Camera angles:

Low Angle:

When shooting a music video, the specific camera angle, called the low angle is deliberately done and used to show the artist and talent off in a certain way, a low angle with show dominance and power, over everyone else, as the camera will be low down looking up at the talent, it will show the talent to be in control, in command and also the low angle will be done to try and sell the artist, by giving the artist a certain dominant feel, it will engage with their audience, or also gain a further and wider audience share.

The song 99 problems by Jay Z, uses a variety of the camera angles and movements, they use the low angle frequently, particularly at the beginning when introducing the artist and the song, they use the low angle to show to the audience that the talent is the main focus, showing and portraying his dominance and power to others around him and the audience watching him. They also persistently use a track away in this video, a track away is common in rap music videos, showing the talent is in control and has the power as they are walking at their own pace towards the camera.

High Angle:

This is the opposite to a low angle, unlike a low angle that shows power, a high angle will show the artist in a different way, this could be showing the artist is weaker, or possibly unstable, it could be used in a music video that is showing the artist or the talent is drunk, or has taken drugs, it can be used to show the talent having a breakdown, these are reasons why the high angle would be used in a music video.

Canted Angle (Tilt)

A Canted Angle is also known as a Dutch angle, this means that the canted angle is where the camera is tilted to one side, they use it as an effect, to make it edgy, this makes the artist look edgy in the video, it can set the mood for he video because it shows that it is different, you can tilt in editing, but by tilting the camera, it looks smoother.

Camera movements:

Handheld camera:
The handheld camera movement can possibly be used to create a sense of a live performance feel, as audiences do not buy music anymore, one of the main sources of profit for the artist is money from their live performances, the handheld camera movement will give off the sense to the audience that they are in the moment with the artist/band.
The handheld camera movement can also be used to make the artist or band, depending on which, seem edgy, or dynamic, as the handheld camera movement is unsteady and always moving, so it can give off the felling of instability, depending on the music video. The handheld camera can also be used to show distress, because the camera is not steady.

Arc shot:
The arc shot can give a sense of dizziness, like the talent is spinning out of control, however, it will be main,y used to show that the shot is revolving around the artist, this is because this shot will be filmed by the cameraman who would be moving around the artist or talent, as they perform.


Track away:

The definition of a track away is when the camera moves away from the artist or talent, it is used to show the artist walking towards the camera as it tracks away. They will do this by placing the camera on a dolly and then they can move it back and forward smoothly.

By doing this, it creates the feeling that the artist in full control, as they are dominating the image, as they are aggressively walking towards the camera, showing power also.




Dolly In:
A Dolly In is used in music videos to show the camera is moving in towards the artist, it is the opposite to a track away, a dolly in is used for a certain dramatic effect.

Crash Zoom:
A crash zoom is another camera movement, it is used by the camera operator who will use it to zoom in to the artist at a fast pace, it is done by zooming in on the camera, they use the crash zoom because it can suggest realism, or a possible intensity, as the shot has changed and zoomed quickly in to the artists face.


Birds Eye View:
This is a shot from the sky, showing the entire location and all of the subjects and talent that you want to show, it is similar to an establishing shot, as the birds eye view will similarly show off he location to the audience, allowing them to understand where the music video is and by showing the talent, it shows where the artist and talent are in the music video at the start. It is usually used at the beginning of the video, showing the setting or at the end, concluding the video.

Cutting to the Beat:

Cutting to the beat is an editing technique that is used in music videos, it is done to cut the visuals to the important part of the backing track (audio) to make more interesting and appealing to the target audience, when you are cutting to the beat, it will ensure that the music video will be quicker paced and faster making the audience enjoy it more and feel more involved in watching it, wanting to watch more when they are watching the video on YouTube or if the editor does not use this technique at all, there is a possible chance that it will look predictable and boring for the audience.

I will be comparing the music video that I helped make in the summer, with the beat edit for the song 'Turn Down For What'.

This here is the first 31 seconds of the song 'Turn Down For What.'
To start creating the beat edit, I first had to download the original track from YouTube and then placing it in to Final Cut Pro. I had to go through the part of the song that I would be using, which in this case was roughly about 30 seconds, I listened to the first 30 seconds of the song and marked all of the points to where there was a beat in the song, to mark all the parts of the song with a beat, I would press the M key and it would mark the point, this is helpful because it allowed me to see straight away where to cut the song and know where to place a knew cut of another shot, this allowed me to cut to the beat.

The song has a fast dynamic feel to it, as it is a dance track,  meaning that there are many more beats in the track to cut to, meaning that a track like this must have beat editing, this is because of the fast tempo, it needs to be matched by quicker and faster cuts to entertain the audience, as all the audience really want is true entertainment, rather than wanting to think about the track in any way.


Lip Synching:
Lip Synching is a very common convention used in music videos, particularly in hip hop music videos, this is for many reasons, but for one, it is because the artist wants to interact with their audience and they want their audience to interact with them to feel involved in the video with them, also, it allows the artist to show that they have the power. It is also common because the artist can show off more of their talent and more skills, so a Hip Hop artist, can show that they can dance and sing within their videos, this can also gain them further viewers and a wider audience share.

I will now be talking about beat editing and lip synching within the music video that was created over the summer, that I was involved in, using the song Thunderstruck, by ACDC.

Beat Editing:
There were many differences between this video and the previous video. There were many mistakes made in this video. Firstly, the location was not correct, as it did not look like a professional music video, as it was only one room, it limited space and was not realistic. There were also not enough camera shots, movements and angles used within the music video. In a proper professional music video, there would be different angles such as a canted angle, or a low or high shot, there would be different camera movements like tilts, not just close ups, mid shots and long shots, which is what we used. By limiting the camera shots used, it gave us less footage to cut to the beat in the post production editing stage, as we only repeated around the same 5 or 6 shots throughout the entire minute, however, we did use cutting to the beat within the music video, but it was not frequent and on a regular basis, mainly because of the limited camera shots taken. This means that is would be boring and definitely predictable for the audience as they are watching, because they can guess what shot is next and probably guess correctly.
In a music video, particularly a rock video, the audience would expect to see the instruments played, through different angles and movements, to be focusing on the instrument that is playing, like a set of drums and with a song like this, other band members were needed to capture the realism, so when we cut to the beat, we were cutting to the same person over and over again, so it became boring for the audience.


Lip Synching:
As already covered, lip synching is important for the artist because it shows that they are in control and also it sells them more and it immediately makes the video more interesting and entertaining for the audience. In our summer music video, lip synching was used at times, meaning that it may have livened up the audience, however, the lip synching was not a frequent occurrence in the video and appeared half way through, by then the audience may have already lost interest with the video because of it's repetitive cutting to the beat.

Artist name - H Dot:

1)

First, I researched where to find my artist and I found the website, Unsigned.com, on this website, I was able to search for the country where the artist is and also I was able to choose the genre of music that I wanted to pick, which I chose was to be Hip-Hop.


2.)

I then had to find out properly whether the artist had a YouTube channel with their own music. I did this and then found out that he did, so this entitled me to contact him via email.

3.) 

I then found the artists email address via the Unsigned website which was already given, so i was able to contact him asking for permission of the use of his work, but also to use him within the music video performing in the video.

4.) I chose the song that I enjoyed the most and thought had the greatest message within it.

Beat Edit

Task 2bii

Performance, Narrative and Conceptual Music Videos:



Performance/ Narrative

 This music video uses a Narrative structure throughout, however, there are elements of a performance in the video also, we can see the performance within the video when the character (the boxer) gets punched off of his feet and in the air he lip sinks along with the track singing a short line - 'Cos I love you lady' The video is shown in a boxing match, however it is really showing the same two people, a married couple watching the boxing match and the same couple are in the boxing ring fighting each other.

We can tell that this music video is a narrative because it is showing relationships, like the couple outside the ring are what their relationship is in front of other people and in company, as they look civilised and happy, however, in the ring, it it showing their relationship behind closed doors, showing that is is an unhappy marriage and possibly and abusive one, but the woman is the abusive half of the marriage, the video also shows that the man, even in the ring, still loves the woman as they kiss in the ring, this may show that fractions of their marriage at times is good and there are happy and loving moments, but they do not occur often, the lighting of the video is low key, however, it is in black and white, this can be interpreted in different ways, it could be interpreted as the past.









Conceptual:

A conceptual music video is very different from a narrative and a performance music video, for one thing, a conceptual music video does not have a narrative story going on through it, a conceptual music video is also unconventional, meaning that it does not use any particular recognised styles throughout that other music videos will use, within a conceptual music video, the artist does not feature in it.

Although this music video is of a conceptual style, the video also involves a performance style to it, this is because there is choreography used for the dancers to dance to. We can see the dancers perform to the camera. The video is also intertextual, this is because the video does not have a narrative and does not follow the specific conventions that the audience would expect to see in a music video, this also shows that the video is conceptual, this is because the artist does not feature in the video and there is no story or narrative occurring throughout.

Task 2b iii

Post modern style:

Homage: Homage is where an artist will show respect or dedication to another artists work, which is usually shown publicly. They are usually paying direct reference, to a real life situation. It is where the artist is trying to promote their own image, this means that the new artist is going to pay tribute to another artists work because they know that by paying respect to another's work will help create their own image.

Parody: A Parody music video is where another usually unknown and upcoming  artist uses a song made by a major artist and copies it, however, the Parody version is one where the other artist will not use the original lyrics, however, they will change the video and put their own idea within it, so the artist making the parody music video is making fun of the original artist and music video for the fun of it. The Parody part of the music video is the exaggeration of the original video by the new artist, making it funny for the audience watching.

This is an example of a Parody music video as the artist has made fun of the original song.





Pastiche: This is where an artist will copy another artists previous work and style of one of their song the other artist created, this is specifically done by record labels and artists because they know that the audience will end up recognizing the new song by comparing it with the other similar song. it is similar to parody in the way that the new song and artist will make another song similar, with the same style as the previous song, however, unlike the parody songs, a pastiche music video is not made to make fun of the artist or video.

This is an example of a Pastiche music video because Miley Cyrus in this video is taking the style of the Sinead O'Conner song which uis called, nothing compare, which was made long before the new song, they know that the audience will reckoning the style and conventions from the wrecking ball music video and associate them with the older song by Sinead O'Conner.





Intertextuality: This is where a music video will use parts of a film from to act as the video for their song.

This is an example of an intertextual music video because the video is for a film, showing the artist in the song and in the video, mixing them both.




Hyper-Reality: Hyper-Reality is where an artist will create a fake image in order to sell themselves better to their audience, by creating a hyper-reality, the artist will broaden their audience and also make more money for their record label and gain further popularity among audiences, the hyper-reality that they create allows the audience to believe in what the artist is selling to them, within the music video, the artist will look perfect and give the impression that they are perfect, persuading the audience to believe in the artists hyper-reality they have created.

Animation: An animated music video will use objects to act as an illusion to the audience within their music video, these objects could be something such as lots of drawings, which will all be put together to be animated. Animation music videos are like a Cartoon movie, there main purpose is make their music video look different to other music videos, giving their music video a unique feel to it, allowing the audience to feel more interested in it and enjoy it more.

2bi - Styles and conventions

Goodwin's Music Theories:

Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - Dream On:

Narrative/ Performance:

 This music video uses a Narrative structure throughout, however, there are elements of a performance in the video also, we can see the performance within the video when the character (the boxer) gets punched off of his feet and in the air he lip sinks along with the track singing a short line - 'Cos I love you lady' The video is shown in a boxing match, however it is really showing the same two people, a married couple watching the boxing match and the same couple are in the boxing ring fighting each other.

We can tell that this music video is a narrative because it is showing relationships, like the couple outside the ring are what their relationship is in front of other people and in company, as they look civilised and happy, however, in the ring, it it showing their relationship behind closed doors, showing that is is an unhappy marriage and possibly and abusive one, but the woman is the abusive half of the marriage, the video also shows that the man, even in the ring, still loves the woman as they kiss in the ring, this may show that fractions of their marriage at times is good and there are happy and loving moments, but they do not occur often, the lighting of the video is low key, however, it is in black and white, this can be interpreted in different ways, it could be interpreted as the past.

Rihanna - Stay ft Mikky Ekko:

Voyeurism:

This music video uses voyeurism this is done by sexualising the star within the video, who is Rihanna, as she is naked in the bath, this is done purposely, they use many close ups, not just on her face, but also on her body, this is an example of voyeurism because this is not something that the audience would get to see and they are showing it off in order to, make the video viral and also to gain further viewers and a larger audience share. There are two stars in this video, Rihanna is the more global star, the other is a male artist, this videos shows the differences with voyeurism in certain music videos, as the male artist is not used and portrayed in the same way that Rihanna is, in terms of voyeurism, a reason for this is because the label will understand that Rihanna is the bigger star and she is what will make the video go viral, by using voyeurism in the way they have done here.





Sia - The Greatest:

Conceptual and Intertextuality:

A conceptual music video is very different from a narrative and a performance music video, for one thing, a conceptual music video does not have a narrative story going on through it, a conceptual music video is also unconventional, meaning that it does not use any particular recognized styles throughout that other music videos will use, within a conceptual music video, the artist does not feature in it.

Although this music video is of a conceptual style, the video also involves a performance style to it, this is because there is choreography used for the dancers to dance to. We can see the dancers perform to the camera. The video is also intertextual, this is because the video does not have a narrative and does not follow the specific conventions that the audience would expect to see in a music video, this also shows that the video is conceptual, this is because the artist does not feature in the video and there is no story or narrative occurring throughout.



Miley Cyrus - Wrecking Ball:

Close Ups:

Close ups are specifically asked for by the record labels in major artists music videos, they are asked for because they help sell the music video and make it go viral, this is because close ups of the major artist are what is appealing for the audience. The record labels insists on close ups because the major artist is who the audience want to see and see more of.