Initial ideas

In yesterday's lesson, we decided that we would discuss our initial ideas as it was really one of the only times that we would be able to have a conversation with the three of us this week due to other commitments. We sat down for the lesson and all contributed to ideas which we thought would be effective in the making of our music video.

Costume: For the costume, there were multiple different ideas. One idea was to get Tavonga to wear a suit, this style is inspired by Chris Brown which he often appears to be wearing in his music video.
Here are some examples of Chris Browns music videos where he is wearing a suit:

The outfit would be smart and would fit with some other successful R&B music videos such as 'Fine China' and 'Turn Up The Music'.

Tavonga would be able to follow this look as he has a few suits which he could wear for the music video. It is easily achievable and can be pulled off for a more gentlemanly look and a classic mood would be created within the music video.
However, something to consider would be that it might give off the wrong impression as Tavonga is young, he would usually be seen in something more fashionable and causal as many artists are in modern R&B.


Another idea which we thought about for costume was another Chris Brown inspired look which was the bomber/leather jacket and also checkered shirts which he seems to wear a lot in his music videos:

In Chris Brown's music video 'Loyal', he set of the trend of the shirt around waist look. This set off a whole new fashion statement when the video was released and many other celebrities as well as non celebrities copied his look.

The look is causal, yet fashionable and something like this would be perfect for our music video. It is also achievable as this is the sort of outfit which Tavonga would usually wear and would suit.

I think that this style would suit the music video as it will be a love song and the lead role will be young and wealthy and therefore we could aim to achieve a style just like this.















One last costume idea we considered was the idea of perhaps using a hat in the music video. Ne-Yo uses many hats in his everyday fashion and is featured wearing one in every single one of his music videos and other celebrities are frequently seen wearing them in their music videos.

Setting:
For the setting, we discussed shooting the music video in Urban areas outside. Most R&B music videos are set in the 'streets' or in outside locations, mostly urban areas. This is easy for us to do as we live just a short distance from Manchester City Centre and know multiple locations where we could shoot the music video. Also, if we decided at any point we wanted a more rural location, we know many areas in Dunham and Knutsford etc.

Manchester is the perfect place to use as the location of our video, especially when it's a bit darker to set the mood of the song.

We also discussed the likes of famous buildings in and around Manchester such as Affelcks Palace and the roads which surround the area of the Northern Quarter.

Another idea would be to use the bedroom as part of the song as it fits well with the genre of the break up and love which the song "So sick" is all about. This may be an ideal location to use in the intro of the music video.

Intro: For the intro, I thought, like many other music videos do, that we would use the idea of the narrative based video to its full potential by instead of going straight into the song, we would give the audience a bit of a story to what is going on before the song starts.
Many successful music videos do this such as Sam Smith - I'm Not The Only One

At the beginning of the music video, there is a clear narrative going on which carries on throughout the music video of the trouble in their relationship and how he has no time for his wife. This is what we aim to do but probably with no dialogue.

Another idea which I proposed to the group was to use the intro to our advantage and show off our editing skills creating a split screen. This will exaggerate the theme of heartbreak in the song as the song is about love. I gave this idea as i thought it would add an idea of professionalism. Two ways which we could do this would be by them slamming the door and then sitting either side of it back to back, or we could have them both sat on the bed with their head in their hands doing the exact same position to show that they are upset.
An effective music video which I have found that has done this is Joe Brooks 'Til my heart stops beating'. The split screens in this video represent two different sides of the story whilst he is on tour and she is waiting at home. It works effectively as split screens are often used about love and this is a song about how they are struggling through their relationship.
We can use this in our video to show how they are both coping with the break up differently,

Flashbacks:

Lastly, we discussed the use of flashbacks in our music video as memories.

This is done in most love songs and I put forward the idea of maybe portraying these in black and white. We haven't yet decided whether these will be good or bad memories, however they could be a mix of both.
One music video which is inspiring is Beyonce - Halo

The video is looking back on her relationship, from moments in bed, to on the sofa and even them brushing their teeth, intimate moments is what she is remembering. Something like this would be good to carry the audience of our music video through the narrative of the break up.