Institutional research

Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. Most of the time, music videos are an artist's subsiduary media which helps to sell their singles and albums. Since MTV was launched in 1981 with "Video Killed The Radio Star" the music video has grown to be a key element in music marketing, making audiences identify a track by its music video. From 1992, the music video medium has become that of a mark of the music video auteur, giving directors credit for the success of a music video in the credits. Directors such as Mark Romanek and Michel Gondry came into the medium successfully because they brought a unique vision and styles to the videos they directed.

From 2005, the internet became video-friendly with file-sharing websites such as Napster, which enabled users to share both tracks and music videos. The introduction of YouTube in 2005 made access to music videos even easier, without having to sign up to view content. YouTube was also a success for the music industry because it marketed videos better because the audience can view them quicker and easier than before. Some artists and marketers began to see success as a result of videos seen mostly or entirely online, the band OK GO exemplified this trend, making their success and fame through their video being on YouTube, gaining over 43 million views.

The record company is a key part of the music industry, they sign up an artist or band and then pay them an advance which covers all costs such as marketing and costumes etc. The record company then produces a brief, budget, deadlines etc. The way that the music industry makes money through this is by employing a commisioner who works out what percentage the record company gets of the profit including the advance paid to the artist, the artist then earns the rest of the profit after the advance is paid back and commision is paid. In the production of the video, directors come forward pitching ideas to the record company (including storyboards), then the producer comes up with a budget and if that is accepted by the record company then the proposal is sent to the client and if they approve of it then the production unit is set up.

evaluation of shoots

Before we actually shot our footage we went on some location reccies and shoot walkthroughs, this enabled us to plan the exact shot and shot size which we needed for the actual shoot. It was also useful because it showed us what problems we were likely to face when doing the actual shoot, one of these problems was the amount of people that were around and we did encounter some problems with this when doing the actual shoot.

Our first shoot wasn't very successful because we filmed it early in the morning so the lighting wasn't very good. Also, we were filming outside a train station and this made it difficult to shoot the longer shots because it was busy with commuters. Furthermore, it was raining when we performed the shoot which lowered the quality of the footage.

Our second shoot was more successful because the weather was better and we filmed later in the day which meant that the streets were not as busy as before. Also, the shots themselves were of a higher quality because we used a tripod which made the camera a lot more steady than in the first shoot.

Our third shoot was successful because we managed to film a lot of footage because the location wasn't very busy. Also, the lighting for the close-up leg shots was better than on the second shoot because the sunlight wasn't as strong so the throusers weren't as bright and the shot looked better.

Our fourth shoot was a re-shoot of the first shoot, it was successful because we achieved what we needed to in that the lighting was better in the re-shoot and we got the camera angles right. In the fourth shoot we also filmed the opening sequence of the music video which was going to be difficult because we needed to use a strobe light to give the feeling of the end of a party. These shots were difficult because the camera had trouble registering the facial details of the actors, we got round this by using phone lights to slightly light up their faces. Also, the camera had trouble focusing because of the flashing of the strobe light, we overcame this problem by slowing down the flashing of the strobe light.

Our final shoot was successful because we found a few new locations which would fit in with the opening sequences. Also, the new footage which we got will help to give the video a sense of a journey.

Overall, our shoots were relatively successful because we only had to re-shoot two sequences and the rest of the footage we successfully shot first time.

editing progress

So far with editing we have come across some problems, these being; firstly the first day of shooting was to dark as we filmed early in the morning. This also had the problem of it raining so when we came to edit the footage it was bad quality and needed to be re-shot. So when we re-shot this footage we did it later in the day and used to the editing software to turn the contrast down and make it look darker than it was. This effect worked but we had to play with the settings so that it looked the same as clips from out original shoot.
After uploading out footage onto the editing software we deleted useless footage and then placed the footage we had in a time order. We decided that placing some transaction between the clips would make it easier when we came to finalising the footage at the end. Some shots we had difficulties editing were the time-lapse shots, we did not realise that we had to have a shot of the empty ally so when the we faded out one clip using the opacity tool the other clip could be faded in. To overcome this we cross faded two shots so when one faded out the other faded in, giving the same effect with what shots we had, saving us having to film more footage.
Other problems we are having is making sure the each shot is not to long as otherwise it will become boring to the viewer, to make sure this didn’t happen we used lots of quick cuts which should be in time with the beats of our track.
Looking further into our editing we were having problems with our strobe, this is a problem as the lighting conditions were slightly different as the cameras would not pick up enough light. To overcome this we turned on a light but as the shots became lighter the strobe didn’t show up on the characters faces, we turned the contrast down but this didn’t help very much. So through the editing we used quick cuts to get between light shots, this has worked out but is still slightly different from our plan.
We realised that just cutting between each shot made the video boring, to overcome this we used dissolves and fades to cut between shots. The fades that we used were the fade to black and then back to a shot. This worked well as it fits in with the music but also allows you to change backgrounds without making it to obvious. Dissolving shots meant that long shots can be cut down allowing the same background to be there but the character moving from one place to the other. This also worked really well as we had a static camera when filming these shots.

Evaluation of Storyboard and Animatic

In order to successfully put together our animatic, we filmed each shot in our storyboard for around 5 seconds. We then loaded the footage onto a computer and loaded the soundtrack onto it. We then cut the shots down in order to make them fit where they were meant to go in the narrative. We then edited the shots to fit them into time with the track.

The storyboard and the animatic will be useful to us in the filming of our music video because we will be able to plan each shoot and know what the actor(s) will need to do in time with the track. The storyboard will be especially useful in this because we will be able to take it to each shoot and use it to perform each shot with the correct camera movement, shot size and shot length.

The animatic will be useful because it will help us to edit the footage in time with the track. While editing the footage, we will be able to compare it to the animatic and time it to where it is meant to go in the music video.

Evaluation of Pitch

The main thing that we gained from our pitch was the fact that we need to incorporate a female character in the music video because the lead vocalist is female. The class agreed with us making the video postmodern by having a female character following the male character which will undermine dominant ideologies. Another factor of the response to the pitch which affected our idea was that we need a wider range of locations in order to keep the audience entertained. Furthermore, because we won't be using any performance shots, the narrative would need to have be depth and detail with a wider variety of shots and locations.

Furthermore, another piece of feedback we received from the group was how we were going to give the feeling of the video being set at night. A way that was suggested to overcome this was by filming in the early hours of the morning, at dawn.

Feedback #3

well done - some interesting technical observations. Your blog has improved, however can you go back do the following so that it is easy for me to review your previous grades:
1. change titles to start with your initials so I can see whose analysis is there at a glance (for all posts)
2. Double check spelling, punctuation, paragraphing - use subheadings if necessary
3. Can you let me know if you have made any changes to your textual analysis as per my feedback so that I can go back and re-read them.

At the moment, you are working at a 3+/4- level. To secure a level 4 (which you all need) for planning, then you must go to town on this blog.

Also - all analysis should have a link to the actual video or imbed the clip.

Technical Analysis – Africa Shox – Leftfield and Afrika Bambaata

Evaluation

It is evident from my analysis that the duration of each shot does not exceed more than two seconds. However there is a longer shot of around 25 seconds but this shot uses camera movement to design a fluid, interesting shot. This technique seems to be an alternative technique to fast paced cutting. This is because the camera moves in different directions resembling a journey. It is not still so the shot doesn’t necessarily seem longer than the others, at least it is not obviously longer than the other shots when viewed passively. This effect adds fluidity to the process of revealing and anchoring s with the main character. It also gives us more detail of where he is and his surroundings which is s good way in setting the location. Other than this shot, the majority of the shots are between 1 and 2 seconds long. This follows the timing of the music and can add more detail in mise-en-scene whilst telling a longer story in a short amount of time. The shots follow in chronological order and are continuity edited. This allows for the narrative to flow through the invisible cuts.
The movement of the camera is also essential to making the cuts go unnoticed. For example, when we see the pigeons taking off, the camera starts pedding upwards. It then cuts to a shot, still pedding up, of the pigeons flying higher up. This means that the middle part of the pigeon’s flight not in the sequence but the audience will fail to notice this. This technique is seen throughout and by cutting whilst the camera is moving, to a shot where the camera movement is continued, the cutting goes unseen.
The majority of shots and MLS, MS, MCU and CU. This allows the main character to always be the focal point of the video, thus giving us the meat which builds up a star persona. These shots also position the audience with the character which means that a certain degree of emotion can be obtained through POV shots an reaction shots. This video uses this technique to convey pain and anxiety.
The video also uses other techniques. It is fairly voyeuristic of pedestrians and films them from low camera angles which connote degradation when used I this way. The camera also zooms into a group of pedestrians from a distance which has connotations of the paparazzi intruding, stalking and spying. The video also uses still shots to good effect. When the main character’s arm breaks off we get a still CU of another man’s face which doesn’t react to the situation or help the main character. The fact that he is filmed in CU with a low camera angle makes the man seem pretty sinister. However, this is anchored further as the camera doesn’t move, as though it had been stopped dead by the man’s callous.
I think it would be a good idea to use the voyeuristic shots used in this video and also using still shots in this way would be a great help in constructing the mood of our video. Furthermore, I will use cutting on action to conceal the cuts and I may even use a longer, more fluid shot to match the baseline in our chosen track.

Analysis of TV Heart Attack - Bang Bang Bang Music Video
From watching this music video it is clear that videos from the genre we are looking at uses quick and very short shots, this is apparent as the longest shot lasts around 2 seconds and the shortest one lasts around half a second. This video which is a noir video has hardly any or no static camera shots. Looking at the video the shots are always panning back or across the artists or the females or males within the shot, this moving means that the longer shots within the video don’t seem as long.
I analysed the first 2 minutes and 6 seconds and sound that there were 100 shots within this time, although some were repeated, this will help when making our video as knowing short repeated shots are as good as ones that have not been shown before. The noir element is clear within this video as it is in black and white as well as having shadows showing a figure with a gun killing the boxer. What I did notice is that there were not very many angled shots within this video, it may have been that they were not appropriate but more so that they were not always needed, there were a lot of flat shots especially when showing the band with close ups of their faces.
An interesting idea that I noticed in this video was the idea of the reverse narrative, this is common within the noir structure in films and music videos. The way the dead boxer was shown at the begging and then the story was told through the video. This was linked in with the cuts of the band playing witch is an idea for our music video.

Technical Analysis

Technical Analysis-Evaluation

I have found the technical analysis of ‘Time is running out’ film noir music video version by Muse useful because it has showed me the sheer volume of shots needed to make a successful music video. This can be seen through there being 100 shots in the first two and a half minutes of the video. It was also useful because it showed the shot length needed to make a good music video, this can be seen by the fact that the longest shot in the video was around four seconds. In this music video there is continuity editing and this gives the video smooth cuts which make it flow with the song. Furthermore, jump cuts are used to cut between the male and female characters when they are is different places, there are also a few fades used to go from one shot to another which are used successfully because they enhance the feeling of mystery in the music video. This evidence will be useful in our music video because that is the effect that we are aiming for. The Close-Up shot of the main characters is most predominantly used in this music video which enables the producers to use the film noir elements of the music video through close-up shots of the character’s faces cast in shadows. There is not a lot of camera movement in the shots because they are so short, however, one successful camera movement was a pan down the body of the male protagonist. The music video is also useful because it shows how certain camera angles can be used successfully, for example, there are a lot of low camera angles tilting upwards at the main male character, giving him power over the female character. The narrative is constructed technically in this music video through the use of cuts between male and female characters and jump cuts between the two characters watching each other and their reactions. There are a few close-up shots that are repeated in the music video, for example shot 13 is repeated as the 15th shot. This music video will be useful in our planning because it will help us form our storyboard because it gives an idea on the amount of shots needed to make a good music video. Furthermore, this technical analysis has been useful because it is a low budget, amateur version of the music video for the original track and this is what we will be aiming to achieve.

Audience Research Results/Analysis

Focus Group-Results

After gathering our focus group of ten males aged 17 to 35 together, we played our track choice to them and asked them to think about what feelings the track, Sneaker Pimps-‘Spin Spin Sugar Armand’s Dark Garage Mix’, gave them. The general feeling was that the track generated a feeling of strangeness with most of the focus group feeling that the song gave a suggestion of drug and alcohol abuse. One member of the focus group said that the song “had a feeling of a diabetic having a sugar rush,” this seemed a good idea for a part of our proposed narrative because it would create a link between the lyrics and the visuals. After asking the focus group to tell us how they would make a music video for the song, a development of the previous idea was made by a fellow media studies student. He suggested that the lyric “spin spin sugar” could be used as a suggestion of taking cocaine in order to build a link between the lyrics and the visuals. This member of the focus group had the idea for a music video as “the main character getting high and then seeing the effects of it with shots of the character spinning to make the people watching feel how he is.”

We then asked the focus group to think of a word or phrase that would describe the track and their thoughts about the music video they visualise for the track. Their responses were:
“Someone in a club”
“Club scene, pills”
“Disorientated”
“Shaky camera”
“Strobe light”
“Colours changing”
“Drunk”
“Dark”

We then described our idea for the music video to the focus group and asked how we could develop our idea. The focus group thought that a narrative music video was the best way to present it, they agreed with the idea of a male main character but one member of the group thought that it would be better with a young woman following him; “a man being tormented by a woman”. Another member of the focus group suggested: “making a storyline similar to how it is in ‘Skins’ with a shaky camera,” another person then suggested slowing any possible shot of characters to fit the speed of the song.

We then asked what the focus group would use as camera shots in our idea for a music video to the track. One member of the group responded that; “there should be shots of the character spinning around out of control when the main lyric comes on.” After hearing our idea of using shots of the main character in mirrors and reflections one member of the group suggested a shot “with the camera behind the person showing their reflection in the mirror”.

Conclusion

Overall, we came to the conclusion that the focus group was a success because the people in it agreed with our idea for a music video to the track. It was most useful in that the group gave us a number of different ideas and suggestions for shots which have widen our possibilities of parts of the narrative and kind of video we are aiming for. We have been wanting to make our music video postmodern and noiresc and certain ideas from the focus group which we haven’t thought of will allow this to happen. The idea of having a female following the male character and “tormenting” him will make the video postmodern because it would portray the woman as having power over the man, challenging the ideological discourse of hegemonic masculinity. This idea was even more useful by the fact that it means we can possibly incorporate a female character into the music video which will fit the track more because the track is sung by a female artist. Another idea that made the focus group successful was the idea of a camera shot over the character’s shoulder focusing on their reflection, when discussing the focus group we developed this to an idea about a shot of the character being extremely pale and then cutting back to them being normal.

Overall, our audience research is useful because it shows us what our niche audience look for and expect in a music video for an alternative, dark garage song.

Audience Research plan-Focus Group

Our audience research will be in a focus group in form time. We will use qualitative research in order to gain different ideas and make the participants more active in creating good ideas. The purpose of our audience research will be to find out how other people would respond visually to the track. We are expecting to gain new ideas for shots, locations and narrative; this will test the quality of our original idea and will give us new ideas which will create more variety in our video. Our sample audience will be a young demographic of around 10 people who listen to a lot of alternative music, this will enable our focus group to respond with good ideas because they have experience of the genre. The media stimulus will consist of playing the track a few times to the group and showing them our mood boards and pitch our idea to them. We will use open questions such as "what do you think of the track" "what images spring to mind when you here the song" "how would you visualise the music video".

Feedback #1

Harry/Jamie/Andy,

This blog shows evidence of your ideas and discussion, however it is very messy and although your comments on each other's ideas can be informal, it is not appropriate to write in txt format - you need to go back through the blog, give each post a suitable title, punctuate properly and spellcheck, remove the "discussion" posts and instead cut and paste them into the comments sections and generally organise this so that it seems like an A2 piece of coursework.

Also - you still need to evaluate and comment on your moodboards (jamie - where is yours?). I can't see what your logic is at the moment in your response to the track.

Finally - you should have chosen your second textual analysis on the basis of the final chosen track. Be specific as to why that analysis would be useful. My other concern is that as a group, your textual analysis is not detailed enough for a level 4. You also need to include at least a link, if not an imbedded Youtube video of the video that you have analysed on the post.

At the moment, this is level 3 planning. Not all auteur research is present, it is a little disorganised and the individual research doesn't seem focused on your task. You must invest time in improving this.

Chosen track - I think this could be a very promising track, however with a lead female vocal, you would expect a female in the video... have you thought about this?

Ananlysis-Oxide and Neutrino-Devil's Nightmare

This music video was released for the soundtrack of Tomb Raider. It is mainly performance based but with action shots and CU's of Angelina Jolie. This is to promote the film. It further promotes the film through amplification as the pace of the track and the MC is closely matched and therefore amplified by the fast, continuity edited cuts. The video also promotes the artists. Many of the shots are CU's of, primarily neutrino MCing and secondly DJ oxide. This makes up the meat of the video and helps to sell the band through associations with them and their music. The artists are represented as tough. This is done firstly by the costumes. The opening shot is of Neutrino standing up. He is wearing an orange boiler suit which has connotations of high security incarsaration which is symbolic of Neutrino being outside the law and society, essentially showing that he is free from society's chains which therefore makes him an inspirational figure. The location is also bends this reading. He is performing on a flat and sandy floor surrounded by shadows. This symbolises that he doesn't need material goods as he has nothing in the video to imply this. When you couple this with the former idea, it clearly connotes an anti-capitilist discourse. The sand also has other connotations. The music has an ethnic, typically hollywood, ancient sounding tune. When you link this element of the music with the sand and the Egyptian symbol tattoed on his back, along with the context of Tomb Raiser, Neutrino seems to be presented as some sort of Egyptian diety. This is because firstly, he is presented as ouside the law, he is then presented as anti-capitilst, it then shows him with a pagan symbol on his back, and finally he laughs at the invisble force attacking him in the final shot.

The video also discourses Laura Mulvey's theory of the male gaze. Most music videos objectify women and according to Goffman, Jhally and Kilborn, women are often dismembered with shots only showing particular body parts. In this musci video, Angelina Jolie is not presented in this way. although we look at her through the refelctions in the male character's eyes which connotes voyeurism, she is not dismembered or objectified. We see actions shots which discourse femine ideologies and we also see her from MS's which don't allow for any one body part to be fetishised.

If I Were a Boy- beyonce-second video analysis

This video follows the genre characteristics of the genre in parts, some of the video follows the single female artist through the dissection of her showing her waist and when she is changing it focuses on her chest area. Although it does not show her singing which is common features in most female artist’s videos. This is similar in the way that she does not caress her own body to show her as an object that others desire.
Within the video there is no link between lyrics and the visuals as there is no lip syncing although the words are representing what is going on in the narrative of the song. The music of the song is connected to the video as the cuts in the music are also similar to the cuts in the video, this make the music flow with the video and making it seem more in time.
The video has close ups of the artist and her boyfriend which show emotion and the reactions to what is happening within the video, this shows how the male character is feeling when the female is going out with the other police officers.
There is a notion of voyeurism within this video as there is a constant POV of the male watching the female, this is not made clear if its actually true or if it is just showing what she is doing, and then a reaction shot of the male. This gives a notion of looking or watching but there is not use of mirrors or camera when the female is working.
This video is a clear narrative based video with the story of a cheating wife who’s job is a police women, this shows her in her job and her social life but then at the end of the video it turns out that her husband was the one cheating, this makes it go against any stereotypes and represents the two characters in a different way to most videos.

music video analysis 2-The Twang--'2 Lovers'

The music video for '2 Lovers' by The Twang has a clear constructive narrative with relationships constructed between the lyrics and visuals with the line "it's in his nature" and the shot of him breaking into a car, stealing it and then selling it.  The music video has continuity editing and uses jump cuts between the story of the male character and the female character.  It has focused viewing through the intertextual references to the British gangster genre.  The '2 Lovers' music video shows amplification as the mark of a music video auteur in which the music video amplifies the song's meaning.  This music video stands up to repeatability because the viewers will enjoy the narrative and the role which the character plays and the role of Danny Dyer makes the video watchable and, therefore successful.

The intertextuality in the music video makes it postmodern because it has clear uses of Bricolage which can be seen in the scene of the male character playing poker and the shots of the characters throwing money onto the middle of the table have a clear reference to the poker scene in 'Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels'.  Furthermore, there are intertextual references to 'Football Factory' through the character which is played by Danny Dyer.  The clear intertectuality in this music video makes it postmodern because it uses the generic conventions of the British gangster genre and the intertextual relay of all British gangster films has brought the typical narrative with it into the music video.  This shows clear elements of postmodernism because it is blurring the boundaries of the British gangter film industry and the music video industry.

Moreover, the video has a lot of social realism through it being shot in urban streets of London and it looks like it is shot in real life.  There is more social realism seen in the scene where the female character is arguing with her family.  These shots denote young, working class people rebelling in shots such as when the male character loses at poker and tries to steal the money that he lost and fight his way out.

Harry's moodboard

Andrew's moodboard

click on image for larger version

chosen track

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zciWTiCdEsA
Sneaker Pimips- Spin Spin Sugar (Armand Van Helden Dark Garage Mix)

Narrative with film noir elements
using mirrors/reflections notion of looking etc.
filmed at night

character thinks their being followed
being drunk?? spinning and staggering to insinuate either drugs or alcohol use!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUtoAOIcSpQ scissor sister interesting song, sorta electric

much better song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GJPcs7WcPU---stand by, scratch perverts....this could really work..more your kinda music harry