brainstorms by Jo

Synopsis by Jo

Our video begins with a boy waking up and getting ready for school. The colours in the beginning of the video will be dull and this will emphasise the way in which the character's life is heading. As the song is about changing your life for the better, we decided to show the boy living a rebellious life that was going nowhere. He gets attracted by alcohol and smoking and gets kicked out of school. However, in order to show the lyrics relating to the visuals, when the line "This Groundhog day goes round" is sung, we decided to have the video start again with all the same shots. But the overall theme will have changed in order to emphasise how his life has changed. The bright colours will also show this so that it is evident to the audience. To finish the video we decided to use the green screen and create the impression that the boy has turned his life around and is now in a successful band that is slowly conquering the worlds music industry, ending in Hollywood, a notoriously hard place to succeed. This then shows the swap between the narrative and performance aspects of the video, as most indie videos tend to have a bit of both.

Nine Frame Analysis by Jo

Ladyhawke- My Delirium    

This shot shows the artist, Ladyhawke, sat in the corner of her bedroom. The messy bed, basic colours and simplicity of the room itself, emphasises the indie genre. Similar to many indie videos, the artist is the main focus and in this case, she is the only character.

In this close up shot, Ladyhawke is seen lying on a bed. This dim lighting adds to the sultry effect created by the music itself. Chequered shirts are commonly worn by both men and women and are considered highly fashionable. Along with her costume, the simple make up on her face contrasts well with her dark eye make up and adds an edgy side to the video.

Extreme close ups, in most music videos, are used to highlight the importance of a certain object. In this case, this shot shows an old vintage alarm clock. Vintage objects and clothing are associated with the indie genre. The meaning of delirium is when someone has sudden severe confusion or rapid changes in the brain. This idea of the clock ticking could emphasise counting down to her next change.

The use of this watercolour cartoon effect evokes the idea of the change in her brain, highlighting the name of the song. Although special effects are not too common in indie music videos as most are purely performance based, the varying effects appeal more to the audience and introduce the narrative and spectacle aspect of this video.

The colours used in these shots are again simple, there are no flashing bright colours and there is no dull feel to the video itself. The use of blues greens and reds create a more relaxed tone to the video, again emphasising the song. Driving through the dessert also expresses the idea of being free from her delirium.

                                      

The special effects sequence then cuts off and it goes back to the singer looking at herself in the mirror. Going back and fourth from special effects to the normal shot also emphasises the idea of her delirium, so the special effects may reflect her sudden confusion. The scenes in which the special effects sequence is set are the scenes from the pictures on the wall of her bedroom, the ones that you can see in this shot.

This aerial shot shows the car driving away into the distance. The use of the watercolour effect shows a rough image of what the scene would look like, almost as if the vision if blurry because of the effect of her confusion. 

This shot again shows the artist lip syncing as she is driving through the dessert. There is a slight colour change, potentially depicting how her moods suddenly change. However, similar to the other shot, there are no bright colours and although the effect itself is very complex, it gives of a very simple feel.

This final shot shows Ladyhawke playing the guitar while the image of her singing in the car is playing in the background. The calming purple colours may reflect how the music calms her down after her confusion. The close up of the instrument is another key factor linked to the genre of music. In many indie videos the band are seen playing their instruments, specifically during instrument solos. As she is playing a guitar solo, the main focus of this part of the video is on the instrument itself. 

Overall, this music video highlights many typical aspects of an indie music video. The simple colours, the costume, the shot types, the focus on instruments and the artist being the main focus of the video are all conventions of a typical indie video. The video is narrative and concept, however in order to make the audience keep watching the video, the narrative is not that obvious and you really have to search deep into the meaning of the song in order to understand it fully. 

Animatic

This animatic shows our initial storyboard ideas. However, as time passed, we had to adjust our ideas and go against the storyboard. The intended alleyway sequence proved to be unsuccessful due to lighting issues and weather issues which would have affected the continuity of the overall video. However, we did stick to the majority of our initial storyboard.

Shooting Schedule

Thursday 13th- Shooting around School
Monday 17th- Shooting the green screen
Wednesday 19th- Shooting at the House
Thursday 20th- Any extra shooting

Shot List

Here is a list of each of our shots that we used in each setting and why we chose this sort of shot:

House

1. Medium shot- this showed the main character waking up and also showed that he was in a bedroom and domestic environment 

2. Close up- showing him getting out of bed and also showed more of the bedroom setting

3. Close up sequence- this sequence showed him putting his t-shirt on but was also edited to fit the beat of the music and emphasise this convention of music videos

4. Long shot- walking down the stairs, this gave the audience more insight into his house and gave the idea that he is from a working class background, similar to our target audience

5. Close up- the character is walking to his door 

6. Medium shot- shows him leaving his house and, for a split second, the audience will speculate where he is going

School

1. Long tracking shot- follows the character and his friend, who later turns out to be in the band, walking into school, which can be seen by the gates in the background. Another long shot sequence shows the characters walking into the building

2. Close up- this sequence of 5 shots shows the characters walking up the stairs and also shows off more of the school environment

Green Screen

The green screen sequence is seen through a long shot as it allows the performers to be emphasised by the background, which in this instance is clouds, to represent how they are flying in the clouds and happy with life, even though, through the use of the beer can, it is evident that they are in fact not succeeding and are rebellious teenagers who do not seem to have any direction in life. 

School

1. Medium shot which leads to a close up- this shows the character, who has just pushed away a group of girls, walking into a classroom. The close up comes when he points and blows a kiss to the camera, adding humour to the video

2. Long shot- showing the character in a classroom setting, his rebellious side is again emphasised when he is asked to leave the classroom

3. Medium shot- after he has left the classroom he walks past a group of girls who bang the window trying to get his attention. This shows how although he may not be leading a successful life, he is popular with the girls, just like many rebellious teens nowadays are. This therefore emphasises reality

The next sequence of shots comes after the 'Groundhog Day' reference and is therefore a repetition of the beginning sequence. This intertextual reference links to the film because in the film, the character repeats each day exactly the same and therefore we emphasised this link by repeating the morning sequence. However, to add to our theme that you can always turn your life around, we changed the ending to show that our character had taken the high road and had become a more well rounded, better being, putting more emphasis on his school work and getting a girlfriend. We show this through a sequence which eventually leads to a humorous green screen ending. 

School

1. Establishing shot- this shows the character by himself walking into school, however he is without the beer can he originally had, and shows more of the school which helps to emphasise how he has changed and decided to focus more on his education

2. Long shot to medium shot- through this shot we can see the character turn away the offer of alcohol and chooses the girlfriend instead, again helping to highlight the changes he has made in his life

3. Medium shot to long shot- walking down the corridor which is meant to represent the backstage area before he takes to his performance. This shows the character and the girl skipping down the corridor, introducing the humorous aspect and building up to the end of the video

Green Screen

The last section of our video shows the two original characters again performing through a long shot. The images change varying from the Eiffel Tower to the Sydney Harbour Bridge and shows how the band have picked themselves up and have now become a successful band that are slowly breaking the music industries over the world and finally ending in Hollywood, a notoriously hard place to succeed in.

Props List

1. Indie clothing: Printed clothing and dark jeans are typical clothing within the indie genre as they represent the clothes that the target audience wear and therefore reflects reality. We decided to use dark jeans and a printed white t-shirt with a banana on to emphasise the overall happy and humorous aspect of our video




2. Beer cans: We decided to show our characters rebelliousness through the use of beer cans and that he brings them into school. This shows how, at the beginning of the video, he is a typical rebellious teenage boy which makes him popular, however, at the end of our video he has realised his priorities and understands that being seen as a 'cool boy' in fact does not get you a successful life outside of school. So, these beer cans help to emphasise and highlight the overall meaning of our video

3. Instruments: Guitars were used as a way of showing the audience that these actors were in fact the real members of the band, this of which is a convention of many indie music videos.

Indie Fashion by Jo

The style of music we chose to make a video of is indie and therefore, in order to make the costumes for our characters as accurate as possible, we did some further research into the clothing style of other
successful indie bands.
The most common trousers worn by the bands are jeans, and commonly skinny jeans. Some are bright colours such as red and electric blue, but most tend to be blue jeans or chinos.
Plain t-shirts with simple designs or cheque shirts are extremely popular with indie artists. We will try and match this style with our characters in our music video.

YouTube Documentaries

There were not very many relevant options that came up after searching 'Indie Documentaries' on YouTube, however, a 2007 BBC2 series called 'The Seven Ages of Rock-British Indie' gives an insight into the progression of British music. This shows the development of the rock/indie genre and shows how many artists influenced many artists who are now mainstream. Here is a link to a short clip describing the popularity of Oasis:



While searching, there were also many fan videos that had been made. Many had created a montage of their favourite indie songs and had published them for others to see and comment on. Here are some examples:

Record Label Research

Rough Trade

The British indie label, Rough Trade began in 1978 when Geoff Travis founded it in the back of his Notting Hill record shop. The first artists signed to the label were the Smiths, the Fall, and Stiff Little Fingers whose album ‘Inflammable Material’ which was Rough Trade’s first ever album release, sold more than 100,000 copies. Despite these early successes, the label went bust in 1991 but was re launched in 2000 when they signed a little-known band called ‘The Strokes’. Now owned by Beggars Group, the label manages acts such as Antony & the Johnsons and Micachu.

Domino

Domino Records was set up by Laurence Bell in 1993 and proved to be a success. It was set up to license American records for the UK. In 2006 Domino had a big success with ‘Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not’ by Arctic Monkeys which became the fastest-selling debut album in UK chart history. Before that, Domino had scored big hits with the first two albums by Franz Ferdinand. With the help of its star acts, Domino continues to release offbeat material from artists such as Anna Calvi, Wild Beasts and Four Tet.

Mute

Daniel Miller did not set out to become a music label founder, however, after releasing a single in 1978, many musicians started sending him their demos. Miller decided to release some of them and Mute Records has succeeded ever since. Guided by his love of synthetic music, Miller signed acts such as Depeche Mode.