Intitial thoughts - locations

Houses

In the second verse of the song the music video is filmed in a living room in a house where the artist pulls the sheets over the girls feet. Therefore our music video needs to be filmed in a lounge. The lounge will also need a mantle piece for there to be a photo frame sitting on it so that when the camera goes into the photo frame there is somewhere that the frame is sitting on. There will also need to be a different living room for when the camera comes out of the photo frame into a lounge where the artist is an old man with his wife and the grandchildren are playing. therefore we will need two different lounges in order to film these shots. The two locations that we will film these shots in is Sophie's House and Erin's house. This is because both these lounges have sofas for the actors to sit on and mantle pieces for the photo frames. Also, it is important that the lounges in the different shots are different from one another to show that they had a different home when they got older to what they  had when they are younger as it is not likely that they would live in the same house in their 20s to when they are in their 70s/ 80s because they may have upsized their house when they had kids or downsized their house when they got older.

Parks

During verse 6 and the second to last chorus there are shots filmed at a park, this is because the couple in the music video are having a picnic, watching the sunset and messing around at the park. This park needs to be one with a lot of greenery/ a field.

This is St Andrews park in Broomfield, Chelmsford, Essex. This park would be a good park to go to because there is a lot of greenery and not just a kids park. This would be a good location to have a picnic set up and watch the sunset. This would be easily accessible to our actors as well because this park has a car park therefore if our actors can drive there is somewhere for them to park whilst filming. Also this park is near one of the housing locations and therefore would be good because the filming for the park shots and the shots at this house could be done on the same day.

Another large park in Chelmsford with a lot of greenery is Hylands Park. This park is good because it is very big and would give us a variety of places that we could film in throughout the park. This park is also good because there is a car park for our actors to park in. However, this park wouldn't be as good because it is on the outskirts of Chelmsford and is not near any of our other locations so would have to be filmed on a separate day which may make it difficult for our actors to find more time for filming. Another reason this park may be more difficult to film in is because it is often very busy and we do not want to film people that are not actors.

Great Leighs park would be a good location because it is rarely busy so we could film our shots without getting people in the background. This location would also be a good place to film the picnic and messing about scenes between the  couple because it is near one of the housing locations and therefore we could film these shots on the same few days. It is also good because if the weather is not going according to plan, the park is so close to the housing location which means it is easily accessible for actors that we could save the filming for a nicer (better weather) day at the park.


Dining room

During the introduction at the beginning of the song, the scene is set in a dinning room because the artist has cooked dinner for his girlfriend. This is a romantic scene. This location is a simple location to find as almost every house has a dining room and if not they will have a kitchen diner. As we are going to need two different houses to use the living rooms for other shots we can also use a dining room from one of these two houses. This includes Sophie's and Erin's houses. Both these two houses have dining rooms. When we film the shots in this scene it will be dark outside as it is supposed to be in the evening when the girl has got back from work. Although it is going to be dark outside, to create a romantic setting it is going to have to be dark inside and lit by candles. Candle light may not come out well in the camera which means we will have to consider a way of making the shots show up better in the camera. Therefore the room may need to be big enough to have somewhere to put an extra light that we can move around to create the best lighting. The dining room will also need to be big enough to fit a dining table and the actors as well as fitting us (the camera people) in the room so we can film.

School

For our performance shots when the artist is sitting at a piano and lip syncing the words to the song we may use the school piano. This is because it is easy for us to access and there are performance rooms which means we can go in there and shoot our footage without worrying that someone may need to use the piano and give us limited time to film and also not worry about someone walking past the camera (someone who is not an actor) whilst we shoot. Although this location is very convenient for me and Erin to use, there may be a constraint that it is only open during the day and not at weekends, so our actors who work will not be able to get here to film. Also there may be health and safety rules that do not let our actors come into the school grounds due to no CRB checks and they will be in a school environment with children.

Salvation Army

As the School may be a difficult place to film our performance shots there is a grand piano at the Salvation Army that we could use to film our performance shots. This would be good as there is a big room to film in (main hall) which means we could film shots from many different angles, and can mainly shoot from the other side of the piano so that we can not see what keys the actor is pressing and we do not need to worry about the piano being played in sync to the actual music. This is important particularly if our actor does not play piano in real life. This location is in the town centre so is a good place for the actors and us as camera people, director etc to meet as everyone knows where this place is however, the only problem we may come across filming here is that we may not be given a long time to film here.


Dressing room

During verse 5 the visuals show the girlfriend getting herself ready to go out with the artist. She is putting makeup on at a dressing table. This location will be at Sophie's House as there is a dressing room with a dressing table and mirrors and enough space for us to film around the dressing table. This room is big and has good lighting which will be good for us when filming. Another reason this location will be good for us to film in is because we will be using the lounge in this house for one of our lounge shots and possibly also using the dining room in this house, this means the actors know how to get there and there will be no time constraints to film.

Sophie Thomas