Synopsis

The song i have chosen for my music video is Damien Rice - Cannonball. My video will be an actress having a dream. The video starts with shots of her asleep in a classroom, then the scene will fade out to show a ballet dancer performing a ballet routine - showing the idea that she is dreaming of being a dancer. There will then be shots back an forth showing the girl throughout the day and her dream of dancing, with shots of her face to show emotion within her facial expressions. The song is calming and soothing and this has the same connotations as ballet because it is graceful and beautiful. The song lasts for around 5 minutes.

LIIAR

Language
The language within the album cover and video itself has to be relevant to the intended audience, or to whom they are going to appeal to. The album title and artists name are likely to be relevant to the audience in terms of what words are included and the style of writing. For example, the Black Eyed Peas album covers I have researched appear to have the same modern style of text and often the titles are quite obviously aimed at younger people, such as ‘monkey business’ which is not likely to be aimed at older people as apposed to youths. The language I will be using will be mostly similar to this. Many slang terms and informal words will be included to make it more appealing to young people.





Institution
The type of institution which would employ the work i have created would be that of a music company which is quite successful. Maybe something similar to Sony BMG or Universal. This sort of institution would be ideal because it appeals in the same way that other famous music and videos would come across. Questionnares and other extensive research is important on discovering institution.









Ideology
The ideology for this project is the same as that of other popular artists of today. Mostly I am referring to artists who are currently in the charts, making their music very up to date and modern. This is definitely how I would like mine to be. The main features would be a modern cover with block colours like many others I have researched. It is popular to have the artist on the cover and this may be something else I will consider.













Audience
The audience of my music video would be mainly young people aged around 13-25 who are interested in this sort of music. I will be showing that this is my target audience by my use of strong colour and modern photographs. The album title will be something short and catchy but also probably something associated with slang language because I associate young people with this sort of language.














Representation
My project will be aimed at both male and female audiences and I do not believe it is biased to either sexes. The idea that it is aimed at young people and involving slang language means that what can be included within the project could be limited because the audience is very specific. The general genre of my video is dance, with aspects of RnB also. This is useful in terms of what could be represented in the video and what connotations of dance music could be included, e.g. People dancing, bright lights, etc.

Conventions of an album cover

Album Covers - the idea of a mixture between art and music.

Conventions

typical conventions for an album cover are quite simply the name of the artist, which is often the largest and most eye catching of the album cover, the album title, which again would be rather large, and finally a main image, which often takes up the majority of the back ground. On some occasions the 'Parental Advisory' logo is present in one of the corners. In some ways this logo would appeal to youths who like the music as it would make the album look 'cool'.

Example 1 -Tinchy Stryder - Catch 22

On this album cover, there is a full length photograph of the artist himself, wearing a very well known 'star in the hood' t-shirt. He is also wearing sunglasses and large heavy looking jewellery which is quite typical of a famous RnB artist. The artist name and album title is written is in the font which is always used for this particular artist so people will recognise this. The colours used on the cover are bright colours which mesh well together, the idea that the title is in white means that it stands out and makes it easily noticeable and obvious. The artist appears to be standing on a wave of colour, and the image is repeated many times behind him to give a sort of 'echo' idea. Also, the idea that the artist is a famous person who has earned a lot of money from his music is dressed in casual everyday clothes suggests he is very much down to earth which again would appeal to the audience because the artist can relate to them.

I think this sort of album would appeal to people around the ages of 13-25 and to both sexes. I think this because young males would look to the artist as a role model, whereas the females could be attracted to him.

For my particular music album cover, i will need to design the inside of the cover as it will fold out. Therefore considering the same colour or images is very important.

Example 2 - Black Eyed Peas - The E.N.D

This album cover is a very simple one. It has a plain black background, and the image is a feature from one of their videos. The feature shown is from the video which is for the song 'boom boom pow' where there are modern robotic style faces and people that appear to be in some sort of computer format. Again the artist name and title of the album are written in the style which is always used for this particular artist. It is also written in white which means the writing can be seen very clearly against the other dark colours on the cover. On this occassion the artist, or artists in this case, are not actually shown on the cover, with a group which is so well known, they do not actually need to put their faces on the cover because they are now extremely popular and choose not to have themselves on the cover. Another reason they might not put themselves on the cover is because on some occassions the album will have a theme, and the front cover will usually follow this theme. For this album it suggests the theme is modern and somewhat computerised.

Again i think this album would appeal to most young people, so ages of around 13-25, because of its modern feel and hip hop songs which are very up to date. Th lightening bolts in the title also suggest energy and this leads us to think the songs are energetic and lively, which is another reason it would appeal to young people. I dont think this is aimed at either sex inparticular and it is probably equal as to who would buy it.

Example 3 - Pink - Funhouse

This album cover shown is very typical of the artist. There is again the main image which is of the artist. Pink is known as a very outgoing and individual character, sometimes spelling her stage name with an exclamation mark (P!NK). The image shows her riding a pretend horse which is obviously linked to the title of the album which is 'funhouse'. We can also see that she is not wearing much and she is showing off a few of the many tattoos that she has, showing off her personailty as we know her as a daring and sometimes shocking artist. We know this about her because in some of her songs involve lyrics about drugs and alcohol. This appeals to young people because, in this day and age, many young people drink alcohol etc which means they can relate to her music. She has a feisty expression on her face and her leg is in the air, suggesting fun and excitement. She is not sitting how anyone else would normally sit on a horse. The artist and album title is again written in white so that it stands out from the background. The difference with this artist is that she doesn't have a particular style of writing or colour scheme for her albums like many other artists do.

Song Lyrics

Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling

I gotta feeling...
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night

I'm feeling... (Woohoo)
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night
I feel

Tonight's the night
Let's live it up
I got my money
Let's spend it up
Go out and smash it
Like Oh My God
Jump off that sofa
Let's kick it OFF

I know that we'll have a ball
If we get down
And go out
And just lose it all
I feel, stressed out
I won't let it go
Lets go way out, spaced out
And loosing all control

Fill up my cup
Mazel tov
Look at her dancing
Just take it... OFF
Lets paint the town
We'll shut it down
Let's burn the roof
And then we'll do it again

Lets do it, lets do it, lets do it, lets do it
And do it, and do it
Let's live it up
And do it, and do it, and do it, do it, do it
Lets do it, lets do it, lets do it

Cause I gotta feeling... (WoooHooo)
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night

I'm feeling... (WoooHooo)
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night
I feel

Tonight's the night (HEY!)
Let's live it up (lets live it up)
I got my money (I'm paid)
Lets spend it up (Lets spend it up)
Go out and smash it (Smash it)
Like Oh My God (Like Oh My God)
Jump off that sofa (Come On! )
Lets kick it OFF
Fill up my cup (Drank)
Mazel tov (La chaim)
Look at her dancing (Move it Move it)
Just take it... OFF
Lets paint the town (Paint the town)
We'll shut it down (Shut it down)
Lets burn the roof (Woooooo)
And then we'll do it again

Lets do it, lets do it, lets do it, lets do it
And do it, and do it
Let's live it up
And do it, and do it, and do it, do it, do it
Lets do it, lets do it, lets do it
Do it, do it, do it, do it

Here we come
Here we go
We gotta rock
Easy come
Easy go
Now we on top
Feel the shot
Body rock
Rock it don't stop
Round and round
Up and down
Around the clock

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
Friday, Saturday
Saturday to Sunday

Get, get, get, get, get with us
You know what we say (say)
Party everyday
Party everyday

And I'm feeling (WooHooo)
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night

I gotta feeling (WooHooo)
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good night
That tonight's gonna be a good good night

Woohooo

Target Audience

The Black Eyed Peas (BEP) are an American hip hop band that formed in Los Angeles, California in 1995. The group is made up of vocalist and multi-instrumentalist will.i.am and vocalists apl.de.ap, Taboo, and Fergie. Since 2003 the group's hip hop/dance-oriented style has sold an estimated 29 million albums worldwide and 29 million singles. I will be aiming my music at young people aged around 16-20 because this is the age group which i believe to listen to this sort of hip hop music. The picutre below shows that they use an up to date and upbeat feel in and around their music. This suggests the idea of a fun but cool atmosphere. I will be using the ideas i have collected to create a questionnare which i will be using to get a rough idea of what my video will be like.

Summary Of Music Video Conventions

The conventions of a Music video are often determined by the genre. There are however, more general conventions such as shots of the artist performing, the lyrics of the song influence what is shown in the video and how they dress reflects the mood of the song.

For example, if the video is designed to have a horror theme (eg. Michael Jackson - Thriller) there will be things like dull colours, darkness, eery noises, old fashioned costumes etc.

If the theme for a video was a happy exciting song (eg. Alphabeat -fascination) There would be lots of bright colours, quick shots with modern costumes, happy people etc.

These are just a couple of examples that shows the conventions can often be determined by the genre.












































The above pictures are the album covers which i talked about previously. It is clear that Michael Jackson CD single to the left it of the horror genre due to the costume and colours, whereas the Alphabeat shows a different genre with bright colours on children's building blocks.

Range Of Textual Analysis - Three

Analysis 3

For my final analysis of music videos, I will be looking at the conventions of the rather different video which is Daft Punk – One More Time.

This is different from other videos I have looked at because this one is a cartoon themed video. This could also suggest that it may carry different conventions because of its different format.

The conventions which I have noted from this video include:

Close ups – Within the first minute or so of the video there are close ups of the character singing the song playing, this is fairly typical of a music video.

Slow Motion Establishing Shots – to show where the video is set and to give the audience an idea of what is about to happen.

Dancing – The video shows characters dancing to the music and , although it is not particularly choreographed, this would still be a convention.

Cut to the beat – This is where the camera changes shots in time with the beat of the music. This video does this a lot and keeps in time with the beat.

All of the above pictures are from the music video, they do not have typical conventions because they are in cartoon format.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lH-0s0pRleg

Range Of Textual Analysis - Two

Analysis 2
For my second analysis of Music video’s, I will be looking at the conventions of The Beyonce music video ‘If I were a boy’.

This video includes all the general conventions, such as the lyrics of the song influencing the video, the artist performing etc. These are some of the more particular conventions included:

The Mood of the Song – The song is quite sad, therefore Beyonce’s expression and emotion is shown to emphasise this.

Storyline – This is another video which shows the idea of a story which goes with the song. Matching the story with the lyrics.

Slow motion shots- these are used so the moment can be held for longer to either show significance or just the emotion of that part of the video.

Pauses – again pauses are being used to show parts of the story which cannot be shown without speech.

The above pictures are taken from the music video for ‘If I were a boy’. They show that most of the video is focused on the one solo singer. The majority of the shots are close ups or long shots of the singer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVTyLqkez6A&feature=channel

Range of Textual Analysis - One

Analysis 1

The first video which I will be analysing is Michael Jackson’s Thriller, one of the worlds most well known music videos. The typical conventions which are viewed in this video are quite straightforward:

Use of costume, make up & hair – this makes a huge difference to how the video would look, as this helps to show what they are meant to be.

Close ups of the singer – Most of the video is shot with Michael in the main frame, this is to not only show his importance, but to show his image and style.

Styled to fit the Genre – The video is meant to be like a horror film, this is shown through noticeable conventions such as darkness, somewhat old-fashioned, with lots of dull colours, the only bright colour we see is Michael and that is because the producer would have wanted him to stand out.

Storyline – often in a music video there is a story which matches the song. In some cases the story can only be a couple of minutes long but in this case the video is up to 13 minutes long which is basically a short story.

Pauses – during some videos there are often parts where the music is stopped to explain the story. These pauses are often edited out for radio or album purposes and are only used for the music video itself.

Dancing – More common in old videos, there are sometimes dance routines which are specifically choreographed for the song, this presents more visual entertainment as well as the song itself.

Each of the pictures shown above are clips from the video itself. They show that Michael is the main focus of the video and this is shown to us by the bright red outfit he wears as apposed to all of the other characters in the video wearing dark dull colours.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtyJbIOZjS8

Brief

A Promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with two of the following three options:

• A cover for its release on DVD


• A magazine advertisement for the DVD

History Of Music Videos

A music video is a short film, often with a story, which works in combination with a piece of music or song. The idea of a music video is to promote the sale and the artist by showing off not just their music, but also their image.

Music video began around 1926, when sound films and talkies came about. Short films then began to be produced. The earliest ones were known as shorts, and these could often be up to about 6 minutes long. They were considered the earliest form of music videos.

The early 1930’s brought about the introduction to a series of sing-along cartoons by an animation artist known as Max Fleischer. He also brought about the idea of ‘following the bouncing ball’. Many 1930’s cartoons consisted of musicians performing their songs on camera during the cartoons.

Many of the early Walt Disney films also consisted of music. Some of the Warner Brothers cartoons were based around specific songs from other Warner Brothers musical films. Many other musical shorts were beginning to be shown in theatres.

In the mid-1940’s, a particular musician named Louis Jordan created some short films for his songs, some of which were then put together into a feature film called ‘Lookout Sister’. These are considered the ‘ancestors of music videos’.

The 1940’s also brought about the one-song films called ‘promotional clips’ which were for the Panoram visual Jukebox. These were short films with different musical selections, known as ‘Soundies’. Thousands were made and consisted mostly of musicians, but also comedians and dancers. The Soundie had virtually all of the named jazz performers in them. The Panoram Jukebox had eight three-minute Soundies and became popular in night spots, but faded out during WW2.

Many current music videos have imitated styles used in classic Hollywood musicals which were around in the 1930-1950’s. One example of this is the Michael Jackson video ‘Bad’ where we can see that the dance sequences were clearly influenced by the classic film version of ‘West Side Story.

The Internet Accuracy Project stated that Jiles Perry Richardson, who was also known as ‘The Big Bopper’ was the first to use the phrase ‘music video’ in 1959. It is also clear that the development of music videos was tied with the development of television. This was because it gave new stars the opportunity to be exposed and become known, which attracted an audience to the box office.

One of the earliest performance clips was the film made by The Animals for their hit ‘House of the rising sun’ in 1964. This clip was high quality and filmed in a studio with a specially built set, with the group doing a lip-synched performance of the song and also certain aspects of choreography were involved.

Probably the biggest influence for music videos would be the release of The Beatles film ‘A hard day’s night’ which was released in 1964 and directed by Richard Lester. The film was a black and white mock documentary which consisted of comedy and dialogue sequences combined with exciting musical sequences. These musical sequences gave the basic model for future music videos and promo clips and has even to this day had a huge impact on the style of the genre.

The Beatles then went on to release their second feature ‘Help!’ in 1965. This was a contrast from the first one. This was filmed in colour on international locations. This particular video consisted of many new features such as cross-cutting, contrasting long shots and close-ups, and unusual shots and camera angles. The colour clips for "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane", made in 1967 and directed by Peter Goldman took the film format to a new level. They borrowed techniques including reversed film and slow motion, dramatic lighting, unusual camera angles and color filtering added in post-production. These films were impossible for the group to perform live, but they illustrated the songs in an artful manner rather than trying to just create an ideal performance or a story.

In the UK the Kinks made a video for their single ‘Dead End Street’ in 1966. This became the first real ‘plot’ for a song. They made a miniature comic movie, where there were photo stills from the Great Depression and an uprising dead man. There was no lip sync involved in the clip, but it was edited to suit each phase of the song. The BBC refused to air the video because it was considered to be in ‘poor taste’.

In the late 1970’s, the TV show Top of the Pops began playing music videos, even though the BBC put strict limits as to how many the could actually show on the program. There was then the idea that a good video would increase the sales because the audience would want to see it the following week.

In 1980, David Bowie achieved his first number one in nearly a decade with thanks to the directing of David Mallet and his eye catching promo for ‘Ashes to Ashes’. In 1975, the band Queen told Bruce Gowers to make a video for the single ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ to be aired on Top of the Pops. This video is also noted for being completely shot and edited on videotape.

In 1981, the US video channel MTV was launched. The first video which was ever aired on the channel was ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ by The Buggles, which began the idea of music on television 24 hours a day. By the mid 80’s, music videos proved to be the strongest form of music marketing. Many artists owed a great deal of their success to the construction and appeal of their music videos, in particular artists such as Madonna.

Music videos then began to progress. Artists and their directors then began to explore new styles for their videos, such as using more interesting effects and adding story lines and plots to them. In some cases the artist was not shown in the video and was instead represented, which often linked to the plot or story.

In 1983, the biggest and most successful music video of all time was released. The 14 minute long video for Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’. The video cost $500,000 to produce and set new standards for music videos in general, the video was aired on MTV but was rare because the channel initially considered itself to be a rock music orientated channel. In 1985, MTV launched VH1 which was to feature softer music.

The launch of ‘The Chart Show’ on channel 4 was also considered significant. This program consisted only of music videos, which became where most of them were aired. The show moved to ITV in 1989.

In 1986, Peter Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer" used special effects and colourful techniques. The video went on to be a huge success and win nine MTV Video Music Awards. In 1988, the MTV show 'Yo! MTV Raps' was aired, the show helped to bring hip hop music to a larger audience for the first time.

In 1992 we saw the rise of the directors as credits were starting to become involved with the music videos. It became almost like a competition in terms of who could create and produce the best music video. Michael and Janet Jackson’s video for ‘Scream’ remains the most expensive music video ever produced and cost a massive $7 million.

By the mid-2000s, MTV and many other channels had abandoned showing music videos and began screening reality TV shows more often, which were more popular with its audiences.

2005 was the year when the website YouTube was released, which made the viewing of online video faster and easier. MySpace's video functions, which use similar technology, launched in 2007. Websites like this had a big effect on the viewing of music videos and some artists began to see success as a result of videos which were seen mostly online.