Research into Music Videos

 

Things to consider for a music video:

• Curate and follow a shot list so filming is organised and so that theres less problems with a lack of footage when editing.
• Make sure that shots are steady and focused, often through the use of a tripod.
• Ensure that the opening lyrics of the song are sung.
• Utilise natural frames when filming, making sure that shots are carefully composed.
• Utilise cutaways when editing.
• Enforce a motif to maintain throughout the video.
• Use intertextuality through the music video and the website, as well as brand identity (often made through motifs).
• Use models with diverse representation (e.g, age, gender, ethnicity), making sure to cover at least 2 different social groups.

Inspiration:

Inspiration from previous music video NEAs:

https://6046ef.blogspot.com/

I really like the animation used in this music video, and I would like to also use animation in my music video too. I especially like how the opening credits are animated, and I would like to replicate this for my music video.

Inspiration from professional music videos:

Alrighty Aphrodite by Peach Pit - Stylistically I love this music video for the way it was filmed in reverse and then reversed in editing to create a very unique look. Although I wont be recreating this style, I will take inspiration from this to have a distinctive look that I can then use to create brand identity by further reinforcing this stylistic choice on my website.

Enjoy The Silence by Depeche Mode - The contrast between the black and white studio shots of the band and the natural mise-en-scene with the ‘king’ character in is a great inspiration for my music video as I’ll create a similar effect in mine with contrasting shots between the band singing and playing the song, and more narrative-driven shots.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper - This music video perfectly embodies the ‘feel-good’ atmosphere and attitude I would like the music video to have. The way Cyndi Lauper and the other dancers in the video dance without a single care is what I would like to emulate in my music video with the members of the band.

Footloose by Kenny Loggins - Similar to the previous music video, this encapsulates the idea of dancing without a care, which I will include in my music video as inspired by certain scenes in The Breakfast Club. The music video also uses scenes and clips from the 80’s movie Footloose, which I can use as an example when deciding what scenes to replicate from the previously stated list of 80’s movies.

Audience Research - Focus Group

Subjects from the primary audience:

Name: Allegra Li

Age: 16

Occupation: Sixth-form Student

Psychometric group: Aspirer/Mainstreamer

What are your interests and hobbies?: Music, fashion, musicals, and pop culture.

What are some of your favourite films?: My Neighbour Totoro (1988), Oceans 8 (2018), Howl’s Moving Castle (2004), and Mamma Mia (2008)

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “I like the general aesthetic of the 80s, especially the fashion!”

What’s your favourite song?: Long Live by Taylor Swift

What’s your favourite music video?: Lover by Taylor Swift

What’s your music taste?: “My music taste is a mixture of everything. I especially love classical music due to my musical roots, but I also really enjoy mainstream female pop stars like Taylor Swift. I also like music from films as well as jazz.”

Name: Amelia Beth

Age: 16

Occupation: Sixth-form Student

Psychometric group: Mainstreamer

What are your interests and hobbies?: Sports, especially hockey, piano and reading.

What are some of your favourite films?: Ready Player One (2018), Parent Trap (1998), Nerve (2016), Top Gun (1986) and Top Gun Maverick (2022)

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “I listened to a lot of 80s music growing up thanks to my parents, so the music has a special place in my heart.”

What’s your favourite song?: You Can’t Catch Me Now by Olivia Roderigo

What’s your favourite music video?: Smooth Criminal by Michael Jackson

What’s your music taste?: “When I’m studying, I like listening to jazz and Taylor Swift. I like lots of mainstream pop like Dua Lipa and Olivia Roderigo, whatever’s on the radio basically. My parents play a lot of 80’s music at home, like Guns and Roses and Kate Bush, so I like listening to that too.”

Name: Saskia Haas-Lee

Age: 17

Occupation: Sixth-form Student

Psychometric group: The Reformer

What are your interests and hobbies?: Musical theatre, fashion, music, video games, making jewellery, and watching movies.

What are some of your favourite films?: Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989), Footloose (1984), Singing In The Rain (1952), and The Half Of It (2020)

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “I really like 80’s movies, most of my favourite movies like My Neighbour Totoro and The Shining are from the 80s.”

What’s your favourite song?: Glue Song by Beabadoobee

What’s your favourite music video?: Because I Liked A Boy by Sabrina Carpenter

What’s your music taste?: “I like a lot of pop and indie music, as well as some R&B and dance music! My favourite artists are Sabrina Carpenter, Renee Rap, PinkPantheress, Laufey, and Beabadoobee. But, I like lots of different music style, and  have listened to some hip-hop, rap and metal in the past too.”

Name: Billy Taylor

Age: 25

Occupation: London Underground station staff

Psychometric group: The Explorer

What are your interests and hobbies?: Photography, nature, hiking and LEGO.

What are some of your favourite films?: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988), Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), and The Lego Movie (2014) 

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “I like the heavier music from the 80s like the metal and rock. I’m not really too keen on the fashion but I really like the movies.”

What’s your favourite song?: Twilight of the Thundergod by Amon Amarth

What’s your favourite music video?: Steel Commanders by Sabaton

What’s your music taste?: “My music taste is predominantly metal, I enjoy most sub-genres of metal such as black metal, death metal, folk metal, and power metal. I do also enjoy different rock genres, especially 

Subjects from the alternative secondary audience:

Name: Julie Taylor

Age: 50

Occupation: Exams officer

Psychometric group: The Succeeder

What are your interests and hobbies?: Reading, watching TV, gardening, and spending time with family.

What are some of your favourite films?: Dirty Dancing (1987), Thelma and Louise (1991), The Shining (1980), and Boiling Point (2021)

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “It was a fun, bright period of time. I really like 80s rock and pop.”

What’s your favourite song?: Keep The Faith by Bon Jovi

What’s your favourite music video?: Club Tropicana by Wham!

What’s your music taste?: “I mainly listen to soft rock and pop from the 80s and 90s, like Bon Jovi, Depeche Mode, Simple Minds, and George Michael.”

Name: Teresa Haas-Lee

Age: 52

Occupation: Emergency Call Handler

Psychometric group: The Mainstreamer

What are your interests and hobbies?: Music, movies, singing, and going out with friends.

What are some of your favourite films?: Serendipity (2001), The Holiday (2006), Calamity Jane (1953), and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)

What’s your opinion on 80s pop culture?: “Being a teenager in the 80s, I have fond memories of that time. It was interesting seeing how the fashion and music has come back recently.”

What’s your favourite song?: You’ve Got a Friend by James Taylor

What’s your favourite music video?: Club Tropicana by Wham!

What’s your music taste?: “I like soul, Motown, rock, r&b, pop, and lots of other genres. I listen to a variety of different artists as I like all different types of music. But my favourite artists that I’ve seen live are Luther Vandross, Black Eyes Peas, Take That, Will Young and Lamar.”

Previous Work

 

Above is my magazine front-cover and double-page spread that I created for my GCSE Media Studies coursework. The brief was a ‘teenage lifestyle’ magazine and I feel as though I followed the brief well. However, I could’ve focused more on the general look and visual aesthetic of my coursework so that it was more appealing and unique in format.

This was a magazine front-cover that I made for the Big Issue. I chose Daniel Craig as my ‘elite person’ to feature because he used to be homeless, and therefore would provide some value transference between the magazine and actor. A challenge for me was making sure that my magazine adhered to the usual conventions of a Big Issue magazine, which I think that I achieved quite well with the typography of the masthead. However, I would improve on the section in between the masthead, focussing on fixing the blank space created.

Here is an infographic that I created for a mock-partnership between the dancer Nikita Kuzmin and the Diabetes medical wear company Dexcom. The main aim of this task was to create a brand partnership that had value transference, and I feel as though I accomplished this due to my chosen brand ambassador.

Above was a task to create a beauty care advert, where I chose to do the Body Shop. I particularly like the gradient on the logo which was done to match the text, but I feel like the text itself isn’t clear enough when in contrast with the photo in the background. 

Mood boards

 

Initially I created two mood boards for my music video. The first mood board is a collage of references for the visual aesthetic I would like the video and accompanying website to have, inspired by the 80s just like the video. The second mood board is a collection of different shots that I may include in my music video, to create a collage of what the product may look like.

Initial Ideas

Brief 4: Music Video and online

For my coursework, I have decided to do Brief 4: Music Video and online. This is because this brief intrigued me the most, not only because I enjoy rock music, but because I want to push myself to produce a good music video as this is something I’d like to do in the future. It was between the music video brief and the magazine brief, but I decided against doing the magazine as I’d done this for GCSE Media Studies.

My initial idea was to do a music video for the song ‘Don’t You Forget About Me’ by the rock band Simple Minds. The music video will be split between performance shots of the band playing and shots following the narrative of the video.The song was popularised and most well-known from the 1985 film ‘The Breakfast Club’, and so I have chosen to parody the movie in the narrative.

The film follows a group of polar-opposite students who represent different highschool stereotypes (such as the nerd, the jock etc) all being put in detention together. By the end, they all become friends and discover they’re much more similar than they seem. The narrative of the video will follow a similar route, but by the end of the detention, the students have all formed a band (which would be the band performing the song).

Each member will represent a different main character/stereotype from the movie:

• The Athlete - The Singer
• The Brain - The Bassist
• The Criminal - The Lead Guitarist
• The Princess - The Drummer
• The Basket Case - The Rhythm Guitarist

The music video would act as homage to 80’s movies in general, with other intertextual references of some of the most iconic 80’s movies also included due to the influence that the ‘band’ takes from 80’s rock music and culture. These references may range from shots mimicking scenes from the movie, to ‘Easter Eggs’ in the mise-en-scene for the audience to recognise.

Some of the movies that may be included are:

• Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
• The Lost Boys
• Back To The Future
• Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure
• Big
• E.T
• Ghostbusters
• Gremlins
• Stand By Me

The band’s description would be along the lines of:

‘An up-and-coming rock band, taking influence from 80’s new wave, dance-rock and post-punk artists like Simple Minds, Depeche Mode, The Smiths, New Order, and The Cure.’

Colour Scheme:

Above are three different colour palettes that I initially created when thinking into the visual aesthetic that I’d like the website to have. With all three, I tried to have a ‘retro’ 80’s theme to them, with the top and bottom palettes focusing on more brighter and lighter colours and the middle palette focusing on a darker, more ‘rock’ mix of colours. I haven’t yet decided on which to use, as I will try them all out on the website to see which works more cohesively together.