My Music Video is for the 1959 country ballad Big Iron. As such I attempted to give it an old-fashioned western theme, making the footage appear damaged and washed out, and making sure to emulate various aspects of classic western films like A Fistful of Dollars. I feel as though I pulled this off rather well, making sure to tint the video a Sepia colour and adding a few different overlays to make sure that the footage seemed as though it had actually been recorded back in the 50/60s. I also made sure to have shots that would likely be in a Western movie, the most obvious being shots filmed from the hip, with a weapon taking center-stage.

However, I also feel as though I could have improved on this in certain aspects. Primarily, my attempt to make a vignette in the corners of the video was in vain, as it is hardly noticeable whatsoever. Furthermore, I feel as though I was a bit too drastic in the colour correction for some scenes, as rather than simply washing the colour out, I made some shots seem a bit too bright.

I also attempted to make the music video fairly more of a comedy, juxtaposing the ultimately quite serious delivery of Marty Robbins’ song. I did this primarily as I knew that it was likely not every shot would come out perfectly as a result of either the cast or lack of too many western props.

As such, I tried my hardest to embrace the flaws of this production rather than try to hide them. I made sure that the Nerf guns acting as though they were real were as prominent as possible, and to even have the cast continue to wear contemporary modern clothing, as opposed to what would have typically been worn at this time, while also opting for them to wear various hats that would have likely been seen in a Western film. I am of course aware though, that comedy is quite subjective, and what I may see as rather comical may actually be deemed as unprofessional and possibly even poor quality by others. Due to this, I am completely prepared for any backlash that I may face due to certain decisions in terms of the footage shown. However, I believe that this aspect should have no real impact on the feedback of other aspects such as my editing and the rest of my coursework.

Speaking of coursework, while my mind map clearly shows my intentions for the music video, and in my mind is stays quite accurate to the finished product, the same cannot be said for my contextual information. The first video that I said I used for inspiration, the XO Tour Llif3 music video, I believe still had some level of influence as it impacted my decision to use various filters in order to make my music video seem older and slightly damaged. However, despite then stating that I was going to use effects to modify the sky, I did not do so in anyway as I later felt that this would not really add anything to the Western theme that I was going for, and would perhaps even take away from it instead.

My second influence, was said to be Clapping for the Wrong Reasons, a short film that I said would help me to utilize more interesting and abstract shots in my music video. While I am definitely happy with a lot of the shots in my music video, I cannot really say that any are all that abstract and creative, with many following much more contemporary styles of camera work. Furthermore, I then credited a Death Grips music video as my last source, stating that I desired to make my video an assault on the viewer’s senses just like that one. There is in fact nothing in my new music video that I would describe as an assault on the viewer’s senses, making this one completely irrelevant to the final product. In hindsight, I should have definitely credited a classic western movie such as The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly as a source of inspiration instead, as this was easily one of the more obvious ones.

Editing-wise, I am quite happy with my use of effects. I feel as though I used them minimally, of course the vintage overlays are noticeable but I still feel as though all they do is act as little details that only serve to accentuate the rest of the music video. All I really did aside from this was to tint and colour correct the footage to make it seem washed out and sepia toned, and add a vignette which as previously mentioned was rather ineffective. However, I feel as though I could have done more in terms of the composition of my shots, as after assembling them in a chronological order, all I really did to represent the passage of time or changing of location was adding a dissolve effect when it happened. I attempted to use this as a visual key by using cross dissolves to represent the passage of time and using additive dissolves to only show the changing to another location, but ultimately I feel as though I could have better conveyed this.

I would not necessarily say that my music video has been edited to the beat of the song, and while I would normally agree that not doing this for a music video may in fact defeat the entire purpose of it being one, in this case I think that due to the song being exceptionally story-oriented, it is fine that I have chosen to edit the footage to be more in line with the ever-progressing story of the song rather than it’s beat. Ideally though, it would have been much more impressive if I was to have done both at the same time, despite obviously being more difficult.

I struggled with exporting my video properly once I was finished editing it, resulting in the final product having noticeably large borders. While I ultimately feel as though if anything it adds to the vintage feel of the music video, I cannot attempt to deny that this was not on purpose and entirely my own fault. I will attempt to remaster the music video in the correct resolution soon though and upload it to my blog, even if it does not count towards anything extra in terms of marks.

Overall, I feel as though I did not use my time wisely enough, as instead of choosing to shoot with people that could make it to earlier shoots, I decided to wait until I had everyone that I needed for the all of the footage. This was a big mistake on my part and I feel as though it resulted in a much more rushed product than I would have liked.

Despite all of it’s shortcomings, I am still in fact quite happy with the outcome of my music video. I am completely aware that it is not a cinematic masterpiece, but I am still proud of how it resulted, especially given that this is my first time ever doing a project like this pretty much all on my own. However, I may only look so fondly on the final product due to me being the one created it. I am definitely interested in how it is reviewed by another person, as it is likely to be nowhere near as impressive to them as it is to me, which I completely understand. Ultimately, I feel as though my music video is quite a mixed bag. I am more than happy with the modernized western feeling that I have created, and I also find it to in fact be rather comedic in its own right. However, I feel as though it is not going to be one of the most technically impressive in terms of shots and composition.

If I was to do this project again, I would definitely make sure to properly schedule shooting days, even if not everyone can make it to them. This way I would be able to effectively utilize my time rather than pretty much wasting certain days that I could have been otherwise using efficiently. I would also work harder in terms of coming up with ideas that match what I desire the final product to be, I know that my mind map is in fact rather lackluster despite many of the ideas fitting in well with the finished video. I would also make sure to focus on the ideas that I do come up with much more than I had done, as this video went through many different transformations before I had even chosen to use Big Iron as the song. Surprisingly, my initial choice of song was in fact On Sight by Kanye West, featuring a drastically different music video to go with.

By completing this project, I have learnt that the majority of film making is much more difficult than I had initially believed. I think that my perception of film making being much easier came from my past project known as The Photographer, a concept trailer for a movie that never existed. As I had worked with three other people on this project, it was obviously much easier than this, however due to that being my first real venture into film making, that was how I initially saw this task when I first began. Clearly, I found this to be much more difficult than working in a group. However, I am glad that I have done so, as I am now prepared to take a much more focused approach to film making in general.