Digital Technology

For my piece I am going to have to use many different types of technology, most of it digital. The programs I will use are:

• Final Cut Pro/iMovie - uploading footage and editing

• Video camera - for filming

• Photoshop - creating digipack

• Blogger - showing work off

• Slideshare - adding slideshows to my blog

• Youtube - finding videos to help give ideas for my video

Frank Turner - Try This At Home

Since I'm showing the conventions of my chosen songs genre, I thought I should use one of the artists other videos to show how he uses and challenges the conventions of his genre. To this aim, I am using the video for the song Try This At Home to show this.

This video is slightly faster paced than 'The Road' but has a similar low budget feel to it. The video features several members of the public performing various parts of the song, along with Frank Turner. This style is very simple, yet effective as it gives large amounts of variation to every frame of the video.

This video reinforces the idea of simple conventions in this genre, as it uses handheld cameras and random members of the public to play the song. It also shows a humorous side to the music, as Frank Turners backing band are occasionally seen directing people, but are mostly seen messing around.

This video has shown me that the type of video I want to make can be very easy to make, and that the genre itself is not at all serious, which will help for any video I want to make.

The King Blues - Headbutt

My favourite music video would probably be for the song Headbutt by The King Blues. The King Blues are a punk band who mix various forms of music together such as ska, folk, and punk. The singer, Jonny 'Itch' Fox has been known to use self-written poetry in the songs to give a more personal approach to the music. The song is featured on the album Punk & Poetry (2011). The video itself is a very simple one, but it helps to emphasise the meaning of the song, which is about a girl that he loved. While this goes against the topic punk songs would normally focus on, the mix of punk and folk allows this to work well.

 

The video shows the singer performing the song throughout in different run-down areas, which gives it a very cheap feel, but this fits the vocal and instrumental style of the genre, as it has a very 'unpolished' quality. The video itself mostly takes place in a single location, a rooftop, and has slight use of imagery to match the song. The chorus of the song is:



I said to all my mates, she won't make a monkey out of me
But when she kissed me it felt like a headbutt
It felt like a headbutt

 

This section has imagery matched to this, by having a monkey in almost all shots of the video with the singer, as well as frequently touching his head or hat when he says 'it felt like a headbutt'.

The video itself has very little story, being a performance video. This does not stop it from showing imagery, as stated above, and using cuts and unrelated shots to effectively add to the video. The video itself is shot in very few locations, mainly taking place on a rooftop with a few additional areas, such as a small kitchen and a red wall, to add some variation to the video.

This video appeals to me because of its simplicity. It shows that you do not need a big budget or fancy settings to make an effective video, and that a good video could be made using only a camera and a few friends.

This video also shows that the conventions for this genre of music are very simple. The videos I have seen in this genre tend to be very simplistic, looking as if they are filmed with handheld cameras in the open areas rather than in studios. This will be very helpful for me, as it makes it easier to create a music video which could be closer to the standards of my genre than other ones would be.

This has influenced my work greatly, as it proves to me that it would be easy to produce a good music video in this genre, as videos for The King Blues and others in this genre, such as Frank Turner, all follow a style model which gives them a low budget, improvised approach.

The song I'm using

I figured I should put the song I am using for my video on here, to show how it sounds and is paced, so I found the official video for it to post on here.

Research methods

There are 4 types of research that are used in any business. These are:

·       Primary

·       Secondary

·       Qualitative

·       Quantitative

Primary

Primary research is first hand information which you have gathered yourself. This is an advantage as it allows the information to be completely up to date, but can be costly and take a lot of time to collect the information together.

This form of research can be used in interviews and questionnaires, and can be used anywhere from the streets to social networking sites

Secondary

Secondary research is information which was collected previously by other companies or opinion survey organisations. While it is cheaper and quicker to get this information, the information may be out of date or not as true as it was, which makes it not very useful for use on modern media.

Secondary research is easily accessible, as much of it is available from books, the Internet, newspapers and even census results could hold some useful information (how many people live in an area where your product sells well etc)

Quantitative

Quantitative research deals with numbers. For example you could research the number of products of a particular type bought in a week, and break that down to see how a single brand is doing compared to its competition. This type of research can also be used for looking for patterns in the numbers obtained in Primary or Secondary research methods.

Qualitative

Qualitative research is research that is based on words or interviews rather than numbers, for example an interview with members of the public would be qualitative. These can be useful if you want to gain an insight into popular opinion of your product rather than look at sales figures. These normally take the form of surveys or questionnaires

About my artist

For my coursework I am using a song from the artist Frank Turner, and it seems like a good idea to give an overview as to how this artist fits into the musical world, so that is what this post is for.

Frank Turner is a British singer/songwriter from Winchester. He became involved in music initially by being involved in the punk rock scene in the early 2000's, being the singer of the now deformed band Million Dead between 2001 and 2005. Following this he started performing solo, using an acoustic guitar to fuse his original punk sound with a more folk inspired one, creating his current style of music, which is normally linked to the Post-Hardcore sub-genre of rock music. His songs normally centre on life in Britain ('Once We Were Anarchists'), touring as an artist ('Nashville Tennessee') or his personal beliefs ('Try This at Home').

Since becoming a solo artist in 2005, Frank Turner has released 4 full length albums, titled Sleep Is for the Week (2007), Love Ire & Song (2008), Poetry of the Deed (2009) and England Keep My Bones (2011), with a fifth, currently untitled, album in development. There have also been 14 official music videos made from his songs.

About my coursework

For my coursework I am going to use a song by the artist Frank Turner, who is a solo folk/punk singer, to make a music video. I am going to use his song 'The Road' for my task, and my aim is to create a more literal video than the official video for this song. This will also prevent me from copying the original, as I will have to create something which avoids the original video