The Music Video

Simon Frith's theory presents the idea that Music videos come in three types. Each type have their own features which are recognizable to audiences.

Looking at examples of real media texts in the genre that we wanted to make ours (RnB/Pop/Street) we found that music videos for them were predominantly ‘performance’, with sometimes a hybrid mix of narrative. Girl groups, like the Fifth harmony ‘Boss’ music video (on the left) are usually of the performance type. We decided the best way to utilize a girl group music video that would also be able to appeal to our TA, is to create a performance type with a subtle hint of narrative, using the generally overused ‘love’ story as the theme.

Our music video Danc

e

Lip-sync is a convention of a performance music video

Fast-paced and discontinuous editing cut to the beat of the music

Dramatic changes of framing and heavy movement of camera to emphasise dance aspect of performance

This point is also a key feature of a performance music video, where the music and lyrics inform the performance, however it’s the performance that drives the video. We used this feature in our music video by putting in symbolic imagery of “heart”, “planet” and themes of ‘Red’ like it’s frequently said in the lyrics of Red Planet.

Red imagery: sometimes in the shape of circles to connote ‘planets’ & silhouettes bring a mystery to the subtle theme of space.

We fully adhere to the genre conventions of Rnb/Street/Pop (as you’ll see on the next slide) in terms of style, Band identity etc. This is so that, within all our individual aspects of our music video which make it unique, we still include conventions our audience expect to see in from an RnB/Street/Pop music video.

Genre Conventions

Tion Waynes- “Can’t go broke” Discontinuous editing with

choppy cuts and visually striking colourful effects

are key conventions when it comes to the style/look of

the music video

Drake- “Headlines”

Representation:Usually in Rnb/Pop/Street music videos, women are usually represented as sex objects and usually use their bodies to sell the music. For example in the examples on the right:Although girl groups in this genre play it down, it’s still prevalent. We challenge this convention of the sexual portrayal of women/girls by reversing the gender roles and making the guys look like ‘objects’.

We have the men serving the women in this shot- a metaphorical shot highlighting the men as objects rather than the women.

Girl group examples of conventions of portrayal

of women

Band Identity:

Band Identity: Style