Above: Miming Footage Examples
Performance Footage Review
Filming of the performance footage went precisely as planned. We were able to use the studio for a much longer time than expected and were in it, filming, for 4 hours. This gave us the time we needed to set-up and film a more than sufficient amount of footage before we had to pack up again.
We set up the studio quickly and successfully; with two spotlights at 45 degree angles either side of Julia and against the white backdrop. I was able to set the white balance on the camera to ensure that the shots did not appear yellow under the artificial light. We were able to minimize the flaws on the backdrop using two spotlights hosting soft boxes. This means that, theoretically, the double exposures should be easy to create using the method described previously. Julia’s make-up and costume worked well and we believe that she is complemented by the lighting, her costume and make-up and so the footage should look good in the sequence. Regarding the shots, they are framed consistently well and range in style as we filmed close-ups, mid-shots and wide-shots. Two different examples of successful shots can be seen above. We feel as though we have a large range of good quality footage; we do not expect that we will have to return to the studio in order to film any more performance footage.
We decided to film using a method that meant we were able to capture the maximum amount of footage, allowing for lyrical mistakes in some places and lack of focus in others. We filmed with the song playing in the background, and for each shot, we filmed for the full length of the song. This means that if Julia consistently made mistakes or was being silly at the same place in one or more shots, we knew with certainty that there would be a usable piece of footage for that line or instrumental in another piece of footage. We tried to ensure that Julia is always focused on the miming throughout choruses, but were less insistent of this during instrumentals; this is firstly because it was difficult for Julia and be in-front of the camera for four hours and secondly because we are interested in cutting away from the performance element in moments of instrumental, making the project much less of a ‘vanity’ project and showing the audience the key factor of our idea, which is, in short, that the dye is as meaningless as the song. Julia was singing along to the song so as to ensure that her lip syncing is as realistic as possible; for example, this means that her breathing is obvious, which will enforce in the final sequence the illusion that she is actually singing.
From here we will begin to edit the performance footage into the experimental sequence that we created previously, when we were originally contemplating using the song ‘Amenamy’ as our idea. Though this sequence is firstly incomplete and secondly requires a great amount of correcting and perfecting, Julia and I are going to use it as the blueprint for our music video, making adjustment to it as we progress. We do, however, need to film more experimental footage of dye before the ‘secondary’ layer of footage within our video can be completed.
