Q1 - Evaluation of Final Cut

Q1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or

challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Annie Scholfield

Goodwin’s Theory• Professor Goodwin is known in the media world for his perspective on his views on social

arguments that occur, in particular Music Videos and key conventions that occur.

Goodwin’s 6 points:

• Music videos demonstrate characteristics to the artists specific genre(e.g. stage performance in metal video, dance routine for boy/girl band).

• There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

• There is a relationship between music and visuals (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

• The demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work (a visual style).

• There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, telescopes, etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.

• There is often intertextual reference (to films, tv programmes, other music videos etc)

Conventions of an Indie/Rock music video

MISE-EN-SCENE/SHOT TYPES• One of the main convention of Indie/Rock or even just Rock is the dominant presence of the band throughout the music video. Most Rock videos show off the ‘musicianship’ of the band – this always features the main singer, wide shots used to represent the band as a whole, and to show their performance as a band and close-up and extreme close-up shots used on the various band members to emphasize their musical talents.• Another convention is a variety of contrasting shots to the band shots that portray a storyline which has some connection to the lyrics.• The clothing for Rock videos are almost always the same – Casual and plain, jeans and a simple t-shirt type look.

EDITING/LIGHTING•A lot of Rock music videos include a strong connection between the music and the shots/editing speed – this is especially effective in fast paced rock music as there is a prominent drum beat or guitar rhythm which the cuts are set in-time to.• The lighting is usually dark and low also creating shadows or to highlight the band members in a particular way.

Conventions used in our music video: Goo Goo Dolls, One Night

We used most of these conventions in our music video. This, I think, was the strongest part of our music video and the conventions we used work really well giving a strong connection between our shots and our genre.

Convention 1: Shots of lead singer lip-syncing

Clear lip-syncing from lead singer giving a strong

connection between the lyrics and visuals

Shadow behind lead singer created by lighting – A convention used in many Rock music videos.

Clothing is casual – another convention used in rock

music videos

We also decided to use this particular shot of our lead singer as one of the sides of our digipak. This is not necessary a

convention used by only Rock bands but a lot of artists from all different styles feature the artist on their album cover and

we thought it would be appropriate for ours.

Examples of this in other music videos

Foo Fighters – The Pretender

CONVENTION 2: WHOLE BAND SHOTS

Wide shot showing the band altogether – This conventions shows the band

member’s talent/musicianship and also give a strong link between the music

and the visuals.

Band members also each wearing casual

clothing.

We also used a similar shot to this on our digipak as

well as the individual shots of

the lead singer.

The lighting plays a huge part in our music video. We used the lighting to

create shadows – this is a convention as many rock videos use lighting to create

an abstract effect in their shots.

Examples of this in other music videos

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication

Queen – Somebody To Love

CONVENTION 3: INDIVIDUAL SHOTS OF EACH BAND MEMBER

Casual clothing convention again

Musicianship of the member showed from close-up

Keeping up with the convention of abstract

lighting – Shadow effect

Another lighting effect we used was by placing this light source behind the musician creating a white silhouette out-lining the shape of the instrument also

Shadow/silhouette convention

We decided that in this shot we wouldn’t include the whole drum kit but instead only a part of if to create a different and interesting

angle/shot

This shot is another convention used in rock music videos – A close-up of the instrument making this guitar and

musicians skill the main focus of the shot. We chose to have this particular shot at this section of the video as the

guitar solo is most prominent in this certain section.

Other examples of close-up outlining the musicians talent

Examples of this in other music videos

Green Day – Boulevard Of Broken Dreams

OUR MAG AD

The design is the same as the

digipak to show the target market what the digipak

is like.

It’s typical of the artist’s magazine

advert to advertise other

singles/hits included in the

album.

Shows retails that have this album

in stock.

Ratings from critics is popular to

include on mag ads – makes the

album more appealing.

Conventional to involve the band’s

website.

OUR DIGIPAK

This image is taken from one of our

shots in the music video – it’s

conventional for artists to feature

themselves on their own album cover.

This image is the whole band playing together, it is also a convention to include picture of the

band on the album art.

We decided on bold font to contrast with the dark

colours of the starry sky – This makes the “GOO GOO

DOLLS” stand out.