Music Marketing #2

Instead of making a storyboard digitally on Thursday, we decided to make the storyboard during our classtime the day after. These changes in plans paid off, and my group was able be proactive and create a viable storyboard in one class period. This feat was only made possible by our combined efforts to pitch in ideas and shots; each individual played a role in planning the music video. We had also brainstormed the band name "Marz" and the song name "Resile" during our planning phase.

This was our first page of the storyboard used for the music video. We had our group members Clover and Zach draw the images, as they were more artistically inclined.

After we completed our story board, most of my group met up in person to finally record the music video. While the main role of Zach and I was to act as characters in the music video, Clover and Bia directed the shots, mise-en-scene, and other elements in the video. Although we didn't record every shot in the storyboard, it gave us a sense of direction during filming and allowed us to complete our music video after two days of filming. Hailey was the only one that couldn't show up, yet did the most work out of all of us. In fact, Hailey made almost the entire powerpoint, and only after we finished the music video did we pitch in to finish it and review her work, which we barely modified because of the quality. We greatly appreciated her role as the "backbone" of our group.

One of the PowerPoint slides arranged by Hailey, demonstrating our promotional Instragram page. Other pages that we made include a Marz website and a few product samples for marketing.

Finally, we began the production phase. We all decided that I would edit the video, and I'd send them the final product to review and see any changes we could make. I made sure to sync everything to the best of my ability; the song timestamps on the storyboard mdae this task much easier, though I also took it upon myself to sync a purposely erratic and heavily edited introduction to the music video. Through the editing process of the music video, I made sure to incorporate numerous techniques such as reverses and speed-ups for the faster and more chaotic parts of the music video. Zooms and black-and-white shifts were used in the slower sections, including a decreased frequency in shots. We also made sure to use blue lighting in one of the sadder shots to emphasize the characters' mood.

The use of blue lighting around the subject symbolizes coldness and sorrow.

We then smoothly presented our project to the class, as we had assigned slides divided evenly between each person. All of us practiced our slides and outlined them effectively, including the showcase of the Instagram page, our website, and our music video. I was the one to explain the music video after its showcase, as I was the one who edited the video for several hours.

Ultimately, this project taught me, most importantly, that organization is everything. Planning, coordination, or however it may be called, it always involves preparation and readiness. Without planning the shots, planning the meet-ups, and without assigning our roles or slides, our project would have fallen apart. In fact, no good projects are ever made without proper preparation. There are definitely ways that we could've coordinated better, which would've resulted in a more sophisticated product, but that is a learning experience that can now be applied to future projects. The daily human experience is that of constant growth, majorly comprised of growth from mistakes. Moving forward I will continue to learn from my mistakes to constantly improve the quality of my work.