When looking at an image to present myself as in a pop rock band I looked at some of the earlier examples of fashion in rock music and attempted to mordernise it for our target audience. Flannel Shirts and have been a staple of modern rock fashion since the early 90's, they are commonly paired with a long sleeve shirt. Kurt Cobain added the Army jacket to the apparell of modern rock and has been shown as an example of fashion since the appearance of Nirvana in the early 90's. Rolled up Jeans/Trousers paired with boots such as Doc Martens have been a staple of pulp culture since the late 60's and add some context to the appearance of the artist.
When annotating the details of the song we focused on the feelings we got from listening to Did Ya' Think by the Veronicas. Considering this song is part of the pop rock genre, the song itself is upbeat and fast paced, which will be helpful when it comes to editing our music video.
To help gain a more clarified view towards the theme of the song, we began to annotate the lyrics towards the song, this helps us to create a theme for the narrative and the music video as a whole, we found that rejection was one of the main themes in the song, although this is a fairly straight forward theme in itself, my group plans to amplify the meaning of the song to make the music video more appealing to audiences.
In our group our task is to take each of the various roles and divide them between each other, this will later help us with orginisation towards setting up locations, lighting and equipment which will in return get each member of the group fairly involved. As we are all performers in the music video, we will all help with the camerawork for example, but the director and camerawork will look over and be the deciding role in that area of production.
In our music video we plan to create a conventional pop punk song, in it our band members will be dressed in punk oriented clothing and have various colourful accessories like artists such as Avril Lavigne. We want our music video to be set in a dark, urban and industrial area as this is conventional to the genre, The song we have chosen is 'Do Ya' Think?' By the Veronicas.
Video 1: Avril Lavigne - Here's To Never Growing Up.
In The music video to Avril Lavigne's Here's to never growing up, we see a variety of conventions which are provided throughout this video.
The first conventions are seen through the establishing shot of the video, this long shot shows three musicians on what looks like a high school band stage, the band members on the stage are not part of Avril's band and are given an overall negetive image. This shows the audience that Avril's music is far superior in comparison to other examples of music, which is a convention in various rock music videos.
The second series of shots seen are a variety of extreme close ups of the artists jewellery and clothes, these along with the establishing shot give the audience an idea to what type of genre Avril's music is along with showcasing some of the traits of the artist and the subculture and audiences which follows the pop rock genre.
A long shot of one of the pupils turning to the camera cuts to a shot of a sihlouette of the artist singing into a megaphone, the shot of the pupil turning his head is to show that the audience is expected to pay attention, much like the characters shown throughout the music video. The megaphone emhisises this as most artists use a microphone, whereas a megaphone indicates that the artist is far more important and requires more attention than the common artist or musician.
Another interesting element seen in this section of the music video is the editing and camerawork, in which each time the musician moves her knee down in a stomping motion, the camera quickly zooms in and out rapidlly, this is cut to the beat of the song and also creates a more powerful impact upon each beat, that the music is part of the video rather than just a track placed over the video.
When the artist is present and lipsyncing as expected, a lot of conventions are apparent. In the long shots of the artist and the band, the camera is only focused onto the artist and the band members do not fit into the frame, and throughout the music video we see the artist lipsync directly to the camera in a variety of shot sizes, the one thing that stays the same is that the artist is the center of attention inthis music video.
Intercut between the shots of the artist performing to the camera are shots of the narrative, the narrative is set in a school prom in a school hallway and follows the various members and students of the prom cheering and dancing to the artist's music. The narrative promotes the artists music and also links to the title of the song 'Here's To Never Growing Up', the use of a narrative to protray the themes of a song is a major convention to any music video.
In our mood board my group have showcased the various conventions and things to expect in our pop rock music video. Many Bands and groups such as Paramore and All Time Low have exotic hairstyles and fashion trends in order to appear individual and to stand out amongst the crowd, this will be seen in our music video as our costume designs will be allocated to the target audience and the conventions seen in the pop rock music genre. Expressive colors and poses are present throughout the Pop rock genre, these showcase the expressive and aggressive conventions of the rock genre whilst the light colours and casual appearance of some artists help reinforce the pop conventions in the genre, in our group's music video, there will be a strong focus on keeping the balance on pop and rock music videos. Most pop rock groups are band, and all play a variety of instruments, this is to show that the content in their song follows the conventions of a rock band and not of a manufactured pop artist. This also shows a sign of creativity in the pop rock genre of music. In our groups music video we will have a strong focus on what the bands appearance is on and off stage.
Varnallis' theory identifies the differences between a Music Video and through Hollywood Films.
An example shown in this is seen through David Bowie's Life On Mars? This particular music video showcases a series of points which are seen in Vernaillis' Theories.
In Vernallis' Theory, The structure of the music video is at random and thus montage editing is a popular and recurring convention seen throughout music videos. In David Bowie's Life On Mars? music video, There is no sense of continuity as the video is littered with multiple fade to white transitions which give the audience a vague impression of the passage of time.
Continuity Editing like in most hollywood films is also a part of some music videos, for example in Jason Derulo's The Other Side we see continuity editing in the narrative, which is most conventional music videos, the narrative stays in continuity editing whilst the performance is in montage editing, as this creates a fine division between the two. At the begging of this clip we see the beginning of the narrative cut between a series of shots of the performance which then cuts back to the narrative of the video where it plays just where the last clip left off, it also helps to define between the performance and narrative due to the different colours between the lighting (ie, gold and blue/black).
In a studio there is no sense of space nor time, considering most music video performances are shot in a studio or stage, the editing in these areas of the video are jumbled and there is no sense of space or time, this was also apparent in David Bowie's music video and is also a figure seen in N'Sync's Pop music video. As in this clip the viewer has no idea of the location, time or setting of the music video.
The other part to Vernallis' Theory was the Phantasmagorical body, a theory seen that in many pop videos, women are portrayed through their body and proportions, objectifying the women as an object of desire. Many examples of this are critisised due to their sexist views.
In Kylie's 'Spinning Around' Music video, this is present as various close ups of her legs and bust are seen throughout the music video.
In Goodwin's study, we see three types of music videos seen throughout the pop industry.
Illustration. One of the examples of illustration comes from the music video for 'Lovefool' by The Cardigans, in this music video the lyrics and theme is clearly represented in the music video about the lead singer performing a song about her partner cheating on her illustrating her pleas for him to come back.
Amplification. One of the more creative examples of amplification comes in the shape of The Avalanches 'Frontier Psychiatrist'Which experients with the theory of illustration in a music video as the music video visually represents every single lyric of the song.
Distuncture. A music video which has very little meaning and concept towards the video, Nirvana's 'Heart Shaped Box' is a music video which never really connects to either the lyrics or the artists in general, the band themselves are portayed in various ways throughout this music video.
This music video is a 0 budget music video, it has showcased the basics of how to shoot a exceptional music video buy using lighting, basic editing and camera techuniques and the conventions of a music video.
The Establishing shot allows the viewer to be introduced to the narration of the video before the main focus becomes the song.
An extensive use of tracking is common in many music videos, in which the singers walk towards the camera, slow motion is also a trait of music videos as it makes the on screen action seem more dramatic.
Music Videos cut between two consecutive scenarios, as shown here. We also get our first clues to the theme of the song, video and lyrics.
Here we see our first examples of cutting to the beat, listening to the song closely, the camera seems to cut during the beat of the snare drum, or the back beat.
