Generic Conventions of a Music Video

Types of music Video:

·         Illustrative: This type of music video tells a story and is often performance based. These type of music videos are typically about love or romance.

·         Amplification: Amplification is where a director interprets a music video in their own way using creative ideas that they have. These videos will still have a direct link to the song.

·         Conceptual: This type of music video may not have anything to do with the lyrics of the song and are known to be very abstract. An example of one of these videos is Daft Punk – Technologic.

        

Camera:

·         Camera shots usually jump a lot from Long shots to close ups and extreme close ups. The close ups are usually on the lead singer and the band and the extreme close ups are usually of the singer lip synching.

·         Camera Movement: Whip pans, fast dolly tracks and fast overhead crane shots to follow the running, walking or dancing of performers.

Editing:

·         Editing: various terms: jump cutting, montage editing. Creating the visually de-centred experience of ‘jumping’ from location to person to instrument without any normal narrative continuity. Instead it is often the beat or the rhythm of the track which provides the organising principle for editing movement. The editing moves so fast it creates the need for viewing ‘repeatedly’. There are exceptions though. Some ‘continuity editing’ used such as atmospheric ‘dissolve shots’ such as in Sinead O’Connor’s ‘Nothing Compare to You’ 

 Lighting:

·         Lighting: Expressive lighting a key feature of music videos. Extreme artificial light to create the ‘bleaching’ effect on pop stars faces (making them seem ageless). Also the use of switching from colour to black & white or sepia to indicate a shift from chorus to verse. Also lighting effects such as strobes or flashing needs to be identified. 

·         CGI is also a popular use in music videos to create futuristic sets and brightly coloured backgrounds which is mainly used in mainstream music as they have the big budgets for their videos.

          Mise en Scene:

·         What to look for in a video. Is there a theme such as the historical period e.g. the sixties (Madonna’s ‘Beautiful Stranger’ with its intertextual link to the Austin Powers film) or the seventies (The Beastie Boys ‘Sabotage’ video which parodies the ‘Starsky & Hutch’ 70s TV Cop genre...also an intertextual link). Does the video’s mise en scene follow the need for authenticity in performance videos by using the concert hall or rehearsal studio setting. Or is there an intentional ‘parodic’ setting to exaggerate star image as in many rap and r&b videos with a focus on glamourous icons such as exotic locations, beautiful cocktail bars and stunning beachside houses with infinity pools (see MC Lantau’s video set in Discovery Bay).