Filming Day 3

Today's shoot was to primarily to film the horse (filler) shots. I collected the horse we chose to work with from the field and we groomed her for around half an hour. This not only made her appear clean and smarter for camera but it also got her used to our voices and kept her calm. I feel like today was a great success, especially since the weather was perfect. Not only did we film the horse, but we also managed to get the album cover photo

From previous planning, we has established that shots of the horse being 'led' around the field by a person (me) and finally shots of her galloping through a filed would look great and would fit into our concept style and meanings that had been implemented in the rest of the video. The reason for picking a horse, firstly walking around and finally running freely, was to symbolise the woman being 'trapped' in her relationship and eventually 'breaking free' from the relationship.

Obviously when working with any animal additional safety precautions had to be taken. The sheer size of the horse alone was a danger in itself meaning we needed someone who knew something about the animals and someone who the horse was comfortable to work with.

Filming the horse took time and patience but we began be following a similar filming pattern to the previous two days. Therefore we set up a range of shots where the horse would by led in a continuous 'S' letter shape in front of the camera, this would create angle range and different perspectives on the horse. We continued this, walking the horse from a distance up close to the camera, and filmed each sequence so it was accompanied by a different back ground view. This gave us range when it came to editing. 

Taking the still shots, which we would use for our digipak cover, we decided that the main feature should be the leader and a horse. We took many shots from different distances and with various scenery to review and pick the best at a later date. The imagery again was linked to our video as the same female is shown walking the horse as on the images. This not only gives the audience the impression that the single which would be on the album is a more well known song, and would create recognition when buying or watching the video as the two products can be linked easily.

Filming Day 2

We had arranged at the end of our first filming day that we would meet again to film the other main section of our music video on the following weekend (12th February). We arrived at the farm about 12:30pm, again a dull, wet day with very strong wind. Hannah and Beth (our two dancers) stayed in the car to put on their make up and finishing touches to the costumes, this was to mainly avoid the weather. Matt Lauren and myself set up the barn by moving the gates, to create enough space for Hannah and Beth to dance in, and sweeping the area of hay and removing any unwanted objects. 

As with the other half of the filming we decided to film the dance from many different angles to ensure footage was not scarce and we have a choice of what to edit, where to cut and to allow the desired outcome to be as closely achieved as possible.The dance was choreographed well in advance to ensure the day ran as smooth as possible. We began by shooting the dance from a standard mid length straight on angle and soon moved on more creative shots such as having the dance going on 'around' the camera and extreme close ups of particular body parts (to exaggerate certain dance moves)

An important element of the day was providing 'warming' breaks for the dancers. As we filmed in February, the temperature was not pleasant to be exposed in, and with the thin outfits we chose to use, it was important that the dancers did not become too cold and risk their own health. To counter this effect we provided blankets and additional layers, which we gave to them after every completed shot of the dance sequence. 

Filming Day 1

From producing our filming time schedule sheet, we began the first bit of our filming of the 5th February 2011. We had decided that it would be best to focus on both elements of the music video individually so that we could focus on each one separately to ensure quality was as good as possible. The other reason for doing this was to make sure that our actors and helpers were not wasting their kindly donated time by standing around aimlessly, and becoming de-motivated.

On the first day (5th Feb) we focused heavily on filming the miming, or 'singing', section of the video. The weather was not good in the morning at about 9:00am so we agreed to wait until 11:00am to see if the weather had improved or at least the rain had stopped. The weather conditions had not changed by 11:15am but we still arranged to meet at 11:30am (our set time) at our location - Acton Trussell farm. When we arrived at our location, we double checked our required equipment list (this allowed one of us to drive home to get anything if we'd forgotten it) and began to carry the equipment (camera, tripod and lighting) to the Oak tree where we would be filming this section of the music video. 

In order to get enough footage, we filmed Ben (our male lead), miming the entire song, in sections, from many different angles: straight on (mid, close ups and extreme close up), from above and below, over the shoulder etc). By doing this it gave us a wide range of footage to play around with and use when we came to edit our project. As well as giving us a variety of creative shots to consider, it also meant that if any shots were not suitable (out of time lip syncing, objects in shots, marks on the camera lens) we had enough footage of each shot so we could ensure that at least one of the shots was usable when editing.

We shared duty's throughout the day and tried to rotate and be fair when allocating. The main jobs we divided out where of course filming, along with lighting, lighting aids (reflectors, filters) and 'water control', which meant keeping equipment dry, as well as the actor and lens of the camera so that the footage was not ruined with unwanted rain marks on the lens.