Wednesday 4 December 2013

Magazine advert idea - Galaxy Theme





For the magazine advert I've used the border pattern that matches the Digipack that I have designed I've followed the conventions that I have seen by analysing other magazine adverts and made the album name the biggest piece of text and centred in the middle of the page. The next biggest pieces of text are the artist name and the 'out now' to show how that they are the next most important bit of information on the advert. Underneath 'out now' we have the websites and record companies that correspond with the artist which will be used for the audience to look into more information about the album and artist.


Throughout this whole design I haven't used the artist in any of it. The reason for this is to connote that the album is completely about the music rather than the star image. The fonts used match throughout the products and tie in with the theme.



I really like this theme and I plan to create another theme for a digipack and a magazine advert and then ask people which one they prefer. I feel that getting the publics opinion on the look of the products will be beneficial as they are who we are selling the products to.

also as the pictures are not mine I cannot use it for the design.

Monday 2 December 2013

Digipack idea - Galaxy theme

The use of the galaxy theme is common within the genre of our artist and the target audience.

Here are clothes and accessories that copy the same theme and pattern.




  

 So I figured that it would be eye catching to our target audience.



The top four are the design for the outside where the bottom four are the decoration for the inside, the black ring signifies where the disc would go.

Its simplistic but effective and it is easy to create pictures that match


I feel like we need to add the singer into our Digipack and for our advert have the same picture of Ben with a border of the Galaxy print from our Digipack.

as there are no pictures that we have taken I cannot use it for our final design.

Wednesday 20 November 2013

Rough idea design of the Digipack



This is a quick design idea for our digipack, it follows the same theme of lights and Ben features in two of the four. I felt that if he was in all four, the audience would think that its just completely about him rather than the music.

the theme are lamp posts that are on so all shots are in the dark, illuminating Ben connoting that we can only be truly seen in our darkest time.

Thursday 24 October 2013

Viral videos

Viral videos are a phenomenon that is where a music video gets incredibly popular online and gets millions of views on sites such as YouTube. The most recent videos that have taken the internet by storm are Psy with ‘Gangnam style’ Rebecca Black’s ‘Friday’ and Yivis with ‘What does the fox say’









All these videos have created world wise success for novelty songs. The main conventions throughout these songs and videos are:

• A chorus that sticks in your mind
• Simple lyrics
• Dance routine that is featured in the video
• Usually with the dance routine, an iconic move
• Usually from foreign country’s or the music is not in English

When YouTube wasn’t a used platform, there were songs like this that made big in the charts. Examples of this are, ‘The ketchup song’ ‘The Macarena’ and ‘The fast food song’ all three fit the criteria of a viral video.











Viral videos also create a following filled with parodies and people filming themselves dancing the routine and so on. These videos get the same hype as other music videos (if not more) but usually just through the internet.

From looking at the videos that are considered viral and what would have been considered viral if they were realised today, you can see they still have simple but effective videos and still get the audience that they want; this will help us as we now know that we can create a video that is simple but effective.

Tuesday 1 October 2013

Pitch idea- Seven Days by Craig David

This activity will help us to make our own music video have a relationship to the lyrics and help us improve our ability of doing this by looking at other songs from various artists and genres.


This is my pitch idea for Craig David's song 'Seven days' the analysis of the lyrics creates a clear visual that could be shown as a narrative music video. Looking at this genre, as it is different to our own, helps us understand the lyric analysis better as we have less knowledge of the generic conventions. It also allows us to work with just our own creativity and imagination to come up with a pitch idea.


Tuesday 2 July 2013

Lyric analysis and their importance


Most music videos contain a narrative. Usually the lyrics within the song are used to either reflect or help enhance the emotions conveyed in the narrative; this is why analysing lyrics is important. Without looking at the lyrics before planning out and pitching a music video idea, your vision and lyrics could clash and not complement each other.

According to Goodwin's theory, the lyrics and the visuals should match at some points. Looking back at music videos that i have analysed, I have noticed this and it has made me think about the lyrics to our own song and how we can incorporate Goodwin's theory of the relationship between the lyrics and visuals and execute it in our final video.

Monday 1 July 2013

Magazine advertisement 2



Media Language: the biggest text on the advert is the date of the album 'Out 11th Jan' telling people that it is going to be out on this day, preparing people to be able to buy it; and the name of the band 'all time low' this tells the audience of the band and could attract new audience. this are the two most important pieces of information the next biggest text on the advertisement is the album name. this is located under the band name so naturally your eyes will lower down the page. The information on the page is the most important bits of information because this is what the general public will see and you need to make this information stick so people will be interested. If there is a lot of information that is unnecessary then the audience wont pay attention to what is needed. the bottom of the poster contains the formats you can buy it on and a website to buy a physical copy online. his will help boost sales because people now don't need to leave their home to purchase the item.

Representation: the bright colours at the top of the advert connote an upbeat and lively album while the band name being held up by tape connotes that they are down to earth and still thinking about their early days of playing when they were unsigned and focusing on the music rather than their fame. the use of the black at the bottom makes the information stand out and it complements the bright colours above. No members of the band are shown which shows that they are more focused on the music rather than the look of the band.

Institution: the website for the band are at the bottom of the advertisement. this allows the audience to explore the band and find out information about them including  their other albums and up coming dates. this advert was taken from kerrang! which is a magazine that is sold in many public shops and therefor has to be non offensive as children could read it. Using non-offensive advertisements will allow more public coverage as there are less barriers to get past.


Audience: The age range for You me at Six is around teenagers you young adults of all genders. The bands advertisements have been in many magazines such as 'Q' magazine and Kerrang! magazine. Kerrang! is for a younger audience where as Q is for a much older target audience. this tells me that they want to extend the age range of their audience by publicising in many different places. The look of the magazine advert connotes how it is not aimed at a specific gender and the colour almost gives a visual representation of their own music.

Magazine advertisement analysis 1


The advert that I have analysed is for Panic! at the Disco's album 'Pretty Odd'




Media language: The biggest text on the advertisement is the Band's name. This will make it clear that this is who the album is by. Underneath this is the album cover with the album name 'Pretty Odd'. This will tell people what to look out for in stores. The next biggest chunk of text is 'The new album in stores march 24th' which will let people the most vital information for selling the product, when it is available to buy. This is crucial otherwise their sales would be less than expected. Most of the page is covered by the album cover and the name of the band. The rest of the page complements the album cover making it all match and look good together. At the bottom of the poster it features social media links such as their own website and record company and their site. it also talks about the deluxe version available only online and the latest single from the album is mentioned to help boost sales as people who like the single will most like the whole album and buy it, increasing sales.


Representation: The imagery is bright and colourful using pastel colours, giving it more of a vintage look. The use of the flowers and butterflies connotes a calmer, softer rock style of music compared to the last album. In my eyes it reminds me of the 60's/70's with the flower power era. Therefore I feel that he music will be based around this era with more calmer tones. the dark purple and gold complements each other making a good base for the rest of the colourful album art to go on top.


Institution: The record company and additional information on the bottom of the poster allows the audience to look into more detail of the band and the album, and the record company can be searched to see any other artists with the same genre as Panic! at the Disco. There is nothing offensive on this poster and it was shown in the music magazine kerrang! This is sold in shops that anyone can look at, which makes it suitable for children to see.

Audience: the target audience for Panic! at the Disco is around ages 13-25 which is quite wide. As each album had a different overall sound the target audience changes between each. Someone may prefer one album style to another. Magazines such as Kerrang! Which is for a slightly younger audience and NME which is suited for a slightly older audience have reviewed this album and the bands others, this implies that these magazines would have this advert inside one of their issues. As there are no pictures of the members of the band on the advert, this connoted that they are more about the music than their image and want to be taken seriously as a band. From the overall look of the advert the colouring and style would suggest that the marketing for the album is focused on a more stereotypical female audience. Although their target is usually a mix between both genders and their music appeals to both.  
From analysing the advert, I now know what to look for in our own music advert.



Sunday 30 June 2013

Digipack analysis 2

From analysing this Digipack I feel that we could easily make an easy but effective Digipack that is simplistic and black and white.

Digipack analysis 1

From looking at this I feel that I need to make sure that our own Digipack fits a running theme and stands out an fits the Genre.

Saturday 29 June 2013

Notes on what a digipack is and magazine adverticement are and their importance


Digipak research

The Digipak is an alternative style of packaging for CDs and DVDs compared to the well-known jewel case. It’s used frequently with bands for special edition or DVD + CD combo packs and fold out to look more like a book than a basic CD case. Digipaks usually have range of two to six fold out panels that contain pictures, discs and a place to contain booklets or a poster.

For our Digipak we plan to create four pages that carry the same themes, style and shots that will be used in our music video and our advertisement. This will make our products have a uniform and that the market will know that they are all associated with each other.

Digipaks are also environmentally friendly and are usually made out of various recycled materials.


Although Digipaks are made of other materials than plastic, it won’t crack. However, the plastic teeth that you would find on a jewel case are still used in Digipaks and are very likely to get damaged and won’t hold the disc safely.

They are important as they are a modern way to sell the product in a more exciting way.


Examples of Digipaks



  

Magazine adverticement research

A magazine advertisement is to help promote the artist and make the product sell; this is usually a single, album or upcoming tour. When one product is being sold, it will link to the others making them sell also, for example; when an artist is doing a tour which is by the name of their album, it’ll automatically make the audience want to buy the album so they know what they will be going to see. The Artist P!nk has done this by touring ‘the truth about love tour’ which is also the same name of her latest album.
The magazine advert will also have similar images throughout for example, the tour advert using pictures from the same shoot as the album. Most artists and record companies will do this to show that it is part of a set and will want to make the audience buy more products.
Here is the cover for the album ‘the truth about love’ on the left and on the right is the advert for the tour of the same name. as you can see, the picture of P!nk is the same on both.


Both Digipaks and advertisements are important because they sell the product that the record company are producing. When we create our advertisement and Digipak we shall make it have a running photo theme and make them complement each other.

Friday 28 June 2013

notes on Cultural effects model and how it applied to a music video

If the same media messages are repeated often enough they will be accepted as fact. However, audience members can resist these messages.

The cultivation effects model also suggests that the audience are active and can 'decode' messages in media texts in a number of ways. People’s responses are affected by their social background.

There can be different types of readings: dominant, negotiated and oppositional.
We need to make our music video memorable all the while making it so that no one forgets the name of the song and the artist.


Using the cultural effects model, this will help us as we can use it to make the artist look like he has a star quality or makes him 'the good guy'. Cultural effects model makes the audience think what the producer wants them to think.




Here is a music video of the Katy Perry video 'Last Friday Night' as you can see it’s a party style setting and a lot of alcohol is being shown and drunk. Also the lyrics depict a scenario where they have drunk so much that her house is a mess, she can't remember much from the night before and has done many acts without thinking about the consequences. This high amount of drinking and the events occurring is being exposed to younger audiences, giving them the perception of it being normal and giving them a false reality of drinking without them knowing about the consequences and effects of it; making the audience think that drinking excessive amounts of alcohol is just a regular occurrence, and should be done every weekend.


From this, I feel that we need to stay clear of sending out wrong messages in our music video and have a lower amount of exposure to drinking and other mature themes.

Thursday 27 June 2013

The importance of lip syncing

Lip syncing is crucial in a music video. It gives the artist screen time and helps them achieve star appeal. However if lip syncing is done badly, it can really change the effect of the video. If performed well it can make a whole music video come together.





This is a music video that contains a lot of lip syncing and shows that it is a tricky thing to do and we have decided that w shouldn't use much as it could take away the quality of the music video if the lip syncing is not good.

Wednesday 26 June 2013

Indepth analysis of 2 Videos from your chosen Genre




The Characteristics for the genre
The genre for this band is Indie rock a lot of the music videos contain narrative in this genre and there is less of a narrative in this video however it is still apparent. for this genre, the use of party locations and fairy lights are seen in many videos.



Relationships between the lyrics and the visual
In the music video, you see the lyrics of the song appear on a television screen. you also people kissing and hugging which relates to the name of the song 'closer' and the line 'I want you close'



Relationships between the music and the visual
People within the big party shots are dancing to the beat of the music, the shots cut on the beat also and during the bridge of the song, the shots slow down as the style of music changes.




Close ups of artists 
There are many shots of the artists close up in the shots. throughout the video, most of the shots are both girls and some are single shots the the artists.




Reference to the treatment of the female body 
ladies do appear in the music video but are not dressed in provocative clothing. however they are seen in fairly intimate situations along with many other people in the video.









Characteristic for the genre
The genre for the artist is said to be electro or pop whereas the genre for the song 'royals' is minimalist pop. There is a slight narrative between the two boxer characters but it is not very clear.







Relationships between the lyrics and the visual
The lyric 'It don't run in our blood' from the chorus is sung and then a shot of one of the boxers with a bloody face and mirror.




Relationships between the music and the visual
The shots are cut onto the beat of the music and seems to be on the beat throughout the music video.


Close ups of artist
There are many shots of the artist in this music video, some include lipsyncing and some just include her looking at the camera.




Reference to the treatment of the female body
The only female in the music video is the artist and she is not wearing provocative clothing or used for male gaze in any way.


This has helped me understand what the genres of our own music video contain, now we can use these to work on our music video.



Research into music videos looking at the seven codes of Goodwin's theory - The Wombats: Kill the Director 14


Research into music videos looking at the seven codes of Goodwin's theory - Gwen Stefani: What you waiting for (2004) 14



Tuesday 25 June 2013

Andrew Goodwin's Seven codes of convention


  1. Music videos demonstrate certain characteristics depending on the genre. For instance many metal bands have a lot of performance in their music videos where as pop music videos have various dance routines. The music video for slipknot's 'Psychosocial' is a perfect example for the metal genre where as Britney Spears' music video for 'Hit me baby one more time' shows the pop genre well






2. Relationships are shown between the lyrics and the visual. This is where the lyrics in the song match the visual of the music video, this can be shown in Bruno mars, 'Just the way you are' as in the song he sings about 'her eyes' and they are shown on screen at the same time





3. Relationships are shown between the music and visual. This is where the rhythm or sound of the music is acknowledged in the music video,this is usually shown where the cuts in the music video match the timing of the beats in the son. this can be shown in the Paramore music video for 'Anklebiters' at the beginning where the cuts match the sound of the drumsticks and throughout the rest of the song.




4.The record company often have certain demands, close-ups of the artist is the most common demand shown in many videos, Here is a collage from various music videos of close-ups.




5.Iconography and motifs are used in the music video that appear in the artists other videos. Gorrillaz do this well as they have cartoon 'alter-egos' of themselves in many of their music videos.





6.Frequent reference to the treatment of the female body. This is where artists have people in their music video, which are usually feamale and sometimes the artist themselves and are shown in a provocative way. this could be from being scantily clad, or shots in the music video emphasizing certain body parts on ladies. a video showing this is Robbie Williams' Radio



7. Intertextuality. This is where a music video will have a reference to another music video, film or television show. This can be shown by paying homage and recreating it or even having clips of the reference in the music video. A good representation of this is All time low's music video


From looking at these codes of convention, I shall make sure that for my music video I have at least five of the seven codes in it to achieve the best grade possible.

Independant learning - Music video fact sheet


The purpose of a music video is to sell, especially the song in the video and also the album. If the song is in a soundtrack then it is also used to sell the film. Other parts of promotion include tours of the band and merchandise such as clothing. 

Music videos give the audience full access to what they can buy as the audience is able to hear the song. Before the digital age, it was harder to listen to the song and could only listen to it at specified times on weekly television chart shows such as top of the pops 1964-2006.

Now we can upload videos to video hosting sites such as YouTube and can be watched on portable media devices such as apple products.

Technologies are problematic for the music industry because audiences are less inclined to buy psychical CDs because it’s all online for free.  Record companies tried to prosecute uploaded videos for copyright infringement but it was too time consuming and expensive. Most companies allow their songs online under controlled conditions. Most record companies have their own YouTube channel and offer links to their iTunes so songs can be downloaded legally. Individual artists also usually have their own channel which links to their social websites such as Facebook. Television shows such as X factor have their own YouTube channels to view performances and have links to legally download their versions of the songs.

Vevo is a hosting site that is for specifically for music videos and is used on YouTube. YouTube and Google both receive a share of advertising revenue because they are directing users to the official versions of music videos.


The Conventions of music video

Movement is crucial to a music video; it complements the rhythm of the song. This can be done by psychically moving the camera or moving and dancing or by editing. Music videos have many shots being less than a second long and flashing lights. Special effects are used to complement the music and visuals.

A music video may have a narrative. The storyline may relate to the song’s lyrics and illustrate what is being said or tell a different story and be independent from the lyrics. Other videos may include more explicit narratives and have closely linked lyrics.

Most videos feature the band or the artist as they are also a product to be sold. They could be featured performing by lip syncing or playing instruments or featured acting or a combination of both    

Producers play with conventions, references can be made to the genre and to other videos, this is called intertextuality. This is done by copying scenes from something else. However, references can be more obscure for example; My chemical romance’s ‘teenagers’ features ‘alternative’ cheerleaders which are in reference to Nirvana’s ‘Smells like teen spirit’ which the fans of My Chemical Romance will most likely be familiar to Nirvanas iconic video.

These are notes taken from a work sheet about music videos and the media. This has helped me to fully understand the is to be put and done about the music video to ensure a product as close to a professional music video as possible.

Monday 24 June 2013

Initial ideas on our music video


This mind map has helped me to have a basic foundation to start on the music video. I have looked into the basic styles and settings of where the music video should be located and what fits within each genre. From this, I now know the guidelines that we have to follow, and how to create a professional looking music video that would be played on a music channel, or video sharing site such as YouTube.

Music artist poster

This is a billboard for Beyonce's album. The colours are neutral and classy with a picture of herself on the side. Her name and the album name are in bigger fonts which are so that if you are driving past that they will catch you eye first. I feel that as she is a very successful artist, she is almost guaranteed sales and will not need to use bright eye catching colours because of her fame as it also goes against her style.
This is a poster for Paramore's new album titled 'Paramore' for their poster they have mentioned their single which is used to bring in more sales as people who liked their single but do not know much else of the band can get the new album to try out new music as they already know they like one song on there. At the bottom of the poster they have the album art which brings the colour to the poster as it is mostly black. This gives the poster an eye catching appeal, which I feel goes well with the style of the artist and band. 

This is a poster for the Album 'The truth about Love' by the artist P!nk. It’s bright and goes with the tone of the artist and album. It contains the album cover and the artist which will be eye catching to passersby. 


All three advertisements contain the artist/band, the title and date of the album realised. We will make sure that we will consider these when we work on our advertisement. And we will make sure that it fits to the style and genre of the artist and album.

Sunday 23 June 2013

Magazine Advertisements

This is from the September edition of Q magazine. From looking at the adverts inside, I've noticed lots of phone adverts, especially telling the reader about the music playing function.  found that there were more adverts for playing music rather than the music itself.







On the back of the magazine it had an album advert. This is for the album 'Home'  it is simple but effective, it shows you the name of the artist, the album name and when it is being released. It also has a line from a review that the album has received and many other star ratings.in the bottom left corner it has the website and a hash tag name which is what the artist will use to promote the album.

looking at this has helped me see what we need to do for our own magazine advertisement.

Other students music videos





This music video has a narrative about a couple, I feel that they could of had some shots which would have explained their current situation as it only contained shots of them in the present where they are all gloomy and shots of the past when they are happy. The audience have no clue on how they got this predicament. If they had a shot or two that would of explained this, I feel that the audience would have gained more attachment to the couple in the video and made the video more powerful.

Transitions were used in the way a generic music video would have them, they included cuts and fades, however I felt that some of the fades, were overlapping too much which made the video hard to watch as you were seeing three scenes at once. A brilliant use of cuts where the two characters were shown as the camera panned round them jumping from person to person. I thought that this was really effective and it also was in time with the music.

The mise en scene within the music video was good as the naturalistic lighting in the gloomier scenes created a wonderful contrast of the high key lighting of the flashback shots, connoting how the flashbacks were happier times. The use of costume works well with this also as colourful clothing was used in the flashback shots and black and white clothes were used in the other shots.

The camera work was pretty good, some shots had bad framing and was a little shaky at times but all in all it was pretty god for the music video. At the end of the video there were credits. This was not needed and although it was done in an artistic way of a time lapse of the beach, they could have used that time to add in some of those extra shots I mentioned before.

To analyse this using Goodwin's theory, I can tell you that there was not treatment of the female body, good relationships with the music an visuals, good relationships with the lyrics and visuals and there were close-ups of the artist - in this case, the characters in the narrative- singing.



Analysing other student music videos will help us to understand what to do and what not to do.

Saturday 22 June 2013

The purpose of a music video

Music videos are used as a promotion tool for the record and the artist to make more money.

Realising a music video also creates buzz around the song, making people listen to it more, promotes the album as people will become interested because of the music video.

The music video is also for entertainment purposes as it gives the audience a visual to enjoy while listening to the song.

Along with the visual, it gives the artist a chance to boost their 'star image' as many videos show them performing to lots of people, giving them a visual of looking like huge celebrities. In some cases, this is an over exaggeration to the actual artists use this to boost their image in hopes to get a real image that looks like this.

Product placement is used in many videos to advertise products which have payed the record company to use. this is shown here in the music video for Lady Gaga's 'Telephone' as she is seen with diet coke cans in her hair


Many music videos have a narrative. This is ususally becasuse many songs have a narrative in them, music videos include the lyrics by having a relationship the lyrics and the visuals
this can be shown in David bowie's 'China Girl' as the afore mentioned girl is shown with Bowie in the video.





Some music videos are for songs on a film soundtrack, therefore by using clips from the film, it is not only promoting the artist but also the film the song is in. this can be shown in Paramore's song 'Decode' as it was on the Twilight (2008) Soundtrack




The basic structure for a music video is to 4 miniutes, however some last longer and have a story or narrative with them. This is shown in the music video for Gwen stephani's 'What you waiting for'



Music videos contain elements
Thematic – means that within the music video, there is a theme running through it which is noticeable
Symbolic – this means that there are placed symbols for the audience to analyse. This can often me mixed with hidden messages within music videos.

Friday 21 June 2013

Music Video History

1920

This was the marking of the early example of the music video.


St Louis Blues by Bessie Smith was realised in 1929, this was a two reel short which was shown in theatres until 1932. This 'music video' was basically a dramatized performance of the song


1930

In this era, Disney created 'silly symphony' which is a cartoon series where music was played throughout, a lot like fantasia but with more of the narrative

 Warner brothers also realised, 'Loony Toons Merry melodies' which was more or less the same concept as 'Silly Symphony'

 Here are examples of both shows.

 Silly symphony


 

'Merry Melodies'


 

1940
Disney realised fantasia which was an orchestra who played various pieces of classical music and the animators created cartoons to fit the music. The most well-known piece form this is 'the Sorcerer's apprentice'


1950

Minnie the moocher by Cab Calloway realised the first live action musical short which would have been classed in this time as a music video.

 
1960

Started in France, Scopitone jukeboxes came into fashion; however they were heavy and very expensive so they were usually seen in big establishments.

In 1964, The Beatles created a motion picture called 'Hard Day's Night' where they spend a lot of the movie running from girls while their music is playing over the top.

When this was realised another similar concept from America emerged in 1966-68 called 'the monkees' which was a television show about the band of the same name. The idea was most definitely taken from the Beatles you can see similarities throughout.

The Beatles then made films for 'Strawberry Fields forever' and 'Penny lane' however looking at what we consider music videos for nowadays, these would not class as them.

These are considered 'Landmark films' as they were the first purpose made concept videos. They used various techniques from films from the era which was a very psychedelic period.

In 1966, Bob Dylan performed Subterranean Homesick Blues with its own concept video of someone holding up the lyrics to the song. This is a very iconic piece and there have been many parodies of this.


 
The Modern Era

Modern music video appeared in this era, video recording and editing because more developed and more effects such as Chroma key and high quality colour came on the scene.

Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen was the very first Music video that was created which fits the purpose of today’s definition of a music video. It started a new era for music videos as it was all shot and edited on a video tape and was used to promote the song effectively.



1970

In the 70's, Top of the Pops started on the television and started to promote singles. The producers of the show would place strict limits on the number of videos that would have been shown on their show. They also had a system when a band couldn't play for them or there was no footage at all, they would use their on-site dance troupes such as the well-known 'Pan's People'.


 


1980

In 1981 MTV was launched and the first ever video to be shown was Bugles 'Video Killed the Radio Star' which was very fitting. This was the very first 24 hour television station.
.

 


the early to mid 80's more sophisticated effects and narrative became more apparent in music videos, a great example of this is in 1983 when Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' Came out and taking the term music video to a whole new level.


 
The music video has credits, voiceovers and acting, it was nothing like any mother music video seen before.

The music video cost $500,000 to make and was directed by John Landis.

1985 was the year that Vh1 was released, it was for an older demographic than MTV.

In 1986, the chart show was shown on channel four which helped gain more publicity and competition between artists and their music.

During this time, Dire Straits released 'Money for nothing' which was an international hit which used computer animation in its music video which was the first music video to do this ever helping it boost its popularity. It also include intertextuality to MTV as shown as the animations are watching the artist on MTV


 
Also in 1986, Peter Gabriel realised 'Sledgehammer' which was the first stop motion music video to be produced by Aardman animation.


 
In the 80's, Top of the pops played before the watershed, so many records caused some controversy to boost sales by making songs or videos too rude for television at that time of the night.

Three examples of this is Duran Duran 'Girls on film’, Frankie Goes to Hollywood 'Relax' and Grandmaster Flash 'White lines'

During the 80's music videos became a bit of a competition on who could spend the most amount of money. An expensive video example of this is Duran Duran 'Wild boys'


 

1990


In November if 92, MTV started to list the director along with the artist and song credits at the beginning of their videos.

Directors such as Spike Jones and Chris Cunningham started off directing music videos then moved onto feature film.


In 1995, Michael and Janet Jackson released their video for 'Scream' which to this date is the most expensive video ever made. It cost $7,000,000


 

During this time, MTV has gone global with various stations such as MTV Brazil.


2000

From 1999 to 2001, Napster was released. Napster was a peer to peer file sharing service which enabled people to share files including songs and music videos.

In 2001 ITunes was initially realised and in 2005, Videos was able to be bought and shown on the apple devices.

In 2002 Madonna almost beat the record of most expensive music video with her video 'Die another day'

This cost $6,000,000 to make as it is a complex video which is shot to look like a James Bond film.


 
At this time, reality TV became more and more popular, therefore a lot of MTV's channels decided to abandon showing music videos


2005

This was the year that YouTube was launched. This revolutionised the way we saw music videos and gave so many artists success through their site. The band 'Ok Go' has gain a lot of success from YouTube as their early videos were very simple and effective as they got lots of views online. Here is the video for 'Here it goes again' this was a simple idea for a music video and the band made a lot of success through putting the videos on YouTube.


 

2007

In 2007, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) issued letters to YouTube users to prevent single users from sharing videos for free. Now YouTube has to pay royalties to the RIAA for the music videos on their site.


2009

Vevo was launched which is a site that works alongside YouTube to show music videos legally, gaining royalties for the record companies.


2010

In this year, MTV finally dropped their 'Music Television' slogan from all their channels as they now show more reality TV shows than music.

Knowing about the history of music videos has given me an insight of the highlights of the music videos through the ages. This will help me to decide what I should do for my music video to make it the most commercially successful.

Thursday 20 June 2013

Textual analysis and Goodwin's theory - Paramore

The song that I have chosen to analyse is Pararmore's song 'Crush Crush Crush'


The Characteristics for the genre

The characteristics for the band changed between album, the song that this album comes from is there second album which I would say is classed as a rock or alternative genre. Their first album is considered Punk, their third Pop-Rock or Pop-Punk and their fourth is of the pop genre. The music in this genre has more of a performance aspect rather than a narrative, however Paramore's music videos usually change with a mix of narrative and performance, heavily performance on some while heavily containing narrative on others.  In this video it is more performance based and has hardly any narrative. They have lots of shots of the band as a whole and lots more of the lead singer, Hayley Williams and shots of the other members of the band. The music of the band has a very strong drum beat which is uncommon for bands of this genre and are usually kept quieter.





Relationships between the lyrics and the visual
The lyrics talk about someone always looking at the person who is singing which could be the singer of the band or another person in general. Some shots of the music video are seen through binoculars or telescopes, matching up to the line 'I've noticed your eyes are always glued to me keeping them here and it makes no sense at all' at the lyric 'One too' The singer uses her fingers to give a visual of the lyrics.



Relationships between the music and the visual

You can tell that the band are playing the song in the music video as the drum beats match up to the music almost giving a live performance aspect to the song. All the shots are cut to be at the same time of the beat in the music. This can be really seen well in the song lyric section 'Rock and roll baby don't you know that were all alone now...'






Close ups of the front woman
Lots of close ups are of the lead singer along with many mid and long shots of her with the band in the background. Other shots include some characters using telescopes and binoculars to look at her.







Iconography. a theme that runs through their videos

Every video of theirs contains close-ups of Hayley Williams, the front woman, and the whole band performing either in an acting role or a musical role. Hayley's colourful hair is a trait of the band and is well known for it. as you can see in this video she have bright red and blonde hair.

Reference to the treatment female body

The only reference to the female body in this video is the front woman, Hayley Williams.

However she is not scantily clad and is wearing casual punk rock clothing.


Textual analysis and Goodwin's theory - P!nk

The music video I have decided to analyse is P!nks music video for 'So What'




The Characteristics for the genre
The genre for the artist P!nk is Pop-Punk with some songs more mellow and some even R&B especially in her earlier work. The album that this song is from has more of a rock feel to it. This genre usually consists of performance and narrative which is what this music video contains.  



Relationships between the lyrics and the visual
During the lyric 'I'm just fine' She is seen to be crying showing that she is not alright. This is a juxtaposition making the music video have meaning and complementing the song. The lyrics 'The waiter just took my table' she is seen at the bar of a restaurant. This is showing the narrative that lies in the lyrics of the song. 







Relationships between the music and the visual
The shots in the music video change on the beats and keep the music video fast paced and full of energy. During the performance shots at the end, the flames go off to the beat as well making the music and the visual match up in sync, giving it a good relationship.





Close ups of the front woman
There are lots of close-ups of P!nk as she is the artist. Almost every shot is of her doing something where it be performing, in front of cameras or in character and Chopping down the tree with her and her ex's name carved onto it. There are also some shots of her in front of cameras and a crowd showing that she has a lot of star quality and is seemed to be a well known woman.








Iconography. A theme that runs through their videos
Humour appears a lot in P!nks music videos. For instance in this video she is show with her hair on fire and in the music video for 'True Love' she is show to be running away from a giant pig.


(Taken from 'True Love')




Reference to the treatment female body
There are shots of P!nk with men and women all in their underwear having a pillow fight, I would say that this is the only part of the music video where there is treatment of the female body. There is also another shot of her being nude in front of the paparazzi which could also be classed as a reference to the treatment to the female body even though it is done for a humorous effect.




Looking at different music videos has helped as we can look at what is included in these and see what we could use in our own.