2. PRODUCTION LOG:
GUIDANCE
• This document is for you to track the progress of your
production – filming, editing and post-production.
• This is so you can track what you did and how you did it,
explaining and amendments and changes you made and
tracking the decisions that have shaped the practical
creation of your music video.
• The more detail you include about how you made your music
video, the better. The document is broken down in to two
sections, Filming and Editing, each of these is then made of
specific elements that occur in both.
• For each slide there is a prompt detailing what you should
include, delete the prompt after you have complete the slide.
• Remember, images often show what you’ve done more
effectively than words. Use text to explain an illustration.
3. FILMING
Explain what worked and didn’t work about your filming and how you managed this
covering the following areas:
• Technical –The camera I was using worked perfectly, my stand was a
cardboard box and kitchen container so there wasn’t much that could
mechanically go wrong, the lighter I used on the fire worked fine as well.
• Logistical – The location was easy to access and I had no trouble getting the
filming done. The ground was very damp, which was irritating but that was the
only issue.
• Personnel – The entire cast and crew was me, so I didn’t have a problem with
personnel.
• Planning – Both my original plan and back-up plan were scrapped due to
events that couldn’t have been planned around or predicted. The finished
video was entirely improvised both during filming and editing.
• Next steps – I had to fundamentally reimagine the entire video twice and after
that I changed what song I’d use another 2 times so the only thing I know
going forth is to expect that literally everything goes wrong with anyone else
involved in the project, so that I can plan ahead, I’ll also make sure that my
projects can mostly be done by me alone.
4. FILMING –
PRODUCTION STILLS
Where appropriate add stills from when you were filming,
annotate where necessary
In the foreground
there’s a bit of wet
tarmac, a field of
thistles and nettles
in the background
and a patch of grass
on which the fire
was lit in the middle.
For equipment I had
a lighter, a bag of
scrap paper and 2
large bottles of
water.
5. EDITING
My first part of editing the video, at first had nothing to do with the source
video, instead I worked on the small animations seen throughout in
Photoshop.
First I would create a black rectangle
across the whole piece, then I would
create three transparent layers. On the
first layer I would draw either a small
doodle that would play constantly
throughout the video or the titles and
chorus. I would draw onto one layer in a
pale cream colour. (I used the black
rectangle to contrast against so I could
actually draw properly.) After drawing a
sketch that I thought the was good
enough I would turn the opacity down on
the first layer and sketch over the original
layer on a second one I would go through
the process again. After making these 3
layers I would delete the black rectangle
and turn the opacity up to the max,
created a frame animation and rendered
the animation as a video.
6. EDITING
Secondly I would use After Effects to animate and position the animations to
later be used in Premiere.
In After Effects I would import the
source video in and position the 3
frame videos. After I was happy with
the videos I would stack the clips on
top of each over until I could compose
them into a few second composition, I
would then stack those compositions
until they were minutes long. I would
then compose all the separate
animations along with the source so
that I could just put it straight into
Premiere.
7. EDITING
I imported the After Effects clips into Premiere as well as the song so that I
could get the timing of the edits frame perfect.
In Premiere I went almost frame-by-
frame through the audio, placing text
for the verses and a few animations
for the choruses. I used a font called
“Cows & Aliens” as it fit a 60’s
aesthetic.
8. EDITING –
FILE MANAGEMENT
I saved the After Effect animations and Premiere files in my
“Document” folders as I had very few files to worry about
and as I did the editing very quickly I wasn’t confused about
where things were.
9. EDITING –
SETTING UP PREMIERE
I built the majority of the video in After Effects and imported
the project directly into Premiere, as such I will show how I
set up After Effects.
First you import (or drag) a video
file into your media tray (middle
left) and drag the clip into the
third icon from the right on the
bottom of the tray. Doing this
composes the whole project to
the same specs as the original
clip, in this case 25fps and
1080p.
10. EDITING –
IMPORTING FOOTAGE
First I exported the After Effects Project as a Premiere Pro
Project.
I then opened the new
premiere project, with
all the clips I required
within.
11. EDITING –
WORKSPACE
This is the toolbar, this
contains different simple
tools that can be used on
the timeline, like a
selector tool, a razor or a
text tool these can ether
be applied directly to the
preview window or the
timeline
This is the
Project panel in
which all the
media used in
the project is
kept, from video
to audio files and
graphics.
This is the timeline, onto which the text, video clips
and audio can be moved around the project as well as
cut, stretched and given effects like colour correction.
The composition of the timeline is the main factor that
plays into the complete product.
This is the preview
panel where the video
can be ran through.
You can also go frame
by frame through the
video and add markers
as well as other
operations.
12. EDITING –
ASSEMBLY EDIT
First I imported the base footage and the animations from
After Effects and added the song as a audio track. This was
simple because these elements stayed fairly constant
throughout the video, apart from the first nine seconds where
the credits are. So I added in 9 seconds that I cut out in After
Effects so I could time the credits to the music in Premiere.
13. EDITING –
REFINEMENT
After getting the “base” of the video onto the timeline I would
then go nearly frame by frame for the start and end of every
line in the song so I could get the timing perfect for each
piece of text. I did the same for the chorus. I then added a
small fade to black at the end of the video, I feel that the
minimal editing made the video not only easier to edit for
someone who never edited video seriously before, but also
gave the video a simple charm.
14. EDITING –
COLOUR CORRECTION/SFX
I didn’t use any colour correction or SFX, it not only would’ve
made the production longer but would’ve also interfered with
the simple, naturalistic aesthetic I was aiming for.
15. EDITING –
EXPORT
I first went to File > Export > Media and got met
with the export settings window and set it up to
the project specs and added the project to my.
Media Encoder 2020 queue. After the queue was
finished I was left with an .MP4 file which I
named “finished MV”