Naming Our Artist

In order to get a good overall understanding of our artist's branding and background we began by brainstorming possible names for them. Seeing as we have chosen a Lana Del Rey song, and our artist is female, we needed to come up with a range of female names.

The (above) circled names are the four final contenders when narrowing them down.

Narrowing our list of names down to 4 left us with Isla, Aria, Fern and Nova. We scrapped names such as 'Luna' previously (as much as we liked them) as it sounded too much like 'Lana' and one of our main aims was for our artist to be individual and to stand out from the rest of the industry- therefore we had to delve deeper into more unique names. 

We began by firstly removing 'Isla' from our list as although it is rather individual, we felt as if it were the weakest amongst others we had come up with.

Aria- This was on our possible list of names as not only is it short and snappy (so therefore easily memorable), but it has a strong link to music. This is because the definition of Aria is 'an accompanied song for a solo voice'. This makes the name very appropriate and suited to what our artist is all about. Although the name has an intriguing ring to it, we did however think that it was a slightly more popular, current and existing name (similarly sounding to Ariana Grande) and we wouldn't want it to blend in with the crowd. 

Fern- This is another name on our shortlist. As this name is linked to nature, it was a good contender as we were planning to put a lot of nature based scenes in our music video, meaning that the name would create a strong link and tie the video together as one. We all agreed that the name was very lovely and feminine, yet we didn't want it to sound too girly due to the more androgynous and edgy image we were aiming for.

Nova- We felt that nova was a particularly unique name. We aimed to choose an alternative name in order to match our selected alternative genre and this name ticked all of the boxes. We all agreed that the name reminded us of a 'Supernova' which is ''a brief stellar explosion that can outshine an entire galaxy''. This is particularly suiting to our artist as we want them to stand out from the rest of the artists in a competitive music industry. Also as she is an up and coming artist, it can also symbolise the fact that she is a 'star' in the making which is very suiting. As Nova is a short name, I think it is very appropriate as it is most memorable to an audience which is an important factor.

To sum up, we decided to choose NOVA as the name for our artist. It is artistic and edgy which matches the branding of our artist. Also its strong links to a more intergalactic theme leave us with many ideas surrounding outer space when it comes to promotion and designing our digipak which adds to the image we have already created for our artist. This may make them stand out and become more individual from the rest which is exactly what we were aiming for. 

Lana Del Rey Lookbook and Style Inspiration

I decided to research further into Lana Del Rey's fashion for inspiration for what our artist will wear in our music video.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       I noticed that her style varies depending on whether she is appearing on a stage or just spotted walking around in public by the paparazzi. Saying this, I think there is a consistent 'retro' theme running throughout many of her outfits which makes her appear particularly unique.  In this image she is wearing a red flowy floral dress which has has a Hawaiian print- this has a strong link to her 'Paradise' album which also has quite a tropical theme, with the album artwork showing palm leaves and other exotic flowers. She describes her music as 'Hawaiian Glam metal' which I feel really suits her appearance.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

 Her looks at red carpet events (such as in this image where she is pictured at the movie premier for 'The Great Gatsby') are very statement and reminiscent of the 50's and 60's much like her music. I feel that her vintage style makes her stand out from the rest which is important in such a competitive industry.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Del Rey often dresses very casually too, on and off stage. These denim shorts make her outfit have more of a retro feel to it whilst still appearing very classy. This is the type of outfit that I believe we would take inspiration from as denim has quite an edgy look to it and you can style it up or down- I think it is appropriate for the 'brand' that we have given our artist. 

 We were inspired by her more casual fashion in this scene of our music video. We aim for this scene to be used in a 'break-up' scenario of our video which is why we thought the clothing was so appropriate. Converse, boyfriend jeans and a hoodie meant that the outfit was still stylish but more relaxed and 'everyday'. I feel that this outfit was successful as it captured the mood that we were aiming for in our video. We were trying to portray a sense of heartbreak therefore a laid-back style approach was most suitable, replicating a causal outfit that Lana would wear herself.

We were inspired by Lana's style in this outfit. We 'branded' our artist to have quite a bohemian look which is why we thought that this floaty off the shoulder top paired with dungarees would be perfect. We have drawn inspiration from the 'festival' type of look as well as the retro dungarees that Del Rey is also seen to wear. I believe this outfit to be successful as it does match our branding which will therefore, if we keep this up throughout filming, make our video consistent which is a very positive factor. I also like that the 'floaty' gypsey blouse is easily associated with a beach which therefore adds a little more context to the video and its location.

These type of outfits (such as the green dress above) show Lana's individuality. This dress at the Golden Globe Awards caught a lot of media attention as it was so different, her unique style is definitely something that we want to draw a lot of our inspiration from as we aim for our artist to stand out from amogst the crowd.

Storyboards