Research Blog

 Now that the commercial project is completely finished and I've had a chance to reflect on it, I've realized that it was an amazing learning experience. It was our first big assignment where we had to film and edit and I learned a ton along the way. I learned how to film and use the class cameras and how tedious it is as an actor to shoot all the scenes multiple times. I learned how to edit the footage and add music and sound throughout the process. It was extremely fun and we put our best effort into every step of the filming and editing process. Even though it was stressful at times with the short deadlines, we just stayed focused, planned everything out, and it all worked out in the end. Overall, it was a very informative and enjoyable experience. That being said, we have now moved on from the commercial and have started a new project. The project is a music video in which we have to film and edit 90 seconds of a music video that we came up with for the song.

 The song we chose is called Chinese New Year. This song is by the band SALES. Chinese New Year is in the genre of pop. They released this song in 2014 but it didn’t get popular until recently. SALES is an American band from Florida. The members are Lauren Morgan and Jordan Shih. They are joined on tour by Malcolm Martin, who is the live drummer and percussionist for when they go on tour. Some other songs they play are Vow and Thurs 6-25.

 With the genre of our song being pop, there was a lot of music videos of songs in the same genre to look at for reference and ideas for our music video. The camera angles are often eye level, high angles, and over the shoulder. The shots typically are single, two, or three shot, and medium shots. The editing consists of sharp and sudden cuts and lots of different angles.

1. The costumes usually consist of odd or eccentric designs. They often dress in dresses and suits with bright pops of color or the entire thing is colorful.
2. The lighting is bright and colorful to mix with the bright costumes. The lights are usually flashing and or sparking so it catches the audience’s attention. 
3. They usually act happy or joyful depending on the music, like if the song is more upbeat and peppy, then they might be smiling. If the music has a more sad tone then they might be frowning and slouching.
4. The makeup usually goes with the costumes like if they have a colorful dress then they might have colorful makeup. It ranges from being extravagant to stand out or very light and subtle depending on the surrounding colors.
5. The props tend to be comically large and not proportional compared to the surroundings and characters. They also tend to have bright colors to match with the costumes and lights. 
6. The setting is usually in a bright room with some sort of color in it. The setting also is often outside on a sunny day.