In what ways does our music video use, develop or challenge forms and

conventions of real media product.

Dubrovskaya Kristina

In the first blog I wrote some conventions of music video and now I am going to compare our music video to some real world once to see whether it

develop, challenge or use the main conventions.

The first point was: - Artists are clothed in fashionable,

stylish and mainstream outfits.

This code is not really applicable to our music video because our band put themselves under indie umbrella which means that they supposed to differ. This means that the way we decided to dress our group challenges the common convention of pop music video.

To reinforce to idea, I would like to compare our image to the mainstream pop one:

Here is an example of a basic pop music video. The girl is wearing bright, pretty dress, has perfect make-up and heir style. overall, everything reinforces the idea of

attractiveness.

This is our music video ( as you could have guessed) and we decided to dress our band in old-fashioned

costumes (that would reflect 20s-30s) which is clearly the opposite of what was done in the previous example.

However, we can’t just say that the way we decided to dress our band challenges the main convention of the music industry because this

choice was deliberately made to reflect the music style. Here is an example of another indie music video where main character is dressed normally. Having said this, to sum it all up, costume-wise, I think, we develop the convention because we not

only reject pop music look, but we create an original look that was maintained throughout the whole music video and this is what expected from

indie- do something different.

Challenges?

Also, it is clear that most of the artists are young because more money are gained from teenagers as they tent to spent more time and money

on their favorite artist. Adults are more likely to listen to the music silently- without this obvious fan behavior. This is why such artists like Justin Bieber are so popular. Justin Bieber is a goof example of using

the main media conventions.

• pretty look• young age• clothed in fashionable, stylish and mainstream

outfits • portrayed as happy, enjoying and content with life• lyrics are normally based around love and

relationships • bands express the unity associated with teens,

which is the main target audience for this genre

and so on…

Our band consists of males who are middle aged and thus it is more orientated for niche audience (middle age people). Again, while some would argue that this fact challenges the main convention of music industry, I would say that the style dictates the main rules and indie tells by all means: be different. This means that having different audience, uses the main convention.

Also, in terms of lyrical content, it is not so obviously about love. This is another thing that challenges the music convention. This is even true for indie music.The main artist ( as well as the whole band) is not betrayed as happy at all. It doesn’t have melancholic feel either. They are serious and this also challenges the pop music convention but uses the main indie convention.

Technological convention If you look at typical pop music video, you would expect a lot of cuts, different (even

weird) camera angles and overall the editing has fast pace. In indie music, editing is not the most important part. Natural filters are often used and no special effects are used to keep it realistic.

here is an example of typical pop music and you can see how editing was used to develop this convention.

Because I was responsible for editing, I decided not to do this kind of thing. The cuts were still fast to reflect the fast beat of the song, but overall it seems natural and not so synthetic. This uses the indie conception and challenges the main pop

one.

SettingsIndie Pop music videos are known to be low budget. Settings are usually small studios, cities, parks, woods. These locations are not expensive or free to use.

One of the most expensive music video ever made is «Scream» by Michael Jackson. It had the budget of $7,000,000

here is an example of a great use of special effects and colors which is

typical for pop music video

This is arctic monkey’s music video (an example of indie music video) and

as you can see it is not so visually exiting. That’s not even because of the low budget. The reason is convention-

indie music video does not have to look bright.

This is our music video. As you can see, the setting are kept to the

minimum and natural filters are used to keep everything realistic and

maintain indie atmosphere

This means that in terms of editing, our music video use the

conventions of real media product.

Also, our band is performing live, using mics and real instruments which is also

typical for indie music videos.

NarrativeAs I already mentioned in previous blog where I

was talking about Codes and Conventions of Indie Pop Music Videos, The story is important in

the indie music video. Lyrics are shown not literal, but still the story should make sense and should have a link between lyrical content and

what we see on the screen.Whereas in the pop music videos, you are likely

to see bright pictures without big semantic code, in indie music video you would expect

the opposite to happen.

This is true for our music video, so in terms of narrative, it uses the

convention of indie music video.