Final Cut Basic Editing

 The image on the right is the viewer box, this is on the right hand side of the screen when Final Cut is running. It shows a preview of the final video with the added effects and transitions, this photo has the MTV Rocks logo, a song title box and a widescreen effect, which when played is black and not white. Having this preview screen is useful for when making a video as it allows the user to quickly view how the video will look with the effects, and therefore editing the video is easier with this tool as you can edit the video in stages.

Mark In/Out

This is the video upload section or browser on Final Cut. It shows a list of all footage captured and uploaded from the camera to Final Cut, so therefore the footage can be viewed in the left screen of the program. The list on the image is the different clips we had from filming with Glenn, and from there the user drags the clip to left hand screen so that particular shots can be selected for use in the video. Once the desired shot is on the left canvas, you then select the clip by clicking the letter 'I' (mark in) and 'O' (mark out) to choose where the shot starts and ends. The image above on the right's blue lines illustrate what footage is selected.

Once the desired shot has been selected by using the 'I' and 'O' keys the clip is then dragged to the main track with the rest of the video and audio track. This is then seen on the middle box on the screen, which is called the viewer, this is used to view the footage and select parts for the actual video. Once the desired clip has been selected it will look like the image on the right; a blue rectangle with a thumbnail image of the shot on the main track.

Audio Track

The music video also needed an audio clip of the actual song, the process of adding this to the video was simple. Matt simply opened the file of the song we wanted, then dragged it to the time line. The audio is noticed through the green bar, this makes it easy to differentiate between audio and video. Once the audio and video clips have been opened on Final Cut the screen will look like the image below, with both tracks being together on the timeline.

During the construction stages the editing had to be cut to a certain lyric or beat of the song, this meant detailed scaling of each clip so that it fitted the song. To make this easier we made the track a larger size, this was done by selecting a tab on the bottom left of the Final Cut screen, seen on the right. We simply selected a larger box out of the choices, which made the whole track larger so editing was easier as we could see the small gaps which had to be filled. 

Idea One (Back)

Here is the first design for the back panel of the digipak. I opted to use this image as it is a shot from the video, thus enhancing our house style from video to the digipak. I began by using the font 'mistral' for the song titles, and added a small stroke to the text so it stands out from the background. Using this font would therefore connote the same style of the front panel which helps the target audience notice the digipak is for Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds. After researching many digipaks from home and the internet I thought adding a barcode would be a necessity to make it look more professional, as every hard copy of a music album has one. I then proceeded to add the record company 'Sour Mash' to the bottom right of the panel, as this shows the record label to which the music belongs. I chose a font called 'Boingo' for the text of the record company, as it similar to the real font used by Sour Mash, yet it is still slightly different which adds to our own style for the digipak. I then changed the stroke colour to white for this font, so that it is easily read as the style may be difficult for some to read if it was plain black. 

Changing The Vibrance 

Once the text and barcode was in place, I wanted to change the vibrance of the photo. This was done by selecting 'image', then 'saturation/vibrance', I then moved the vibrance up to +23. This makes the colour deeper and crisper, which I believe makes the overall image look more professional. The deeper colours also make it easier to notice and read the text for the song titles etc. 

Here is what I thought was the finished design for a possible back panel for the digipak. Overall at this stage I was pleased with the general style and look of the panel. However Jay then noticed that many of the albums he has shows some form of legal content, which includes who owns the copyright of the song and album artwork. As a group we then decided that adding a small paragraph of legal content would complete the professional style of the digipak.

Idea Three (Front)

The third idea is very similar to the second idea for the front panel of the digipak. However instead of using the turquoise and orange gradient, I edited theContrastBrightnessVibranceof the image. I chose not to use the gradient for this idea because the gradient dominates the whole image, and would therefore need to be used on all of the panels to follow the house style we want to illustrate in the digipak. 

I made the image slightly brighter, so that it would overall look a lot cleaner and recognizable. The brighter image is strongly noticeable compared to the original photo, as the walkway and sky is lighter, making the text bolder and easily readable. I then increased the contrast, so that the green from the building on the left would give the image stronger colour, as it is fairly plain without it. The vibrance change worked well with the edited contrast, as both together work so that the photo has deeper colour which is needed for this particular image as without the change it would look rather bland. 

Finished Music Video

Filming With Glenn 3

During the half term break we had to re-film and find some new locations for our video for the final cut. With it being half term Glenn was available for a limited time, due to his numerous employment and band commitments. We therefore had to priotitize and plan a day around him so that everyone could go to London to film.

We agreed a date amongst ourselves and Glenn and prepared what we needed for the day, this was mainly the camera, tripod, signs for Glenn to hold and our plan of action so we didn't waste any time whilst in the city.

Southbank Filming

Myself, Matt and Jay traveled up to London early so that we could have the whole day filming, we wanted to film more locations to show the vast range of life and culture in London, so went to locations such as Trafalgar Square, Southbank, Tower Bridge and various streets and underpasses. We were also lucky with the weather on this particular day as there were clear skies and therefore the best day-light was available, which improved the standard of our footage as most of the previous was in slightly darker conditions.

Matt Setting Up The Tripod And Camera

Glenn joined us in the afternoon as he had to work during the morning, once he arrived we walked to the tunnel which would be used for our opening shots. Once we arrived and began filming the footage again looked a great deal clearer as we still had day-light. We re-filmed the opening pans and shots of Glenn singing so that we could replace the old, dark shots from previous filming. The location of this tunnel must be a popular filming location as it is similar to the Coldplay music video to 'Fix You', and whilst we were filming there seemed to be a photoshoot taking place on the other side of the tunnel.

Whilst we had Glenn with us I began to take some photos of him and his guitar for possible Digipak covers. Due to the title of the song being 'What A Life' it was difficult to think of a single image which could portray or connote the title of the song. I did however, remember some of Noel's other artwork on his singles, and some of them had Noel facing the other way looking into the distance. Taking this into consideration I took some photos from behind Glenn when we was walking along the Southbank near Tower Bridge. I believe photos such as this can promote the song title as Glenn is watching different lives around him, and at the same time a sense of voyeurism is created as the audience are essentially watching Glenn too.




Here is a short slideshow of some locations we visited whilst in London. They included areas such as Southbank, Trafalgar Square, Westminster and Buckingham Palace.

Idea Two (Front)

Here is a second possible album cover, we wanted to keep the fonts the same through-out our digipak so adding the font to this image was simple. I also used the same gradient which was used for the previous design, however before adding it I changed the opacity to 28%, this made the gradient more visible but still subtle. I then repeated this process by adding a second gradient over the current, so that the orange was more noticeable. Jay also suggested to change the type of gradient from 'normal' to 'colour burn', this gives the gradient a deeper look and makes the green and orange stand out.

I then wanted to try a different effect on the title font, as before we used a drop shadow only. In this design I added a stroke and contour to the font, which made it slightly bolder which the group and I think needs to be done as it is above a light background.

The idea behind the photo used is to hopefully connote part of our video, as in it our character (Glenn) is traveling around numerous parts of London, so when taking this photo I wanted to portray how he is actually moving over the city through the notion of walking.

Idea One (Front)

I began to use Photoshop to create some potential digipak front covers. I started by choosing a simple photo which was of the guitar Glenn used whilst filming in the tunnel. I then added the gradient which Jay had created before-hand; this was a turquoise colour fading into orange. Before applying the gradient to the photo I changed the opacity of the gradient to around 20%, this was so it wasn't too bold and was still subtle.

The next stage was to add the text of the band "Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds" and the song title "AKA...What A Life" to the cover. The group and I agreed to use the fonts Coaster and Mistral for the text on the page, as both looked similar to what is used for Noel's artwork yet still looked unique for our work. We also wanted to follow Noel's style by having a smaller sized "o" with an underline beneath it. To achieve this we highlighted the "o", then chose the "superscript" option below the font options on the right hand side of the screen.

Below is a potential idea for our digipak, we wanted to keep a simple style through-out with the cover as we feel it is difficult to represent the song title "What A Life" with a single image. For this design we opted to have the guitar used for the song, as it promotes the instruments used by Noel to create the song. I also changed the rotation of the "AKA...What A Life" slightly as many of the other fonts on Noel's singles have slightly slanted font as it is handwriting, which is scrawly. I then decided that adding a stroke to both texts would make them stand out more from the wall in the background.