Filming Day: Ogmore-by-Sea with Jade

Location: Ogmore-by-Sea

Date: 13th of February

Group members present: Jade Dibble, Hannah Martin and Jasmine Greene.

Our final filming session consisted of us filming shots for the final sequence of our music video. We wanted to attain the shots that would actually establish the relationship between Hannah and Jade's characters, after the build up to it in the prior shots. This location is exactly the same that we used when filming with Josh, which meant that we could directly replicate certain shots.

The lighting at this time of day was absolutely excellent for what we wanted. The sun started to go down slightly whilst we were filming, which created a semi-romantic mood in shots that we made use of the lighting to make silhouettes.

Due to the nature of the location, and how the beach is very open, we encountered problems with the wind. As Hannah and Jade both have long hair, we found that in many of the shots that we had planned to film, their hair was blowing in the wind and covering their faces. This meant that we had to abandon filming certain shots, as we could not find an angle in which we could prevent their hair blowing in their faces. As a result, we had to improvise and brainstorm different shot ideas that we could use that would create the same effect. We had to think of entirely different shots that would be similar to those planned, or shots that were just slightly different to the original plan.

To achieve an effective shot of Hannah and Jade running away from the sea as it washed in, we had to attempt it a few times. Whilst I was avoiding getting wet, we found that I could not obtain a shot that was smooth, and that I could not obtain a shot from a good angle, or use steady camera movement. It was then that I made the decision to stand in the sea, and let it wash over me, so that I could obtain the desired shot. Not only were we competing with the cold weather already, but the decision for me to stand in the sea meant that this would have to be the final shot that we filmed that day, as I would need to return back to the car to attempt to warm up. Thankfully, the shot that we got was very effective, and it was what we had wished it to be like, so it was very much worth it.

On location, we found that obtaining the shot of the tide washing over the word "Sorry", that we wrote in the sand, was actually very time consuming. We had to attempt this shot multiple times, and we had to experiment with where worked best. We found that we had to write "Sorry" at a distance away from where the tide was washing up to at that moment, because otherwise it would get washed away before we could finish it and start filming. However, this meant that we had to leave the camera filming and wait for quite a long period of time for the water to reach where we needed it to, in order for it to create the shot that we wanted. We were very happy with the shot once we had achieved it.

In the video above you can see us working on the beach during this filming session. We were in competition with tide, as it was coming in, which mean that the sand we had to film on was gradually becoming less and less.

Filming Day: Hannah's bedroom

Location: Hannah's house

Date: 18th of January

Group members present: Hannah Martin, Jade Dibble and Jasmine Greene

Our inspiration for some shots we filmed on the occasion came were inspired by scenes in Panic! at the Disco's music video for their song "Miss Jackson". A key theme within this music video is emotional trauma and self-conflict, which is why we wanted to draw inspiration from what was demonstrated in their shots. 

As with the shots we filmed in Hannah's bathroom, we wanted to use Hannah's mirror in her bedroom to film shots that had depth to them, and would be interesting for the audience to look at. A mirror was also used in the "Miss Jackson" music video, and we thought this was effective for the purpose of showing the emotional trauma of the protagonist. The use of mirrors in our video would also be symbolic, as it would represent how the protagonist is constantly looking at themselves and finding fault in who they are. It would signify that she is trying to look for a way to change herself, and to hide who she is. As we were positioning the mirror in place to film, the mirror got broken. As a group, we initially saw this as a big problem, as we had no other mirror which we could use. However, after discussion, we saw that we would actually still use the mirror in our piece. We thought that the broken mirror could serve two purposes: it would be representative of how the character feels broken, and how that she feels her sexuality means she is broken, and it could also serve the purpose of planting a narrative enigma. How did the mirror get broken? Was it in an argument between Josh and Hannah's character within their unhappy relationship?

We found that the artificial lighting was once again a problem. The light in Hannah's bedroom produced very yellow light, which made Hannah and Jade, and their surroundings, look a very unusual colour. This highlighted to the group that with very limited filming equipment, and without the budget that there would be to create a professional media product, it is very difficult to create certain shots that look professional. The nature of the time of year that we filmed mean that we could not use natural lighting, as it had already gone dark by the time we arrived at location in the early evening. To add to the insufficient lighting of Hannah's bedroom light, I attempted to use the torch from Hannah's smartphone, as can be seen in the image below. I was attempting to film a birds eye shot of Hannah and Jade lying on the bed, to mirror the one that I had filmed of Hannah and Josh, so that the audience could draw a direct comparison between them. Therefore, I was stood on the bed above them. The artificial lighting created unusual shadows on Hannah and Jade's faces, which meant we could not film. As we could not achieve the desired shot, despite our various attempts to create better lighting, we had to attempt to create a similar shot, but from a different angle.

Here you can see our attempt to make the screen brightness of Hannah's phone right so that the camera could focus on it properly:

Detailed Planning During Editing

During the editing process, we needed to make a lot of changes to our music video in terms of the order of the footage and what footage we included. We discovered that we needed more suitable footage in order to fill certain sections of the video, so we had to plan what this would be. In order to do this, I created a 'second count' of the video that included all the shots that we had placed into the timeline, and also included the space that we needed to fill. Being able to look at this on paper allowed us to make clear planning decisions in terms of what footage we though we needed. There was also footage that we had not put into the timeline yet, such as the shots of Hannah and Jade in Winter Wonderland, and this method of planning allowed us to figure out where we thought this should go. 

'Second count' of the video:

Contacting the Artist & Copyright

The song that chose to create our music video for was not our original piece, and we had no input in its creation process. This meant that it was essential for us to attempt to gain permission from the artist to use the track to avoid any copyright issues.

I took to Twitter to attempt to contact Nothing But Thieves, to ask for their permission for us to use their song "Sorry" in our production. Unfortunately, I was unable to gain a response, though we are hoping that we may hear back at some point. In order for us to avoid copyright issues, when uploading our piece to YouTube, we will state in the description that all rights of the song go to the artists, Nothing But Thieves, and we will specify that we are not attempting to take any credit for the track that we have created our video for.

From my production of the thriller opening sequence for my AS Level production last year, I learnt that YouTube have a copyright bank, which your uploads are checked against to look for any potential copyright issues. I knew this year that our upload would be marked that it included copyrighted content, and that this would mean the video would not able to be monetised. It is illegal to take credit for other peoples' work, and to earn money for this content, which is why YouTube have developed this very useful tool. Instead, the copyright claimants will be able to place adverts in front of our video, in which they will gain revenue from. They will then be able to earn money from the song being featured in our video, which means that we can continue to have the video posted in the site without having to acquire and pay for the rights to the track. This also minimises the risk that our video will be removed from YouTube.

Pictured above is a screenshot I have taken from the copyright page of our AS Level thriller opening sequence on YouTube. It details the content of the piece that YouTube has found in its copyright bank, which was 'The Abduction - Gennessee". It shows that the the copyright claimant 'The Orchard Music' on behalf of 'Noble House Records', and that the copyright policy that had been applied was that the video could be monetised by the copyright owner. The disclaimer towards the top of this page states that Ads may appear on our video, which is because the copyright claimant is consenting for us to use the track, as long as they can gain revenue from the views that this video obtains.

When we upload our piece to YouTube, the track will be identified by YouTube's copyright bank. It is likely that the copyright claimant for the track "Sorry" by Nothing But Thieves will lay out conditions that are the same as those that can be seen on our AS Level piece. This means that despite the fact that our video will include copyrighted content, it should be protected from YouTube removing it from the sight, as we are not claiming any revenue, or any credit for the track.

Filming Day: Party Scene

Location: Hannah's house

Date: 15th of December

Group members present: Hannah Martin, Jade Dibble and Jasmine Greene. Josh East was also present.

On this day, we wanted to achieve the 'party scene' shots for our video. We needed Josh, Hannah and Jade for this scene, and this was the only date at this time that we could co-ordinate us all to be at location to film. We wanted these shots to not only to demonstrate Hannah and Josh's characters relationship. We wanted them to show how Hannah was trying to pull away towards Jade's character, and to also use them to demonstrate the downward spiral of the emotions of the protagonist.

Much like what we found when filming inside using artificial lighting when we were filming the bathroom scenes, we had difficulties with the lighting of this scene. We managed to eliminate the severe grainy effect by swapping from using the main room light, to using a stage light lamp, as we found this was better, and created a darker scene, which was more party-esque.

Here is a video in which you can hear my direction of the shots:

Changing Our Song

Shortly after beginning the editing process, our group noticed that the footage that we had was not very fitting to our original song of choice. We had encountered struggles when filming in terms of being able to fulfil the grunge aesthetic that we wanted for our piece, which meant that the visuals were not suiting to the song. We did not realise that creating such looks for our piece would require the ability to hunt extensively for dingy locations, and a budget for obtaining the correct clothing and props. No members of the group have passed their driving tests, which means we were limited to what local locations we could use, and none of them seemed particularly fitting for the aesthetic we were aiming to achieve. We did not have a budget to acquire extra clothing, props and equipment, which meant that the overall look of the piece did not have the 'edgy' mise-en-scene that we desired.

We liked the footage that we had already filmed though, and we wanted to keep the same narrative for our music video. So, the search began for a new song. We needed to find a song that was from the alternative music genre, of which the lyrics could be interpreted to fit the narrative of our piece. As we are all frequent listeners to the alternative music genre, we took to listening to some of our favourites bands to search for a song. Eventually, we found what we thought would be the perfect song for us, which was "Sorry" by Nothing But Thieves.

The song tackles the themes of relationships and self-conflict. It describes an individual that is unhappy in their relationship, and as a result, this relationship is breaking down. It talks about overcoming your demons by learning to accept yourself. The lyrics of the song, however, are not restrictive, as there are no mentions of pronouns, and there are no specific details mentioned. This meant that the song was open to interpretation, which was exactly what we needed it to be. The song was more upbeat than our previous choice, which was much more suited to the footage we had accumulated, such as the shots that we took in Winter Wonderland.

Lyric Breakdown:

Filming Day: Bathroom Shots

Location: Hannah's house

Date: 8th of December

Members of the group present: Hannah Martin and Jasmine Greene

Our aim for this filming session was to capture some shots of Hannah appearing to have a breakdown in the bathroom. We chose this location as we wanted to use the mirror in order to create some interesting shots, with dimension and depth to them.

Only Hannah and I were able to film on this occasion, as we decided to do it very last minute. It was not an issue to us, as it was only a very short filming session, as Hannah and I were scheduled to spend the evening studying prior to arranging to do this.

We encountered an issue with showing Hannah's emotion effectively on the camera. We attempted to create the effect that Hannah was crying, by her administering eye drops. We found that you could not see the fake tears on camera, so we had to brainstorm a way to demonstrate the emotion more clearly. As a result, we then applied heavy coats of mascara to her eyelashes that Hannah attempted to smudge with the liquid from the eye drops, to give the effect that her make-up was running. However, we found this to be ineffective, too. The make-up smudged too much and did not give the desired effect. Hannah and I decided that we would not focus on showing emotion through tears, and she removed the make-up. We decided that she would solely use her body language and facial expressions to portray her emotional breakdown. Our attempts can be seen in the video below:

In the bathroom location, we did encounter another problem; the lighting. Though the lighting appeared to be ok, the nature of the colour of the lighting meant that it was difficult for the camera to focus correctly. You can hear me telling Hannah about the difficulties that I was having focusing the camera, and trying to make sure the footage was not grainy:

Filming Day: Scenes with Josh

Location(s): Josh's house (Pencoed), Woodland's field (Pencoed) and the common (Pencoed).

Date: 2nd of December

Group members present: Hannah Martin and Jasmine Greene. Josh East is also present.

We wanted to use this day to film the majority of the shots in our piece that would be representative of the relationship between Josh and Hannah's characters. Josh had very little availability at this time, so we dedicated the entire day to filming all of the shots that we would need to be filmed in these locations. Unfortunately, there was very little availability with the members of our group on this day. However, as we had to work around Josh's availability in this instance, we decided that we must film despite only having two group members present. I was responsible for direction and camera work, as I had done on previous occasions, which mean that the footage did not suffer in terms of its quality and content, because I had experience in doing this. 

As we were attempting to display the relationship between the characters, we made sure to include shots that connoted a normal relationship. However, we chose to dress Hannah and Josh in dark clothing, as we thought this would be symbolic of the misery that surrounds Hannah's character in this relationship, despite it appearing to be a very stereotypical relationship. Of course, it was necessary for us to capture shots that displayed a time when Hannah did feel at least some happiness in the relationship, which we made sure to film with good lighting. These were often filmed outside, as the natural light was bright and the denoted a content mood. We believed that including shots that showed a decline in the happiness within the relationship would help to anchor the narrative, as the audience would be able to compare the shots in which the couple were happy, to those when they are not, providing an explicit demonstration of the fact their relationship was disintegrating.

Happy:

We used this shot to be demonstrative of the happy part of their relationship. We did this by having Josh show Hannah physical affection, and by having the lighting quite bright. However, we still wanted to show that Hannah was not entirely comfortable in the relationship, which we attempted to do by having her not react to the affection. Her body language allows the audience to perceive that she is uncomfortable with it.

Miserable: 

We used this shot to highlight part of the decline in their relationship. In this two shot, Hannah is positioned with her back to Josh. This suggests that she wants to put their relationship behind her and move on from this, and also, that she does not wish to focus on him as it would make her feel even worse. The contrast to Hannah acting unhappy, is provided by Josh sleeping in the background. This is reflective of how Josh's character is blissfully unaware of Hannah's character feels, and he feels very content in the relationship.

One difficulty we encountered whilst filming was attempting to achieve the birds eye shot that we wanted of Hannah and Josh lying in bed together. We only wanted to see their head and shoulders in the shot, meaning we wanted to achieve a close up, birds eye, two shot. Josh's ceiling is slanted above his bed, due to the nature of his house, which meant there was not a lot of room to achieve the shot. Additionally, I had initially planned to stand on a stool to film above them, but having the stool at the end of the bed meant the shot was not centred where we wanted it to be. Therefore, I had to get up onto the bed and stand between Hannah and Josh, in which I leaned over them to obtain the shot. This was safe, but as the bed is soft underfoot, it meant that it was difficult to maintain a shot that was not shaky.

Here are two clips that demonstrate my directing on set:

Prop List

To ensure we were organised when filming, we needed to compile a list of the props that we would use throughout the filming process. We needed to identify what scenes we would use the props in, so we could make sure that we had everything we needed when going to location to film.

Here are the props that we will be using in our music video:

The prop list may be subject to change, depending on the scene/shot changes.

Filming Day: Winter Wonderland

Location: Winter Wonderland, Cardiff Central

Date: 15th of November

Group members present: Hannah Martin, Jade Dibble, Caitlin Elward and Jasmine Greene






We chose to use this location to film, as we wanted to make use of the bright and colourful lighting that this venue has. We thought that these shots would be representative of the LGBT+ themes within our video, and they would create a stark contrast to the more melancholy coloured shots with Josh. In the evening, the rides light up, which in previous years has created some wonderful landscape photography opportunities for us. It was these experiences that made us consider this location, as we knew that it looked good on camera.

We arrived at location just prior to 5pm, to ensure that we could start filming at that time. We had worked out with our previous visit to scout the location, that 5pm was the optimum time for us to film. The lighting at this time mean that the colourful lights would stand out very prominently against the dark background in shots. We were concerned about the quality of the shots we would have achieved in dark lighting, as the filming equipment we had was not advanced enough to film with flawless quality in minimal lighting. However, we discovered that the lighting at 5pm was perfect, as it did not cause the footage to be grainy, and it did not reduce the quality as we had previously worried about.

We planned the shots we would film in this location carefully. We wanted to use them to enhance the focus on the developing relationship between Jade and Hannah's characters. As a result of this, we ensured that we would use multiple two shots, and also P.O.V shots. As demonstrated on the left, the P.O.V shot aims to help to develop the audiences understanding of the relationship between the two females, by giving the audience the impression that they are viewing Jade's characters through the eyes of Hannah's character, as the shot is from her perspective. This helps the audience to engage, as they feel directly involved in the narrative.

A problem...

Whilst we were filming in this location, we did encounter certain issues. Most were very minor, however, there was one in particular that caused problems; the volume of members of the public present at the location.

The day we chose to film on was a Friday, as this was the only night we could organise to travel there together in which we were all free. Winter Wonderland is always very busy on a Friday night, as it is the beginning of the weekend, however, we had to make it work. It was necessary for us to achieve what we needed to when filming on this day as we were not aware of a time that we could revisit the location.

When filming, we found that people would walk in front of the camera, and this would obstruct and ruin the shot that we were trying to achieve. This difficulty can be demonstrated in this clip:

It was off-putting for Hannah and Jade whilst they were acting, as I often had to stop and start scenes spontaneously due to where people were walking, or in regards to us finding a gap in the crowd. However, they were both very professional and worked past these difficulties.

In my role as director, I was responsible for instructing what would go on in a scene. I had to tell Jade and Hannah what to do, and how to do it, whilst describing the shot that I wanted to achieve out of it. Here is a short video in which you can hear me directing Jade and Hannah:

Casting

During the creation process of our AS thriller opening sequence, we discovered that it was very difficult to gather people to act in our music video. Therefore, we had to resort to using people within our media class.

We encountered the same problem this year, as we could not gather any people external to our media class to be involved, as only minimal people showed interest. It was then found that these individuals were not able to adere to our filming schedule, so they had to be discounted from our selection.

We chose the cast of our video out of willing individuals in our media class. The roles and subsequent candidates are as follows:

Female Roles:

• Female protagonist
• Best friend/love interest

Candidates:

Name: Hannah Martin

Age: 17 

Role: Female protagonist

It was decided that Hannah would take on the role of the female protagonist, as she was the most comfortable in acting, due to her previous experience studying Drama, and performing in school productions. Hannah has good relationships with everyone in the media class, which meant that she would be able to work well with whoever we chose to co-star in the video with her. 

Name: Jade Dibble

Age: 17 

Role: Best friend/love interest

We thought that Jade would be most suitable for the role of the best friend/love interest, as she has also had previous acting experience, from her studies of drama. Jade also has a very close friendship with Hannah, which we hoped would contribute to ease of filming the more relationship orientated scenes.

Name: Caitlin Elward

Age: 17

Role: N/A

After consideration, Caitlin confessed that she did not feel that she would be entirely comfortable in front of the camera. This meant that she was not a suitable candidate to be cast in the video, as obviously, the foundation of the production is video based.

Name: Jasmine Greene

Age: 17

Role: N/A

We decided that I was more suited to roles behind the camera, as this is where I am most confident. As I have taken on the role of director, it would be difficult for me to fulfil this role effectively, whilst actually having to act in the piece.

Male Roles:

• The boyfriend

Candidates:

Name: Josh East
Age: 18
Role: The boyfriend (Actual)

Josh was not our original choice for the role of the boyfriend in our piece, as he has a lot of other commitments outside of school time. However, after discovering Rhys had broken his leg, Josh agreed to step in and help us with the video. We made an effort to work our filming schedule around Josh's other commitments, as he had volunteered to help us.

Name: Rhys Jones
Age: 18
Role: The boyfriend (Initial)

We chose Rhys to play the role of the boyfriend in our music video, as his schedule was more free to allow us to organising filming times well. However, Rhys was unable to fulfil his role in the music video, due to breaking his leg. 

Filming Day: Bridgend Town

Location: Bridgend Town

Date: 13th November 2017

Group Members Present: Hannah Martin, Jade Dibble and Caitlin Elward

Our use of this location was inspired by alternative genre music videos we had seen. We wanted to film in a dingy, urban environment, that did not have particularly stimulating mise-en-scene. Our inspiration as a group for this location came from watching videos such as 'Sweater Weather' by The Neighbourhood:

We thought that a location like this would help to highlight our protagonists emotional trauma, as the dark lighting would connote the misery that she feels. We wanted to use a location that was a blank canvas, as this would mean the protagonist would stand out against, and this would show her importance in the piece. We decided that filming in a location like to this would reflect the loneliness and the isolation of Hannah's character.

Unfortunately, due to other commitments I had with school, I was unable to attend this day of filming. However, before my group left, we had a discussion as to what the objectives of the filming day would be, and what we wanted to have achieved by the end of the day. Additionally, when they arrived back at school, they updated me on what they had filmed, and showed me the footage that they had gotten.

This was my favourite shot that they achieved on this day. The sunlight shining through the window isolates Hannah in this shot, which sets her apart from the dark background. This helps to portray the isolation of her character, and how to her, the world feels dark because of the emotional trauma she is experiencing. In this shot, she is holding a cigarette, demonstrating the bad coping methods she has turned to in order to try to cope with her self-hatred and denial. Cigarettes are common props used in alternative music videos, and have become conventional to their mise-en-scene.

The purpose of this over the shoulder shot is to demonstrate the distance between the two characters, and to demonstrate the longing that Hannah's character feels for Jade's character via her facial expression. As with the nature of over the shoulder shots, its purpose is to show the relationship between the characters, so Hannah is purposely positioned quite far away from Jade. Hannah is stood in such a way that makes you perceive that she wants to get closer to Jade, which represents her wanting to get closer to her emotionally.

The long two shot shown here has the purpose of demonstrating how Hannah's character is influenced by Jade's. We wanted to demonstrate the protagonists development of feelings for Jade's character, which we thought we could encompass in our video effectively through making it seem as though Hannah's character holds Jade's character on a pedestal and idolises her. Jade is influencing Hannah's characters to smoke, and the fact that she does whatever is suggested to her by Jade in an attempt to impress her, shows that her rational thoughts are overshadowed by her feelings.

In all of these shots, we focused on the lighting to make sure that it appeared dreary and miserable, to create a sense of pathetic fallacy, reflective of the protagonists clouded mind. We made sure that Hannah and Jade were in dark clothing, which is a common convention of alternative videos. They often focus their aesthetic around dark colours and lighting, and wear grunge-style clothing.

Filming Locations

It is vital that after deciding on the narrative of the piece, and after having brainstormed some ideas for scenes and shots, that you venture out to scout locations to film at. The locations that you choose must be suitable for to film in, the mise-en-scene must be appropriate and they must be accessible for your cast and crew.

We sat down as a group and, considering our initial ideas for our music video, we came up with a list of some of the locations types that we would need. We followed this by identifying locations similar to these in our area, and we then set aside time to go and assess these locations for their suitability.

Locations types needed:

• A beach
• Dingy/graffitied areas
• A house
• A plain white wall
• Open fields/natural places
• Somewhere with bright and colourful lights

Locations similar to these near us:

Beach:

• Ogmore-by-Sea
• Rest Bay, Porthcawl
• Southerndown

Dingy/graffitied areas:

• Multi-story car park in Bridgend town 
• Graffiti wall in Cardiff Central

A house:

• Josh's house
• Jade's house
• Hannah's house

A plain white wall:

• Shopping arcade in Bridgend town

Somewhere with bright and colourful lights:

• Winter Wonderland in Cardiff

Assessing the locations:

The beach we chose: Ogmore-by-Sea 

Ogmore-by-Sea is the beach nearest to us, and therefore, it was the first place that we thought of when we knew that we wanted to film some scenes at the beach. We have all visited this location many times, yet we still went out to visit the beach again, to assess its suitability for filming.


Upon visiting the location, we found that it would be a very suitable place for us to film. There were a variety of different levels on which to film, which would allow for opportunity to gain lots of interesting shots via different angles. We also thought that the different surfaces that were available, such as pebbles, rocks, grass and sand would provide interesting mise-en-scene. Additionally, these varied surfaces would provide the ability for us to acquire a lot of shots that had a similar look to them, but that were all different, which subsequently would make the overall look of the scene more appealing to the viewer.

We visited Ogmore-by-Sea on a relatively bright day, which allowed us to get an idea of how we could use the scenery to connote a happy atmosphere. However, from having visited here on many occasions, we knew that if the weather was gloomy, the scenery could very much reflect a melancholic mood. We thought that we could use this to highlight the misery that the protagonist feels with her boyfriend, and that it could act as pathetic fallacy.

We found the pebbled surface to be difficult to walk on, and we thought the uneven surface may provide difficulty in maintaining steady tracking shots, etc. However, we thought that this could be overcome by wearing appropriate footwear, and by choosing our paths carefully.

The beach is very open, which means that it can be very windy there. This is a disadvantage of the location, as it may have an impact on the look of the shots that we would attempt to achieve, particularly with the protagonist's long hair. This is something that can be expected of most coastal locations, particularly in the winter months, which is when our filming period is.

Ogmore-by Sea is the closest beach to us, at about a 15 minute drive. It was important to us to chose the best location for filming, but also had to make sure that it was within a reasonable distance, due to us having to be able to obtain lifts there.

Beach: Rest Bay, Porthcawl

Though Rest Bay is one of the beaches in our local area, it is the furthest away. It is also difficult to reach by public transport, as there is no train station, which means that unfortunately, we were not able to visit this beach to assess it for filming. Though we know the beach the beach very well, the difficulty we faced in trying to get there to scout the location, showed us that we would not be able to feature Rest Bay in our music video.

Beach: Southerndown

Southerndown beach is just a little further in the car than Ogmore-by-Sea. However, the location is a lot more remote.

We visited Southerndown in the evening after school, which meant that the sun was setting. This provided a really nice shot, as is pictured to the left, and this provided us with some inspiration of how we could use a setting sun in our piece to signify the end of the protagonist's relationship with her boyfriend, and to signify that Hannah's character is reaching new horizons.

An advantage of the relatively remote location is that the beach is often clear of people, especially in winter months. The beach is less open than Ogmore-by-Sea, as the pebble beach falls in between two cliffs, which is an advantage as it meant that it was more protected from the wind.

The cliff edges in Southerndown provided a unique platform for some very poignant shots. Though, in order to make these shots look their best and create the desired effect/mood, we discovered that we would have to stand very close to the edge.

We decided that this location would not be suitable for our group, due to its relatively remote location, and the fact that we were concerned for the safety of our cast and crew in certain areas that we desired to film in.

The dingy/graffitied area we chose: Multi-story car park in Bridgend town

Caitlin had recently used this location, and therefore, we did not re-visit it to scout it. Caitlin had told us that she thought there were multiple locations within the car park that were fitting with what we wanted to use. She said that there was a stairwell that we could use, that was very similar to the one in the image below that inspired us to include a shot similar to it.

Caitlin had said that there were window adjacent to the staircase that, at midday when she was there, the sun shone through that acted as a spotlight. We thought this would be very useful for us to film a shot with Hannah sat on the stairs, as the light would shine on her, making her the focal point of the shot. However, it would mean that the rest of the staircase would appear darker, making it look more even more dingy, which would help to create a gloomy atmosphere.

There was also a large white wall close to the entrance of the stairwell, which would is something that we wanted to use in our video. We desired to have a shot of Hannah stood against the white wall, to signify her isolation. We also had the idea to have her wearing a white t-shirt, that we would gradually cover with splashes of coloured paint between shots, taking inspiration from stop-motion filming techniques. The colour in this shot would be another method of including LGBT+ flag colours/rainbow colour imagery that we wanted to include throughout the video to signify the protagonist's sexuality. 

We chose to use this location as we could reach it easily by just a 5 minute train journey. This meant that we would not have to rely on lifts from anyone, which meant that the location would be convenient for our group. 

Caitlin also mentioned that there was a graffitied section of the carpark wall outside, which meant that the location incorporated everything that we were looking for. The graffiti wall would provide a contrast to the white wall, and the graffiti imagery is conventional to be included in alternative music videos. Additionally, as we had planned to have the protagonist drinking alcohol/smoking against the wall, as part of her breakdown sequence, we knew that there is a societal association between graffiti, drinking and smoking.

Dingy/graffitied area: Graffiti wall in Cardiff Central

 As a group we were aware of this location next to the Principality Stadium along the boardwalk. However, we wanted to assess the location as none of us had visited there previously.

We caught the train in Cardiff Central one evening after school, but fitting with the time of year, it was just starting to get dark. Thankfully, this did not affect our ability to assess the location for filming use, and we actually thought that the slightly dark lighting provided a nice contrast to the graffiti wall that was popping with colour.

As you can see from the photo above on the left, we trialled some shot types to get an idea of if the location would be suitable. We liked the busyness of the graffiti, and we thought that this could be useful to reflect the confused nature of the character, and be representative of her overflowing thoughts.

As shown in the picture above, there were multiple different graffiti wall designs, which gave us the idea of creating a montage from us replicating a shot that we would take of Hannah in front of one of the walls, in front of each of the different walls, to give the effect that the background was changing.

This location is a 20 minute train journey away from us, which is a manageable distance for us to commute. However, the trains to and from where we are based to this location only run once an hour. This would make it more difficult for us to be able to get here and be able to film unless we had a considerable amount of time at one time.

We decided that this would not be our primary choice of location, though we may visit here to film if we think that it will improve the look of our piece.

Houses: Josh's, Hannah's and Jade's

These were locations that, of course, we were all very familiar with, and we decided that we would feature all three of these locations in our piece. We needed three different houses, as we needed one to represent the houses of each of Josh, Hannah and Jade's characters.

When creating the opening sequence for a thriller film for our AS level piece, we filmed it in Josh's house, so we knew that it was suitable for filming. We knew that as it was Josh's house that it would be suitable to use to represent the relationship between Josh and Hannah's characters, as we could use Josh's room., which is a stereotypical presentation of a male's bedroom.

Hannah's house will be suitable to film the party scene, as she will have just moved house at this point. This will mean that there will be limited decor, and that the living room will be a blank canvas for us to use. Hannah's bedroom will be very neutral and bare when she moves in, which we will use to reflect how her character feels numb and empty.

Jade's house will be featured in our video as Jade's characters house. The decor in Jade's bedroom is very feminine and this is will provide an excellent contrast between that of Josh's room, which will be reflective of the difference between Josh and Jade's characters, and subsequently, will highlight the change the difference in Hannah's sexuality.

Plain white wall: Shopping arcade in Bridgend town

 As previously mentioned in the post, we were looking for a location with a plain white wall that we could use for some shots of the protagonist.

We remembered as a group that in Bridgend town, there was a section of a shopping arcade that had recently been painted white, which can be seen in the pictures on the left.
We liked that the whole area was very plain, which meant that it fitted the blank canvas look that we wanted. Additionally, the walls are tall, which would give us the ability to film a long shot of Hannah, but still have the whole background plain.

We decided that we would not use this location, however, as due to it being the entrance space to a shopping centre it, it is frequently used by lots of people. If we were to film here, we could inconvenience shoppers, which means that it is not a suitable location.

An image I found online

Bright and colourful lights: Winter Wonderland in Cardiff

We knew that Winter Wonderland was a beautiful location that features lots of bright and colourful lights. We thought that it would allow us to create some visually beautiful shots, whilst the colour would be representative of our narrative that focuses on sexuality. We also thought that the lights created a magical effect, which would make the sequence of footage very dream-like. We thought that this could highlight how Hannah's character feels as though she is dreaming; now that she finally has embraced her sexuality, she feels free.

We visited this location on the same day as we did the graffiti wall, as we were already in Cardiff Central. As we got there, it was dark, which accentuated the colour of lights. Therefore, we decided that when we would use the location to film, we would visit in the evening.

We had to consider that this venue is very popular, and that it gets very busy in the evenings. Additionally, many of the venders here sell hot drinks, which means we will need to be cautious when filming whilst walking through the crowds, to avoid bumping into anyone.