MUKZ-SHE’S GONE AWAY

Its finally finish and here are the results:

In my opinion I believe that my understanding and skills have improved highly. I look back at my previous work and feel that I’m really getting somewhere and also gained another interest. After effects is something I would that I’ve enjoyed using this year because has given me encouragement and helped me concentrate to see a broaden my horizon for the near future. Even though my interest mostly lies upon becoming a film director, I’m also interested on the format designs of a complete motion picture, including ideal special effects, scenery use, and plot ideas. With all the hard work in the two years of foundation and hopefully participate for a third year in the course to form a degree, I have so much options to choose from and experiment with.

I really hope I can create work at this quality if I put my mind to it. However I feel I still need a bit of practice. I’ve learn t a lot this year especially on the terms of organisation and to always rely on yourself because there will be many disappointments and you always need a backup plan if all fails.

In terms of the music video i believe that the synchronizing could have been better and probably work on my imagination a bit further so there’s more to establish with than few simple shots however I must remember this is my first music video and there will be more opinions when the time comes. Overall I’m proud of the effort and I will from my mistakes in future to create more impressive pieces of work.

Changes to the script

At the beginning of the music video I was I hoped to establish the idea of the performer to start crying emphasizing him emotions using after effects, however I decided to scrap the plan because when I attempted to create tears from his eyes using motion tracking as well, it looked very unrealistic. There are ways in making a motion made effect realistic but the program I was using didn’t have the advance tools needed such as particular which is a more advance and effect way in producing better particles.

Demonstrations

Here are some examples of affect effects at work. Here are demonstrations of matte effects. This is where it creates transparency by comparing a source layer with a difference layer, and then keying out pixels in the source layer that match both the position and colour in the difference layer. Typically, it’s used to key out a static background behind a moving object, which is then placed on a different background.

Before:

After:

Behind the scenes

MAYA & AFTER EFFECTS

According to the storyboard, the music video begins an isolated room. I wanted to gain the idea of isolation so I didn’t want to simply film him in a house it didn’t have the ideal quality I was looking for. So I decided to create the room which gives me the opportunity to create the atmosphere that I’m looking to gain the song itself.

I’ve learnt a great deal about different types of express media and its uses and with my understandings and skills developed in the past two years, I decided to use the chance to use them all at once.

I firstly decided to create the room using Autodesk Maya which took me two days to finish the modelling.
Here is some rendered examples:

Day 1:

Day 2:

My plan was to composite 3D models with capture footage making it more interactive as well as given it a cinematic experience towards it. However, even though it could have been an interesting idea, but due to the time that I had left I felt it would take a lot of time to get it all process, especially trying to track/make the actor to sit exactly on the chair to make it really realistic. Also I felt that my understanding of the software still needed more effort so I thought it was best to stick with what I know rather what I don’t. But I hope when I have another opportunity and time I’ll have the chance to experiment with challenges and ideas with the software’s.

To save time, I decided to create the room in after effects which make things easier and at the same time it’s giving me a chance to experiment further with the software which I’m really enjoying.

Here is the final production of the room that will be used in music video:

COMPOSTING

Everything seems to be going as followed; now it was time to work on a few tests using the studio for green screening for practice In order to gain the best quality of the shoots and form critical decisions for the actual production stage.

I have now gained an influential interest in after effects and I have enjoyed it so much I tend to use my spare time to experiment with the software and work on my own projects to adapt on my understanding and creativity. In this case, I knew I would enjoy composting.

Here’s an example:

I’ve been working on a theme for my music video and the fact that the song is based on the break-up of his love partner I decided to base it on the flow of water. The reason for this is because, emotion is the key to the song and there are different forms of emotions such as sadness. I thought of way in which emphasis the meaning of sadness and I came to the conclusion to base the song on the art of the weather.

Here is a reference I found interested and felt that it related to what I’m aiming to establish:

‘Like rain, tears can be stormy or just a light sprinkle, and feel angry, cold, dreary and sad, or even come through the sunshine. Rain often follows a change of weather pressure, and tears can be the result of release of inner tension. People frequently cry from relief that they’ve been heard or that they can see a solution where there appeared to be a problem. Those who suffer from a trauma or a loss normally cry a little after the first shock of finding out, as the awful pressure of the news is absorbed and the grief sets in.’
Here are some experimental examples I created using after effects until I came to a final decision my design I looking to use:

By gaining the best quality waves I used such effect The Ripple effect. This creates the appearance of ripples in a specified layer, moving away from a centre point in circles. The effect is similar to dropping a stone in a pond. To animate ripples at a constant speed i used the Wave Speed control. This control doesn’t require keyframes for animation.

Another example is Wave World effect. I used this effect to create a grayscale displacement map for use with other effects such as Caustics or Colorama. This effect creates waves based on a simulation of the physics of liquids. Waves start from an effect point, interact with each other, and realistically reflect off their environment.

The Caustics effect simply simulates caustics where reflections of light at the bottom of a body of water, created by light refracting through the water’s surface. The Caustics effect generates this reflection and creates realistic water surfaces when used with Wave World and Radio Waves.

Final establishment of the test:

Setbacks

Everything seems to be in order, I’ve rented a green screen in a studio and gained access to the university film course department to retrieving the film equipment needed for this project and it will only take two days to complete the filming process. The only problem is the artist. The producer has finally returned with some results on the artist but it wasn’t good news. Unfortunately , the artist can’t make the visit which is a big problem since he’s the main attractive to the whole project however the producer and I had discussion on the situation and we’ve came to the conclusion to continue the filming process but to replace the artist with an actor with his permission. I couldn’t argue with the idea especially when time was running out.

I made a few calls and emails to those I felt would be interested in the part. I only needed to actors. In days or researching I eventually found my actors. The main actor’s name is Ambrose Gradwell, who is a student at the Bournemouth University and plays on the basketball team. I also decided to help him with his basketball show reel by filming one of his games and produce a DVD copy of the event. This was in order to gain a basketball scholarship.

PREPARATION FOR THE MUSIC VIDEO

After days of careful considerations and meetings, I have decided to take, Nathan Mukoro also known as Mukz, music video much further. I had other offers however, they only led to setbacks which I have to time for. Time was precious so I had to take what was resource for the time being. However I hope in time I’ll get back to my previous offers, not only to make up my hours but for further experience and encouragement to reflect my goals of becoming a director.

The artist was unavailable to contact at this time but I’ve been talking to his producer who give me the authorization to create a music video for the song given. I had a second meeting with before he left for London with storyboards to back up my plans of development and he was happy with the results. With confirmation on the go, he agreed to go to London to talk to the artist about the pre-production plans and find an available time for the artist to visit Bournemouth for the filming process.

In the meantime, I made further preparations before confirming the days of filming. According to the storyboards demonstrated from the last entry I will be using green screening for compositing and also using close locations to establish the perceptive of the relationship between the artist and his love interest. So I decided to firstly book a day and a room where I can used the opportunity to work with the green screen which will take place mid April. For location uses, I used a specific day to find useful places for the relationship scene. Here are some examples:

Bournemouth town was my first choice so I started looking art locations such as the beach and the parks as I thought helped establish the feel of their relationship. However I must remember that this is just an idea and at the same time I need to think of my film crew and actors/actresses on their availability, so to make things easier I decided to shoot the relationship since on the university campus as a closer location:

Storyboard Descriptions:

storyboard descriptions:

NATHAN AKA MUKZ’- SHE’S GONE AWAY BREAKDOWN SCENE(S)

Scene 1-Location: Sitting Room

Action & Description:

the performer Nathan is sitting in a chair in a room, pondering over a photograph he found of his love partner. We see a closer shoot of the photo. He starts crying, and a single tear flows from his eye down his cheek. The single tear drops off his cheek, its followed until it hits the sea of water creating ripples and fades into black forming into a dream.

Sound/Dialogue:
None

Scene 2- green screening

Action & Description:

We open on the panorama of a dark, grey, tormented ocean filled with ripples, introducing the name and the artist of the song.

Sound/Dialogue:
RnB track playing in background.

Scene 3- green screening

Action & Description:

We opened up to a new scene where we have a better introduction to the artist demonstrated using Random shots and angles to build up an establishment of who is and where its set. He does will be behind an imaginative background to create his emotional feelings, which we merged into to bring in new conventional scenes.

Sound/Dialogue:
RnB track playing in background.

Scene 4 – green screening and Bournemouth university campus

Action & Description:

Homemade footage of the artists relationship is brought into the scene. We are brought back to the artist to remind us of his position has changed and continues using different angle shots. The shots are experimented with the use of typography. Scenes swap around showing the ripples of water again to homemade footage again.

Sound/Dialogue:
RnB track playing in background.

Action & Description:

The artist mourns and puts his hands together implying he’s holding his emotions within himself until it starts to rain upon him. He opens him arms with the rain continually expressing his feelings. It then fades out from its dream mode to embrace in the same pose as when we first saw him. He’s asleep when suddenly the picture he held falls out of his hand to the ground. We see a clear close shoot of the photo then fades into black once again and words are carefully written in the middle: ‘One tear says it all.’

Sound/Dialogue:
RnB track playing in background.

Storyboards