Critical Reflection

 This is the Critical Reflection Essay for my Component 3 Music Video project.

For our Component 3 project, we chose the Music Promotion Package brief, producing a music video, social media

page and digipak for our artist “Kika Laene”. Using “Shapeshifter" (2025) by Lorde, in the electro-pop genre. We

constructed her embodying emotional resilience and self-discovery, targeting female 18-24 year-olds experiencing

toxic breakups.

Branding refers to the general perception that an audience has with a media product or artist, created through a

consistent and recognizable message across different platforms. In music promotion, branding is essential as it allows

audiences to instantly identify an artist, understand their values and form some kind of emotional connection, which is

important in a focused electro-pop market. For our promotional package, branding was a key consideration from the

beginning to ensure that our products such as the music video, digipak, and social media all align to present our

fictional artist Kika Laene.

We used consistent visuals and specific styling to reinforce Kika’s brand identity. To enhance the electro-pop genre,

we focused on a controlled color palette and directional lighting from the front which symbolizes hope because bright

light has positive connotations of hope. This visual approach is further reinforced through the digipak design,

particularly on the front cover where the double-exposure effect visually represents the idea of being more in the

“Shapeshifter” atmosphere. The blurred second figure creates a sense of emotional identity conflict which links to the

song’s theme of transformation after a toxic relationship. The repeated use of deep blue backgrounds contrasted with

yellow typography creates a strong visual branding, making the album instantly recognisable. This same blue and

yellow color scheme is carried onto the tracklist panel and subtly flowed into the social media posts/page, ensuring

cohesion and relation across platforms. (image 1 & 2)

(image 1)

(image 2)

On the instagram page, the grid layout carefully alternates between professional editorial style images, professional

shoots, and some behind the scenes content. This balance constructs Kika as both aspirational and authentic which is

crucial in contemporary electro-pop branding. This consistent makeup styling, particularly the symbolic facial details

(glitter, gems) seen on the digipak and profile picture further enhances her recognisable image. (image 3)

(image 3)

Before producing our final products, research played an important role toward our pre-production process. We researched

electro-pop artists and existing digipaks to understand these typical genre conventions. Through analysing artists such

as Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n sweet, two things we learned from this were that electro-pop digipaks frequently include

minimalist layouts and strong central framing of the artist to reflect emotional intensity. This influenced our decision to

position Kika centrally on the front cover with a dominant blue palette. However, we also wanted to avoid creating a

conventional static image which led us to experiment with a double-exposure effect. Our research showed that many

album covers focus purely on aesthetics, so we developed this layered visual to symbolize identity conflict and

emotional instability, making our design more concept-driven. (image 2)

For the MV research, we analysed how electro-pop narratives often contrast emotional highs and lows through lighting

and color. This directed our decision to use bright, dreamy filters during romantic parts and desaturated blue/dark tones

during toxic arguments. During early rough cuts, peer feedback suggested that the emotional contrast wasn’t strong

enough, which led us to intensify the color grading and increase foreshadowing between past and present scenes.

This showcased the narrative more clearly and enhanced the emotional impact. Overall our research  process allowed

us to both follow electro-pop conventions and make our creative adjustments to clearly show our transformation by

combining research with experimentation. This research process helped us make more clear decisions rather than

relying purely on each other's aesthetic preferences.

(image 4)

Our social media page went through a major shift during the production process. At first, we presented Kika Laene’s

ordinary, sunny and bubbly personality by posting behind-the-scenes photos and casual everyday content, initially

aiming to reflect her own personality. Until we received feedback from an actual singer/artist who is fortunately

Lamiya’s sister, saying how our page looked more like an influencer account rather than a new artist. This made us

question whether our Instagram was truly supporting the identity we had constructed for the Shapeshifter music video.

Which is why we decided to completely restart the page by researching artists such as Lorde, Charli XCX and Kanye

West and noticed that their Instagram feeds are often centered around their current album era. Instead of mixing lifestyle

content with promotion, their pages visually reflect the mood and concept of the album they are releasing. This

influences us to shift from more green-toned, casual imagery to a more dominant blue color palette that aligns with

our euphoric persona of Shapeshifter, which is what we initially wanted to go for.

By rebranding the page, the social media became an extension of the album’s emotional narrative. The consistent blue

visuals and professional posts allow our target audiences to immediately recognise the tone of the theme and emotionally

engage with our transformation of toxic relationships. For our target audiences of young women ages 18-24 years,

experiencing toxic breakups, this focused aesthetic creates reliability and emotional validation (conform). Overall, the

shift strengthened audience engagement while reinforcing Kika’s credibility as a new electro-pop artist

In our music video we wanted to represent young adult relationships as emotionally intense and dramatic, especially

the way teenage and early adult love can feel dreamy at first but unstable later on. During the romantic and “pretty”

moments, we used medium close-ups of the female protagonist to clearly capture her happy expressions and beauty

(image 4)These shots are added to show how she appeals/exists in his thoughts during the big running scene, especially when

combined with slow motion. This makes the relationship seem dreamy and idealised but also reflects how young love

can feel exaggerated and overwhelming.

In contrast, the fight scenes were mostly filmed using long shots, such as the sofa scene where they sit distanced from

each other and the argument scene in the corridors. The physical space between them visually represents emotional

distance and disconnection that foreshadows, from them being so close together on such a large couch (image 5 & 6).

By keeping thecamera further away during these conflicts, the scenes feel colder and less intimate. However, after the corridor fight,

we included one tracking shot that moves closer to her face. This moment shifts from distance to intimacy, allowing

the audience to finally see her emotional reaction and vulnerability. (image 7)

(image 5)

(image 6)

(image 7)

In the studio lipsync scenes, we used a steady/fixed medium close-up framed from the top of her head to slightly

below her shoulders. This framing clearly captures her emotion while presenting her as more mature and composed.

Overall, our products represent young women as emotionally expressive but strong, and young relationships as

passionate, intense but sometimes can be unstable.

Final Product

 This blogpost contains the Final Product of Component 3!

Music Video

GDrive Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RioFwh6nffjjbqU17qNb_sjTPRntlDCy/view?usp=sharing

DIGIPAK

SOCIAL MEDIA

Digipak: Research and Development

 This is our research and development on our Digipak and how it will influence our artist for our music video project. This blog was made by Lamiya.

1. SZA - SOS

Camera
The album cover uses a extreme long of SZA sitting on top of a diving board where we can see a lot of the ocean around the artist. The reason behind this extreme long shot where it makes her look tiny shows how vulnerable and isolation SZA looks. The camera angle is straight and does don't have a dramatic effect which makes the image feel natural and real making it look like a moment caught on camera.

Mise-en-Scene
The only three main things in the Mise-en-Scene is SZA, the diving board and the ocean. The ocean takes up most of the space, showing deep emotions and feeling lost. SZA is sitting with her legs hanging down and her body slightly slouched making her look relaxed and comfortable. The connotation behind sitting at the edge of the board also shows riskiness like she is in between staying safe or jumping into unknown which highlights the emotional state of whats in the album.

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
The overall color shown in this album is blue. This plays a huge role in showcasing her emotions because blue represents sadness, loneliness, and calmness. The blue ocean and sky creates a quiet and emotional mood, showing how she feels emotionally and overwhelmed. Which can reflect to audiences or listener to quickly guest that the songs in album are all about deep emotions, personal struggles, heartbreak, and self-reflection.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
The imagery shows SZA as someone who is open, emotional and vulnerable. Sitting alone and looking away from the camera suggest she is thinking deeply and lost in her thoughts, making the moment feel personal. This matches her music, which often talks about love, heartbreak, and self-reflection. She is not trying to look perfect, which shows she is not focused on frame or image but instead, comes across as honest and relatable.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
SZA does not really use a logo. Instead she mainly uses her name in simple and clean text. The bold "SOS" test on the album cover stands our and feels strong and serious, which links to the albums theme of emotional struggles. This style is consistent with her other albums and media, where she often uses minimal visuals and lets emotion and storytelling be the main focus.

How has the album cover influence you?
The album cover influences me because it strongly focuses on the color blue, which we also want to use since our color palette is blue. The use of blue to represent sadness and calm emotions inspired us, as it clearly shows emotional depth. We also like how the meaning of the album focuses on grief and emotional struggles, because our music video is about toxic relationships and the struggles of dealing with them. The calm but heavy mood of the album cover helped inspire us to show emotions in a simple but powerful way.

2. Gracie Abrams - The Secret Of Us

Camera
The album uses a lot of close-up shot of the artist's face. This makes the images feel personal and emotional, as we are very close to her expressions. The close-up framing allows the audience to focus on her emotions and thoughts, making the album feel intimate and honest. Her facial expressions range from neutral and serious to soft and thoughtful which suggest calmness, vulnerability, and deep emotional reflection.

Mise-en-Scene
 Here is only focused are the artist and her facial expressions. The expression look gives soft and thoughtfulness, which shows vulnerability. In the middle image, the two versions of her whispering suggest secrets and private thoughts, which links to the album title. The font used for the title album is a soft cursive yellow style, which feels gentle and personal, which is almost like a handwriting. The simplicity setting keeps the focus on emotions rather than distractions.

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
The soft lighting and neutral colors create a calm and gentle mood. The lack of bright colors or strong shadows shows emotional softness and reflection. This helps audiences quickly guess that the album focuses on personal feelings, relationships, and inner emotions. The simple visuals make the album feel private, as if the artist is sharing secrets with listeners. The technical elements also make the emotions feel more honest and real helping audiences emotionally connected to the album.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
The imagery shows the artist as emotional, honest, and relatable. She does not look glamorous which makes her feel real. Her expressions suggest deep thinking, which matches music that focuses on relationships, secrets, and emotional experiences.This matches music that focuses on relationships, secrets and emotional experiences which makes the artist seem open to share personal stories.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
The artist does not use a logo on this album. Instead, she uses the album title in simple text, which keeps the design clean and easy to read. This shows that the focus is more on emotion and meaning rather than strong branding or marketing. The simple font and layout allow the audience to pay attention to the feelings and themes of the album. 

How has the album cover influence you?
This album cover influenced us because we want to use close-up shots and yellow font like this album. The close-ups help emphasis a euphoria and emotional look for our artist. We also like the yellow font, but in our meaning it symbolizes happened and hope in a world where the artist is living with toxic emotions. This contrast helps show how she is trying to find light and positivity despite the struggles she faces.

3. Sabrina Carpenter - Short N' Sweet

Camera
The album uses close-up and medium shots that focus on the artists face and body, which links to the idea of the malee gaze. The camera angles and framing highlight her appearance, skin, and poses in a way that is visually attractive, especially to male audiences. Her body is positioned to be looked at, and the direct or over the shoulder look creates a sense of invitation. This use of camera helps attract attention and makes the artist appear desirable.

Mise-en-Scene
They focuses on the artist, blue and pink color palette, and the styling. The blue background creates a clean and bold look, while the pink vinyl adds a soft and playful feel. Her outfit, hair, and makeup are very styled, showing confidence and femininity. The lipstick mark and the visible skin suggest flirtation and self-expression. The lace and soft textures on the vinyl design add a romantic delicate touch.

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
The bright colors, strong lighting, and confident poses create a bold and playful mood. The use of blue and pink suggests both confidence and softness. The lighting highlights her skin and features, making her stand our clearly from the background. These technical elements help audiences quickly guess that the album focuses on love, confidence, and emotional experiences in a fun way.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
The artist's imagery shows confident, feminine, and self-aware. She appears glamorous and in control of how she is seen. Her poses and expressions suggest confidence and flirtation, which matches a persona that is bold and expressive. At the same time, the soft colors and delicate details show a more gentle and emotional side, making her persona feel balances rather than aggressive.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
They did not use a logo, but instead uses her name in elegant cursive way. This font feels soft and classic, which matches the romantic and feminine theme of the album. This style is consistent with her other media, where branding focuses on elegance, personality, and visual identity rather than a bold image.

How has the album cover influence you?

This can influence us through the use of the blue background and the way the artist shows body confidence. The blue background creates a clean and bold look, which makes the artist stand our clearly. We also like how her confident pose and body language show self-assurance. This inspired us to use confident body language in our own project to show our artists growth and strength.

4. Addison Rae - Addison

Camera
Addison uses a mix of close-up and medium shots, mostly focusing on the artist's face and body. The close-up shots make the image feel personal and intimate, while the way she looks toward the camera creates strong eye contact. This draws the audience in and makes her the clear focus. Some angles are sightly posed, which links to the idea of being looked at and admired, helping attract attention and interest from the audience.

Mise-en-Scene
It focuses on the artist, warm colors, and soft textures. The orange and yellow tones create a dreamy and romantic mood. The feathers and sheer fabric shows softness and elegance which makes the visuals feel delicate and feminine. Her outfit and styling are glamorous but gentle, showing beauty without being harsh. 

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
These colors create a soft but intense mood. The orange and magenta tones suggest passion and emotion. The soft focuses and layered textures makes the visual feel dreamy and unreal, as if the album exists in a fantasy world. These technical elements help the audience quickly guess that the album focuses on emotions, identity, love, and self-image.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
The artist is presented as glamorous, confident, and expressive. She looks aware of being seen and comfortable with attention, which shows confidence. At the same time, the softness in her expressions and styling suggest vulnerability and sensitivity. This creates a balance persona where she is both strong and emotional, making her feel interesting and relatable.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
The artist uses her name in decorative, stylize text rather than a strong logo. This font feels elegant and playful, which matches the dreamy and feminine theme of the album. This branding style is consistent across the album artwork and vinyl designs, helping create a clear and recognizable visual identity without overpowering the imagery.

How has the album cover influence you?

I like how the vinyl color is the dominant color alongside yellow. This can inspire us to use a strong main color in our own project, such as yellow or blue, to make it more visually striking. The use of the artist's logo also shows how branding can help make an artist more recognizable. This influences us to include a clear logo for our artist so audiences can easily remember and recognize her.

5. Dua Lipa - Future Nostalgia

Camera
The album uses a mix of medium shots and close-up shots of the artist sitting in a car. The camera often faces her directly, which creates strong eye contact and makes her look confident and in control. Some shots focus on her body position and facial expression, which draws attention to her presence and attitude. The framing makes her the clear focus of the image, helping the audience connect with her confidence and star power.

Mise-en-Scene
The album included the artist, the car, the moon in the background, and the colour scheme. The car represents freedom, movement, and independence. The moon and dark background creates a dreamy, night-time atmosphere. Her pink outfit stands our strongly against the dark setting, making her the main focus. Her styling, includes her hair, makeup, gloves gives a retro glamorous look, linking to the albums theme of nostalgia.

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
The dark background combined with the bring pink outfit creates contrast, making the artist stand our and appear powerful. The night setting and moon give the album a futuristic and dreamy feel. The lighting highlights her face and body, showing confidence and control. These elements help audiences guess that the album focuses on confidence, love, and self empowerment.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
They presented the artist as confident and strong. She looks serious and focused, which shows control and self-assurance. Sitting in the driver's seat suggest she is in charge of her own life and direction. This matches her persona as a modern pop star who represents confidence and freedom.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
The artist uses her name as a logo in a clear, stylized font. This logo is visible on the vinyl and is easy to recognize. The font branding are consistent with her other work, helping build a strong and recognizable artist identity. This makes it easy for audiences to remember and identify her work.

How has the album cover influence you?

I think this can influence us because we like the confident expression the artist gives. It shows confidence and self-assurance which is something we want our artist to show as well. We also like the blue, midnight scenery more than the pink as it creates a cool and powerful mood. The artist gives off strong vibes, which we want to reflect in our own artist to create a similar presence and attitude.

6. Olivia Rodrigo - Sour

Camera
The album uses mostly medium and close up shots of the artist. The close up framing brings attention to her face and makeup, making the image feel personal and emotional. The camera is straight which makes her look honest and direct like she is facing the audience without hiding. This helps the audience focus on her emotions and expression.

Mise-en-Scene
Mise-en-Scene includes the artist, the purple background, the stickers, and the makeup. The purple background creates a soft but emotional mood, often linked to sadness and vulnerability. The stickers on her face look playful and childish, which contrasts with her serious expression. This shows mixed emotions, such as feeling hurt but still trying to express yourself. The simple setting keeps the focus on her and her emotions.

What meaning is being created with the different technical elements?
The simple background and soft colors create a calm and emotional mood. The lack of props and distractions makes the emotions feel more raw and honest. The contrast between the playful stickers and her serious expression suggest emotional confusion and vulnerability. These elements help the audience understand that the album focuses on emotions and personal struggles.

How does the imagery reflect the star's persona?
The imagery presents the artist as emotional and relatable. She looks natural and not overly glamorous, which makes her feel real and down to earth. The use of stickers and simple styling shows creativity and individuality. This matches her persona as someone who openly shares her feelings and personal experiences through her music.

Does the artist have a logo? Is it consistent with their other media?
The artist uses simple test for the album title and her name rather than a logo. This keeps the branding clean and minimal. The scrapbook-style visuals, stickers, and handwritten elements are consistent across the album artwork and vinyl, creating a clear and recognizable style that feels personal and expressive.

How has the album cover influence you?

We like the simplicity of this album cover, especially the makeup and the use of stickers. It inspired us to use the similar idea where our artist can express herself through her worn style of makeup. This allows emotions and personality to be shown visually without needing a complex setting, making the artist feel more authentic and relatable.

MY EXPERIMENTAL DEVELOPMENT FOR THIS DIGIPAK

    first I sketched out my vision of how I wanted the digipak to look like. I envisioned a couch and our artist Kika to be laying on the couch sideways. I 

Reflection: Throughout this process, I did not play a role too much during this part as we spit the tasks evenly for each blogposts to our groups. However I did learn that many different album covers create several possible meanings and that it affected our choice in tone and coloring for our disk alot too in order to showcase Kika Laene's persona.

Branding Research

 This is our research on branding and how it will influence our artist for our music video project. This blogpost was made by Kristine

Zara Larsson

Who is Zara Larsson?

Zara Larsson is a Swedish pop singer who becomes famous after winning the talent show Talang in 2008. She is recognised for her strong vocals, confident personality, and popular pop songs like "Lush Life" and "Symphony." Today she is known as an international pop artist with a modern sound who often uses her music to promote confidence and independence.

To deeply understand the purpose of using Zara Larsson, it is important to look at her current persona / branding and the reasons behind her shift. Beforehand, she was seen as a more generic pop singer with a safe and cliche image, but now she has rebranded herself with bold colours, a stronger pop vibe, and a clearer personality that helps her stand out more in the music industry.

Zara Larsson's 

Social Media Platform

Throughout her social pages, we can clearly see her shift in style, branding, and persona, moving from a simple artist image to a more bold, expressive, and personal presence.

Zara Larsson's 

Music Albums

Even though she started as a generic artist, she has now developed a strong aesthetic persona. This change is also show in her albums, as many of them follow her new branding by featuring the symbolic yellow hibiscus flower on remixed versions released after her rebranding.

Zara Larsson's 

Music Videos

Before Branding

Lush Life 

(2015)

After Branding

Midnight Sun 

(2025)

In this case, Zara Larsson's rebranding faced a minor downfall due to controversy around Midnight Sun. However, because she had a strong branding and clear identity, it did not seriously damage her image. Instead, it helped her stay recognised and relevant, showing that strong branding can protect an artist from a major downfall.

Zara Larsson's 

Magazine Shoots

In shoots like this, magazines avoid showing the 'model's' usual persona and identity. Instead, they change her image using styling, makeup, lighting, and concepts to show a different side of models. This helps audiences see the transformation and prevents image from feeling repetitive, as for Zara, her vibrant aesthetic. As a result, the model stays interesting and relevant to viewers.

What Caused Her Shift?

Overall, this matters to our artist because gaining popularity often requires rebranding. This can be seen in Zara Larsson, who changed from a generic singer into a colourful, summer-focused personality. This idea is applied to our artist, who shifts from an ordinary girl with big dreams into a euphoric persona that reflects who she is now. This transformation helps audience build interest and recognition. This links to the theory of stardom, which states that stardom is contracted by media to attract audiences and create profit. Zara Larsson is an example of this, as her song Symphony went viral on TikTok through the dolphin meme trend, which then explains the textual productivity in the theory of fandom where fan-made memes gives fans a sense of ownership which increases her visibility and strengthening her branding through audience interaction. 

What brand identity are they giving off?

Zara Larsson's brand identity is confident, bold, and expressive. She presents herself as empowering and independent. She is no longer a generic pop singer but a recognisable international artist with a clear personality. Her branding shows strength, individuality, and confidence, which attracts audiences and makes her memorable.

What is their persona?

Her persona is confident and playful. She is seen as someone who is strong and self-aware. Even though this persona feels natural, it is carefully constructed through her music, social media, and visuals. Fans read her as a symbol of empowerment and individuality, which connects to the theory of stardom where a star is created to represent certain values while staying relatable.

What image are they creating for themselves, how?

Zara creates the image of a bold, expressive and colourful pop artist. She does this through her music videos, album work, social media, and fashion. An example would be as her albums now feature the yellow hibiscus flower as a visual symbol. Even magazine shoots allow her image to transform with makeup and styling, which helps maintain her vibrant, evolving brand.

How do they speak to their fans?

Zara loves to speak to her fans in a fun and expressive way, often using the GenZ emojis like "💕✨🐬🌺🌞" and lots of repeated exclamation marks (!!!!!). She uses these emojis to show excitement, personality, and a playful vibe. She shared opinions, test new lows, and responds to fan reactions. Fans help shape her rebranding by giving feedback and she uses this to improve her image. This makes her brand feel fun and visually connected to her bold aesthetic.

What visuals link all of the media products together?

The visual linking her media products include bold colours, bright lighting, confident poses, expressive fashion, and symbols like the yellow hibiscus flower. This consistent visual style makes her branding recognisable and memorable across all platforms.

How could this artist influence you?

1. The big shift of persona

Zara shows that changing persona is an important part of growing as an artist. At the start of her career, her image was safe and generic, which made it harder for audiences to remember her. By shifting into a more confident, bold, and expressive persona, she became more recognisable and relatable. This teaches our artist that rebranding is not a weakness but a strategy. A clear persona helps audiences understand who the artist is and builds stronger recognition.

2. The aesthetic, reversed to a euphoric look

Her current visuals focus on bright, summer theme aesthetic with bold colours and playful energy. Our artist can take inspiration from this but reverse it into a more euphoric look, using expressive visuals that reflect emotion, freedom, and personal growth. This shows that aesthetics are not just decoration, but a way to communicate mood, meaning, and identity to the audience.

3. Magazine shoots do not define her identity

Zara's magazine shoots often show her in different styles and concepts chosen by the magazine. These images are creative and eye catching, but they do not fully define who she is as an artist. Her true identity is build through her music, consistent visuals, and interaction with fans. This teaches our artist that while magazine shoots are important for promotion, the brand remain consistent across all platforms.

4. Social media shift after career blow up

After gaining major attention, Zara used social media to strengthen her rebranding. She communicated more directly with fans, shared her personality, and reacted to feedback. This helped her stay relevant and rebuild trust. This shows our artist that social media is a powerful tool for controlling image, responding to controversy, and maintaining a loyal fan base.

5. Very explorative with her style

Zara is not afraid to experiment with fashion, makeup, and visuals. She tries new looks, changes aesthetic, and involves her style over time. This shows confidence and creativity. Our artist can learn to explore her own style freely, test new ideas, and take creative risks. Being explorative helps an artist grow, stay interesting, and avoid becoming repetitive or predictable.

Reflection: Thoughout this blogpost, I learned that branding research is important to be considered wisely. Knowing our target audience and sticking into a theme is important in order to clearly show Kika Laene's persona and have a fixed vision ahead.

Post-Production: Editing

This blog post will contain of the process of how we edited our music video using editing styles, meanings and how they play a huge role to help create messages for our audiences. 

Background

To start developing my skills, I had to dive into the world of editing and prepare myself to meet all the required criteria to achieve the best results. One of the main things I've discovered that can help me boost my work was colour. Colouring plays an important role in editing because it helps bring the song and the cinematography to life.

For me, the best way to research this was by watching movies and observing how they achieve their quality, colour grading, and overall visual style. In our project, we chose a cool blue tone inspired by a movie we've discovered together, as it helped create the mood and vision we wanted. Here are movies we've liked based on their colour palettes.

Waves (2019)

Edited By: Isaac Hagy

Euphoria (2019)

Edited By: Julio Perez

The Florida Project (2017)

Edited By: Sean Baker

After analysing the three films, I noticed they share a similar colouring pattern that can guide me in making my own videos look closer to their palettes. This is because certain features are used in all three, and these features work together to create their colouring style.

Grain is very important in this colouring style. It makes the image look rough and textured instead of smooth and clean. This stops the footage from looking too digital. The grain makes the scene feel more real, raw, and human, as if it was captured naturally. It also adds emotion because the image feels imperfect and natural.

Saturated lighting is a key feature because the colours are very bright and strong. The colours look more intense than in real life. This makes the scene feel dream-like and emotional. The strong colours catch the audience's attention and help show the feelings of the characters through colour.

Low exposure is important because many scenes are kept slightly dark. There are deep shadows where some details cannot be seen clearly. This creates mood and tension. The darkness helps the audience focus on the feeling o then scene instead of seeing everything clearly.

Colour Development

Now that I have discovered these editing style techniques, the next step is to explore the colouring tools in editing apps and develop a palette that matches the look I want. Because I'm new to this, it took me a while to figure out the colours and how I want them to be represented. Here are the colours that I've done and how I did it in VideoStar for (7.99$) subscription.

This colouring is gonna be used for her singing, we chose this colour because it highlights the mood of what we want which is blue and because her overall persona and what she wants to showcase is purely blue in her media.

We chose to do a yellow vibrant colour to help symbolise the subversion of using yellow for happiness but in the scene like this it shows that there it's good that they're having a fight and it it's happier this way.

The use of a cool tone when they're alone helps increase and emphasise the emotion that they feel which is sad since they're alone now and it feels isolation. These blue colour will only be shown during times where they're alone and the running scene.

The use of pink purple and blue for memories helps emphasise the nostalgia of the relationship and creates this dreamy effect since there are all just memories. We barely chose to use a warm colour because the overall meaning of these cool tones show audiences that their memories are very depressing and sad. It feels very emotional and that it's very toxic in such that it's sad to watch.

Process of Editing

Now that I've prepared everything, the first thing that I'm gonna do is to get a copy sound of the song to use as audio for editing. This website https://spotidownloader.com/en14 is what I used to download my song and thankfully it wasn't paid or had no viruses.

The first thing I did was to put my lip sync video to the song and match it to my singing. Then I cut them to placements where I wanted the artist to be singing completely or just a short cuts to let people know that the artist is still there storytelling,

Following whats on the storyboard, the next thing that I've done is adding the clips according to beat, especially emphasising the first lyric in the song and matching it to give audiences a dramatic shift from seeing a long take of the characters having fun and then a match cut of when they are split apart. Because the clips are so short, the idea is that we jump cut them back and forth which is used to increase the tension of the characters making audiences wonder what is the parallel about. 

After getting feedback from my teacher, since we added a starting scene of the artist, he explained how this indicates to audiences that this is the artists story, while in reality, our intensions is to make this whole music video about the guys POV. So to make this idea, he suggested to start the music video with the guy alone. Because we do not have a single shot of just him, we decided to use an idea where well use the same exact video of him at the beach which can be a hermeneutic code to audiences to question who is at the beach and why is he there. Which in the end helps reveal the answer to the whole message of the music video.  

The next thing I did is to continue on the short fighting scene that they had earlier, which helps showcase the short flashback of why they had the intense scene on the couch. I decided to keep it a long take to help keep the fighting realistic and so that audiences can see the full tension in detail and develop sympathy to the female lead in this fight. I then decided to use jump cuts and cut them based on the lyrics which plays a connotation to help enhance the emotion of the scenes. These lyrics are very important to help define the meaning behind the camera work and so audiences can deeply understand the idea.

"Why cant I stop?"

This just helps focus on how she's being very helpless with herself knowing that all they do is fight but she tries to keep herself in, knowing it's a toxic situation. Which technically refers to "why can I stop myself and get out of this toxic relationship".

"Everything I want speeding up my pulse"

Behind this meaning showcases the female leads wants and desires of wanting to be in a stable and happy/healthy/loving relationship that she was in at the beginning before all the fights and loss of interest. she desperately wants to go back to how things were before. 

"Give em nothing personal"

This plays a huge role in the meaning of the relationship. This whole time during fight scenes, there is no communication happening. In most of the scenes where they are basically over, it shows them sitting down together in silent and no-one is saying anything to each other showcasing the lack of communication between them and how instead of trying to communicate and point out the problem to settle the conflict, they are brushing it off and no-one is addressing the elephant in the room . This plays a role in meaning because this shows that the characters will never open up to each other and they would rather watch the relationship fall apart rather than just lowering down their pride and egos to fix the relationship. this personally and highlights the reason of why they are toxic for each other.

"I'm not affected"

Modern relationships are very different to how things were in the past. It is far more confusing and complicated. One of the biggest pressures of modern relationships is the need to appear "nonchalant". many people feel like they must act like they don't care and it doesn't affect them when it really clearly does. This lyric emphasizes this meaning because both characters never openly show that the relationship falling apart bothers them when in closed doors it clearly does. showing too much emotion ma appear ''too much'' or ''too needy'' Because of this, people hide their true feelings, avoid serious conversations, and pretend they are okay with uncertainty just to keep the other person interested. This creates a situation where both people may care, but neither wants to be the first to admit it which connects directly into this music videos storyline. 

For the verse, this is where we will showcase all the memories and all the emotional moments they had when they are happy, clips like this help audiences believe that they used to be in love and gives the sad emotion to audiences that the relationship is falling apart even though it used to be so cute. I chose to use quick jump for this because it helps emphasise that these memories are ironically fading away because these memories wont be there anymore since they are in a stage where they are moving on from each other. Using eye-line cuts when they are looking at each other helps bring their love interaction with their body language more realisticThe focus of this makes audience try to feel like not that look so cute why did it just quickly disappear to enhance how good the relationship was before. 

"I've been the ice, I've been the flame

I've been the prize, the ball and chain

I've been the dice, the magic eight

So I'm not affected

These lines showcases the female lead being really tired and emotionally exhausted because they've been through so many different experiences in relationships. she's acted cold sometimes and very passionate some other times hence why we put flashbacks of memories of different situations in this specific verse. she's acted wanted and desired (which is at the time of the memories) but she's also felt like a burden and pushed away. after going through all these things, her present self (the one narrating the story and lip-syncing) they don't feel surprised of hurt as easily anymore. she's showing that she's grown out of it and she is much stronger now hence the "so I'm not affected" part. 

To end the verse I decided to emphasise this lyric to when she's singing.

"Tonight I just wanna fall"

 Emphasises on her growth from all this and now she's finally ready to tell her story, move on and 

completely ready to let go from this bad past she was in.

The next thing I did was add a parallel of a scene of when they are happy together inside a car and when they aren't. 

"Mirror, mirror"  

Is used in this scene to showcase a parallel of when they were still in love and it switches to the present of how they are now falling apart. so there is a parallel hence "mirror" which is a reflection. 

The next thing I did is to add 2 parallel scenes of when she enters the house during a tensed situation where she is still willing to stay and a scene of her leaving the house to show case how she's leaving the house for good. Then I used the lyrics in the scenes that helps emphasise what the meaning is behind the moment.

"I become her again

Visions of a teenage innocence 

How'd I shift shape like that?" 

In this scene/lyric she picks up a photo frame right when she's about to move out of there apartment and reminisces about a memory of them taking a Photo Booth picture. it cuts too the memory with the lyrics 

"I become her again" 

She falls back to that memory and wants to relive it and misses it. 

"Visions of a teenage innocence" 

Talks about how when they were in love they looked so pure and innocent before all the toxicity got involves. 

"How'd I shift shape like that?" 

Talks about how she cannot seem to fathom the fact that she was once so happy and full of love and now there's a huge jump to the her right now that is moving out of their apartment and completely heartbroken. she hesitates for a moment before she leaves because she still feels a bit of hope but then she finds it in herself to know that leaving is what's best for her and leaves. 

Using jump cuts I went back and forth to each scenes of when they are standing in front of the door and the girl enters and ended the verse of her leaving to end the tensed situation. I made sure that I cut it to the moments of when she head turns and when they open the door and thew same time to help really bring the match cut and eye-line cuts for audiences to feel like they are in her position.

The next thing I was to make a memory flashback again but this time lesser since the memories are slowly decreasing and tis building up to the present of the story. I also decided to use a scene of them happy when the song says flame to symbolise that the she was passionate about her relationship and its sad that its slowly fading.

The next thing I did plays a major role that helps build up the scene of the whole meaning behind the music video. This scene has 2 pathways after the breakup, the girls POV and the guys POV. We see how the reactions after the breakup using memories and their present situation.

As soon as she leaves and moves back into her childhood home, in the heat of the moment from all the heartbreak she only remembers everything bad he's done to her and how the relationship was so toxic. it cuts to the male lead now and the whole mv shifts to his POV and we don't see anything more from her because it symbolises the fact that she has moved on and that's the end of her story. 

The main focus is now on the male lead months later because in general it is said that men only start to grieve their loss a lot of time later because they are still in denial at the beginning so we showcased that by making a whole shift in the music video to his POV. From his POV, everything is a lot more different from hers because she was the one being treated badly so she remembers only the bad. However, he only remembers all the good memories that is shown in a very dreamlike filtering to showcase how when we are feeling nostalgic our minds play a trick on us and showcases only the good and not how toxic the relationship actually was. he is shown heavily reminiscing and can't seem to get her out of his head. 

I also added a small text edit of when he gets notification to help audiences understand that the reason why he will be running out to chase her is because of a special occasion. I used video start and used the same style form the movie euphoria when they get phone notifications.

This is when he goes to the beach with the same exact scene in the beginning because this is when the answers are being revealed to questions about who is this guy and why was he at the beach. He goes to their spot which is the beach. the place where they spent the most time being in love and starts to feel a lot of regret for his actions. which is why we only chose to add memories of the beach only when he is at the beach thinking about all the great memories he had with her.

I also chose these specific lyrics during the scene where she's singing. Just like what I've mentioned the purpose of "I'm not affected" is that she feels like she doesn't care if he wants her back no matter how desperate he is. So really emphasising this lyric during scene really shows how far she has moved on.

Now it cuts to him running. Because the clips were quite short and it was really difficult to shoot, since it was a public space, our choice was to create jump cuts and help make the clips look longer using this technique. It also really helped emphasise the heated tension thats happening. In the end, a long take slow-mo of her looking back really helps support how he really misses her and how precious she was to him. We also used a blur effect to highlight that his focus is now becoming reality and he is finally realising what he truly wants in his confusing situation.

After getting feedback, our teacher suggested to added clips of the girl between the running scene to help develop the memory core, We also decided to slow those down to bring the mode of how he is really just trying to focus on her as he is running really fast.

Ending it with him arriving at the cafe where he meets her with another guy, I've decided to add clips of her when she isn't singing to showcase that her part of the story ends and its a slow-mo of her looking away, this helps indicate that she's moved on from the relationship and isn't looking forward to the same situation.

We've decided to go over the time limit of the music video of the eyeliner match of him looking at her when she's with another guy. This long take, allows to really emphasise the emotion of the guy after realising that he lost her. This then allows audiences reactions to feel apathy for him because now they know that he was the cause of this whole situation. But it also because sympathy audiences are more willing to see a happy ending but only to find out that it wasn't. 

Reflection: Although the editing role wasn't entirely my part, I still managed to give some feedback and inputs almost everyday during the editing timeline. Wether it was in class or outside school, or even at my house as me and the main editor Kristine are neighbors. We have gotten so much feedback from Mr Nick aswell which allows us to learn that choosing clips and putting them together were not easy at all. We had to sacrifice clips we likes better, kept redo-ing one part over and over again for it to make sense, and struggle with clips being too short. This was a new experience and made me learn new things such as filming enough and as much as possible, doing more communication in how we want the clips to go, and even things like focusing on detail when filming in order to get good continuity.