Taylor Swift - The Music Videos

Taylor Swift is arguably one of the most famous artists of our generation. She started as a country singer in 2006 with her Debut Album 'Taylor Swift', her first music video being for her single 'Tim McGraw'. This is just a little look into her early videos, what made her so famous and where she is now.

Taylor Swift - The Videos by Beth Newton

Stevie Russell and Kodaline

Brother by Beth Newton

Shot List

I'm a truly awful artist so when planning my video I chose the best thing for me would be to make a shot list rather than a story board.

As you can see, what I did was write out the lyrics to the song and think of something for every single line. Some of the ideas were repeated or based on ideas from my practice piece. I chose to do this so there was always something happening during the song and I didn't end up not having enough footage. However, I didn't think this version was detailed enough.

I made a more detailed version of my shot list deciding to work out what second each line came in on. Because I wanted a sort of 'semi-narrative' approach to my video I needed to see the song in more detail. I wanted to know where the breaks are in the lyrics knowing how much I would need to film to be able to fill the gaps. 

By making the shot list more detailed it gave me a better idea of what needed filming, helping work out which lines would be best to use for lip syncing because I don't want the video to be centered around me 'singing' the song. I want the viewer to be more focused on the video itself and the story of it. 

Having a really detailed shot list is beneficial for me because it helps me see what needs filming. Because there are a lot of different short scenes for my video I wanted a clear idea of what I wanted to us, how long they'd last etc. The actually types of camera shots and angles I aim to use will be a collection of dissolves that I will add in editing whilst other shots show the camera panning across various items such as lights. I also want to incorporate close ups of eyes to show the idea of 'dreaming'.