TW: Digipak and Advert Process 1

For progress on the printwork (digipak and advertisement) I have mainly been in charge of the photoshoots, planning different panes of the digipak and thinking of creative ideas in which we can frame certain pictures we want to incorporate.
Many of our ideas for the printwork have been revolved around the grosvenor and Bedgebury shoots so most of the shots we took on shoots 1 and 2 have been very experimental, such as the picture below which we have since decided to discard.

However, one of the pictures we have always had planned for our back pane of the digipak was a focused picture of headphones, doing this to represent Jack Garratt as an authentic artist, credible for his own music, we took the picture from a variety of angles and decided the picture at the bottom would be most suitable.
To decide which was most suitable I took the framing and cropping that would be necessary to fit a digipak pane into account, the bottom picture has plenty of space to the left of the headphone for a listing of tracks for the 'Phase' album, something we will definitely try to achieve. Furthermore it also has more tones of light and shadow which I believe captures the attention of a person more, especially if colour editing is made to it, which we plan on doing.

This picture has plenty of space for information on the record label 'Island Records' as well as a barcode, for example in the bottom right corner. We plan on adding colour to the picture which fades across it in different shades as well as trying to reflect the editing used in the video in the digipak also, perhaps by adding a black and white filter. We will achieve this in photoshop fundamentally by cropping the image to the correct proportions and adding a suitable text to the pane, after looking we have decided a font called 'Typographica' may be appropriate as it reflects and highlights similarities between the typography used on many of Jack Garratt's EP's. 

TW: In class individual role 3

This week I have continued with the project editing and positioning our footage onto the timeline, I focused mainly on after effects for two lessons, I edited two clips together in order to show the two brothers together side by side but with the brother who has passed away (Harry) slowly fading out of the shot in order to represent his loss from his brother and highlight the fact that his brother is no longer around.

When shooting this scene I took one shot of George alone in frame looking upset and without moving the camera took another shot framed the same way but with both brothers in the frame, this allowed me to edit this effect with more ease as without camera movement it would be easier to take Harry out of the frame.

However when putting these two clips together, I realised there was a slight movement with the camera meaning the scale and positioning of the two shots did not correspond.

To solve this as you can see in the screenshot I overlaid the two clips and began to alter the scale and positioning of the shot in which both brothers are featured, I did this until the clips were no longer blurry and gave the effect that both clips were exactly the same.

Once I was happy that the two clips matched, I began to alter the clip to give the 'fading out' effect of Harry's character that we had hoped to do. To do this I altered the opacity of the clip over time, decreasing this opacity of the clip as it went on, making the clip look like Harry's character slowly faded out before the end of the shot.

I have also been replacing some of the shots featured in the first minute of our video of George with clips of the children when the were young. I did this in order to make the meaning and story of the video more obvious and understandable to the audience, as through audience research I realised that it was unclear at some points that these two characters were actually brothers. This is shown in the screenshot below of the two children playing in the woods.

To the right of the screenshot you can see some of the after effects we have been adding to clips of George in the present, when upset following the loss of his brother, using the effect 'colour pass' to highlight his mood and state of mind during the video.

TW: Reflection on shoot 4

This shoot took place in Bedgebury Park, we focused this shoot mainly upon the flashbacks featured throughout the video of the two brothers doing various activities when they were younger, we used Corey aged 6 and Dylan aged 3 to do this. After shooting these scenes we went back and shot similar scenes but featuring primarily our protagonist (George) but in the present, without his brother there to enjoy the location with him.

What was your role during the shoot?
Like previous shoots, my role was mainly involved with the filming process, I used the tripod and steadicam to help me shoot various things around the park, such as the children playing in the woods and by the pond. Throughout the shoot I would direct both the children and George on what to do during each shot, as well as the speeds they should do each thing and when to change their non-verbal language.
Digipak Development?
I also took various pictures around the park for use on the digipak and advert for our project, for example I positioned the children in front of a tree and made them look up to capture one of the pictures we may use on the digipak. I have brought these pictures into lesson since and they are currently in post-production.

Which shots were less successful or problematic? Why was this?
There were little to no shots that were unsuccessful during the shoot, this is because we had the entire day to capture what we needed so if a shot was problematic we had plenty of time to re-shoot until it fitted what we had expected.

HG: Digipak Process 1

These two images below are examples of a rough mock-up for one of the digipak frames we would like to incorporate. We took these particular shots on Shoot 2, at Tom's location, utilizing a pair of headphones to connote that Garratt is a recording artist. For this particular frame, I took inspiration from the 'Remnants' album cover - by our artist Jack Garratt. This digipak cover is evident on the right-hand side, and it is evident that all of Jack Garratt's possessions are surrounding him, scattered across the floor. This is where we conjured up the idea of capturing a pair of headphones for one of panes. Also, the fact that the headphones are the sole object, connotes that all the artist cares about is music. Despite this, when inputting the image into photoshop, it proved a problem due to the image not being square, and therefore not suitable for a digipak cover. Subsequently, I had to use the 'crop' tool, using Height 1 and Width 1 to make the image square, though this meant cutting out some of the original image and moving the text. Because of this, I have created two digipak panes in order to decide which one looks best, one of the covers is taken from the right hand side of the original image, and the other was cropped from the left side. In terms of the text I discovered the font 'Prisoner SF' which looked similar to the font used on Jack Garratt's album, and is relatively iconic. Also, in completing some background research alongside Tom, we noticed that all of the typography associated with Garratt was in capitals.

This first mock-up was taken from the right hand side of the original larger photo. I liked this particular pane because of the thoughtful framing, especially the typography. This is because it is positioned in the reading path of the consumer, and is also bold, making it obtrusive on a fairly plain surface. Also, despite only seeing half of the headphones in this image, it is still apparent and clear for the audience to consume the artist.



I also believed that this particular image had potential in terms of framing, though, it does have a large plain space on the left side of the pane. This image was cropped from the left hand-side, and the font is also positioned in a different place. The positioning of the typography is effective, as the consumer is probably to view it first, which is the main objective over the image itself.



Personally, I like that both the images are particularly unique as it creates a parallel with the artist Jack Garratt. Also, the fact that the rule of thirds isn't taken into as much consideration, gives an abstract feel to the digipak. In terms of the tools used, I used the insert tool to input the image, the 'T' tool to insert the font and the crop tool, to make sure the digipak pane had the correct measurements. In terms of editing the image itself, I used a channel mix to make the image lighter, as well as the Hue/Saturation tool to enrich the potential dull colours, for example the brown flooring.

GT: Reflection on Shoot 4

This shoot took place in Bedgebury park, a large park with various scenery that would prove effective for our music video. The combination of woodland, open areas, slopes and open areas along with the long distance visibility meant capturing stills in Bedgebury to be a vital opportunity. 

 What was your role during the shoot?

My role during this shoot was, again, to act, and also to film. For the majority of the shoot I was being filmed as the character of the brother in the music video. However for the scenes I wasn't being filmed I helped operate the camera and also shot some sections of the video. I also posed for a variety of stills for the digipak and advert, however we decided not to use the majority of them, simply because they weren't as visually effective as others already on the digipak. I also took up the task of taking pictures of Cory and Dylan for the digipak, some included in the final advert and digipak. Lastly, I was also provided with the jobof transportation. This included driving group members up to Bedgebury, as well as camera equipment, such as the tripod and track.

Which shots were less successful or problematic? Why was this?

 

One shot that we struggled with in particular, was the shot of the two children, Cory and Dylan, standing on a tree stump. This proved difficult simply because the weather restricted any visually effective images being taken. After waiting a few hours and returning to the location we managed to take an effective image, that was enhanced even further in after effects by increasing the saturation. This image later comprised an aspect of our digipak design.

GT: Reflection on Shoot 3

 For this shoot, we decided to film at Grosvenor park after the weather had previously prevented us from doing so. 


What was your role during the shoot?

• My role for this shoot was again to act as the main brother for our music video. 
• I had to convey a positive mood since this aspect of the video is set in the past, where Harry (playing my brother) is still alive. 

Which shots were less successful or problematic? Why was this?

• We were very successful in capturing what shots we had planned to capture before arriving here, and so few shots offered challenges for us to face. Despite this, an improvised shot of Harry and me with our reflections in a small stream was not captured with complete clarity and we decided to abandon this unplanned shot. 

What other challenges did you encounter and how did you respond to them?

• We faced an issue with member of the public constantly wandering into the background of some of our shots, however we knew this would be an issue before we started shooting since the location is public. We simply overcame these by recapturing the shot which didn't prove too difficult and time consuming. 
• The weather also created a temporary issue, which resulted in us packing away the gear and returning to the car to end the shoot. However the rain was only present for around 10 minutes meaning we were able to capture the fade shot we set out to capture as well as a few others. 

How did you develop your ideas for the digipak and advert on the shoot?

• We realised that the wooded areas was ideal in conveying the sombre mood reflected in the song, and from this planned to capture a variety of shots in Bedgebury which is where our next shoot will take place. 

GT: Advert Progress 1

 

We gathered images from a variety of shoots we carried out in order to obtain footage for our music video production. These stills would pose as a digipak and advert reflecting the themes shown in our video, as well as replicating the theme and style of the artist, Jack Garratt, who originally sung and produced the song in our sequence. 

One image that showed potential when altered in Photoshop was this one. The photo itself was taken in Bedgebury park on our fourth shoot, and shows both Corey and Dylan (who played George and Harry in the past) against a tree. We manipulated the photo in order to match the style of our music video, which sees an uplifted tone when Corey and Dylan are on-screen. We increased the saturation which left a visually enhanced image, creating more vibrant colours, such as the green around the tree and Corey's red shirt.

The image appears distorted at first, evident from the trees in the background, however this was simply due to the low angle the image was taken at.

The text positioning in the above screenshots follows the same style as 'Remnants' by Jack Garratt. Also the font (Ziagra Engraved) in the below image did not continue the theme we desired, and so we changed it temporarily into a more appropriate font (Prisoner SF), evident when compared to Jack Garratt's album cover below.