My Devised Project was an audio-visual portfolio that included two pieces of music, entitled 'New Heights' and 'Pieces' with accompanying music videos. The intention was to produce music that could be published as a standalone form, with videos created to reinforce the track for sensory and promotional purposes. This meant that the music was not manipulated in order to fit with any visual sequences. The music in itself came naturally and was very self expressive and, in essence, the visuals were produced as if I were working for a client. The two pieces of music correlate in style and production technique, where as the visual pieces are very contrasting - one being a narrative based video, focusing on traditional cinematography and filmmaking, and the other being entirely abstract, focusing on visual aesthetics. This was the intention of the project; I wanted to create a broad portfolio of work and thus, developed two videos operating at either end of the moving image spectrum. I had the opportunity to develop a sound design portfolio in another of the course pathways, and saw an opportunity to create music, which acted as a ‘glue’ to ensure coherence throughout the project. To categorise the music under a stylistic umbrella would probably develop some inaccurate predeterminations as to how they are going to sound. But regardless, the music is very much influenced by today’s dance/electronic music, (garage, post-dubstep, house) but has a natural, organic sounding presence. It is upbeat and rhythmically composed of a vast array of Foley sounds, live drum samples and vinyl percussion samples to help give this feel. Furthermore, all synthesised sounds are tape saturated or alternatively modulated to give a more warm, analogue sound. As for the visuals, It was always set in stone that the visuals were going to be contrasting - developing a broader set of skills whilst creating variety for the spectator. The first being the narrative music video for the track titled 'New Heights'. The context of the narrative was gradually developed over time, being influenced by availability (crew, location, equipment), collaboration and the pre-existing atmosphere, tone and structure of the music. The focus of this one was to achieve technical cinematic quality. Thus, thorough research and practical application occurred in areas such as DSLR and lighting operation and technique, colour correcting and related image ‘looks’ and editing continuity. This video had relatively high demands in pre-production. It involved a crew of actors and production assistants, various locations and times of day and a vast amount of equipment. The New Heights music video is very much the leading piece of the portfolio due to its high production value, with Pieces being more of a secondary addition. The music video for Pieces took a more creative, artistic approach, which was composed of a collage of colourful moving textures. The concept was to create a piece that was solely aesthetically pleasing, whilst relating to the change in tone apparent within the music. The coherence between the music and the visuals occurred in the form of movement (visuals move in sync with musical gestures) and colour (colour temperatures relate to the emotional tones of the music).



The concept of my practical project developed considerably since its proposal, but has always remained in the audio-visual spectrum. Initially, the task was to produce a narrative short film, produce visuals and sound design. However, coming from a musical background I decided to change the projects route in order to focus on audio production rather than relying predominately on filmmaking and cinematics. The alternate route still allowed me to explore aspects of filmmaking, but without completely relying on them as the core element of the project. Unfortunately, the reassessment of my project plan came relatively late in the year, meaning that all pre-production and project planning of the short film were inept, which lost a lot of time. However, I strongly feel that the change was essential and that the project has benefitted as a result. In terms of personal satisfaction, I am very happy with what I have accomplished. Musically, I think I have developed a new production style in comparison to what pervious pieces, one that I think is a lot more natural to me. Hence the title of single, 'New Heights', the project is stylistically a new path, as well as the fact that video production is still a relatively new area to me, one that is beginning to flourish. I feel that my production ability, in audio and video, has set a higher standard of quality in comparison to my pre existing portfolio. In particular, I think that my video production skills have excelled since my last video project, and I have learnt a great deal as a result of this project. The biggest challenge for me in terms of the video production was the arrival on a 'look' for the 'New Heights' video. While the protagonist is on his journey, the intention was to create two very contrasting atmospheres. The first of which was an urban city environment, which was intended to look dull, cold and uninspiring. The second of which was a rural woodland environment (his initial destination), which needed to look almost 'magical' in comparison. This required thorough research and experimentation into colour grading and image processing in order to establish this emotional contrast, whilst keeping aesthetic coherence throughout. Naturally, there were areas for improvement. An array of production issues occurred when shooting, but considering the circumstances and resources available, I think the project was successful. Furthermore, if the concept of the project was set in stone earlier on in the year then the quality would be higher. Personally, my work is incredibly reflective of da Vinci's philosophy that "art is never finished, only abandoned", as I could endlessly edit and make changes on my work.



My project fits under a very broad scope of work; therefore I will solely be focusing on music videos for underground, electronic music to draw more accurate comparisons. I referred to two music videos to try and establish sufficient 'looks'. The videos were for Bonobo's track 'First Fires', directed by Alex Takacs, and Virtual Boy's track 'Memory of a Ghost', directed by Joe Still. I used these tracks as look references because one of them incorporates a very cold, blue, emotional look and the other, a vintage look that seemed to replicate old 50mm film, two looks I wanted to try and captivate when creating the look contrast previously mentioned. Both music videos are equally emotionally stimulating as a result of the colour grading in practice and both make use of a ‘washed out’ look through desaturation and lowering contrast. 'First Fires' has an array of colour schemes, but I will be focusing on a blue look that is used in an urban, city environment. This look immensely exaggerates the blues in the shadows, midtones and the highlights to the extent where there is often little other colour. 'Memory of a Ghost' creates a warm, vintage film look by boosting the blues/mauve shades in the shadows and yellow/gold in the highlights, creating a very warm look as opposed the cooler look. I tried to adapt a similar method to these. However, when applied to ‘New Heights’, I found that the 'First Fires' look was overwhelmingly blue and 'Memory of a Ghost' look was intensely reduced in contrast. On reflection, I think the intensity of processing that the above videos took was more successful in portraying moods than my efforts. But, this technique was only destructive when applied to ‘New Heights’. However, both videos also rely heavily on the use of slow motion to develop atmosphere, whereas I feel that the editing in 'New Heights' creates atmosphere through more diverse cinematic and editing techniques.



'Pieces' adopted a method of producing abstract visuals without digitally generating content. The method involves filming of textured objects with a close zoom or macro lens, which consequentially creates moving textural outcomes. This process often results in the source content to be abstracted from its origin, which is arguably the most effective possibility of this technique. I applied this method when mixing food colouring with an array of domestic substances (milk, soap and water), which naturally painted a collage of moving, colorful textures. One very influential video of this sort is a video for Flying Lotus, titled 'Small Moments' by Beeple, which used an array of source materials, such as burning paper, sparks and fog over grass. The piece is quickly edited creating stutters of video, as opposed to the long, warping textures that I created. Both pieces interact with the audio, an important necessity of abstract music videos. Aside from rhythmical cutaways, ‘Pieces’ interacts in the way of relating colour temperatures to that of the musical tone, and also warping shapes correlating with musical gestures. ‘Small Moments’, too, matches visual aesthetics with audible ones, and moves with the music in staggered, glitchy cuts. Both as effective as each other, I believe, and is subject to artistic intention and personal preference.



The budget of a music video is much more reflective in comparison to music. It is not an alien fact that todays bedroom musicians are at their most powerful position to date. Thus, I feel that the music sits comfortably in the standard of unsigned electronic music productions. A video, however, is dependent on equipment costs, location costs (travel and often hire) and vast amounts of computer processing power, which consequentially meant that the 'New Heights' video, in particular, video is subject to cost detriment.