CONVENTIONS OF MUSIC VIDEO

VICKIE HOYLE

CAMERA

Camera was the first area I looKed at when thinKing about the conventions of music videos.

Firstly I realised that there are lots of extreme/long shots in order to establish where

the music video is taKing place...

EXAM

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FRO

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As the song develops often close ups and mid shots are used to portray the artist’s emotions to the audience, either facial expressions or body

language.

EXAMPLES FROM RIHANNA

There are also lots of movement shots involved within music videos, such as panning and

tracKing shots. These shots follow the artist or actors through the narrative and/or

performance.

Another popular shot is a wide shot, where the artist is shown to be taKing up a third of the

screen, but the emphasis is on the location and the artist is shadowed, in a very wide shot the

artist is barely visible.

EXAMPLE FROM ED SHEERAN

Over the shoulder shots are also used in music videos though it is primarily in the narrative as it

highlights to the audience Key relationshipsbetween characters and/or showing what a

character is looKing at.

EXAMPLE FROM ED SHEERAN

MISE-EN-SCENE

This is the arrangement of performers/artists as well as props in a chosen scene, the creation of this scene further enables an artist to represent

to the audience the meaning of their song.

The location of the music video can often give hints about the music genre that the

song is from, for example pop music videos are liKely to occur on beaches or at party

scenes.

EXAMPLES FROM TAYLOR SWIFT &JASON

DERULO

Hair and maKe-up within a music video is very important as often artists use extreme hair and maKe-up in order to differentiate themselves

from other artists.

EXAMPLE FROM LADY GAGA

LIGHTING

The lighting in a music video aids in depicting the mood. For example, when depicting sadness and sorrow you will see low lighting in the music

video.

I W

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Low lighting here creates a sad tone, however the glimmers of light coming through the trees suggest a

sense of hope

EDITING

Typical editing techniques in a music video are; jump cutting, CGI effects as well as

parallel editing. This is a method of cutting between a couple of scenes or stories which

occur at the same time.

SOUND

There are two main forms of sound, diegeticand non-diegetic.

There is also sound parallel which occurs in music videos which is when the music

matches the mood of the video.

Although sound is mainly vocals during a song, in some music videos there are introductions before the song, which appear more as short

films.

Performance or narrative

Performance based music videos are where you see the artist performing the song, although they

are not considered to be popular among audiences as with no narrative it is harder for

audiences to identify the meaning of the song.

Narrative based music videos.. There are two types of narrative; linear and fragmented.

A linear narrative is where the story line is followed by the audience all the way through. Whereas a fragmented narrative may have a beginning middle and end, although they are

mixed up and may not appear in the right order.

There are also non-narrative music videos, these are music videos which are essentially random

thoughts, they contain lots of symbolism and are created from loose themes such as anger, love

etc.

IDEA OF SPECTACLE

Music videos are can be looKed at as examples of spectacle. In a spectacle the artist will perform whilst looKing at the audience so to speaK. This

is Known as direct address.

The idea of spectacle changes depending on gender. When the artist is male he is considered

to be performing for you as he addresses the audiences directly. When the artist is female they are often seen as an object of male desire, this is

Known as voyeuristic gaze.