Q1.In what ways does your music

video/digipak/magazine advert, use develop or challenge forms and conventions of real life

media products?

By Ashleigh Norris-Seal and Beam Phromsorn

This year I have been studying music promotion. I worked with a peer, Beam Phromsorn, in order to create a professional looking Music Video, Digipak and Magazine Advert. We created these products to show how genres of music are represented, predominantly in music videos. We have focused on a hybrid of RnB and Pop. There are similar representations portrayed within both genres, along with completely contrasting themes and conventions. We have came to the conclusion that the RnB genre uses neutral and grey-scale tones, along with very basic and plain settings. We feel like we have been able to incorporate the Pop conventions, of bold colours and the use of star power and the focusing of the artist, effectively, producing products, which use representations of both genres.

Our video focuses on the artist expressing her feelings over, what the audiences could interpret as, her ex lover. The video shows flashbacks of times they spent together, contrasting with the sadness and isolation conveyed throughout. The digipak and magazine advert emulates the recurring themes presented in the video, continuing the house style.

PERFORMANCE

Where the artist is singing and dancing in the music video. The performance in the music video can either be a song performance, dance performance or an instrumental performance. Basically, there is no narrative and lacks a story.

Carlsson believed that the performer is often made a commercial exhibitionist where the performer is promoting an item, making fans aspire to be like them.

e.g. Rihanna wearing her own clothing line (anything to do with a brand, e.g. beats)

He also believes that they could be televised bard (singing the lyrics), almost like a singing storyteller to express their inner emotions.

e.g. Rihanna and Eminem, Love the Way you Lie:Singing at the camera, telling the story

The final type is an electric shaman, where the performer is invisible and their voice anchors the visuals.e.g. Ed Sheeran, someone else taking his role

CONCEPTUAL

Carlsson also believed that music videos can also ENCODE a message/belief/idea and show the audience something else other than the artist.

He believes that these types of music videos attempt to have ARTISTIC AMBITIONS, in order to carry different signs and signifiers for the audience to decode, as the meaning may initially be unusual or obsure.

Artistic Ambition- Thematic statement, the message you are trying to get across.Conceptual music video depends on the GENRE of the music video, as the genre can carry many stereotypical

themes for an audience.Basically the genre of music will dictate the themes and content of the music video.

e.g. Heavy metal associated with anger, rap/hip-hop associated with money and wealth.For an audience to understand the concept behind the music video, they will often have to decode elements such as

lighting, editing, icons/symbols, camerawork

Sven E Carlsson: Believes that music videos can be categorised into two different types:

Sven E Carlsson’s theory links with our video in the sense that we use both performance and a concept. Throughout our video, our artist is performing and singing the song, directing it towards the audience. We see our artist as being a ‘Televised Bard’, telling a narrative and expressing her inner feelings. We found this effective and it involves the audience and helps the song to relate to their personal issues. However, we also have abstract themes, appearing within the video. For example, we have a scene of a wolf howling, which underlays the artist singing. We wanted this to be open for the audiences interpretation, but as directors and editors we wanted it to convey a sense of freedom, even though the video is very isolated, it evokes that she is able to release all of the pain that she has been bottling up throughout her relationship. This is an artistic ambition as we are trying to put across a thematic statement.

Andrew Goodwin

GENRE CHARACTERISTICSGoodwin believes that all genres have certain CONVENTIONS that all videos must follow in

order to be identified by the audience.For example, a dance routine is typical for a boy/girl band.

Therefore, music videos can also link to other music or film genres. This is known as INTERTEXTUALITY (when different media products are referencing each other, Iggy Azealia

Fancy video and Clueless)For example, Heavy metal may be influenced by horror films.

 Example: Independent Woman by Destiny’s Child

The intertextual reference isn’t the Charlie’s Angels extracts played it’s the fight scene etc. 

VOYEURISMGoodwin also believes that many music videos portrays men and women seductively (MALE/FEMALE GAZE). However, it is much more common recently for women to be

OBJECTIFIED, rather than men.Voyeurism is often used to sell the artist, and their image, through sex appeal to an often

youthful audience. This is where music videos can often be controversial, as they are selling an adult image to a younger, more impressionable audience.

Sometimes women or men objectify themselves.

Andrew Goodwin

MUSIC VS. VISUALSThere is a succinct relationship between music and visuals.

ILLUSTRATIVE: Music videos can use a set of images to illustrate the meaning of lyrics and genre (this is the most common!)e.g. Taylor Swift, Love Story

AMPLIFY: This is where meanings and effects are manipulated and constantly shown through the music video, in order to persuade the audience.

e.g. Michael Jackson, Earth SongDISJUNCTURE: This is where the meaning of the song is completely ignored.

e.g. where music video does not relate the lyrics, Lady Gaga Applause

RECORD LABEL CONTROLRecord labels often have full CREATIVE CONTROL over an artist and will constantly have

demands over their image.This often means that Record Labels will help create an overall REPRESENTATION for the artist,

create a VISUAL STYLE that will recur throughout their work and often feature CLOSE-UPS in music videos to help promote their image.

The fact that they will be the main focus of the video at that point.

STAR IMAGEOnce the music artist has their own representation, their music promotional material will then

help promote them as the main selling point.The META NARRATIVE is the development of the music artist over time, and how their

image/personality has changed from the beginning of their career.This is extremely important for Pop artists, who will often have an army of ‘fangirls’ who follow

them from the beginning.

Our video links to Goodwin’s idea that all genres have conventions. Our video is both RnB and Pop, and includes themes from both. Our video has very neutral, classy colours. They are basic, which is commonly seen throughout RnB videos. We have one bold colour which appears throughout, red, which links to bright and eye-catching colours used within the Pop genre. Throughout our video, the artist is the main focal point, which is commonly seen throughout pop music videos. Throughout both the pop and RnB genre, the female is subjected to Male Gaze. In our video our artist does wear one revealing costume, however is not meant to appear seductive. Although it ma come across like that, it means we will attract a wider audience, in the way that males may want to watch the video. We are not intentionally trying to sell our music video through sex appeal, but the way it may link to audience’s personal relationships and experiences.Our music video is illustrative. It emulates the lyrics, although there may be a few scenes which are abstract, they still evoke the sense of sadness and loss of love we want to convey. In a way, we have promoted our artist by using close up shots, but this will help audiences to remember her image and what she looks like, and if they have enjoyed our video, may look out for her work in the future. We have used star image to promote our music video. She is the main focal point in the video, and the images we have used on the magazine advert and digipak are of her and her only. There is nothing on the images distracting the audiences attention from the artist, only she can be seen.

Neutral colours, red lips, close up.

Michael Shore

ADOLECENT MALESShore Believes that music videos often used recycled images and

styles that simply appeals to adolescent males and their fantasies of SPEED, POWER, GIRLS & WEALTH.

Occasionally, Shore believes that this can lead to the music videos becoming soft-core pornography with stereotypical

representations.

In a sense, our video could appeal to adolescent males. As we have an attractive female artist, and often appears in revealing costumes, it could draw in a male audience, making it a mass audience.

After looking at Beyoncé's ‘Best Thing I Never Had’, music video, we liked that it was simple in the way that it was just of her before her wedding, reminiscing about the mistakes she made in the past, regarding a boy that didn’t treat her the way she deserved. Although, the song we chose, Rihanna ‘Stay’, wasn’t as upbeat and positive, we liked the idea that she is thinking about her lost love and expressing her inner emotions. This related to Beyonce’s video, just in an opposite way. Beyonce’s video includes home footage from her prom, We liked the idea of the use of home footage, however we decided to use it as if it was from her ex partners point of view, when they were happy. We thought it was effective as it give the audience more of an insight into our artists life and why she is acting the way she is.

Beyonce: ‘Best Thing I Never Had’

Our Music Video- Rihanna: ‘Stay’

To ensure that our music video met the conventions of real media products, during the planning and research tasks, we conducted audience questionnaires to receive feedback on what audiences think should be included in a music video and linked the answers to different genres.Alongside this, during production, we ensured that it was filmed in the studio, so we could control the lighting and background (green/black screen). We used a DSLR camera and a tripod, making it look as professional as possible.

We had to create a script to help us when it came to the filming. We followed most of it, however some of the shots we wanted were a bit ‘ambitious’ therefore we had to change it last minute. It did not effect us too much, as we were able to change ideas and film it efficiently. Other parts we decided, when it came to editing, that they fitted better elsewhere. As we recorded the artist singing the song, in various costumes and positions, it meant we were able to fill in any gaps we may have missed, without it looking repetitive and ‘sloppy’.

Our representation was continued by the use of basic settings, neutral and simple colours and link between all scenes, whether it be the costume, location or lyrics. We knew that the artist would be the iconic image for our products, therefore we wanted her to wear similar colours and costumes throughout, to create an image personal to our products. We wanted her to have all the attention and be the reason audiences are drawn to our video, digipak and magazine advert. We have made her, not seductively, but objectified by male gaze to entice a wider audience range.

We did not use props, except to create a setting. They evoked subliminal messages, for audiences to think about and ponder on. For example, we use two wine bottles in the background of one of our scenes, this has the denotations of alcoholism and trying to escape from reality, where as audiences could connote that its because she’s emotionally unstable, she drinks herself into a state to release her emotion.

We think that my music video has predominantly stuck to the forms and conventions of our chosen genres, RnB and Pop. However, we also agree that it may have challenged some of the themes that would commonly occur in RnB videos, as we do not have any reference to money, cars and “ladies”, but as the song itself is categorised as RnB, it falls under this genre also. We believe that the narrative creates questions and thought throughout audiences, at the same time relates to a lot of people, who have been in love or who are perhaps trying to find love, or have witnessed it happening to someone else.

As we previously asked for permission to use the song, it meant we was able to use the artists name and song name on our digipak and magazine advert. The font I used was found on Adobe Photoshop, which meant it was free to use and was accessible. We used to different fonts, one for the name of the artist, which was feminine and fancy, in contrast with the font used for the name of the song which was very basic and ‘delicate’ looking. We did it like this because we think it represents both genres and the products well. The daintiness of the artists name shows how fragile and beautiful she is, and the font used for the song name emulates her unstable and distant state. The track list numbers are the same font as the artist’s name and the list of songs is the same font as the song name. The backgrounds of the back cover, right inside page and magazine advert, fade from black to white. The typography on the back cover is white, on the right inside page is a black signature and on the magazine advert is black and grey. All of these colours are neutral and conform to the conventions of the RnB genre, with neutral colours and keeping it classy and ‘expensive’ looking. Our front cover and lyrics page was slightly different, both with a black background and a vibrant image. Once again it conforms to the conventions with its neutral colours. The typography on the front cover is a different cover to every other product, although it is consistent with the house style, we wanted it to be more emphasized so people know it is the main part of the digipak. To ensure our digipak looked as professional as possible, we used logos of the companies which helped produce the song (originally) along with a barcode, copyright clause and other logos found on various real products. This was the same for our magazine advertisement, we used social media logos and links, to make the song accessible to audiences, along with star ratings from different music magazines, showing that appeals to a wide audience range.

We decided to use the artist as the main image on each section of the digipak and the magazine advert. We used her predominant costume which was the black slip as it iconic to our artist and theme. It is also slighting more revealing, linking to the male gaze theory, attracting male attention and widening the audience demographic.

Front Cover Back Cover

Right Inside Page Left Inside Page

Magazine Advert

Professional Products which have inspired us:

We liked the neutral colours and the simplicity of the close up and the bracelet. It holds connotations of love and worship.

We liked the long shot and the naturalness of this image. We also liked the idea of two different fonts.