planning lighting and color

Employing a variety of lighting and color are both essential within a music video as they are key to portraying certain moods and emotions which is important in connecting to the audience. For instance, using low-key lighting is helpful in constructing a more depressing or melancholy mood; contrastingly, using high-key lighting produces a happier atmosphere. The lighting helps to tell the audience how the characters are feeling as well as foreshadowing things to come; a shot going from high-key to low-key lighting generally signifies that something terrible is going to occur. Similarly, the use of color within a music video is helps to convey particular emotions as say, for example, all the saturation was drained from a shot, the audience's own emotions would reflect the depressing mood created by doing this. On the other hand, subtly increasing the color used in the video or using filters will subliminally create a brighter and happier mood. However, some artists, such as those of the soul genre, choose to adopt black and white filters in their music videos as this monochrome scheme connotes sadness, reflecting the mood of the lyrics.

Above is a picture of the planning my group and I have done for our lighting and color. One of the lighting styles we have chosen to adopt within our music video is the use of low-key lighting. This style will be used in both the performance scenes as well as scenes where the lyrics are more despondent. However, as a group we decided to gradually decrease the lighting throughout the video as the ending of our narrative is rather sad and depressing. For the performance scenes, the low-key lighting helps to represent the artist as having two sides: one we see in the narrative scenes that make use of high-key lighting and therefore the artist is seen as happier and more innocent, and the other side in the performance parts of the video where the artist is represented as darker, more mysterious and serious. This helps to connect to the audience more as they feel like they are getting to know the artist on a more personal level; we see what the artist is like when she is on her own as well as with people she loves. This consequently allows the audience to relate to the artist more as they understand what it is like to be different when you are lonely in contrast to when you are surrounded by those people who lift you up. However, there are also scenes in the narrative side of the video where we are going to encompass the use of low-key lighting. For example, during the argument scene where the male character relates to the artist his plans to go off to war, we want to create as dark as mood as possible without it looking like a completely different genre. The low-key lighting will successfully add to the tension of the narrative, as well as foreshadowing that something bad is going to happen within the relationship. In addition, to create that more

personal feel to the video during the performance scenes, we have decided to use candlelight instead of just dimming the lights, as this creates a much more intimate feel to the scene as well as representing the artist as being more serious; consequently, her lyrics will also appear to be more deep and meaningful. Using low-key lighting is quite conventional of the indie genre as the artist often likes to create a more sombre mood to reflect the more emotional and deeper meaning behind their lyrics. Furthermore, indie artists conventionally like to use low-key lighting as it allows more focus on specific parts of the shot; for instance, during the performance scenes, the lighting will be constructed so that there is going to be more focus on the artist's face and the piano rather than the content of the room. It is essential that the lighting we use will reflect the lyrics of the song. Therefore, we have ensured that the performance parts of the video are placed in parts where the lyrics reflect the artist's mood and the visuals. For example, we have planned to show a performance shot when the lyrics of "just a trick of light to bring me back around" are sung, as the "trick of light" part fits in the use of candlelight and low-key lighting, as it connotes little lighting. This way, the video appears to be more thought out and well-constructed. In addition, the use of the lyrics "bring me back around" fit in with the artist's mood here as this performance part will be shown after the couple first meet and therefore reflects the artist's positive attitude towards the relationship, as her partner is the one to metaphorically pull her up from falling.

Another lighting style my group and I have decided to use is high-key lighting. This style will be beneficial for the beginning and middle-ish parts of the video as this is where the mood of the narrative is more positive. High-key lighting extremely useful as it connotes a sense of innocence to the relationship. It is also good to contrast with the low-key lighting we will use for the performance scenes which will be placed between the narrative scenes that use high-key lighting. As indie music videos do not tend to use as much high-key lighting as other genres, we do not want to use too much or make the lighting too bright. This is due to the fact that we do not want to represent the artist as being excessively happy, as the later scenes will be very depressing and therefore the video would look quite weird if it fluctuated from two polar opposite emotions. The use of high-key lighting helps to represent the artist as being quite carefree and playful, something which the target audience can relate to, especially whilst being in a relationship. Therefore, the lighting helps to connect the artist and audience on a personal level and the audience appeal to the happiness of the artist, particularly when they can contrast it to the darker and more serious performance scenes. The use of high-key lighting is somewhat conventional of the indie genre as their music stereotypically reflects peaceful and happy memories; however, high-key lighting has a more artificial look to it than natural lighting, which is more commonly used. However, my group and I would still like to consider using it for scenes at the start of the video, such as the couple watching TV or cooking together, etcetera. There is a chance we may not opt for this style of lighting, simply due to the unconventionality of it, particularly fitting into our own music video. If my group and I were to use it, we would place scenes using this style of lighting where the lyrics of "I was buried underneath and all I could see was white" were sung, as "white" connotes bright light, and therefore fits in perfectly with high-key lighting. In addition, the lyrics connote a heavenly image, associated with "the light at the end of the tunnel" and therefore the use of high-key lighting would subliminally help to portray this image. In addition, it will help to bring about connotations of this being a fairytale, almost too good to be true and therefore susceptible to ending.

The final style of lighting my group and I would like to include is natural lighting. In parts of the narrative where the scenes are going to take place outdoors, natural lighting is going to be needed. For example, in the scene where the characters first meet, natural lighting which is quite bright is desire; however as British weather is quite tumultuous right now we have prepared ourselves with an alternative rainy shot which would still work. The reason for having quite sunny natural lighting is so that the shot looks a lot more genuine and personal; a sense of innocence is connoted and therefore reflects the nature of the relationship as well as representing the artist as more authentic and relatable for the audience. The use of natural lighting is quite conventional in indie music videos as a lot of the action generally occurs outside in a rustic location as artists like to represent themselves and their music as quite natural and simplistic.

Using bright natural lighting can be quite conventional in the indie genre as for example, if the the artist wants to ensure that nothing in the shot is in the shadows and everything is focused on in the shot. In addition, capturing a shot in natural lighting allows you to manipulate the sunlight and use the sun's rays to create a more genuine feel to the video, e.g. by filming a person's face whilst the sun's rays are shining on them. However, we will also use natural lighting in shots where there is not a lot of available light; for example, we want to film the scene of the artist running through the forest where it is not too bright, not evidently not when its too dark as well, as you will not be able to see anything. This is due to the mood of the lyrics at this part; the artist is about to discover her partner has died and therefore the natural lighting cannot be captured at a sunny part of the day. We also want to use natural lighting when we film the shots of London as we do not want to heavily edit these scenes; it is better to capture a more genuine shot of the city as it gives an accurate portrayal. In addition, natural lighting helps to represent the artist in much more real and relatable way for the audience as they able to see the artist in the outside world, where they almost cannot hide away like you are able to do inside. My group and I would like to use this style of lighting at the beginning of the music video where the lyrics follow as "you are the avalanche", as the use of "avalanche" connotes pure whiteness, a bright image. Therefore, the use of natural lighting will help to visualize this image. In addition, as avalanches are part of nature, using natural lighting as opposed to high-key lighting helps to keep the authenticity and verisimilitude of the scene. It also ensures to keep to genre conventions of using natural images to create a more rustic feel.

Aside from lighting, my group and I have also opted for using color within the video, or so to say, lack of color. We have chosen to drain the saturation on a variety of shots; we first chose to place a black and white filter on them but decided it was too unconventional of the indie genre as it is more common for the soul genre to do this. The reason for the desire of the slight absence of color is due to wanting to create a more sombre mood where subliminally, there is foreshadowing that something terrible is going to occur at the end of the narrative. The performance parts of the video is where there is going to be most focus on the decrease in saturation as my group and I would like it to contrast with the rest of the video, so the audience feel like there is a lot more to the video and the artist. However, we are also going to turn down the saturation level gradually as the music video progresses as the mood also decreases. For example, during the running scene, although we are going to make use of natural lighting during the pre-evening time of the day, we can also turn down the saturation as well as it will help give that solemn and foreboding mood. This will be a successful way in representing the artist as being quite different to what you normally see; for example, in the pop genre, the artists are usually only representing in one light - usually quite strong and happy. However, in this music video, as it is conventional to the genre, we are only to represent the artist as different to other artists yet more similar to the audience as we all have two sides to us (happy and sad), so it is more relatable. From researching other indie music artists, I have seen quite a few of them drain the saturation in their shots; Birdy's music video for "Skinny Love" is a quintessential example of this and due to the mood of her lyrics, it really fits so I think it would suit "Salvation" as well. Looking at the lyrics of the song, it is clear that this style of color will fit well with the music video as the lyrics become increasingly more depressing. For example, the video starts off with "you are the avalanche", which needs brighter natural lighting, but ends with the artist singing "my salvation, my my" repeatedly. This, on the other hand, connotes a sense of fading away, as the artist is losing her partner and is trying to call him back; therefore the color must be drained from the scene to fit with the melancholy mood.

The fundamental way that the target audience are able to build a relationship with the artist through the use of lighting and color is by the contrast in using high-key/bright natural lighting and low-key/reduced saturation scenes. Furthermore, by separating the narrative and performance scenes by use of lighting and color, the audience are coherently able to distinguish between the emotions that the artist is experiencing. This enables the audience to relate to the artist more as their mood will be a reflection of the artist's. This also allows the audience to be perpetually immersed within the music video and also be engaging with the artist as a lot will be occurring; the audience will have to pay attention to be aware of how the narrative and performance shifts according to the lyrics. In addition, the varying styles of lighting ensure that the artist is represented as being more relatable for the audience; for example, the use of both low-key lighting as well as brighter natural lighting is beneficial in showing how the artist is experiencing both positive and negative emotions, making the narrative more realistic. If the lighting was purely bright and high-key, the audience would not appeal to the video or feel as a greater personal connection with the artist, as it is not particularly relatable; real-life relationships are quite tumultuous. Noting down the styles of lighting and choices of color in this planning stage is extremely beneficial for the production of our music video as it means that we are fully aware of the effect we want to generate from our audience and everything we do will be based on this. Consequently, all of our shots will be filmed according to the mood of the lyrics and the storyline we have picked and therefore will all be relevant, so when it comes to editing, we can get straight with it and create a more successful music video.