Digipak Research

Bands are recognized usually by their album covers, which relate to the bands appearance/scene. Some albums have artwork that is extremely simple, yet relates to the band in some way. Others can be completely spontaneous and do not relate to the band at all. But the fans of these bands will relate to that specific image as the image represents their favorite band! Some of my favorite bands have completely random images for their artwork. Bands such as Animal Collective, Band of Horses, Good Shoes, Grizzly Bear, The Maccabees, Marmaduke Duke, MGMT, Mystery Jets, Noah And The Whale, The Rumble Strips etc. I've noticed that the artwork usually relates to nature in some way as the majority of the images are either taken outdoors, or include natural 'things' for example trees! Also the artwork/photography has a kind of antique feel to it, with a slightly 'sepia' effect, again adding to the aged appearance. For the antique look I may take photos of an old bookshelf including vibrant coloured books etc. With a strong contrast between the other photos included! Here is fleet foxes' digipak. I could only find the Front and Back cover, however the layout inside is pretty much the same, giving it an almost antique style!

8 Second Clip

Here is the first attempt of animating the first few seconds of footage. Using iStopmotion, it was far more easier to place the photos in the same place after the last photo. This technique is made easier by using the 'onion skinning' tool, which allows you to see a vague picture of the last photo taken, as well as the photo you are about to take, therefore making the animation smoother! Once I finished animating I Lip-Syned the audio to the video, which took a while, but I got there eventually. From 8 seconds of footage, I used 99 cut-outs, which took about 20 minutes, alone, to animate. Although I will have about 4 or 5 people helping, 2 and a half minutes will still be a long progress, however, if I get the finished product to look pretty good, and my audience to like it, it will be worth it!

Cutting Footage into Frames

Today I eventually found out how to cut my video footage into 12 fps (frames per second). All I had to do was to Export the footage to 'Movie to Image Sequence' and selected the amount of frames in a second i wanted. I chose to have just 12 frames a second as 25 frames (another option) would take twice as long. So far, i have printed out each individual frame with 9 images per page. I have also numbered these to make such I do not muddle these up when I start recording. This stage is still experimental as I am still not 100% sure whether to narrow down the 12fps to 6fps. It will be a lot more 'blocky' but it will be a quicker/easier process!

Overview So Far

Here are just a few stages, showing the main stage of the making of the music video. It is a brief view of how it will be done, but hopefully it will give an idea. Click on the photos to see a larger version!

Today's Progress

Today me and Luke recorded ourselves miming the first few lines of my version of the song 'White Winter Hymnal'. We simply played the song through my laptop, and sung/mimed the words. By doing this I can then split the recordings up by 24fps (frames per second) allowing me to individually print the frames, cutting out the heads, and animating, eventually! I've thoroughly looked on websites on how to cut a video up into frames, but haven't found a tutorial, or a possible answer. However I hope to get in touch with someone who knows how to do this, maybe ask a technician either at school or a shop. Anyway here are a few clips of what we have put together so far:
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Finished Song!

Here is the finished song for my music video. It is 02:35 minutes long so it will be a relatively quick video, however I still need to keep the audience entertained throughout!
I have no video to the music yet as i have only recorded myself miming the video. I still need to record Luke miming some parts, which won't take song. There is also an 8 second delay at the start, so don't worry if you can't hear anything :)