Conventions of a Music Video

Conventions of a Music Video:

Conventions of a music video means things that you would expect to see in a music video, such as a long shot and various close ups of the artist addressing the camera. A long shot is used to focus on the location. this helps the audience o understand the genre of the music video. Close ups are used also to show facial expression and emotion. other shots that are also included in a music video are things such as movements like panning and tracking. These help to add more depth to the music video. panning is a shot that we have used in the editing process of our music video. 


There are certain conventions in a music video by rihanna that we have tried to incorporate into our music video.     One of these conventions is have some sort of coloured background either by a green screen or projection. This isn't included in all of her music videos, but we have noticed it more then once. This then has become something that we wanted to include in our music video. Here we have used the same method in which we have used a projection of a moving image and included it in our music video. The difference in the two projections is Rihanna is more dark and vibrant in which i believe represents the song as the song WE FOUND LOVE is a upbeat song and the pitch various. Our projection is of moving clouds and the colours are very neutral, due to the nature of our song we felt that it worked best and fits in well as this part is used in the climax of our song.   

choosing artist name

 Choosing our artist name:

I believe that choosing an artist name is the most important thing and really defines a group and shows the type of age group that a band/ group appeal to.
We as a group are hoping that the name that we choose will represent us to our target audience and will appeal to our age group which is 13 and upwards. 

Our group is an all female group, however only one member of the group is shown in the music video. Something that i thought would be useful was to research group names. 

some of the names that I found was:

• The weeknd 
• Led zeplin 
• The script
• Pink 
• Lana del ray 

These to me all show names that sound like a group name but only feature one person. This i think is ordinal and appeals to people more then a single average name. These artist names are also popular and are well known. Taking this into account we came up with a name that we believe will represent our group in memorable way and that this name will show what type of group we are. The name that we have chosen to represent our group is:

This is the name of our band. when we came up with the first idea of our music video and all three of us were going to be in the video our original name was Triple threat but since we changed the idea of our video we have now changed it to single threat. 

analysing song lyrics

Analysing song lyrics:

As part of planning our music video I decided to analyse the song lyrics. This will hopefully help when filming our music video and figuring out what shots we want to go where. This also shows what i believe the meaning of the song is. The song is Russian Roulette- Rihanna.

The first thing that i highlighted on the sheet was the first lyric that is sung. the lyric is " take a breath, take it deep". I believe that this part of the song means that a decision is being made. This part of the lyrics could be seen as a command and a verb as she could be stating to someone to take a breath as if she is giving advice to someone. The good thing about this paerticular part of the song is that it can be included into our music video because of the fact that whilst lip syncing the actor can take a breath whilst signing the song. 

Some of the songs lyrics could also be seen as negative. and example of this is " Take the gun and count to three". The reason as to why i believe this is negative is because when reading it i believe that this could be said in a quite forceful manor and usually a gun is seen in a negative way and a gun is usually associated with violence and rage. This is included in the first verse so when people are listening to the song it already shows the song in a adverse manner.

As well as parts of the song showing violence and antagonistic speech, i believe that the song is a massive metaphor for being in a abusive relationship and overcoming certain lengths to be with someone. I think that this is mainly shown in the second and sixth verse when  the work " trigger" is repeated. By re[eating the word trigger it could be an emphasis on the emotional strain on the relationship, therefore every time she says the word trigger it could mean that she is one step closer to either leaving or doing something that she will regret. 

Overall after analysing the parts of the song that i believe to stand out I think that the overall theme of the song is negative and quite dark. This is something that i will be able to show when filming our music video. It will also be shown in the type of outwits we use and the scenery we also choose to film. The negativity i think we stand out most in the way the actor choses to sing the song and their posture. I am also hoping that we will be able to add a filter on our music video which we also enable us to show the darkness that is represented in the lyrics. 

In conclusion, i think that this has been very helpful as it has meant that i am able to use my own ideas and interpretations rather then using similarities from the actual music video. This furthermore has been influential on my music video. 

Permission email.

costume research

This collage of images show the type of costumes that we will be wearing whilst filming. i have based these images on the type of music that we have decided to use. The clothing is mainly dark coloured. i have also based this style on the type of clothes that our chosen artist Rihanna wears based on the fact that there are some things in the video that we want to keep the same and have some elements in our music video that will be based on her.

Storyboards

This is the storyboards that we have designed as a first draft of what shots we want in each scene of our music video. 

As part of preparing to film our music video we created a very basic story board to gain a rough idea of what we are hoping our music video come out looking like. Storyboards are there to help figure out what scene goes where, how long each scene will be and what camera angles are being used and when. This story board shows the basics and helps us gain a rough idea of planning the production schedule out as it shows what places we need to go first and what scenes we need to prioritise. As we start to get into more detail about our video the story board will change and things will become more clearer and more detailed.

As you can see for the moment we haven't added any images yet because we wanted to get down the basics and have a rough idea of what we wanted to do. During this process we are planning to use a variety of shots. Most of them will include a jump cut of different locations as that helps to place a story behind our music video. This will help to make the video more interesting and more engaging to our target audience. We want to try and use various shots so that the video doesn't become boring but not to many shots that our audience gets confused on whats happening. 

The things that we are going to add to our music video are things like the timings of each shot, angles, lighting and also what lyrics are being sung in what shot. Because our music includes background noise and things that aren't part of the song we are going to try and cut this out otherwise our music video would be too long and we think it would become unnecessary footage. 

Some of the shots that we are going to use is a jump cut and shot reverse shot. A jump cut is a cut in the film in which two sequential shots of the same subject are taken from camera positions that vary only slightly. This type of edit gives the effect of jumping forwards in time. This shot will enable us to be able to tell the story in our music video. This is an example of how a jump cut is used when filming. It helps to make the transition between two shots smoother and easier to understand. 




A shot reverse shot is a film technique where one character is shown looking at another character (often off-screen), and then the other character is shown looking back at the first character. We will use this shot to link two scenes together and to show expression of the characters that are not going to be singing in the music video. This is an example image of what a shot reverse shot is used when filming. It could also be linked to a over the shoulder shot in which it helps to show emotion and expression of the two actors.

screen test of possible actors

This is a photo of the three girls that we are going to include in our music video. The girls are Emily Clark, Molly Bale and myself. These are also the two other girls in my group. We decided that we would be in our music video purely because we found it difficult to find people that felt comfortable in front of a camera and being filmed. We will all be filmed in different locations but with the same person. I think that the reason we are all good for being apart of our video because we are all different in the sense that we all look different, for example we are all from different ethinic backgrounds, and all have quite diverse personalities, which i think is a good quality to have in a group because it means that we can all appeal to our target audience and act like role models in a way which i think is a important thing for us. 

Another reason as to why we are all in the video is because depending on the outfits that we would wear we can all act slightly older then what we are and appear older on the video which i think would help to widen our age bracket of our target audience.

I think that are target audience are a mixture between young adults and teenagers and i think that this will be shown in our video and they type of message that we are trying to put across. In saying that i think that the target audience may really apply to women due to the nature of the song and the type of video that we are producing. 
Our video will mainly be about how women are perceived when in a relationship with someone and how they don't always need someone int heir life to be happy as all three of these girls gets played by the same person. We have adapted this idea due to the song that we have chosen and i think the outcome will be successful. 

institutional research

This is a few ideas of the type of record labels that we wouldn't mind producing our video and our group being signed with:



Syco Music has offices in London and Los Angeles and is home to several artists. Syco has the exclusive right to sign winners and finalists of The X Factor and Got Talent due to the fact that the company was founded by Simon Cowell and offers a contracted deal with syco with the winner from X-Factor and Britain's Got Talent depending on the act. Susan Boyle's debut album, I Dreamed a Dream, has sold over 9 million copies, making it one of the best selling releases of the last decade and Syco's most successful release to date. Between 2004 and 2009, Leona Lewis became one of the most successful talent show winners when her second single, "Bleeding Love", propelled the album Spirit to 9 million global sales. The reason as to why i think that Syco would be a good record label is because it has people signed like One Direction and Little Mix and appeals to the same target audience as us as well. Another reason that Syco would be a good company is because it is a major record label which means that it is a popular label and its easy for a artist to get noticed and become successful if signed to Syco. 




Def Jam Recordings is an American record label, focused predominantly on hip hop and urban music, owned by Universal Music Group. In the UK, the label takes on the name Def Jam UK and is operated through Virgin EMI. The label distributes various record labels, including Roc-A-Fella Records, Kanye West's GOOD Music and  Ludicris. Current artists include Logic, Big Sean, Kanye West, Leona Lewis, Alesso and Frank ocean. Def Jam would be a good record label to choose because our song is by Rihanna and this is the record label that she is signed to. Def Jam also produces the type of music that our song relates to which is R&B and Hip Hop. i think that this would be a good record label because again it is a popular record label and it would be easy for someone to become successful if signed to this particular label. 



Domino Recording Company, generally known as Domino, is an independent record label based in London. There is also a wing of the label based in Brooklyn and NY that handles releases in the United States. In addition, Domino is apart of a subsidiary label Geographic Music, which releases more unusual British and World music. In 2011, the company announced that it was beginning a book publishing division, The Domino Press. Domino would be the type of record label that we wouldn't necessarily choose due to the fact that it is an independent record label and produces music from artist that are not as well known as we would like also i think that this particular record label appeals to a more older target audience and produce music of a different genre. 

*Information about record labels was found on Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Def_Jam_Recordings

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domino_Recording_Company

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syco_Music

collage to represent chosen target audience.

This image shows the type of target audience that we are want to appeal to when we are doing are music video. As you can see that all the people in this music video are all girls purely because of the artist that we are doing, when look at the the artist she mainly appeals to girls so i think that it would be a goo target audience. Also the ages of the girls are  roughly between 15-17 so when we conduct a questionnaire we will hand them out to mainly that age group. the music that is also shown is the type of make that we may potentially include in our music video so its quite dark as i think that it is best suitable for the type of music that our song is. 

Andrew Goodwin's Theory of music

Andrew Goodwin was born in Sydney Australia and his father was a school teacher who was a fan of classical music. 

 Andrew Goodwin came up with a theory towards music videos and things that most music videos contain. 

1.  His first point was that most times that a music video is produced it contains demonstration of of typical genre characteristics, for example a music video will contain stereotypes that relate to their chosen genre.           

  2. A music video can also contain intertextual references. An example of this would be that most upbeat romantic songs will contain clips of a romantic film. 

This would be an example of intertextuality as Iggy |Azalea has taken reference from the film Clueless and included/ replicated it in her music video. In this music video she has also try to include actors that look like the people who played in the film to try and get people to recognise them film and make the connection between the two videos. This could also be seen as advertising the film and encouraging people to watch it. 


3. There are frequent references to the notion of looking and the treatment of female body. 
This means that their are frequent references to either indecent exposure or sex. For example in the Miley cyrus video wrecking ball we see her being quite sexual to certain objects this would be an example of this particular point.   

4. There is a relationship between the music and visuals. In certain videos there are sometimes visuals that will tell the actual song. I think that this is a good technique to use and i would like to try and incorporate this in our music video when it comes to producing it.  

5. The record label which the artist is assigned to tends to have certain demands. They often include the need of lots of close ups of the artist and the artist will have visual style which recurs in their work. An example of this would be the style of lady gaga which is represented in her clothes. 

artist biography

Rihanna Biography:

Robyn Rihanna Fenty (born February 20, 1988), known professionally as Rihanna  is a Barbadian singer, actress, songwriter and fashion designer. Her career took of when she auditioned in front of rapper Jay Z.Both her debut album, Music of the Sun (2005) and its follow-up A Girl Like Me (2006) peaked in the top ten on the US Billboard 200; the former featured the commercially successful song "Pon de Replay" while the latter produced her first Billboard Hot 100 number-one single, "SOS". 

Rihanna has sold over 41 million albums and 150 million songs worldwide, making her one of the best-selling artists of all time. Many of her songs rank among the world's best-selling singles of all time, such as "Umbrella",

Rihanna is known for frequently reinventing her style and image, most notably since Good Girl Gone Bad. Her work has earned her numerous awards and accolades, including eight Grammy Awards,eight American Music Awards, 23 Billboard Music Awards, and two BRIT Awards, and in 2012, Forbes ranked her the fourth most powerful celebrity of the year, with earnings of $53 million in one year. That same   year, TIME named Rihanna one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World. At the American Music Awards of 2013, she received the first ever Icon Award and on June 2, 2014, Rihanna received the Fashion Icon lifetime achievement award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America. 


Overall I think that Rihanna is a good artist to chose purely because she has been successful in her career and has a variety of songs to chose from and is a good role model. 

word cloud

This is a word cloud which shows all of the words that represent my song: 

Analysis of music video

Macklemore - Cant hold us

I really like this music video because i like the effects that have been used and i think that the effects that they have used has a real impact on this video and makes people interested in watching it. The effects that are used are things like when the video is being filmed the characters in it become animated and look like a comic strip. Although i think that this is a good effect to use i don't really think that it would fit in and be appropriate in our music video due to the type of music video that we have chosen to do. This video is more narrative based as it tells a story of a person running away from some robbers. This is easy to understand due to the outfits that they are wearing and we are able to indicate who plays which part in the video. I think that the target audience of this video would be young teenagers because they have made this video quite fun to watch due to the facial expressions that they characters use. This helps people engage in the video and want to carry on watching it. There were no intertextual references made in this clip however i do think that there where some stereotypes that were used as it showed two robbers dressed in black and white. I believe this to be the stereotype because it is showing that this is the way in which robbers look like therefore can be easily identified. 

Analysis of music video

Let it go - James Bay

This music video contains various close ups that make the video look more professional as in this music video there are scenes that contain the actor singing in a recording studio, which i think is a good thing to do because it allows the viewers who are watching this video to let them think that he is the actual singer in this music video. Although there are good aspects of this video i think that there could be a more variety in the shots that are used as it is mainly close ups and just shooting from a different angle but still close up on his face. I think that this is used to try and show the emotion that is in this song and they are portraying that through the use of camera angles even though it is limited. When watching this clip i can see no real stereotypes that are being used and no intertextual references. One thing that i did notice in this music video is that when they have edited this music video they have repeated the same clip but just changed the lyrics that he is singing, i think that this is a good thing to do because it shows a narrative in the video and shows context on what the song could be showing. 

Problem - Iggy Azalea 

This music video is very different from the top video. It is different because it is a different type of song in the fact that this song is more upbeat and contain a lot more of people dancing. From seeing this in the music video it indicates to me what type of target audience they could be appealing to. Another thing that i noticed in this music video was that it is a lot more  performance based and didn't really contain much of a narrative. However in this video that have used the green screen to gain a different background. I think that this is something that we would potentially consider using in our music video if it can be executed properly

Analysis of Music video.

ignition R-Kelly 

This genre is quite romantic for a music video as i think it is about a couple meeting and getting together. I think that this video is more concept based as it is two people that are rein acting a love scene potentially rather then signing to the song that is being played. I think that people are being represented in a stereotypical way as it is saying that this is the typical way of how people meet. 
I don't think that there is much in this music video that would make people want to purchase this song . From what i can see in the music video i don't think that there are any intertextual refrences from any TV shows or films. The camera shots that are used i think are quite basic and don't really show much complexity . I think that the whole concept of this video i pretty bad and hasn't really been executed well. No real effects were used like the green screen. I think that the intended  target audience for this video is teenagers and young adults. Overall i think that the things that i will be taking from this music video is not what to do in order to get a good grade. 

Analysis of music video

A2 Music Video: Run the world By Beyonce

This music video is by a group of girls that have decided to use the Beyonce song Run the world. The video starts of with shots of a field and the jumps to a close up of a girl on a climbing frame. The video uses a lot of close up shots and jump cuts.The reason that i chose to analyse this music video was because i think that in terms of the music video i think that it is close to our chosen video in what we may want to do as a final outcome. The genre of this music video i believe hip hop due to the instruments that are used and the tones that are used. The video is concept based and doesn't really have a narrative but i think that the story that is being told is that girls are powerful and can be on their own. This video doesn't really use any stereotypes per say, if anything they are going against the stereotype by saying that potentially they are more important then men by saying that they run the world. I think that the shots that are being used are what attract people to this music video and the editing that has been used on this video. By looking at this video i don't think that there are any intertextual references that are from any media or TV shows. The intended target audience in this clip i think would be teenagers from the age of 14 and upwards as i think that the way they have gone about creating this video appeals to a large audience . There are quite a range of different shots in this clip which i think is what makes it stand out so much. 

new song choice

After having a discussion with the other members in my group we have decided to chance our music video to something that only contains one singer rather then a group and a more slower song so that we could produce a better music video then what we may have done with a faster song. 
This is the song that we have decided to do instead. The song is Russian Roulette by Rihanna. The reason we changed this song is because we think that we could produce a better music video with this song and think that it would be easier then doing a music video that is a group as we have found it difficult to find people that feel comfortable being filmed. 

logo ideas

Logo ideas:

This image shows different record labels that we could potentially base our own record label on. The image shows various different record labels that are well known across the music industry. I think that based on the group that we have gone we would go with syco industries as they are well known and are apart of a bigger music company therefore our group would have more chance to be well known rather then going with a independent label. Based on this i think that we would design a label based on this.
The label that i like the most of os this image would have to be the Atlantic label. The reason that i like it is because i think that it is bold and its not to in your face in comparison to the capitol record label which although it is bold and interesting i think that it is too much for a record label logo and is to packed and crowded. 

Mood board to represent chosen genre

Mood Board to represent chosen genre:

This mood board shows the types of things that our chosen song represents. The song that we have chosen represents the things that are shown in the mood board. In the mood board there are things that i believe the song is about for example there is a picture of the group and a picture of the UK top 40. This shows that the image is in the UK top 40 and it is quite a up to date song so therefore although it is a well known song it is still realistic for us to produce a video because the music video it self isn't well known. In the image there is also a picture of a girl dancing this is because some of the instruments that are used in the track remind me of the type of interments that you would hear in a dance track. Therefore when filming we are going to include a dance sequence into it. The song is also quite upbeat and has a high tempo which means that the song is quite cheerful and happy which i think is a good thing to have as when people listen to the song it because catchy and people enjoy listening to it. Lastly there us a picture of some of the outfits that the girls in the band wear. This gives us an insight as what type of clothing either us or other people should be wearing when filming. 

Our Chosen Song!

Our Chosen Song!

The song that we have decided to use if fifth harmony - worth it:

The reason why we have decided to do this music video is because when going through the suggested songs as a group this was the one that we all decided on and was coming up with ideas for.

Some of the reasons as to why we have chosen this song is because the group is all female and so is ours so it already starts to make it more believable and realistic , we think that it would also be a good song to lip sing to as its not fast and its fits in with the fact that when we were picking a song we did want it to be upbeat and something that we could enjoy filming. 
We have started to think that because the song congaing parts that are quite upbeat we might choreograph a dance to go into the film, whether we are the ones perfuming it we are unsure of yet. 

Decision Blog Post

Deciding What To Do:

As a group we have decided to do the Music promo, Magazine and a poster. The reason that we have chosen to do this task is because it hasn't been to long since we don't the Thriller opening and when it came to the final outcome of that there was quite a lot of improvement and changes that could have been made to make that better and the have a more successful outcome. 

When it comes to choosing a song there is a criteria that we have to follow that is:

• The song can be no loner then 3 and a half minutes long
• If the song contains rap then we have to make sure that we know it and that it looks realising enough to lip sync to.
• In practical terms if the song has a fast tempo then we have to make sure that it looks realistic when filming it. 

Here are some of the ideas that we have come up with:

 The highlighted songs are the ones that we are potentially considering to do. The songs that we have highlighted are: 

• Rita Ora - How we do or R.I.P
• Fifth Harmony - Worth it
• Taylor Swift - Shake it up
• Lorde - Royals

The thing that is similar about all these songs is that they are all quite upbeat and party songs. I think that the reason that we have chosen these songs is that because we want to be able to have a laugh when filming this and in the video be able to show that we have had fun filming this.

A2 Media

Introduction to A2 Media.AS Review:

 Here is a photo showing a review of AS Media and the things that i accomplished and felt that i could have improved on. The first column is about digital technology. During AS media the type of technology that i used was things like |Garage Band to compose my music and a camera to film my thriller opening on. By using these digital technologies it helped me to add in more complex skills and conventions into my thriller opening and this was able to her reflected in my coursework. If i could improve on this element then i think that i would possible improve on my camera work by perhaps using a tripod so that the movement on the camera would be a lot smoother, i think that i would also try and include in more complex camera angles so that i relates more to a thriller. 

Another topic that i found useful in AS Media was  planning and research. The type of things that i used for this were Google and youtube. Youtube was a massive help when planning our Thriller opening as it enabled us to do researched on what a Thriller was and the type of things that are included in a Thriller. To improve on this further i could of tried to gain a further understanding of Thrillers and look at a larger variety of Thriller openings. 

A2 Media:

As part of A2 Media it requires us to either do a promotion package for a new film, to include a trailer and produce a film magazine front cover, featuring the film and a poster of the film or a promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video and a digipax for the albums release and a magazine advertisement for digipax. 

Out of these two i think that the one that i would most likely want to do is the music and the music promo video as i think that i would personally enjoy the music project a lot more and i have already done the thriller so i think that it would be more enjoyable rather then doing a more complex version of what i did in AS. As a project swell i intend to put more effort into this and try and work on my techniques and skills that will be required in this task. Another advantage of me doing this is that i have some experience in producing a magazine cover as i done it in GCSE Media.