The project for this year was based on creating and developing an artist of our choosing through the use of media products such as Digipaks, advertisements and the recording of a music video. We had to design these products in order to give a strong title to our artist and promote them as much as we could. The first product we had to produce was the music video. Before the process of editing and going out to get footages, we had to research the type of genre we were willing to imitate and the conventions of a music video. Many theorists have different ideas for the conventions to a music video. For instance, Andrew Goodwin argues that every music video has three type of distinctions between them: Illustration, Amplification and Disjuncture. In brief, illustration is self explanatory- this is when the artist displays images and footages that are correspondent to the lyrics. Amplification is when the video has different type of meaning to the lyrics and disjuncture is when the footages has no relation to the lyrics. Another theorist, Carol Vernallis, states that music videos tend to break the rules of continuing editing in order to keep the viewer at interest. This is done by music videos having more jump cuts. Lastly, the last theorist, Laura Mulvey, talks about the male gaze. She believes that all music videos have a clear representation and she states that some consistent on the male gaze. This is when the women in the music video are objectified and intentionally to be portrayed as sex objects.
As we covered the conventions of a music video, in the design of the music video we decided to follow the aspects of amplification and illustration- by displaying images that suggests the lyrics of the song (Attracting flies). Our music video belonged to the Genre of Electro pop and we decided not to follow the conventions of this genre as we wanted focus all our attention with having a clear narrative to the song. For our music video, we had a few music videos that may have had a strong influence to the final design of the video. Here are some of them.
The first video I would like mention that had a strong influence to our music video was Azealia Banks 212:
These two particular shots were a strong influence in our music video because we had a similar camera shot when we were filming. The close up of the artist's lips and the mid shot of the artist behind a wall, these were used because we liked the idea from Azealia Banks' video. We interpreted that the two shots displayed above showed that the artist is confident and not afraid to get up and close with the camera and the same time it somehow gave her feisty image. We wanted to give this image to our artist- the girl with attitude and glamour. Also there was a strong link to the mise en scene between our artist and Azealia Banks. In both of the footages with the artist standing against the wall, we see that their costumes are almost the same. The white jumpers with the black writing shows a strong influence. Again this was to display our artist with some attitude by the informal type of clothing we chose for her. As I felt that Azealia Banks was represented as a sex object, we decided to challenge the theory of women being displayed as sex objects according to Laura Mulvey. From this, we wanted our artist to be seen as a strong and independent artist that inspires young women.
Another video that had a strong influence was American Boy by Estelle. As this was the original song that we wanted to do, you will find that most of our products and image is strongly influenced by Estelle.
Since our song is about a bad lovestory between the girlfriend and boyfriend, we decided to use the same mid shot that was used in American Boy. We also used this shot because it displayed glamour between the two characters but we wanted something a little different and wanted to slightly challenge this in our music video. Instead of being a romantic atmosphere with both characters being glamorous, we only wanted the artist to seem glamorous by carefully picking out the costumes for the two characters. Boyfriend, dressed in dirty fashion, and the girlfriend, in classy and expensive clothing. This was to display illustration within the lyrics and also follow the image we wanted for our artist which involved a luxury lifestyle; an image that was heavily influenced by American Boy. In the other screenshot above, the outfits for Deseree Diamond (our artist) and Estelle have some similarities. Another influential aspect is the mise en scene, the rich and classy costume between the two artist are very similar. The hairstyles are almost in common as we believed that Estelle beautifully portrayed the idea of luxury with the costumes and hairstyle. With the theory of Andrew Goodwin, we decided to follow the conventions of illustration as we wanted to create a narrative in the video.
Another video that also had an influence to the production of our music video was Brandy Ft Monica- The boy is mine. Here is a clip to the video:
From watching this music video, it is clear that we have challenged the aspects to it. The reason why is because we wanted one artist and wanted to create a narrative to the music video. But with the idea of the two contrasting characters, we decided to slightly incorporate that into our main artist, Deseree Diamond.
Between the costumes, we can see a clear contrast. This was to create the idea that character, Deseree Diamond, was miserable without the boyfriend and towards demonstrate that she found independence. The idea from the video 'the boy is mine' helped to create a strong structure to the story of the video. This also helped develop the image of the artist being glamorous and feisty.
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