Treatment Sheet

Treatment Sheet

Song Choice

 

The band we have decided to make a music video and digipack are Sigur Ros who are an Icelandic post-rock band. They have an ethereal sound and combine classical elements with bowed guitar and distortions. We have chosen the song Brennisteinn, which is the single from the bands 7^th studio album Kveikur.

 

 

Concept

 

The song Brennisteinn has more of an aggressive style compared to the bands other back catalogue. This has inspired our group to produce a very dynamic, vibrant video. We have decided to split the video – having a narrative and story in the video, whilst having band members play instruments to the music. We believe that this will suit the genre of the video as well pleasing the audience as it conforms to their conventions and expectations. The original video of the song by the band includes the band playing on stage and switching back and forth to the narrative; which includes the capture of a prisoner, his escape and chase. The full video is black and white with edgy colour splashes used here and there with contrasting colours of yellow and green. As a group we are taking inspiration from the original video and have decided to use the idea of escapism for our narrative, which also relates to the lyrics and meaning behind the song.

 

Performance & Narrative

 

The narrative we have decided on is combining elements of escapism with romance and loss. We are taking influence from the original video of having a captured prisoner, but also having a captured woman who is the prisoner’s lover. The two lovers are kept apart and are trying desperately to escape to reach one another. This idea came from interpreting the lyrics: Now drag and stretch ones self, and drag out the arm, try to receive, and brake over falling places, running blood in the veins. We have decided to end the video with an unclear resolution leaving a rhetorical question at the end to interact with the audience and have them guess the ending. This not only meets audiences expectations but reflects our chosen genre.

 

Location

We have decided to use juxtaposing locations in our music video. Ideas for this include an industrial location as well as woodland nature areas. This is to link in with our narrative of two different people trying to escape, i.e. in two different locations to be with one another. The locations we are going to use contrast one another as they are different types of environments that link the mise en scene in the frames to different connotations associated with these locations. Our nature ideas for location have been inspired by the original video which also has a lot of this in. We are also going to have a studio location where the band will be playing in low key lighting to relate to the concept in our video as well as follow generic styles of the genre we have chosen. 

 

 

 Shot List

To fit in with our genre we have decided to use a lot of extreme close ups in our video as well as cantered angles and interesting compositions. We are also going to incorporate a combination of high angle and low angle shots in our video. In terms of editing we are going to include a graphic match in our video as well as a lot of jump cuts to mix up the video when flicking back and forth between narrative and band. When exploring the pace of the actual video we have decided to combine slow long shots with fast jump cuts. The jump cuts are going to occur when a drum beat in the song is heard. This follows the theory of thought beats and makes the video follow in time with the music. In this we are going to include jump zooms as well as multitakes. When editing we are going to make sure that our shots make sense so that the narrative in the video is easy to follow. 

 

Lighting

 

To make our video artistic and make the mise en scene reflect our chosen genre we have decided to make our video quite dark and gloomy to also imitate the storyline in the song. To do this we are going to film in dark locations with natural light, as well as use the studio to create a lot of low key lighting shots of the band. However, despite having most of our video dark there are going to be parts with bright flashes of light to fit in with the storyline in the video.

 

Live Performance

In terms of live performance in our music video we are having shots of band members playing along to the music, recreating a live performance. To suit our chosen genre and style of the video we have decided to use a studio location for this, creating a low key lighting environment to produce dark edgy shots that reflect our chosen genre.

 

Mise-en-scene

Mise-en-scene is extremely important in our video as we are having a mixture of narrative and live performance. Things that I have already discussed such as lighting, location and live performance already come under this heading but to elaborate we are going to incorporate a lot of costume, props and colour. For example we are going to produce monochrome unsaturated shots in our video with splashes of light and colour to fit in the stylistic elements that the genre reflects. In terms of costume we have decided to have fairly plain colours and fabrics so that the audiences attention is not directed from other factors such as facial expressions and live performance. Costume also has to reflect our genre and be fairly artistic and different. We have also decided to embark upon masks in our video, taking inspiration from photographer Matt Wisniewski who combines portraits with nature elements. For this we are going to try creating double exposures between portrait footage and landscape footage.