First Treatment

While the first few notes of the piano in the beginning of the song "How to Save a Life" play,  our main character will be walking slowly, looking sad or maybe depressed, towards the camera(medium shot) through an alley where there are trees on his left and right in a bright hoodie lip synching "Step one, you say we need to talk". The camera then quickly forwards towards the singer's face making it a close up, allowing him to finish the next lyric. This is followed by a slow motion of the character performing the action sitting down on a bench, looking into the sky as the lyrics go "sit down..." The lip synching continues until the end of the verse on the bench.

The chorus starts with a more fast paced beat which has a second or two of build up where we will have an extreme close up of someone about to play the guitar. This will then create an unzoom effect to a medium/long shot of the band playing the instruments and the singer singing, however his back will be turned to the camera until the shot pans around the person playing the guitar creating a over the shoulder shot from behind the guitarist looking at the singer lip synching.

After the chorus there is quite a long break where the music quietens and this is where the camera moves towards the artist and another person and a blur that was originally there will disappear significantly. When the lyrics start the lack of a blur shows that the two people are arguing in a medium, still, shot; as the lyric goes "try to slip by his defense" the second actor/actress will bardge through our main character hitting him shoulder to shoulder. The scene then cuts to another room where the second character is doing some sort of drug, however it will be an over the shoulder shot and as the person takes the drug the camera will switch focus to a painting that will be hung on a wall and the actor/actress will be blurred out. When the next lyric comes, the camera will be switched to a medium shot of the character sitting on the same bed/couch and then falling back to lay down. This is where the camera cuts to an eagle's eye shot of the character's crying face and as the verse finishes there will be a steady zoom into the eye of the character to create a smooth transition into the lip synching part of the chorus sung by the main character.

The start of the next verse will be a long shot(from the same room) of a door opening quickly and the main character walking in, looking irritated. The camera then switches to the second actor who has previously been taking drugs, as the lyrics go "you grant him one last choice" to show the actor about to go furious. Then, the camera goes back to our main character who is still standing in the door, looking a bit calmer now, saying "Drive until you lose the road or break with the ones you've followed". It is important that the actor says this instead of singing as it adds more realism to the situtaion. As the next line of lyrics is being sang, there will be a transition that will swipe the screen to the left, creating an "what if" scene of the second actor looking guilty and saying "I'm sorry" and then a swipe right to the actor intaking the same drug again and saying "I'm just not the same". The camera then goes to an over the shoulder shot to show the main character walk out and slam the door behind him which will transition to the chorus, where the main character will be lip synching.