Research and planning: Pre-production

The final aspect of your Assignment 3 Research and Planning is pre-production.

This is the planning, sketching and drafting that you must complete before picking up a camera and filming your music video.

In your group OR individually, you need to complete the following planning:

1) Lyric annotations
2) Storyboard
3) Shotlist
4) Mise-en-scene planning

You need a minimum of 3 pages EACH. You CANNOT put any work in your folder that has been created by someone else in your group.

1) Lyric annotation

• This is brilliant way of developing the ideas from your treatment. You can pick out certain words or sections of the song and plan the shots and editing that would fit best. 
• Make sure you use a clean or radio edit version of the lyrics - you won't be able to submit non-clean versions to the exam board AQA.
• Simply find the clean version lyrics on Google, copy and paste them into Word and then plan the shots, action and locations line-by-line.

2) Storyboard

• Use the skills you have already developed in Assignment 2.
• Create a visual ‘feel’ for what you want your music video to look like – you won’t be able to storyboard every shot.
• Use a wide variety of creative shots and draw them accurately.
• Aim for somewhere between 5-15 frames (depending on whether you are working individually or in a group).
• Make sure you write text in the right-hand boxes explaining the type of shot (must be accurate), camera movement and sound (which line of the song the shot goes with).

3) Shot list

• The shot list is the single most important pre-production document – you will tick off each shot while shooting.
• Remember, you will shoot far more than you actually use - which means a variety of shots for each event or location in the music video.
• Due to this, there will be far more shots on the shot list than in the storyboard.
• You will need at least one shot for every second of the track you have chosen - so the shot list will contain 180+ shots.
• The most important shot type to plan is close-ups. Ideally, you should have one close up every three shots. That means 60+ close-ups planned in your shot list!

4) Mise-en-scene planning

• This document involves all the planning for anything appearing in front of the camera. Remember CLAMPS: Costume, Lighting, Actors (cast), Make-up, Props, Setting.
• Use images to show you have planned each aspect of mise-en-scene (phone pictures/ Google images/ Google maps are all acceptable here).

The deadline for all your research and planning will be set by your teacher - it depends on your year group and timetable. 

IMPORTANT: you cannot sign out a camera for filming unless everyone in your group has completed ALL research and planning documents.