Behind the scenes of up and coming artist HONNE's new music video
Hayden talks about his new music video for the artist HONNE and their new single, Someone that loves you.
Hayden has recently made a music video about a character, who walks around Tamworth, swims in a river, clones himself and eventually kills off seemingly his entire species with his laser eyes.
Hayden said, "Being new to the industry, music videos are a great way to get your name out. Music videos can be about anything, which means going for a low budget is an option. I chose to have no actors at all for the video. By doing that, I could rely on my own creative skills. It was a challenge, but by opting for an animated character in real space I could generate footage without having to use a camera or crew. The original idea was to do frame by frame animation but due to time restraints I decided the use of "2.5D" (2D elements used in 3D ways) worked much better."
We asked Hayden about planning of the animation.
"The process involved storyboarding and gathering ideas to use for the video. At first the idea was completely different, and involved a nameless character in a house searching for an item that was never decided. After quite a few doodles on a whiteboard, characters drawn on a computer, and some abstract ideas were put to the test, I presented the idea to the artist HONNE. If he didn't like the idea, I would have had to start from scratch."
Then the initial filming began. It was mostly just still videos of Tamworth, that would later have meaning added to them. Some of the scenes however he knew was needed from the start. The clips were edited separately before being put back together in the right order. Finding the right order to follow with the feeling of the song proved to be tough.
Later on we filmed extra clips for the music video. Normally you wouldn't be able to get away with this, but since Hayden wasn't filming on location and actors weren't hired or anything along those lines, he could. Usually videos like these when done to a professional standard would be filmed all at once, and each scene would be planned out well in advance.
Hayden used 'After Effects' to create most of the video. 'Premiere Pro' and a couple drawing programs were used too.
Next for Hayden came the advertising. You have to get the video out there somehow. People usually think of YouTube when they hear about a video being posted online, however there are other websites that are going to get the word out about your video. Twitter is one. Getting HONNE to tweet a link to the video on his official page means that quite a bit of HONNE's fan base is going to see the video. Facebook also works well, the problem being that your video will not get shared unless it really stuns people, in whatever way possible. Becoming viral on Facebook may make little income, but it gets people listening to the song and it is more likely to spread globally rather than nationally. Vimeo is also a great website that is often used by filmmakers to learn new techniques and get new inspiration.
Most of the video involved techniques like motion tracking, and rotoscoping (essentially the separation of layers in order to put objects behind objects - for example putting a digital object behind an object in your footage). Keyframes were the most vital tool in making the video. If you want a variable like position or scale to change during the video, you would use keyframes.
The client said they enjoyed how they would be associated with a fun character and they were very happy with the professional quality of the animation. They wanted some changes. They wanted the character to have more meaning, and therefore be more interesting. To fulfil this Hayden added more to the narrative by filming extra footage that had more of a plot. He changed his initial ideas for a frame by frame animation because he felt he could achieve more by using After Effects. That meant there would be more time to make each scene a little more interesting.
He decided to gain feedback form a focus group by putting the first edit onto Youtube. There was generally positive, constructive feedback. A couple of errors were pointed out that he otherwise would not have noticed. A few people noted that some of the color grading could use some work. It was also pointed out that the resolution was not great, and it was reducing the quality of the video on Youtube. He also used social media to gain feedback from people in the creative industries. The response was positive.
After correcting some errors, Hayden posted the video online and it was well received.
You can hear HONNE's new single, Someone that Loves you on their website or on Youtube/ Spotify.
Friday, 29 April 2016
Wednesday, 6 April 2016
Pre-production
Copyright Issues
The owners of the rights to the song are Detail Records. To get
permission and legal rights to make a music video we would need to contact them
at hellodetail@gmail.com. They seem to have given permission for a music video
to be released by a third party.
Storyboards
http://xomf.com/g/bpxcw
Editing logs
Each time I needed to make a new scene, I would create a new project and import my footage into After effects. I dragged the footage from the camera onto the new composition button even if I didn't need the footage, because I needed composition settings from the video like FPS, resolution and aspect ratio. After each scene had been completed, I would convert the video to MP4 to make it fit youtube's formatting better.
If I was using real footage, I would duplicate the layer, and use the rotobrush tool to coat the objects I wanted the character to stand behind. Then I would insert the character in between the two layers, with the roto layer on top.
Then I would use the motion tracking tool on the lower footage layer and track a spot onto the character and set the target to a null object and parent the character to it (explained later) so the character would look more in the footage.
Next, since I would want to move the character, I would keyframe the character by pressing the stopwatch on the first frame I want the character to start moving in, and set the end keyframe by dragging the time scrubber on the timeline forward on the last fram I want my character to move in. I can't keyframe over keyframes that have already been keyframed (from the motion tracking) so I would attach the keyframes to a null object and make the null object the characters parent. That means the character will follow the animation information of the null object.
Each time I needed to make a new scene, I would create a new project and import my footage into After effects. I dragged the footage from the camera onto the new composition button even if I didn't need the footage, because I needed composition settings from the video like FPS, resolution and aspect ratio. After each scene had been completed, I would convert the video to MP4 to make it fit youtube's formatting better.
If I was using real footage, I would duplicate the layer, and use the rotobrush tool to coat the objects I wanted the character to stand behind. Then I would insert the character in between the two layers, with the roto layer on top.
Then I would use the motion tracking tool on the lower footage layer and track a spot onto the character and set the target to a null object and parent the character to it (explained later) so the character would look more in the footage.
Next, since I would want to move the character, I would keyframe the character by pressing the stopwatch on the first frame I want the character to start moving in, and set the end keyframe by dragging the time scrubber on the timeline forward on the last fram I want my character to move in. I can't keyframe over keyframes that have already been keyframed (from the motion tracking) so I would attach the keyframes to a null object and make the null object the characters parent. That means the character will follow the animation information of the null object.
Risk
Since we are filming next to roads, we need to be careful.
While editing, wires must be tied down to avoid people tripping
over them, and drinks must be kept away from computers to avoid electrocution
and damage of sixth form property.
Filming from the top floor of the indoor car park would have several risks involved, like accidents with cars, and being on such a high building, we could risk falling.
Filming from the top floor of the indoor car park would have several risks involved, like accidents with cars, and being on such a high building, we could risk falling.
Budget
If we were to buy equipment needed specifically for the video, we
would need:
A PC
running Windows 10 – The HP 110 Desktop PC http://www.ebuyer.com/665321-hp-desktop-pc-110-desktop-pc-j2f55ea-abu?gclid=CjwKEAiAoIK1BRCRiMqphvnlwlwSJAAOebPMerCMTafKfDiXVUQJdd5M1w8bfjcwFCjPnnXNN_NiuBoCBqjw_wcB#fo_c=951&fo_k=98efa4c66b3c8bb2f2fce91ae68be91f&fo_s=gplauk?mkwid=s_dc&pcrid=51482417219&pkw=&pmt=
This camera records in 1080p. DSLR's are not great at recording audio, which will be fine for our use because we will not be recording audio anyway.
Adobe Creative Cloud Membership –
Illustrator – Shape creating program for Michael
Photoshop – Photo manipulation and great for sketching
for Michael
After Effects – Used for applying effects like
roto-scoping after the video has been arranged in Premiere Pro
Premiere Pro – Used to arrange clips and work with
sound
SpeedGrade – Color grading of clips easily
Membership per month costs around £30, but Adobe
offers a 30-day free trial which we can use.
If we were to need a van, we could hire one from
B&Q’s service for £15 an hour. It takes probably around 6 hours to film,
which would total £165.
The total budget is £960.
We can take out a minimum of a £500 loan from HSBC if
we need to.
Production schedule
Start of project until the 23rd of march: Pre
production
Wednesday 23rd March: Capturing of footage around
Tamworth
Thursday 24th March: Editing of footage
Saturday 26th March until Sunday 3rd April:
Editing footage
Wednesday 6th April: Editing of footage
Thursday 7th April: Editing of current footage, Michael
drew for the project
Role allocation
Drawn assets
|
Filming/scripting
|
Post Production
|
|
Michael
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Hayden
|
No
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Location recess
Mood boards
http://xomf.com/qhllv
http://xomf.com/qhllv
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