Review

I worked in a group of four and produced the opening to a documentary which is called ‘Sound of the Underdogs’ which followed upcoming and well known artists who struggled to make it into the music industry. This documentary gave young and upcoming artists a voice to say how they felt about what they were doing but also to help others who wish to aspire to become budding artists. It was great fun working together although we did struggle at times with lack of communication. The documentary's main aim is to try and show how hard it is to break into the music industry but also try to show some ways in which to overcome this difficulty. Its main points focus on the struggles artists have faced in getting where they are and advice to others whilst showing vast improvements over the years to help people breakthrough. With special guest appearances from 29^th chapter (well known Christian hip-hop group) and Sunit and Raxtar (hip-hop and RnB group), ‘Sound of the Underdogs’ fuses different music genres together to provide something for everyone. Overall although we had our ups and downs, we worked well as a group and overcame obstacles to produce ‘Sound of the Underdogs’ which fulfilled its purpose of being informative whilst entertaining but also original and creative.

Rosanne

Voiceovers

Music industry/how hard to break through voiceover

Thousands of people try to break into the music industry each year however very few ever make it. Artists and Repertoire (A&R) is the division of a record label company that is responsible for scouting and artist development. A&R departments at major labels typically only accept solicited demos, or ones from business contacts with which they are familiar. However, some major labels and many independent labels still accept unsolicited demos.

Myspace/other help voiveover

Created in July 2003, Myspace is a popular social networking website which offers users a place to express themselves. With roughly 43,000,000 users, myspace is the world’s fifth most popular website. However it is not the only way in which has helped youth break into the music industry. Programmes such as x factor and Pop idol have also helped youth to fulfill thier dreams. They may not be the best way to fulfil your dreams but they are ways of helping.
Following the lives of some upcoming artists will show their dedication and the struggles they face in breaking through to the music industry along with advice for other budding artists.

Rosanne

Celebrity Rap Superstar

Celebrity Rap Superstar.... What is it? Well the title says it all I think! If you still haven’t got it, I’ll make it clearer... it is a show about celebrities trying to become superstars, But not any sort of superstar; Rap superstars!
I hear you asking Who’s going to be in it... well how does Redman, Warren G, Too Short, bubba sparxxx , tone loc, Bizaare and Mc lyte sound??!! I wouldn’t miss it for the world....
This show will give us the audience an intake on how hard it is to become a rap star, it isn’t your usual street rapper; it’s the real thing.
So I here you asking, who are the celebrities?? Well, how about Perez Hilton, or Sebastian Bach, maybe you will, prefer playboy model; Kendra Wilkinson, if you like your bad boys, then you can have Jason Wahler, or the actress Shar Jackson. There’s a singer/ actress; Countess Vaughn, another actor; Efren Ramirez or maybe you need a little sport; former NFL player Jamal Anderson.
What is the price?? What does the winner get?? Well what about street cred... yes they will get mad street respect just like their mentors!! What else can they ask for..?!
So fine we know who’s going to be in it, we know what they’re fighting for. Now what is it that they’re doing??... well of course they’ll be performing songs, but they weren’t be jus any songs they’ll be tracks that are specially made for them... whooo exclusive songs only on Celebrity Rap Superstar!!
This show will be entertaining you for 8 weeks and within those 8weeks the celebrities will be practising and learning their verses as well as their flows with their mentors. Ohhhh it ain’t as easy as it sounds, after all that practising you have to spit in front of a studio audience, how about that!!! It doesn’t end there they have to be judged by the experts of the music industry. Who’s the panel... well how about hard hitters like DMC (run-DMC), rapper Da brat and finally the radio personality Big Boy. Will these celebrities be up for the challenge or will they be trippin’???
Now I bet your wonderin’, ok soo it’s all cool, we just watch them straggling and that, that sounds boring, we ain’t getting involved. Yeh, true we thought about that when making the programme, see the judges are just there to judge them and tell them where they’re going wrong. But you play the main part, YOU decide who should win!!!! How u doing that?? Well you vote for who you think should stay and who should goJ.
Minnie

Sunit & Raxstar video links

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hz5pyPsj0mc - Sunit & Raxstar - In Perspective
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F80ElsJ23e4&feature=related - Sunit & Raxstar - Keep It Undercover
Vipesh

Basic script

Location shots
Jump cuts between posh areas
Jump cuts between shots of graff, Acton, Northolt......etc
'Classical grime' instrumental

Production title
Graff style title
360° turn and zoom on title

Vox pops
'Who do u admire in the music industry' on screen
Jump cuts of different people's favourite artists

Voice over
Image of a studio with words popping on screen
'Just a rascal' instrumental-Dizzee Rascal
Clips from videos:

• Ciara - That's right
• Kanye west - Stronger
• Kano - P's + Q's
• Jay Sean - Ride it
• Estelle - American boy

Dhillon: Many young people today aspire to break into the music industry as an artist or even behind the scenes as a producer or songwriter, however it's not as easy as it seems to breakthrough.
Youth today idolise artists such as Ciara and Kanye West but the youth fail to realise that they didn't get where they are today just by luck. Popular homegrown artists such as Kano, Jay Sean and Estelle put the work, effort and time in to achieving the goals they strived for.

Introduction to artists
Split screen with all artists images with captions of their names, age + group if part of one. Basic info
Dhillon: Following the lives of these artists will show the dedication, struggles and achievements in breaking through to the music industry along with advice for other budding artists.

Interviews

• Struggles
  Quick clip from artists stating thier personal experience
• Advice
  Quick clip from artists stating thier personal advice to any buding artists

Freeze frames
Frozen images/pictures of artists with caption stating current situations

• Prince- 29th chapter: currently working to next album and touring in the UK and USA
• Rasheeda: working hard to complete her BTEC National Diploma in performing arts
• Matthew: releasing his second album and looking for a job
• Beatrice and Stitch: currently working hard t make it, making tracks and trying to release a music video in the near future.

End credits
Images of artists happy and jamming fade out to music
'Dreams'-Ashanti

Rosanne

Editing ideas

Voice over
Fix up look sharp instrumental- Dizzee rascal in the background
Studio image with emphasis on words
clips from videos: Ciara - Get up/that's right
Kanye west - Stronger
Kano - Ps + Qs
Jay Sean - Ride it
Estelle - American boy
Dhillon: Many young people today aspire to break into the music industry as an artist or even behind the scenes as a producer or songwriter, however it's not as easy as it seems to breakthrough.
Youth today idolise artists such as Ciara and Kanye West but the youth fail to realise that they didn't get where they are today just by luck. Popular homegrown artists such as Kano, Jay Sean and Estelle put the work, effort and time in to achieving the goals they strived for.

End
Freeze frames of each artist showing their current situations.

Prince- 29th chapter: currently working to next album and touring in the UK and USA
Rasheeda: working hard to complete her BTEC National Diploma in performing arts
Matthew: releasing his second album and looking for a job
Beatrice and Stitch: currently working hard t make it, making tracks and trying to release a music video in the near future.

Rosanne

Guys we need to include some indian people to our production, i know that minnie is trying to get kray twins, so please get some people to add that are indian as they are also our targeted audience as well!
Vipesh.

Archive

Idea's Whilst In Editing Suite 2

The other idea that I had was that we should have a title screen in which we contain a question, then we place the shots that the artists answered in accordance with this, so we would need to chop up the interviews into sections, which I have almost finished, and seperate the interviews.
Also we need to get together the ideaologies of our documentary, what we are trying to get across or raise awarness in this documentary.
Vipesh

Idea whilst in editing suite

Wednesday 5th March 2008

Whilst me and Avneet were trying to sort out the opening sequence for which we have captured loads of footage of estates, we and Avneet soon realised that we did not have an order in which we were going to arrange the sequence of shots, meaning should we put the estates then the station, you get the point.
I discussed an idea with avneet this being, that we should create the opening as if the audience were seeing it as if they were living out a day in the musician going to the studio, this would mean incorporating an arrangement of the shots, meaning that we would first have to put in all the shots of the estates first (to give the idea of movement around, on train, almost as if the audience are the artist on the train looking out of the window), then you would need to place the station after this (to give the idea that the audience are the artist leaving the train station), then you would have to include the the studio shot at the end of the opening, (to give the idea that the audience that are getting a view point of the artist, have arrived at the studio to record a track).

Vipesh

Filmig Diary 04 - Interview With Artist (Matthew)

Thursday 21st Feburary 2008

Today me and Rosanne went to west kensington to interview an artist called Matthew, we took a train from Ealing broadway, on the way we messed about, I recorded Rosanne doing her thing on the train, which we could once again use for the outakes part of our production. however getting back to the actual production, focusing on the good points firstly, we got another interview to add to our production, the interviewee answered the questions with relivance to the production, for example when I asked, 'What influenced you to get into the music industry?' and Matthew answered, that he used to try an immitate some old school swing and R n B artists, so inspired him to create his own singing style or lyrics, another good question asked was by Rosanne, when she asked 'What struggles have you been through in order to get accross your music?', this is good as it relates to our documentary, which is a documentary to discover how some underground artists are struggling to become mainstream. We asked all the following questions:

1. What influenced you to get into the music industry?
2. What struggles have you been through in whilst trying to get into the music industry?
3. Do you have any advice for people who are trying to make it in the music industry?
4. In a day how much music comes into your life? (e.g. studio time, even listening to it)

However the bad things of this interview were the following:

1. The mise en scene does not match the effect that we are trying to create, i.e. there should be some sort of white background, or a derelict building, to represent the non-edited effects of the documentary, or to represent the struggle of some sort, however we have shot the interview in a front garden area of a house, which has alot of flowers, however this interview could only be done there and then, so we cannot worry too much about it.
2. the background noise, we have some weird girls screaming and shouting in the background, which could link to an affect of realism that Micheal Moore uses in 'Bowling For Columbine'.
3. we did not make a script of what we were going to ask the interviewee, so we asked questions that we thought of from the top of our heads.

However the other good thing about this interview is that Matthew relates to most internet sites that he used in order to become known, for example 'Myspace' and 'Bebo', this relates to the decline of the music industry, yet it also represents how it allows most artists to become known within the music industry, as most producers and companies go to these websites as it contains so many people with so much talent on it.

We were even lucky enough to get Matthew to sing for us, which we could add to the production, he actually is a great singer. This shows how if you have the talent then you will get noticed, and the effort that you need to put in to get into this career option.

VIPESH

Reasearch on studio scenes

in order to develop a deeper knowledge of the music industry we need to contain things that allow our audience to see some of the things that people have to do in order for them to be widly recognised within the music industry, for example in the t2 and addictive video, we see that one of the girls said that they had to go a rave in leeds in order to get a feel for the genre of music, that being bassline, she then goes on to say that she hooked up with the producer on a internet site for connecting with people, 'myspace', which happpens to be a leading website for promoting their customers talents, this could also link to the decline in the music industry, so we could link this to the struggle that most people have when they are in the music industry as well as getting in it, people download from the internet rather than buying the cd's, also more and different genre's of music are available online. also looking at both the video's we see that the artists are performing in the studio, which is also a concept that we need to implement into our documentary, one of the ideas that we came up with is to have this clip playing over when the artist is discussing features of their lifestyle, i.e. what they do during a typical day for them, relating this to music, when they record a track in the studio.

These video's are taken from youtube, they are recordings from the radio station bbc 1xtra, if you would like to know more about this radio station then go to their website, www.bbc.co.uk/1xtra:



Vipesh

Archive

Famous Artists

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kYukMhWpqU- Ciara
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LCJgf0gjiQ - Kano
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZd1Js0QaOI - Kanye west
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGDJMq89O78 - Dizzee Rascal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lz0VGkD3LHo - Jay sean
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3_eh46a6SE- Estelle

29th Chapter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ol0szWK_dE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xF7UDDRzFs0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahSlyzhX09s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6t38ARemO68
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VpAADE-k04

Location shots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNxszgoAIIQ

Rosanne

Title of production/ opening shots

Graffiti





Simliary to the videos above, in our opening shot, we would like to get someone to graff our tilte and then in ending speed it up similar to this but ahve our oringinal as it will wipe onto the screen.

Rough idea for sketch of graff



Rosanne

Day 2 and 4 of filmimg

Day 2 of filming

On day 2 after school I went on my own to south Acton to film Beatruce (an upcoming artist) on her normal routine, to the studio she records her music. I met Beatruce and my cousin there, but unfortunately when I got there it was closed and I got pissed of cause I had to carry the camera and tri-pod on my own on the train. But I wasn’t going to waste the journey and I took location shots of the different estates around the area, to show the gritty areas most the artist’s come from, which will be used for our opening montage shots of different locations.

Day 4 of filming

I again went on my own but dragged my sister along with me to Hounslow were Beatruce lives and filmed her every day routine juggling sixth form, working and studio. We left early morning to get shots of her going to 6th form and coming back, which the group will use when we do clips of every day lives of upcoming artists and show them as normal people, as well as showing their struggles of breaking through in the industry.

AVNEET

Day 1 of filming: interview montage of favourite artists

On day 1, Me, Avneet and Vipesh filmed many clips similar to the one below asking people to state their favourite arist/ who they admire in the music industry. We had alot of fun whilst filming but also it was our first time working together in the group filming and we all got used to the roles we played and shared the jobs eually. Everyone had a go at filming. Overall we got quite a few clips but also sum good footage for outtakes. We wanna take everyone who agreed to help us.

Rosanne

Day 3 of filming: Inspirational moment

On our way home from a very long and tiring day of filming, Vipesh started playing music on his phone on the bus. This triggered an idea for the production. We decided to use the song he was playing (The streets) as a piece of non-diegetic sound and play over our montage of different location in the opening shots. We also decided that the order for the montage as a time continuum. As the day goes by, the shot reflect this in a change of lighting started with our bright early morning/ afternoon shots to dark late night shots.

Rosanne

Filming Diary 03 - Location + A Few Shots For Montage

Saturday 26th January 2008

Today Me, Rosanne and Avneet went out on a filming trip, we were supposed to film our first interview with an artist called castro, however he had to cancel, so instead we decided to film some locations that are important for our opening sequence. We visited shot in the following places:
1. Greenford
2. West Ealing
3. Acton

We filmed mostly estate area's and blocks of flats, this is because they connote the rough area that most of the artists grow up in and are trying to get out from, Music is one of the escape routes for most of these underprivileged people. We also managed to shoot one of Rosanne & Avneet's friend as well as Rosanne's two cousins saying who their favourite artists were and why. The filming of the block of flats were filmed with a panning technique, this is important as it gets an all round view of the whole location/area, this is a crucial technique. We also shot locations whilst on the E9 bus, it allowed us to get more of an overview of most places, it also will be very nice to look at for the audience once we have edited it. we also shot some walls that contained graffiti on it, this once again is crucial as it connotes the struggle and the rough areas that most artists go through as they develop their way through their struggle to become a mainstream musician.

While we were on set shooting some bits for our documentary we had some inspirational ideas, for example, whilst we were shooting a block of flats in the Greenford, rectory area, me and Rosanne had a great idea for an extra in our production, whilst we are shooting different things we could also do a "making the documentary to 'Sound Of The Underdogs'", we also had an inspirational moment whilst we were on the E9 bus, I was playing the song 'breakaway' by Tinchy Stryder and Rosanne said that this would be an excellent soundtrack for the locations part in our documentary, and it is another connotation of the struggle that certain people have to deal with in order to escape certain rundown area's, if you listen to the lady singing you will hear the words 'I want you to leave leave, I want you to go go, but you keep telling me the streets are all you know'. One of the other inspirations that Rosanne had on the E9 bus was that our shots of the locations are excellent, as they go in order of light, as we shot it from light to dark, so we wouldn't have to edit it really, as they are already in order.

Here are some Photographs of Avneet & Rosanne filming:

VIPESH

Day 3 of filming: Location shots

Today, Me, Avneet + Vipesh met up and started filming some of the location shots 4 a montage at the beginning of the documentary. Overall, we're quite pleased with today as we got alot done and the shots we got were quite nice. We also had an inspirational moment on d bus home and we had fun together whilst filming. Here is a couple os stills from the day.



























Rosanne

Filming Diary 01 - Montage Sequence

Montage Sequence - filmed on Wednesday 22Nd January 2008

For the montage sequence we shot many people answering the question that we asked, which was, 'who is your favourite artist in the music industry?' and as an extra bonus some people also said why. We also filmed some key moments that we could implement into an outtakes option. We also had shots of Rosanne & Rasheeda dancing for the moments of the daily life/routines bit.

Some of the people that we asked were:
1. Amrit
2. Hamsa
3. Moe
4. Victoria
5. Jenni
6. Neleema
7. Zatashia + Nikita + Ekra
8. Lenroy
9. Tanisha's sister + Friends
10. d-r's sister + Friend
11. Rosanne + Sister
12. Ms. Jones
13. Mr. Williams
14. Amanda
15. Sarah + Friend
16. Habib + Hassan + Krishna
17. Shirley
18. Inderveer
19. Nimrat
20. Calvin
21. Rosanne
22. Michael + Dwayne + Friend
23. Lansell
24. Jyoti
25. Dhillon

All of these people that we asked are crucial to our documentary, as we are mainly targeting their age group and in some ways their ethnicity. However we asked some teachers, this could be perceived as showing the influence that the educator's have on the targeted audience (students) or how little. Most of these shots were taken as medium-close ups, this is because we need to see their body language from the shoulders to their head, in order to see their facial expressions, or in a certain perception to analyse how their body language creates links to the different type's of music. The filming we shot is shot in a white background as well as a college area, so this connotes the audience (students), it also connotes the realism technique that we implemented into our documentary, as the white background means that nothing has been added into it. The sound that was recorded with the interviews for the montage was of people talking, it was very noisy, this creates a theme of realism into our documentary, as it shows that we have not rehearsed or edited anything, an example of this in other documentaries is in 'Bowling For Columbine', when Michael Moore does an interview with the man who created south park, we hear all the car engines overpowering the interview, this is also to create the effect of realism.
Vipesh

Research on Editing techniques

Valve Sound system documentary

We really liked the way this channel 4 documentary was edited. We like the way they used jump cuts which keeps the audience's attention because it is short and quick. This would appeal to our target audience as it doesn't focus on anything for too long as they get bored easily if something doesn't interest them. This would keep them interested as they will never know what is coming next (the element of surprise).



Ciara: That's right music video


The bit of editing we like and wish to use in our production is the jump cuts back and forth from different shots. This looks really good and would save a lot of time to include other clips.



H2F2 hip hop documentary part 1

We were fascinated in the editing techniques used in this documentary as it was something we were unfamiliar with. We would like to try and mimic the editing techniques used close to the beginning where they maneuver from one shot to another by a wipe of graffiti on screen. We found this interesting because we like the effect for our title as this is also in graffiti.



Rosanne + Avneet

Techniques used in music documentary called 'Shadows'

Documentary title: Shadows

The documentary shadows contains a editing technique that is similar to what we want to use for our beginning, also if you look at the captions that are used that go along with the voice over, they are something that I think that we should implement into our documentary, because it anchors the audience's view of whatever we are trying to explain, for example in the documentary the voice over says, 'shadows is a brotherhood, that came from a background of struggle, that are searching for a better life, and fulfilling their dreams.' The caption technique is a technique that is similar to that of many documentaries, the technique of using captions that ends with the last caption being zoomed to emphasis a point, it is used in the documentary 'Bowling for Columbine'. This technique is also used to end the documentary, so it reinforces the point of whatever the documentary is trying to get across, so we should once again think about using this technique at the end. Also it links to the idea that rosanne had, whilst doing the interviews we should show the persons everyday lifestyle, which is what this documentary has used. The documentary also uses a soundtrack that contains the words of the title, 'shadows', so once again rosanne this will help to understand about how we can use the soundtrack and where else we can put it, as well as the beginning.


Vipesh.

Voiceover Techniques & Shots Used In A Dub Documentary

Documentary Title: Deep Roots Music
This documentary is on a genre of music called 'Dub', I looked at this documentary and thought
that the director chose a excellent voice over, if you analyze it carefully you will see that the voice over has a authoritative tone, yet it also produces alot of information about the genre of music, for example the voice over describes what 'Dub' music is compelled together by, "dub is the instrumental riddim track, an unobstructed rhythm without words, with the emphasis on the base...sound effects and echo in particular are used alot." The voice over also adopts the language that goes with the stereotype or group of people that listen to the music, this is important as if we are going to be successful at creating a great documentary that our audience will be interested in, we need to be more connective towards our audience, that means adapting a voice or language that sounds like them.

Looking at the shots in the production also, you see that they get alot of medium close-up's of when the producers are working in the studio's with there team or group members, you also see the documentary use some medium shots of when the producer is messing around with the controls, this is important to us as we can implement this technique into our documentary because it allows the audience to get a better idea of how the musicians are at work, also uncovering the atmosphere that some producers and musicians work under. There is a key moment in the documentary where you see the three co-operatives dancing around and boping there heads, this shows how the music can affect the everyday lives of the typical people that listen to the genre of music 'Dub', it makes them all happy.



Vipesh

Sound of the Underdogs

‘Sound of the Underdogs’ aims to target both male and females between the ages of 13-30, however it will have a secondary audience of anyone with a passion or interest in the music industry. ‘Sound of the Underdogs’ will follow the lives of young upcoming and well known artists, showing an insight of what really goes on behind the scenes and the drive and determination they have in trying to achieve their dreams.

We thought the title was appropriate because the word ‘Sound’ connotes music and ‘Underdogs’ mirrors the fact that they have not made it yet, which reflects the documentary as it will be following upcoming and well known artists who struggled to make it into the music industry, to provide information and advice to a young target audience who have an interest in music and aspire to break into the music industry.m

As it is produced and presented by young people, it should appeal more to the target audience because we have a better understaning about thier interests. We aim to target a good range in music genre however it will mainly target Grime, Hip-hop and RnB. These are some of the artists we wish to feature in our documentary.

Finally ‘Sound of the Underdogs’ will be entertaining whilst informative.

Rosanne

Message from the Underdogs

Hello and welcome to our blog! There are 4 members in the Underdogs: Rosanne, Vipesh, Avneet and Maninder. Hope you enjoy as we take you on the journey to producing our documentary.

Underdogs