Styles, conventions and techniques of the music video

Style

• depends on the genre 
• colour 
• location
• choreography and performance 
• narrative (story)
• sexual/violent content 
• image of musician 
• humour 
• editing
• lighting 
• representation (gender, class, age)

video one (pop)

the colours used are bright 

they changed location from a house to a beach to a party

video two (rap, hip hop)

Bright colours are used at the start but it gets darker towards the end. 

The location is on a street then it changed to a party.

Not an innocent image. 

video three (rock metal)

Dark colours are used which makes the fire stand out. 

The song has a negative tone and the artists seem angry.

Violence. 

Controversial. 

In concert and 'as live' footage -

footage of the band or artist performing live. 

Animation

stop motion or digital

Illustrative/Interpretive 

Illustrative is literall. visuals and lyrics connected. 

Interpretive - speculate to deeper meaning of the song, not literally from the lyrics. bond between lyrics and visuals will not be obvious.

Narrative 

refers to the way the story is told. how a music video communicates a story to its audience. 

Surrealist 

break boundaries between fantasy, dreams and reality. sing bizarre and jarring imagery. non realistic. 

Pastiche and homage 

when one media text refers to another 

Parody 

mocking another form of media instead of tributing it. 

Conventions
lyric interpretation - how lyrics shown in video and how audience interprets.

Extending or consolidating songs meaning.

Allusion - making reference to other things (pastiche/homage and parodies)

Links to other artists - collaborations

Techniques
Cutting to beat - editing in video, whether or not video is cut to the beat and tempo of the song.

Visual effects - experimental nature and freedom of expression, music videos have been basis to new effects, CGI.

Miming and lip sync - mime to connect image and performance to the sound of the song. They pretend to sing the songs as if they were singing it live.

Chroma key - layering two images or video streams together based on colour hues. Often called green screen.

analysing video - take on me
I the video, every scene was cutting to the beat.
The video shoed animationas the people seemed to be drawings.
It was surreal as the woman went into the book.

Lady Gaga - Telephone
It can be seen as illustrative and also interpretive.
There is lots of product placement.
It is surreal.
There is cutting to the beat.