Costume and Make-Up Research

Costume not only helps the audience understand the age of the characters, but also the time in which the music video is set. e.g. modern day or periodic. Deciding what Phoebe will be wearing in our music video was not particularly difficult because we chose clothes to represent the emotions she is feeling throughout the music video. We have decided to dress Phoebe in black, ripped jeans and a khaki jumper to reinforce the stereotype that young people of this generation are often depressed or sluggish. She is going through a break-up, so naturally she will feel down. The fact that much of her upper-torso will be concealed also emphasises she may be insecure or worried about never finding someone like him again. She will also be wearing these clothes (including Nike Janoski shoes) because they are stereotypical items of clothing that young people wear; this helps to make the music video less jarring. She will also undoubtedly be wearing a coat to keep herself warm as we will be filming in the winter time.

She will also be wearing a necklace. The significance of the necklace will be that her ex-boyfriend gave it to her. The fact she hasn't taken it off shows she is not over him yet and still needs to come to terms with the break-up before she is ready to take it off.

Below are images of costumes we want our actor to wear when we are filming our music video:

Phoebe will be wearing minimal make-up to intensify the fact that she is not trying to impress anyone and feels down about the break-up situation. We also feel like a casual look (to match the clothes she is wearing) would be jarring against a full face of make-up.

Casting Research

This is one of the hardest decisions to make during the research and planning process as it is vital we choose the right actor to fit the role of the character. If the actor does not fit the criteria, it could give the music video a jarring feel to it. Our music video was not based upon anything, e.g. a book, so our group had complete freedom with genre, song choice, theme and what we wanted our actor to look like as there is no 'character' to by.

The singer in 'New York City' is female and so it would only make sense to have a female actress. We wanted our actress to look very feminine and natural, e.g. to have long hair minimal make-up but also to look as if she fits in with the 'club scene'. We also wanted our actress to look mature as our target audience is 18-25 so if the actress is around this age or looks as if she were then it will help the audience to relate and connect with her, making our music video effective. We know that our close friend Phoebe has an interest in drama and achieved an A* grade at GCSE and a C at AS Level. She is an obvious choice for the lead female role.

Location Research

1) Bedroom

This location will be used to show the actions of the sad girl at the beginning of her day, i.e. checking her ex-boyfriend's profile online, putting make-up on and getting ready. The room will be dark and dusty (as if she rarely leaves it or goes outside of her house). This will help to emit raw emotions of loneliness. Empty alcohol bottles and cigarette packets will be placed around the room to tie the video with the lyrics - "to kill yourself with bad habits".

2) Forest/woods

We will film Phoebe walking and lip-syncing through the woods as part of our music video. It helps keep the visuals interesting if there is a variety of locations in which our character is filmed in. Also often people walk through the woods to get away from the struggles of everyday/home life because they are peaceful and tranquil. Our character is shown to be experience a break-up, which is saddening for her, thus, we wanted to film Phoebe in the woods as it shows that she is trying to escape the emotions she is feeing and try to clear her head.

3) Guards Park (Island)

It was Bonnie's suggestion to use Guards Park Island (facing the Maidenhead Bridge) as one of our locations for our music video. As a group we discussed how we thought that it would be possible to gain very effective shots of Phoebe walking up and down this bridge or sitting on the bench positioned opposite, as she reflects on the meaning of the song.

We also want to use that same bench, which is situated in the middle of the island to film the initials carved into the bench of the girl and her ex-boyfriend. This will make for an effective music video as it shows the typical activities that couples do and conforms to the media's representation of modern day couple life. Due to practical and financial difficulties we are unable to actually film this music video in New York City and so we want to constantly remind the audience that the girl is in a city but it is not New York. We have decided, as a group, to use this as a representation of Brooklyn Bridge in New York, because despite as much as we would like we cannot film in New York City, as previously explained. We also thought that by filming Phoebe walking across and looking out at the surrounding water would be very reflective of the way she is feeling and what she is experiencing.

4) Maidenhead Town Centre

As a group we have decided to include some footage of Phoebe walking through Maidenhead High Street. This helps bring some continuity to the music video as it helps to audience believe that the female character is actually on a journey rather than just random locations for variety purposes. This is also a representation of Maidenhead being a smaller version of New York City. Also, at night we thought this location would be effective to film in due to all the street/shop lights illuminating around her as she walks straight down the middle of the high street.

5) Top of car park

We thought that this will be the most effective location of all because it will make for a very cool shot. Being able to see the entire town lit-up at night will show just how deep the girl's emotions run and that they are constantly with her - through day and night. We think that the effect filming at night will bring to the music video and theme we are trying to project will work well and in our favour.

Final Idea for Music Video

After coming up with a wide variety of initial ideas, as a group we finalised our favourite idea:

This happened to be a day in the life of our female character. Our main character is to be a girl, around the age of 18 - an age based upon looming important decisions about what life has in store for them after they leave school/comfort of the comfortable, routine-based life they have become accustomed to.

We want her outfits to reflect her mood and by this we mean because the song is quite sad we do not want her to be in bright colours because it would be incongruous to the theme of the song and the emotions felt by the character.

We want to show a journey, such as the main character getting ready for the night, we will show her make-up as well as her in different locations such as the woods and the top of a building, looking out at the towns skyline. Our target audience is of an age where watching 'Day in the life of...' videos online are exceptionally popular, which is one of the reasons why we decided to follow with this theme.

We plan on making links with the lyrics and the visuals on certain lines such as "Losing my lover to the arms of another" and "New York City please go easy". As we will not actually be filming in New York City we want to find a way to incorporate American culture in to our video as well through imagery and metaphors.

Initial Ideas for Music Video, Digipak and Magazine Advertisment

Music Video Ideas

Digipak Ideas

Above are our initial ideas for our digipak. We wanted our actress to be on the front cover of our digipak and to incorporate the night-time shots that will be featured in our music video, shown through the drawing of the stars. We also wanted to conform to the typical EDM album covers that we have previously deconstructed by featuring the band/artists name and the song/album title. The side panels will most likely just include a backdrop of the city view (trying to mimic the song lyrics "New York City") with the song name/band name due to limited space. The back side of our digipak will follow on from the front with the night-time shots to give our first ancillary task a sense of continuity. To make the back side of our digipak more interesting to look at and appealing to a wider audience we have decided to introduce ideas about one statement object, e.g. our actress from a side point of view or a lamppost, originating from the filming location.

Magazine Advertisement Ideas

Above are our initial ideas for our magazine advertisement. We wanted the magazine advertisement to match our digipak to give our whole project a sense of consistency, but we have made minor changes to make sure we keep the campaign interesting and versatile. The only main difference between these ideas and our initial ideas for our digipak is the positioning of the superimposed text. We will have the record label name, name of artist and name of song on the advertisement but we also wanted to include "OUT NOW" because we thought it stands out and the sense of urgency it projects will help get our target audience engrossed in the promotion and speed up the purchasing process.

Analysis of Chosen Song

Deconstruction of lyrics:

Analysis of 'New York City' by The Chainsmokers

Because everyone in our group has very different music tastes it was a difficult task to decide on one genre. 'New York City' by The Chainsmokers incorporates almost every aspect of what everybody in the group likes listening to. This song will be challenging but enjoyable to use when filming for our music video because it has various ways to mimic the meaning of the lyrics into our visuals. I also think that because we will be filming in the winter season this will help creatively when trying to grasp the dark tone of the meaning behind the lyrics.

Audience Research

To ensure that all of the promotional materials appeal to the correct target audience, we have, as a group, decided to introduce a focus group to witness the development of our products and provide us with feedback at each different creative stage. Currently, some of the members of our focus group have provided their opinions on what they consider to be strengths and weaknesses of the real media artefacts we have been investigating. When moving forward, the focus group will provide us with feedback on our promotional works at periodic intervals. This will allow us to make our products to the best of our ability and to explain decisions about the development of the product through detailed evaluations. 

When we were assembling our focus group, the goal was to come up with a representative sample of our target audience. In order to decide on a target audience we began by creating a profile of a typical member using theories such as 'Register General's Social Scale' and 'Selby's Psychographic Cluster'.

Audience Profile:

Age: 15-24

Gender: Mixed, but primarily female

Register General's Social Scale: C1/B/E 

Selby's Psychographic Cluster: 'Innovators: who wish to make their mark'

The Register General's Social scale is the way the British Government defines the populace through their occupation:

Group	Occupations
A	Professional Workers (lawyers, doctors etc.), Scientists, Managers of large-scale organisations.
B	Shopkeepers, Farmers, Teachers, White-collar workers.
C1	Skilled Manual (i.e. hand) workers – e.g. high grade, e.g. master builders, carpenters, shop assistants, nurses.
C2	Skilled Manual – low grade, e.g. electricians, plumbers.
D	Semi-skilled Manual, e.g. bus drivers, lorry drivers, fitters.
E	Unskilled Manual, e.g. general labourers, barmen, porters.

Values, attitudes and lifestyles (VALS) is possibly a better way of defining audiences by categorising them into groups by the values and attitudes they hold, along with the lifestyle they have. These are psychographic variables (psychographics is the study of personality, values, attitudes, interests and lifestyles).

Description:
A typical member of our target audience would be a female, however the various promotions will be targeted for both males and females. When researching The Chainsmokers original productions and who typically goes to see them live, we personally felt that they catered slightly more for women than men. They would also be in their late teens or early twenties - perhaps a sixth-form/university student. They would be someone who wishes to strive in the world they are present in and make their mark and could possibly see themselves as rebellious - someone who wishes to remake their world in their own image. We also think that the members of our target audience would most defiantly enjoy going to gigs and festivals, much like those of Nass and Boomtown, where dance/EDM music is sort after.

In terms of Elihu Katz's 'Uses and Gratifications', they would be someone who gains a sense of their own identity from the music they listen to and someone who uses music as a form of escapism from the stresses of everyday life drama. The 'Uses and Gratifications' model suggests that audiences use the media rather than being used by the media.

Focus Group:
Using this audience profile (above) as a base, we compiled a group of five people who are within the same friendship group so to an extent share similarities and are similar ages/genders with our target audience. We will continue to use the exact same members of the focus group throughout the development of our coursework and evaluations.

Phoebe: Studies drama, English literature and philosophy and ethics at A-Level. Her hobbies consist of playing guitar (very musical person and enjoys going to gigs and festivals), blogging and reading.

James: Studies maths, economics and geography. His hobbies are football, going to the gym and socialising.

Alex: Studies history, geography and business studies. Hobbies consist of horse riding and socialising with friends from school and work.

Scarlett: Studies geography, business studies and drama. Her hobbies include dancing, athletics and socialising with friends.

Ben: Studies psychology, biology and chemistry. Ben's hobbies include playing cricket and attending gigs.