Bella - Dangerously in Love
The above video is the music video which we created. Our group task was to create an r&b music video, which conformed to the generic conventions of other r&b music videos. T ensure that we did this well, we researched into other r&b music videos to widen our knowledge and to also understand the genre conventions so that we could then implement them through our own video. We also researched into our chosen artist, to help us present ours in a way which can be related to our chosen artists (Beyonce Knowles) and also compliment her. We also researched into music channels, to then help us decide which music channel we will show our music video on. We looked into the laws governing censorship, which lead us to the decision of not showing anything which would be censored i.e; nudity and swearing, when considering censorship, we knew that because of the nature of our music video and the song that companies the music video, that we didn't have to show anything which would we seen as explicit. If we did, we would not be conforming well to the r&b/soul music video conventions and our music video would have a much different target audience. Lastly, we produced a questionnaire to outline all the aspects of our music video creation and the showing of our music video, this helped us to make decisions on certain aspects of our music video, for example; which music channel to air our video on.
Throughout the music video we used many different camera shots, to create a better video and to also show the video in different lights and locations, the camera shots were the major aspect of the music video as they make the video look much better, just by showing the artists from different angles, the camera shots also helped the audience to familiarise themselves with the locations and the narrative more.
Below are the camera shots which were used in the music video:
Close up shots
There are many close up shots of the artists and the props throughout our music video, this is to show the importance of the characters and the props and to also show the facial expressions of the characters, helping the audience to make more of a connection with the artist and helping them to sympathise for the artist. With each facial expression, there is a story behind it, which is shown in our music video. These help the audience to see also, when the music video has a sad scene or a happy scene. A sad scene being when she is seen singing in the present day and a happy scene being the artist shown in the flashbacks with her partner.
Two shots - Two shots were used throughout the music video as there are two people in the music video, these being the two important people. The two shots show the relationship between the two people. The two shots are also used to enhance the sadness of the artist when she is then seen crying about her loss. This is because we have seen how happy she once was in comparison with her being sad in the present day.
Hand held - This makes the music video more believable as it shows the man videoing his girlfriend, this conveys their romance and also shows the happiness that their relationship had, through the close up shots when the hand held camera is on each character, showing the happy facial expressions, relating to the happiness of their relationship and their time spent together, this also makes it sadder once the video returns to the artist in her house singing about her lost loved one. This helps the audience to sympathise for the artist. 
Costume - The artist was filmed reminiscing on the beach in a long flowing dress, this relates to her mood and also portrays her elegance and beauty. In comparison, the artist was filmed in her house, wearing baggy clothing, which can be related to her mood as she was once happy, with beautiful elegant clothing and now she is sad, with frumpy and not very stylish clothing.
Locations - The locations include; Park, sea side (beach), bowling, arcades etc. These are all realistic locations, they help the audience to understand the narrative and the artists emotions through the flashbacks. As the locations are realistic, the audience can relate to the artist as they may have been there before with there partners, they can then understand her emotions. Through the locations filmed for the flashbacks of the artist and her love, the relationship between them is shown in greater detail as they are seen enjoying themselves in these locations, i.e, bowling alley and arcades.
Editing styles -
Black and white effect was used to show flashbacks, this helped the audience to stay tuned to the narrative and this also helped them to understand what was happening more. The black and white effects related well to the narrative as they were showing flashbacks, the colour black alone shows the sadness of the flashbacks and also helps the audience to relate to the artists grief and sadness.
Cross dissolves - Cross dissolves were used to keep a constant flow of camera shots, showing a rhyming and making sure the music went with the performance and narrative. The cross dissolve editing style was used frequently throughout our music video to help the scenes and shots blend better together, showing the narrative and concept more clearly.
Goodwins Theory
1. The music video demonstrates genre characteristics through camera shots and editing - the close ups which are used help show the characteristics of the genre. The narrative also helps to build a relationship with the audience. This helps demonstrate the genre characteristics also. Other characteristics of this genre were a good narrative and realistic locations, the music video has many realistic locations and a very good narrative, which meant that the video demonstrated the genre characteristics well.
2. There is a clear relationship between the lyrics and visuals. - The artist sings about the love of her life and her happy times spent with him. This is shown through flashbacks and a narrative. The locations and camera shots help the audience to see the relationship between the lyrics and the visuals as the artist is seen with her love through the flashbacks and then seen without him in the present day scenes, the lyrics which accompanied the visuals illustrated the way in which the artist was feeling.
3. There is also a clear relationship between music and visuals. The music is slow and so is the actress when she is reminiscing. The music is slow which shows the sadness of the topic in the music video, the artist is also seen sad, through her facial expressions - This helps the audience to relate to the topic of the music video and also to the artist through the locations and close up shots, through the flash backs we see the artist happy with her boyfriend and then we see her sad when she is reminiscing about her love.
4. The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close up shots of the artist and the artist may develop motifs with recur across their work. - There are many close up shots of the artist. There are close ups of the artist to show her emotions through her facial expressions and passion when she is singing, the facial expressions help the audience to relate to the artist and also build a relationship with her.
5. There are voyeuristic shots of the female body - to attract their audience and to also help the audience to understand better. There a long shots showing the artist and her costume, this is key as it shows her outfit which helps the audience to understand what the artist is like and also helps the audience to relate to her more as she may wear clothes which other women may also. The voyeuristic shots of the body also show the body language which is being shown whilst the artist is singing, showing her emotion.
6. A me to you bear features in the music video - this helps the audience to relate to the artist. This helps the audience to recognise the meaning of the bear to the artist as they are what is given as gifts by other halves. The audience can therefore relate to the importance of the bear after seeing the flashback and how she came to have this bear. The artist is seen with her love when she gets this bear. Which suggests that the bear has a high importance to her and also suggests that when she has this bear, she thinks of him.
7. The music video is both performance and narrative as throughout the music video there is a vivid storyline which shows the past relationship between the two people in the video. There is also performance as before and after the flashbacks, the artist is singing and moving to the music, showing her emotion through her facial expressions and singing.
Chosen music channel -
I think our music video would be best broadcast on MTV base as this music channel plays mostly music of the R'n'b genre and therefore our music video will be among the audience of r'n'b videos and as a result the music video will be consumed by out target audience.
Target audience -
Our target audience are people, girls specifically of the age of 13-30. I believe our music video appeals to our target audience as there is a heavy representation of falling in love, this is something which many girls/women can relate to as it happens all the time in real life.
Our CD cover & Magazine advertisement -
Dyers star theory: Promotional material
Bella’s promotional material (Album cover and Magazine advertisement) constructs an image and portrays the idea that she is independent and strong, which is a good quality to have as woman, meaning that she can be aspired to by other women, other women would aspire to also be seen as independent and strong as this is a good quality to have, fans may also want to be just like her, looks, sing and dance like her. The audience is left wanting to know about the artist after seeing her promotional material as through this her true beliefs and likes/dislikes are not shown, only the beliefs in which her ‘Star’ persona has.
Dyer star theory can be implemented here, as the advertisement attracts the target audience and lead them to having incoherent interpretation of the artist, they then want to ask questions to find out more about the artist, meaning that they will then go on to buying the artists album to then find out more about the artist.
The artist creates an image which is being represented through her body language and facial expressions, also through her costume and make up. – By looking at each aspect of her image we can see clearly that the image she is trying to convey is an image of someone who is strong headed, independent and seductive.
Through the audience consuming the artist and adapting to her image, they are placing themselves within the culture as it is typical to see a woman dressed like this as mostly everyone is aspiring to look or be like someone, these aspirations coming mostly from artist.
I believe my CD album cover and magazine advertisement were successful. I believe this as they both show the audience a little bit about the artists. The artist is portrayed through my choice of colour, facial expression, costume and hair and make up. The two products leave the audience wanting to know more about the artist and may therefore lead them to buying the CD. I believe that these two products are very important to the success of my artist as they promote the artist to an audience, which helps the artist gain public eye and become known, they are also important as they help the artist construct an image, through his/her images/style shown on both the album cover and magazine advert. Both my album cover and magazine advert are both useful for my artist but the one which is most beneficial, I believe, is the magazine as it has both images of the artists, more images that what are shown on the album cover and also information, this is helpful as it is informing my artists target audience as well as attracting them. The magazine advertisement ensures awareness of the audience and also familiarises the audience with the album cover if they wish to purchase it.
Both my album cover and magazine advert work well alongside my music video as they portray the artist well without letting too much information out, they also show the artist how she is and also gives the audience a good understanding of the kind of artist she is, through the artwork. The artists image is shown throughout the music video which relates well to the album cover as the same image is portrayed.
Dyer's star theory: Our artist - BELLA
Does the promotion material construct an image rather than reveal a real person whereby you know their likes and dislikes, family, background, education, problems, etc?
Her promotional material constructs an image in which she wants to be seen as. Her promotional material however may also reveal her real person as she might be the same as how her image is portrayed. She could be showing her audience her real image, in a discreet way. Either way we are not really let in to her dislikes/likes, family background etc. This is so that she can leave her audience wanting more.
Does the star represent something/have an identity that the audience can consume and aspire towards?
Yes, Bella represents a woman, who is kind and someone who is independent. She has a specific fashion sense which defines her as an artist. The image in which she represents is an image in which her audience can aspire too. For example. Her attitude and her exterior appearance (clothing ECT). Her audience can consume her image by buying clothing similar to her and also, aspiring to act, sing and dance like her.
What meanings are being represented through the promotional material and how are they conveyed? (costume, location, body language, hair and make-up, props)
The images which are being represented through the promotional material are; that Bella is a young, independent, beautiful individual woman. Her costume/wardrobe are clothes which are seductive yet serene which shows that she wants to be seen as a someone with class. The locations in which her promotional materials are taken place show that she is independent and ‘in charge’. Her body language represents her as a woman with attitude and sophistication. The same applies for how her make-up, hair and props represent her.
Do the images leave the audience asking questions in order to ‘complete’ their understanding of the artist?
Yes, the images do. They leave the audience wanting to know more in order to complete their understanding of the artist, it leaves them wanting to then buy more magazines, and music etc which would then give out more information about the artist and therefore mean that every time they are consuming something from the artist, weather it being a piece of music, music video or images (from magazines etc) they are understanding more about her. However, they will never fully know everything about the artist.
Through consuming the artist in this way is the audience positioning themselves within or against a culture?
The audience would be positioning themselves within a culture, as a lot of people aspire to look like and act Bella and therefore many people would act and look the same. Setting a trend within society and therefore adding to the amount of people who dress and act the same.My music video and how it uses, develops or challenges the forms and conventions of real media products -
To ensure that my music video worked well and conformed to the generic conventions of other music videos of the same genre, I had to research into music videos, to give myself a clear idea of what makes a music video and, quite simply, what is a music video.
After looking at my finished product, I have come to the agreement that my music video does in fact tap into most, if not, all of the conventions, when considering the genre. As close up shots have been used, close up shots being one of the many different camera shots which were used throughout the music video.
To conform to the conventions of R’n’b music videos, I ensured that the artist was dressed glamorously, portraying the image and attitude in which her target audience may want to buy into.
To differ, a dance routine was not used throughout the music video as the beat was slow and a routine would have been too fast. However in parts, the artist does move and sway etc.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning evaluation stages?Research -
The websites which I used to do my research from were YouTube, Wikipedia, Blogger and Google. I used YouTube to analyse and look at other music videos, to get a better idea of what my music video should include. I also used YouTube to looked at the artists music videos which had already been made, to look for any trends and to analyse the conventions. I also used YouTube to research into what the artist is like and how she performs. I used YouTube to analyse a range of music videos, to see the conventions of music videos in general.
I used Wikipedia and Google to find out other information to research other information; about the history of music videos, two music video producers; Cunningham and Gondry. I also used Wikipedia and Google to research about music labels and channels. I researched about the major record labels. This help when producing my music video. Blogger was used to collect all my research together, this helped me to see all the research and therefore make decisions based on it.
Conclusion - How the research progress helped me -
Overall, I believe our music video follows all the conventions of an R'n'B video, it does this through the use of realistic locations, various camera shots and a good narrative, shown by the actors and the edit styles. From my research I came to the understanding that music video’s of the R’n’b genre include; close ups and many other camera shots, other conventions of a R’n’b music
video were that the artists were usually dressed quite glamorously, for example; Beyonce, with her diva dressed and low cut tops. I also noticed also that there were usually dance routines throughout r’n’b music videos however this was not incorporated into my music video as the song was of a slower pace and routines were not needed. By researching into many of the elements when considering music video creation, I become more knowledgeable about all the aspects of music video creation which helped me to produce a music video which conformed well to all the genre conventions.
Planning -
To plan my music video, my group and I discussed all the aspects of the creation, taking into account all the research which I carried out and all the information I knew based of the research. Whilst going through the planning stages my group and I developed questionnaires which were then given out to our target audience to give us a better idea of what we need to do in order to appeal to our target audience.
Producing -
To construct my music video and the two ancillary texts, after planning and researching, I had to use a number of programmes to ensure that they were all up to industry standards. To make my products I used; Final Cut pro (to edit my music video), Photoshop, to produce my graphics (album cover and magazine ad) and lastly iTunes, to download and by the track to go with the music video.
Evaluating has proved to be very important and useful, by doing this you can see what has been done right, wrong and what can be improved on. You can also make changes based on the decisions you make, if you are unhappy with certain aspects of your product.
To receive feedback on my music video, I placed it on YouTube; I decided to do this as this website is accessed everyday by millions of people all over the world, so the likeliness of the video being seen and rated is much higher. Also, the feedback which I received was from a wider audience and varied, I received a range of good and comments, giving me a better idea of how good my music video is. By using YouTube the popularity of my music video become greater and received more hits.
We received a number of comments on your Youtube page, these comments ranging from good to made, good criticism which made us aware of the god and the bad aspects of our music video.
Comment number one spoke about what we did right as a group and this person also spoke about most aspects which govern the success of our music videos.
Comment number two spoke about the locations, outfits and the lighting which was used and gave us good feedback - This person had nothing negative to say which is a good thing.
Comment number three gave both positive and negative comments - Positive being the good use of editing skills and directing skills and negative being that we could have improved the straight cuts which were used.
These comments spoke about most of the aspects which are involved in the creation process of music videos – These Youtube users believe that our music video is good and that we have used many good camera shots and also have a good narrative, it is also said that we have attracted our audience well. This is good as this means we have done everything correctly.
Overall, I am happy with the comments our music video received as they were mostly all positive comments, talking about how well we used the camera shots and locations ect. I believe that we have done a very good job with the creation of this music, I know this as the audience have commenting a rated us highly, meaning that not much could have been wrong, otherwise this would have been stated.
Yasmin, this shows an excellent undsterstanding of your final music video and how it appeals to your target audience. Also you have referenced Dyer's star theory and your chosen music channel in detail too.
ReplyDelete