In what ways does your media product use develop or challenge forms and conventions of media products?
Part of our research and planning included studying music videos related to the one we have created, to gather & analyse knowledge about conventions in modern music videos, and how we could make use of these popular techniques to streamline our production for a mainstream audience. Listening to our song, we heard derivatives from pop rock & disco music styles. The conventions that we specifically picked up on in videos such as these, and used in a similar way in our own clip are as follows:
‘Live’ Performance & Lip-Syncing
In the modern pop music-scene, image and personality are of almost equal or greater importance than the actual music. Advertising, promotion and radio play are the main drivers of record sales, whereas artists with lower profiles often flounder. Additionally, the ‘band’ format of ⅔ guitars, drums and vocals automatically attracts attention from those who enjoy band music. Therefore, in music videos promoting music by a band, the bandmates and frontman are commonly the focal point. Live music gigs and performances are also an integral pillar of band-music culture. The promotional videos often emulate a live performance, complete with actual playing of instruments and lip-syncing. We decided to also use this ‘live performance’ format for our own clip, also because a band playing instruments is engaging and visually interesting, giving more drive and emotion to the song, as you can see it being ‘created’ live through playing.
Limited Colour Pallette
Despite the fact that modern film equipment can now produce an incredibly deep and varied colour scale, the current trend in, not just music videos but cinema in general, is to actually limit the colour palette to about only two colours, usually opposite to each other on the colour wheel. The result is a sort of comic-book style. Objects can be easily made to stand out, because the picture is not particularly busy, and action becomes incredibly easy to follow because of the contrast. For the 1975, neon pink & blue is their sort of trademark, used abundantly in their own videos and live shows. For this reason, we decided to limit the colour pallette in our video to primarily these colours. We did this by using pink & blue filtered stage lighting during actual recording, and in post we used tints and colour correctors to remove other colours. We also did this as a technique to create association between our promotional clip and out ancillary products. The poster & Album artwork feature a similar palette, only slightly more saturated & visually striking.
Dynamic and Unusual Camera Movement and Angles
Essentially, a music video is a medium used to convey a piece of music. There are multiple ways to do this, through a narrative structure, or, more commonly, a recorded performance of the song. An actual live gig/performance has the advantage of tangible atmosphere, powerful sound systems and communication & interaction with the audience. A music video has none of these liberties, and therefore, plainly recording a performance of the song with minimal visual effects or movement can easily become stale and uninteresting. To resolve this, you need to make a promotional clip more than just a medium for music, and instead make it a work or art in it’s own right. Our clip features a live performance, but to make it more visually interesting, we used many dramatic and varied camera angles. We mixed neutral mid-range shots with close ups, bird’s eye and worm’s eye shots of the band members and props, whilst additionally interlacing macro shots.
Sharp editing and visual effects
Often, music videos are some of the most abstract & dramatic forms of cinematography, featuring unique, avant-garde artwork and visual effects. We wanted to do a similar thing, utilising symbolism and imagery. The most prominent example of this in our own clip is the skeleton, representing the unromantic, cynical and slightly macabre side of the music. The skeleton is, quite ironically, painted in vibrant ‘rave’ fluorescent body paint & sings. We also include shots of medical, scientific equipment, meant to represent drug abuse. There are also many interesting editing effects that we used, such as slow motion, speeding up footage, and reversing footage. For example, in the opening shot, the wine glass lava lamp speeds up, slows, and reverses erratically, but rhythmically. The same thing was done to the syringes containing the fluorescent liquid, and the macro microscope shot. All these things we did to both make the video purposeful and visually interesting, whilst also making up for the lack of structural narrative.
Question 2 (video).
Question 2 (video).
What have your learnt from your audience feedback?
Once we had completed the final cut we uploaded the video to Youtube and shared the release of it using the ancillary products on other social media platforms. From this we were able to get a variety of responses to the music video.
We split the audience feedback into three segments, in order to focus on different aspects of the product and how effective it is:
- Current media studies students - other peers will give constructive feedback on camera shots and angles and more of the practical side of the video. Because they are more familiar with the construction of developing video it would help more.
- Target audience for product - Music videos can be consumed by everyone. However all bands have specific genres, styles and age groups they appeal to. In addition we wanted feedback that didn't just focus on specifics but the music video as a whole. Was there a clear theme? Did we convey the story well? Was the video effective?
- Extended group - As we shared the video on several social media platforms we then were open to getting feedback from anyone else who viewed the video. This enables us to gain any extra feedback that we didn't receive from the other two groups.
FEEDBACK:
Positives:
- "Engaging, fun concept"
- "The use of bold, minimal colours is really effective when conveying the theme"
- " I loved the skeleton shots it was very original and added something extra to the piece"
Negatives (constructive criticism):
- "There isn't a narrative there, so sometimes the theme of the song is lost. Despite that very creative"
- " A few of the shots didn't seem smooth enough, although the shots cut quite quickly there are a couple that could have been stabilized"
- "The quality of some of the shots could have been better. I really liked the lava lamp shots, however there wasn't quite the clarity that really would make them stand out"
Most of the feedback we got given was positive and people seemed to understand the concept of the video. Most of the feedback focused around more of the creative shots we composed from the lava lamp shots, the skeleton, uv paint and close ups of the blurred lights. We did think that those would be the preferred shots as we spent time constructing them and they stand out against the many shots of the band playing. A few people mentioned about there not being a set narrative. When planning the music video we did take this into consideration, and when reflecting on The 1975's version of UGH! they didn't have a narrative either and sometimes it works better with the song to let it just focus on the band.
With the editing it was very difficult to get the shots perfectly matching up to the audio, alongside it being on the beat which is at a fast tempo. Tommy and I sat together and working on getting the shots on the beat as smoothly as possible. However during this process we found that because the shots changed so quickly, our footage was going too quickly and thus we needed to reuse some footage to pan the video out a little. In hind sight we would have shot more, if we counted how many times it changed before filming. In addition it is unlike professional videos which would have a hierarchy of cinematographers, directors and editors all working together to complete something that has been informed by many different people - an option we could of course not facilitate within an A-level piece.
From the feedback we received we have gained more of an insight and alternative perspective to our music video. This information was critical in helping us develop our media product as well as give us a further understanding of how media is consumed.
We split the audience feedback into three segments, in order to focus on different aspects of the product and how effective it is:
- Current media studies students - other peers will give constructive feedback on camera shots and angles and more of the practical side of the video. Because they are more familiar with the construction of developing video it would help more.
- Target audience for product - Music videos can be consumed by everyone. However all bands have specific genres, styles and age groups they appeal to. In addition we wanted feedback that didn't just focus on specifics but the music video as a whole. Was there a clear theme? Did we convey the story well? Was the video effective?
- Extended group - As we shared the video on several social media platforms we then were open to getting feedback from anyone else who viewed the video. This enables us to gain any extra feedback that we didn't receive from the other two groups.
FEEDBACK:
Positives:
- "Engaging, fun concept"
- "The use of bold, minimal colours is really effective when conveying the theme"
- " I loved the skeleton shots it was very original and added something extra to the piece"
Negatives (constructive criticism):
- "There isn't a narrative there, so sometimes the theme of the song is lost. Despite that very creative"
- " A few of the shots didn't seem smooth enough, although the shots cut quite quickly there are a couple that could have been stabilized"
- "The quality of some of the shots could have been better. I really liked the lava lamp shots, however there wasn't quite the clarity that really would make them stand out"
Most of the feedback we got given was positive and people seemed to understand the concept of the video. Most of the feedback focused around more of the creative shots we composed from the lava lamp shots, the skeleton, uv paint and close ups of the blurred lights. We did think that those would be the preferred shots as we spent time constructing them and they stand out against the many shots of the band playing. A few people mentioned about there not being a set narrative. When planning the music video we did take this into consideration, and when reflecting on The 1975's version of UGH! they didn't have a narrative either and sometimes it works better with the song to let it just focus on the band.
With the editing it was very difficult to get the shots perfectly matching up to the audio, alongside it being on the beat which is at a fast tempo. Tommy and I sat together and working on getting the shots on the beat as smoothly as possible. However during this process we found that because the shots changed so quickly, our footage was going too quickly and thus we needed to reuse some footage to pan the video out a little. In hind sight we would have shot more, if we counted how many times it changed before filming. In addition it is unlike professional videos which would have a hierarchy of cinematographers, directors and editors all working together to complete something that has been informed by many different people - an option we could of course not facilitate within an A-level piece.
From the feedback we received we have gained more of an insight and alternative perspective to our music video. This information was critical in helping us develop our media product as well as give us a further understanding of how media is consumed.
How did you use media technologies in the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages?
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