MEDIA
How my media products develop forms and conventions of real media products
Structure:
Music Videos structure vary frequently with no two being identical. However typical music videos share a similar structure of there being an even balance between performance parts of the artist/band singing and performing the song, and narrative parts which tell the story of the song and often feature other actors. My music video has developed and slightly changed this common convention by being more narrative heavy. I have included frequent performance shots to maintain the normalcy but the emphasis of the video is on the story it tells that accompanies the songs lyrics of a 'fight'.This is because the storyline I chose is quite deep and complicated and thus needs time and footage to be explained and explored in its' entirety.
Genre:
The song I chose to do my music video to is classed as being in the pop genre and by a fairly well known pop singer. The lyrics could be interpreted in a fairly typical way and a storyline followed of a struggling relationship and a broken heart. This is a common theme and convention found within the pop music genre, along with that of opposing ideas of female empowerment and then female oppression when they are objectified and hyper-sexualised even by female singers themselves. While this video shares some common pop music representations such as a girly and feminine character in the happy persona showed by the artist, the majority of the video rejects these ideas. The music video tells a story that would more often be found in a indie, acoustic genre. The storyline is one that is thought provoking and profound, deeper and less shallow than breakup videos often found with pop music. Issues we faced with doing this kind of video is that it personality disorders are real mental illness's that people deal with in their everyday lives and thus needs to be approached in a careful and sensitive way. However, what needs to be taken into consideration is, as with all music videos, they are fiction and a creation for entertainment and thus their content will reflect this and not always being entirely accurate and depict the whole picture.
Costume:
A large part of music videos that audiences rarely think about but does actually have a huge impact on the outcome and the way it is perceived is the outfits the artist/band and actors wear. In my music video I follow some of the common conventions found in music videos, but of a different music genre than Pop. Some of the outfits my artist is seen to wear is what you may expect to see in a rock video or something similar. When dressed as the angry persona, dark heavy makeup is worn with black clothing which is quite common to see in music videos. However, this video develops on the idea of costume as it doesn't conform to what is often seen in pop music videos of skimpy clothing where it's main objective is to sexualise the artist as Lura Mulvey theorised is for the 'male gaze'. Instead all my artists' clothing is respectful and modest, the white dress worn for her 'natural self' almost virginal and innocent in it's look and connotations.
Digipak and Poster:
The font used in Digipak's and their posters are arguably one of the most important aspects when it comes to design. I found this one of the most difficult things to get right and struggled with it for a long time. Even now I am not entirely happy with the fonts chosen. There are so many to choose from, and each one carries a different meaning and connotation and can completely change the look of the Digipak. All Digipaks use fonts in their design, and a common convention is to have one particular font that reoccurs in each product to create this idea of a brand. I have used this convention and have chosen one particular font to write my artists name in that repeats itself throughout my products. This creates a sense of continuity and synchrony between my products and a recognisable brand for my artist. I took inspiration from Ed Sheerans' brand and font used to write his name which is found in all of his products and material. When you see it you instantly relate it to him and the particular font used (a handwritten scrawl) makes him seem relatable and familiar so I went for something similar but slightly more feminine and classy.
However, I developed this whole idea by using a variety of different fonts throughout the rest of the products. Usually only one or two different fonts are used but in my digipak, a different one has been used for almost each section of writing. This is because I felt they all demanded a different font and feel and the same font didn't seem to fit with all the sections. In particular for the title, 'Bloom', I decided to go for an unusual font where flowers are incorporated into the letters themselves which acts as a form of text-cage cohesion. While this may work for the title it would merely look strange and out of place if used elsewhere such as on the back for song titles.
