Rough Cut Digipak

Rough Cut Website

http://amberhemming.wix.com/thecassettes

Props problem

Our initial idea was to use fairy lights to decorate the barn set, but because we didn't have access to electricity in the specific part of the barn we used this was a problem for us. We managed to get electricity but just for the main lighting and as the weather was very bad on the day of production we didn't have the facilities to get any other source of electricity to the set. We couldn't use hay bails within our set design because the person in which we were going to use them from had stacked them up in another barn therefore we had to improvise on the day with the resources we had. Overall, the set has changed since we designed it but I think it still followed the conventions well. Instead of using hay we set out a bench and decorated it with cushions and lights etc with wood blocks scattered around to still make it the woods type theme.

Home page

This is my home page of my website, I decided from looking at twin atlantic's website layout that I thought this was the most clear with the most relevant information on the front page focusing upon what is going on with their live dates down the side and their new album advertised as soon as you open the page. I didn't like the idea of having the video on the front page because I already had it on the welcome page and a music page in which it would also feature therefore I thought it would be too much if i put it everywhere else.

However, once I looked at my website I felt as though the news stories were too spread out and it looked as though there was no information to go with the story creating too much empty space. Therefore like Twin Atlantic's website I made the news stories closer together adding a facebook and twitter share button because that's a good idea for the fans to be able to share our stories to their friends creating a bigger fanbase for us if more people know about us. On the right hand side where the Tours were I made it look better by making that less spread out too, I didn't want to put the live dates down the side though because again I have a page solely for the tour dates so by just putting a button on instead I can link it to other pages. I still need to figure out what to put underneath my news stories because the bottom of my website it quite empty.

Welcome

This is my welcome page in which the fans will be directed to straight away when they click on our web page, I liked the Royal Blood design in which the black background contrasted well with the white writing and the video being centre of the page standing out to the audience. I liked how the writing stands out at the top of the page and I changed the enter site button so that it turned a different colour when it was clicked. I liked the idea of having all our social media sites on one bar so that the fans could click on whichever like they wanted and it didn't take up a lot of space. Once we have finished and exported our video I will add that video to our front page I just put that one there for alignments and to see what the layout looked like.

Music Page

I liked the idea of having a page solely for music therefore the fans can easily access our songs and play them whilst being on the website itself. The top left video is being left for our video so that it will attract the audience attention. As there's options to play the songs from soundcloud or from youtube it's using two different music pages broadening our audience as some people prefer to use one or the other to listen to songs. I have used the download on itunes button to make it easier for the fans to get our songs and it's also as though we're promoting the download of our songs not just them listening to it. In comparison to the Jake Bugg website below I have videos but he has all of his songs available to play whereas I only have three I might add more videos later to again fill it out and make more of our songs known. I don't particular like how Jake Bugg just has youtube videos on his page therefore I changed the design as it was easier to do on Wix and also I liked using two different music sites.

Blog on website

I decided to add a blog of what the "band" are getting up to in weekly posts sometimes featuring videos and photos or just text of what we're up to, this is so fans can keep up to date with everything we're doing and it makes more of a connection between the fans and the band to keep them interested in us.

Opening scenes and establishing shots

When we were on set in the woods we decided we would take still shots of the types of opening scenes or establishing shots we liked from our location, these could go in our video as transitions between sets and veruses etc. These scenes along with the sun look really nice and we therefore want to film when the sun is out rather than it being dull weather to emphasis our happy atmosphere.

Promo video and outtakes

We decided that using our outtakes we would make a promo video for another of monsters and men song just to make the whole identity of our band seem more professional and most band sometimes do using gig videos for promo videos such as this one by Catfish and The Bottlemen however we thought we should just use our outtakes and use another song from of monsters and men: we will now add this to our website to fill it out a bit and make it look better.

Website Gigs

I thought a simple layout of the tour page would make it easy for the fans to understand when and where the tours will be taking place with the festivals on the right hand side just showing where we would be playing later on in the year. I went for the plain layout because I thought the font and the contrast to the background made the writing stand out, it's clear to read and I didn't think the tour page would need any images because it is all focused upon this information rather than anything else.

Images on Production

Merchandise

Here is the merchandise in which I made on my website store, I replicated of monsters and men store as I liked how the name of the product and the price was near the image an that it was clear to see what the image was. At the bottom when the buyer puts their products into the cart it would come up at the bottom but obviously because we don't have as many products as the OMAM band do ours is limited to how many rows and columns I have. I figured that I should aim the marketing at boys and girls and also accessories for phones because in today's society most people of the target audience have phones so therefore it would be a good selling technique.

Website Merchandise

I found a website in which I could make my own products for my merchandise page, I have added them to my website with the costs, sizes and images. I thought of the types of products people of this genre would want so I came up with these with the designs on the front of them being cassettes relying on the name of our band.

Website Development

Instead of using a typical menu bar at the top like most band website I thought, as the website developer, that I could change it and make it seem more professional if I used cassettes for the buttons to direct them to different pages. I found a cartoon cassette on google (the one above) and I photo shopped the words onto it, I then changed the colours of this particular design by quick selecting and using the magic wand tool in order to change the colours of the images for the different buttons and added them to my website. Here are some images to show this:

After I have made the images I have added them to my website menu bar making sure they're the same size and there are equal gaps between the buttons again making sure that it is representative of a professional website. I didn't want to make my buttons too colourful otherwise my genre may venture into pop music and I want to stay in the indie/folk side of it.

Model Release Forms

Set Design

 This image was taken from the Mumford and Sons video, we liked the way in which the sun shone through the trees and the character was on the right hand side drawing focus to the background rather than the person making it stand out more. We will use this in our video because we have a field and grassy areas in which we can try and recreate this shot.

 Again, the field location of our video we like because it follows the conventions of folk being in the countryside, outdoors etc. Also it makes it different and unique to other videos that will be made because they're usually staged in a set place with all one coloured background emphasising the people in the foreground and also I feel like they represent the pop culture more than anything else.

 

Here is the set in which we want to use for the course etc, apart from the narrative in which will be set in a field. We want the lights and hay around the barn to connote the folk/country atmosphere and so our audience can clearly see the genre we're trying to produce. Also the fact that our costumes will have to represent the genre too as you can see from the Mumford and Sons video they where quite "farmer-like" outfits in which we would try and find from charity shops. 

This is taken from another video whereby the set is similar to the mumford and sons one yet it has hay bails visible in the background, it represents the folk atmosphere because of the outfits and background props. We want to use all these videos settings in our video to make it connote to the genre we want.

Influences

Even though this kind of genre (folk/country) isn't performed by Lily Allen I thought this would be a good video to use to show how she has followed the conventions of the genre in order to present that image to her intended audience. She has used the typical hay in the background with the backing singers and band dressed appropriately using the correct instruments you find in folk songs, she has even used the country-style dancing to further show the audience her song is catergorised into the folk genre. However, from looking at this video I feel it is directed more towards old-style country in what they're wearing which I can't follow as I'm using more modern folk mixed with indie which means I can't focus upon the folk genre more than the indie as its all one genre not two separate ones. We are definitely going to use the intruments from the genre and the hay in our video, I also like the lighting in this video at the beginning but I don't think this would be possible to use because of the barn setting and how the daylight will contrast the lighting itself.  

Opening scenes

We liked the establishing shots at the start of this video with the sunrise and landscape images, we want to use this before our video starts to show the audience our location and set the scene. As we aren't using a studio location we feel as though we should use these shots to our advantage and start building up the setting from the start. It also adds an interest to the audience rather than going straight into the song, the limitations to this is that we might not be able to get a sunset shot due to timing issues and also we need to make sure the location looks nice in a professional way rather than just taking any random video. Due to the weather as well filming our video could prove difficult because we want a nice landscape shot rather than one that is dull and raining, we will therefore need to consider carefully when we do our shoot which could mean delays in our production.

Animatic

ANIMATIC from Dom Brown on Vimeo.

Storyboard

Storyboard