Account of music video shoot

At the beginning we spent time going over the different backdrops, for instance, there was a sofa, green screen and and a rock wall. We used various lighting to create different effects on the way the music video came across - most of which included ones that lit up the whole face making us come across as happy and light hearted. We then allicated differnt positions such as floor director and music manager then split into groups. Each group were handed the words of the song we were singing which was Daft Punk 'Get Lucky'.
 We moved around the different set ups, in each doing differnt shots such as close ups and wide shots. The shot of the sofa was pretty basic as we mainly stuck to simple shots as it was hard to shoot from far away because we couln't get the whole backdrop in. However, as we moved to the green screen we were able to get more of our body in so therefore could coordinate the moves we made to fuller effect, however we couldn't do moving shots and we struggled with not getting too close to the greenscreen as then it created a shadow which would create further problems when we got into editing. In the final backdrop which was the stone wall we found that we could light it in an effective way which allowed us to create a more sinister and realistic look, you honestly couldn't tell that we had shot it in a studio. It looked increadibly realistic. On top of this we had a dolly in the studio that could move along tracks, giving us the ability to make a moving shot. This allowed us to create a 180 degree midshot and close up around our actors and create tracking shots.
  I think our team work was really good. The studio was quite noisy as the track was constantly playing as well as the other groups talking. However, we managed to be able to communicate with eachother easily and effectivly. I think the shots we came up with were origional and different, especially when it came up to the dolly, for instance doing a close up of our actors lips as he sang. However, i think if we were to do it again we would vary the actors and scenes we used, in order to make a broader variety and create a more exiting music video.
  Using the studio was good in some ways and bad in others. The bad thing would be that everything that anyone said would be extreamly noisy as it would bounce off the walls and it was quite hard to all work together in a massive group as we had to coordinate our shooting times with others as the track would only play once. However, saying this it was also quite usuful having other people there as they helped us out when we were trying to come up with a new or origional camera angle, as well as helped us come up with some pretty interesting dance moves.
  Our lighting that we used was differnt in the shots we used. In the first scene with the sofa we used mainly natural light because we wanted to create a relaxed atmosphere. In the second scene with the green screen we used one light which lit up both our faces which created a light hearted and happy atmosphere. This went very well with the song as the Get Lucky is an upbeat and light hearted song.  In the final scene we used more interesting lighting and used one light on the right side. This was interesting as it reflected off the rocks and lit up one side of the actors face creating a slightly mysterious look as it left half of the face in shadow. I think this didn't go as well with the song but looked really interesting and life like and would have worked really nicely in a less upbeat song.
  When it came to editing the first thing we realised is that in half the shots we had forgotten to mouth the words to the songs as we had gotten too carried away with the dancing. However, this actually worked in out favour as we used the shots where people were singing when there were lyrics in the song, but when it got to a part where it was just music we would cut back to us dancing which i think worked really nicely. From our thrillers i have now learned how to lip sync and how to cut to the beat of the music. I have learned that you need to vary the cutting, for instance if you cut at the same time throughout it can begin to look quite boring and the same throughout.
 Overall i felt that i have learnt a lot and think the shoot was entertaining. I would deffinatly be happy to do it again and can't wait untill next year when i can make my own music video with my own idea.