Timeline for my music video

Timeline – I created a timeline for my music video. A timeline represents a detailed overview of shots, and timings that we wish to use in our music video. The idea of the timeline is that it will help my group put together the three elements of my music video and the different parts together. I have written it out from 0 seconds through to 3.15minutes as that’s how long we would need to put in all the elements and cut back and forth to create a visually pleasing music video.

Below is the process of our group producing the timeline. We made both a hand drawn one and a digital version. As well as this I have the stages of development whilst we were creating it.

My Groups completed Targets

Below is My group members Amr and Ella's targets, which they completed and I am embedding on my blog so we have all 3 completed targets together making it clear to us how we advance from here. 

Amr's Completed Target the Neon Cube. 

Below Is Ella's completed target: 

How to get an artist to cut your song if you are a songwriter

How to get an artist to cut your song 

Starting out, as a songwriter is an extremely tough job, although you may think your song is great and should be recorded by artists it is often not the case.

However I have done some research into the top tips of getting your song heard and played. The key to a successful song is that it is memorable and easy to learn, it needs to stick in people’s minds, and weather that’s a catchy chorus or it is simply easy to learn.  A song that is easy to learn is much more appealing to an artist and ultimately future fans as they can learn it quickly and feel a connection with the song instantly.

 

The song needs to be easy to sing. This will benefit the artist in the studio when they are recording it – for example keep the melody range simple, you can also hire a Demo singer whose job it is to sing your song in a studio and test the water. This can be very helpful as if they are having trouble recording you know there will be a problem with an artist who may not be so use to shooting in a studio will struggle.

 

Another important thing to bare in mind is making sure your song portrays the artist in a good light, fans will often assume the lyrics of the song were written by the artist/band themselves therefore you need to make sure the song represents the artists in a good light. Therefore when you are writing your song you have to cater for what the artist would want as ultimately it is them who choose weather to record your song or not. On top of this have some sort of universal message in their, the lyrics need to appeal to the largest possible audience as that’s the way it will become a top hit.

 

Lastly consider your artist choice wisely. Especially if you are a new song writer the chances of a famous band using your song is slim, like with everything in the music industry the key to success is starting from the bottom and working your way up. Maybe try to collaborate with an up-and-coming artist, they will be as desperate as you to create a great track that people in the industry and fans will want to listen to.

The song-writing business is a very competitive one that is hard to be successful in, however once you make it you are in. From doing my research on how to be successful, I would say the key is to not loose sight of your lyric preferences however you need to be flexible when meeting artists and bands as they are what will sing your song and get it heard, this job is about making sacrifices and being prepared to compromise. I have found I can relate to this whilst I work in my group for my A level music video, you have to work as a team and be willing to put your preferred idea or preference aside as at the end of the day you are in a team and not everyone is always going to agree but a group of minds is better then one.

My Completed Target

In my group I was set the task of developing our element 2, which is the screens. Initially we wanted to have three individual screens set up in the studio however we soon realised whilst pitching our treatment that this wasn’t possible as there is not enough space to set up three screens.

 Having been made aware of this problem we decided we would have to use one single screen and film different sections on their own. 

For example we want both the artist and the dancers with their own screen, so we will shoot them separately and in editing during post-production we will change them so that it looks as though we have all three screens set up when in reality we only used one. We even have a plan B for this as we don’t want it looking unprofessional so it may be the case we have the dance and the artist singing on their own in the music video and we cut between the two to show everything we want, this may be a clearer way of doing it and would remain professional. We would split the sections up and in our final music video we could initially have just the artist then move to the dancers.

We also wanted to ideally have the screens lit so we can shoot not just the silhouette of our dancers and artist from behind, but also flip the lighting around so we also have a few sections of them in front of the screen. We thought this extra detail would help add a new look, and keep our audience focused and engaged as the different sections changed. 

For us it is going to be really important that we do a test run with our dancers especially so we know what it will look like as their silhouette behind the screen shows everything therefore we want them to be confident about what they are doing and look sassy brining lots of attitude on the day of our shoot. 

Target Audience

As a group we decided our target audience should be females between 18 and 21. We decided this based on our artist’s genre and ideologies. Having done some research it was clear that the most successful audience and artist pairings are those that feel they have a similarity or connection to each other. For instance if we take Richard Dyers Star theory that states we see stars as commodities produced and consumed on the strengths of their meanings. The star image is essentially made up of a range of meanings, attached to a target audience.

The star has to be a Construction, Commodity and ideology to be successful in the music industry. Dyer states it is based on two paradoxes, the star being simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary and present and absent for the consumer. This is why we believe girls should be the target audience for our artist, as she can act as a role model who they can look up to and aspire to be as well as a friend who they can look to for help and feel connected to.

Our song lyrics suggest a girl who is thinking about weather to be with this particular guy or not, this is relatable to females of our age bracket as almost all of them are experiencing what relationships can be like therefore they feel they can relate to the song this means it appeals to them and they are much more likely to listen to it then any other gender or age. Not only do the lyrics suit our target audience but we also believe our music video idea is new and different therefore will appeal to younger females as it involves lots of visually pleasing things like different light colours and interesting choreographed dance.