Justification for album name...

A few days ago, I was watching an T4 interview on Cheryl Cole on Channel 4. I took great interest in this as I want to be a Journalist in the future and I also enjoy listening to Cheryl Cole's music.

The interviewer was questioning her on why she named her new album 'Messy Little Raindrops' and what the hidden meaning was. As we are currently in the process of naming our own album, I paid particular attention to this. She said how is it a metaphor-messy little raindrops is how the rain falls all messy and then afterwards it brightens up everywhere and the sun comes out. This relfects the songs on the album as the songs at the start of the album are sad and upsetting but further on in the album they gradually become happier and more upbeat.

The idea using the poetic device of a metaphor to name an album and then relate it to the track order I found really clever and unique as I had not heard of this before. I really liked this idea and might use it when naming my album...

Analysis of an album..

In order to gain ideas when creating my own CD Digipak, I am in the process of researching album covers within the pop genre. I previously researched a few and analysed them vaguely, but I have decided to chose 'Katy Perry's' album called 'Teenage Dream' and analyse the digipack in detail taking into account the generic conventions...

FRONT COVER... main conventions are an eye catching image, colours, name of the artist and album and any additional information.


Katy Perry Analysis of Album Cover





BACK COVER...main conventions are the track names, images and colours, production details and any additional information that might be relevant.

Katy Perry Analysis of Back Cover

What is a CD Digipack..?

• It is made from card, it is shatterproof and allows great graphic display.


• Originally used for album packaging


• They can have either 4, 6 or 8 panels


• They make a big statement, representing the ultimate custom packaging for our cd replication project.


• A Digipack is more environmentally friendly than the old style plastic cd covers.


• The front and back of a digipack are different. The front tends to have the album name, artist name, illustrations and sometimes stickers or logos. Whereas the back cover will have a track list, and perhaps the name of the producers or a website address.


• On a shelf in a shop, digipacks are placed so that they are facing the front so a consumer is attracted to the front cover. They will see the front cover first and then the back cover thereafter which is why it is important that the front cover is more attractive.

Day Four...

Today, after school we filmed the performance scenes of Elle singing at Alexandra Palace. We were right on top of the hill so the view was amazing and we managed to film some good shots, especially at the time we were filming at about 5 o'clock when it was dark so all the house and street lights were on.

We set up the tripod at the top of the hill and then a staff came out saying "You can't have a tripod or any sort of photographic equipment here without permission." Luckily, all we had to do was gain permission, prove we were students and sign a form. After this, we managed to start filming, we filmed Elle against the wind singing the song all the way through. In this shot, we had the skyline and the view, we used the rule of thirds and composed her in the correct position. We also filmed long shots, mid shots and close ups of her singing ensuring the scenery was in the shot.

After this we set up the camera and tripod along a walkway and had her singing and walking towards us whilst Sophie who was filming at the time was walking backwards so it acted as a dolly shot. Seeing as it was 5 o clock at night and it was dark we had a big light that was quite bright and we shone it on her Elle so the shot has extra light and so it could add a bit more of a professional look. This looked a bit weird in some shots as you could see a big circle where the light was but in other shots, such as when Elle was standing by an arch way singing, it looked effective.

After Ally Pally, we went back to Elle's house and filmed the "Polaroid" pictures that Emma made. Seeing as Elle didn't have any pictures of her and Alex in Polaroids she made them by cutting out pictures of them and sticking them on card backgrounds to make them look like the typical Polaroid picture. She also did some green screen's of this to see if it will work on iMovie. This inspiration and use of intertextuality has come from the music video "Airplanes - BoB" when the camera pans across all the Polaroid pictures and then one of them starts moving. We would like to try and incorporate this into our music video, but if it doesn't work, as we weren't too sure, we filmed it with the park bench shot as well so we can zoom into it and the next scene will happen.

BoB- Airplanes Ft. Hayley Williams from tommy's music on Vimeo.

Emma also created a stop motion effect on paper of a printed cupid shooting an arrow and breaking, hence the title of the song "broken arrow". We filmed this in 8 different shots and will create a stop motion of it for our music video. We will also do the picture in picture effect and have her in the background singing the lyrics. We also found on Elle's mantelpiece L O V E letters. We also thought to have them jumbled up, and to move them little by little to create a stop motion of them rearrange themselves and we can also play this backwards so they split up. This idea has come from the Kate Nash - Foundations video.

Kate Nash "Foundations" from AndrayNovak on Vimeo.

Day Three...

Today, we took a look at the weather outside and it was a dry fine day and the sun was shining. So, we decided to make the most of this sunny weather and headed out to film the park scenes.

Myself, Emma, Sophie, Elle and her boyfriend Alex all went to Enfield Town park and began to film the scenes in the park. We wanted a shot of the couple both reading the same book, preferrably a love novel, so myself and Elle both brought along our 'Pride & Prejudice' books as we are English Literature students. We filmed them both reading the same book on the bench and then realising they are reading the same book and moving closer together to start a discussion on it, this marks the start of their relationship. We filmed this scene as a wide shot, close up and two shot.

This scene contrasts with another scene we filmed after their break up as they are in the same location on the bench but are reading different books to symbolise their break up. We also filmed them kicking leaves at each other, and giving each other piggy backs around trees which was also filmed from a point of view shot of Elle.

As well as narrative scenes, we also filmed performance scenes of Elle singing. These included a dolly shot of Elle walking down a path and us filming from the front and walking backwards. The weather symbolised their relationship as when they first met it was sunny and now they have broken up it is raining and we filmed Elle sitting on the same park bench with an umbrella in the rain lip synching.

We managed to film a lot today in a short amount of time which is rewarding as we now have more footage to edit.

Narrative for exam

I have chosen to write about my A2 music video my A2 exam in the summer as I feel as though it has a clearer narrative. Our short film last year at AS level was told in a linear way in chronological order, but our music video has flashbacks which is more effective and broader to discuss in an exam whereas I think our film could be quite vague.

The narrative for our film... A teenage girl is a dancer and on her way back from dance class she is targeted by a criminal who begins to chase her through different locations where he eventually manages to find her in an underground car park and it ends on a cliffhanger.

The narrative for our music video... A teenage girl has split with her boyfriend and she is now reminiscing on the good and bad times of their relationship. There are flashbacks which reflects their relationship as it is fragmented and reflects the narrative.

Overall, I feel as though my knowledge on narrative is far more advanced now than at AS level so we can produce a narrative music video with a clearer narrative and storyline so we can discuss it in our exam.

Day Two...

Yesterday, we filmed the (500) Days Of Summer scene in IKEA

Ikea from mood on Vimeo.

We used intertextuality from this film and incorporated it into our music video. We decided to change the south end scene - reflecting the good and bad areas of the relationship, to the IKEA scene as we believe that it is more achievable and is less costly and time consuming.

We filmed them sitting around in the kitchen, on the sofas and on the beds, and also running around the shop. We used the flip camera and the actual camera to record our footage and recorded this from different angles such as long shot, wide shot and pan shot.

Also, downstairs in the warehouse we were sitting in the a trolly and filmed a pan shot of them around the warehouse and a point of view shot with Elle filming from inside the trolly.

This is an edit of the footage we filmed on the flip camera...

Changed Band Brand

As we have changed our chosen song, we need to change our band name as our initial name 'IdEst' has no relevance to the song 'Broken Arrow' by the artist Pixie Lott.

During the christmas holidays, we communicated via Facebook and decided on the name 'Pixie Mix' , the reason behind this name being a blend of the artist name 'Pixie Lott' and the idea of 'Pick and Mix' sweets as it has the connotations of the pop genre.