Group 1: The Used - Blood on my Hands

Scuzz

2010-04-21T05:43:00.000-07:00

Scuzz is a music channel that started in 2003, it is owned by the CSC media group. The channel plays a wide range of rock videos from emo to punk to death metal. Scuzz plays more underground music than other British rock channels such as Kerrang! It has recently opened a website aswell, where combined they are filled with news, videos and competitions. The logo changes every year but it still gives off the same vibe as the previous logos. Our prducts would appear on the website and channel if it was a proffesional video.

KERRANG!

2010-04-20T12:18:00.000-07:00

Kerrang started in 1981 as a magazine. The word Kerrang is an onomatopeia and is the sound after strumming on a guitar.
Magazine - First sold in 1981 as a one off with a newspaper to sell the newest heavy metal bands such as ACDC to the readers. In the 1980s Kerrang started to put glam rock bands and thrash metal bands in the magazine until Nirvanna brought themselves to fame. In 1990 EMAP became the owner of Kerrang.

Looking at the cover helped up with the style of the website and the DVD cover, the title is cracked which connotes an anarchist style. The layout seems cramped as if the band barely fit on the shot, but this is a common style in the rock genre. The colours (blue, yellow, white and black) reflect a pop-punk style which shows the band on the fronts genre.

Kerrang radio 105.2 - Kerrang radio started in 2004, broadcasting around the UK. It plays modern and classic rock and is targeted at teens and a rock adult audience. It plays a wide range of rock from Indie to punk to metal.

Kerrang TV - In 2001 EMAP started Kerrang TV where the viewers could phone in and choose what video to watch. The station would play lighter rock music throughut daytime and become more heavy and violent after water shed. The show often has days where it features special countdowns of the best music videos which makes the viewer wait and watch the whole show to find out who is number one, this helps to get the viewer into new music.

Kerrang.com - The website carrys the logo on throughout the entire media collection and still brings out the rock anarchy, it has a link to the magazine and the radio station. The background is splattered paint, which again brings out the anarchy and anger of the genre. The main picture keeps flowing through many different parts of the rock news. As the page flows down the rest of the news is shown in smaller writing.

I have chosen to look at this as our products would be presented with a label such as Kerrang!

Evaluation - Matthew Potter

2010-04-20T11:56:00.000-07:00

evaluation

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DVD Cover

2010-04-20T11:15:00.001-07:00

Photoshop and Car Crashes

2010-04-20T09:43:00.000-07:00

Storyboard Annotations

2010-04-20T09:04:00.000-07:00

1) Medium shot of a two shot with the doctor on the right dressed in a white shirt and black trousers and the female character on the left, also dressed in a white shirt, each at opposite ends of the table. The woman is looking down at the table, upset. The use of costume and facial features enhances the atmosphere and instantly tells the audience that there is something wrong, setting the narrative for the rest of the video. The curtains filter red light, creating a stylistic effect that connotes danger although the scene is seemingly peaceful and innocent.

2) An over-the-shoulder shot of the doctor telling the female “I’m sorry for your loss”. This again implies why she is upset and the cause of her depression/guilt.

3) An over-the-shoulder shot of the female looking up, replying “It has been really difficult. I’m having trouble sleeping at night.” The facial expression accompanying these words emphasizes their meaning; the absence of colour (apart from the red of the curtains) indicates the loss of feeling and emotion.

4) A close-up depicts the doctor handing the female tablets, telling her to “Take these.” She accepts them which leads onto the next scene.

5) This medium close up of the woman taking the tablets will be filmed on a green screen, so we can use an image of a kitchen as the background and add dissolving effects to symbolize her deteriorating mentality.
6) A close-up of her face, mouth closing, draws the viewer’s attention to the
fact that she has taken the tablet.

7) Another close-up shows her throat swallowing the tablet, again drawing emphasis on the fact that the pills are related to the distorted reality that the character is about to experience.

8) A mid-shot depicts the female character clutching her head as she thrashes her body about. An overlap of the woman performing the same actions makes it seem as though she is two people, or turning into an echo of herself, suggesting madness, whilst the background dissolves and falls down, indicating the start of the twisted reality and her deteriorating mentality.

9) A side-on, medium close up of the woman facing to the left, coughing and slowly lifting her head.

10) Another medium close up pans to the left, depicting the woman looking around to the right, confused and frightened. The audience is forced to pan to the left, whilst the female looks to the right, suggesting confusion and giving a strange, unusual effect. It also emphasises that the audience are only viewing, whereas the female is experiencing it which could draw on the viewer’s feelings of being scared for her.
11) Medium shot of female choking and falling to the floor.
12) Medium shot of the female’s head with a blurred background. Her alternate self is crouched behind, blurred into the background.
13) The same shot but the female’s head is blurred, and the background is in focus (along with her alternate self).
14) Close up of the alternate female raising her head.
15) Extreme close up of the alternate females eyes opening.
16) Medium close up of alternate females shoulder popping into place.
17) Extreme close up of alternate females hand on floor
18) Close up of alternate female’s spine/back straightening up in a jagged, robotic way.
19) Over the shoulder shot of both girls standing up (over the ‘normal’ females shoulder).
20) Long shot, side angle of the ‘normal’ female walking to the right.
21) Long shot, side angle of the alternate female walking to the left.
22) Medium shot, side angle of both females meeting in the middle, face to face.
23) A quick, close up of the ‘normal’ girl screaming.
24) A quick, close up of the alternate girl screaming.
25) A last quick close up of the lead singer screaming. These shots help give the video a feel of distress and emphasize how much pain the issues brought up can bring.
26) Close up of the lead singers hands on the microphone.
27) Close up of lead singer
28) Medium shot of the lead singer pointing to the front.
29) Medium shot of guitarist.
30) Medium shot of bass player.
31) Medium shot of the lead singer pointing to himself, then to the front and then crossing his arms whilst falling backwards into the next scene.
32) A close up shows him to be in a car (in a flashback).
33) Medium side shot of lead singer turning his head and looking towards the camera.
34) Medium front shot of the lead singer in the car, dead on one side of his face (bloody and pale).
35) A close up pan from left to right over the lead singers face emphasises his physical state.
36) A medium close up shows the lead singer alive and normal again.
37) Close up of the lead singer pulling alcohol out of the female’s hand, relating directly to drink driving.
38) Medium two shot of the female taking back the alcohol.
39) Over the shoulder shot showing her drinking the alcohol whilst driving. This foreshadows the events that precede this.
40) Over the shoulder shot of his worried expression.
41) Medium close up of lead singer gripping the dashboard as he looks ahead.
42) Close up of female’s head hitting the steering wheel as they crash.
43) Close up of lead singer crossing his arms over his face defensively.
44) Close up of lead singer uncrossing his arms as they crash.
45) Cut to the band implies the lead singer dies. Long shot of the guitarist and bassist.
46) Medium side shot of the drummer.
47) Medium close up of lead singer raising hands coated with blood.
48) Medium close up (to the side) of lead singer raising bloody hands.
49) Long shot of the band as the lead singer grabs towards the camera.
50) Long shot of the female looking around in darkness, creating a sense of loss and confusion.
51) Long shot of girl surrounded by darkness. She is trying to work out where she is.
52) Dramatised close up of her eyes while she is scared and working out where she is
53) Flashes of newspaper titles explainning about the car crash or spinning newspaper
54)Extreme close up of girls face, she is staring straight ahead and the lead singer is whispering in her ear
55)Two shot of the girl and the lead singer face to face with eachother
56)Reverse two shot (From teh other side), this shot shows that the lead singer is dead (blood on the face)
57) Lead singer holds his hands together in a prayer in a close up
58)Long shot of the band perfoming
59)A close up of the lead singers hands slowly rising up the microphone and grasping it tightly at the top
60) Close up of lead singer from the left side screaming "blood"
61) Close up of the lead singer from the right side screaming "blood"
62)close up of lead singer from the front screaming "blood"
63) Medium shot of guitarist strumming guitar in the interlude
64) Medium shot of bassist strumming guitar in the interlude
65)Medium shot of the drummer banging on drums in the interlude
66)Medium shot of the entire band playing together in the interlude
67)Medium shot of the guitarist strumming in the interlude
68) Over the shoudler shot from the girl of the band.
69) In a medium shot the lead singer wipe his hands across his bloody face and all of the blood is wiped off to reveal a clean face
70) A close up of the alead singer singing
71) Close up of the lead singer raising his bloody hand and pointing at the girl
72) Long shot of the entire band playing
73)Long shot that fits in both the guitarist and the drummer
74) Two shot of the lead singer reapproaching the girl
75) Lead singer in a medium shot singing
76)In a close up he grabs her hand with his bloody hands and pulls her in close
77) Long shot of the entire band playing and singing
78) A long shot that shows the girl struggling and trying to push him off of her
79) Medium shot of the lead singer being pushed away from the girl
80) Close up of the lead singer, quickly raising his head to face the camera, whish is followed by a sadistic grin
81) Two shot of the lead singer quickly approaching the girl again
82) Over the shoulder shot which pans down behind the lead singers back to show that he has a knife in his free hand
83)In a medium close up he regrabs her hand again and once again pulls her in
84) Close up of her looking up at him while paniking
85)Close up of him still sadisticly smiling at her
86) In a medium close up the lead singer brings the knife around and slices across her hand
87) Medium shot of her falling to the floor in pain and then looking up in guilt and sadness
88) Low shot of the lead singer looking down at the camera with a bloodthirsty smile still hanging onto his face
89) Extreme close up of her eyes widening
90) Fades to a doctor and nurse entering a room and stopping in a medium shot
91) They explain the girl is in a coma and there is little they can do to help, they are both facing eachother in a two shot
92)Long shot of the doctor and nurse leaving the room making them seem hopeless and the girls condition seem even worse
93) Fades to a panning close up. up the girls body to her pale face, she is screaming inside her head. The shot goes black.

Evaluation- Amy Greenwood

2010-04-20T08:09:00.000-07:00

Evaluation

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The Used - Blood on my Hands

2010-04-16T11:33:00.000-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFsxRSJGcrs
Here is is, the final version!

Making the Website

2010-04-09T08:24:00.000-07:00

To make the website I used Adobe Photoshop CS3. I feel this is important to mention, as using digital software is a very powerful way to quickly create a design and post it on the internet without the fuss of scanners and materials. Not only does photoshop save us in time, but it also offers some tools that are not possible at our level of expertise by hand. I will now go through how I created parts of the website using Photoshop.

The first thing I did, was collect the pictures i was going to use. One of these was the Black bloody red striped background that is noticeable in the performance scenes in our music video. This create an image the band can later use for audiences to recognise.

Next, I created the guides that were to be the placeholders for my website. This is not necessary, but it helps in the long term when positioning the features, and saves a large amount of planning.

These teal lines allow me to add an option that lets the layers and objects 'clip' to them, making an easy design quickly.

Next, I decided what to do for the design. We got together, and though up of the cartoon idea. This was then put forward into photoshop and i worked with a few designs until we found the one we agreed on. To make the background, I first added a few gradients from the bottom, left, a circle over the middle with a low opacity, and then a north eastern angular gradient resulting in the bottom left of the background image being totally black, and fading into a visible picture. All of the gradients were transparent at one end. Next, I made the cartoon effect. To do this, i used the cutout effect, followed by the poster edges. I messed around with these until i had the desired effect. The effect i was looking for was a pardee 'black outlined' style that was very bold. This had to be similar to the heart picture i recreated. To do the heart, i simply used a freehand brush tool to make the red inside, then added a black stroke to make the outline, with some black scratches inside. This was the same method for the tree. The font was a font called 'Rock-it' however this was too indy to be used in our genre of music video, so to make it more sinister I increased the kerning so that the font was further apart. I also added a stroke to some of it to highlight certain parts. To make the logo i again used 'Rock-it' but elongated the left line of the "U" to fix into the "T".

Next, I made the picture of us. Firstly, I removed the green screen from us, being sure to not remove and hairlines to keep max quality. I then added a picture from underneath a bridge with graffiti on it. This was again not the genre we were looking for, so i gave it the cartoonish style, making it slightly more 'Used-ish'... I then to make the picture of us more fitting in the website added a poster edges gradient on the bottom and right of the picture, making half of me, and the bottoms of the rest of the band slightly cartoonish. This was done by selecting these parts with the Rectangle Marquee tool and giving it a feather and expand so that it created a 'fade' so the effect blended in. This again, didn't fit into the website, so I created a splat brush, and used the rubber with this brush to delete parts of the edges, giving it a splattered effect, and a slightly more worn look to it. I then gave it a red stroke with a small transparency. To finish it, I layerd this at the back.

To make the splats i used the brushes menu.

What i did here was make a brush with a few effects to make sure that each splat was unique.

The black transparent overlay was used to make the content of the website slightly more outstanding than the rest of the page. This was simply a rounded edge rectangle with a transparency. It also had an overlay stroke effect to bring it out.

The font used was "Bell Gothic Std" for the plain white text, as this matched the basic enough to read yet sinister enough to match feel we were going for.

To finish, I added some of the content used currently on the Used website.

Here is a list of the layers.

The Website!

2010-04-08T12:49:00.001-07:00

After spending many hours deciding on a design, we thought this one best stood out, and was unique form others we had looked at.

The website certainly has a grunge theme to it, very rock-ish and dark.
The layout is hectic, chaotic and stylish.

We chose the 'cartoony' stylings as they played on the artists "Alex Pardee's" previous artworks.

The basic text is white with a gothic serif making it seem a bit more interesting.

The titles are in a blood red with a white outline. This emphasizes them.

The navigation bar at the far right was chosen to be 'unconventional'. The links are in blood red, with a black 1 px stroke. This highlights them. When a person mouses over a link, a white 1 px stroke effect is applied to give them something to judge where their cursor is. When a person is on a page on the website, a randomised splat is applied to the navigation link that is relevant to that page. The splats are different for each page.

I have included the links to their latest news, released and tour dates for a quick access for fans. There is also a 'Login' feature highlighted at the top for serious fans to log into the forums and chat with the band and other members around the world.

As previously mentioned, the stylings are once again taken from the 'heart and tree' album cover which was their most recognised image, and i chose this as it stands out, fits their style and is very recognisable.

H.I.M. website

2010-04-06T08:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.heartagram.com/

I chose to look at the H.I.M. website as the style is very dark, like we want it. The main attraction of the website is the large heartagram which is the bands logo and is always found when the band is mentioned. The logo is simple, but very effective at is says a lot about the band. The heartagram is a messed up pentagram which is related to the devil, however the heartagram suggests that the band's music is love tragedy in a metal genre. The logo stands out from the background, which again is very stylised for the band. It is burnt ink stained paper, which again suggests the love poetry and the tragedy that lead the person to burn it, it connotes anarchy and anger. Unlike other websites the main picture of the band is actually replaced by the latest video in a large screen, in doing this they get the news forward quicker of the new video. Another continuous theme that H.I.M. has is their choice in colour, it is black, grey and white throughout most of the front page, this suggests darkness and depression of the band. Again, like the other front pages of the rock genre, everything is easy to get to and the most important information is on the main page in a summarised format that leads on to more information deeper into the site.

Reprise Records

2010-03-31T05:57:00.001-07:00

Reprise Records was created in 1960 by Frank Sinatra to enable more artistic freedom for his own recordings. The first album released on the record label by Sinatra was Ring-a-Ding-Ding! and he used this record label to get his group "The rat pack," even more well known. In 1963, Sinatra sold the label group to Warner Bros and this lead to many groups dropping out of the record deals. Mo Ostin became the new president of Reprise Records and he started to recruit younger groups to help them reach fame, the most popular was the Kinks in 1964. The company kept growing and growing as more groups kept getting signed with Reprise records. For two decades they mostly worked with pop groups as they were the "in" things for those years. Now the group has evolved signing up many musicians such as: Michael Buble, Greenday, The Used, Cher, Fleetwood Mac and Madonna.

Enter Shikari website

2010-03-31T05:48:00.000-07:00

The website uses very interesting colours which makes everything on the site stand out. The purple doesn't outwardly contrast against the dark greys, which gives the impression of a more techno/ rock band. The band want to show that they are British and proud, but still want to have an anarchist attitude so their flag has been changed to fit their web page. A geeky image of the band is brought through with the typeface being in a Greek style. This also hints at a cultural interest/ theme. Unlike other band websites the first interface is a media player which is located in the top right, it has the latest single ready to be played. This is also in the same colours as the rest of the website and adds to the appeal because the viewer can listen to it for free. Like most of the other sites it has the usual news, videos, store write ups on the web page, the newest post is direct from twitter which is a regularly used site for many people and it lets the viewer join into their conversation and go between the sites with ease.

Blink-182

2010-03-25T02:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.blink182.com/default.aspx

A reason to look at this website is because of the style that can be seen in a lot of The Used's videos and fashion. The title of the band is in very large, attractive and noticeable writing which is in a simple but powerful font to lure in the viewer. This is followed by their logo which

reflects rebellion being a spray on smiley face. The background to the website is very scratchy, which is a lot like other bands of the same style. The wallpaper is the same logo as before but in grey scale and still looks like it has been graffitied on. As this continues down the page it gets darker until it is fully blacked out which makes the foreground stand out very well. The large photo is taken with a bowl lens which is usually used for skating videos, again this reflects the style and fashion of this band and The Used. The photo is also in black and white which makes the band seem like a classic group. The websites main page features are the usual for a group website, the news is in the top left and it is the main feature of the page showing how important it is. This is followed by a Blink TV article which shows the latest videos by the bands.

A.F.I. website

2010-03-23T04:58:00.000-07:00

http://www.afireinside.net/

I have chosen to look at this site because of the colour themes and the background. The ideas would help us to develop our website. The whole website is in greyscale except for the headings while are in yellow. This brings out the darkness behind the band and brings out more detail in the picture. The large banner at the top is very calm and seems unprepared as if they don't have to pose to look good. They are all dressed smart but still have the punk look because of the hair and the dark clothes. The picture seems to be corroding away as if it was an ancient wall, this gives off a gloomy effect and it flows down into the rest of the website. The type face is classic modern, the style is very modern, with simple font and the colours that contrasts with the background gives off a classic effect. This makes the website seem alternative like the band is suppose to be. There is a link to a lot of social websites such as Facebook which suggests the target audience of the band and gets their fans closer to what is going on. Like most band sites the two main features that are present is the news and the last video that was shot, this lets the audience instantly see the most important parts of the band.

Job for a cowboy website

2010-03-18T03:52:00.001-07:00

http://www.jfacmetal.com/

This website is a lot more extreme, even more than the used's website. As soon as the page opens a large and very detailed anti-Christ picture appears of a goat devil on a throne. This is a very threatening picture which instantly introduces the genre of the band. The writing of the title is barely readable but again it reflects the violence that the band wants to bring forward. In the background of the picture is a red and green wall, the green shows off the evil and makes it seem damp and slime. While the red side suggest blood and anger as if the creature has sacrificed for their god. A green navigation bar with gold writing is under the picture and the colours are very rich which again shows the power of the picture or of the band. After scrolling down the rest of the front cover is very short and it is the links which hold most of the data. The data on the page is the news of what they have currently been doing, such as live tours and new videos. On the right hand side is their latest video and underneath is a subscription with the band. The background is still the demon but it has been shaded out where the writing is and a flame is falling 0ut of the side where the video is this keeps the powerful image going throughout the entire front page.

Rasmus website

2010-03-18T03:29:00.000-07:00

http://www.therasmus.com/frame.html

the website background is similar to The Used's one where is has spoiled paper, this is a ripped page from a book and the paper is faded. This brings out the Gothic genre of the band and continues the flow down the page with the rips on the right hand side. A shadowed lead singer is the first real noticable thing. The eyes are just about noticable to see a threatening glare at the reader. The feathers in thehair and the mad hair suggests the bands "I don't care" attitdue to life. Finally the writing is very smart, a lrge golden font shows the importance of the band, but it also suggests a tomb stone. The website contains band, galley, releasedates, media for fans to see what they are up to. Finally, the navigation bar appears to be a sword which again suggests that the book is old and it also connotes violence from the band.

Practise to draw the dvd cover

2010-03-17T12:26:00.000-07:00

I have been practising to draw like Pardee by copying his work the best I can, ready to turn a picture into a DVD cover.

Missing Shots

2010-03-17T11:24:00.000-07:00

website idea

2010-03-17T11:03:00.001-07:00

(Amy) This website design is heavily based on

the In Flames website. The navigation bar is on the right-hand side, decorated by a Pardee-style heart, tied around the middle with a rope. This connotes heartbreak and could also connote death, possibly caused by a loved one. This links in with the music video theme; the girlfriend inadvertently causing the lead singers death through drink-driving.

The banner at the top is a simplified version of the red and black striped wall taken from the music video. I have spot-lighted it to emphasize the absence of the band, which adds a mysterious element to the website and gives a sense of attitude- if they don't want to do something, they won't do it.

Underneath this banner and on the left is a blank space left for an image of the band, to show who they are and what they look like. To keep with the colour scheme, the background of this photo would be white. The picture would look better if it was a long or mid shot, showing what they are wearing and how they are standing. How they look within this photo would project what they are about to the target market.

To the right of this is the band logo framed with drips of blood, which is in-keeping with the colour scheme and represents the theme of Blood on My Hands. This theme is carried on throughout with splatters and smudges of blood randomly placed.

The titles and typeface used to give news, tour dates and advertisments would be related to The Used logo to carry on the scruffy, rebellious feel.

Evanescence DVD cover

2010-03-17T06:56:00.000-07:00

Although this cover is fan-made, the aspects included, such as the logo, an image of the lead singer and the track listings, are commonly seen on typical music DVD covers.

The typeface theme is carried on through the track listing font and the symbols and lighting used resembles the Evanescence website, which is a link that allows the target market to associate common symbols and typefaces with the band.

On the back there are polaroid photos of the singer within the music videos featured on the DVD. These are set against a backdrop of an elaborate door open to a grey, stormy sky. This sets a dark fantasical mood that seems gothic. This mood is first established with the front cover, where the contrast of blue and yellow lighting suggests dark and light/good. The woman is dressed in a long, gothic dress which harmonizes with the mood and is illuminated by both blue and yellow lighting, creating a misty, ethereal effect.

The spine of the cover features the DVD logo, the name and logo of the band which makes the cover look realistic.

For our cover and website, we will try and link the two together using a similar colour scheme, band photo and typeface/logo.

DVD covers

2010-03-17T06:54:00.001-07:00

These music DVD covers feature the logo of the band and the name of the DVD. The images generally portray an odd/surreal meaning or idea, especially within the Muse cover.

AFI
'December Underground'
The background of this cover is well suited to the name. The cold blues and whites create an icy, cold atmosphere, connoting winter. The logo of the band is slightly gothic and contrasts heavily against the light colours. Rabbits seem to be jumping around the band name, framing it (and looking slightly like the mobius loop). The significance of using rabbits is to link in with the 'Underground' part of the title, since they bury underground in winter. This, coupled with the mobius-loop style in which they are positioned implies that nature and life is recycled- going on in an endless loop. This naturalistic approach to putting across the DVD name and theme is slightly surreal and relates to the genre of the music.

This Muse DVD cover features a strange concept. It shows one man looking up at the sky, surrounded by shadows of floating bodies. This could signify the end of the world/ an apolcalypse (bodies floating in the sky), a sense of feeling alone amongst many, standing out from the crowd (in a good or bad way) or perhaps it is designed so the viewer has only a vague idea of what's going on- they cannot see what the man is looking at, creating a sense of mystery, and the shadows of the bodies are on the ground, connoting death and graves.

The band logo is small compared to the images, which could be because they are usually associated with concepts like this and do not need to instantly tell people who they are, or the image creates so many questions that it is enough to capture someones interest.

Ideas for DVD cover

2010-03-17T06:53:00.001-07:00

Front
(1) My idea (Matthew Potter) is to have a photo of the band all looking down at the lead singer's hand, white paint will cover up the bottom of the cover. Over the paint will be drawn hands in a Pardee style and red blood will be pouring off it. Also in the hands will be the female character who has been minimized so she looks vulnerable. I chose this idea because in the video the lead singer has taken the girl into a surreal dream to get back at her for his death. I also wanted to keep the Pardee style because it is used 90% of the time with The Used's material.

Back
(1) On the back of the DVD cover will be a tree, again in Pardee style and it will have Polaroid photos hanging from the tree with string, like the hearts from an older Used video. Each picture will have writing under it of a feature on the video and the pictures will be cuts from the video, behind the scenes and photos.

Front
(2) My idea (Amy Greenwood) is to have a picture of a tree (Pardee style) and the branches morphing into the lead singer (draw again in the Pardee style), as if the tree is growing him. I will draw buds on the tree leaking blood and dripping onto the lead singer's hands (in reference to 'blood on my hands'). The colours will be predominately white, black and red to create a sketchy reality and to link in with the website design. The bleeding tree symbolises the car crash that kills the lead singer in the video. He is growing back out of the tree as if he is coming back, wanting revenge. The blood represents his death and the title of the song.

The typeface used will be similar to the typeface of the bands logo and will link in with the sketchy images shown. The font is script but with a scruffy edge, implying attitude and rebellion against the restraints of society.

The Used logo and the name of the music video will be noticeably placed so the target market will immediately know what the DVD features.

Back

(2) The back of the cover will feature information about the DVD (such as running time, language, record company etc.), the DVD logo and the studio logos. A bar code will also be included for added realism. The design will have the continuation of the tree, but instead of the lead singing growing out of it, pictures/Polaroids (like the Evanescence back cover) of the band within the music video will be growing out of the buds on the tree. A gravestone will emphasize the singers death in the video- blood from the tree will be dripping onto a wilting rose in front of it. This will probably be done as a sketch in a similar style to the lead singer on the front.

dvd ideas

2010-03-17T06:40:00.000-07:00

(POSTERS)

From looking at these posters we are finding ideas that would be good to make our DVD cover. Something that they have in common is the stance and the expressions, the band want to match their genre, to look "hard." They are tightly pushed together and have a fierce faces that glare at the audience. Unlike their videos, the posters are realistic, set in a real life environment which brings the poster owner closer to the band unlike the surreal videos which is escapism for the viewers.

(Artwork)

Altough Pardee has been mentioned many times over many blogs, it is important to use his work on the DVD cover and on the website. We hope to use his work (after I have practised enough) to make our work similar to the artist. We can reltae the blood in the video to the long drips and strokes that are found in the above pieces. Also We want to use teh famous hanging heart that was featured in The Used's All that I've got video as it has became their symbol and releates to a broken heart which happens in the video.

Filming (behind the scenes: part 2)

2010-03-13T23:25:00.000-08:00

Filming from November

In Flames Website

2010-03-11T01:29:00.001-08:00

http://www.inflames.com/main.html

The scratchy logo/typeface instantly attracts the viewers attention because of the contrast it has- white on black/dark blue. The style connotes violence and aggression which links into the death metal genre of the band and enhances their image of rebellion against perfection and the main stream bands that dominate the charts.

The style of this typeface is imitated in the navigation bar, where uneven capital lettering continues the theme of imperfection and rebellion. The red connotes danger, violence and blood which again links in with the genre.

The image that accompanies the title is from the artist Alex Pardee, who is known for doing bizarre, slightly twisted art. This again suggests there distaste for normality and a penchant for going against the rules.

The headings of each section have a white font colour against a red, uneven background with splatters of paint emphasising the mood of nonchalance towards social codes.

The site features news of the band, a link to photos, shops, fan club, videos, blogs, music sites- such as myspace music, advertisments for products such as guitar hero (which relates to the target audience) and their endorsements.

Green day website

2010-03-09T12:35:00.000-08:00

http://www.greenday.com/

The large, white 'spray painted' banner/typeface instantly draws the viewers attention. The drips and stencilled typeface insinuates that it is graffiti, which connotes rebellion and attitude. The background is also a graffitied wall which carries this rebellious mood throughout the website. The left hand bar is made up of unclean cut rectangles, implying that the band don't 'play by the rules'.

The site predominately features the band tour dates, with some smaller advertisments at the bottom (for songs on iTunes and a singles collection).

Evanescence Website

2010-03-09T11:55:00.000-08:00

www.evanescence.com/

This website has predominate use of the colour black, generally connoting darkness and usually is associated with the gothic/rock genre. A golden yellow and white has been used to contrast against this, enhancing the writing and suggesting feminity. Coupled with the soft glowing banner and the elaborate, gothic symbols used as borders there is an overall mystical mood created.

The main image is of an interior of an old building, which shows a large archway, again indicating a gothic theme. Butterflies are seen just before this archway and generally relate to females and beauty.

The typeface/logo associated with the band accompanies the moving banner and ties together the theme created with the images and colours. It links to fantasy and is framed with another elaborate symbol that glows on and off.

The typeface used within the rest of the website suits the logo and carries on the gothic/fantasical theme.

The information provided includes: Latest news, upcoming tour dates, new album, links to downloadable items/fan sites/merchandise/exclusive performances and photos. This is common throughout most band websites.

theused.net

2010-03-04T03:06:00.000-08:00

http://www.theused.net/

The website catches the audiences attention instantly with blood smeared across the top as a tool bar and a large scratched picture of The Used on the right hand side. Along the top of the website is many links to parts of the site that fans will be interested in such as: Tours, news, blogs, music, pics and a shop. The dripping blood on the left side of the page pushes the reader to continue to see what else is further down. The continued blood splatter and the far fetched imagery stands out from the white background. Pieces from Pardee are also featured on the main page and this links the band to other bands such as In Flames who are also known to use artwork from pardee.

The band picture is ripped as if the band have pushed their way through the background to be seen (a rebellious attitude) and destroyed their surroundings. In the picture Bert is the centre of attention with his arms raised high looking down at the audience with the other members behind him doing the same. This brings a threat from them to say that they are a big powerful band.

We will be adapting the scratchy style from the original website when working with pictures and font. Also a lot of blood will be present to link to the music video. We will be using many original pictures and playing with them until they give off the same attitudes and values as the original website.

Newspaper

2010-02-27T08:43:00.001-08:00

I put together these newspaper articles to show during the music video. They will pull together the narrative and make the story and events clearer. Close ups of the headlines and certain words that stand out will instantly clear any confusion that our audience may feel.I have roughly drawn pictures that illustrate the car accident and how the girl was guilty of drink driving, ultimately killing her boyfriend- the lead singer of the band. The writing is also rough and both will be neatened up when Adam replicates these designs in photoshop.

First Draft

2010-02-09T16:36:00.000-08:00

Feel free to comment, There is a lot we missed out in the first cut, but this gives us a chance to show what we have finished so far, and allows people to comment on anything they think we have done well. Go motivation!
We have a clear understanding of what to do next, however the first cut allows us to see what the video will look like finished without the special effects.

More filming!

2010-02-07T09:54:00.000-08:00

Today we decided that the miserable weather was the perfect conditions to go out and film for our green-screen overlay footage for when the car is moving. The dull, dark weather was perfect to reflect what was going on in the car. It was also not too bright, so it does not draw attention to the fact we used green-screen.

We got a variety of shots, and some problems we knew would occur will be overcome when we get to them. We had to film the footage by hand, and because none of us can drive in a forrest, we needed to walk. So we will smooth the footage out and speed it up. If this doesn't work, we also have plenty of other ideas and reasons behind them.

Alex Pardee

2010-01-28T03:04:00.001-08:00

Pardee was born in 1976 in California. Through his life he has had to struggle through many emotional problems such as depression, anxiety disorders and being on medication for 15 years which reflects in his artwork. He was influenced by 1980's horror films and street graffiti.

Pardee has done all of the album covers for The Used and has kept a dark and twisted style throughout their back catalogue. He has also directed The Used most famous video, All that Ive got in 2004, in this video there is a few seconds of animation that was created by Pardee of vines attacking the lead singer and the video returning back into a book.

He has also co-directed another video for The Used which was Paralyzed, he worked with his artist group called Zero Friends to create a black and white stop motion, the video was released in 2007.

Pardee's most famous work is found on http://www.eyesuckink.com/ where Pardee puts up his work to talk about and sell as posters and shirts.

Zero friends

2010-01-28T03:03:00.000-08:00

Directed the video "Paralysed" for The Used. The directors in Zero Friends contains the artist Alex Pardee (see Pardee's post) who worked on their album artwork. The video is a black and white stop motion where the characters meet up to play together. This is the only music video that they directed as they mostly work on art which tells a surreal story. The video is very art based, being in stop motion and it brings forward the twisted style of Pardee.

Kevin Kerslake

2010-01-28T03:02:00.000-08:00

Kevin Kerslake is an American video director, he has worked on many different types of television commercials, music videos, live performances and photography.

There is little said about his life but it is interesting to compare the styles of his media. The video he created for The Used was "I caught fire," he also worked on many other videos that have a similar style. This includes: Green day, Paparoach, Nirvana and Rise Against.

A commercial that he created was the DC "chase," advert which shows a skateboarder escaping from a crowd of girls, the dress sense is passed onto the Used and the extras are similar to the cast in the advert.

Kerslake also worked on documentaries, all of these were on rock bands such as Nirvana, this shows how much he loves the style that The Used have.

Finally, he has done a lot of photography for many directors and bands such as Tarantino and Korn.

We chose to look at this director as we also try to pick out a similar styles from many different forms of media to add to our own video.

Mark Webb

2010-01-28T03:01:00.001-08:00

Webb is a music video, short film and motion picture director signed to DNA, Hollywood, California and Academy Productions Ltd in the UK. Before DNA he ran his own company.

Webb's first music video was 'Canadian Rose' by Blues travellers. In January 2005 he directed 'All That I've Got' by The Used and continued to direct videos in the same genre, these included: 'Work' by Jimmy eat world, 'Teenagers' by My Chemical Romance and '21 Guns' by Greenday.

Webb adds his signature logo 'sneakily' into his videos, the logo is a white lamb which can be found exploding on his web page and also in a few of his videos e.g. on a girls shirt.

Webb has also created the feature length film '(550) days of summer' in 2009. The film is a rom-com, it covers 500 days of a relationship and shows the break up of the two main characters and how well they cope throughout the days. The film is nothing like his music video style but it was a huge hit all over the world making $32,391,374 total gross. Webb has moved onto his biggest project so far, he has been asked to direct the video for the 4th spider man movie which is to be released in 2012 and in 3D.

http://www.marcwebb.com/

The Malloys

2010-01-28T03:01:00.000-08:00

The Malloys is the working name of music video and directors. Their names are Emmet and Brenden Malloy. They are signed up to HSI Productions. They have directed about 60 videos, most of them being in the "rock," genre. Bnads such as: New Found Glory, Blink 182, Alien Ant Farm, The Used, Metallica and Lostprophets. They have also directed 2 films, Thicker than water (2000)and Out cold (2001). They directed on of The Used's first videos A Taste of ink. It was a very basic music video which shows the lives of the band members struggling through life, this is the most down to earth video by The Used. It is filmed in the same style as their film Thicker than water both has some aspects of a document in the way of location and camera shots. One example is when one of the band members sit down on a sofa, the camera catches him as he is going to have an interview, while in comparison the film is a surf documentary movie.

Green screen - a deeper meaning

2010-01-28T02:22:00.000-08:00

We have chosen to use the chroma key effect to fake backgrounds and to multiply a character so that she sees her "dead self" in the music video. However we have used the green screen to create a deeper meaning inside the plot. The video is about being caught between the conscious and unconscious mind. The use of green screen and the chroma key effect mixes the mind of the character and makes everything seem unreal. The surrealism created confuses the woman and the audience whether she is still dreaming or has been caught in another world. When we make the car scene for example, the background is obviously chroma keyed but it shows that it is a vivid memory of the crash and everything is unclear to her. It is also used as a transaction from the real world to the other one when the background falls away from her after taking the drugs.

Colour Pass

2009-12-30T17:22:00.001-08:00

Some practices I did with colour changing on my school bag. Took approx 1 and a half hours for it all. There are some mistakes, that have helped me to develop my skills in this editing effect; therefore making the editing for our music video much better. I also did not want to use a tripod, as it will make it a little easier to edit; i felt it was better to have something challenging, as so far we do not know how difficult this will be on our footage.

Music Video History Timeline

2009-12-14T03:09:00.000-08:00

1900 - Thomas Edison invents the gramophone in the USA. Music videos are now able to be experienced on disc as well as real life live performances.

1927 - First sound film, 'The Jaz Singer' (Alan Crisland, USA)

1930's - Creation of first 'soundies'

1940's - Peak period of MGM Hollywood musical

1954 - Elvis Presley

1960 - Scopitone introduced in France (Jukebox for music videos)

1963 - UK's first music TV programme, 'Ready Steady Go' starts on ITV.

1964 - 'Top of the Pops' begins on BBC. The Beatles release the film and album, 'A Hard Day's Night'.

1966 - The Monkees' TV show starts on NBC in the USA.

1967 - The Beatles release TV promos for 'Penny Lane' and 'Strawberry Fields Forever'.

1975 - Queen release 'Bohemian Rhapsody'.

1977 - 'Saturday Night Fever' starts in the USA.

1979 - Buggles release 'Video Killed the Radio Star'.

1980 - David Bowie releases 'Ashes to Ashes'.

1981 - 'Pop Clips' starts on Nickelodeon. MTV TV show starts.

1983 - Michael Jackson releases 'Thriller'.

1984 - MTV Video Awards launched.

1985 - Live Aid. VH1 begins. MTV are taken over by Viacom.

1986 - Dire Straits' 'Money for Nothing' reaches #1 in UK top album chart.

1987 - MTV - Europe is launched. Peter Gabriel's 'Sledgehammer' wins best director award.

1989 - MTV Europe reaches 6.7 million homes. Madonna's 'Express Yourself' by David Fincher wins best director award

1990 - Madonna's 'Vogue' by David Fincher wins best director award. MTV-Unplugged launched.

1991 - Madonna's 'Justify My Love' released.

1993 - MTV launches TV series 'Beavis and Butthead'.

1994 - VH1 in UK. MTV-Europe Music Awards launched.

1997 - MTV UK and Ireland launches as stand-alone channel.

1999 - Fatboy Slim 'Praise You' by Spike Jonze wins best director award.

2000 - Launch of 'Jackass'

2001 - MTV Dance launched

Diary Entry - Practices

2009-12-11T03:57:00.000-08:00

After i had spent about 4 hours yesterday practicing with Adobe Premiere and Aftereffects, i felt it was important to realise how long this will actually take to get the animations, chroma key and colour pass/corrections done well and correctly. These, how ever short they will be in the finished product, take a huge amount of time. I have a practice to post which was done in my room, where i practiced with the animations. To Do this, i created a title, then added lines and squiggles over the object i wanted to emphasise using a higher layer. The lines were one frame a size. There was 400 frames to do this in, so you can appreciate the time it takes to do this. I will of course make the lines a little more interesting, with dark 'noise' and other effects to make it look more like a scratch in the real thing, although this was just to get the sheer timescale of the whole project into proportion.
Here is the first practice:

This next one only took 1 hour. I could have spent more time making sure that every single pixel was the colour i wanted, but that would have taken much longer. When using any of these effects for the real thing, i will be sure to do this.
Here is the second practice:

UNFINISHED

Diary entry - editing (day 1)

2009-12-10T01:21:00.000-08:00

FINALLY we are editing our video, after a few minuscule set backs we are ready to go. It is going to take a very long time with the amount of shots and the many layers of chroma key added, but with hard work I am sure we can do it. We are using lots of different software to try and get the full effect of editing. We are using Adobe premier, Adobe after effects, Pinnacle studio 12, Prodad and photoshop. It is going to be so much fun. -MATT

What Matt said! Yeah were just starting editing today, finally got all 6 discs rendered, finalized and exported to avi. Firstly, we are going to cut them up, just whack in all of the footage into one file, then split the scenes. Then from there, we will name and separate the individual shots. The Chroma Key and other special effects will get done at the very end. This is the most easiest way to tackle the amount of work we have to do. Really looking forward to seeing how we got on. Just got the last bit of footage to film, which we shall do over Christmas. We will also try and get more extra content on the blog of behind the scenes footage, with Matt and us singing Christmas Carols! -ADAM

We have finally got everything ready for editing and I'm looking forward to helping with the complicated effects and edits. We still need to film some other stuff over the holidays but I'm sure we'll get that done okay. I have started editing the behind the scenes footage of the narrative filming day. I've had a few problems doing it on my computer so I've had to hijack Matt's and edit on there instead. - AMY

Practices

2009-12-09T03:21:00.000-08:00

Put up some of the practices we will do, things such as the animations, photoshop background, chroma key, colour correction. Use ones we have already done.

Here is a still practice that includes Colour Correction, Scratches and 'animation' -(the effect off). To do this, I first got the image, and put it into PhotoShop. I then, using the Quick Selection Tool, dragged a selection, varying the brush size for more detailed parts, around the guitar. I then copied, an pasted this into a new layer. Next, I made the original image black and white, by adjusting it through the Image, Adjustments, Black & White menu. I then, if I wanted, could have changed the guitars colour by the same process, but instead, through the Hue/Saturation menu. I decided to keep the original, 'psychedelic' colours that the performance lights created. I then made a new layer, and using the Brush Tools menu (F5) created a dual brush. One with the simple 3 Pixel size, then another with the grass shape brush, then added a scatter effect. This then gave the brush a distorted, scratched effect when I ran it over the picture. I made squiggly lines contracting out from the image, following the movement of the guitar giving it 'motion'. The other effect was the dusty/speckles on the far left. I used these to fill out space and create a balance between both sides of the picture. It gives it a worn effect. Again, I used the dual brush, although increased the size and scattering, and drew in a new layer, underneath the guitar and over the band.

Here are a few more:

This one shows a lot of movement, and balances both sides of the picture frame with different images. It is much more exciting than the original. I gave it a blood red glow rather than orange and added the lines afterwards.

This one makes the drummer look skeletal in a way. It also emphasises movement and the parts of the picture that will be animated at some point; thereby drawing the audience away from the still parts.
UNFINISHED

Filming - Day 2 (Part2)

2009-12-06T08:08:00.000-08:00

Matt
We have just finished most of the narrative to the music video, it has taken us 3 hours today and we have done quite a lot. However we ran out of time and need about another 3 hours to get the rest of the footage. Throughout the day we found even better shots then we had before and added a few more shots so we can fill some space just in case we have to. The last past we have to film is very difficult, we have to get our actress to be covered in a lot of paint and we have to make motion footage as well.

Adam
Today went extremely well! A lot of stuff was happening today, so we had a lot of time spent making sure that everything went smoothly, and we had spared if the originals didn't go as well as planned. The footage today will be very technical today, used a lot of green screen, and will require a lot of layering of shots. I can tell you now, this will either go really well or really bad when it comes to editing. As Matt said, we got most of the footage sorted now, just the second narrative layer to add with our actress being covered in paint.

Amy
Today, I stood outside in a T-shirt, in the freezing cold, holding a piece of green screem up against a car window... Other than that I think it went rather well. Most of the narrative was shot, the only bit left is shooting Amy as the 'dead' girl. This involves me covering her in Chinese writing and tribal markings... I don't think she'll be very happy at the end when she has to scrub herself clean again.
I hope that our video will be able to be properly synched and edited correctly...

Filming - Day 2 (Part 1)

2009-12-06T02:38:00.000-08:00

Matt
So here we are again, ready to film the narrative side of our music video. this is going to take a bit longer than the previous part because there is more to prepare and we have to move to many locations. I have got everything ready (camera, tripod, green screen and costumes) for filming and I am now checking everything through before waiting for everyone to arrive at 1pm.

Adam
Ok, all ready for today! Got the cameras, checked my one works, and the school one works, just getting the tripod then ill be off. Spent about 10 minutes deciding what tie to use. Had to make it most like a doctors one, and all the ones I had were fairly random! Ended up with a lovely dark blue shade. We are filming the narrative side, gonna be good as hopefully we wont have Matt singing all day. Not really. I love his singing. Thinking its gonna be a long day, so was well prepared. Brought the chargers for the cameras incase we needed a re-fuel. Leaving in 10 minutes.

Amy
Got everything ready on Friday because I slept over a friends house. I hope I haven't forgotten anything this time... I need to bring a black skirt and white blouse to act as the nurse, the storyboard and shooting script, blood, my camera and black washable pen to create the 'dead' girl. I also need to bring the Chinese writing and tribal designs. I have actually remembered to charge up my camera.
Looking forward to the constant flow of 'awesome' coming from Matt and Adam's amazing camera skills...
Going in 5 mins... sooo tired

Gantt Chart

2009-12-03T03:12:00.001-08:00

CHARRTLE GQANg

Body Art

2009-12-02T09:34:00.000-08:00

The woman's alternate will be covered in traditional chinese writing and tribal tattoos, to illustrate the surreal world the woman has entered. The writing will say 'It should have been you' and 'Blood on my hands' to relate to the narrative and theme of the song. 'It should have been you' shows the guilt the woman feels for killing her finace.

I will buy a body pen to draw these symbols onto Amy.

Blood

2009-12-02T09:20:00.000-08:00

Last year I made all of the blood from scratch, which involved a lot of golden syrup... which stains... and smells... and is generally not good to work with.

Therefore we have decided to use my bought blood, which looks fairly realistic and is good for what we want to do with it.

The stage blood is better than the children's gel blood because it is more realistic and won't dye Matt's face pink... The congealed blood in the pot is good for making cuts and scars so we may use that too. We don't need a lot so I don't think I need to buy anymore.

Meanings behind the video

2009-12-02T05:32:00.000-08:00

In our video we have included many symbols and meanings to make the video more personal and interesting.
When the female takes the pills to help her sleep, the special effects added will emphasise what she is going through. The first effect is the background dissolving/ falling away from her. This shows her reality crashing down around her as she is left in a surreal world. The added blurring shows again the effect of the drugs that she has taken, also when she is holding her head the blur shows the speed of the violent movement showing that she is in pain.
In the next scene a new backdrop is placed behind the woman, it is a tribal pattern which represents moss and ivy which is growing up the walls, this represents the decay of the next character that appears on shot. The character has ripped clothes and a body full of tattoos. The ripped clothes bring make the narrative partly strange, however it becomes revealed later on. Her body paint at first blends her into the backdrop, her eyes will be covered in black makeup to show her dark emotion and her skin will be pale dead white. There are two symbols on each of the characters arms, one is - 應該是你 - which says "It should be you" in Chinese, this refers to the girl who is alive and it tells her that she should have died and not her fiancee. The other arm has - 血液在我的手 - which says "Blood on my hands."
The idea of the two characters meeting is a visual on the girls emotions, she meets her inner self which tells her she should have been killed.
The character fades away to reveal the lead singer screaming, this brings the character back to reality as the chorus continues. At the end of the chorus the lead singer folds his arms as if he were in a coffin, this again shows that he is really dead. He falls back and instead of falling into a coffin, he falls into a car seat.
The second verse starts and it is set just before the death of the lead singer. It covers real life problems found in many countries today, two young adults drink driving after a party the female. The female is the drinking character who starts an argument when the passenger (lead singer) tries to take it away from her.
We have linked the verse into the chorus where the lead singer crosses his arms to protect himself from the crash, he then pulls his arms down and continues to sing.
Again the character come back in to reality but as the solo takes place the lead singer appears haunts her as a ghost. The girl is in the fetus position showing her madness which is also emphasised by the edits, this is ironic as the position represents birth and new life.
As the song comes to an end the lead singer and the girl meet up, their is an emotion clash and they both react in a mixed way. Again the emotions are reflected through the actions of the characters. He shows his pain when the lead singer cuts her hand open. We add surrealism when she asks why is she feeling pain in a dream, and to create a power twist he tells her that she is still awake.
The last scene shows that the girl is in a coma, and as she is left in the hospital room alone, the camera zooms into her face and she screams to escape from her coma nightmare which shows her trapped guilt.

Day 1 - Behind the scenes

2009-11-22T10:49:00.000-08:00

While the footage is being edited and more is being prepared to be filmed we have a viewing of behind the scenes for our first shooting. A lot of it is random singing and dancing.

New Media Technology

2009-11-22T06:59:00.001-08:00

There are many different ways for musicians to promote and produce their work that have only just become available in the past decade. The most important of these, is the Internet. This allows people from all around the world to be able to get in contact, buy merchandise, follow news/blogs, watch music videos and talk with other people of a similar interest. Things such as youtube and the bands website have been massive tools for promoting their work.

Twitter

This helps the band to promote itself through recent activities, where they are, what they are doing and pictures they uploaded.

The Used Website
This gives information about their tour dates and merchandise. It also gives fans the opportunities to talk online to the band and each other about anything they desire. It gives access to unseen band tours and live performances as well as being able to stream music. Finally, they can download things such as wallpapers and shop online.

Youtube

Youtube enables the public to stream videos online, such as live and studio based performances, interviews and extra features. It also gives the public a chance to upload and create their own versions of the songs as well as the videos, allowing self promotion or it could be just for fun.

Myspace

Myspace was one of the major breakthroughs in new media technology that allowed musicians to present themselves freely over the Internet without much constraint. Fans can access the bands myspace page, look at pictures, stream music and post comments on the bands status. This was such a huge success when it was first released, and still continues today.

PureVolume
This enables fans to download/stream music.

There are many other ways the band can get in contact and keep fans enriched with news. Twitter, Myspace and Facebook tend to be a very popular way of keeping the masses of followers up-to-date with the bands latest releases. These websites allows the band, or someone connected to the band, to create an account that shares information and news on the band, upcoming tours, new releases and in some instances, things the band are interested in, such as pictures or videos they enjoyed watching.

We will be using chroma key and video and photo-editing software such as photoshop to create effects and specific meanings behind the video. The effects will enable us to emphasise and clearly put across what is happening within the narrative.

Fashion Label and semiotics

2009-11-22T06:55:00.000-08:00

An important part of a bands career is their image. Most bands in present times are signed to a fashion label, where they wear clothes that are quite similar to the genre. The Used tend to be fairly conventional with the grunge yet mordern look. A lot of the fashion is black and red which connotes anger and death. Some of the labels inclue : Atticus, Famous Stars and Straps and Macbeth. Obviously the clothes are very expensive and having no budget it will be hard to obtain their costume. We will instead be following just their colours as it still represents the bands style. This includes: hoodies, make up and black shirts.
Many bands follow this similar style, they all come under the same genre and these include: Atreyu, Avenged Sevenfold and Blink-182.
When recreating this look, we have used make up also, which can be said to be included in the semiotics. We will use eye liner under the bands eyes to fit with the dark/gothic look.

Filming - Day 1 (part 2)

2009-11-22T06:47:00.000-08:00

Adam, Matt and Amy

OK so we just got back from the filming. Everything went well apart from the issue with the blood on Matt's face, which doesn't come off unless you use a Brillo pad... All of us who were acting wore makeup and costumes that matched what was described so that all went perfectly well. We also did some of the stills that we will be using in the website and album covers. Never knew how hard it was to keep an unhappy face for so long while playing a guitar! But it looks really good. We left the discs with the footage with Matt, who will put together the 'filming of' and bring in ready to be used on Monday. We are 1/3 of the way through the shooting script now, and are well prepared for next week.

Okay so the filming was a huge success, took about 3 hours but i think it will turn out great. We decided to do a few extra shots to be more experimental and just in case others didn't work out properly. I also found out that I should check the labels on fake blood before I use it, as for some unknown reason it stung. A lot. And was really hard to remove, now i can't wait to start editing.

Filming - Day 1 (part 1)

2009-11-22T02:08:00.000-08:00

Matt

So here we are, 22nd of November about 10:15 AM and I am ready to film.
Since 8 AM I have been sorting out the room downstairs to make it into the setting we need. This includes: moving all of the furniture, applying green screen to the walls, moving all of the instruments into place, testing the sound and setting up the cameras. I have also got changed into my costume to play as Bert Mccracken (the lead singer) which is an all black costume with buckled gothic trousers, black hoody and a dark top. Todays filming is going to cover all of the perfomance based aspects of the video.
Just have to wait another 45 minutes for the rest of the crew to appear and hope it all goes well.

Adam

It's 10:20 and I'm getting all the equipment together and my costume ready. I will be meeting with Matt, Amy, Will and Dan at Matt's house at around 11:00 to start the filming for the performance based shots. Looking forward to today, we got everything we need so far, costumes, actors, settings and all. Bringing my dark jeans, black shirt and belt as a costume for the guitarist. Bringing also two cameras and a tripod.

Amy

I think it's around 10:30 and I've just found the blood and make up that we need for the mise-en-scene of our music video. I have a feeling I've forgotten something...

I'm looking forward to coating Matt in blood and doing Adam's make up. Should be fun.

The Animatic

2009-11-21T08:56:00.000-08:00

Even though we value audience feedback, we felt that it was still a little to hard to see the Grunge Red, Scratches and Stains effect we practiced while developing the animatic to give it a certain feel. We then decided to go for the next best thing, and stick with the Original colours. This made sure we could understand what was happening. Thanks for all who voted.

We then made another poll and are awaiting results to see if the animatic can be understood by the audience. This does not matter much as we understand it, but it is useful to know, as extreme reactions to it could cause a few problems for us.

Using Green Screen and Photoshop

2009-11-21T08:53:00.001-08:00

When creating the background for our band, we decided to use a green screen material over the walls of our sets, allowing us to use an array of different backgrounds. The backgrounds will be created through PhotoShop. Firstly we layered the images we were going to use. Then, we added the effects over the top of them by using different tools. The gradient tool was used to create dark and light tones within the image, there by drawing the viewers attention to the lighter parts. This kept the focus where we wanted it. We also had some black and white in places to create a dramatic effect, keeping the user focused on the colours. This was called using the Colour Correction tool. We clicked on the colour we wanted, then changed the amounts of colour we wanted to keep, making sure that only that object was shown. This let us change the colour to black and white where we didn't want the viewers attention, and kept them focused on the colour. We did this effect in both stills and moving image, however, the stills were far easier to manipulate.

The green screen tool, we used by first shooting the footage with the green screen behind on the set. We then when editing, removed it using the Chroma Key tool. This removed, like the colour corrected, parts of the colour we selected. We used this to add a different background in after we had finished filming. We can also add certain animations that we see fit. This allows to also correct parts that we do not want in the footage, and digitally correct it.

After having added all these effects, a large proportion of our video will consist of digitally enhanced footage, which is a strong convention of The Used. It also makes it seem less life-like, and almost dreamy, or nightmarish.

The Animations

2009-11-21T08:46:00.001-08:00

The Corrections - Barcode
Apart from the similar in genre, and as a result semiotics and conventions, this band is excellent to look at when developing our scribble animation effects. They however, added it in by scratching over the top of the frames individually with a sharp object. We are using DVD discs though, so we will do this using video editing software and putting it over the stills. This will take much longer but it will be well worth it when the effect is similar and fits what we wanted. The animations also were not just random; they often emphasised what was on screen, by creating movement and drawing extra objects on the screen. We will use this effect throughout the video, emphasising certain parts, mostly on the performance side.
Venom and Eternity
The scribbles work by keeping pace and motion in the moving image. They give the viewer a sense of the speed of the video; making it seem faster than it actualy is. After looking more into this, we came across a very old piece of footage on youtube called Venom and Eternity (1951) Isidore Isou (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2OtPcowy70) Which featured the similar effect to that of which was used in the Barcode video. The effect was used by putting bleach, scratching or painting onto the original film reels, giving dark or white lines over the top of the footage.
The Venom and Eternity film by Jean Isidore Isou was deemed a scandal in the 1951 Cannes Film Festivile. The film 'rejected conventions' with its irregular concepts; the sound track did not match the moving image, the image was 'attacked' with both sharp objects, bleach and paint, as well as distortion of the footage through rotation. The film was a 'revolt against cinema' although its doing influenced many, both positively and negativley to its cause. Jean Cocteau, a French Film Maker says; "Is VENOM a springboard or is it a void? In fifty years we'll know the answer. After all, remember how Wagner was retrieved. Today, no one objects to his outbursts. The day will come, perhaps, when Isou's style will be the fashion. Who can tell?".
Examples
We plan to get some examples up as soon as possible.

How our video compares to the original

2009-11-21T08:42:00.000-08:00

The original video by The Used for "Blood on my hands," is about the lead singer (Bert) being a murder suspect and throughout the video it shows Bert's suffering in many different shots and edits. As the video continues it shows Bert murdering the real murderer, a pedophile , while he is talking to a young girl. This pushes Bert into madness and the police find him and lock him up. The video ends and Bert is shown being hung. This is a very personal video which is quite violent and has a very dramatically twisted ending.

Our video for the music is quite a lot different, we have decided to make ours even more personal and have a much greater meaning. Our video also covers murder and the character who is responsible. This will be shown in the event of a car crash; although we cannot recreate this, we will use green screen and other software to remake this. We have focused on a couple about to be married, which makes the characters seem a lot closer, and have chosen to have the characters at a young age, (early adult) to make them seem naive and to fit into the narrative. Another sensitive area we have covered is young drivers and alcohol. We have chosen to have the main character a female who abuses her drug dosage and falls into a coma. This was a key issue throughout the bands life and career, and we decided to show this through their music video. Like the original video we will be using many effects to bring the drug abuse through to the audience, like theirs we will be have rapid camera movement, lots of colour corrections and many added digital effects to give a drug feeling.

Our video gives off a much greater surreal feeling than the original, we go deep into the woman's feelings and visually bring them out when she sees herself. Again this makes the video more personal and meaningful. We do this through multiple layering of footage. We will first film the woman in her normal form; then with the tattoos covering her. We will use distance, scaling an green screen to put the same person into the same shot twice. This will be highly difficult to perfect, but we have filmed the footage multiple times to be sure.

Our narrative, like the original starts halfway through and until halfway through the narrative is very difficult to understand. In the original it gets to about 2/3 of the way through before we realise Bert isn't the real killer. In ours we have the same amount of time before we see how the girl kills her fiancee.

In terms of Misé en scene, our video highly compares to the other conventions researched. There is a lot of costumes used throughout; with strange characters; seeming very creepy. Narrative and performance 'slicing' will be used in the editing. This means we have shots of both narrative and performance coming in at different times, disorientating the audience. However, we have made sure it is understandable. The performance based shots frequently have the band looking at the camera, involving the audience. We also have the conventional 'non caring' band members not bothered about the fact they are being filmed, looking fairly sad and bored about performing. Finally, we have used lip syncing, like most music videos, this makes the band involved.

Action plan for the next two months

2009-11-19T02:47:00.001-08:00

Shootings schedule
22nd November filming the performance based part of the music video
22nd November – 5th December editing the performance based footage, prepare for the filming of the narrative performance
5th and 6th December filming the narrative based part of the video
Edit the rest of the video and put the two parts together.
Finish posts on the blog.

Prop List

2009-11-18T05:55:00.000-08:00

Costumes-
Main female character- Black tank top
- Black jeans
- Black skirt
- White blouse
Dead female- Black bikini
- Black paint
Lead singer
- Black jeans
- Black shirt
- Black hoody
- Black converse
Band members- Black tie
- Black shoes
- Black suit/trousers
- White shirt
Doctor (GP)- Cream/beige jacket
- White collared shirt
- Black trousers
Doctor (Hospital)- white shirt
- white trousers
Nurse- handmade white mouth mask
- white blouse
- black skirt

Props- Car
- Blood
- Guitar
- Drums
- Bass
- Two chairs and table
- Pen and paper
- Pills
- Microphone and stand
- Amplifiers/ leads
- Alcohol
- Green screen
- Bed
- Clipboard
- eye liner
- eye shadow

Image Motifs

2009-11-18T03:12:00.000-08:00

We have crearted a motif board to gather themes and ideas that we are definitly using in our video together. This shows the mood and the tone of the video.

The Used Website

2009-11-14T06:47:00.000-08:00

An important part of a bands life is to keep in contact with the fans. Now-a-days most bands use a website to keep the fans up-to-date with the latest news and products. It also allows them to access special features, live tours, pictures and more! The fans can also log in and chat on the forums with other fans from around the world.

The Used have a website, http://www.theused.net/ which is highly enriched with things for the fans to do. The main screen, immediately has a picture of the band which you are drawn to. The pic has scratches over it, a convention of the genre (grungy, non-conformist vandalism?). The effects and design of the page is fairly typical for the genre. The background has a tiled shadowed square, almost like what you would expect from a public toilet. There is then what looks like kitchen or toilet roll in front of this, to make another relation to public toilets (something which is quite conventionally disgusting). The layout seems to be cluttered, with the fonts and links backed by a scratch/scribble or swipe of paint. There is blood stains, with a slight yellow, puss like layer over the toilet paper. There are a lot of references to blood in The Used, and related artists songs. The top banner has blood dripping off it.

The features of the website, include links to the bands Myspace, Twitter, Facebook, Apple store, TV and Pure Volume websites. Along the top banner, there are links to news, blog, music, board, members, media/art, tour and shop. There are a lot of things for fans to do on the website. There are also merchandise, and endorsement features, such as the media/art link which allows you to see pictures and videos of the band.

Animatic

2009-11-11T11:13:00.000-08:00

This is the finished animatic.

Storyboard

2009-11-11T01:22:00.000-08:00

Character infomation

2009-11-10T04:22:00.000-08:00

List of characters:

The female: A blonde young female with a withdrawn personality shows sorrow in her blue eyes because of loss of husband. Her first costume in the doctor’s office is a plain jumper and jeans. This changes in the next scene to a long white night dress which is worn throughout the rest of the video. She has pale skin, showing that she may be unhealthy; she hasn’t gone into the light much after her husband had died. In the car crash scene she will wear punk-styled clothes to fit in with the fiancée.

The fiancée/ lead singer: The fiancée will wear punk-styled clothing, his attitude showing him to like parties but knowing when to stop. There are a few shots of the fiancée in the car showing him with ripped clothing, covered in blood. The clothes will be a dark shirt and camouflage shorts. This will also be worn in the performance.

The band: They will be dressed up smart in suits but they will be seen to be very scruffy and stylised. Some will have dark, punk clothes underneath their shirts that are slightly visible possibly with some logos showing. They will also have eye liner on, which makes them conventional of the gothic genre.

The doctors: The doctors in the video will seem suspicious and dark, suggesting that there is something off about them. In doing this it will set up the mood of the scene before the girl falls into her sleep. The doctors will be wearing stereotypical clothes; long white shirts, pens and ties. Their voices will be eerie and sound quite old. One of them is a GP who will be also wearing a blazer and the other is hospital doctor dressed mostly in white.

The nurse: She will have a mask over her mouth and wear a stereotypical nurse’s costume. Her emotions will come across as blank and she will not say anything within the video.

Dead woman: Her body will be covered in tribal tattoos which represent vines and moss, showing that she is decaying away into the background. The word ‘Blood’ will be written on either hand and her chest will bare the words “blood on my hands” in Chinese. Her movement will be very jerky and slow when moving towards the main character.

Practicing with the Animatic

2009-11-05T09:46:00.000-08:00

We decided that it would be a good idea to have effects put on to our animatic to give it a similar style to the actual music video. This is the original

Here are a few ideas we came up with...

Red Highlights and broadened pencil lines. This is a simple but highly effective one. It gives it a bit of colour, makes it stand out more and also keeps it simple.

Bold Red Comic style. Too stylistic for our theme.

Grain, textured surface with red highlights. Worked, but seemed like too much had been done to it for it to be an animatic.

Arty Red Chalky effect. Makes it harder to look at, but fits the grunge theme.

Grunge Red with dirty scratches and stains. This was my favorite one, although it may be too hard to see what is happening, although it makes it look like there is alot of movement.

2009-11-02T13:50:00.000-08:00

Shots on location working with the car interior and the added forest background. As we can't create a car crash due to lack of budgets, we have had to use green screen to fake it. Amy and I went up into the forest to set the scene, before the car crashes it goes through a forest area and to do this we will be moving up and down the forest first in a smooth manner and then in a violent manner to show the car has came off the road. The green screen is placed in the background over the window and while editing we will be putting the moving background in.
Video to be added soon.

Shooting Script

2009-10-25T04:00:00.000-07:00

Click here for the "Blood on my hands" shooting script.

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?tnqtdzjh2ln

Reprise Records

2009-10-21T10:14:00.001-07:00

Reprise record was founded in 1961 by Frank Sinatra. It has featured many huge successes such as The Kinks, Jimi Hendrix, and Neil Young. It was merged with Warner Brothers Records in 1963, resulting in a large amount of the artists dropping out. The label then focused on teen pop music. The label was 'hibernated' in 1977, there by bringing all the artists on to Warner Brothers main label. It was reactivated in 1988, to become what it is today; a very successful label owning many popular music artists, including The Used. The logo we see now a days, first came to be in in 1966. It is useful to know who the band we are looking at belong to, and its history, to give us an understanding of important issues such as similar genres, and popular culture.

How The Used changed over time

2009-10-20T03:47:00.000-07:00

The Used were not always part of the group that they are now today. They started off with only two of the currently four members in the ban, Quinn Allman and Jeph Howard. Branden Steineckert was also a founding member, although he is not in the band anymore. They started the group when they held singing auditions in Brandens room in 2001, which was where they found their current singer, Bert McCracken. This was where they made their first album as a group, Formation and Demos from the Basement (2001), which was quite amature in style, although, John Feldmann, a producer from the SKA group Goldfinger (a Pop-Punk genre band).
John took them to LA where they played for record executives to try and get them signed. At first they were not so successful, but they ended up signing with Reprise Records, where they sign with today.

It was only in 2003 where they released their next album,

which incidentally was named after their new-found name, "The Used" which also featured four music videos, and live performances. The music videos in this album were all quite performance based, and featured a lot

of the band. We can also see from these videos that the band are still establishing their style, and are not quite as strange yet as their later videos. Although, similar to all their videos, we can see the development of the bands life being implemented into their music videos. This is a recurring theme in all of their music videos, and seems to be typical of the genre.

It was after this first label released album that the band were under the media spotlight. Following this, they went on many tours including; Ozzfest (may be because Bert was dating Ozzy Osbourne daughter at the time, Kelly, which also created a lot of publicity and recognition in its own sense), which is a strictly rock and metal festival, Warpe

d Tour, as well as Projekt Revolution and Box Car Racer's, both of which are hosted by bands of a similar genre. The band gained a lot of fans during these tours.

They released their next album in 2005, with its artw

ork featuring a very stylistic picture of a grey tree with a sagging red heard being hung, which was to be one of the iconic symbols of the band from now on, appearing frequently in a few of their videos. This album was said to be ded

icated to Berts ex girlfriend who recently died of a drug overdose, who also was holding Berts baby at the time.

One of the music videos in this album also had some animation to it, "All That Ive Got" which caught on. The slightly cartoonish animations had an erie yet playful manor to them, making light of often quite odd occurrences. We also see at one point of of the animations looking at his hands which grew bigger and older, where later we see in another video, one of the bands hands turning giant and hitting someone. The hand theme was also to be brought up again in the names of one of their songs, "Blood on my Hands". It was also after the release of this album that one of their founding members, Brenden Steineck

er was removed from the group due to him not getting along with one of the other band members, and was replaced by Dan Whitesides. The bands image at this point is still established as this stylistic, new, strange, 'I don't care' group of young men.

In 2007 they released their third album called Lies for the Liars, which again featured the artwork

of Alex Pardee who had worked with them previously. The album cover shows the playful yet strange cartoon animations yet again, and also displays the similar black 'whip'-like vines from All That Ive Done. Their Music videos at this point changed a little. One of their songs called "The Bird and the Worm" was written to talk about how their fame is now making them tiresome of the crowds of people who constantly demand contact with the band. The band at this point are very well established as an image and as a musical group.

Their newest album, Artwork, is so far the only album without the animated style, although it still fits the bands image. It was released in 2009 through Reprise Records, like all their other albums. Another change was the producer of this album, John Feldmann, was replaced by Matt Squire, a 'Pop' music producer because the band wanted a new image, something different to their other albums. Bert said "In the past, we've always kind of brought pop sensibility into heavy rock, but this is going to be much more tantalizing and brutal. Our songs are 10 times more messier and noisier than they've ever been". Interview with the band in a studio. One of the songs was also featured in the new Transformers movie, Burning Down the House, which also featured songs of a similar genre from bands such as Linken Park and Green Day.

There are a few ideas that the band carries throughout their career, such as the way the lyrics are quite unpleasant by talking about death and pain, as well as their reflection on their life. We also have their performance style, which comes with the genre sticking with them.

Throughout their career the band had also released lots of live performance DVD's and a Digital Extended Play featuring unseen songs and bonus tracks from other albums they had re-done called "Shallow Believer".

Referenced from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Used

http://www.theused.net/

Pitch Presentation

2009-10-16T10:25:00.001-07:00

Pitch Presentation

View more presentations from Adam Marshall.

The Used Presentation

2009-10-16T10:19:00.000-07:00

The Used Presentation

View more presentations from Adam Marshall.

The Used Mood Board

2009-10-15T02:07:00.001-07:00

The idea of this mood board was to represent the feelings and ideas given to us as an audience from The Used. We can see that its quite typical of a rock/grunge/post-hardcore genre due to its stylish, cartoon artist, Alex Pardee. We can also see alot of the performance in this, most of it live. The band is also trying to be seen as quite playful, and un-conformist in nature, but twisted in attitude.

"Blood On My Hands" - Lyrics

2009-10-14T12:11:00.000-07:00

You felt the coldness in my eyes
And something I'm not revealing
Though you got used to my disguise,
You can't shake this awful feeling
It's the me that I let you know,
And I'll never show, I have my reasons
Hate to say that I told you so, but I told you so...

There's blood on my hands, like the blood in you
Some things can't be treated
So don't make me don't make me be myself around you

Straight from your eyes it's barely me,
Beautifully so disfigured
This other side that you can't see
Just praying you won't remember

Feel the pain that I never show
And I hope you know, it's never healing
Hate to say that I told you so, but I told you so...

YEAH...!!!

There's blood on my hands, like the blood in you
Some things can't be treated
So don't make me don't make
me be myself around you

Straight from your eyes it's barely me,
Beautifully so disfigured
This other side that you can't see
Just praying you won't remember

[INTERLUDE]

There's blood on my hands, like the blood in you
Some things can't be treated
So don't make me...

There's blood on my hands, like the blood in you
Some things can't be treated
So don't make me don't make me be myself around you...

THERE'S BLOOD!

The Mood Board

2009-10-14T11:50:00.000-07:00

It shows the band which gives a sense of their costume and their attitude. Some of the album artwork is their which is very dark and twisted along with an image by their artist Alex Pardee. The transformer's poster shows the audience who would listen to the band and The Used helped to create the movie soundtrack.The logo shows the Gothic sense of writing used by the band which also suggests the genre. Finally the blood splattered along the page is to emphasis the chosen song of "Blood On My Hands"

Muse- Invincible

2009-10-14T09:50:00.000-07:00

The first shot denotes the band’s silhouettes in a three shot filmed from behind them, indicating that they are sitting down on a boat ride. The bright colours and large shapes suggest that the ride is for children. The music starts straight away and suits the slow boat ride which is moving through a tunnel. The camera tilts and sways with the music, creating a relaxing, almost sleepy atmosphere. The scene turns black as the boat moves through the tunnel and the next shot slowly fades in, carrying on the relaxing theme. As the shot gets clearer we see that the camera now shows the band members from the front, the lead in the front seat and the two musicians in the back. They seem to be wearing red suits, which match the boat and contrast against the black, artificially starry background. A point of view shot shows the audience the path of the boat and a spinning roof, ending with a swirly flashing blue pattern. A tracking shot takes us to the end of the path and into the next scene. Again, these images move to the rhythm of the music.
The singing starts and the first shot is of Matt Bellamy on the left side of the frame playing his guitar. He is wearing a red jacket which matches the centre of the frame but contrast with the rest of the background. The lighting spotlights the robotic animals and cast everything else into shadow. Fading transitions are used to show bits of the children’s ride. The images depicted are predominately of dinosaurs (one biting another’s neck). The musicians are shown in a two shot, one in front of the other, with the drums taking up the back row. The members are wearing black outfits and hold black instruments, possibly so they contrast against the bright spotlighted background. The transitions remain fading and more shots show the lead singer and the robotic dinosaurs as the boat slowly moves on. The lights and colours are childlike. The scene progresses to show a medium close up of the human evolution cycle, where each stage pops up in sequence (monkey to human). The robotic cavemen turn to the camera and wave. The events progress to the Egyptians and the slaves and again, fading transitions show the band and robots in turn. Behind the lead singer, the lighting turns blue as the robots depict the Romans and war. A close up shows a lion jumping out of a coliseum and is highlighted by a red tinted light, just as the lyrics ‘together we’re invincible’ are heard. Vikings are featured in the next scenes to be shown on the boat ride; again cold lighting highlights the fighting scenes. It moves onto the industrial revolution, showing the factories and machinery and the robots walking in a regimented fashion. Again, war is shown but with cannons and fire rather than swords as depicted earlier. The fire and cannon blasts stand out against the dark background but blend in with the lead singers red jacket, possibly indicating that he would fight for something he believes in.
A city is shown as the music gets gradually louder and the camera pans upwards and spins, showing the buildings towering above the boat and the audience, maybe suggesting that we are stuck down and are unable to break out of normality. The scene progresses to the future, a childlike representation of futuristic buildings and hover cars are seen again to have contrasting cool and warm colours, possibly hinting at the good and bad. The shot zooms into a tall building on fire, issuing black smoke which continues to lead us to hurricanes and more fire, red lights illuminating this to connote danger, destruction and fear.
The music changes to a faster pace and becomes louder. A low angle shot depicts the lead singer having a guitar solo against a black background. More shots of the band playing are shown and a side view of the lead shows him small on the left side compared to the rest of the shot, where red and orange lighting suggest fire and illuminate a large robot with sharp, threatening teeth. The robot is bigger than the lead singer, perhaps suggesting his problems seem bigger than he can take. Planes (or spacecrafts) encircle the robots head shooting red lasers or lights to the ground, adding to the chaos of the scene. A close up of the robot shows him biting a building and eating it. More threatening robots join in, illuminated from below by red lighting, casting half of their faces in shadow, bringing out more fear and emphasizing the chaos and loss of control. People-robots are seen running away as the guitar solo gets faster, higher pitched and louder. One jumps on a big red button and an alarm sounds with the music, played on the guitar. Red sound waves are emitted and these are shown in the following shots of the band. They move backwards and forwards as they try to reach Bellamy but he moves onto the next time period, which is back to the dinosaurs. However the broken city is silhouetted in the background by more red lighting. People are riding the dinosaurs, carrying spears. More chaotic scenes depict the fighting and killing between humans and dinosaurs. Characters and machinery from past scenes, such as the tanks and the killer robots are shown joining in. The killer robot erupts into flames and gets knocked to the ground, demolishing a building as it does so and causing a fiery explosion. ‘Together we’re invincible’ is repeated as another robot goes down and the image of two robotic cave people (a man and a woman) surrounded by skulls is seen. They are illuminated in red, possibly suggesting that they are dangerous and are the cause of all the wars and killings shown previously. The scenes have travelled full circle and two mid shots of the drummer and Bellamy (also in a low shot) are shown before the doors to the ride slide shut. Water appears to leak out of them, possibly hinting that the outside world and the childlike, robotic one are linked- the doors are like a barrier but the water has seeped through.
The robotic scenes depict wars throughout history in a childlike manner which creates an eerie feeling within the audience. The past and present go on to predict the future, which show the giant robots wreaking havoc amongst society and destroying everything. The scene then denotes the return of the dinosaurs and tanks suggesting that we will circle round again and repeat mistakes. The theme of war and fighting a battle relates to the lyrics:
Follow through
Make your dreams come true
Don't give up the fight
You will be all right
Cause there's no one like you
In the universe

Don't be afraid
What your mind conceals
You should make a stand
Stand up for what you believe
And tonight we can truly say
Together we're invincible

And during the struggle
They will pull us down
But please, please let's use this chance to
Turn things around
And tonight we can truly say
Together we're invincible

Do it on your own
Makes no difference to me
What you leave behind
What you choose to be
and whatever they say
Your soul's unbreakable

And during the struggle
They will pull us down
But please, please let's use this chance to
Turn things around
And tonight we can truly say
Together we're invincible
Together we're invincible

And during the struggle
They will pull us down
Please, please let's use this chance to
Turn things around
And tonight we can truly say
Together we're invincible

I looked at this video because it is of a similar genre to the Used and explores the theme of relationships in a way that compares them to something violent, like a battle. The childlike concept behind the video is an interesting and unique idea. It is surreal which another link to the plan for our music video.

Mood Board

2009-10-12T12:15:00.000-07:00

These are a collection of images that relate to the theme of 'Blood on My Hands'. The paintings are the surreal kind of imagery we are going to try to imitate within the video. The typeface represents the 'grunge' look, commonly associated with the Used. The images of transformers shows the types of films they are related to, which links to their target audience and market.The harlequin images also relate to the theme of odd and strange.

Our Music Video Pitch

2009-10-08T03:43:00.000-07:00

Dean Karr (Director)

2009-10-02T03:52:00.001-07:00

Website Reference: http://deankarr.com/
Directed that were interested in:
Seether - Remedy
Seether - Truth
Marilyn Manson - Sweet Dreams

Billy Talent - Falling Leaves

Dean Karr was first discovered by the media when he did his first mainstream music video for Marilyn Manson, Sweet Dreams. This was a major step in his career, and not only for Dean, but both him and Manson flew out into the commercial spotlight of the visual rock world. He recieved a Bachelor of Find Arts from Washington State University, during his years as a student. Following his education, Karr set out in Los Angeles, making friends while traveling the depths of the city. During this period, he gained the trust of many of the people he worked with and knew, who respected his passionate and uniqueness to his work on their films.

His works frequently appeared on MTV playlists, as well as getting nominated for major MT, Much Music, Billboard and MVPA Video Awards.

Throughout his career he has worked with artists such as Marilyn Manson, Ozzy Osbourne, Tommy Lee and Queens of the Stoneage, which are all of a similar genre to what we are looking at.
His TV commercial projects combine his distinctive bold imagery with strong project recognition and his highly tuned sence of style, fashion art and storytelling are evident in his visuals.
He has created album artwork for artists relevant to us such as Marilyn Manson, and has created numerous print campaigns for Universal Studios and HBO.

Intregued by the potential of moving image, Karr was asked to direct Marilyn Mansons "Sweet Dreams", a music video we have looked at. The resulting piece was a shocker, drawing immediate and broad commercial attention.

Always finding inspiration from reality, Karr has developed a sense of adventure in seeking out unique settings for his project.

His producer talks about him. "Dean is a poweful, exceiting, and challenging talent to work with. His eye is totally original, his instincts full of immediact and freshness. He has the gift of being able to gain people's trust so they give that something extra in front of the camera. It's always exhilarating to see what comes next."

Seether - Remedy

2009-10-01T09:49:00.000-07:00

Youtube Link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZENfHdnZ8M

Lyrics

http://www.lyricstop.com/r/remedy-seether.html

The song starts with a pure white background, then fades to a close up of the guitarist who solos the beginning of the song. He strums in synch with the song. The lighting is also fairly dark on this, and there are shadows cast. We later find we are set in a fairground, which suggest the way the lighting is so strong, but its also dark, which connotes bad thoughts. This feeling is also reinforced through the bands costumes. The lead singer is in a 'carny-man' costume, which is generally seen as quite a fun looking costume, but the singers face is dark, and expressioned so that he looks fairly sinister in such a fun place. His playful, but dark semiotics suggest trouble...

The second shot is another extreme close up of fairground lights flashing on a dark atmospheric background. We next see a circus like poster at a side angle, suggesting the angle at which we should think when we read "The world's most TERRIFYING living creature!". This could be a pun to the band, or maybe a foreshadow of the things to come. Following this shot, we see other circus themed attractions at queer angles with the moody lighting blackening the background. These shots are also in time with the bands guitar strums, giving a sense of building speed as the song reaches its full swing.

We are then taken to an over the shoulder shot of the drummer banging in synch to the song. Already we know this song is based on performance of the band. We are then taken to a low angle shot of some peoples feet (quite voyeuristic in a sense, as the characters are all female dressed in schoolgirl costumes), and are lead onto a shot of the girls laughing, followed by a shot from behind looking into ones skirt. These shots are shot without the characters in the scene knowing we are seeing them, which suggests that we are 'stalking' them. We then see another shot of the drummer, then an extreme close up of the singers face. We only see half his face, which may suggest that there is another side to the con-man clothed person, (Evil, due to the lip piercing and black makeup). All the shots so far have had no transitions on this, which gives a sense of speed and uninterrupted madness. There are then flashes of white as the camera moves from different angles from one band member to another making them look powerful. We also see one of them shake their head which is a very conventional representation of something the audience do who listen to this song.

Again we are taken behind the girls pacing towards the fairground, while showing shots of the band in between. We also see the lead singer again, with half his face hidden behind some splintered wood, as his lip synchs the words. After this shot, we see the singer standing unsettled in front of a spinning bulls eye, which is a circus attraction known to us by the one where someone throws knives at it, while the other person stands still. It can also be seen as quite hypnotic. This connotes danger. We then see a shot of the circus/fairground where the darkness overpowers the lights in the shot. We then see the singer again, only there is a blue effect put on the camera as it slightly moves from side to side. This, and the next few shots make us feel like there is tension building. We see the circus over a still lake with a brief shot of the band and the guitarist again.

A man (who is very conventional of the audience of rock due to his long hair) is scared by a shot of a clown that springs into view from the side of the camera, and is then seen sticking his tongue out at it. This suggests the audience (who can relate to the man) find danger, or scary, quite fun, much like the band. We then see a shot framed at either side by a man with the red and white striped costume the singer is seen in, and some of the people we earlier seen moving, looking like they are having fun, under what looks like a wooden stage. The next shot shows the singer gesturing with his body and facial expressions an evil cringe, as if to say he has a bit of fun to be had with these people... There are then multiple shots of the band strumming, still building tension till till the chorus.

The chorus open with a fast paced shot of the guitarist looking fairly 'bored' playing the guitar 'like he has to', or its 'easy'. There are a lot of vert quick shots in only a few seconds, one showing the people again laughing. We see the singer lunge at the screen during a yell while synching the lyrics, with a gruesome facial expression. This shot is very common in this genre. We again see the guitarist, playing with a sad, uncaring face for a brief moment, while flames go off in the background. The next few shots are switching from the singer, to the band, to the people we seen earlier. One of the shots also has smokes, which are used sometimes at gigs. At a few points, we also see the singer in black clothes what look like leather, making him look tough.

The tension ends with the chorus, and builds again during the next few shots.

We see a dolly shot of water, suggesting we are in a point of view in a boat, where we also see a skull with a human eye in it. We also see one of the girls looking disgusted and scared from behind some grass. We then see the boat again from an arial view with smoke and flames coming from either side, then a static shot as the skull we earlier seen moves past through the smoke. There is a very quick shot of the girl screaming, then were taken to a shot of a corpse floating in the water. This all seems quite conventionaly scary. A lot of the corpse is shadowed out, and its very gruesome looking, very rotten. We then see an arial shot of the boat again, then it shows a medium close up of the girl, frightened and a mans hand around her comforting her. The lighting is at a minimum here, only 'moonlight'. We then see the lead singer near the old wood again, with a sinister smirk on his face, followed by a teeth grind as he mouths the lyrics. We then see a low angle shot, maybe point of view again of some webbed trees, then a shot of the guitarist with the drummer in the background, on stage performing. Similar shots continue, close ups of the band, till we see the frightened girl again, turning round to see an almost nude figure looking at a tree. We also see now that the men are scared, or horrified. This is juxtaposed with the band looking sad faced, as if to mock them, while looking up at the camera, making them seem weak, although their body language tells us they want to be seen like this. Continuing on from this, there are more quick, untransitioned shots of the band, where we see the misshapen nude figure again against a ghostly white backdrop, with overgrown tree roots. This shot is like a stereotypical horror scene, although humor is brought to it as the camera zooms quickly to see the figure dancing, ever so slightly to the beat (shaking its but).

More shots of the band looking up at how powerful they are, with the camera shaking and moving, till we see a shot of an old lady in a skin tight leather costume, looking fairly sexually positioned. There is red smoke rising from he background. We then see the scared people again in the boat, then see them watching the lady on a bed shaped like a love heart, from a range behind them. The old woman gestures her finger for one of the people to come to her, then we see them looking disgusted. We see the old lady from a side view with the bubble on her head with a psy-fi looking backdrop in place behind her. There are more shots of the band 'rocking out' then a skeleton lying against a tree, more shots of them disgusted and a low shot of fat feet. We later see the fat men in a hazard hat with an axe. There are lots of close ups of the fat mens skin, framed quite ugly, as if seen in the view of the people in the boat. Behind the fat men in one of the shots of a moon with star-like objects in the sky. One of the men put their hands over their mouth, maybe about to throw up/boke or to look surprised. the band, fat men and people are shown quite a few times during the last few shots.

We then see a shot from underwater of a figure moving. The water is smoggy and green, and were then put into a crowd of silhouettes of people dancing. We then see the band playing, the end of his guitar catches fire. We next see shots of hands waving and cheering next to shots of the band performing.

After this, at the end of a a yell by the singer, we see the camera shake 'uncontrollably' looking at the lead singer.

The next scene is shot like at a live concert, with lots of flames, smoke and light, with the camera moving fast showing us the action, of the band performing and the people dancing. These shots continue, with regular close ups of the band and crowd, with frequent shots of the lady, fat men, scared people in the boat. We also see a shot of the corpse almost subliminally, followed by a very fast zoom into the frightened girls face.

There are flames coming out of the end of the lead singers guitar in synch with the drum beats and strums at one point.

The video ends with the boat sailing through with a skull on it instead of the people, and cuts to a shot of the singers face staring directly at us.

This is a brilliant video to look at for us, as it is shot in a performance themed way, portraying the thoughts of the lead singer, making him look devilish, yet comedic. It also like a lot of our other videos were analyzing has strange costumes in it, with very atmospheric lighting. These both, we are sure to add to our music video.

Post - Hardcore

2009-09-30T12:35:00.000-07:00

Post - Hardcore is a music genre that evolved from hardcore punk, the groups emerged from the punk scene and took inspiration from hardcore. It started in the late 1980's in the USA with bands such as: Fugazi, Big Black and Jawbox. This genre is characterised by its precise rhythms, loud guitar-based instruments and the clean to screaming vocals. It has become more popular in the year 200 with bands such as The Used, Senses Fail and Alexionfire. Also people have started to call the music screamo or an even more popular name, emo.
We chose to have this genre to go with our video to bring out a gritty violent realism to it.

My Plug in Baby by Muse

2009-09-30T11:35:00.000-07:00

The opening of the song starts with an image of a woman, coming out of a screen in 3D sound frequency waves. The waves move with the music quickly and a quick cut shows a close up of the lead singers face, linking the two images together. Two more screens are shown, featuring extreme close ups of women's eyes, also coming out of the screen. The lead singer is depicted playing his guitar in a mid shot, slowly zooming in. The shot suggests voyeurism, as we are looking through a window at him surrounded by bright furniture and white walls which contrast heavily with his black outfit and hair. He is in the centre of the image, framed by two vertical black lines (the window frame) which draws our attention to his straight, almost unmoving figure. His head is slightly bowed as if he is concentrating or wanting to look mysterious. A close up, side on view of him playing his guitar again links to the 3D screens of the women. This may connote power over them and could explain his stance in the mid shot.
As the music becomes louder and faster, the drums start which makes the music seem to jump. As this happens a long shot and medium close up (from two different angles) show the lead singer jumping on the beat. More performance shots of the band are shown, quickly edited to match the beat of the music. The band are playing in a large, lit up house which seems especially bright compared to the dark outside.
A cut to a close up of a woman's face and legs indicate the singing is about to start. As the lead singer is saying 'I've exposed your lies' a high angled long shot depicts a bed with a duvet cover covering the body of a woman, only exposing her leg. This shot links to the lyrics and how her leg is the only part shown. The duvet could be her facade, covering the truth. The audience could have many assumptions with this- the main idea could perhaps be that the woman is fake or lying about how she feels or who/what she is. The bed seems isolated in the shot- it is not surrounded by anything apart from the woman's shoe, perhaps indicating an emotional detachment or being physically detached. There is a slow zoom in and a quick cut to the drummer.
A low angle shot, slowly panning upwards shows another woman in a bath with just her head and arm showing. The arm looks slightly odd- either covered by some kind of material, or naturally covered in lumps. The only decoration is the large canvas in the background showing the bottom of a face. The rest of the room is white and grey, apart from the red towel where she rests her arm. The limitations of what the viewer can see may suggest again that there is something hidden that will be exposed later on, as the lyrics suggest ('the underneaths no big surprise'). More performance shots- the lyrics 'now it's time for changing' show what he thinks and a close up of the girls face (in the bath). She is wearing a red top and has heavy make up on, including dark lipstick. This connotes passion and love but can also relate to anger and danger. A cut to a long shot shows her body, covered in bubbles, concealing what's underneath. Her hair is up, plaited with flowers, as if she is getting ready for something. This could also connote being fake or having a false image- coupled with the covering of her body- like she has something to hide. A side close up of her face depicts her looking up. Coupled with the lyrics 'to forget your love' it is clear that the lead singer is talking about this woman. Her expression is innocent- a hint of a disguise? A close up shows her hand against the red towel. She is wearing a black bracelet on her wrist. Black, red and white are bold, contrasting colours which connote strong, dramatic emotions. White suggests purity, red passion or anger and black may suggest death or something dark and mysterious. Her hand is surrounded by the red, with the white barely showing on the outside of the shot, possibly hinting that she is not innocent.
The shots showing the band performing are quick, with the rhythm and feature a lot of tilts, pans, zooms and close ups highlighting the upbeat music and atmosphere.
A medium close up of a woman's legs (when she is crouching down) and an amplifier (she is lifting headphones to her head) links to the title of the song 'Plug in Baby' maybe suggesting that she turns her emotions on and off to suit her or that she has an image/facade that is fake. Her real self is concealed.
She puts the headphones on and immediately begins to pulse with sound- like she is part of a computer program or machine. A medium close up shows her lying down, covering the headphones with her hands. She is still pulsing like something digital or computerized- like she has been created and doesn't have any real emotion.
Another image of a woman in a mid shot being distorted by technology- a hairdryer is shown blowing and distorting her image.
A longer montage of the band performing with more shots that are designed to reflect the music and atmosphere. Zoom is used a lot to maybe create an idea of confusion or energy. The band is not often shown in shot that displays them clearly- this may link in with the idea of having something to hide.
Quick medium close ups show parts of a woman's body (top of legs as she is standing in front of bed, one leg in the air as she is lying down, the top of her body- including her face- as she lies down on her front like she is trying to get up). As the music calms down an odd image of a woman's legs sticking out of a bright red chair is shown. The chair may symbolize her body- connoting passion or danger again.
Later on, a medium close up shows a woman, hair down, dark make up and clothes on with a black necklace walking into a room. The clothes are very revealing which usually has negative connotations. A mid shot gives us a very odd image of her lower body being cables rather than legs. The shot shows what was covered up earlier on- she has finally been exposed. There is more than one woman, suggesting that the lead singer may have had poor relationships with women in general or something to do with meeting/seeing women over the Internet. It could also relate to the growing use of technology that most of us depend on and how that could make us seem unreal and fake.
The women previously shown are also uncovered, showing cables as legs -'plug in baby' seems much more relevant now, however there could be many meanings to this and is fairly ambiguous to what it could mean. The expressions they all wear seem unemotional but there seems to be something sinister underneath, as if they are trying to portray an uncaring attitude or making it seem like they are normal. There expressions juxtapose against the cables coming from their bodies- they seem indifferent, whereas the audience should feel some kind of shock to what they look like. They are looking directly at the camera which could create a sort of relationship with the viewers.
The band shots do not change throughout the song, as if they are expressing no shock or surprise at what they have found out. Again possibly juxtaposing against the strangeness of the women.
One of the last images of a woman shows her lying down, looking at the camera and reaching out to us and waving slightly. She is smiling, possibly suggesting that she is trying to connect with us- like a robot that doesn't know any better.
The last shot depicts the lead singer, bent down, holding his guitar vertically and still playing- perhaps symbolising a disused robot or machine. A slow pan around him, along with the scratchy sounds of a guitar indicates the end of the song, but maybe also him giving up or ending a relationship.

The Used - Blood On My Hands

2009-09-30T10:53:00.000-07:00

The newest video by The Used is by far the most violent and twisted video of their time. The colours are drained from the video leaving only shades and the Strong red every now and then. The camera pans into Bert as he is shown in distress, this sets the narrative in the very first shot. The music starts and the shots changes through clean fading transitions of newspaper articles about a serial killer. This quickly cuts too and from close ups of the band standing inside a dark trashed room. The shots overlay each other as the camera pans across each section of the shot. Finally to set the scene Bert is shown jumping violently into place with the music. The whole room is destroyed and dark showing that Bert could be the serial killer and is hiding away.
When the lyrics start, a fast pan lands on a close up of Bert's face, this shows his anger to the audience while he is singing. A flash of light to the drum beat cuts the shots up and forms shadows in the dingy room. While the lights are flashing the camera goes out of shot of the band, this makes their movement a lot more blurry and distorted. Just before the chorus the camera in a high angle (nearly Ariel) shot pans over policemen checking a dead body.
The chorus starts and the video becomes both mixed with narrative and performance based. The performance based side of the chorus swaps into many different angles of the bands with a many close ups of Bert's facial expressions and the band playing their instruments. The bands costume is mostly black, a lot is plain jackets and shirts, this could add to the idea of Bert hiding from the police as well as be the fashion they are usually wearing. The narrative side shows the police working with the dead body trying to find out what has happened to the girl. This is again done with many closes ups of the dead body and many business documents.
The second verse starts and Bert is secluded in a small room where he is singing towards the audience. The lyrics and visuals connect when "Beautifully so disfigured" is mentioned, a close up on a pair of hands is shown bursting a balloon. Again Bert reappears in a medium shot revealing a new trashed setting to the viewers. The shots show Bert frantically writing on the wall and reading through papers, this with the quick edits show that Bert is very stressed out about the murders. Using chroma key Bert fades in front of the extreme close up of the writing on the wall, the colours are very dull and Bert is in black and white, the use of this tries to show the audience that Bert is innocent. The camera is very unsteady which again shows how much Bert is being pushed over the top with the crime.
The chorus starts for a second time, the scene changes between the band and Bert by himself, this again reflects to Bert's madness and his madness due to isolation. In one shot is is even upside down on the ceiling with a close up on his mad faces creaming towards the audience.
The chorus ends the and music dies down again, it shows a pedophile in a range of close ups talking on the Internet. Also Bert's madness when he is grabbing his head in a fast paced edited shot. The scene keeps changing from the band to the narrative as Bert creeps up behind the pedophile, the use of close ups brings suspense like a horror film. For a split second the music stops and Bert grabs the victim by the neck and throws him to the floor. To the loud bass drum beat Bert continuously stabs the man and a large amount of blood covers Bert. One shot is from the mans feet up at Bert, this makes the killing seem a lot more personal. The drum beats become the knife stabbing and the they both become a lot more frequent until the music dies down fully for the final chorus. The music slowly starts to build up again and Bert slowly raises his head with a face full of blood. A long shot shows two prison guards dragging Bert in an orange boiler suit. The shot fades to show a vicar following them.
The final chorus starts, every time "blood," is mentioned in the lyrics, Bert appears on the camera in a close up with a face full of blood, still stabbing at the man. This fades into slow motion Bert being dragged outside by prison guards. The music comes to a climax and Bert covered in blood raises his hands as if he is screaming for forgiveness while holding his knife over his head. The band appear again with flashing lights cutting the shot up. An extreme close up shows an orange boiler suit and a white sock climbing a step, this can be led to a hanging. The last few shots show Bert being prepared to be hung, they place a black bag over his head and the shot cuts back to a final time of Bert holding a knife to his neck. The lever is pulled and to a beat of the drum Bert falls into the pit and the video fades out to the rope hanging Bert.

The Used - The Bird And The Worm

2009-09-30T10:51:00.000-07:00

The video opens to the band walking through a crowd with little lighting and a very unsteady camera. It follows through the crowds, nearly as a point of view shot. A windy effect is added over the top to show that they are down in a basement. A close up shows a hooded character who seems eerie waiting for the band to arrive. Bert gets to the character and in an over the shoulder shot he seems shocked to see the face under the hood. He pounces at Bert and in a few multiple shots the audience sees that he has had his hand cut open. With a point of view shot Bert rushes through the audience looking at the crowd and down to his hand, with this the music is gradually building up.
An extreme close up is used to show in reverse the blood going back inside the cut, we have adapted this into our production when the lead singer wipes the blood back off his face. A close up from the side shows Bert as he starts to sing while hiding in a shadow. The shot speeds up as Bert sits down on a couch and covers his head with the jacket hood. The speed shows the paranoia that Bert is feeling while locked in his room. Both long shots and close ups are used of the room and Bert as he is singing the lyrics.
The chorus starts and the scene changes as the camera pans into a dead forest. The set is obviously a stage with the background colours changing from blue/green to red/ yellow, this casts shadows off the trees and onto the band. The camera continues to pan throughout the band as the chorus continues, this shows all of the band members and the background. A lot of the time only silhouettes are casted of the band giving a more eerie feeling off the band.
The verse kicks back in again and the music dies down a little bit, Bert's room is again revealed with him still on the sofa. The shots cut as Bert raises to his feet and heads to the door. This is followed by another point of view shot as Bert looks through the peep hole in the door. Like most of their videos, the creepy characters start to appear, the first is the hooded character, as he crawls towards the door. The shots cut extremely quickly from long shots of the character to extreme close ups of an eyeball looking through the hole.
Bert then heads towards a mirror and an over the shoulder shot is used of Bert to show his reflection staring back at him, this automatically gives the feeling that there are two of them. Bert grabs his hoodie and as the over the shoulder shot suggested the mirror image of Bert has black hair which contrasts from the real Bert. An extreme close up shows Bert putting his hand onto the mirror and a small ripple comes out from it. When the chorus starts for a second time the a hand grabs Bert's from inside the mirror and the music becomes a lot more violent. The shot goes with the music when the Bert's pull themselves too and throw inside and out of the mirror. As the second chorus ends, more panning shots are used on the band on stage, the pans are very slows compared to the movement of the band, which makes them seem like they are moving a lot faster and more violently.
A medium shot follows as the song comes into a break, Bert is fighting with the mirror self by the end of his jacket, again the cuts in the shot show how violent the movement is and Bert's' desperation to break free. A lot of this can be again linked to drags and paranoia by the edits, shots and lighting. The lyrics match the visuals when the word "worm" is mentioned and for a split second an extreme close up is used to show one squirming about.
The chorus comes into another more peaceful break with a medium shot of Bert falling into the back of the sofa. The music becomes sounds very aquatic now as Bert is underwater and trapped inside the sofa. This could relate to a feeling of claustrophobia; again an affect from the drugs. The background colours makes the water seem endless and makes Bert's' chances of survival seem impossible. He floats in slow motion which again could relate to drugs and mental problems,it also works with the speed of the music. More surrealism is added when, back in the room, the rest of the band enter to look for Bert, they start to float around the room as if there was no gravity, maybe light headed. The violence picks up in the music again and the performance starts again, this time the lighting effect are a lot more drastic as the band play more louder and the shadows casted are flickers on the bands' faces. There is a spilt second pauses where Ber rises from the sofa soaking wet from the water. The song, for the last time goes quiet and a close up of Bert shows his facial expressions, this changes to him drowning back in the sofa again. Bert crawls out for the final time and dramatically (due to the extremely fast edits) starts to pull himself out of the sofa.
The scene keeps changing on the beat from the narrative to the performance as the music comes to a finish, the edits are still very fast and work with the lights and the music to keep the flow going. A point of view is again used to show the character coming towards the door in a surreal manner. Bert hides as the band walks in to look for him, this shows that Bert is delusional. The video ends as Bert looks into the peep hole and sees the character moving away to the strings of the music with a creepy laught. The eyeball is last seen with an extreme close up and the video fades to black as it ends.

The Used - Pretty Handsome Awkward

2009-09-30T09:48:00.001-07:00

http://www.contactmusic.com/videos.nsf/stream/the-used-pretty-handsome-awkward

Released after the album Lies for the liars, this video shows their celebrations after the bands parade. The video starts with an Ariel view of the parade with a large crowd and a car moving down the road along a red carpet. In the back of the car, is a character dressed as the album cover art. The camera pans around the car as they get out to show their huge audience in the background. The music starts in the background and the camera (unsteadily) follows the band as they get interviewed.The lead singer (Bert) replies to the interviewer, "We just going to take it easy and chill out afterwards." The speech juxtaposes with the following shot when the music starts to play loud and fast. The movement is blurred which emphasises the effects of the alcohol and drugs. Bert uses a steady camera and swings it around with him in a panning movement which creates a bond between the audience and him right at the beginning of the song. The lights are flashing and create a disorientating effect. This leads to a blue background which shows the rest of the people in the club, showing them partying in a twisted fashion. For example the two girls making out and the still shot of the old man.

The shot cuts to Bert singing as he is making his way through the crowd who have frozen in time. Bert is wearing a white blazer and a black shirt. These colours contrast with each other and his surroundings, making him stand out as the lead singer. Images are shown of people wearing harlequin masks. The drummer freezes and a fast 360 degree camera pans around him just before he hits the drum. The video then continues with a motion blur on the band. The performance is played in the club but seems to be on stage, with tinsel falling from the ceiling and stars in the background.

The second verse starts with Bert surrounded by black singing at the audience, motion blurs multiply the band with a mirror effect down the middle which again gives the effect a drugs again. The footage is disorientating which ties into the lyrics of the song. A shot starts with the people in the club moving at a great speed while the band member is barely moving, as if the drugs are now taking a turn for the worse. Bert is shown in a two shot with an attractive women, he raises to his feet and then vomits on the girl. This slows the video down and brings back the 360 degree shots, a motion blur is added as the characters spin out of control. The colours create a rainbow effect behind the spinning band members. Bert comes back to singing again with a lighted bulb microphone which has a motion blur behind the movement. The bassist is shown again with a mirror effect and in a close up he looks lost and confused. The cuts are very quick with flashing images to make them unclear to the viewer, Bert is pushing through a group of dancers towards the camera. The camera moves with the instruments as they raise up and down making the shot quite unstable.
As the song comes to an end, the rooms get brighter. As Bert is screaming towards the end, many shots of a trashed party cuts in with people being sick down a toilet, the guitarist smash his instrument through a bar full of glass and many dehydrated band member. Berts' arms are still flailing around, then a spinning areil shot of Bert out cold on the floor comes into play. The band members pick him up and walk off as Bert says, "We just going to take it easy and chill out afterwards." Ironically in a voice over.

Nirvana - Heart Shaped Box

2009-09-30T09:09:00.000-07:00

Lyrics
http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Heart-Shaped-Box-lyrics-Nirvana/2FCDF6E5D7DA40EC4825682D000D7667 Video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SK7Ai9dWrRQ

Begins looking down (like an angel) into a hospital themed room, where the rooms are covered in a dark grey. (typicaly hospitals are white, so this tells us that the band are 'against the rules' as to speak, and the song is not about happy white romance, but something a little darker. We see that there is a little light coming through also, and the floor has a black cross on it, which foreshadows the next scene where the man is old, famished and stuck on a crucifix. The shot is then cut, without a transition to a side view, of the man in the hospital ward, where there is a small opening in the curtains that separates the rest of the people with the man in the bed. The shot is then faded through white to a shot of the group of people looking bored, as if waiting, looking at the man in the bed. This shot lasts only a few seconds where the same white fade is shown taking the viewer, quickly, to a dreamscape where what we think is the man in a field of red flowers. On the left we see the crucifix with two crows that frequently appear on top of it. The man is famished and only wearing a white cloth round his thigh and a santa hat. This seems to me like a quite symbolic view of religion (the santa hat, the crucifix and the white cloth). We next see the man bend down and pick up a flower, where the next shot leaves him in the background unfocused. We then are taken to the man trampling on one of the flowers while looking up at the crucifix, where the white fade again brings him into the shot. There were no transitions again and other fast shots from side angles of the man, and the viewer, looking at the crucifix. He climbs up onto it slowly, where there are a few fast transitions skipping the part where he becomes 'trapped' in the crucifix. This could represent the songs background, where the singer sings about how his lover 'traps him' by buying him a heart shaped box. There are then multiple shots, close-ups and medium shots of the man on the crucifix looking sad, but not resisting (maybe the singer is showing how they fell they are trapped, but cannot do anything about it, and they lead themselves into the trap), with the white fade in between a few of the shots. We see the crow shake its head in disapproval, followed by an extremely fast shot looking down, like a point of view shot, on himself, maybe reflecting on what he has done to himself. As the man looks up, there is an increase in tempo of the song, and a white fade, to the same dreamscape, only the man is gone, and the sky is now orange. The band are standing on the flowers, with the cross exactly in the centre of the screen, with the lead singer in front of it. This is where we know that he feels he is like that man. The next few sots lip synch the singer, ranging from group shots of the band, to extreme close ups of the singer, all of which are looking directly at the viewer. As the words "Hey" are sung, the shot cuts to the close up for the brief time the word is mentioned. Some of the close ups are blurred and unfocused. The sky during these shots are fluorescent purple and orange. While the singer synchs the words, he is seen almost lounging at the screen in what initially looks like head banging, but we then see him looking emotional while staring straight at the audience, which removes the threat that you first think when he does the lunge at the screen. The singer is also not static at one point during this, there is a lot of movement of the characters involved, but the camera is always static throughout the whole songs sequence. The crows at one point synch the words as well, which can be seen humorous, but maybe quite strange at the core. We also see during the first chorus a an animated looking tree come into the scene. This tree is then extended into the next shot, where a small girl dressed in white is looking at the tree which has babies hanging from it. This links with the lyrics where he talks about babies breath, breaking Hymen (looking virginity) and umbilical chords. This shot is extended until we see a curly haired lady in a fat suit with grey angel (or crows?) wings. This could be the juxtaposition of the virgin (little girl in white) and the mother (fat and not very pretty). The little girl also looks up quite dauntingly at the tree of babies, where the mother figure tried to walk towards it, as if to want more babies. The next shot is of the little girl jumping at the babies trying to grab them. We are then taken back to the famished man on the crucifix where the little girl walks past him (him being unfocused). Then we see her looking up at him, followed by her jumping again to try and get to him. Again he is wearing a different hat, this time it looks like a grey version of the popes hat. She walks away in the next scene, while he watches. The chorus scenes and lyrics come again, with a mixture of the tree background and the crucifix. We also have a lot of long very fast shots of the characters standing and skipping in the landscape. We also see the singer take his top off, and kick dust followed by pushing the top in the guitarists face. The chorus continues, where we see similar shots of the band, as well as a shot of the little girl looking at the screen, as well as throwing one of the flowers on the floor. During the solo, the girls hat is blown off by a wind, and we then see it fly past after with some birds, with the crucifix and crows as a silhouette in the background. The hat lands in a puddle, has a close up of the white turning to black, and were now taken back to the hospital ward, with the band missing. There is a close up of the 'drip' should be, but instead a baby fetus is inside. We see the band again come back into the shot. The next shot has blue with white stars, typically a happy looking backdrop with two of the band members hugging, who come out of focus as the singer comes back in again, looking fairly tired. This shot is the longest scene without any transitions in the whole sequence. After this shot there is a cut to the band in a long shot, moving inside a box with a black heart on top, with a gradient of red and white coming out of it. The singer is seen holding himself while rocking a chair, looking almost insane or tired of waiting as he sings the chorus. We also see during the chorus, the little girl, and the band frequently with a heart shaped pink box, thats empty. They don't look happy holding the box. His clothes have changed, he is now in jeans, with patches on it, and the band are in simple coloured shirts and trousers, looking fairly rock-casual. We see him rocking in the chair quite often during this part of the song again looking like he (and the band) are waiting, looking bored (like most rock bands do). We also see him fall off the chair at one point. The song is almost at an end with the band unfocused (again) behind him looking at the viewers, with his teeth showing, after he has finished, as if to look relieved at the fact he has just let all his feelings out. It ends again looking down on the hospital ward, where one of the band members opens the curtains letting the light shine in. There is a white fade.
This song is very conventional of a rock/post-hardcore genre due to the semiotics given to us by the band. They all wear very casual, but outstanding clothes. The lead singers hair looks greasy and abused (much like himself). The content looked as if what we seen was either a dream or under the effects of drugs. The subject matter of the song is also conventional as the singer is singing about love or his feelings towards someone/something.

The Used - Under Pressure (Live)

2009-09-30T00:13:00.000-07:00

After the tsunami on boxing day, The Used joined My Chemical Romance on tour to raise money for those who were affected by the tsunami. The song was originally sung by David Bowie and Freddie Mercury.
Like all of the music videos the bands are still dressed in certain colours to represent themselves and their band.The colours of red and black are the same colours that continually come up in their videos. Both of the lead singers stand towards each other and take on each others lines throughout the song. Their actions on stage are similar to what comes up in their perfomance parts on their videos, they move lively to the beat of the song, but this time it is more restraint. The background is black with the MTV logo standing high in white.
The camera angles come in a wide variety where the shots pan over the audience and glides to the band. A lot of close up of the singers and the band is used to show their emotions and their playing. Another commonly used angle is a low angle shot of the band as if the viewer is in the audience and it makes the band seem a lot more powerful. As it is a live video the edits are simple cuts which go with the beat and the lyrics.

The Used - I Caught Fire

2009-09-30T00:10:00.000-07:00

Like "Take it away," the video starts with lens flares that interrupt the shot and become the transitions until it becomes an extreme close up of the guitar. The camera then pans up to show all of the band members in a large empty hall. As the music blares out the lead singer jumps up and the song begins. Their costumes are similar to those in their other videos where they are wearing average clothes in a grunge style. The shot changes to the drum beat and swaps between the band and people sitting on the street together. Lights flash in the bands hall to the guitar riff, casting shadows around the room and reflecting the hardcore style of the band.
The shot turns blue and a medium close up shows Bert (Lead singer) with luminous eye shadow singing at the camera. This fades through other shots where a couple are sitting together and a tree is burning which fits into the title of the song and gains more meaning later in the video. As the verse continues it continuously fades between the band and the couples on the street, changing shot distance continuously to show the settings and the characters emotions right up until the chorus.
Like the introductions, the chorus starts to Bert jumping into a flashing background
which changes into a medium shot of the drummer and a close up of the guitarist. This then flashed back to Bert who is singing at the audience, he moves softly to the guitar riff and with the lights which brings the video into the music at a softer rate. To end the chorus the riff is played as a solo and an extreme close up is used to shows the guitarists finger work on the fret board.
The second chorus is more soft and the fade transitions come back into play, unlike the other videos by The Used, this one is a lot more peaceful and is reflected through the teenagers playing in the streets and having fun. The lights flash more violently and the chorus begins again. This is fully focused on the band a wide variety of shots are used on all of the band members. Throughout the whole song, the camera is very unsteady making the viewer feel as if they part of the video and to show they are a care free band.
As the video builds up to a climax the cuts get a lot faster and the band become more violent, this also leads to the bands setting of a large underground car park showing the great distance from anything down there.
The song comes to an ending and everything slows down, from the band movement to the edits, the band slowly sway with their instruments and the camera movement is less violent. The burning tree connotes the burning love for the two silhouettes in front of them and come up more as the song ends with simple cut transitions. The final shots show Bert by himself with a blue light on him as the video fads out to finish.

The Used - Take It Away

2009-09-29T23:48:00.000-07:00

Th video for Take It Away is about being an insomniac and hating the light which is reflected in the editing and narrative of the video. When the music first starts playing, lights interrupt the min camera focus in a number of shots wit and without the band. The lights react to the beat of the music flaring a transition between shots. Bert starts to sing and the shot is lead to the band members on the roof of a shop, all of the band members are wearing dark clothes to contrast with the lights that are shining on them. This leads onto the narrative with Bert trying to stop the light from entering his room desperately, the close shots used give a feeling of entrapment, having to trap himself to hide away. As he leaves the building, the lights turn on behind, personifying them as a stalker. As the song continues it shows Bert and the rest of the band outside in the dark with only a torch, the band members hold the torch on themselves like if they were in a horror movie while talking. But when the light hits Bert he flinches and hides himself again. As the song builds up to the chorus it swaps back between the performance and the narrative which contrasts the light and dark between the two. In the narrative a large billboard lights up as Bert walks past it, suggesting the stalker.
The chorus starts by showing the performance and when the lyrics "Burn the sun" are cried out, a large light shines behind the guitarist like the sun. Throughout the chorus, lots of lens flares interrupt the performance with a lot of exposure to the light, which again ties in with the lyrics.
The chorus dies out and the stalker theme is reintroduced as Bert walks past the shops that are lighting up. He mentions "My Chemical Romance" in the song which is significant to the album as they worked together while the album was being created and did a cover of "Under Pressure." Bert's movement through the streets suggest that he is troubled and trying to hide away from his problems. When the performance based side shows, the colour theme from the album is revealed with Bert's red eye shadow and his black clothes, on the album cover, there is a lot of black and red in the artwork. The chorus starts to build up again and Bert is shown in a cafe with shades on trying to hide himself even more. When he is knocked to the floor the screaming ties up with the lighting in the shot as it grows more intense as he screams louder. In the shot Bert's pain is also exposed as he is being pummeled by the light.
In the chorus the camera is getting a lot less steady and the shots are mostly medium shots to show the light that surrounds the performers. However, unlike the first chorus, this one has a lot of narrative in it showing Bert escape from the hospital with the intense light creeping up behind him. In some ways there is intertextuality with the lights in "Take it away" where the darkness creeps up on the characters but here it is done in reverse where the light follows the lead singer. He leaps up onto the table and trhe camera starts to move around him showing that the hospital is now a dark red with a few small spot lights facing down on him. The camera quickly fades between him and the audience in the waiting room with close ups to express their emotions. The light in the background intensifies as Bert leaps from the table and into a car park. He is sprinting from the lights being turned on behind him, the long shot shows the size of the car park making the situation seem even more intense.
As the chorus builds up again Bert is shown struggling to fight the light, even when he is on the bus, where a blue light is flickering above his head. The close up shows him pulling down his hood to try and stay away. This is followed by a log shot with Bert in curled up position on the back seat to show that he is vulnerable. Before the last chorus bursts out, the music goes into a drum beat where Bert is circling in the opposite direction to the camera with lens flares hitting him from every angle. These lights are going off at the same time as the beat. The performance has a high angle shot from behind the band which also shows the intense light that they are having to put up with. Bert then runs into a wired fence which places a red shadow on his face just before the final chorus cuts in.
The final chorus starts when Bert shouts"Life" this instantly goes to their performance with Bert jumping into the light with the microphone. The narrative instantly comes back with a low angle pan of Bert running past shops that are being lit up just as he passes them. the camera that is used is very shaky now and goes with the music beat to intensify the video. The video ends with a silhouette of Bert in his room with the light shining onto him and the music cuts out nearly instantly.

The Used - All That I've Got

2009-09-29T23:42:00.000-07:00

This video is the first video to be released from their second album "In love and Death" it is about a boy who finds a book and is looking for the end in it, however "The "end" has been personified and it leads him after a strange man who he thinks he knows where to find it.
The first shot opens to show a boy framed between two piles of books, his clothes are old (Victorian style) and his hair is in a mess. There is a quite howl of the wind in the background. The shot then quickly cuts to a pile o book and slowly zooms away from the pile as if there is something of great power on top of it. The camera switched back to the boy as he walks off shot, it focuses into the foreground of the window where "The Used" then "Bookstore" appears. The camera zooms in behind the child as he approaches the pile of books, this leads to an over the shoulder high angle shot of the front cover to show the logo of The Used's new album. The music calmly starts as the book is opened. The artwork (created by Alex Pardee) from the book moves and the song gets a lot heavier. The camera tracks through dead trees and into a house to show the child as a cartoon, he is still wearing a Victorian styled dress but it is now more upper class and the mise - en - scene suggests that he is in a ball room of a mansion.
The shot changes back into a film and as the lyrics start a close up is shown of Bert (the lead singer), his costume is again very smart from what he usually wears: white gloves, smart black suit, top hat. The camera tracks in reverse as the boy looks around the hall, the camera in a low angle shot spins to show the golden ceiling ad how the boy doesn't know where he is. To the beat of the drum the shot is quickly cut to a close then to a long shot of a man in a suit raising his head looking at the boy. He has the same costume as the boy and has a surreal appearance with his long grey beard and moustache and a large red heart on his top hat. The shot cuts out and shows the child, the old man and Bert on the chair, the doors close between them and a medium shot in a POV is used to see the man disappearing.
The music starts to build up for the chorus and a low angle shot is used to watch the drums raise up from the floor, the lighting in the room is very bright making the mansion they are in seem alot more posh than at the very beginning. The first shot of the band playing is used as a medium shot of the drummer behind the drums, he is also wearing smart clothes, a bowlers hat and white braces in his black suit. This is followed by a close up of Bert singing, which lasts for a short period of time before moving onto other members of the band, this is still in time with the drum beat and the shots are mostly medium shots to show the members in their setting of the mansion hall. The boy appears again on the right side of the screen, his lips move which is followed by writing in a very Gothic style crawl up the screen. He asks, "How does this story end?" which makes the narrative alot more clearer. This is followed by an over the shoulder shot of Bert answering (again the writing appears in the same style and manner as before)He turns his head which cuts to a medium shot and his face becomes more exposed, the make up on his right eye could be intertextuality of Alex from "A Clockwork Orange," which could suggest his mischievous side.
The chorus starts and a variety of shot angels and lengths are used from close ups of Bert's face to long shots of the whole band which shows the whole hall they in and in doing this, it introduces us to the rest of the band members. A close up is put out of focus of a metronome ticking to the drum beat as the child enters the next room. The guitarist is introduced more personally with an over the shoulder shot from the child, he is wearing a white suit and with his blonde hair he appears to be more of a light character that juxtaposes from Bert. This starts the conversation and brings up the Gothic writing which suits the band and the song style. An over the shoulder shot shows that the book the guitarist is reading is blank, he says "He has been looking for years" which makes the video seem odd as he is trying to find the end through a blank book. The shot changes angle slightly and the old man is seen walking past in the background. The chorus ends with a close up of Bert's face singing the lyrics, "It's all that I've got."
The song continues into the second part with a lyric and visual "gunshot" movement of Bert holding his hands like a gun and aiming it at the camera. Throughout the whole of the second part, the camera is tracking down a hall heading to an open room occasionally showing the boy speed up to try and catch up to the man, this shows the child's desperation to find the man.
The music instantly picks up again for the chorus and a tall man in black raises up above the boy, the camera changes after the boy falls to the floor to on its side, doing this makes the man seem very tall and flexible as he is shown to be straight. He asks what the boy is looking or and he answers, "I'm looking for the end." In doing this he personifies the word "End" and it could be the old man that he is talking about. The shot changes to the band which reveals tat the last person was the drummer. The boy stumble into a large banquet with the last band member on the other side of the table, he is the bassist and his costume again copies the other band members in a smart suit but also has the gothic look on his face with some black markings. The music slows don to a more quiet and steady pace after the bassist reveals where the old man is, this could be to get the audience to believe that it is the end to the story. The band start to sing again which brings out animations that work around the bands movement, it has dead trees moving out in an ink style which could suggest decay inside the mansion.
The final chorus opens loudly with the original book opening violently and ink poring out of the side. The child walks behind a blurred pillar which takes him back into the animation and into a desert, the style of the drawing shows a zombie personality behind the child, as if he were tired. Another part of the logo from the album cover appears as trees grow and drop hearts from them. This is used to constantly refer back to the album that the video is from. As a medium close up is used of the boy transforming, it shows his facial expressions before he turns into an old man, which then goes back into film as the book closes. The music dies back down as the camera zooms away from the book pile.

The Used - buried myself alive

2009-09-26T00:14:00.000-07:00

The Used - Buried Myself Alive

The shot opens quickly to a barely visible character with a simple outline to his face using a night vision camera. The music starts and the shot quickly changes to three medium shots of the drummer, a guitarist and the lead singer. This is followed by a long shot framed to fit all of the band members in and it has them positioned behind amplifiers. This shot shows the mise-en-scene which is very dark and the only light source is from a chandelier hanging from the ceiling. The yellow filter in the light suggests that they are buried underground in sand which gives of a claustrophobic impression and fits with the title of the song. The edits are very quick as it changes to the lead singer behind a flickering light, which gives of an eerie affect with the shadows playing in the background, the camera angle that is used shows that he is also held in a small dark area. As the shots continue between the band and the lead singer, it shows that there is no way out for the band and the lead singer is held in a coffin. Before the singing starts more shots of the band are shown in many different angle, all of these emphasise that they are trapped. The camera changes quickly to the lead singer as he starts to sing. The camera seems to be a steady cam that moves shakily around the members.
"Drop the worst light" is sung by the lead singer as he swings on the chandelier, this could be saying that it is all the light they have. While shots are used of the lead singer in the coffin, the lyrics cover a semantic field of being trapped, with examples of "Buried myself alive," and "So I could shut you out." This builds up to the chorus where the edits are extremely quick with clean cuts to the sound of the drum beat.
Through the chorus the camera seems to be even less stable and the lights from the ceiling start to flicker a bit to go with the music. Shots are continuously used on the band with variety of different angles and zooms, a few of the shots are low angle which again could emphasis their situation of a huge room underground.
As the music dies down the shot turns blue as it shows the drummer in a hall of mirrors lost, trying to find his way out. The lights get brighter and the band members become more visible showing their costume, they aren't dressed up in any particular way, just the stereotypical grunge style. The shots continue through the same manner as before which could represent their time trapped and make it seem to last for ages.
The first light shot is used, with quick edit to show a guitarist hanging upside down from the ceiling, the whole room is bright and the quick cuts make the guitarist's squirming seem more dramatic and him more helpless. This continues into the chorus back with the band as the lights seem brighter and a lot of lens flare is created because of it.
The final band member is brought onto the screen and it shows him in a small space that is being filled up with water. "I finally have you, right where I want you," brings back the semantic field of being trapped and showing it visually on the screen. The music dies down once again as it shows how little time the band members have left to escape. Keeping with the quick edits but having the camera move slower along them. The music builds up ready for the final chorus and all of the members are seen attempting to break out. The light flare is used to cut up the shots and build up the pace just as the final chorus is staring. The band jumps and thrashes about with the instruments as the lead singer screams his final parts, a lot of close ups are used on his face, with the band and while breaking out of the coffin. As the song dies down for the final time its shows them all escaping from where they were being held, and the band finishing their song while the lead singer falls to the floor as if he is still in the coffin.

The Used - Taste Of Ink

2009-09-25T23:30:00.000-07:00

The Used - The Taste Of Ink

This video by The Used shows their history and how troubled they were before they made their band. The first shot opens instantly with the music to a long shot of the lead singer (Bert) sat in a run down room, with a broken shelf, small - worn sofa and writing all over the wall. His body expression shows that he is fed up as he is leaning on the arm of the chair. Then the shot quickly cuts to Bert singing in a close up, this shows more of his costume, a plain black shirt, black hair wit a red highlight in it. The shot changes to a few medium shots in which it shows the rest of the band playing, in doing this it reveals their costumes which are in the same style as Bert's.
As the music builds up the shot moves to an outside sub urban night time with closed shops and lights turning off, except for one. A long shot is finally used of the band to show the audience with them and to show that they are in a small confined space, maybe a basement. The narrative then starts with a smart bright living room with juxtaposes with the first few shots shown. Everything is well organised, it is well lit and bright. However, the narrative shows a man (the guitarists dad) yelling at his mom and then him. To make the shot more personal it has an over the shoulder shot which makes the action seem more realistic. "Now I'm ready to be free" follows as the boy leaves the house fed up off his dad which is significant with the video showing that he is breaking out from being trapped.
The chorus starts and it goes back to the band with their audience, a lot o close ups re used on Bert to show his facial expression, and to get the audience to see how much he is enjoying himself. When the chorus suddenly cuts it, it moves to a shot of the moon to remind the audience the time of night all of this is happening, then shows Bert in his room drawing on his walls.
Two more band members are introduced showing one sitting on a car getting fed up of his friend and becoming left out at night by himself and another fed up of stacking shelves in a shop while the people around him are doing nothing. The shot quickly moves back to Bert in his room. The name of the song comes through as visuals, when Bert is sitting down he bites into his pen and breaks it, letting ink run out of his mouth, with him getting the "Taste Of Ink." Extremely quick shots are used of Bert scribbling quickly on his wall.
A second time the chorus starts and it goes back to the boy stacking shelves, in a long shot it shows him standing up and throwing his coat off, an extreme close up is used to show that the time is four in the morning. Two more shots are used of him escaping over the fence and away on a skateboard in the darkness. Between this more medium shots of the bands and close ups of Bert are used. It instantly cuts to an open show where a sped up effect has been used to blur everyone going in and coming out of the shop. This establishing shot then builds up to everyone meeting outside of it(turning up in cares and on skateboards). Bert is then shown running sown the middle of a road from an extreme long shot to a long shot, which suggests that he can't get to the other members.
The music calms down and at many different angles Bert is still walking down the road, where there is so little lighting that only the two yellow lines and Bert are seen. The shot transitions for this brief period are all instant fades from one to the other which could suggest a long passage of time through the night. It changes from Bert to the rest of the band having fun in the shop. When the music picks up again the fade edits stop and the band meet Bert at his house, where it clarifies the basement and shows all of the instruments laid out in the room. More over the shoulder shots and two shots are added now showing that the band are together and their body language shows they are now aid back and having fun. The music builds up and as Ber screams into the chorus it has four quick fades to him screaming in different locations.
When the final chorus starts, long shots are used of the audience jumping to the band singing, the camera changes angles and distance to the beat of the drums, now making the performance like a live show. The music dies down and everything goes into slow motion as the song finished. The final shot is an establishing shot of the sun coming up in a high speed.