LO1 Assignment 1- understand the requirements of working to a breif

There are at least 5 different ways in which a brief can be communicated from the client:

Contractual: the brief might be set out in a contract, which is a written agreement which explains the responsibilities that the media firm and client may both have, and how they might share in the financial success.

This is a good format because the contract can be very detailed to avoid any misunderstanding, but it’s also quite inflexible so not so good where the project might change as it progresses

Negotiated: This is when two parties have different ideas from each other but they both have to come to a decision by compromising and making sure that both the parties are happy by the decision. In this way the brief is gradually developed by discussion.

This is good because client will get what he  or she wants, but because the media firm is not competing against others the client doesn’t know if they are getting a good price.

Formal: This might be when the client has some very clear ideas about what they want to achieve so they invite the firm to a formal briefing meeting to tell them, or they write to them describing the brief in detail and asking for a proposal.

This is pretty much the same advantage and disadvantage as above.

Informal: This might be the client ringing up to tell the media company his requirements rather than writing to them formally or sending a contract.

This may be good for speed of the project, but if the brief is not written down there could be some misunderstandings later

Commission: Occasionally, because you may have a really good reputation for certain types of work, the client will just come to your form only, and commission (pay) you to do something in a certain way.

The client will get just what they want, and the project can carry on quickly if other proposals have not been invited.

Tender: Quite often, clients will ask media firms to compete against other media firms for the work. They might pick a handful of firms that have a good reputation from that sort of work to put on the tender list. They would probably indicate generally what they want, and then leave it to the media firms to make their proposals of how they will do the job and what it will cost

This is a good way of making sure the client gets what they want at the right price, but it takes some time to organise the process.

Cooperative brief: This may be a project which involves more than one media firm talking to another in order to agree the brief, or perhaps more than one client talking with more than one media firm. All of the parties will need to cooperate closely to agree the brief.

This is a good way of sharing a complicated job between different firms, but it will be even more important to make sure there is a written agreement so that everyone knos exactly what they are supposed to be doing.

Competition brief: Like a tender, the media firm will be in competition, however the main difference is possibly that the brief might be a little less detailed, and it may be possible for many firms to enter the competition rather than just a few.

This may produce some really great ideas, but it might be difficult to decide between all of the media firms that have put forward their ideas and this could slow the project down.

All briefs

 Should try and communicate the following as clearly as possible:

·         The general idea or objective

·         Some information about the client, which tells you what they have done before and what their business is trying to do.

·         Any information or research which the client has already picked up.

·         What result does the client want

·         Who is the target audience

·         How much does the client want to spend

·         How long has the team got to do the job.

Examples

The Documentary film brief is a Competitive brief, because the brief is not very detailed, and anyone can send a proposal in to be considered.

The Taxi firm is a good example of a media firm seeking Commission briefs from their clients to try and get them heard in the music industry.

SIMS Recycling solutions video advertisement

Task: To create a 60 second long video which encourages people aged between 16-22 to recycle or if they do then to recycle as much as they can.

Other important things to include in the video:  Tag line must be “Wipe out waste”. Contents of the film must be upbeat throughout, images/music and clips can be used but must be allowed to use by whoever owns the original item. Contents of film must have pace to it keep audience captivated. It must be no longer than 60 seconds long.

My idea for the recycling video

I decided I wanted to make a video ad that would entertain the audience as well as educate them on recycling. There is some humour contained in my video ad, but nothing too funny so that it doesn’t make the recycling video advertisement seem pointless.

My video is based on a plastic bottle that starts off in the bin and eventually makes its way to the recycling bin. The bottle falls out of the bin when I open the lid to put some rubbish inside. It falls into a pile of leaves. One day later it is almost buried in dead leaves that have fallen from the trees above.

The wind then picks up and blows the leaves and the bottle out of the camera shot into a new scene showing the bottle rolling down a slope. The next scene then shows the bottle being blown along a stone patio along with leaves, include in this scene is also an extreme close up video shot of the leaves and bottle traveling along the ground.

The scene after that is showing the bottle flying over an outdoor cage (there is a Guiney pig inside the cage). This then turns to another scene showing the bottle flying up into the sky and then dropping back down onto the grass (there is also a bird flying overhead in the video shot?)

The next scene shows the bottle landing onto the grass very close to some chickens which are scared by the bottle when it drops to the ground and run away from it. After this the chickens walk back to the bottle and start pecking at it, suddenly the wind picks up again and the bottle rolls very fast towards the chickens which run away from the bottle yet again. The bottle continues its journey rolling down a grass slope.

The next scene shows the bottle being gently blown into the edge of a green box which has “recycling” written on it. The bottle can’t get inside the recycling box so it just stays where it is. The last scene shows a female walk past the recycling box, she walks out of the video shot and text saying “don’t be waster” appears. The female then walks back into the video shot, as she does “Wipe out waste” appears in text. The female bends down and picks up the bottle and then opens the lid of the recycling box, as she does this a dog’s head appears out of the box.

The female puts the bottle back down on the grass and then picks up the dog and puts the dog on the grass, the dog then walks towards the camera comically and then walks out of the video shot. At the same time as this was happening the girl has put the bottle in the recycling box and placed the lid back on top of the box and she then walks out of the video shot too.  The video ad has now finished.

My only concern for this video is that it is 10 seconds over the 60 second limit although I did cut out all unnecessary video clips I could from the ad video.

Locations

The main location was at my house, most of it was filmed in my garden. My sister helped me out by doing the last scene of the video ad, with thanks to my chickens, dog and Guiney pig of course. I filmed it a week earlier than we were intended to start filming; the main reason being for this was that the bright sunny weather was perfect for my recycling video ad.

Where my idea came from for the recycling ad

Here are the links to the YouTube videos that inspired me with how I made my own video ad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtdgYtT1DP8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-jO7qHDCs8

Camera Techniques

I used a small video camera that I had at home; we recorded twenty minutes of footage to get the best camera angle shots possible and then cut the footage down and put it into sequence which was one minute and twenty seconds long.

Music

This is the link to the a YouTube video of the song that I used

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCRae5mRoRE

Blues Brothers - Rawhide

My final video for "recycling advert video" made to encourage young adults/ teenagers to recycle and not waste.

My recycling video ad

LO2 Be able to develop a planned response to a brief

My brief
 

Finding a brief and receiving the initial brief:

I asked my manager at work if he could give me a brief to do something for the company. I work at Skirmish paintball in Lane end. My manager suggested to me that I could do film and edit a promotional video advertising airsoft gameplay at Skirmish.  I told him that this was a fine idea and asked him to send it to me by email so that it would be a formal brief with all the information I required to work to the brief.

I will now quote the email brief from my manager.

Hi Matt,

I would like to encourage you in making a promotional video for Skirmish paintball as our previous videos are out of date by years. I would like the video to be aimed at promoting the airsoft gameplay of Skirmish paintball and for the video to be approximately two and a half too three minutes long. I would preferably like the video to be finished and ready to upload by the end of March this year. To film the footage you can either come in on your own free time or film it during our weekend shifts. If you have any questions about this brief please contact me.

David.

LO3 Be able to apply a response to a brief

Responding to the brief:

When I was given this brief offer by my manager I was immediately keen on taking it up. My main reasons behind why I chose to respond to this brief is because the brief itself is my category of expertise, I am a very confident with my filming and editing styles which I felt would come in very handy for a brief such as this one.

I responded to my manager within the day of receiving the brief telling him I would take up the brief offer and complete it for the given deadline. I also sent him a questionnaire for him to fill in. The reason for the questionnaire was to get as much detail out of my manager as possible about how he wanted the final video to be like. Below is a copy of the questionnaire table that he filled in and emailed back to me.

Approximately how long do you wish the advertising video to be?	Roughly around three minutes long seconds but no longer than minute. Time of the video does not matter too much because we won’t be putting this video forwards for TV promotion. YouTube is a much more likely location for the video you are going to make.
Should I include music? If so what music should I include? Any sound effects?	You may use copyright free music, as long as it is upbeat and has no swearing in it. Sound effect can be inserted in the video, but don’t insert them into unnecessary parts of the video. We are very keen for you to keep the sound in from your footage so that people listening can audibly capture the experience. Make sure you cut out any areas that include swearwords or other offensive language.
Shall I include important information in the video such as pricing or the logo? If so then when should I include it?	No, We only want the video to show people who are new to Skirmish paintball what it is all about. We will insert pricing and other vital information in text underneath the video.
Are there any rules or health and safety modulations I should know about if I’m about to film people playing paintball?  If so please list them.	The usual rules as if you were marshalling a game. Wear body suit and helmet. We might suggest a protective or paint proof cover for your camera. Just to warn you, we will not cover the costs for any of your equipment if it is damaged when filming.
What is the final deadline?	I don’t see the need for a deadline, but If you require one I would like the video done before late May.
What features of Skirmish Paintball would you like me to video? Paintball, Laser tag or Airsoft? Should I film gameplay, special events, or any other features?	I would like it if you featured game play of airsoft games only. We already have a large amount of past footage advertising paintball. However we have hardly any footage of airsoft.

Budget

There is no budget for my given brief because I am doing this brief for free. The camera and recording equipment is owned by me. I use editing software at home and on College site. The health and safety equipment was handed to me on the days of filming without any requirement of payment.

Project management and developing my final video from feedback

Now that I had all the information I needed to start filming I had to start managing how I was going to make the video. In other words I did pre-production for my promotional video.

Research into similar video ads:

I needed to do research into similar promotional videos to see what video capturing and editing styles they used to make their videos.  At first I found it difficult finding promotional videos along the same category, but a work colleague told that there was a skirmish paintball channel on YouTube.  The channel was very helpful to my research; I found the most common video capturing technique was filming the footage in a first person view using a head strap with the camera. I think this was good way of way of capturing footage because the audience could relate to it as what it would look and feel like if they were playing right then.

The majority of the videos I saw used montage editing techniques keeping the all the airsoft action on screen flowing at a constant rate. This is a technique I decided I would be using because it would help keep the audience interested and fixed on the video.

Below is the link to the Skirmish paintball YouTube channel that I used to research into similar video ads.

http://www.youtube.com/user/skirmishpaintballtv?feature=results_main

Preproduction for Skirmish Paintball promotional video

Health and Safety form:

In the form below is a list of Hazards that I will face while filming airsoft at Skirmish paintball. The form also shows how each of these hazards can be prevented from happening.

Hazard	Safety precaution taken to avoid the hazard
Damage to eye or face from paintballs being fired at me.	To avoid this hazard from happening I shall where a plastic mask that comes with goggles to protect my face from damage from paintballs.
Damage caused to camera and other film equipment due to be paintballs possibly hitting the camera or equipment.	My company has already told me that any damage done to my filming equipment will not be paid for by them. So I have decided to take extra precautions by putting a protective lens cap on the camera and covering all my equipment in padding and plastic bags to avoid the damage caused by the impact of the paintball or from the paint leaking on my equipment.
Clothing being warn most likely will be damaged by paint when paintballs hit me.	Where the overalls handed out at the beginning of a paintball game so this way I can avoid my clothes being ruined by mud and paint from paintballs impacting and exploding on me.
The ground at skirmish paintball will be very wet and muddy due to all the feet that go over the ground and all the wet paint that has spilt on the ground from paintballs that have exploded.	I will where willies so that I can move around the ground easily with less chance of slipping. By doing this I will not ruin my trainers with mud too.
Overall damage being done to people inside the facility.	When you have been handed a gun, you are not allowed to load it with paintballs until you are out of the facility and in one of the playing fields. This way we can prevent people from being injured by paintballs.
Damage from paintball gun or physical contact.	You must be mature while playing in arenas. This includes not physically attacking other players or using your paintball gun as a baton.

 Shooting Times:

I will be shooting the airsoft footage at Lane End on the 7^th of April 2012 from 1pm until 7pm because this is the date I have arranged with Skirmish to come in with my camera and shoot the footage.

Shooting script:

I have no storyboard or shooting script for the video I am about to shoot because this is not a performance video where everyone does what the script says. This is me going into an airsoft game with 20 other people and capturing everything that happens. When I get home I’ll edit the best clips I have into a three minute long video.

Equipment list:

Protective overalls: You are made to wear these for protection to be allowed to play at skirmish paintball.

Protective mask or goggles: You are made to wear these for protection to be allowed to play at skirmish paintball.

Camera: The most necessary item to me if I am about to film footage.

Camera protective lens and cover: These are both to stop my camera from being damaged by BB pellets.

Another very useful item that Skirmish is lending to me is a protective mask with clippers on the side of it. This will allow me to mount my camera on the side of my mask to make the footage look like it’s in first person.

Developing my promotional video from feedback:

Once I had made a final edited version of my promotional video I emailed the video to David (my manager) and asked him for feedback including critical feedback. I was emailed back by David who was very praising of my final video. He made one critical feedback point saying that I needed music playing in the video.

I responded to this email within two days and sent him a new edited version with sound playing in the background. David was pleased by this and told me that this final edit was ready to be used. What also made me impressed with myself is that he also mentioned that he wouldn't mind me making future promotional videos for the company.

LO4 Be able to review work on completion of a brief



My review of working to my brief and new skills I have learned or improved on:

The key skills that I have developed are video editing, video capture and meeting my deadlines. A new skill that I have learnt would be the questionnaire. When I first started with my brief I didn’t feel that I would need to send my manager a questionnaire because I thought I knew what he wanted, it turned out there were a few things I would have missed doing if I hadn’t sent him the questionnaire which makes me understand the importance of it.

The one thing I would have done differently if given the opportunity again is pay more attention to my health and safety. In my health and safety form I had written down that it would be a good idea to use a camera protection lens. I decided not to in the end because I didn’t want to buy one, but it turned out for the worst because the first day I went out filming my camera lens was smashed by a pellet which cost me a lot more money repairing  than buying camera lens would have.

My final edited version for the Skirmish paintball promotional video:

Presentation for working to a brief

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