Evaluation Question 4

Evaluation Question 3

Evaluation: Question 2

Evaluation: Question 1

"Day Off" D-Rey Completed Music Video

"Day Off" D-Rey Completed CD Digipack

"Day Off" D-Rey Completed Music Magazine Advertisement

Construction: Music Video - 'Day Off' by D-Rey

When I opened up Premiere Pro the first thing I did was import all of my raw footage. An example of the raw footage is below.

 





Here is a selection of raw footage to the right. To get the music video to how I want I will cut parts from the larger clips and put them together in a way that will pleasing to the viewers eyes. For example I will use a number of editing techniques such as cutting to the beat, black and white, colour changes etc. I will be taking screenshots along the way as evidence.











One of the first things I did was right click on the very start of my project after I put the first clip in, and clicked 'apply default transitions'. This provided a fade from black to make the start of the music video look less harsh.




After a while of cutting clips, lining them up with the track and putting them together, my timeline looked like this:

When I was faced with a long clip that may become boring to the viewer, I edited the clip to change to different colours at the beat.



To do this I opened up the 'colour effects' at the bottom left of the screen, opened up the 'colour correction' menu then click and dragged 'RGB colour corrector' to clip I wanted to change the colour of.




After clicking on 'effect controls' I chose the colour that I wanted and repeated for the rest of the clip.

The finished clip with those effects are below.




Towards the end of the video where there are no words I decided to use some quick cuts to match the beat. I lined up three different clips that I wanted to use and used the razor tool to cut the bits that I didn't want. I used the audio timeline at the bottom to make sure I was accurate when cutting to the beat. At the end the timeline looked like the picture below.

Planning: Costume

A common convention in rap videos is the artist wearing a shirt with the name of the town/city they grew up in or live in. I will try my best to match this convention by getting my actor to wear a t-shirt with the name of a well known location on it. An example can be seen below.

Another style of t-shirts that hip-hop artists wear are branded shirts. This can include Nike and Adidas so if I can't find a shirt with a city on it, Darrel should wear an Adidas or Nike shirt.

In hop hop music videos it is rare that the performer will be wearing bright clothes. I will follow this convention by choosing dark jeans and maybe a dark coat for the wardrobe in my music video.

Lastly, the pair of shoes that are worn in hip-hop videos are not usually specific to a brand or style. However they are rarely smart shoes. They are usually anything between sneakers and trainers. Examples are below.



A will also see if Darrel has any jewellery to wear, preferably a ring and chain necklace.

Planning: Props

Props are extremely important in a music video as they show in almost every scene and can influence the story telling throughout. My track is called 'Day Off' so the props that I will choose will have relevance to the story and the name of the song. For example in the first verse there is a line that goes 'Maybe i'll start looking up breakfast recipes to set the speed of what's ahead of me'. For this I will need either a cookbook or a smart phone to access a cooking recipe website.

Another prop I might need is Nando's food. More specifically 'A plate of hot wings, side of fries' to match the illustration of the songs lyrics. Perhaps also 'two McFlurrys to finalise'.

I will only use props that have some sort of relevance to the song. Although all of the props accumulated may become quite expensive I have set myself a budget of £100 which should be enough.

Planning : Storyboarding and Animatic

For planning my storyboard I drew out around 25 panels and arranged them into what I felt suited the continuity and illustration best for the song. This is to help me visualise what the finished article will look like and also helped me to get more practise using Premiere Pro. When editing them together I also got to practise with cuts to the beat.
To ensure that the cards were in order I wrote out the lyrics onto a timeline so I got an accurate visualisation of how long the shots will last and when they will appear.

Research and Planning Self Assessment

• Research into existing music videos

I think that the current level of research into existing videos is basic. I have added a decent amount of detail for the music video of Kendrick Lamar and  Drake's 'Poetic Justice' while also using images and gifs. To get to the next level I will have to make a post with the same amount of detail for at least one or two more music videos.

• Research into a potential target audience

I think that my research into a potential audience is fairly detailed and could not have much more added to it. I have got 3 full paragraphs and a conclusion so I am pleased with this part of my blog.

• Work on storyboarding

The storyboarding still need to be uploaded to YouTube so, at this present time, cannot be marked. To get the marks I will have to uploaded to YouTube and embedded into my blog with an explanation of the task which will be completed as soon as possible.

• Time management 

My time management has been fairly poor and needs to be improved if I am to get my target grade. There have been a few tasks which have not been completed and published on time. From now each task set will be aimed to be on my blog by the deadline.

• Use of digital technology or ICT

On my blog there have been plenty of uses of different types of media. For example I have used gifs and images in my research into an existing music video, I have embedded videos from YouTube and also audio from SoundCloud so I think this aspect of my blog is good.

• Communication skills

I think my communication skills are good and I put a lot of detail into most of my posts and I think my written communication is very easy to understand. To improve I would have to include maximum detail into all of my posts, this would get me a lot more marks.

• Level of care taken in the presentation of work

I feel that my presentation is very good and neat. When I create my posts I put them in a way that they will not look untidy so they are easy to look through and understand. For example in my 'Planning: Locations' post I have an explanation of the location followed by a picture, then the next location.

Planning: Location

My music video will be filmed almost entirely in London. I think this is very fitting as the majority of British rap/grime/hip-hop is filmed in the streets of London. Because this is now to be expected in the music video I will follow the codes and film in London. However I will have to set a date and make sure to get it all filmed in the time I am there as if I miss an important shot it will be very difficult for me to travel there a second time and film in a way that doesn't damage continuity. For example if it is a sunny day on the first time I am there but I go back on a rainy day to film some missing shots it will look very unprofessional. Another bad thing about filming in London is that in some places it could be too crowded which would prevent me from creating a professional looking video without people getting in the way.

The separate locations I may be filming at are Nando's in Stratford, the streets in Central London, Vue Cinema and outside the Olympic Stadium.

Nando's is a suitable location of which to film a short section of my video in. This is because the restaurant is mentioned in the second verse and will make the video narrative as well as performance.




Filming Darrel lip-syncing in front of iconic London landmarks not only contributes to making the video both narrative and performance but also backs the idea that it is his 'Day Off'.

I will have a short clip filmed in and outside the cinema in Leicester Square because it is mentioned in the second verse and contributes to making the music video illustrative.

I will try to film in the brighter parts of London as this will match the mood of the song. For example I would film in a place like East London if the song was about negative things. This song has an upbeat tune and would only look good if it is filmed in a bright and positive place.

Green Screen Practise

To use the green screen I took the original footage and audio from Adele's 'Rolling in the Deep' and some footage of Ellie singing to the same song in front of a green screen.
Making sure the green screen layer is on top I applied the 'Eight-point Garbage Matte' to trim the size off the edges of the video to just leave a minimal amount of green screen.
After syncing the audio from the music video and the lip syncing from Ellie I applied the 'Ultra Key' filter and set the key colour to green to get rid of the remaining green screen, which can be seen in the second image.

The finished result can be watched above.

Planning: Casting

For my music video I am using the artist that made the song so I didn't need to go through casting for the main role. The reason I chose D-Rey to be in the music video is because he is a natural performer and his lip syncing will be near enough perfect as he wrote and performed the song himself.

There is a video of him performing in front of a camera here:





It is important that Darrel is comfortable in front of a camera as this could be damaging to the professionalism of my music video. However, from the video, it clearly shows that he would be more than happy to perform without any problems. If he was not a confident performer this may cause the audience to feel disconnected with the song and the lyrics.

There is some evidence above where Darrell agreed to let me use his music on an email. He agreed to appear in my music video, although there is no evidence of that because the conversation happened in person.

Planning: Music Video Pitch For 'D-rey - Day Off'

Planning : Creating An Online Mood Board

In this task I had to make a moodboard for my chosen song. I used www.goodmoodboard.com to create it. My moodboard consists of pictures that relates to my song, artist and genre. I chose pictures that will show the though process when considering mise en scene, the logos of Twitter and Instagram to signify his online presence and also common conventions of similar artists to help me piece together ideas for my video.
Click the link below to see the full mood board:
http://www.gomoodboard.com/boards/uXaADq6I/share

D-rey - Day Off ft. Puppz

Research : Who Are The Target Audience For My Artist?

Daniel is a huge fan of hip-hop, grime and rap. He listens to music at every opportunity  he gets whether this be on the way to work, while at work and at home. His biggest passions are surfing the web and going to live gigs and festivals. When he is not watching live performances he listens to his favourite artists on different type of media such as iPhone, iPod and iPad. He also listens to music using YouTube, Spotify and Vevo. Daniel specifically only listens to his favourite genres and no other. He deeply hates anything between classical to scream rock and only listens to rap.

Living in London he can go to his favourite live gigs and festival mostly whenever he pleases. This includes going to watch Skepta at 'Live Future Underground Red Bull' and attending 'Wireless' to watch Drake, Chance the Rapper, JME and Lethal Bizzle. He mostly dresses very much like his favourite artists, like most hip-hop fans. Daniel's friends also share the same interest and they travel to the performances and dress the same way. Their favourite song from their favoured artists would be either 'Know Yourself' by Drake or 'King Kunta' by Kendrick Lamar.

Daniel follows all of  his favourite artists on most types of social media. This includes following on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc. He likes to see when his favourite artists are performing next and when they are bringing out new songs, albums and mixtapes. He doesn't regularly read magazines on the artists because he just follows them on the internet.

He spends most of the day working as a project manager at a post-production company, saving up money so when the next big festival or gig comes along him and his mates can buy tickets instantly to reserve their spot.

Research: Existing Music Video - Action Bronson ft. Chance the Rapper, Baby Blue

Introduction

This particular introduction for 'Baby Blue' is in comedic fashion and is used to pull the audience before the song has even started. It features Action Bronson playing 3 characters in a barber shop talking about the Floyd Mayweather vs Manny Pacquiao fight. Although this has nothing to do with the song itself it would still appeal to the audience.

Performance

Performance is very popular in a hip-hop music video. It gives the audience a feeling that they are at a live performance which would appeal to a lot of fans who aren't able to afford to get to a live gig or concert. 

Colour Of Clothing
When Action Bronson sings the chorus (which is quite downbeat) he wears a light blue suit which can be to represent his 'blue' feelings and also matches the name of the song 'Baby Blue'.
The chorus is:
'Why you always all on my back? huh?
Why you gotta do me like that? huh?
Why you gotta act like a B***h,
When I'm with you?
Baby girl I'm blue'
From reading the lyrics I can see that the blue suit can be used to strongly represent his feelings and also to match the words and name of the song.


Interlude

An interlude is similar to an intro, apart from it takes place around half way through a music video. This particular interlude takes place at 'McBronsons' where Action finds his future wife and impresses her when he takes down a thief who tries to steal all the money and all of the cheese fries. This, as well as the intro, is not meant to be taken seriously and is used in a very comedic way

Cuts To The Beat
The cuts that follow the beat is purely to engage the audience because the cuts are pleasing to the eye.  This appears in almost every music video and the cuts will rarely mismatch the beat as it makes the music video look unprofessional and doesn't look paired or synced with the actual song. 

Research: Existing Music Video - Joey Bada$$, Christ Conscious

Mise en scene

Jewellery
Jewellery is an important convention in hip-hop music because nearly all artists like to show off their wealth to signify power. The large amount of jewellery also signifies that they have 'made it' which is a huge status in the big hip-hop genre.

Clothing

In this music video Joey is wearing dark clothing which, compared to other hip-hop videos, seems to be a common convention. He also wears a jumper which has the name of his home town. Representing where they grew up seems to be a very popular thing among rap artists with Kendrick Lamar and the NWA constantly referencing Compton in their songs, being a couple of examples.

Performance and Close Ups

Performing in your own music video is something you always see in a rap/hip-hop/grime music video. This will make the audience feel a lot closer to the artist and almost forces them to take in the lyrics.

The close ups also back the idea that it is a live performance which would appeal to people who can't come and watch one of his performances, as well as this being a common convention in Hip-Hop so the audience would expect to see this anyway.

Illustration

People have come to expect a story in their music video and this is exactly what Joey has done in 'Christ Conscious'. The song is about reaching a new level in the Hip-Hop genre and eventually ascending into the 5th dimension with a 'Christ Conscious'. The way this has been woven into the music video is that he starts of the music video in a cave, then appears on the street, then the top of a building, then into space.



Research: Existing Music Video - Kendrick Lamar ft. Drake, Poetic Justice

I had to make notes on a similar artist from the same genre because D-Rey has not yet released a music video that I could analyse.

Split Screen

The split screen allows the audience to see two views at the same time. The split screen usually shows two scenes that are happening the same time but this isn't necessarily the case 100% of the time. The split screen ruptures the illusion that the screens frame is a seamless view of reality, similar to that of the human eye. The split screen technique happens again at 2:47 in the song where in one side of the screen Drake is leaving a message on his phone, and in the other side it shows the phone that Drake is trying to call.







Close up on the artist
A close up on the artist will appeal to the audience because it gives it a feel of a live performance. Also this is a very common convention in hip hop songs and the target audience will expect to see their favourite artists in the music video. There is also bright white lighting shining onto his face which puts all of the attention onto Kendrick Lamar which labels him as the 'main man' in the video.

Cuts that follow the beat

The cuts that follow the beat is purely to engage the audience because the cuts are pleasing to the eye.  This appears in almost every music video and the cuts will rarely mismatch the beat as it makes the music video look unprofessional and doesn't look paired or synced with the actual song. 

Rewind

The rewind technique is used to appeal to the audience and to add a range of different shots in the video. When the rewind is used in Poetic Justice (2:14) the lyrics repeat so the scene repeats and matches to add effect. 

Women objectified

This is a common convention in hip hop music and the target audience would expect to see this in a music video. It is a common convention in rap music also and it has become the norm over time to portray women as 'sex objects' in music videos. These perceptions misrepresent women in music videos and portray them as objects which suggests they are powerless.  

Birds eye view

This camera shot puts maximum attention on what is on the screen and also allows the audience to see the entire scene in one shot. The main object in the birds eye view shot in Poetic Justice is a man who has just been shot and it suggests that the camera is looking down from heaven, giving the viewers further assurance that he has been killed. There is also a kind of 'drifting' movement from the camera which gives it a feel that he is slowly drifting away from the real world. 

Mise en scene

Sunglasses, sunglasses and jewellery are very common in hip hop music videos and this helps portray the music and the genre as 'cool'. The jewellery shows that the artist has lots of money and wealth and spends it on his appearance becoming more attractive to women. 

Research : Detailed Research Into Chosen Artist (Name of Artist)

D-Rey is an unsigned artist who has been writing and recording songs from the age of 13. His first mixtape was titled 'I dunno yet' and was released in May 2012. His next mixtape 'Day Off' was released in June 2013. However his latest mixtape was meant to be released in summer 2015 but was scrapped.
His website is: http://d-rey.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/dreykickit

He released a promotional video on JCtv freestyling:


One of the songs from 'I Dunno Yet' is here:

AS media grade: Reflection

On results day I felt disappointed because I felt my coursework was to a good standard. However I was only semi prepared for the exam and I should have started revising earlier than I actually did. If I did start revising earlier I would have remembered a lot more media terminology when it came to analysing the video clip.

Research: 3 Potential Albums

Favorite Music Video

Research : Steve Archer 'How To Study Music Videos'

Steve Archer wrote an article in Media Magazine in 2004 in which he suggests five essential criteria which should help you to evaluate music videos.

Pessimists often complain that music video television has made pop superficially image-based. But my description of MTV and music video in MediaMag 6 failed to address what is still its most central and significant element, beyond the control of MTV, Viacom and Motorola: the appeal and power of pop sounds!

I’d like to suggest that the sounds are the basis of a process of visualisation that serve to enhance, not restrict, the original pop sound effect. Pop music theorist Andrew Goodwin claims that a good music video is:

"..a clip that responds to the pleasures of music, and in which that music is made visual, either in new ways or in ways that accentuate existing visual associations."
(Dancing in the Distraction Factory 1992)

If we accept the theory that pop songs on their own are not enough to create sufficient meaning and pleasure in the audience, the ‘added value’ of star image created by CD covers, live performance and music videos can be enough to inspire the consumer to buy into the whole intensely romantic myth of it all – and therefore actually buy the pop music. 

Certainly, the whole music business is sustained by the few star guarantees of profit in an unstable market. This maybe explains the somewhat fetishistic behaviour of fans who will buy the CD even if they can easily get the tracks for free on some P2P provider – we want all the packaging, the sacrosanct details in the booklet, the assurance it really belongs to us, not just the ‘stacking up’ of sounds that is the song itself. 

However, I am keen to keep these sounds as the primary pleasure and driving force of the music industry. This focus, therefore, is reflected in the order of my ‘Top Five Things to Look for’ when deciding if a music video is any good. 

Five things to look for …

I’ve turned the ideas in Goodwin’s book, Dancing in the Distraction Factory, into checklist form for you to test out on the current crop of music videos. 

At number 1 ... 

‘Thought Beats’ or seeing the sounds in your head

The basis for visualising images comes from a psychological process called synaesthesia, where you picture sounds in your mind’s eye. This idea is absolutely central to understanding music video as they build on the soundtrack’s visual associations in order to connect with the audience and provide that additional pleasure. 

To use this approach you need to start with the music, sorting out the way the song works, taking into account the way it has been stacked up with sound. To begin, lyrics don’t need to be analysed word for word like a poem but rather considered for the way they introduce a general feeling or mood. Very rarely do song lyrics have a coherent meaning that can be simply read off; but they are important in at least creating a sense of subject matter. So key phrases or lines (and especially those repeated in the chorus) will have a part to play in the kind of visuals associated with the song. 

Here, Roland Barthes’ theory of the ‘grain of voice’ is relevant – this sees the singing voice more as an expressive instrument, personal, unique even, to the singer, like a fingerprint, and therefore able to create associations in itself. The voice of a song may even possess trademarks that work hand-in-hand with the star image – so Michael Jackson’s yelp is a trademark sound that immediately sets him apart from other singers.

Finally, if songs are stories, then the singer is the storyteller and this obviously makes music videos stand out on TV, as they feature a first person mode of address rather than the invisible ‘fourth wall’ of television narration. 

Goodwin interestingly compares pop singers to stand-up comics in the way the personal trademark or signature dominates the performance. The music – or arrangement of the song, including instrumentation, the mix and effects, including samples – generally works with the lyrics and grain of voice. Generally we can look at key sounds, like the tempo (or speed of the song) and structure of the song in terms of verse and chorus. To give an example of how instruments can create visual associations, the slow twang of the steel guitar could create geographically-based visual associations from the Deep South of the US – a desert plain, a small town, one road out, men chewing tobacco … We all share a memory bank of popular culture imagery (intertextuality), a sense of shared cultural history without which these references would make no sense. Places, people, feelings, situations leading to mini-narratives – all these can be summoned from the sounds of popular music. 

These visualisations can arise from more personal, individual responses, sometimes even tied to a place or part of your own autobiography, the specific details of your life story and emotions. A combination of these shared and personal images tied to the words and instrumentation form the basis of music video creativity. 

At number 2 … 

Narrative and performance

Songs rarely tell complete narratives; we are used to studying them with other visual texts like film. The narrative fuzz in songs affects the way stories are used in music video representations of a song’s meaning. So, often we get the suggestion of a story, a hint at some kind of drama unfolding. 

There is another important reason why music videos should avoid a classic realist narrative, and that is their role in advertising. 

Music videos need to have repeatability built in to them. We need to be able to watch them repeatedly in a more casual way, with a looser approach to their storytelling. I’d suggest that more important than narrative is the way that performance is used in video clips, a point I’ll look at again in number 3. Often, music videos will cut between a narrative and a performance of the song by the band. Additionally, a carefully choreographed dance might be a part of the artist’s performance or an extra aspect of the video designed to aid visualisation and the ‘repeatability’ factor. Sometimes, the artist (especially the singer) will be a part of the story, acting as narrator and participant at the same time. But it is the lip-sync close-up and the mimed playing of instruments that remains at the heart of music videos, as if to assure us that the band really can kick it. 

Remember that pop music is a romantic art, all about truth, talent, and magic, so we need to believe in the authenticity of the performance first and foremost. The supposed individual and original qualities of these performers leads me to my next point, the source of all profit in the business … the star!

At number 3 … 

The star image

The music business relies on the relatively few big name stars to fund its activities; it usually fails to connect with popular audiences – only about one in ten acts put out by the industry actually makes any money. Therefore, what we can describe as the meta-narrative of the star image will have an important part to play in the music video production process. 

Meta-narrative is a term that describes the development of the star image over time, the stories that surround a particular artist. 

Michael Jackson – a mini case study

(Note : this article was written before Jackson's death)

Michael Jackson’s meta-narrative has been a long, sometimes difficult journey and one he has lost control of in recent years. 

There have been a few crucial moments in Jackson’s meta-narrative of pop stardom. The first was the successful move from being one of a group – even if acknowledged as its central talent – as child member of The Jackson 5, to becoming a solo artist. 

He was then able to negotiate one of the most successful solo careers ever through developing both his trademark sound and image. The ground-breaking music videos for Thriller and Beat It were an important part of this mega-stardom. 

At some point in the 90s, though, this meta-narrative took a wrong turn and his unique ‘star image’ became ‘freakish’ and self-indulgent; we are reminded that this child star has never grown up. Thus, the Jackson talent, his natural birthright it seems, becomes the reason for his adult weirdness. His younger self – black, funky, energetic – is constantly held up to condemn his current abnormality – withdrawn, of no ethnicity, over-produced to the point of ceasing to exist. And yet, all this means he is still talked about, the object of mass media fascination and so, in a very real sense, still a star. Whether the most recent allegations of child abuse will finally render that stardom invalid remains to be seen.

Meta-narratives of star image are not simply a matter of manipulation, but a dialogue or negotiation of what the music business asserts about their star, and what we accept! Still, in each new video, Michael Jackson tries to regain control over his meta-narrative but he can’t just switch off all the different associations he’s accumulated during his career, whether good or bad. So music videos can best be seen as one of the most important ways that the image of the artist is ‘managed’. 

At number 4 … 

Three ways in which music videos relate visuals to the song

We can identify three ways in which music videos work to support or promote the song. These are illustration, amplification and disjuncture and I find them extremely useful in attempting to generalise the effects of individual music videos. 

• Music videos can illustrate the meaning of lyrics and genre, providing a sometimes over literal set of images. Here, then, is the most straightforward technique and the classic example of visualisation, with everything in the music video based on the source of the pop song. 

• However, as with all advertising, the most persistent type of video adds to the value of the song. Amplification is seen as the mark of the true music video Auteur, the director as artist, and an increasingly common way to view music video creatives (VH-1’s Best 100 Videos clearly placed Spike Jonze in the Auteur category with his work always amplifying the original song’s meaning and effect, usually through surreal humour). Crucially, though, and what separates it from disjuncture, is the fact that amplification music videos retain a link with the song and work to enhance or develop ideas, rather than fundamentally changing them.

• Disjuncture is a term used to describe those music videos that (normally intentionally) seem to work by ignoring the original song and creating a whole new set of meanings. This is quite a radical technique and used by arty bands in order to assert their difference and originality. Usually, disjuncture videos of this type don’t make a lot of sense and may be based on abstract imagery. For example in Spike Jonze’s video for Daft Punk’s ‘Da Funk’ we see a man with a dog’s head and his arm in a cast walking round New York, ignored by all, with dialogue completely unrelated to the song itself. Sometimes though, disjuncture videos are just bad, ill-conceived and self-indulgent mistakes. 

And finally at number 5 ... 

Technical aspects of music video

The last really essential aspect of music video to study is technical. This includes camerawork, movement and angle, mise-en-scène, editing, and sound. 

It is important to remember the more general features of music videos already mentioned when trying to work out the technical effects, especially those which are post-production, effects. Broadly, the technical conventions can be summed up as follows: 

1. Speed! 

Speed is visualised by camera movement, fast editing (montage) and digital effects.

Camera movement is often motivated by running, dancing and walking performers.

Fast-cutting and montage editing creates a visually decentred experience necessary for music video consumption, with the images occasionally moving so fast that they are impossible to understand on first viewing and thus need to be viewed several times (repeatability). 

Post-production digital effects – a staple of music video where images can be colorized, multiple split screens appear, and so on, all to complicate and intrigue, providing pleasure again and again. 

Not all camera movement is about speed though and some use slow pace through dissolves or static shots. This kind of editing – like Sinead O’Conner’s ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ – is striking and effective in setting the song apart from the hustle and bustle of most pop activity. 

2. Meat! 

The meat of most music videos is the cut to the close-up of the singer’s face. This is because the voice is seen as the most important part of pop music. 

3. Beats! 

Often, the video will try and represent the music through the use of the cut to go with the beat or key rhythm. This is called 'cutting to the beat'.

4. Lighting and colour 

...may also be used to emphasise key moments in the song, using methods from lighting live performances for dramatic effect. Colour may be used to show a development in the song, going from colour to black and white or vice versa when the chorus comes in. Equally, any change in the mise-en-scène or camerawork can signal the same type of thing.

5. Mise-en-scène 

Obviously the setting for music videos is important, often to guarantee the authenticity of the clip rather than anything else. So mise-en-scène for many music videos is the concert hall or rehearsal room to emphasise the realness of the performance or the grit and practice that goes into attaining star quality. Increasingly, CGI is used, especially for dance songs, which don’t rely so much on being ‘real’ like rock, soul and rap acts. 

Steve Archer : Media Magazine 2004

Research : Andrew Goodwin's Features Of Music Videos

Andrew Goodwin’s 6 Features of Music Videos

In his book Dancing in the Distraction Factory (1992) Andrew Goodwin points out characteristics and features that can be found in music videos. 

1.    Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics.

(e.g. stage performance in metal videos, dance routine for boy/girl band, aspiration in Hip Hop). 

2.    There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals. 

The lyrics are represented with images - either illustrating, amplifying or contradicting them. 

3.    There is a relationship between music and visuals. 

The tone and atmosphere of the visuals reflect that of the music - either illustrating, amplifying or contradicting. 

4.    The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (a visual style). 

5.    There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, mirrors, stages, etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body. 

6.    There are often intertextual reference (to films, tv programmes, other music videos etc).

(From Andrew Goodwin, DANCING IN THE DISTRACTION FACTORY, 1992.)