Evaluation Task 1- Conventions in Our Music Video

Conventions in Our Music Video

Whilst creating our music video, we explored other music videos of the same genre and decided to either challenge the conventions or subvert them. We relied on previous forms and conventions of other music videos, this is because these conventions have been tried and tested and have found to be successful. 

There are many common forms and conventions that are found in music videos, including the length of the music videos, the use of a performance element and the use of post-production. 

One form of a music video that we explored is the length, as we found when researching other videos, they were all approximately three minutes long. We decided to reinforce this convention as there are a number of good reasons why music videos are roughly three minutes long. As seen below, in a screenshot of our music video, our video lasts for exactly three minutes. This is beneficial for the audience as it is long enough for there to be a narrative enabling the audience to understand the meaning of the song and long enough for the video to make an impact but simultaneously short enough to prevent the audience losing interest, an aspect especially important to us as our target audience is primarily younger people with a shorter attention span. It is also common for the music videos to be around three minutes long as radio airplay time is strictly kept to two minutes and 48 seconds. However if the music video was too short, for example closer to two minutes than three, it may leave the audience not feeling satisfied with the video or song or not being able to understand the songs meaning.

Another convention of a music video is to have an element of band performance, either completely taking up the music video or cut in-between a narrative. Similarly the convention is to have the artists lip-syncing the song. There are a variety of reasons that this is beneficial to the music video and the artists themselves. Using performance and having the artist lip-syncing the song showcases the artists and demonstrates the artists abilities as well as creating a marketable star image, all of which are important to marketing the artist. Again, we conformed to this convention and used band performance and lip-syncing in our music video, as shown below in a screenshot of our band performance, with our lead singer lip-syncing. 

The above screenshot also conforms to another convention of having a variety of shots. We chose to have a majority of shots of the lead singer, close up to establish him as the lead singer as it reinforces the star image of the singer and the band. The close ups of our lead singer are a good marketing tool as it showcases the artist and their talent. Additionally we also made sure to include other shots of the other band members to establish their talents as a band and the importance of the band as a whole. It also ensures that the target audience realise that the bands sounds are organic instead of synthetic, which should appeal to them. This can be seen below in an extreme close up of the guitarists. 

Another convention that we subverted to is the use of narrative, this is less commonly found in music videos whereas the use of band performance is in almost every music video. The use of narrative is beneficial as it pulls the audience in with a story and keeps them entertained and it also suggests a way of interpreting the song but it can also leave the song open to the audiences interpretations as well. The narrative in the song is the 50's stereotype of the suburban household with the idea of a 'perfect world', contained within a dolls house. A scene from this can be seen below in one of the rooms of the dolls house where the perfect wife makes breakfast for her perfect husband. 

One convention not found in all music video but found in ours is the use of 'artistic' camerawork. This is used in music videos because it creates flow and keeps the audience entertained with interesting transitions and also makes the music video look more professional and gives it a unique look. An example of a music video which uses this is Leona Lewis' 'Bleeding Love'. This is found in our music video when we panned through the walls in our narrative to show the design of the dolls house and show that the house was connected. It created a better transition from one scene to the next, without just cutting to the next scene. This is shown below as the wife walks between the bedroom and the bathroom with the wall in-between. 

One convention that I believe we conformed to in a beneficial way is conspicuous use of lighting used in our band performance. We wanted to have the idea of the band being in a dingy basement with poor lighting to contrast with the brightly lit shots in the dolls house where everything is perfect. The lighting controls the mood of the scene and controls how the audience sees it. This is shown below in our band performance.