Conventions of a Music Video
- 1. Codes and Conventions of a Music Video By Jack Harding
- 2. Style of Video There are three different styles within a music video; abstract, narrative and performance. Abstract is predominately random and follows a montage of various shots that may not be related together or they may. Narrative follows the focus of a story, most often focusing around a love story. A performance looks at the image of the band showing literally a performance.
- 3. Time Music videos used to be based around a three minute time span, since Michael Jackson's hit thriller some music videos can spread to at least 10 minutes and sometimes more. It is completely dependent on the budget and also the brand image of the band/artist, what they are trying to get across and how they want to reflect their brand image. The focus of a story can change the length of the music video as well.
- 4. Brand Image A music video is important as it shows what the band is really like. If the band appeals to a target market it can excel as artists need sponsorship and popularity from fans to make money. A band or artist will normally follow a certain genre whether it is Rock or R&B, for example darkness, chains, death and leather are all common themes and looks within the rock genre. Fans will associate with this and can relate well to the artist looking to them as role models and fashion idols.
- 5. Camera shots Music videos use various different camera shots, these include: 1. Pan shot 2. Close up 3. Extreme close up 4. Mid shot 5. Tracking shot etc. These shots enable various different effects to be portrayed, a tracking shot could help show someone walking away and a close up may help to show a major importance to that certain thing which is in the shot, this can be a body part, a piece of jewellery or maybe even a flow to signify a memory of someone of a loss of love.
- 6. Editing and sound Editing helps to show the focus of the music video whether it to be quick paced showing a postive atmosphere for instance being at a party, rapid editing may be used. Other examples may be: Split screens Colour changes Using diegetic sound These can all majorly effect the image of a music video, whether to enforce the idea of a storyline thought the use of diegetic sound or to set the scene to be depressive and about loss through the use of grey colour, this is often used in slow R&B tracks.
- 7. Mise en Scene Clothing is very important inside a music video as I have mentioned before can help give a good brand image as if portrayed well can make an artist become a fashion idol making them much more marketable. Props can also be used but are completely dependent on the genre of music, a rolex in one genre may be music more appealing like a leather jacket is in another. Locations are also very important as they help to set the scene for the music video, much like the other parts of miss on scene they are very important, if wrong the music video will look bizarre. You wouldn’t expect to see a song about women and dancing in a graveyard.