Mise-en-scene refers to the setting of the scenery, the props used in production etc. during a film or a theatrical performance. In other words, it could be referred to as the visual theme of the story of the music video I'm making. The term considers the cinematography, stage design, story-boarding and direction used.
Locations and setting:
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In order to create two story-lines for the two distinctive artists that make up the duo: Lil Gems, I decided to include a number of locations personalized to represent their qualities and emotions. For example, as I've mentioned before, my brother will be a metaphor for happiness and enlightenment. This will be achieved through the use of open spaces/locations and colorful imagery e.g. saturated shots/clips, increasing exposure, speeding up moving images and having some exceptional edit breaking my consistent structure for some parts of the music video as a stylistic choice just to reflect on the unique moment the character is experiencing. Locations will include places like the woods which will be a metaphor for openness, nature being a friend and ideally the implication of being part of a world where someone has full control over the future. I will also include a garden with the idea of someone being around its own comfort zone as gardens have association with home.
The other side of the Gemini: Danni, will be representing depression and oppression by society, and the state of being lonely and isolated from people in general. Therefore, I decided to choose locations for Danni's character that are darker in reality. For example, a lot of the times the background for her portraits used in the music video will show a brick wall. This will be a good connotation of being barricaded (both literally and metaphorically). The simplicity shown due to the consistent and structured layout of the wall which has nothing special shown in particular suggests how society is directing the community to be the same, not allowing individuals to be who they want to be.
Visual story:
As with most pop songs in the music industry, they are less about narrative and have more to do with attracting the audiences' attention for more viewings. In other words, a lot of the times the visual story is inbetween different timelines with in-continuous cuts from one location to another. Therefore, this could sometimes mean a non-chronological order and an unclear storyline. In order to follow traditional conventions of the media industry, I decided to also use a lot of these cuts to and from the same frames from one part of the video to the next. Although because my song and video is much faster paced than a more mainstream song, I decided to include more locations and cuts which also means that the visual story will be represented by each of these separate locations.
The visual story itself is based around the surrealistically represented actions of the members of Lil Gems, taking place between day and night. The visuals will often match with what is written in the lyrics to help engage with the audience more literally. Both characters have fast-paced scenes, however, Danni's clips are black & white while Dom's are in colour to show an imbalance in emotions etc. The song in this case stands for two nonidentical social societies which is why the duo is playing an essential part in the story as they are too two separate social groups.
Costume and make-up:
In order to create an identifiable brand image for the target market, it is essential to present each of these two characters in oppositional ways in order to clearly distinguish their differences. Since the origin of the duo's name comes from the idea that each member have their own individual personalities, their clothing will have to look representative to what they and for.
In order to achieve this, my brother will have to reflect on the bright side of the Gemini, and to do this it will be rather simple than off-putting in relation to filming. This is due to the fact that I decided he should be wearing casual clothing for the production, not only because the video will be filmed on consecutive weekends outside of school (it's more convenient to wear casual clothes), but also because it simply suggests being comfortable in one's own environment. For Danni, I decided to ask her to wear darker clothing (e.g. black trouser and a grey top), with these colours easily connoting depression and thereby add a more severe degree of thoughtfulness. This helps to reference her inner character without having to say a word about it in the song's lyrics which poses further implications.
Overall, there is no need for make-up as it would bring a more serious tone for the video which I would consider unnecessary. Instead of costumes, selecting everyday clothing more carefully is a better option and helps to keep perspectives clear and realistic for the audience as they could easily emphasize with them since they dress the same.
Props:
Props could be casual objects such as a microphone or an instrument which could be used to imitate the performance of the song in real life while being recorded. They could also be used to represent the artist in the corresponding image that they are choosing to be portrayed in. Props can be categorized into different genres since specific objects have associations with themes which could be present in a song. For example, rock songs often express themes of isolation and rejection in life, which could be well played out by using a hat or a jacket which would be a metaphor for trying to hide from the public.
Although "Day 'n' Nite" is a pop song and sounds very positive, I introduced a second story line with Danni's character which will express a negative surrounding. She will not be using any props for her sequences, but instead the clothing will play a more significant role for those moments. Technically, costumes are considered to be props, although everyday style that I decided to include (only that they are worn at specific times) do not qualify as props.
The props I considered to include in the video are: my bike, basketball, speaker, the car, a phone and a chair. The car and the phone could ideally be used to portray a wealthy image of the artist, showing that Lil Gems does make a profit, although the way in which they have been applied is less likely to show the signification of wealth, but rather secrecy, as the car has only been used to create a fast-paced footage, rather than to show off that it's owned by the duo. This also helps to accurately denote what Lil Gems stands for, which is a troubled personality, instead of a message of an over-used prop-portrayal regarding to richness.
https://www.slideshare.net/Trampezium/conventions-of-a-pop-music-video-26096998
Lighting and colour palette:
Since I have gained experience with editing during my photography course, I decided to rely on post-production in order to improve lighting and the natural environment of the video clips. Therefore, my primary, and only source of lighting applied to each scene was coming from the sky. Later on I edited/adjusted the lighting levels so that each shot that I plan to film with my brother would look bright enough to support the story's motive of happiness, in case the footage was too dark in the first place due to the cloudy sky.
I also used my experience with editing to apply the colour palette appropriately so that it brings out the darker tones for Danni's scenes, and the brighter tones with increased exposure for Dom's shots. Since most of the clips that I've filmed with Danni are in black or will be for those left to film, the rules of colouring apply differently as the colours are seen differently by the program which makes it more unpredictable to edit using any guidelines. Instead, I decided to experiment and therefore, rely on my instincts.
According to the conventions of pop music videos, a lot of bright colours should be used to create a positive image in the audiences' mind, while darker colours should be enlightened. fashion accessories are also often used to imply richness and wealth.
Performance:
One of the key USPs of all music videos (of all genres) is lip sinking. It gives a much more realistic vibe to the video as if the artists were performing directly to individual audiences. It also makes the video more visual, besides the dancing and camera movements. Although these features help a lot selling the brand of the artists' identity, I decided to exclude it from my music video. In my opinion, "Day 'n' Nite" is too fast-paced in order to allow lip sinking to as a fluent material and therefore, to fit the uncommon style I applied to the song. Instead, the camera movements will do the talking and refer the visual story often by showing exactly what is implied or directly said with the lyrics.
Similarly to dancing, the pace of the beat drop makes it hard for me to time lengthy and well-choreographed movements in one go. During the filming of each scene, a lot of these movements that I ended up telling the artists to perform were improvised as part of the plan. Altogether, it happened to work out just fine to all the clips that I've filmed so far. For each part of a consecutive beat drop where the beat slows down and speeds up multiple times, simple dance moves will be used while applying the reverse effect and adjusted speed so that cuts can be made at exact times. For these beat drops beside dancing, I also included some objecting such as my bike's wheel rolling forward and then backwards with 300% speed. These sudden, irregular and unusual movements of these objects will make the predictability of the video much more surprising to engage the audience.
In conclusion, these features applied may not exactly follow traditional conventions of pop music videos, but I find them easy to familiarize for the intended audiences due to the matching of the rhythm and stylistic visuals.
