OBSID!AN: The Whole Process

 

This week, my group and I finished our Music Marketing project. It's safe to say that I'm proud at the end of the day of what I submitted. So, here was the process of creating Obsid!an. 

Part 1: Picking the song

Part 2: Picking the aesthetic

Picking the song for this project wasn't easy to say the least. We had to choose between a couple songs that none of us had ever heard before. After choosing "Many Shades of Black," we immediately started working on the project itself. We started brainstorming and led to the conclusion that Obsidi!an would be an artist and not a band. We created a pinterest board to start putting together the aesthetic of the artist. 

The pinterest board was super helpful in the making of this project. We could quickly go back at any time and remind ourselves how we wanted our project to look like. We didn't want to accidentally go with the wrong aesthetic and the project end up a mess. Obsid!an is quite a unique name, and for us to come up with the name of the artist and brand. I want to say that we spent at least 30 minutes trying to make sure our name was perfect for this brand.  

The music video was the biggest part of this project. We made a storyboard and had some great ideas to write down. We took our time on a Sunday to film and edit the video. We had the concept of "Beauty and the Beast' but with a modern twist. We wanted to incorporate roses into the video, and the petals falling as a sign that the relationship in the video is falling apart. 

Part 3: The presentation

We started working on the presentation and chose the color palette and the theme for our band. We chose a template before realizing we could get more creative with it. We wanted to be proud what we eventually turned in. We ended up creating the presentation from scratch, and being really proud about it. 

The presentation started off as a simple black background. One of the girls in my group had the very good idea to tear up pieces of paper with the song lyrics on it and put it as the borders on the presentation. So, as you can see the borders have lyrics of the song like "many shades of black" and "smash it on the floor." In the middle of the drums is also the logo with Obsidian itself. We thought it added a nice touch. 

The rest of the presentation had only the bottom left corner with the ripped paper. We thought it added a nice touch to the rest of the presentation. We also decided to keep the information to a minimum on the slides. When actually presenting, we wanted to go into depth about whats on the slides already. 

Part 4: Fun details!

Now to the fun stuff! The little things that make a big difference in the presentation! The merch was designed in a simple, yet cool way. We opted for a design that had the song "Many Shades of Black" on it, and we also chose another design that had the lyrics of the song on it. The poster for the spontaneous concert was made also, and posted on the instagram. Something that I did that also turned out amazing was the apple and spotify music profiles. People loved them and commented about them after we presented. It was definitely a little detail, but it made a big difference! 

Part 5: After the filming

So after the filming, I immediately put all the footage into premier and started editing. The total time of the footage was around 20 minutes all together, but when I was done with the editing, it was way too short. I had to incorporate some cool transitions and try to make it longer. In the end, it ended up being enough time. The music video was posted on youtube. I thought the thumbnail also came out very awesome, and the fonts make it look more dramatic as well as the makeup that the character is wearing in the picture. 

Part 6: Reflection

So, what did I learn after this whole process? I definitely learned that when filming my next video for any project, I should take several takes for each scene/shot. I want to have a variety of shots/takes next time for when I'm editing. It would offer more footage as well as backup's just in case one of the shots turn out to be wrong. I also learned for next time to engage more with the audience when presenting. Presenting for the first time in class definitely made me nervous and I could've better prepared for it. 

I think when developing my Cambridge portfolio, I will definitely look back at this project as it will be helpful for any upcoming problems that might arise while finalizing the project. Overall, creating Obsidian was definitely very fun! Obsidian was a big and good experience!