Question 1
- 1. Music video: My music video that I have created conforms to some of Andrew Goodwin’s ideas on music video such as the visuals link to the lyrics. This is demonstrated through the lyrics ‘smoke and lasers, love and ravers’ being played over footage of a crowd of people dancing, in a club with laser lights beaming out toward them. In doing this I have created a visual representation of the words in song, thus conforming partly to Andrew Goodwin’s theory of music videos. Moreover, the pace of my music video also links to Andrew Goodwins theory that the music and the visuals interlace with interweave with one another at times. The song I chose, ‘Afterglow’ by Wilkinson, is predominately of fast tempo, therefore when editing my music video, I ensured to keep a face pace by making sure that the shots cut in time with the beat and so did not negate the inflection of the song. With reference to representation, I attempted to portray two contrasting situations. The first representing the loneliness some people experience in life. This was displayed through the use of my protagonist continually drinking by herself in her room, the shots of her walking home in the dark, and also the footage shot in the studio with the bright lights and the second situation representing ‘togetherness’ which leads to happiness via the shots of the club scene with a crowd dancing altogether. The representation of loneliness was portrayed through the narrative and also the performance of my protagonist. Camera work also helped along the way with close up shots of her face displaying a range of different emotions i.e smiling, rubbing her face, blankly looking into the camera etc. This helped represent the multiple stages that people go through when they are intoxicated, i.e. they start of happy and in control but if they drink too much they become disorientated and
- 2. not in control of themselves. Props such as the vodka bottle also helped reinforce the link between the protagonist’s feelings of sadness as the reason of being drunk and drinking heavily. I could be argued that my music video does infact challenge forms and conventions of real media texts, as I have use a women as my protagonist in my music video, whereas many dance/drum and bass music videos tend to use young me as there protagonists. I decided to challenge forms as I wanted my narrative to be original; I also wanted young women to be able to relate to my music video, in turn meaning they could create an empathetic relationship with my protagonist as they would understand her predicament, meaning that my music video can also be applied to Bulmer and Kats Uses and Gratifications Theory. My music video fits into the genre of ‘drum and bass’. This can be identified through the shots used of the crowd and also through the intoxicated state of my protagonist. Objects such as laser, crowds dancing and alcohol bottles are all things that an audience expect to see in a Drum and Bass music video, thus illustrating that in this case my music video does in fact conform to conventions of other Drum and Bass music videos. Magazine Advert It could be argued that my magazine advert does not in fact conform to the conventions of real-media products. There are very few real ‘drum and bass’ magazine adverts to compare mine with, even the real music video does not have an advertisement poster. However, the few that I did see normally included a black background with
- 3. brightly coloured text. They did not included reviews or even a date of when it was released. Whereas, on my magazine advert I included a close up of my protagonist, on a purple background with reviews, the date of release and also where the song can be brought. The only point that my magazine could follow codes and conventions of a real-media product is the size of the font and the text used. Most of the magazine adverts I saw included blocky text, like ‘impact’ for example and was enlarged. I used ‘Impact’ and also used a font called ‘Birth of a hero’ which I enlarged to a reasonable size. Digipak cover My digipak cover also breaks conventions of real drum and bass products. The real digipak for the song ‘afterglow’ consists of a black background, with ‘Wilkinson’ and ‘Afterglow’ taking up the whole cover. The text is in a font called ‘impact’ and has a yellow/orange effect on it or just comes in black, with a white background. There is no image on the cover. In comparison, I have included a close up of my protagonist and have written ‘Wilkinson’ and the album name ‘Smoke and Lazers’ in the font called ‘birth of a hero’. In challenging the codes and conventions I have created something new and original. I feel that having a picture on the front cover was necessary as it allows my audience to be able to recognise my music video and relate it to my digipak and magazine advert, and visa versa. It could potentially be argued that my digipak does follow codes and conventions of a digipak simply because it has four sides to it, just like most real digipaks do. However this would be the only conformity.