Evaluation of Deconstruction and Reconstruction of a Media Text Task

Process and Difficulties

For the deconstruction and reconstruction of a media text task, we decided to base our video on Twin Atlantic’s Make a Beast of Myself music video. This involved speeding the song up beforehand (1.6), filming the action in one single shot with other characters involved, and slowing the video down in order to match the lip sync filmed in the shot. We sped up the song so that the miming could be done quicker, and therefore the whole shot would be shorter overall so that when it came to editing the shot after slowing, it would be of a similar size to the song itself. For example, if we had filmed the shot with the miming done in time to the original song, after slowing down the shot it would be too long in comparison to the song.

We arranged to meet on a Wednesday afternoon (when the entire College had a free period) at Newland Avenue as this ensured many students were also free at this time, so they could act as the other characters in the video. However, the problem we found here was that two members of our group (myself) and another member of the camera crew (Jennifer) couldn't make it in this period, so we ensured we leaded in the storyboard and editing process so that group responsibilities were equally shared.
We went through each stage of the video during the storyboard process and described each shot in detail so that we knew exactly what to shoot when it came to filming. 
During the filming process, the characters had to be lined up exactly as seen on the video and their actions had to be carefully timed. The crew had to ensure that the miming of the main character (Danny), the characters' actions and the tracking of the camera crew were in time with each other. As expected, a number of shots were taken as it was extremely difficult to get all of the action in time with each other. Another difficulty the camera crew found was ensuring the concentration of the external characters were kept continuous and their performance of the given task was just as effective in the next shot as it was the previous – in order to create one single, effective shot. 
After the filming had taken place, the editing began. We uploaded all of the shots we had taken – even the ones we knew we weren't going to use – on an editing suite. We then named all of our shots appropriately; chose the most effective single shot that would match the criteria, and dragged it onto the timeline. We then added the song at its regular speed, and slowed the shot down to what we thought was appropriate. The difficulty we found here was that it was extremely difficult to match the speed of the shot with lip sync to the speed of the original track; we found that although the lip sync started off perfectly, the more the video went on, the more the lip sync began to un-sync with the song lyrics. 
To solve this, we decided to drag the same video shot across (so we had two versions of the same thing on one timeline) and continue to chop the video and change the speed until it became similar to the original. We then cut the first shot where the miming became out of sync (so we were left with only the perfectly synced part of the shot) and then cut the second shot so that when we put both of the shots together, it looked like one continuous shot. It was difficult to get both of the shots to look simultaneous and without it looking like it jumped from one shot to another.
Eventually, we solved this problem and the shot looked continuous and in sync.


What I learnt

• The difficulties of working in a group in terms of individual ideas. Working in a group is definitely something I wouldn't choose to do when creating my music video as by working singularly, I can make all of the decisions and be in control of the whole project. 
• The difficulty of working with external characters in terms of concentration and controlling the project, therefore I think large numbers of external characters is something I will try to avoid (although I suspect separate shots will be much easier to control). 
• How to use the editing suites to my advantage, including the speeding and slowing down of data, cutting shots and adding special effects; something I can definitely take with me to the creation of my own music video. 
• I regret not being able to witness the filming first-hand, as I feel I would have been able to contribute a lot more of my ideas and take a lot more from the process.