In class today we had a group meeting!! It was pretty exciting. I honestly didn’t really know what to expect and I thought it wouldn’t be much help, but it was a big help. We each took turns discussing what our films are going to be about and what we’re having trouble with. I started us off (which was pretty scary) and told my group about my idea. They really liked my idea and liked how the title of the film was actually in the middle of the opening rather than just at the very beginning.
One of my group members recommended that I actually hint at my main character being gay in the very beginning, but having it be very subtle and kind of in the background. I like this idea a lot, and another group member suggested that I do this via costume design, set design, and props. I need to research a bit more about typical clothing for this group of people, but I think this will really elevate my opening and hint at the upcoming conflict in the later parts of the film.
The suggestion regarding props inspired me to think about how I want the main character’s room to actually look, which goes hand in hand with set design as well. I’m gonna be using my room as the major set for this, so I just need to figure out how I want to arrange my room and what kind of things I want to be shown and be seen by the camera. I don’t want to make the gayness too obvious, especially since she isn’t even out yet. Instead I want to make it almost like she’s trying to hide it from herself, and not just everyone else in her life. I think maybe I could have the character wear a rainbow bracelet while at home and then her taking it off before she leaves to go to the store, because she doesn’t want anyone to know. She could even put the bracelet into a hidden spot in her room or something. —->
I also shared my storyboard that I completed a couple classes ago and discussed how I want to film my shots. We discussed how my story board is very much a rough draft and doesn’t really include everything I want to have in my opening, especially in the very first montage scene. They suggested that I create a more fleshed out storyboard and shot list that would describe almost every shot I want to include. This is definitely something I’m want to get done within this week and next to stay on schedule.
Today in class we learned about the process of writing a screen play, which literally aligned perfectly with my schedule as today I’m supposed to write my script. Perfect timing! There are four parts of the process of writing a screenplay. The first thing to do is brainstorm, which I already did. Done. Then is to outline the entire story and major plot points I would want to include in the film. Did that too! Then is to actually write the screenplay, which is what this blog post is about. The final step is to get feedback and make revisions to better the writing.
[my notes from today’s class]
Anyways, after the lesson finished, I started to think about my own screenplay. I didn’t really know where to start so I started to research other screenplays from coming-of-age movies. I looked at the first 10 pages of the screenplay for Lady Bird, a coming of age film about the relationship between a mother and daughter. The article linked above not only included the actual screenplay, but also discussed why certain choices were used and how the screenplay developed tone and characters. The screenplay demonstrates how the film wants to develop the relationship between the two characters, which is something I want to portray in my film opening. The descriptions of the character’s actions demonstrate the tone of their characters and how they feel about other characters. The screenplay also describes how the character feels through their specific actions.
This screenplay example was really helpful and allowed me to start my own. I actually finished the entire screenplay in one sitting in class today, which is insane because normally I’m a pretty terrible writer. Doing the storyboard first, I think, was really helpful as it allowed me to visualize what I wanted to portray and then writing the screenplay further cemented how exactly I want to showcase my character’s thoughts and feelings. Here’s a screenshot of my script:
Last class we meet with our teacher to discuss everything we’ve worked on so far, and she told me something that has stumped me since Thrusday. Animation is difficult. Ok I knew this already, but once she told me I realized something, I would never be able to complete an animation sequence in the time given, especially with all my other classes and after school activities. I’ve spent the past two days thinking of alternative ideas and I FINALLY came up with an idea that could work. Instead of animation, I could do a short montage of the main character working on a project about the myth. Ok, it sounds kinds dumb, but hear me out.
The film would start with a montage of the main character working on a school project that’s about a greek myth and we can see them drawing things out and writing. While they are writing with a sharpie it all of a sudden runs out of ink and then they get a text message from their friend’s asking if the project is done yet. This introduces the friends and shows how they have made the main character do the entire project by herself, even though they are supposed to be in a group. The main character replies and puts her phone face down. Since the pens out of ink, she heads to the store to buy a new pack. While at the store, she get distracted by the toy isle. This is where we’re introduced to the fact that as a child she wasn’t allowed to look at the toys through a flashback. After the flashback, we are brought back to the present where we see the main character go into the toy isle and look at everything there. An action figure catches her eye and she grabs it and leaves the store. Then we see her back at home, about to open the things she got from the store, and the opening ends with her looking at the action figure she just bought.
Ok, now that I’ve got the idea for my opening, I started to storyboard exactly what I want to film. Here it is:
Wow. I basically just changed the entirety of the first scene, but I think this works a lot better than an animation sequence would and I have my teacher to thank for that. I also think that a voiceover wouldn’t work very well with this scene anymore, so instead I’m just going to stick to music. The past two days have been a doozy, but I left the week with a finished storyboard and fleshed out opening idea. Now to just write the script and have a more detailed list of everything to include in the opening. Oh and to figure out the name of my film. Damn.
Ok so during my brainstorming of the plot that I talked about during my last blog post, I started to come up with the idea of having an action figure be a symbol of moving on and growing up, which is something that follows the conventions of a coming of age genre, which I researched before. Many coming of age films have symbols of growth that are used throughout the film, so I want to incorporate that into my piece as well.
I want the main character to be extremely attached to an action figure, bringing it with her everywhere she goes, almost as emotional support. I want the action figure to act as a symbol of her realization throughout the film. In the beginning, she will keep the action figure with her, but her friends will think she's weird for it. Her obsession with comics and action figures is also detested by her parents, who think that this hobby is only for boys. Then after the coming out scene, she will throw away her action figure, as an act of aggression and her being mad at herself. However, someone finds it and brings it to her, knowing that it's hers (This person is the person who will introduce her to the queer friends btw). This act demonstrates that it's not herself she needs to fix but rather the people she surrounds herself with. She needs to find people who will accept her for who she is, and she does through this friend group. The person who found the action figure will also be a huge fan of the comic series just like her, again adding to her fitting in with these people.
This idea of the action figure is actually what inspired me for an idea for my opening. After the animation sequence (which I still don’t know if ‘ a practical idea) I want to show the main character buying the action figure that will follow her throughout the film. I also want to showcase the parent’s disapproval, which I can do through flashbacks to her not being able to get the action figure she wanted when she was a little kid. Then it would go back to the present where she is actually buying the figurine that she’s always wanted. I kinda want to include the part about her friends not approving of her hobbies, which I could do through maybe them wanting to meet up and she tells them why she’s late and they call her weird and childish. I don’t know yet if I want to add that, but I think it might add more background that would further develop as the film went on. That way, my film opening would serve perfectly as a way to establish background, which is one of the approaches to an opening that we learned about before (this is all so exciting!!).
The action figure represents the main characters inability to grow up as well, especially as they weren’t able to live the childhood they wanted to. I think at the end of the movie, the main character would have a realization that they don’t need the action figure as their emotional support as she now has a supportive friend group, which will be symbolized by her leaving the figurine on her desk and leaving for school without it instead of bringing it with her as she always did before. This would incorporate the main part of a coming of age film, growing up and changing as a person for the better.
I actually came up with the idea of an action figure from personal experience. Check out my very own emotional support black panther, he’s awesome and I love him:
[here is an amazing edit of the one and only black panther]
(It’s funny because I actually had two black panthers cause I lost the first one but my coach bought me a new one, so he’s actually two of a kind!!)
I did not expect to come out of this week with an already fleshed out story idea, but guess I’m ahead of schedule. It all just came to me at once, it was very overwhelming, but I’m glad I got it all written out (check out my previous post to see the word vomit I produced onto paper last class). Alright, now that I’ve got my basic idea for my film opening, it’s time to start storyboarding and writing out my script!
[actual picture of me word vomiting all over the place]
So I've been struggling in figuring out what the actual plot of my film was going to be, which I have to figure out before I can even think about what my opening would consist of. I started by researching various myths that I could use as my opening animated sequence as I mentioned in my previous post. The two that caught my eye were the Three Sisters of Fate and their string of fate and the myth of Daedalus and Icarus.
The Three Sisters of Fate, as the Ancient Greeks believed, were beings who weaved the fate of gods and mortals alike. The sisters, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos, each had their own specialty. Clotho spun the thread of life, creating life itself and the birth of a person. Lachesis determines the fate of ones life, choosing who they would become and what they would achieve. Atropos, the third sister, was the cutter of the string, ending a persons life and determining when they would die. This myth includes the main parts that I want to include in my film, which are fate and changes. I also really like this idea because the animation would be really interesting because I could incorporate the string aspect and kinda tie everything together (get it, cause strings haha). My character could have a struggle in not knowing who they are, which could be represented by the strings being all jumbled up, which could look cool. This is definitely one of my top choices for the animated sequence.
The other myth that I researched was that of Daedalus and Icarus. Daedalus, renowned architect, was good friends with King Minos, however after a falling out, the king banished him and his son Icarus to the deadly Labyrinth that housed the Minotaur. He and his son were left to die on top a tower, however, Daedalus, being the inventive man he was, began to devise a plan for him and his son to escape. The only way out was through the sky, so Daedalus created gigantic wings that would allow him and his son to take flight and escape the Labyrinth, defying the laws of nature. Icarus, however, being young and adventurous, got carried away in the thrill of flying and dove close to the sea and up high near the sun. Daedalus tried to stop his son and make him understand that he must stay level in-between the sea and the sun, but Icarus didn't listen. He flew too close to the sun, and his wax wings began to melt, and as he fell into the sea, Daedalus wept the death of his beloved son.
After researching this myth, I got really inspired and started to think about how my film can kind of embody this story, without being a direct copy but rather a story that has aspects of this myth in it (sorry if that didn't make much sense, I don't really know what I'm doing). Anyways, I started with a basic overview of what I wanted to include in my story and wrote it all down on a paper. Then I kind of word vomited all over the page as ideas came flying into my head (haha flying like Icarus. Hopefully I don't get burned :0).
Since you most definitely cannot read my handwriting, and honestly I'm struggling reading it myself, I'll explain it as best as I can. The basis of my plot is that a girl is struggling to come out to her friends and family. She doesn't really talk to that many people, and the people she does talk to aren't the greatest friends. The rising action of my film would be her coming out to her family and them not talking it well, forcing her to have to run away. She would then meet someone who is just like her and they would hit it off, introducing her to their friend group who are also queer. She gets more comfortable with them and realizes that it's the family you choose not the family you're born into that matters.
REFERENCES
dev, S. U.-. (n.d.). 30 of the most famous tales from Greek mythology. 30 of the Most Famous Tales from Greek Mythology. https://greektraveltellers.com/blog/30-of-the-most-famous-tales-from-greek-mythology
(2020b, November 25). The myth of daedalus and icarus. Greek Myths & Greek Mythology. https://www.greekmyths-greekmythology.com/myth-of-daedalus-and-icarus/
I’ve started to watch different types of film openings in the genre of coming of age. I watched the opening to Boyhood and one thing I noticed was that this film put its title as one of the very first things on screen, before even the characters or setting. Music was the main part of the opening as well as introducing the main character, the little boy. Most of the film openings I watched had a similar theme. Introducing the character seems like the pivotal part of an opening to a coming of age film (which makes sense cause the movie is about their journey). I really like this idea and I want to incorporate this in my opening because I feel like it fits the genre really well.
During my research I also realized that coming of age has many different sub-genres, like drama or comedy, so I watched the opening to a coming of age drama called Perks of Being a Wallflower. The major part of this opening was the voiceover of the main character. This acted as an introduction to the character (told you it was common!) and established the environment around him. I like the idea of a voiceover, but I don’t want it to be cheesy, so I’ll have to think more on whether or not that’s the way to go.
Then I watched the opening scene to Gifted, another coming of age movie in the drama category. For this watch I focused on the ordering of the credits, as for the other two I watched didn’t have the major credits that is required for this project. I noticed that, once again, the main focus of this opening scene was to introduce the characters and the relationship between the father and daughter. We also get a glimpse into the conflict that might happen in the film, which might be due to her troubles in school. Ok, so for the ordering of the credits, I saw that they had the title of the film very early on in the film (just like in Boyhood), so figure that’s the way I should go with my film as it seems conventional for the genre. Then came the casting director, music supervisors, music writers, costume designer, film editor, production designer, directory of photograph, executive producers, and finally the producer. Wow that was a lot. The ones that I’m gonna focus on, however, (cause that’s a lot of credits) are major actors, film editor, production designer, director of photography, and producer. This film opening has given me an idea of how I want to order my credits in my film opening.
The next film opening I watched was from Good Boys. This film is in the coming of age comedy genre, so I thought I’d explore this sub-genre as well to get a good example. The opening’s main purpose was to introduce the main character as well as allude to the conflict, which would be the struggles of growing up. I definitely want to include this in my opening, as I want to make sure the audience knows the conflict right in the beginning of the film without giving away too much just as this film did.
After watching that opening, I decided to delve deeper into the topic I really want to focus my film on: the gay struggle. So I looked up different films that embrace LGBTQ+ topics within the coming of age genre to get an idea of how these films started. One film opening I watched was Love, Simon. This opening, just like in Perks of Being a Wallflower, began with a voiceover of the main character describing his life. Normally I’d think this would be a little cringe, but I think this opening did it justice. The voiceover introduced the main character as well as his family and friends. It also introduced the major conflict, without being too obvious, which was him being gay and having to deal with it in high school. The use of music was also really interesting as it added to the tone, which a lot of coming of age pieces do, so I definitely want to have good music in my opening.
The next film I watched under this topic was The Half of It. Ok I really liked this one. The film started, once again, with a voiceover, but what I really loved about it was the fact that the voiceover part was all during an animation sequence. It was so cool. I’ve gotta show you.
This animation sequence provided insight into the characters struggle of not fitting in and wanting to find love. I think it’s a really creative idea that adds so much to the film opening. Then the animation fades out into the harsh reality of high school, which I think is a really cool idea. The opening in itself provides context, an introduction to the conflict, and an introduction to the main character. I watched this video of the director, Alice Wu, who goes further into why she chose this opening scene. She talks about how the opening scene acts as a beginning to the discovery that her main character will go through in the film. She also explains how little parts of the animated sequence hint to various parts in the actual film itself, foreshadowing to things that are soon to happen.
The idea of an animated sequence is really interesting tome. I kinda want to delve a little deeper into this idea. Which brings me to the next part of this post. I maybe have an idea of how I want to start my opening. Inspired by The Half of It’s opening sequence, I want to incorporate an animated sequence into my own opening. I don’t know yet what I want to really do for the animation, but I like the idea of a stop motion piece, just as Alice Wu describes she did with help from her animators. The question is, how practical is it? and how good of a drawer must I be to make it actually look good? Questions I’ve gotta think a little bit more into, but this film opening really inspired me to do something similar.
Ok so it’s Valentine’s day today and since I have nothing better to do, I figured I’d start to schedule this GIGANTIC project. This project consist’s of so many different parts that it’s a little overwhelming even thinking about it right now. So, I decided I’d break it down to a weekly schedule.
I’ve used this app called Notion for everything school related, like with assignments and tests and stuff, so I figured it would be the perfect thing to organize myself with this project.
[video of how I have my school work organized. isn’t it cool!]
Anyway’s enough of me fangirling over Notion. I figured I could use this app just like I do for school for the portfolio project. The app allows me to create a schedule on a calendar that is extremely helpful to organize myself and helps me keep track of everything I have to do.
Ok so I started by figuring out the basics of what I need to do, which you can see under the checklist of “major planning steps”. This helped me orient myself and know what I needed to get done specifically. I started with brainstorming/research, then storyboarding, script writing, developing story outline, and finally having a shot list. This is everything I need to get done before I can even think about starting filming. Then I wrote out everything that needs to get done on a week to week basis. Here’s a basic rundown of everything that must happen every week (which is all written in Notion, but it’s hard to see in the video)
2/8-2/11 (already did this!): start brainstorming genre
2/12-2/18: choose genre, research openings in genre, develop schedule (what I’m doing right now :) )
2/19-2/25: figure out approach and plot
2/26-3/3: storyboard and shot list
3/4-3/10: pre-production, props, setting, cast
3/11-3/17: FILMING/EDITING
3/18-3/24: editing and CCR
3/25-3/31: CCR
4/1: finalize film
4/2: DUE DATE
In my Notion calendar I wrote out exactly what needed to be done each day. Every day I did a little list of everything I would have to do for that day to keep my self on track to completing this project in time. I think this project timeline will really help with organizing myself, which was something that was difficult for me when we worked on the Music Marketing project. With my calender I will be able to stay on top of everything that I need to get done and so I won’t get behind and haven’t to rush to finish the project at the end. It also really helped me break down this huge project into smaller more simpler tasks so it doesn’t seem as daunting anymore.
Over the weekend I started brainstorming various genre’s for my film opening. I didn’t know at all what I wanted to do my film on, so I started by looking up genre’s in film. The ones that most resonated with me were Action/Adventure, Science Fiction, and Coming-of-Age. After narrowing down my choices a little bit, I started to research different conventions of the genres to see which ones would work the best for this project and which one’s I could come up with ideas for.
Action films are often associated with some sort of quest or end result, typically with “combat, violence and pursuit”, as according to Encyclopedia.com’s article regarding Action and Adventure Films (It’s linked, go check it out!). Films of this genre typically focus on character vs character conflict, which I thought was an interesting approach to this project. Some popular action films include John Wick (all four of them), any Fast and Furious Movie (there are so many), and The Matrix. However, after deeper consideration, I realized that action films typically depend on high special effects and a big budget, which is something I would not be able to achieve at this level. So I scrapped that idea.
My next idea was a film about science fiction. Action and science fiction are pretty similar, but science fiction focuses more on the mythical and more dystopian feel, rather than just guns and fast cars. Some examples of the science fiction genre in movies include ET, Avatar, and the Star Wars franchise. Science fiction seemed like a really interesting topic as it would let me explore various effects of technology and create a story from complete scratch and build my own world. However, due to similar reasons as not choosing action, science fiction would require intense special effects and editing techniques that I would simply not be able to complete in a 9 week time period. So I scrapped this idea too.
The final genre that I researched was the coming of age genre (P.S. this is the one I’m choosing!!). A coming of age film is characterized by the main character’s journey as they overcome adversity, typically due to the struggles of growing up. Some typical topics in these kinds of films include romantic relationships, going to middle or high school, or the struggles of growing up and wanting to fit in. Major characteristics of coming of age films include character growth, emotional dialogue, and focuses on social commentary, often to do with drugs, teen pregnancy, or bullying. Some notable films of this genre include The Breakfast Club, Boyhood, and Ladybird. I’m choosing this genre for my final portfolio project because I feel like I can create a story that people my age can relate to and coming up with an idea for my film shouldn’t be too difficult because I basically am living the teenage life. Filming won’t be as difficult either because there isn’t as much need for intense editing or special effects, and finding a cast wouldn’t be as hard because I can just recruit my friends to be in my film as the main characters will be people our age.
Now that I know what genre I’m going to base my film off of, its time to research different films in the genre to get ideas of what my plot should be and what kinds of shots and techniques are often used in this genre. Research here I come!
References!!
“Coming-of-Age Movies: What Is the Coming-of-Age Genre? - 2024.” MasterClass, www.masterclass.com/articles/coming-of-age-movies. Accessed 13 Feb. 2024.
.“." Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film. . Encyclopedia.Com. 7 Feb. 2024 .” Encyclopedia.Com, Encyclopedia.com, 13 Feb. 2024, www.encyclopedia.com/arts/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/action-and-adventure-films.
It is officially the beginning of my portfolio project. After copious amounts of learning and research throughout this class, we have FINALLY started working on our Cambridge portfolio project. The project will be a two minute film opening of any genre and I am so excited to begin. This project will take almost 2 months to complete and I will be spending a LOT of time working on this. But where to begin?
Throughout the past two class periods, we have started to learn about what this project will actually comprise of. Last class we discussed various aspects of a film opening and what we should include and think about including in our opening. Here’s a picture of my notes that I took while my teacher was talking about this content.
We learned that a film opening should establish tone and genre, include credits (such as director, producer, writer, cinematographer, editor, and major actors) and the title of the film (this is really important!!), develop purpose and engage the audience. We also learned about the various approaches to a film opening. These include developing context, character, tone, establishing setting, and establishing various types of conflict. The two approaches that I’m most interesting in are establishing character or establishing conflict.
I have no idea what I want to do my film opening about, but focusing on establishing character seems interesting to me. I like the idea of creating a character that my audience can relate to or feel drawn to, yet make it exciting. This approach would allow me to focus more on this specific character, especially through developing their aesthetic through costumes, makeup and setting. This approach would also allow me to delve deeper into my character and have the film focus on their interactions with other characters and their development throughout the rest of the film. Developing character in the opening scenes builds a good basis for the rest of the film, foreshadowing for what is to come in the rest of the film.
The other type of film opening that interests me is one that establishes conflict. There are many different types of conflict, but the ones that draw my attention are character vs. character or character vs. supernatural. These types of conflicts seem like they would be fun to explore and would bring more action to my film, especially in the opening. Having conflict as the initial scenes to my film would be a lot of fun and I think this is a great option for my film opening.
The first part to the music marketing project was to research how other companies and musicians advertise their music to consumers. My group and I began with researching production companies, specifically in the country genre because that’s what we were assigned. We found two production companies: Big Machine Label Group and Mercury Records Nashville. Under these companies we picked two artists from each. From Big Machine we chose Dolly Parton and Florida Georgia Line and under Mercury Records we chose Chris Stapleton and Luke Grimes.
I had to research the band Florida Georgia Line and I began by finding out the history behind the group and how it formed. I found their website (https://floridageorgialine.com) and looked into how Big Machine developed a marketing campaign for them. I researched about the different marketing techniques they used such as making a brand for themselves by making personal relations with their fans and have a fun and lively atmosphere at their concerts. This research allowed me to understand how marketing in the music industry works and allowed me to use these techniques in our marketing campaign.
After we all finished researching our respective groups/artists, we moved on to planning our actual project. The first thing we needed to do was finalize which song we would do for our music video . We were given three options, and after careful consideration we chose “Need You Now” by Lady Antebellum. We listened to the song fully and started to brainstorm what we wanted to do for our music video. We had to decide between a promo, storytelling or artistic music video, and after looking at the lyrics, we decided to do a storytelling video. We then had to discuss what type of story we should tell. After figuring out the content of the music video we began to storyboard it. Here is the storyboard for our music video:
We then began the process of actually marketing our artist and brainstorming how we would do that. We discussed and brainstormed our marketing plan. We drew up a brainstorming sheet where we came up with ideas to push our artist into the mainstream. We took ideas from our research and incorporated them into our own marketing campaign such as partnering with a whiskey brand just as Florida Georgia Line did. We discussed our distribution plan and how we would start with releasing a single and then following it up with a release of a full album. Then we wanted to artist to go on tour and incorporated that into our plan. The most difficult part of the process was figuring out the artists signature move/brand identity. We eventually came up with the idea of the artist having her own lipstick brand, and her brand identity incorporate that into her music. Lipstick would be her signature look, which we got the idea from Dolly Parton’s signature look of her big hair. Here is a picture of our brainstorming process:
We then began to film our music video. We went over to one of the group member’s house and started filming the various shots that we decided upon during the brainstorming/storyboarding sessions we had before. I acted as the director of the video while my other group members were acting in it as the characters. The hardest part of this part of the project was getting the perfect shot that we had envisioned while brainstorming. It was difficult trying to produce our vision, but we were able to make it work. We then went to South West Ranches, a town near our school, where we filmed everything that we wanted to be outside. This did not take long and we were able to finish it before it got too dark to film.
The next thing I had to do was actually edit the music video together. This process was tedious, but eventually I was able to put all the videos together. I had a hard time syncing up the lip syncing of the singer with the actual song in the background and I had to go back and edit each individual shot so the lips would match up correctly. This was especially annoying as I had to continuously input new videos that we had recorded on different days as it would mess up my entire editing process and the syncing up that I had already done. Each time I would have to basically start over and sync up the lyrics once again. Previously, our teacher had explained to us that a fix to this difficult problem would be to film shots where the artist’s mouth was mostly covered by extraneous things. I tried to incorporate this, like for example with the shots that were extremely dark and it was hard to see the singer’s mouth. That was I had some leeway when matching the lyrics to the mouth.
During class times we worked on our PowerPoint. In the beginning we were stuck on what we actually wanted to write on each slide and how we wanted to communicate to our audience the various marketing and distribution patterns and ideas we had come up with. We divided up the presentation to each group member and began working on our various slides. I was assigned to the explanation of the music video slide and the distribution slide. The music video slide allowed me to explain why our video would be a good promotional video, especially for this upcoming artist that we had created. I explained how various aspects of the music video aligned with her target audience and how the storytelling aspect of the video aligned with the genre of the song.
I was also tasked to help out with the marketing aspect of the project. I created a website (which was a pain to make and took a LOT of time) that acted as a hub for all of our artist’s creation, and I think it came out pretty well. I struggled a lot with figuring out how to use the website and how to add everything that I wanted to include while making it look aesthetically pleasing as well. Here’s a screen recording of the website:
Along with the website, I also created a promotional teaser trailer to our artist’s album. This was also a struggle to make, but it came out really well and I fell as if it really adds to the marketing of her album. This video will appear on her instagram, which was created by another group member. We then finalized all the marketing products and every idea we would incorporate into our presentation through discussion in class. Here is the video that I created:
Once each group member completed their slide for the presentation we began creating script for our actual recording of our slideshow. We each wrote our own parts and included information that we deemed necessary for our artist. We were then able to record each of our parts and edit them all together into one huge presentation that included every aspect we wanted to discuss.
In this project I learned how to manage my time wisely. It was a struggle figuring out the timing of this project because there were so many components and I didn’t know how I would manage it all. The structure that our teacher gave us provided an outline in which to start, but beyond that it was still difficult to manage time well, especially in finishing the PowerPoint. I also learned about different ways artist’s market and distribute their music based on their audience and how they want to be portrayed and viewed by their audience. Even in a similar genre, many artists have a different brand identity because of the vibe that they want to put out to their audience. Dolly Parton and Florida Georgie Line, for example, are both a part of the country music genre, yet their music could not be any more different. This is because of their audience and how they present themselves. I learned that knowing your audience is the most important part of a musicians success. Additionally, I fell as if this project will be a huge help once we begin our Cambridge portfolio. Our final project will consist of a huge amount of work and managing time to finish everything in a timely fashion will be the hardest part. This project allowed us to understand the important of this and practice it on a lower stakes project. This was a great way to ready us for our Cambridge portfolio project.
