different styles of music videos

These days all music artist are competing for first place and there is a lot of competition out there, just like many products the artist have to have USP. A unique feature to show who they are and  differ them from others to become more noticable and start there own iconography. Some examples are Wiz Khalifa's weed smoking scene and lady gagas whacky out of the world style. Music video's must also contribute to this by showing off the iconography of the artist and potraying the artist in the way which will benifit them.

Public.

Almost all music videos you see these days are rehearsed or made so the public see the artist the way the producers want to show them. This video is an example of a complete example of a typical publicity video, the shots are taken exactly the way they want and in this particular video there is a lot of extra editing and illustrations added to give a more stronger feeling of the artist. Here in Kanye Wests good life this is shown very well.

As you can tell from from this picture the white background and car illustration has been put in the shot separately in post production. So this was altered for the public to see.

This has also been edited, in fact the whole video has this sort of editing.

Location

This video is great for showing the location concept of a music videos, this is also one of the most popular one, this technique makes the audiunce relate to the area and if the audiance is familiar with the location they will feel an attachment to the video. producers can use this very well to make a lot of aspect relivent, for examplhip party based artist may use the location of ibiza which is a capital for clubing, another example would be nikki minajs video pound the alarm which was show in rio de janiro the home of the carnival, people will notice the carnival and know this video would be as crazy as the actual carnival. Below are a set of pictures and this video 'till i'm gone' by tinie tempah shows a varety of world famous places.

This is him in amstadam

Japan

Milan

Singapore

Sydney

And of course London, other places include Paris, Switzerland, Monaco and NYC

Mood

This video is very different from the rest of the videos here because it is so underground and gritty, this video gives off a feeling just like a previous video i analysed called 'getting nowhere' by magnetic man. this is a great mood video because it shows the artists mood so well and with the graphic images it also makes the audiences feel the same mood. This is a song by professor green about the means streets of London in particular hackney, the scenes in this give a strong impact to the audience because the stuff shown here is very strong and stays in the mind very well sort of like a shock tactic. Some of the aspects shown here include drugs, crime, prostitution, gangs, youth, killing, guns, chaos and a lot more. This is done to show pro greens life style and shows where he came from most likly to show that he started from the bottom.

Youth being submerged into the gritty life.

Prostitution

Beat up of another.

Storming into a drug house

Intimedating looking figure, creates tension.

Gun violence

Bleeding

Group of hoodies, shot in a wayto show gritty lifestyle.

The reason why this is really good for a mood video is because the mood is such a strong one in which the target audience can relate with. This video in particular does it through shock but many others use the mood technique in a less intimidating way for example one of these videos is Jessie J's music video 'price tag', instead off using the mood technique to give a shock the mood tactic here is used to give off an impression of how Jessie J is to here audience  a tool to advertise here iconography. This also works very well and has proved to be effective with many other artists such as Eminem, Ed sheran, maroon 5 etc.

Jessie J's 'Price tag'

candid

concert

Here is an example of a concert style music videos, these would be watched by mainly hardcore fans or just to show off the artists vibe and energy. This sort of music videos used to be really popular before but these days the other styles of music videos prove to be a lot more emersive and enteraining to watch rather than there concert types. As you can see this song is quite old, it was really hard to find a modern one becasue many music videos do not use this anymore and use better stratgies but the closet thing i could find was jay-z's sone  'niggers in paris' which is ona concert but one that is edited extensivly.

After looking some examples from music videos and understanding the concept properly we went out and took our own versions of publicity, candid, concert, mood and location shot types. We took pictures around the college and we had some equipment like professional cameras to make the shots look realistic. below are a few of the pictures we took.

Mood

This first one is a great mood shot, it shows a classmate standing in front of the window watching over a great veiw which could also be seen as a location shot as well and a great mood shot. The shot shows the charecter as if he is seeing a new light and gives the audiance the feel that the artist is having. This is one of the best shots too show the feelings of the artist advertised.

 Concert

Here is my version of a concert as you can see the audience are shown and the artists are on a platform higher than the audience, this gives a great view of the both the audience and  the artists. More specifically it makes you feel as if you are on of the fans within the concert and gives that feel with the actions of the fans. The artist also show great acting with their air guitars and really simulate a real concert.

 Publicity

 location

Surprise

In this post I'm going to show Kanye West's iconography, Kanye West has a very cocky attitude, he believes he is better than the common person and special, he is very proud of himself and his music videos show it very well. This is shown very well in the video 'Power' which is dedicated purely to himself and he tries to show himself as almighty.

Here is the video 'Power.'

Mise en scene is the most used convention to portray the idea of  Kanye West having all the power, this is done by using the wide number of props, most of these props have ancient origin and are normally associated with wealth, power and being majestic. These are also from ancient empires that everyone sees as the superpowered civilisation, the main references I noticed were from Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Chinese origin. some of these are:

• gold owl chain
• horns
• daggers
• swords
• girls
• pillars
• throne
• staffs
• halos
• crowns
• fireworks

As well as this he also shows the aspect of him being god like, the most obvious is the fact he is surrounded by angels, other objects which depict this are the grapes, devils, clouds, wings and scenery, which looks like a vision of heaven. This shows Kanye as if he were a god. 

One other use of mise en scene being used is the sexualisation of women, this goes in with Goodwin's theory of a successful music video and here it shows that the women flocking towards Kanye as if he has everything, this is to show that he has everything and makes people want to be like him.

Here are a few pictures of some objects:

Illuminous eyes, shows he is a higher being. The glare which is looking directly at you can be quite intimidating, this is done to show power using fear. 

Devil

Angels

Dagger

Heavenly women

Grapes in a vase, majestic and very royal

Sword

Sword and halo

Solid gold chain with pageant god on it.

The camera is very stationary in this music video, it is just a slow progressive zoom out from Kanye which could be a transition. this makes kanye stay in the centre of the shot through out the whole clip, the only other time it changes is at 1.15 where the camera changes rapidly to specific parts in the shot such as the angels and devils yet still it's the same shot, the reason why there is only one shot is because only one shot is needed and cutting to different shots will lose the concentration of the audience. it does this five times before going back to Kanye. These are short, continuous jump shots which helps you focus on Kanye West by showing what's around him.

Lighting is used very well in this mainly on Kanye as there are the lights on him which are the primary light, the fill light and the backing light. the backing light has the effect of him being illuminous and makes him a lot more distinguished compared to everyone else on the shot. most of the other light was from the blue screen behind. most of this video was filmed separately on blue screen and then put together.

Creative media btec: Goodwins music video theory

Andrew Goodwin had seven theories about how succesful music videos work, he said most videos include the following aspects, but sometimes not all of them. His theory pointed out what a successful music video would need.

His theories were:

• The lyrics of a music video are connected to the visuals.
• The visuals are connected to the music.
• There should be a lot of close ups on the main artist.
• The artist should have a clear star image (original theme).
• Most of the time females are sexualised.
• There are intertuxtual references to other past videos.
• Has a performance or narrative (story).

I personally believe that his theories do point out a lot a successful techniques in making a good video but it is not always the case in some of the videos I have analysed, although every video did support at least one of his theories. One example is the video 'You Need Me, 'I Don't Need You' by Ed Sheeran where this challenges the normal conventions of music videos, yet still supports the theory of the lyrics being connected to visuals and a few others, if there is a video that does not support a single theory it is probably not popular and a complete failure, that is why most producers tend to use these because they don't want to take any risks, and use conventions to create a good selling video.

This is Tupac's music video 'California Love' it was the video out of all the videos we studied which followed most of the theories, it followed all seven of the theories.

• the lyrics go with the visuals
• visuals connect with music
• a lot of close ups on the artists
• the artist definitely have a star image
• females are sexualised
• intertextuality to some films at that time
• there is a definite narrative, and form of performance.

Here is another video:

This video has:

• Close ups on artists
• Star image 
• and a performance

Music video 'getting nowhere'

Here is the video 'Getting Nowhere' by Magnetic Man and John Legend.

The reason why i have chosen to talk about this video is because it is very creative like the other videos I have chosen, and it has an original theme and puts you in a trance. As well as this the video has a massive amount of symbolism, mostly dark and depicts the dark gritty side of London. One way it has been filmed well is the fact it was filmed on a council estate on East London as well as being filmed in the financial district. To me this shows the corruption and space between the poor and rich in London.

This music video is also filled with crazy random moments which still relate back to the theme it is trying to portray. On the whole i would describe it as surreal with a partial narrative if any.

Some of the themes in this are:

• hoodies
• BMX's
• crime
• youth corruption
• poor
• prostitutes
• drugs
• urbanism
• suffering
• greed

To me these tell a story about the London that most people don't know about.

The four main charecters, who are all on BMX's and have facemasks as well as a hoodies, is a great way of showing this culture and depicting what the video is showing (they are the illustration to the music). They are also shown as being there yet not taking action (silent witness). They are also shown as the modern day version of a highway man, this is shown perfectly at the point 2.59 where there is a two shot of both the biker and the highway man via mirror reflection so they are shown as one entity.

I also noticed the colour of each of the hoodies corresponds with its own theme, i say this because of when the hoodies are shown during key parts of the video.

White - connotes death
Black - connotes crime
Grey - connotes mystery
Red - connotes suffering

Music video 'you need me, i don't need you'

I chose this video because is one of my favourite and has always captured my attention every time I've seen it, it explores its ideas in depth.

The video does not show the main singer much, instead its has a person translating what is said in sign language in a very fluent movement. To me this idea is very well done and shows a twist to the video instead of conventional music videos which have the main artist shown a lot. This video has no narrative, it just explores many ideas and themes such as disability and dancing.

This video really uses the lighting to its full potential with the spotlight technique, where there is a spotlight highlighting the main importance which keeps the audience's attention. Other things that are in place to capture the attention of the audience are the flashing lights and fast editing which has a variety of cuts, mainly fast cross cutting. The cinematography in this is very rich with a wide use of all shots from different angles and perspectives, for example close ups on facial expressions and movement of the arms, this is done to make the audience feel as if they are being spoken to directly.

The mise en scene in this piece is used very well too, with a lot of props. The point is made clear and also keeps the mind of the audience with the lyrics. Another theme I noticed was the black and white look, which was quite simple compared to the rest of the video yet still has a profound effect when watching.

All together I would say this video is a new sort of video in which producers are becoming more creative with the videos they are making. This is a great example and works well for an urban rap video, this also holds some similarities with the 'Glory Days' and 'Subterranean Homesick Blues' video in a way that it has something illustrating the lyrics, in this case it will have to be the sign language.

Music video 'glory days'

The reason why i like this music video is because it was made 6 years ago and still gives an impact to people watching now, this song is truly a classic and speaks for the care free and happy life, compared to the Magnetic Man music video which shows the dark gritty side to London  this video has a narrative but it is not a full story, most of it is shown in the lyrics.

One thing I found very interesting about this music video is the wide use of mise-en-scene, every scene has a number of different props and the body language and actions work well. The main props used are the t-shirts which illustrate the lyrics and change to keep the audience's attention, the cartoonist images on the top also show a happy care free attitude. this is creative and very abstract, but reminds me very much of another video i have studied and talked about before which is Bob Dylan's 'Subterranean Homesick Blues' which uses cue cards in a similar way to which the t-shirts are used in this video.



The song is also very slow in tempo has a relaxed feeling to make the person have the trance of being in a 'glory day', this is to lighten up the mood and the dance scenes are also very abstract with a unusual dance. the reason why i say it has a narrative is because of the scene in the beigel bake where he talks about his dark past and the letter he talks about how he left all that behind and is looking forward to what the future brings.


" And I can feel that destiny is on my side  

Above are some lyrics to show he's come out from the bad life into the new.

The 1980's part 2

This is the second part of my 1980's post.

By the 80's music video's became a prioroty for artist if they wanted to get heard, it brought a movie like feeling to music.

Micheal Jackson's 'Thriller' was the forerunner for the pop music culture and also led the way for music videos. The music video was quite long compared to the ones these days, this is because it packed in a story behind the actual music video, therefore it was 13 minutes and 43 seconds long. it was directed by John Landis.



This music video was soo influential it was called the watershed for the music industry. The video came out in 1983 and sold massively along with the backstage videos of the making of thriller in total 9 million units. It's been calculated that it had been watched by 4 billion people worldwide.


What this music video brought new to the industry was :

• Used a lot of actors to give it a hollywood look
• Used a wide variety of shots and cut shots too make it look more fast paced
• The quality of the video was better than others of its time

Whilst making 'Thriller' a behind the scene's videos was made to show the process of creating the music video. This was included when people bought the music video. These days you cant make as much money from music videos on a whole, this is because people can download the video or watch on TV or Youtube.