All Planning For Third Sail Away Video

The second version for the Sail Away video sadly had to be scrapped as during the editing and post production process it became apparent that the narrative wasn’t clear enough to be a strong video for the song, the bird idea was good in theory but in practice the idea just didn’t show through.

Sail away with me is clearly a light hearted song meant to reflect Summer but as this has now become the third set of planning for the new music video the Summer months have been and gone meaning this video will be based almost entirely inside to avoid the dreary winter weather. This is because the Winter weather is not appropriate for the song and there are likely to be a lot of problems with unreliable natural lighting and weather conditions for both the wellbeing of the cast and the connotation of the video.

Rough Ideas

Drama Studio
From the previous video we discovered that the shots we captured whilst in the drama studio were extremely strong in places due to the fantastic use of lighting, therefore we have decided to keep this location as one of our main locations for the performance aspect of the narrative as we know there is potential in creating a great performance with the right filming techniques and the technology available. In this location we will be shooting our main character (Fluffy) as the singer/performer and our guitarist (Cameron) sitting on a high stool, this set up is often used in live acoustic performances and is often very effective. A range of camera shots will be used, especially focussing on extreme close ups of the guitar and the singer.

Bedroom
A second narrative will be interwoven around the performance narrative to create a storyline and meaning to the video, and to also create variance and maintain the viewers’ attention.
The second narrative will be shot in a bedroom where the main character Freya will be packing her bag to leave, possibly for a fresh start/ new beginning but that is open to the audience to interpret. This visual narrative links to the narrative in the song as the main lyric in the song is ‘Sail away with me’ basically meaning let’s leave this place together.
Alongside her packing there will also be a montage of her trying on different outfits, playing around in them, being careless and showing that she is enjoying the moment and escaping from the strains and stresses of life for that moment. This reflects the overall feel of the summery song, as it is keeping the emotion light and simple, generally happy.

Outside Location – Tree Lined Path
This location will be the only outside location, it will be a single shot which will be the final shot in the video of her walking away – leaving. Hopefully on the day of shooting there will be a good amount of natural lighting as we are relying on this since in previous outdoor shoots the quality of lighting has been poor and caused the material to look bad quality and amateurish.


Costumes and Props
Performance Element
For the performance Freya will be wearing a flowing summery white dress, this will reflect the femininity of the song and the summer aspect, the femininity of the dress will also help Freya to act daintily in her outfit and put her in a positive mindset for the performance. The white dress will stand out well against the black background and will help illuminate Freyas face also as light will bounce off it making her appear a lot brighter on camera. The brightness of the dress will also reflect the uncomplicated, light and peaceful mood of the song. The femininity of the dress also makes her appear visually appealing to the male audience through the idea of the male gaze theory.
To further emphasise her femininity Freya will be wearing high heels, earrings and an anklet, an anklet is very delicate and this will reflect on the character making her appear much more delicate as a person – this is a trait expected to be found in a woman as she is the ‘weaker sex’. The earrings also emphasise the feminine element, but they are used to draw attention to her face and neck once again to promote her female beauty. The high heels will add an element of sex appeal, and also make her come across as mature and elegant; the heels will be beige to follow the ‘natural’ feel of the outfit, as there are no bright bold colours. The colour scheme is to be kept plain and simple to reflect the simplistic message of the song and the naturalistic element of the folk genre.
The minor character in the performance element will be played by Cameron who was in the previous video and we know we can count on as a reliable actor. As the main focus is on Freya he will be wearing dull coloured clothes so as not to draw attention, he will be wearing a grey t-shirt and jeans, this makes him come across as nothing out of the ordinary, and he will be placed in the background to further stress this. He will be sitting on a stool with his acoustic guitar covering most of his torso an will never make eye contact with the camera, this way he stays anonymous but the guitar – which is a vital instrument within both the song and the genre - will be clearly visible.

This scene is quite minimalist in a sense of props as we wanted the audience to focus on the personality of the singer and the music as opposed to the material aspect as this is what the folk genre is based upon. The only props used will be a microphone with stand, a tambourine, a guitar, a stool and an amp.
The microphone is used to give the viewer the idea that this is a live performance, but the fact that there is no audience within the scene makes the performance personal, a one on one session between her and them, this then draws the viewer into the song. A stand is used for the microphone so as to prevent too much movement or playing up to the camera as we wanted to keep it simplistic to reflect the genre, whereas if it was a rock song for instance there would be reason for having a lot more energy and a lot more movement in the performance. The amp will also be used for the purpose of creating the feel of a live performance.
The acoustic guitar as aforementioned is crucial as it is a key element both within the song and the folk genre, it also adds to the performance element.
The stool will be used for Cameron to sit on; this layout with the singer standing centre stage and the guitarist on a stool in the background and to the side is a regular set up in acoustic live performances. Therefore maintaining this layout within our video creates the most realistic performance as possible, and it is a layout the viewer will recognise therefore making it more approachable to them.
The tambourine is used to draw the singer into the musical aspect of the song, showing she is not just a ‘front man’, she can clearly establish the rhythm of the song, this makes the song appear much more personal to her which the audience will appreciate her as a ‘serious musician’.

Bedroom Scene
In the bedroom scene Freya will be dressed much more casually, and more colourful, this reflects her excitable mood as she is packing to leave for a ‘new beginning’. There is a montage in this narrative where she is singing parts of the song in a range of different outfits as if she is trying on her entire wardrobe, this once again gives her feminine traits where clothes and image are a very important part of a girls’ life and they can tell a lot about a person. The outfits chosen are a range of colours and styles, they are all dresses, one is completely red, showing passion and possible danger, another is black and white check with a red sash showing that she is more conservative but with still a slight aspect of fire within that, another is a retro style stripy black and white dress with hat and gloves showing she is fun loving, another is black and sparkly giving the impression she is a girl who likes to party and can go out and have a good time.
The main props in the bedroom scene will be clothes, shoes and the suitcase as within this narrative she will be seen packing to leave.

Cast
Freya – Freya is a fun loving, bubbly girl that really reflects the summer feel of the song in her own personality, when shown the song she was really excited about it and thoroughly enjoyed the song, she was prepared to learn the lyrics and within a day she wouldn’t stop singing it. This showed promise to her being dedicated to the project and one who can be relied on to both turn up to shoots and act well in character. She is petite, with a short quirky blonde haircut that compliments her petite facial features, her look definitely fitted in with the song, especially in the sense that she is pretty with blonde hair and blue eyes (much like Bex from the original first video) giving the impression that she is sweet and innocent.

Cameron – Cameron is clearly reliable as he was one of the few that always turned up to shoots when he was part of the cast for the second video. When I told him we were scrapping the video and had to start a third he offered to help out behind the scenes if we wanted, so when it became clear that we wanted a guitarist he was more than happy to help. Once again having an enthusiastic cast member shows reliability.

Storyboards

Shooting Maps

Shooting Schedule