Publicity Shots: Further Research

Using the collection of images of publicity shots we had from a few weeks ago, we decided to look further into costume, posing, light and framing for the publicity shots of the band.

Firstly we sat together with the pictures we gathered and made notes on the common characteristics and conventions between them and discussed what we particularly liked about each one, and which ones we could take influence from for our photos.

From this we agreed that we wanted to try both direct and indirect address, along with a range of frames, along with full length, long shots. We also decided that we wanted a studio-based setting with high key lighting, similar to Clean Bandit publicity shots.

Example of a Clean Bandit Publicity Shot

We also discussed the positioning of the band. We wanted Kayvon to stand out more than Gavin and me, because he's the leader of the group. However we didn't want him to dominate the shots, otherwise it would offset the themes of friendship our video and brand are trying to convey.

Production Meetings: Week of 3 - 7 November

This was the last week before our first shoot, so we had to make sure all the props for the shots we planned for were in school by Saturday morning and that the majority of our research and planning for the video was done by the time we started the production stage.

As well as preparing for the shoot, we worked on other aspects too. We prepared the confetti for later shots, so that we have less to organise later. We also brought in some of the costumes, for other shots, like the superhero costumes.

Agenda for the week

Our to-do list for doing before Saturday's shoot

Finally we made some notes on publicity shots, on how we want the band to be posing, the costumes they'll be wearing and the overall colour scheme of the pictures.

Publicity shot notes (page 1)

Publicity shot notes (page 2)

Costume, Hair and Make-up

Kayvon (Lead Guitarist/Singer)

For Kayvon and Gavin's characters we took fairly similar inspirations for both characters, so I put them into a mood board for the both of them rather than making two very visually similar mood boards.

For Kayvon's character, being the lead, we wanted him to stand out the most. Therefore we decided to dress him up slightly more than Gavin's character, by making him wear button-up shirts in almost all of the shots, even if he wore them casually and unbuttoned, like in the prop set up shots. This was influenced by artists like George Ezra and Dan Croll, who, even though are solo artist, stand out compared to artists like the band members of The 1975 (not including the lead).

Performance Setup

Visual Rep of Kayvon's costume

Kayvon is wearing a blue and white button-up shirt, dark skinny jeans, wristbands and his black Dr. Marten boots.

For the performance shots, we wanted the band to look more dressed up, this was to add contrast to the more casual shots where the band play with the props. So we put the two boys in smart shirts and had a black and white colour scheme for costume.

The hair and make up is all fairly natural. We put foundation on Kayvon's skin to hide imperfections. We did not need to put any make-up on his eyelashes or eyebrows as they are already reasonably dark, therefore they would show up on camera easily.

Props Setup

The costumes for the props setup are more casual than the performance costumes. We dressed Kayvon in a plain, white t-shirt and an undone, brown, corduroy, button-up shirt over the top. He's also wearing dark grey skinny jeans and his black, lace-up Vans.

Superhero

The purpose of the superhero costumes was to fit in with the theme of nostalgia. Kayvon wore a Superman costume.

Publicity Shoot (1)

This publicity shoot was styled more casually styled, as none of us wore button up shirts or anything formal.

Kayvon is wearing a plain, white T-shirt, blue skinny jeans and black Vans.

Publicity Shoot (2)

This publicity shoot was more formal than the first as we wanted to have some variety of shots. This time the background was white rather than grey, again to have more variety of shots.

Kayvon is wearing a buttoned-up, brown corduroy shirt, black skinny jeans and his black Dr. Martens boots.

Publicity Shoot (3)

This third publicity shoot was more serious and make the band look cool, with a colour scheme of grey, black and white, against a grey background.

Kayvon is wearing a plain white shirt under a half done-up, green, checked shirt. He's also wearing dark grey skinny jeans and his black Doc Marten boots.

Gavin (Drummer)

Gavin is the drummer, meaning that his character draws the least attention than any other member in the band. We dressed Gavin's character in overall quite casual clothing, such as t-shirts and pull-over jumpers. If it was necessary for his character to wear a button-up shirt, in for example the performance shots, we added a casual item of clothing, for example his Addidas trainers.

We took influence from George Ezra, Bombay Bicycle Club and The 1975.

Performance Setup

Visual Rep of Gavin's costume

Gavin is wearing a white button-up shirt, dark skinny jeans, wristbands and trainers.

We wanted him to look smart, but slightly more casual than Kayvon because we wanted the audience to be able to differentiate between the lead and the other band members. To do this we put him in trainers rather than something like Doc Martins.

Gavin's make-up was simple too. We put foundation on his skin to hide his imperfections. However since his hair colour is quite fair, we coloured his eyebrows and eyelashes with a light brown colour to make sure his features were not washed out on camera.

Props Setup

For the prop setup Gavin is wearing a white, printed t-shirt, black skinny jeans and his blue Addidas trainers.

Superhero

For the superhero prop scenes, Gavin is wearing a Batman costume.

Publicity Shoot (1)

For the first publicity shoot, Gavin is wearing his blue and yellow patterned, knitted pullover, black skinny jeans and trainers.

Publicity Shoot (2)

For the second publicity shoot, Gavin is wearing a white t-shirt, with a short-sleeved, blue, undone shirt over the top, along with his blue skinny jeans and brown trainers.

Album Cover Shoot

For the third publicity shoot, Gavin is wearing a grey, buttoned-up shirt, black skinny jeans and blue trainers.

Alice (Bassist)

My character's costume required more thought because I'm female, as opposed to the other two. We wanted my character to be aspirational to our female audiences but also slightly quirky to connote the indie genre. However we didn't want to draw too much attention to her and away from Kayvon (the lead), so we dressed me in quite casual, tomboy-style clothes.

Some inspirations we used were Kristen Stewart, Mila Kunis and Alexa Chung.

Performance Setup

Visual Rep of my costume

Ripped, high-wasted skinny jeans, a black crop top, a checked, black and white button-up shirt and black Converse shoes.

For make-up, I wore foundation to cover imperfections, make-up on my eyebrows to make them stand out and eye shadow, mascara and winged eyeliner to enhance my eyes on camera.

We kept my hair fairly natural, but I straightened it down a bit to make it appear slightly longer and slightly more styled, as it is naturally quite curly.

Reference to winged eyeliner: Hayley Williams (Paramore)

Props Setup

For the prop setup, I am wearing a grey, knitted jumper, blue skinny jeans and black, slip-on Vans.

Superhero

For the superhero setup, I am wearing a Green Lantern costume.

Publicity Shoot (1)

For the first publicity shoot, my character is wearing blue skinny jeans, a white vest top, with a blue button-up shirt, half done-up, along with black slip-on Vans.

Publicity Shoot (2)

For the second publicity shot, I am wearing a long-sleeved, white shirt, high-waisted skinny jeans and black, high-top Converse.

Publicity Shoot (3)

For the thrid publicity shoot, I'm wearing a black vest top with a knitted grey jumper over the top. I'm also wearing a black skirt with tights, along with black, high-top Converse shoes.

Shoot-board

After the storyboard was done we started on the shot list, so that we could begin on the shoot board. To start this we categorised all the shots on the storyboard into 4 different setups: performance, confetti, balloons, empty set and empty set without band members in.

By writing out all the shots like this it makes it easier to put together similar shots for the shoot-board and ensures we do not miss any shots in the process.

Once we had the list of shots categorised, I put them onto a shoot board in order, so that on the day of shooting we had a list of the shots to reference to and to check off.

Page one of our shoot schedule

We put in the set up number, an image from the animatic for us to reference to, a short description of the shot, what is included in the set, cast needed, props needed and the lighting we will use.

However we didn't fill in the time section because we didn't know exactly how long each shot would take to film, especially as some shots would take longer to film, for example the Glide-cam shots, which would take a lot of setting up and testing. This may mean that we might not get all the shots done in time but we'd rather get a few good shots than lots of bad shots that will need to be reshot.

Shoot Schedule & Call Sheet

This is our shoot schedule, made by Mahalia. This was made so that the whole cast and crew are completely clear on what time everyone has to be in, for what shot and what props will be needed. We made this using the shootboard and the studio schedules. 

Shoot Schedule

This is the call sheet, which is useful so that the cast and crew can look for their name and see when they are needed on set, just at a glance.

Studio Schedule

Since a lot of the groups are using studio to film their videos and not everyone has the same free time during school times, a schedule had to be made to break down the times that the studio could be used by different groups.

The members of our group mostly had completely different free time to each other, which made scheduling for our group more difficult.

Group 1 (our group which is coloured in blue on the schedule) have some long time slots, especially at the weekend where we are all present (marked with a capital A for all), which we hope to shoot the majority of the footage using the performance setup with. The other slots are during school time, which can be beneficial to us, for example with the performance shots using confetti, we need people on the sides to throw the confetti, which would be more difficult for us to do during the weekend when no-one is around. During the school time slots we think that it will be better to film the shots using the empty set and the close ups. This is because the empty set has very little preparation time and the close ups can be shot without the whole group present (as it is only one band member in the shot at a time).

Casting

Pilgrim is a three-piece band formed of Kayvon, Gavin and myself. We kept the band members within the group to make scheduling easier for ourselves and also because we are all friends, therefore making the chemistry on camera more genuine.

Kayvon Nabijou

We cast Kayvon as the lead singer and guitarist. We felt that Kayvon was the most comfortable in front of camera out of the three of us. This was because he played the lead singer and guitarist in our prelim exercise when we remade The 1975 'Girls' video. Below is a short video of shots from our prelim shoot demonstrating Kayvon's stage presence.

Kayvon's character is the leader of the group and he is cool, stylish, confident and modest.

Alice Cahill

I am the bassist of Pilgrim. We decided to have a female member in the band to break conventions and to appeal to wider audiences. By having a female bassist, female audiences could view her as an aspirational figure. We wouldn't be able to achieve this with an all-boy band.

I have experience in front of the camera and know how to play guitar, so playing bass on-camera should look more natural.

My character is cool, quirky, aspirational and a tomboy.

Gavin Fraser

Gavin is the drummer of Pilgrim. We cast Gavin because he plays drums and has experience playing drums on-camera for the Girls video remake, therefore playing in our music video should not be a problem for him.

Gavin's character is relaxed, funny and laid-back. We felt that this fit well with his personality anyway so he will look genuine on camera.

Once we had made the final choices, Mahalia created a cast list for us to reference to whilst we're shooting.

Album Cover: Initial Designs

To begin with, I started looking at interesting textures to base the background of the design on.

http://www.bene.be/blog/comments/15_textures_for_download

http://www.bittbox.com/freebies/free-high-res-texture-pack-the-anatomy-of-a-really-old-book

http://www.mayang.com/textures/Fabric/html/Patterned%20Fabric/index.html

Then using these textures, I experimented using Photoshop and some of the features it has to manipulate the photographs and create different looks. The first three designs are unfinished don't have the title or album name because I was only testing the effects on the photo. My favourite are the first two because they clearly connote the indie genre and they are interesting to look at.

I made some more designs after that, with a different texture and mood completely. I like the effect of the yellow in the background coming off on the photo, which looks like paint. I tried to incorporate colour scheme into these ones. However it's quite loud and conveys more of a punk-rock genre rather than indie.

Gavin's First Designs

Gavin created some of his own designs using similar ideas to textures. He used a different font and experimented with block colour and shapes.

From creating these initial designs we were able to have a starting point for the album cover. We can now use the ideas from some of these designs and channel them into a few designs that we all like.

Using design ideas from our past experiments, I created some more album designs. I tried to use different publicity shot types (mainly ones with white backgrounds as that's what our shots will have).

My Second Group of Designs

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

My favourites are numbers 2,3,6 and 8. I like the paper textures and the effect I used on the image. However, when I showed the group my designs, Gavin pointed out that the logo I used was very visually similar to the band Muse's logo, therefore we decided to change it.

Muse's band logo

I took into account the comments that the group made. Gavin, Mahalia and I then created a completely new cover, not including the lines. I liked the 'scrapbook effect' so we tried to use more paper textures and we also used a filter on the picture to add contrast to it. Lastly we used a clipping mask to create a cut-out effect.

9

After we made the design above, Gavin and I made a few more to make the whole image feel less 2D. In images 10 and 11, we added shadows, in the first it was a black which we liked but thought was a bit too dark for the overall colour scheme of the album. From this we then created the second one which had a shadow using the paper the texture from the back. We then tried to reposition the words and use a different focal image.

10

11

12

From making these, Gavin and I showed the rest of the group our new designs and then we all agreed that numbers 11 and 12 worked best and that we will use this as a template and then put in our own publicity photos in place of the ones of the established bands.