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Our group initially formed due to the similarity of each individual’s ideas and how each idea fitted together to create the perfect concept. Kate wanted to focus on different perspectives and how everyone views things differently. I wanted to focus on the atmosphere and weather, more specifically rain, and how it may make you feel. And Molly’s idea was based around reflections. After a few discussions, we collectively created the concept of showing and exploring different perspectives on rain and how it may change the way a person feels. In our video we wanted to try out different angles of reflections in water and how we can take inspiration from the movement of water and then turn that into choreography to highlight the emotion it brings out in people. We discussed our strengths within the group and allocated roles. Zoe would be the director, Tilly the choreographer, Kate as editor and Molly and I shared the role of videographer. Our next step was then to create a narrative for our video and produce a storyboard to plan how to bring our vision to life.

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It was agreed that the video would begin with our main character (Kate) walking through a park, in the rain, feeling sad and lonely. Kate would then get into a car to travel to a park. She would be looking out the window and, somewhat stereotypically, tracing the rain drops on the window with her finger as often pictured in rainy, melancholy scenes. This would then inspire choreography, which Kate would begin to perform under some trees, still feeling deflated because of the rain. Then she would be joined by some friends which instantly would change her mood and uplift her as they change her perspective of the rain and teach her how to have fun in it instead. This would lead to a big scene with the group dancing around having a great time in a fountain. Kate would then leave her friends to head back home, but this time her walk in the rain was a lot happier, as her friends had lit up her day and the rain didn’t seem so bad after all.

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Although our plan seemed secure and easy enough to create, there were some flaws to it that we realised when we began filming. First of all, although we live in the rainy UK, we found it very hard to pick a day to film that schedules allowed and that it was also raining!  After trying to find a solution to this we came to the decision that we would have to slightly tweak our idea. We decided that we would look at the broader idea of people’s perspectives on the weather as a whole, instead of just rain, we felt this would broaden our opportunities for our video. We wanted to look at how the environment and the people around us affect our mood and mental well-being. This meant we had to change our narrative a little. For example, the final scene turned into Kate dancing and messing about with her friends in a big open park instead of the fountain.

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Despite the fact I had a few cameo clips in the video, my main role was as videographer. I began this task in the studio space when Tilly was choreographing. I captured some test shots of the others dancing and improvising to test out what style of filming we liked. I found it challenging to make sure I had caught all of their movement and it was in frame. After more trial and error, we came to the realisation that it would be helpful to have two videographers for our project. This would ensure we were capturing more than one angle of the movement we were filming, without having to be cautious of continuity issues.

My role as videographer continued when the group travelled to Alexandra Palace to begin filming. We started filming shots of Kate walking through the park. I filmed this from the side and Molly filmed from behind her, which worked out well when putting the clips together as it displayed her body language as well as her facial expressions, which I think worked out well as it helped the viewer understand and sympathise with Kate’s emotions.  We also filmed a clip of Kate putting on her headphones to listen to music, to show that she was trying to drown out the loneliness of the world around her. This shot was tricky to film as it was a small movement and therefore difficult to capture the meaning and significance behind it. To overcome this, we asked Kate to really over exaggerate the movement so we could make sure it was evident to the viewer watching and therefore to help with the narrative. I also tried to film some candid shots of the group together where they were chatting, giggling, and playing around which resulted in  some of the best shots I had captured as they look natural and real, and the emotions they were bringing out in each other weren’t staged.

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The Diana Memorial Fountain at Hyde Park was one of our initial spots for filming. This location offered great opportunities for filming as it was a beautiful open space and we thought we would be able to capture some great shots. However, as our idea developed we didn't end up using a fountain in our video and instead decided we wanted to film the majority of our video at Alexandra Palace as it was easy for us to commute to and has so many diverse areas in the one place, making this location extremely versatile.

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My role as videographer continued when the group travelled to Alexandra Palace to begin filming. We started filming shots of Kate walking through the park. I filmed this from the side and Molly filmed from behind her, which worked out well when putting the clips together as it displayed her body language as well as her facial expressions, which I think worked out well as it helped the viewer understand and sympathise with Kate’s emotions.  We also filmed a clip of Kate putting on her headphones to listen to music, to show that she was trying to drown out the loneliness of the world around her. This shot was tricky to film as it was a small movement and therefore difficult to capture the meaning and significance behind it. To overcome this, we asked Kate to really over exaggerate the movement so we could make sure it was evident to the viewer watching and therefore to help with the narrative. I also tried to film some candid shots of the group together where they were chatting, giggling, and playing around which resulted in  some of the best shots I had captured as they look natural and real, and the emotions they were bringing out in each other weren’t staged.

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The inspiration came from a couple of different things when planning and creating our video. The first concept was  the opening credits scene in the tv show “Friends”. We specifically liked how they were all splashing around in the fountain. Although the friends were soaking wet and likely freezing cold, they looked like they were having a great time laughing and playing around in the water because they were all in each other’s company. We wanted to draw from this idea and highlight that there are different ways of perceiving situations and sometimes it’s about just finding a different way of looking at things.

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Our second piece of inspiration came from  the music video “Paradise” by Coldplay. The video begins with a lonely elephant character running away from the zoo to be free in the wild. His journey to the wild is long and treacherous, but at the end of his adventure he is greeted by his other elephant friends. He has finally found happiness! We loved this heart-warming story and wanted to interpret the same emotions in our video, specifically when Kate meets up with her friends. We knew we wanted to use a song that began slowly and has a crescendo in the middle, and so we decided that “Paradise” would be perfect to complete our video. This music video was great to refer back to when we found ourselves a little lost or looking for further inspiration, and helped our creative process stay on track.

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After watching the video back now and reevaluating my filming, there are a couple of things I would have liked to change or improve on. For instance, I think that I would have played around more with more slow-motion shots of the water rippling in the lake or the leaves getting thrown around. I think this could have helped to show the sombre themes at the beginning of the video. If I got the chance to now, I would have also liked to experiment with slightly longer clips. The majority of the clips were shorter, but with a slightly longer clip I think the viewer would be able to connect more with Kate and be able to understand her better whilst providing some variety in the piece.

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Overall, I found the filming process very valuable as it allowed me to learn a new skill that I had never indulged in before, and now I can develop and improve on this. It took me a small while to settle into the role but when I did, I think I worked well with my co-videographer Molly to wrap up our filming. I am satisfied with what I achieved in my role, and my assistance in  the group reaching our goals and ambitions for the project. Specifically, I was mindful of  being open minded to the opinions of the group, honest, and reliable. I am grateful for this process and for the group of people I had the pleasure of working with.

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With our redeveloped plan we began filming. However, we also had some other minor setbacks while in the filming process. We had ideas of locations we wanted to film in around London, for example, the fountain in Hyde Park, but when it came to traveling out there it was difficult to get to due to tube strikes. To overcome this we decided to film our scenes mainly at Alexandra Palace which has great open landscapes for us to film in. This allowed us to move forward with our project and not lose time in the process.  As well as this Kate took a few clips back at her home as she lives out in the countryside with endless opportunities. As this was all a very new process to us as a group, there was a lot of trial and error throughout our journey. For example, we had to adapt the choreography Tilly had previously created to be able to dance it outside. We also had to try out different angles to depict what we wanted to capture and what shots would help drive forward our plot, as such it was beneficial having two videographers, which I will discuss in more detail in my reflection.

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C. G. P. Grey. (2006) Wikipedia [Online image] Available at:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diana,_Princess_of_Wales_Memorial_Fountain#/media/File:Diana,_Princess_of_Wales_Memorial_Fountain.JPG(Accessed: November 24th 2023)

Coldplay (2011) Coldplay – Paradise (Official video), YouTube. [Online video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1G4isv_Fylg

(Accessed: November 12th 2023)

NBC Universal. (1994) Digital Spy [Online image] Available at:https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/ustv/a29082496/friends-cast-fountain-opening-credits-reason/

(Accessed: November 12th 2023)