The 1970's

During the 1970's the British TV network only had a few channels,in fact only 3 channels which still exist today (BBC 1, BBC 2 and ITV). so there was no channel dedicated to broadcasting music videos, the closest thing to a music channel was the popular show 'Top Of The Pops' which could be called the forerunner of many shows such as 'X Factor' and 'American Idol'. this show was shown once a week and consisted of popular groups lip singing their pre-recorded songs or live performances.

At this time music videos were not taken seriously as a market and no-one had interests in selling them until the group Queen which you may know as the band behind 'I Want To Be Free' and 'Another One Bites The Dust' asked the director of the show M. Bruce Gowers to film a promo for their song 'Bohemian Rhapsody'. After it was created and shown it had an incredible success and stayed at the top of the charts for nine months! After this it proved massive amounts of money could be made off these music videos and the rise of the videos started.




Here is the video of the track.

Here you can see a slow fade being used to go from one shot to another, this is done to make an immersive feeling and to be as if the video is taking the audience with them using the fade, this technique is very widely used in music videos but is used less in modern day ones.

The two images above which are taken from the music video show how the video experimented with early effects with successful outcomes, as you can see the top image has two clips overlaying each other, this was new and unseen which made it very interesting to look at. Something which shows this better in the second picture which depicts the same image changing colour and falling back. this was also new and authentic. This was very early in effects usage and in more modern day music videos effects have evolved from these to much more extravagant and amazing effects.

Another aspect noticed was the transitions and multiple shot angles which made the footage more intense and kept the audience's attention.

Also on 'Wayne's World' they also show the song and have the actors miming and playing along with the song, this is a form of synergy as both things (film and song) are helping each other gain more popularity in a mutually beneficial way.




...and of course there are always parodies, this one by the muppets:

The 1960's

In this blog i am going to speak about music videos from the 60's and how the they similar and where limited in in music technology compared to the quality we are used to.

Technology at this time was progressing very fast and a lot of experimentation was happening to make video's more interesting, a lot of new and extravagant techniques were being used and Bob Dylan's 'subterranean homesick blues' was a great example of this. lip synching was also very widespread so the actor or musician could film in ways which would be more creative.



This is the video 'subterranean homesick blues'

To us it may be seen as very simple and old but back then it was the latest and the most modern. some of the things i noticed were:

• instead of a transition, a zoom out with the camera was used at the start

this was done because editing was not widely used and very expensive, as well as that it was in a early stage where they were only able to put different clips together by hand (cutting film strips with scissors and splicing them back together). there was no massive editing like transitions or effects etc.

• black and white 

colour was around at this point and was used, but black and white was still wide spread and being used, this shows where in time there was the difference of black and white to colour.

• one long clip

because there was only one camera there was a lot of continuity issues and even then the 180 degree rule was still used to make the footage look real and good. so the easiest technique was to use one take instead of multiple takes which with one camera would be very hard and take a massive amount of time and mistakes were sure to be made. another reason was that editing was not very good and the film strips were expensive.

Bob dylan also made this video in this way to express himself as a simple and 'out of the box' mind that is why he used black and white and such a different location. because it was so simple yet effective his technique was used again and again, one example of this being used again is in the music video.
'in and out' by jernade miah. please keep in mind the subject of this song is VERY VERY explicit.

Mr Keil microphone proximity recording

part 6:

STE-155 by tufael kabiri

In this sound clip we had to get a radio conversation

For this we had a very good area to work which was a sound proof room and equipment that real radio shows use, so we got the equipment ready and just had a unscripted conversations, on our second attempt we got it complete and it was quite long. We were very happy with this piece and we recorded it by putting the recorder in a microphone reflection shelter and talked directly into the sound recorder.

The foam object was called a sound reflecting screen and real radio station so to do a simulation this was the best way. This object helps very well, the foam material it is made with had a lot of air pockets which sound waves get trapped within therefore it allows you to control the way the sounds travel makes sure none of the sound goes and echos around, as well as this the sound reflection screen also acts as a shell making sure outside noise does not go into the mic which is in the centre of the device.

Here is the sound reflection screen.

Our audio came out very professional and this is the most accurate recreation out of all the sounds i have simulated.

Mr Keil microphone proximity recording

part 5:

This time we had to get the sound of a ball being kicked onto a wall repeatedly.

In this we wanted a clear sound of a ball being kicked on a wall with no echo's and a clear sound. first we done this in a large room, this proved to not be very good because the sound would echo and mess up the clarity of the sound.

STE-152 by tufael kabiri

Later we went into a smaller studio room and tried again, this time it proved to be very good and we got the result we wanted. Here is were we recored:

The reason why this was better than the hall was because here the sound did not echo as much as the hall did so it was ideal yet we still didnt have the sound of the ball hitting the floor. Therefore i had to change the technique i used to make the sound which proved to be very helpfull. The material in the wall was concrete, this gave the sound a very firm and strong sound which was ideal also this was the same room as the radio show so it had insulation and foam on the wall which took in any background noise and the carpet also helped a lot by taking in the noise and giving off no echos.

Mr Keil microphone proximity recording

part 4: 

STE-149 by tufael kabiri

This is the recording of traffic from inside a car.

Because we didn't not have access to a car we had to improvise, thankfully the local shop keeper allowed us to use his shop, at first it did not work well because of the air conditioner but after that it worked well because it turned off. Because we wanted a good sound where you can hear clearly that it is traffic we kept the door very slightly open so that it made the perfect sound and made it seem believable. This worked very well because there was a van reving the engine right outside and made a very good sound.

This is a look of the shop from in doors, as you can see there are a lot of objects such as cardboard plastic and in general a heap of stuff, this helped out when we wanted just the sound of the road and all other sounds would be quite discrete. the glass on the windows also help very much, they cause the sound waves to bounces off from the outside so you don't get a sound which sounds like you are right next to the engine of the car but instead simulates the effect of being inside another car.

Here in this picture you can see the distance the road is from the shop, this would be about 4 meters and as you can see it is a relatively busy road.

Mr Keil microphone proximity recording

part 3: footsteps

The task we were set was to get the sound of footsteps approching from behind closed doors.

The footsteps scene was a lot harder to do than we thought it would be because all the doors in our college were thick and sound proof and we had to get footsteps from behind the door. So we ended up having to use a normal corridor and nicholas delivering the footsteps. We had him walking towards the recorder so we get a good feeling of the footsteps geting closer. This was definitely the worst recording because we did not muffle the microphone properly and thought the pillar would muffle the sound enough. Due to this the sound came out very loud and very close to the recorder and we had to do task again, Below are some pictures showing what we did.

STE-147 by tufael kabiri


Because the sound was nothing like what is should have been we tried to get the sound again but this time trying different methods from before, we tried to simulate the door by once again muffling the sound using my trusty jacket.

In this shot you can see me walking towards the microphone from quite a distance away, about 20 meters away but i was getting closer and so the sounds of my footsteps were getting louder. The reason why we chose to record here is simply because all other place were too noisy and background noise flooded the recording, we also walked from quite far away so we know at what point is the best for simulating the sound.

This shot of the jacket and sound recorder and the jacket shows how we used our surroundings to use. The yellow ring shows the recorder and the how it is being muffled and the black lines show where the sound is coming from.

This is the visual of the sound clip as you can see the sound is very quite at the beginning because the footsteps were quite far away, the only footsteps being caught are the ons in the green region then in the red region the footsteps are more vibrant and sound a lot better.

Mr Keil microphone proximity recording

part 2: the background conversation

The task here was to get a recording of background conversations as you heat in such public places, it had to be distorted enough so you cant understand the speech yet you can still hear a conversation taking place.

The first time we tried to do this recording we encountered a lot of problems first of all people were too shy and did not want to get recorded and because they did not know what to talk about there was a lot of gaps in the conversation. we also made a big mistake whilst recording, we recorded too close to the people and there speech could be heard clearly which was not what the task asked us to do. as well as this we learned that muffleing the mic would get the sound that we wanted. below are some videos.

here you can see exactly how we recorded the sound, as you can see it was too close to the conversation  (proximity was poor) and also the camera shutter could be heard in the recording. The battery died out half way the recording so we only got a little bit of the conversation.

after hearing the recording we decided the recording was not great so we went to record again and this time used the surrunding and proximty to the best with the enviorment we had, below are some pictures which shows how we did this.

This is me with the sound recorder. As you can see i am recording from a meter and a half off the ground so i can capture the best sounds. As well as this i also used my jacket to muffle the sound, we learnt from a previous attemp that recording with out muffling the sound made the sound very clear and you could hear the full conversation which didn't work for us. Using this method we could control the amount of sound being heard and distortion.                                                              

In this picture you can see the material of my sleeve, its a fabric which has a lot of free space in it, this means that its good for absorbing sound. 

Here is a picture of room '1' where the conversation was taking place, i marked the areas where the sound will be absorbed in red, as you can see they are tables, chairs and of course the carpet which makes the most difference. The purple areas are where the sound gets bounced off such areas are the glass, windows and walls.

Heres another shot of room '1' you can see the size of the room and also the size of the people having the conversation. As you can see it is quite a large room and there was also another room. Note that this is not the room where the sound was recorded from.

This is the room where the sound was recorded, from here you can see room '1' and the distance from the speech.

This is a picture showing room '2' and the exact location of the recorder in the blue circled and the green arrow shows the direction which the sound is moving.

Here is the sound clip as you can see the conversation is fairly constant in sound until it reaches the yellow region where it becomes more loud.

Here is the end sound enjoy:

MR Keil microphone proximity recording task

part 1: introduction and whistle recording

for this sound effect we had to get a clear sound of a whistle being blown in a large room such as a hall, the first time we did this we had the perfect enviorment to record in, i stood in the middle of a large sports hall as the person blew the whistle from one side of the hall, the reason why i stood dead center in the middle of the hall is because i wanted a clear and perfect sound and also wanted to hear the sound rebounding on surfaces and getting recorded again (echo). this sound came out very well but there was an issue. whilst recording background noise of y jacket was captured onto of the sound, although it was a quite clear we could have done it better so we went to do it again.

we got to the hall to find out it was being used and would be impossible to get a good sound with school kids running everywhere. after this we desperatly searched for another place to record, after long searching we found it by accident whilst trying to get some where. this was the stair case which echoed the sound of our footsteps. we blew the whistle once and it sounded great! so we decided to do it here. like the hall we chose to do it right in the middle of the staircase for a more vibrant and rebounded sound.

here are a few of the pictures we took whilst recording:

 Here it shows where the whistle was blown and which directions the sound traveled.

the blue ring shows the source of the sound, as you can see the whislte was blown from halfway up the stairs and there were hardly any objects to absorb the sound for example furniture of fabrics. you can also see there is a lot of free space around the source of the sound, this alows the sound to travel far until it bounces off a surface. overall i would say the ceiling would be about 15 meters high which would let the sound travel quite a far distance.

the yellow arrows show the direction the sound traveled, as you can see the sound is going in every direction and is not muffled by anything.

this is a veiw of the area from where the whistle was blown, as you can see there was a lot of space for the sound to travel below, above there was also a large empty area, this worked out very well for us.

This picture is from the other side of the staircase, i edited it on photoshop to show the movement and traveling of the original sound with the red arrow, it is also the biggest arrow to show it was the loudest sound wave. the black lines show one of the areas the sound bounced off, as you can see from this the blue arrows show the secodry sound which bounced off the wall, you can see that some of these sounds go back in the direction where the sound originated. the white arrow shows where the secondary sounds could have bounced off from.

the picture above is a sreen captured i took off the sound from logic pro, i edited this in photoshop aswell, the sound can be seen in the yellow region, after this you can see the green region where it picked up the sounds which where echoed and also how the sound decayed out into silence. 

Here is my end sound:

magazine cover

So in BTEC media we have been making magazines and this has been pretty fun and also learnt a lot.

First of all we were taught about DSRL cameras, ive heard about these camera's before but never actually got a chance to use them or even see them.

here is an example of one.

We were shown how to use the camera and then shown a video of the camera used to film a skateboarding video in great quality. After the introduction lesson we went around the campus taking pictures here are a few examples of what the DSLR captured.

We also played around with the focus on the camera and got this semi-focused shot.



my media hero/ heroine

This post is just about a presentation i made in class about someone in the media industry who inspires me and i look up too, it was hard finding one person because there were soo many succsessfull people such as peter jackson, akon, james cameron etc. at the end i just chose someone who started off small and is still making there way up there, this is because i want to become somthing big in the media industry and this person is making a path for people like me to follow.

my media hero on Prezi

also i used an internet programme called prezi to do my presentation, very easy and stylish and can be embedded into blogger aswell as being shared.

RESEARCH

home work for mr kemps class,

Vitaphone shorts

A).Very much like the Gaumont's phonoscene in ways of sound and image being shown at the same time, vitaphones were the last major analog sound on disk that was used widly and great sucsess according to wikipedia. the sound track was not given with the film it self buy infact given seperately on a vinyl record.

vinyl record

B). this was also used commercially and created quite alot of money, round about 1000 shorts was made and sold by warner brothers nd the company first national



here is a video suming up the previouse research topics

RESEARCH

work set by Mr. kemp

Leon Gaumonts phonoscene

A). Leon gaumonts created a machine which got pre recorded sound (music) and a film footage and forged them together in sync so that the timing made it look as if the actors in the video where speaking but in reality it was more of a lip sync. this was called the phonoscene.

B). like the illustrated song gaumonts phonoscene was used comercially and created quite a lot of profit


this is a phonoscene from the year 1905 showing "Alice Guy"

Wikipedia described this invention as the antecedent of music videos and more  highly as the forerunner of the sound film. this was first made in 1902 and was incredibly popular and as you can see quite a massive leap from the illustrated song so naturally people would be amazed, this was literally music with moving, flowing film...the first true basic music video! the phonoscene was then officially introduce in the united kingdom in Buckingham Palace at 1907 and kept going until the last phonoscene although it was different to modern day music videos in ways such as quality, pace, colour and sound. it still held the features which resemble modern day music videos the most, such as a hardware which simultaneously played the music and image in perfect sync, film like images (not slide shows). this was not done before because it was expensive (Hollywood expensive). in my opinion although the techniques and hardware were different it still held the concept of a real music video.

RESEARCH

this is the home work from mr. kemps class about early music videos

a) what sort of format did it use
b) what was its purpose

1. The illustrated song (1990's)

a). The format of an illustrated song was very different from the music videos these day, most people will not see it as a music video but more of a slide show. the way they would be shown is with 12-16 glass slides which would be projected on a screen whilst music was played by mainly a live pianist and/or vocalist, the slides would be pictures which would relate to the lyrics or song being played by a live person or piano simultaneously as the music. the glass slides where in black and white and because they were on glass they could be painted by hand to make they more appealing. in some the last slide had words to the song's chorus so that the audiance could sing along.

b). These illustrated songs were used commerically to make money, these illustrated  music were played between changing reels and where very popular in advertising popular music.before radio was in its prime, live performances was the main way in which music would be heard by the public and then sold onto sheet music.
                                                 

example of sheet music

when illustrated songs came, music publishers realized the potential of advertising sheet music through these illustrated songs, therefore many sheet songs where sold in theatres with pictures of the slides on them.

as far as music videos go this is very different from music videos we have now, in fact more differences can be picked out rather that similarities for example

• They were shown in only the theaters (no modern day hardware like TV)
• only had 12-16 slides which was just stills, (lacked the "video" concept of music videos)
• they had music played live rather than recorded and synced in with the video
• quality was bad in slides
• music was played live (this could be more of an advantage compared to less vibrant recorded sounds of these days)
• hardware used to project them was very different 

although this was a very early version of music videos it was immensly popular in america and was loved by many as it was new technology to them, according to wikipedia at least 10,000 theatres in america featured them.
 here is an example of an illustrated song "the lost little child" VERY popular back then.


 here is another but this one was painted in colors.

Love this music video, its unique, smart and creative. hopefully my music video can do as well as this

apparently im not alowed to use the word"bitches" on my blog.

This is my new blog!