Theory - Representation

Below is a Slide Share summarising the key aspects of Representation Theory. 
 
Throughout the course I will be using theory and applying to my work. This post will be updated as I work to show how I apply theory to my decisions when making my music video.

Conventions: Form

When researching music videos and planning my own, I started to look at the typical conventions of music videos. I have research this heavily as I feel knowing the conventions of a music video will help me greatly when deciding what shots to do and how to make my product look more professional. Specific genres do however break these conventions such as the genre I will be focusing on, Indie. They break conventions to create an original or new look to the video, it also adds a unique style, and personally I will most probably break conventions but I feel like I still need to know what the conventions are to ensure I do not twist them to far or break a convention that would help me out when producing my video.

The general conventions of a music video across most if not all genres are:

• Artist being featured
• Performance (Differs depending on genre) 
• Close-ups of artists or the narrative focus
• Shot length is often short, but is dependent on the beat of the song
• Rhythmic editing
• Mise-en-scene: Locations, costume and props change frequently
• Cinematography: establishing-shots, mid-shots, low and high angles, high amounts of camera movement, close-ups etc.
• A narrative,pure abstract, or performance, many videos feature more than one
• Editing is fast paced, and is often more interesting than cuts for example fades, slow motion etc.  
• Most videos offer no other sound but non-diegetic sound of the song, however sound breaks are used rarely depending on the artist. 

Planning and Research - Mood board

I created a mood board to reflect the feel and look I want for my music video. I have chosen all black and white image, and some with colour splash as I feel that my video will look better and reflect the lyrics better in black and white. The images I chose that have colour splash is an idea I like and I would like to slowly add colour into the music video towards the end of the song. This may give the video a more abstract feel which is what I would like. Blurred images also feature and I would like to have similar imagery at the start of my music video and slowly focus the shot. Other images just show the look that I want to acheieve in the video.

Conventions: Genre

Audience Research (Music Videos)

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50 Word Treatment.

50 Word Treatment

An abstract based narrative featuring slow-motion, black and white colour scheme, split screen edits and large amounts of editing to the beat and a performance element. The narrative is a flashback break up that is performed through lip sync by the male in the bedroom and living room.  

The History and Development of Music Videos.