Possible filming locations

Because I am planning to film during school hours, I have been thinking of the best place to film, that both fits the setting, as well as being close enough to return quickly. These are shots of a location that I will probably use for running through, as well as a large concrete area where teenagers could hang out. Here there are local shops that we could film the robbery from.

I have checked with the local shop that I will film the front of if I have permission to use their establishment, which they have given me.

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs analysis

After I created my idea for pitch, I realised that Arcade Fire have created a video for their song The Suburbs, with very similar themes in mind. This was directed by acclaimed music video director Spike Jonze, and is part of a yet-to-be-released short film for the album “Scenes From The Suburbs.” The director was already made a name for himself, most prominently in the '90s through feature films such as Being John Malkovich, as well as music video's for bands such as the Beastie Boys, Björk and Weezer. He is particularly noticeable as his style as the auteur can be very comical and off-the-wall, particularly in his films. He also seems to use tributes of his inspiration in his work directly, such as the use of Happy Days and classic cop drama's in Weezer's Buddy Holly and Beastie Boy's Sabotage respectively. This video seems to be no exception, as a tribute to youth and the American suburbs, much like my own pitch.

The video starts with two medium long shots of a teenager trying to climb down a bank. He is wearing an apron, which could represent the dead-end and simple jobs teenagers of his age tend to be employed in, particularly in countries such as America and Canada, where Spike Jonze and Arcade Fire are from respectively. At this time diegetic bird sounds and footsteps can be heard, as the song still hasn’t yet started. This is followed by the same person in a long shot, showing his suburban setting, with the increasing sound of police sirens and helicopters. This single shot is abnormally long, at least 15 seconds, almost connoting on the person in shot, reflecting on his life in the suburbs. The diegetic sounds seem to lull, just as the shot changes and the song kicks in. This is a long tracking shot of a group of teenagers on bikes, slowly pedalling, which mirrors the overall pace of the track. A medium shot of on of the teenagers tracks alongside him as he looks back. He is wearing a beanie hat, iconic of rebellious teenage fashion, and what looks like a BB gun over his shoulder, which is also iconic of teenage rebellion. This returns to another long shot of the teenagers, with him turning around to catch up with them, suggesting he could be the leader of the gang. Next comes a medium long shot of 3 of the teenagers, tracking them from behind as they continue. Continuing this are a variety of shots of the teenagers on bikes as the vocals kick in “In the suburbs I learned to drive.” Here it is noticeable that the shot is a medium close up of the bikes wheels, connoting their tern of “learning to drive.” The following shots represent their friendship and youthfulness, particularly shots which first track alongside on of the teenagers, until they jump off the bike and let it ride away. Here the camera stops with the teenager, keeping them in shot to show his celebration, whilst panning to follow the bike. The next shot is an extreme long shot, of the teenagers looking through a wire fence at a what looks like something used for the military, as a helicopter flies overhead. This could represent the border between the youthful play of the teenagers, and the dangerous adult life of the army, which they may admire, through them carrying BB guns, which is shown in following shots, as they shoot pellets at a telephone wire. Here there is a medium shot, showing some of the teenagers shooting, whilst a boy sits with what is presumed to be his girlfriend under his arm. Next is a close up of the two, showing their intimacy. The teenagers start aiming a man in the distance, shown through a long, over the shoulder shot. When they hit him, his response is shown from the same point, but without the teenagers’ shoulders, as if the camera is a member of the gang that has dared to stay behind to peek daringly over banister. This theme is continued through the next shot, a medium tracking shot of the group running away, where the camera becomes shaky, as if it is running along with them. The next few shots are of the teenagers playing with guns and play-fighting, or the couple gazing into each others eyes for example, which is juxtaposed against the army men in balaclavas patrolling the streets, suggesting that they are not only confined behind the fence, but are occupying the whole suburbs. The juxtaposition could be explaining that teenagers do exactly what the soldiers do as a game, and as a form of release, whereas the soldiers are much more sinister. Following this is more of the teenagers on bikes, as they pass two police officers, played by the two lead singers of Arcade Fire. This is all that is seen of the band throughout the narrative driven video. Clips of the teens on bikes continue until it turns to night, where they ride past a street filled with army trucks and civilians surrendering to soldiers. A medium close of up one teen shows he is looking at what is happening, before a long shot of soldiers dragging a person away. The group carry on through the Suburbs, looking at a house being targeted by the soldiers, again using the same medium tracking shot to show the reaction of individual teens. The camera cuts away from them, to inside the house, with a medium shot of one of the bike riding teenagers, now holding a baby, looking through the curtains at the soldiers. There is a then a point of view shot, half obscured by the curtain. The next shots show the various teenagers are also in the same room, looking panicked about the events outside. One shot lingers as a medium close up of the boyfriend, holding his crying girlfriend, looking distant, as if remembering. Another point of view shot in used, of a bright light directly at the screen. Then a medium close up of the same teenager being blinded with a torch by a soldier. This seems to serve as a flashback to what happened outside, which caused them to find shelter inside. There now is a close up of one of the teenagers pressed against the fence, as the previous one is turned around to the same position. They seem to nod to each other, before being taken away. The next shot seems to be set in a different time, with one of the teenagers in the apron shown in the first shot. He leaves what seems to be the establishment he owns to see his bike damaged to he cannot ride it, established in an over the shoulder shot. Again another change in time, as the boyfriend is shown running (notably not riding his bike) in a close up shot, down a street, while the lyrics say “move your feet off the hot pavement,” which fits what he is doing. Next is the teenager last seen in the apron, in another close up, in what seems to be a party. The camera shakes, as if being bumped by partygoers, adding the voyeuristic style of the camera as part of the action. He stops and seems to see something which makes him stop. Here there is a medium close up of a teen talking to a girl, who looks back towards the camera, as if giving the previous teen a warning glance before leaving, connoting he was the one who damaged his bike for an unknown reason. Next three of the teenagers are seen in a side tracking, long shot, running, seemingly in panic, across grass. There is a following long shot which follows the teens towards the restaurant which one of the teens work at. There is a medium shot of the teens running up to the glass, banging on it, to get the attention of those inside. Here is an over the shoulder shot to show the teenager who works there sweeping. A medium close up back at one of the teenagers displays her panic at what she sees, before cutting back to the previous shot where the teenager is attacked by the person at the party, insinuating what the warning look he gave meant. A reverse shot back at the teenagers shouting at the attacker through the window. Soon later, when the teens run for the door, the camera shows an unsteady follow shot, connoting again that the camera is part of the action, and the panic of the viewer, as well as the teenagers. This is interspersed by blurry point of view shots off the attacker punching just below he camera repeatedly, and point of view shots of the attacker. There are close up shots of one of the teenagers screaming, whilst the lyrics say “We’re still screaming.” before she runs to get the attention of the soldiers. There is a medium shot of the victim fighting back at the attacker, and a high tilt shot of him looking at the attacker. This is mirrored by a low tilt shot of the attacker breaking furniture and shouting toward the camera, almost as a point of view shot, before the attacker breaks down. The video ends with a medium shot of the victim lying down, and a close up of his face, looking relieved, as the song comes to an end. When it does, the shot cuts to a weather shot of blue sky, with police sirens in the background, ending the video in a similar fashion to how it started.

The video is rather odd, in that there seems to be many storylines occurring in a short amount of time. This may be to give the viewer a chance to interpret the video as they wish, to take their own meaning. It could also be because the short film it is part of is called “Scenes From The Suburbs,” and these are small sections of various “scenes.” All in all, I see this as a very powerful video, which takes the theme of youth in a very interesting way, vastly different to my pitch.

Pitches and my chosen pitch

For my video, I have developed two ideas for my video, but have already decided against one, which I will explain first. This would include a typical “Lads night out,” including many close up shots of drinking (if I had the correct equipment I would have had the whole video filmed with the “Lads” having fixed cameras called Snorricam's to keep them central of each shot in ether a close up, or medium-close up, similar to the Radiohead video “Jigsaw Falling Into Place”)

(A Snorricam)

(Radiohead's Jigsaw Falling Into Place)

This would gain pace through the chorus’ and reach its climax in the final verse, where there would be a fight (“Dirty nights. Indulgent fights”(Goodwin 2)) most likely in slow motion between other drunks. By the time the chorus kicks in, the Lad’s have made their escape and are drunkenly running away. Although this is more accurate to the lyrics, I have decided not to film this, as it would be extremely difficult to film something such as this. The lack of light in clubs and bars would require us to bring additional lighting, as well as difficulties of staging a fight in a street at night without attracting the attention of police and other club-goers. If this was a professional recording I could be able to work around this, but for an A-level piece I need something much more simple.

That is the reason why I have settled on my other idea. Here, the focus would be of a group of teenagers (who may or may not represent the band) who hang around the streets with a lack of anything to do. They would most likely kick a football around, drink stolen alcohol and generally mess about. During slow sections I would use many over the shoulder shots that would be angled so as to show part of their face, as well as another person, or objects, such as the sun. If I had the capabilities I would change the focus mid shot between the two people, specifically in the pre-chorus to the second chorus, as if to look like there was a secret plan that is unspoken between them. This suspiciousness is brought to a climax in the second chorus when they steal something from the shop they are stud outside, and run throughout the chorus. Then during the slow section they could be gaining their breath back, but it should also seem reflective of the freedom of their youth. Then there would be a brief piece of action, a friendly push or kick, which would be in time with the gain of pace in the final chorus and outro. This would be filmed most likely in black and white, or another effect, to create a romantic and idealistic feel.

I have chosen this last pitch, as it is simpler for me to create on my budget and with my connections. It still is appropriate with the lyrics, as it is still teenagers who “seize the day” in their own way, and is in keeping with the rebellion of the final verse. I have decided on the narrative video not to include performance the band, as they are not always used in music videos, but the teenagers may sing the lyrics in close ups. It fits with the genre and the target audience, because a large part of the target audience of such bands are in the late teenage years, so would to some degree, associate with the teenagers in the video. The romantic effects may also allow those older than this age to reminisce on times of teenage rebellion, and still associate with the video.

I have taken note of Goodwin’s theory, as I have tried to fit the video with genre stereotypes and characteristics. I have used lyrics to inspire themes explored in my video, in particular “seize the day, today.” I have acknowledged the music, by including lip-synching. However, I am deliberately not including the faces of the band, as this could potentially become a motif among many of the band’s video’s, preferring more narrative focused videos. There is a sense of looking, in the concept of watching the antics of a group of teenagers, but on their level, as if the viewer was part of the group, and this was looking back romantically at these days. However, there are very little intertextual references planned as of yet, as I cannot think of how to include them fittingly, but there may be when it come to filming

Lyrics and analysis

Here are the lyrics for An Army Of Light’s “An Army Of Lights.” I could not receive the lyrics from the band, but from listening to the song, this is what I have gathered.

Seize the day, seize the day today.
Dance the night, let's dance the night away.
Looking for a little light. Looking for an army of lights to shine
Looking for a little light. Looking for an army of lights to shine

Blinding. Blinding me,
Nothing's gonna stop us now.
Blinding. Blinding me,
Nothing's gonna stop us now.

Seize the day, seize the day today.
Dance the night, let's dance the night away.
Looking for a little light. Looking for an army of lights to shine
Looking for a little light. O, looking for an army of lights to shine

Blinding. Blinding me,
Nothing's gonna stop us now.
Blinding. Blinding me,
Nothing's gonna stop us now.

Distorted minds. Broken lines.
Nothing'll stop us now.
Dirty nights. Indulgent fights.
Nothing will stop us now.

Blinding. Blinding. O!
Blinding. Just blinding me.

From these lyrics, what I have gathered is to quite literally “Seize the day,” live life to the full, and not let anything stop you. In the last verse, the lyrics change to symbolise when this can have negative effects, I am guessing taking inspiration from the effects of alcohol on nights out, which is very typical of British indie rock bands, for example, Arctic Monkeys. However, the upbeat last chorus gives the impression that the singer has overcome this, as “nothing will stop us.” The title and reoccurring image of "An Army Of Lights" connotes the landscape of a British city at night, and by proxy, the hedonistic world of "sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll."
These lyrics have inspired me to create a youthful, but almost hedonistic video, most probably including alcohol.

Animatic - Hero - Chad Kroeger feat. Josey Scott

For our animatic, we took time in deciding on studying a video that was iconic personal to us, that had the ability to represent a modern, mainstream rock video. For this we chose Hero, by Chad Kroeger featuring Josey Scott. Both artists have become famous through the alternative rock bands Nickleback and Theory Of A Deadman respectively. Due to the mainstream success, particularly for Nickleback, as well as the fact the song was written to be the lead single in the soundtrack for Sam Raimi’s adaptation of Spiderman, it is expected that this video had a larger budget than many music videos, which are usually created with a notoriously small budget. The video was directed by Nigel Dick, perhaps most famous for directing the video for Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” Whilst being interspersed with clips from the film itself. In the group I was part of, I took the responsibility of drawing a brief outline of each shot, whilst others drew outlines and coloured in each shot. There were very little difficulties in this, except for the fact that it was very time consuming. We then took images and edited them into the below video. We had some difficulty here in getting the changes of shot at exactly the same time, as well as this being very time consuming, but this served as good practice for editing our final pieces and getting us back into the habit of working on iMovie. Another issue was that some shots we were not able to include just as they were in the video, such as very quick zooms, and quick movement that almost resembles a trucking shot, in which the focus is shifted from one side of the screen to the other. In these instances, we simply kept the same shot without the movement, as we could not find an effect suitable to resemble this.

An Army Of lights

An Army Of Lights are primarily an British indie-rock band, with noticeable influences in folk and acoustic musicians. On first listen, they reminded me of artists such as The Maccabees and Bombay Bicycle Club, and NME have described them as "The Futureheads fronted by Turin Brakes or Mystery Jets". Such bands have developed large fan bases, aimed at those in the teens and early twenties. Both are frequently featured in magazines such as NME and Q, as well as played on radio stations as Radio 1, which are all associated to some degree with young and mainstream alternative fan bases. With this in mind, I will take influence from bands such as these, as well as other folk and rock acts such as Arcade Fire and Noah and the Whale, who also have rather similar music styles and have achieved much mainstream success in recent years.

NME Breakthrough and An Army Of Lights

After searching for Local bands over the summer, and having very little success, my choice of band and song is "An Army Of Lights" by An Army Of Lights. I found them through NME Breakthrough, which lead my to their website and Facebook. I have sent this as a message over Facebook (hence the casual tone) and they replayed positively, giving permission for me to use their work.

"Hey!
So, I found you guys on NME Breakthrough and I'm really loving your stuff! I was just wondering, if it was possible, if I could use your track 'An Army Of Lights' for my A-level media coursework. I need a good unsigned band, and that track really sparked some ideas, which I'd love to carry out! All I'd need is your permission and the track sent to me somehow, preferably as an mp3 attachment or something. Sadly, I can't pay you or anything (as I said, I'm doing A-level, I hardly have any money anyway!), but it would be incredibly helpful if it would be OK :)
Cheers anyway, and hope to hear from you soon!"