Music Video Treatment

Chris Cohen presents “If you only knew” in an alternative rock genre of music, comparing himself to such bands as Coldplay and The Fray. Therefore we intend to plan our music video around themes and ideas used within music videos of this genre and to challenge them also. One way we will seek to be successful in our intentions for example is how the majority of alternative rock music videos do feature the musicians/artists involved, either in a storyline manner or collectively within the band image of singing and playing their instruments in a chosen setting. So the way we will be challenging this theme is enlisting alternative personnel to perform as the chosen characters in the video, yet still including the theme of a musical instrument being played and lyrics being sung with the mouth synchronisation. We do realise that this does decrease exposure of our chosen artist within the video itself; however this can be counteracted later on in the promotional package for our artist, by displaying him in the digipak cover and producing a biography of him.

The narrative presents a couple (male and female) that have had an argument (which the end of the argument is shown as the intro of the song) which shows a photo of both characters together torn in half (dividing the characters in the photo and in the later narrative), this is where the equilibrium is disrupted, fall to the ground leading to the female characters exit from the scene. This will cover the intro consisting on instrumentation lasting 8 seconds. A long shot will be the first shot that is scene establishing the two characters engaged in argument before the female character rips up the photo in her hand. A tracking CU shot will track the pieces fall onto the floor (ideally both halves of the photo facing upwards to shot the audience that the two characters are “torn apart”). A medium shot of the male character bending down to the floor to pick up the half of the photo that displays the female character, before walking out of the room in a different direction, which will be shot with the male character walking towards then past the camera which will also show the female character exiting in a different direction in the background behind him. The first two verses and the first chorus of the song are perceived from the male characters perspective. Verse 1 lasts 15 seconds, which will see both characters retreating to their own homes upset and in regret of what has happened (the argument). Both characters are from here on (until the final chorus and outro) alone in their respective houses and begin to reminisce past times how they have spent their time together in their relationship. Verse 1 will begin with a long shot of the male character entering his house through the front door, followed by a CU shot of the banister on the stairs that the male character will place his keys (camera will remain static as he walks towards the banister, place the keys and walk on. The camera will be focused on the keys yet movement of the male character will still be seen. The possibility of a long shot at low angle would track the male character as he puts his jacket on the back of a chair (medium shot) and then as he walks across the lounge area to a leather seat where he will sit. A medium shot will follow to see the male character sit down in the chair and pause for a moment (possible idea of him putting his head in his hands or pausing to look at the half of the photo he took with him). A bird’s eye shot would show the half of the photo being placed on a small table to the side of him for later referral as he will continue to use this photo as inspiration for words he will write on a notepad and lyrics he will sing. A shot of the guitar as the male character grabs it and places it on his lap ready to play (I will later reference this idea from City and Colour – Comin’ Home).Verse 2 will last 16 seconds, and will begin with the male character singing the line “You feel like home”, where the camera will be focused on him picking up a notepad and pen using a high angle shot. This is followed by an over the shoulder shot of him writing on this notepad. “I feel a burning fire for you, I feel it in my bones” follows with the reference to City and Colour – Comin’ Home as we will shoot the male character playing his guitar in the same style, a medium shot of him playing the guitar and the CU of him strumming.

Instrumental will last 15 seconds A panning shot of him writing words on a notepad placed on his lap (lyrics in the way that match the track and as if the male character is composing a song to explain how he feels about the other character). We will use an over the shoulder high angle shot of him writing the word “Understand” on the notepad.Chorus 1 will last 30 seconds and will feature an ECU of the male character’s mouth singing “If you only knew”, cut away to the female character standing at a window in her house during the line “You might understand” followed by a zoom towards her. To follow on just like the first line in this chorus, the female character will lip sync “You might understand” to the music as a response to the male character in the first line of the chorus. Then we will cut away to the male character sitting in the black leather chair at his house looking at the photo (without guitar and notepad). This will be followed by a low angle shot of the female character walking into her bedroom (as if she is walking into the shot), then back to the male character again still looking at the photo (medium shot).Instrumental will last 16 seconds before preceding to verses 3 and 4 and the second chorus, which are all perceived from the female characters point of view. Verse 3 will last 16 seconds. This will see her lonely in her house without the male character, finding a jacket or jumper of some sort at the end of her bed (this is set in her bedroom) he gave her when she was cold when they were together one night (this will cue a cut to reminisce the event in question), a scene will be re-acted from the past as the female character is thinking about it, which will show both characters together, and the male character wrapping a jacket/top around the female character as she is cold (either sitting together or walking down a road, leading to second reminisce of male character taking her home?). This will be shot with a tracking shot, following the female character as she finds the item of clothing, a medium shot as she glances upwards towards a photo above her bed, the same shot will zoom into the photo and a scene will be played out whereby both characters are walking together (the female shivering as she is cold, and the male character will put his item of clothing around her to keep her warm (this done over the line “On a cold dark winters night”).

An instrumental will last 5 seconds moving to a long shot as the characters approach the female characters house, and an over the shoulder shot as the male character places a hand on the female’s shoulder.Verse 4 will last 15 seconds. This will start by showing the same over the shoulder shot of the male character putting his hand on her shoulder, but proceed to kiss her on the cheek, the camera then moving to a close up shot of the female character smiling. This will cue the end of this reminisce and the camera will zoom out of the photo on the wall and pan around to show her smile slightly then looking sad and moving out of the shot. We will from here cut to her finding the remaining half of the photo displaying the male character, this will be shot by a low angle shot of her feet as she approaches the half of the picture (also within the camera shot), bend down to pick it up, cut to an over shoulder shot as she looks at it, provoking her to write a message on the reverse of the photo (which will be shown via superimposition as we will show the male and female characters writing on the back of their halves of the photo in sync in the same shot) before leaving her house to visit the male character as his house. This will also cover the instrumental that follows verse 4, that will last 7 seconds.

Chorus 2 will last 29 seconds to find the female character arrive at the male characters house. We will show a CU of the male character singing “You might understand”, which will be followed by a medium to long shot of the male character sitting in the black leather chair and the female character appearing in view at the door behind him. She will knock on the window/door and push her half of the photo up against the door (CU from inside the house) leading to the male character turning around to see her in the door (long shot); he will proceed to stand up, place his guitar up against the black leather chair (his half of the photo in his hand) and walk towards her at the door (tracking shot) leading to the camera cutting back to the door as he walks into the shot to approach the female character (parallel medium shot). Here we will open the door slightly to allow ourselves to pan around the characters standing at the door for our next shot. We will go from here to an over the shoulder shot from the female’s point of view to see the male pressing his half of the photo up against the door.It is here that the message that she wrote on the back of the photo comes apparent; it will read similarly to the lyrics being sung at that point “You might understand”, the message she wrote on the photo will read “Do you understand?”Outro will last 15 seconds. In response to the female character’s writing on the back of her photo “Do you understand?” It will become apparent that the responding message from the male character will read “I understand”.

At this point, the camera will show the two halves of the photo being pressed against the wall from two angles, starting from an over the shoulder shot from the female character panning back round to an over the shoulder shot from the male’s point of view where the camera will stay still. This allows us to show the audience the messages together and picture of both characters being rejoined. These shots will be shown as the lyrics “My puzzles been complete”. The male character will let the female character into his house (opening the door) and into his arms as the song sings “If you only knew” medium parallel shot.The mise en scene provides a sense of loneliness, regret and happiness. Loneliness and regret is prescribed in the way that both characters are broken up at the beginning of the video and are from that point in the present narrative shown as apart, with the storyline sees the characters both engaging in thinking about the other character and happier times when they are together. This reminiscing and the ending to the video, which sees the two characters resolve their differences and “get back together”, provoking happiness. Regret is presented through the actions that each characters carry out when they are alone in their houses which leads to change in opinion and resolution in the end. Most importantly, these actions are, for the female character, photos and items of clothing that she encounters, reminding her of the male character. These reminders will importantly inspire her to track down the male character and resolve their issues at the end of the video. In regards to the male character, he will express regret through writing key words that will match the lyrics of the song, and singing key lyrics in the same fashion.In terms of colour in the video, from when the characters in the present narrative are shown to be apart (after the photo was ripped in half), the video will be edited to black and white, to impose the feeling of loneliness in their lives without the other character, and to link in with the theme of the lyrics of how much the characters mean to each other and “add colour” to each others lives. For this reason, when the narrative cuts to times when they are together, including the reminiscing and the ending as the female character enters the male characters house, will be shot in colour.Lighting in our music video will be dark to follow our theme of lack of enthusiasm between the characters following their argument. The theme would be seen as negative by the audience and the dark lighting would help to reflect this. In contrast, when the video is shot in colour, the lighting will be brighter to change the theme to a more positive and happier mood when the characters were together in their relationship (happier times).

Track structure
Intro 8 seconds
Verse 1 15 seconds
Instrumental 6 seconds
Verse 2 16 seconds
Instrumental 15 seconds
Chorus 1 30 seconds
Instrumental 16 seconds
Verse 3 16 seconds
Instrumental 5 seconds
Verse 4 15 seconds
Instrumental 7 seconds
Chorus 2 29 seconds
Instrumental 21 seconds
Outro 15 seconds
Total duration 3:38

AmendmentsThe original track of this song lasted over 4 minutes, which is too long to match our set brief for the project for the track to last between 2-4 minutes. Therefore we had to cut two of the verses out, meaning the total duration of the track is now 3:38, which does comply with the set brief.