FORMS AND CONVENTIONS OF MUSIC VIDEO

GENERAL THEORY
 Lyrics: establish a general feeling/mood/sense of subject rather than a meaning
Takin' It Over has few lyrics, which indeed have little meaning, other than amplifying the party mood
 Music: tempo often drives the editing
We have main four sections in our music video: boudoir, Brick Lane, Mercado and montage, and will edit at different paces at each point.
 Genre: might be reflected in types of mise-en-scene, themes, performance, camera and editing styles
Our music video will comply with the genres of feminist 'girl power' and voyeristic star performance, especially through the use of close-ups and cut up body shots.
 Camerawork: has an impact on meaning. Movement, angle and shot distance all play a part in the representation of the artist/band (close-ups dominate)
 Editing: the most common form is fast-cut montage, rendering many of the images impossible to grasp on first viewing, so ensuring multiple viewing. Often enhancing the editing are digital effects, which play with the original images to offer different kinds of pleasure for the audience.
 Intertextuality: not all audiences will spot a reference, which would not significantly detract from their pleasure in the text itself, but greater pleasure might be derived by those who recognise the reference and feel flattered by this. It also increases the audience’s engagement with, and attentiveness to the product. Many music videos draw upon cinema:
o Madonna’s Material Girl drew on the song sequence Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend in Howard Hawk’s Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
o 2Pac and Dr Dre’s California Love, which referenced George Miller’s Mad Max
Our intertextuality will come from the fact that it is from the motion picture (Mercado), so those who will have watched the film will recognize various scenes and therefore feel 'flattery'
 Exhibitionism: The apparently more powerful independent female artists of recent years have added to the complexity of the politics of looking and gender/cultural debates, by being at once sexually provocative and apparently in control of, and inviting, a sexualised gaze.
We have definetly used the theme of exhibitionism in our music video - Golnessa is an independant and confident woman, who is not tied down to any man (as is clear from the video - she flirts with the boys but pays no particular attention to any one of them), yet she still manages to be extremely sexy and provocative.

ANDREW GOODWIN’S THEORY
 Visuals either illustrate, amplify or contradict the lyrics and music
Our visuals amplify
 Genres often have their own music style/iconography
We have complied to the 'pop' and 'latino' genres
 Close-ups should always be included
We had several close ups, several of which voyeristically cut up sections of Golnessa's body
 The artist/band might want to develop their own star iconography, which becomes their star image
 Voyeurism is a common theme within music videos
 Intertextual references are also popular
 Goodwin argues that the female performer is frequently objectified principally for display purposes, often through a combination of camerawork and editing with fragmented body shots emphasising a sexualised treatment of the star.
We definetly played along with this theme.

STEVE ARCHER’S THEORY
 There needs to be a strong and coherent relationship between narrative and performance in music promos.
 Music videos will cut between a narrative and a performance of the song by the band
 A carefully choreographed dance might be part of the artist’s performance or an extra aspect of the video designed to aid visualisation and the ‘repeatability’ factor.
We included a dance routine, albiet a very short dance routine, in the music video, which was appreciated by many of the feedback audiences who did in fact state that they wanted to watch the routine again.

JOHN STEWART’S THEORY
 The music video has the aesthetics of a TV commercial, with lots of close-ups and lighting being used to focus on the star’s face.
We used lighting to a great extent during the filming of our music video, especially taking advantage of filters to create a 'warm glow'. This kind of lighting was used in particular on close-up shots of Golnessa.
 He sees visual reference in music video as coming from a range of sources, although the three most frequent are perhaps cinema, fashion and art photography.
Our visual references come from cinema, through factors such as the widescreen mode we filmed in.
 Stewart’s description of the music video as ‘incorporating, raiding and reconstructing’ is essentially the essence of Intertextuality, using something with which the audience may be familiar, to generate both nostalgic associations and new meanings.
 The video allows more access to the performer than a stage performance can. The mise-en-scene, in particular, can be used to emphasise an aspirational lifestyle.
We hoped to create a character to whom the younger members of our target audience could look up to and aspire too. This was clearly achieved from the responses we got.

SIGMUND FREUD’S THEORY
 Refers to the notion that erotic pleasure may be gained by looking at a sexual object (preferably when the object is unaware of being watched)
This happens many times when Golnessa is dancing according to our male responses, although a lot of the time Golnessa looks straight into the camera, which connects her directly with them and gives the video a more light-hearted feel.

LAURA MULVEY’S THEORY
 Because filmmakers are predominantly male, the presence of women in films is often solely for the purposes of display (rather than for narrative purposes).
We go against this theory, because our music video encourages the power and independancy of the female.
 The purpose of this displace is to facilitate a voyeuristic response in spectators, which presumes a ‘male gaze’ one that is a powerful controlling gaze at the female on display, who is effectively objectified and passive.
There is definetly a 'male gaze', however there is also a 'female gaze', this time in aspirational admiration.

10 SHOT STORYBOARD

Here is a sample of our storyboard that I constructed:



Right click and save the images to see them full size (I don't know how else to do it and didn't want them to be really small - sorry!)
It is clear from these drawings the range of distances we used, and the variety of colours and styles, such as the contrasting of the graffittied streets of Brick Lane with the flowery pink scenery of the boudoir.

FOCUS OF THE VIDEO

GOLNESSA!!!

I looked into the representation of strong and powerful women within the music and film industry.

We can compare the character of Golnessa to that of Jennifer Lopez, who acts and sings, and so also creates a hybrid between music and film:

Here is also an example of some of the film work she has done:

This scene incorporates her love of dancing and acting, two factors which we also will reference in our video.

We can also compare her independance and highly sexualized dancing to Shakira:


Similarly, Fergie, who formally performed with the Black Eyed Peas, has broken away from the band and become an extremely successful solo artist in her own right. She is a great example of someone who began as a low-earning, local girl, and has hit major stardom, just like the character within the film, Golnessa.


Finally, Christina Aquilera and her music videos is such a huge influence to us, through her bright and flamboyant style, Latino themes and dance routines:

INTERTEXTUAL REFERENCES

Since our music video is meant to be complied from scenes from the motion picture, Mercado, I researched into other music vidoes which have used this technique. This kind of promotion is also extremely clever, as it helps to endorse both the artist and the film, through each other.


Jessica Alba as the main focus of Sean Desmond's "Sexy" music video, from the film "Honey"


Julia Stiles as the main focus of Chris Brown's "Gimme That" music video, from the film "Save the Last Dance"


Hugh Grant as one focus of Girls Aloud's "Jump" music video, from the motion picture "Love Actually"


Scenes from "Love Actually" encorporated into the Sugababe's "Too Lost in You"

ARTIST IDENTITY

As our artist won't actually be appearing in our music video, I wanted to explore other artists who did not make themselves the focus of their videos.


"Macerena" By Los del Río does promote the two men, however the main focus of the video is on the girls.


This video, "Give It Up" by Twista and Pharrell, centres mainly around the girls in the video, as oppose to the artists.


"Galvanize" by The Chemical Brothers - no illustration of the band at all.


Similarly, "Hey Girl, Hey Boy" by the Chemical Brothers doesn't show them either.


Gorillaz, "Clint Eastwood"
Gorillaz are a band who rarely reveal their real identities, instead posing behind these cartoon characters.