Analysing Lily Allen's previous work certainly inspired us whilst planning for our own music video for her single 'Everyones at it'.
LDN (Lily Allen) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmYT79tPvLg
The idea of Lucy walking through the streets was hugley influenced from the LDN video. We liked how it was such a simple narrative which clearly displayed a message but also looked great visually. We will be using similar types of shots such as mid shots and close ups whilst Lucy is singing the lyrics, long shots to show scenery and peoples behaviours in the background and extreme close ups to show details such as elements of Lucy's costume and certain props.
Tears DryOn Their Own (Amy Winehouse) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojdbDYahiCQ
In Amy's video she walks along a busy street during the day time. Although we our shooting our video for the streets at night time, so there won't be as many people, it can still be very influentual. For example, the behaviour of people passing by, such as; people bumping in to her and a drunken man trying to talk to her and she ignores him. But also elements that make it seem more natural/realistic; such as people in the background walking past eating or getting money out of a cash machine. An effect I like is the camera infront of her whilst she is walking forward, so you are able to see the background setting but also people walking the opposite way, which looks good visually as the pop upwards in to the frame.
Hit Me Baby One More Time (Britney Spears) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKo4fFVymqk
Our idea for the classroom scene at the start was based on the begginning of Brtiney psears' video for Hit Me Bbay One More Time. Britney is sat in class looking bored, eagerly waiting for lesson to end. We want Lucy to look bored in class at the start of our video, I liked elements of Britney's behaviour such as; tapping her foot on the chair, rolling her eyes, having her cheek rested on her hand to use for our video.
Blinded By The Lights (The Streets) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7MCbis75wk
In our video, we want to make it obvious that people are taking drugs and to also show the affects of drugs, however, we don't want to make images of drug taking to graphic as this would cause alot of complaints and be very unsuitable. Also, we don not want to 'glamourise' the negative behaviour and make it seem 'cool', so we must be very careful. There are features of the blinded by the lights video which show the effect of drugs in a suitable and more subtle way, for example; two men are seen sniffing and rubbing their noses whilst in laughter this conveys the idea that they have just snorted cocaine without actually showing them doing so. I also like the way they used quick close ups of lighting a cigarette and taking alcoholic shots and would like to use the same quick shots for our video.
Alfie: (Lily Allen)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RgOm_WJKpE
The camera work is very simple in this video yet shows all details effectiveley. I like the way the camera zooms in and out of Lily Allen, and would like to use the zoom technique in our music video, perhaps the scene where Lucy is singing against the brick wall. This video is evidence of how simple camera shots, if edited in time with the music can be simple but look visually great.
Thursday, 10 December 2009
Lily Allen - Alfie
The second Lily Allen music video I am going to analyse is 'Alfie' :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RgOm_WJKpE
Alfie reached number 15 in the UK charts in 2007 and was Lily's fourth single released from her debut album 'Alright Still'.
Like in the 'LDN' video Lily has one costume through out the music video. Lily wears a bright yellow head band, a simple white and blue floral dress with dark blue peep tow heels with red detail on. Lily keeps the jewellery simple and she is not wearing the trade mark earrings in this video, but she has gold bracelets on her wrists. Her make up is very similar to LDN, a gold neutral eye shadow with black eye liner above her eye, the eye liner is not as thick as it is in LDN which gives a more natural touch. Lily still has her thick full fringe, but her hair is down and straightened and appears very long, which could perhaps be extensions.
The song 'Alfie' is about Lily's younger brother Alfie Allen and how she worries about him sitting in his room all day watching TV and smoking weed. The narrative of the video is again very simple but through the use of colour and humorous aspects the video is very amusing to the audience. Alfie Allen is a very small puppet in the video, and his room is a tiny cupboard under the stairs. Lily is in the kitchen carrying out productive tasks such as ironing Alfie's small clothes, washing up and looking in the newspaper for a job for Alfie. She visits him in his room the first time to see if he would like a cup of tea, but he appears high on drugs so she takes his computer control away from him. The next time she goes to his room to give him the ironed suit but walks straight out when she find him mastrubating under the covers to 'barbie porn' which is a very funny scene in the video. There are many other humorous aspects of the video such as Alfie dancing at the end and mooning to the camera.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RgOm_WJKpE
Alfie reached number 15 in the UK charts in 2007 and was Lily's fourth single released from her debut album 'Alright Still'.
Like in the 'LDN' video Lily has one costume through out the music video. Lily wears a bright yellow head band, a simple white and blue floral dress with dark blue peep tow heels with red detail on. Lily keeps the jewellery simple and she is not wearing the trade mark earrings in this video, but she has gold bracelets on her wrists. Her make up is very similar to LDN, a gold neutral eye shadow with black eye liner above her eye, the eye liner is not as thick as it is in LDN which gives a more natural touch. Lily still has her thick full fringe, but her hair is down and straightened and appears very long, which could perhaps be extensions.
The song 'Alfie' is about Lily's younger brother Alfie Allen and how she worries about him sitting in his room all day watching TV and smoking weed. The narrative of the video is again very simple but through the use of colour and humorous aspects the video is very amusing to the audience. Alfie Allen is a very small puppet in the video, and his room is a tiny cupboard under the stairs. Lily is in the kitchen carrying out productive tasks such as ironing Alfie's small clothes, washing up and looking in the newspaper for a job for Alfie. She visits him in his room the first time to see if he would like a cup of tea, but he appears high on drugs so she takes his computer control away from him. The next time she goes to his room to give him the ironed suit but walks straight out when she find him mastrubating under the covers to 'barbie porn' which is a very funny scene in the video. There are many other humorous aspects of the video such as Alfie dancing at the end and mooning to the camera.
The use of colour is also a key element of the video, like the LDN video, bright colours are seen through out the Alfie music video. In the kitchen, the walls are bright blue, the kitchen utensils are red and orange and the hall way outside Alfie's room is lime green. However, Alfies room has darker colours to create a contrasted effect, due to the darkness and hazey smokiness of his bedroom. In the LDN video, red was the dominant colour. In the Alfie video, less red is used, but the red details stand out strongly against the green, blues and yellow drawing great attention to it. Alfie's hooded top is red and although he is very small in size, sue to wearing that colour he stands out immediately in the frame. Other details in red include; the kitchen utensils, the pen Lily uses to circle the jobs and the kitchen table cloth.
The Alfie video also uses simple camera shots and movements. The camera zooms in and out of Lily whilst she is in the kitchen, which is different to the LDN video, as in that video the camera was still whilst Lily made big movements, compared to the Alfie video that zooms in and out of Lily whilst she is barley moving. Extreme close ups are used to show detail such as; Lily stirring the tea, Lily knocking on Alfie's bedroom door and Alfie's facial expressions. Many long shots are used to show the whole of the scenery in the frame and interaction between Lily and Alfie in one frame.
Wednesday, 9 December 2009
Lily Allen - LDN
The first Lily Allen video I have chosen to analyse is 'LDN'...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmYT79tPvLg
LDN reached number 6 in the UK charts IN 2006 and was her second single released from her debut album 'Alright still.' Therefore, Lily Allen was a fresh face to the alternative music scene, which is why the music video made such a big impression, particularly in terms of Lily's image.
In LDN Lily Allen has one costume through out the video, she wears a long red prom style dress with white and red Nike trainers. Teaming a dress and trainers was a very unique style choice which created an instant identity, Lily Allen will always be associated with this particular look a sit was so original. Lily wears her hair in a messy bun with a thick full fringe, the trend for fringes soon became popular again after Lily hit the music scene. A trade mark of Lily Allen's appearance is her big gold chunky jewellery. In LDN Lily wears large gold hoop earrings and gold chains around her neck, this look is typically associated with 'Chavs'. But girls across the country went crazy for Lily Allen's unique accessory choices which still remain popular in the high street
The narative of the video is very simple yet still very visually effective. Lily walks out of a record store and continues through the streets of London, she has a skip in her step, her head held high and a big smile on her face which contrasts with the music lyrics- which are about the negative behaviour that goes on in the streets of London, such as; mugging, prostitution, violence and drug abuse to name a few. All this is shown in the video by actors in the background, however, Lily views all this through a positive perspective and this is particularly conveyed through the use of colour. For example, a long shot is used to show Lily walk from one side of the screen to the other, in front of her as she walks are very bright colours, such as a house which is bright green with yellow cutains which has elegant flower pots and a white picket fence out side, which stands next to a red telephone box. A female is seen looking down from the top window of the house and appears to be getting serranaded by a male who is looking up at her adoringly. But as Lily reaches the other side of the screen, the colours behind her change to dull greys and the female is dramatically chucking clothes out of the window to the male in the street who is in his boxers holding a bin liner of belongings. Colour is a very important factor to any music video and that is clearly displayed in LDN as it defrenciates between Lily's posative perspective and the realistic negative one. Although there are many bright colours used to show the positivity, the most dominant colour is red. Lily wears a long red dress and the fact that she is in nearly every scene makes that colour stand out the most. Also various props are red or have some detail of red which makes the colour more symbolic in the video.
Although simple shot types and camera movements are used for the video, the editing techniques make the simple shots look visually effective. Close ups and mid shots are used to show Lily Allen's facial expressions as she sings the lyrics to the song, long shots are used to show Lily's body movemements aswell as the background scenery extreme close up cut ins are used to show Lily's feet skipping along the streets and cut out extreme close ups are used to show objects on the street floor change as Lily walks past them, e.g: a red sweet turns in to a cigarette but and a pen turns in to a needle for drug use. The camera movement is very smoothe and very still which emphasises Lily's movements. A wipe transition is used across the screen to show the change in perspective and colours.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmYT79tPvLg
LDN reached number 6 in the UK charts IN 2006 and was her second single released from her debut album 'Alright still.' Therefore, Lily Allen was a fresh face to the alternative music scene, which is why the music video made such a big impression, particularly in terms of Lily's image.
In LDN Lily Allen has one costume through out the video, she wears a long red prom style dress with white and red Nike trainers. Teaming a dress and trainers was a very unique style choice which created an instant identity, Lily Allen will always be associated with this particular look a sit was so original. Lily wears her hair in a messy bun with a thick full fringe, the trend for fringes soon became popular again after Lily hit the music scene. A trade mark of Lily Allen's appearance is her big gold chunky jewellery. In LDN Lily wears large gold hoop earrings and gold chains around her neck, this look is typically associated with 'Chavs'. But girls across the country went crazy for Lily Allen's unique accessory choices which still remain popular in the high street
The narative of the video is very simple yet still very visually effective. Lily walks out of a record store and continues through the streets of London, she has a skip in her step, her head held high and a big smile on her face which contrasts with the music lyrics- which are about the negative behaviour that goes on in the streets of London, such as; mugging, prostitution, violence and drug abuse to name a few. All this is shown in the video by actors in the background, however, Lily views all this through a positive perspective and this is particularly conveyed through the use of colour. For example, a long shot is used to show Lily walk from one side of the screen to the other, in front of her as she walks are very bright colours, such as a house which is bright green with yellow cutains which has elegant flower pots and a white picket fence out side, which stands next to a red telephone box. A female is seen looking down from the top window of the house and appears to be getting serranaded by a male who is looking up at her adoringly. But as Lily reaches the other side of the screen, the colours behind her change to dull greys and the female is dramatically chucking clothes out of the window to the male in the street who is in his boxers holding a bin liner of belongings. Colour is a very important factor to any music video and that is clearly displayed in LDN as it defrenciates between Lily's posative perspective and the realistic negative one. Although there are many bright colours used to show the positivity, the most dominant colour is red. Lily wears a long red dress and the fact that she is in nearly every scene makes that colour stand out the most. Also various props are red or have some detail of red which makes the colour more symbolic in the video.
Although simple shot types and camera movements are used for the video, the editing techniques make the simple shots look visually effective. Close ups and mid shots are used to show Lily Allen's facial expressions as she sings the lyrics to the song, long shots are used to show Lily's body movemements aswell as the background scenery extreme close up cut ins are used to show Lily's feet skipping along the streets and cut out extreme close ups are used to show objects on the street floor change as Lily walks past them, e.g: a red sweet turns in to a cigarette but and a pen turns in to a needle for drug use. The camera movement is very smoothe and very still which emphasises Lily's movements. A wipe transition is used across the screen to show the change in perspective and colours.
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