Sarah Lester G324 Advanced Portfolio: 2011

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Could use 9 frame analysis and comparison to real media products (Y)

Could edit a short video package with lots of visual exemplification of how your video uses, challenges or develops forms and conventions.

Thought Beats:

In our media product there is evidence of ‘thought beats’ throughout the video, for example the feet running across the floor are in time with the music, as well as a jump cut of the band walking along a path. Also, the background colours of purples and blues are quite serene, for the most part, throughout the video that challenges the pop-rock music – however this has been used in other music videos of the same musical genre. When the band are performing the shots are cut closer together than when the narrative is in play, also the guitar solo is edited a lot faster before the dynamic returns back to narrative which is slower cuts. On average the cuts are only 2-3 seconds long.

Star Image:

Our music video consists of a band made up of four members, three guys and one girl, this creates an interesting dynamic as all audiences can reflect on an ‘eye-candy’ of either male or female. However the amount of airtime for each band member is in favour of Sarah as she has the highest shot count amongst members. Our media product uses the classic conventions of real media products through embracing the commonly used principles of music videos from the alternative music genre. For example the usage of dark colours in the clothing coinciding with a sharp contrast of colour, which in our video is the bright orange of Sarah’s hair contrasting with the dark colours of the clothing worn.

Narrative and Performance:

The narrative is cut often with the performance of the band, this s a classic convention of music videos from this genre – this is because rock bands preferably like to show of their live talent in music videos, proving they play their own instruments. The performance of this video takes place in a studio, we put this in effect by revealing areas of the studio throughout the video to as well as showing the camerawoman filming the band. The narrative of this vide is based on the main character being help within some sort of asylum, as she has been seeing the band members and stalking Sarah, the lead singer. Asylums and institutions are quite popular music video narratives in the rock music genre, for example Green day’s – Basket case and Avenged Sevenfold’s – Nightmare. The music video narrative takes place within a white room, consisting of a bed, mirror, and sink. The overall white colour of the room contrasts so clearly with the performance areas blues and purples giving the viewer a distinct change in colour and perception of the character’s and band.

Type of Music Video:

This music video is an amplification music video, also the narrative contains some direct links to the lyrics of the song, for example ‘Sitting in a room, made up of only big white walls’.

Technical Aspects:

The technical aspects within this video include a wide variety of camera angles, the use of ****green screen studio, as well as added effects during the editing process, for example speeding areas of the music video up and adding text and images to the video.

Other technical aspects include the camerawork, movement and angle, editing, sound and mise-en-scene.

The camera work within our music video gives a professional appealing to the video, as the filming has taken place in a studio the effects used, such as colour backgrounds, give the video a more attractive appearance. The camerawork also boasts a significant amount of close-up individual shots and medium close-ups for each band member during the performance scenes, also as the camera is always in movement, such as a pan or tilt shot, the shots are never boring or still. There are also jump cuts used, as well as a handheld camera scene, which is a point of view shot during narrative, however the majority of shots are steadier and taken on a tripod or a ***dolly. The quick change of shots enhances the viewers interest as the cuts are never more than 4 seconds apart, a regular convention of this music video genre.

The mise-en-scene within this video is very similar to other videos of the same music genre, for instance Fall Out Boy’s ‘Sugar We’re Goin Down’ also has an outdoors narrative. The bands clothing is very similar of that which the fans of the genre would wear, also within the Paramore – Misery Business music video the band all have one colour in common, red, in our music video the colour is grey.