Analysis Of Pop Videos 3

Feel So Close- Calvin Harris

Cinematography: In this music video so much cinematography is used, there are various different shots of different parts of the music video. There is a close up of a handheld radio, which shows the music is about to play on their radios, there is also an extreme close up of the characters turning up the volume on their stereo which could mean that its a dance pop song, that you want to turn up and play loud. Showing other people turning the music up and enjoying the music makes you want to listen to the song and enjoy the music as well. There are lots of extreme close ups of random parts of cars and people changing the gears, which all make it a very abstract music video and makes it weirdly appealing to watch as you don't know what is going to come next.

Sound:
The sound in this music video is effective and is very abstract in relation to the actual music video. It relates to the music video as the actors in the video are made to look like they are enjoying the music they are listening to and are dancing in time to the Calvin Harris Song. There is also the tuning sound of the radio which shows the people desperately trying to get the radio channel which is playing his song, which people will want to do as well and they will try and listen to it on the radio, it also promotes the song because it shows people really wanting to listen to the song. The beat of the song is what they dance to and because it is a Pop song that you can dance to, showing the actors and actresses dancing it shows that the song is feel good and effective.

Mise En Scene:

All of the characters in the music video are made to look like they are in America, but quite old fashioned and rustic. They are using small olden looking handheld radios instead of a modern day Ipod or something higher tech. One of the female characters has bright green hair and leopard print shorts on which is slightly strange which makes you think that this music can suit any style, not mattering what you look like. It is set in lots of random settings, such as a desert like setting, and a street setting. These two settings are at opposite endings of the spectrum therefore go against the lyrics of the song 'feel so close' but could also be interpreted as feeling close to certain people even if they are on the other side of the world to you. 

Editing:

The music video has been edited so that for each different beat of the chorus, the screen cuts to another shot, and another and another, its a quick cut sequence so you only get a glance at each abstract image and your mind tries to relate it to the music, and also the movement on the screen and the music beat in your head work hand in hand together. Also in the opening sequence of the music video, there are many jump shots to show its a quick, fast paced song. Also slow motion is used to counteract the fast speed of the music soundtrack, when there are papers blowing across the table and when the male is dancing on top of the rocks, the slow motion shows that they are actually having fun, and it gives a professional finish to the song.

Analysis Of Pop Video 2

Ed  Sheeran- A Team.

This is the pop song by popular artist Ed Sheeran. (The A Team)
Cinematography:
This music video is full of interesting story lines and camera shots which portray the dramatic storyline. For example in the first camera shot, you get a close up of the actresses face, where she looks cold, still and lifeless, this shot shows her dead, and is the starter for the whole video. It leaves the viewers wanting to know how such a young pretty girl has died and they are then hooked onto the video and the storyline of the video all through one carefully thought-out close up. A second carefully picked out camera shot is the mid shot of the male characters torse and the females hands wrapped round pulling out money. The focus on the money being pulled out of the shirt, and the romantic embrace helps to show the viewer what the storyline is, and from the midshot of just the torso it puts focus onto the money, and the audiences minds clock that she is a working lady/prostitute.

Sound:
At the beginning of the music video, there is the sound birds tweeting. It signifies the morning, and it shows that its a brand new day. In one of the shots where the bird is tweeting she is laying dead in the morning and in the other shot of the bird tweeting, showing her in the morning with the day ahead of her. The birds tweeting gives the first shot an eerie feel to it, like something bad has happened, whereas that soundclip over the next shot of the woman laying on the chair in the morning, gives it an early morning feel and a more positive feel.

Mise En Scene:
The Mise En Scene of this music video is beautifully made. The female characters role is to play a homeless woman, who sells her body for money, and takes drugs. They stereotypically dress her in rags and a sleeping bag, and ripped gloves etc. Also when she waked up on the park bench its a good prop as it shows her as homeless and reinforces the storyline. This makes the music video very appealing to some people and shows a real issue within our society and also shows the dangers of it. This promotes the video as a very raw and true video that even addresses some extreme issues. The make up used in the music video is dark and quite dogged, it shows that she is suffering and the makeup inforces the fact that she is sad and alone. The dark colours insinuate negative connotation, such as sadness and loneliness.

Editing:
There are some wonderful low budget editing special effects used in the Ed Sheeran Video. He uses fast forward for some of the people walking past to show time going past quickly and all the people turning into a big blur accross the screen. It shows all the people rushing past and not even noticing the girl sitting there. It reinforces the fact that she is very alone. There are also a few shots where her face comes out of focus at points, for example when she is doing her lipstick in the mirror, the camera is used to that her face is blurred so you cant see her face, and then once the lipsticks on she pushes her lips together and you see her all dolled up ready to go out and looking different. The editing used reinforces the fact that she is a prostitute and that she fades into the background and that what she does isn't a part of everyday life for any normal person. This also shows Ed Sheeran as a caring artist, it shows that he cares about prostitutes and has tried to portray the hardship they suffer in a popular music video.

Analysis Of Pop Videos 1.

This is the pop song by The Wanted, It was made for a charity called Comic Relief. Throughout the Pop Video, they make strong connections with the charity and promote it by wearing the promotional charity 'Red Nose' and adding a comical touch to the performance. This is a very good way of promoting the band 'The Wanted' which are a reasonably new and it promotes them as a charitable band.

Sound:

The song of this music video relates to the video as it keeps to a positive jolly theme, and they are wearing the red noses which relates to the main meaning behind the song which is that it is for charity. The boys all lip sync along to the music in a comical way which gives it comical value and makes you want to view it again and again.

Cinematography:

There are lots of different camera angles and shots used in this music video to make it more effective and appealing to the eye to watch. The opening shot is of an extreme close up of a lightbulb, which then pans to show one of the members of the bands faces. By starting initially with a lightbulb the audience already can see its a lighthearted music video that will be fun to watch. Another good representation of cinematography is when the characters are moving from place to place and theres an excellent transition shot of a rope moving with the 'red noses' on it, which is good product placement as the whole aim of the single is to raise money for charity. Its also an extreme close up which is a nice variety from the usual mid shot.

Mise En Scene:

The mise en scene within the music video is very effective. Especially the 'boyband' look that all of the male singers wear, they are dressed in similarly coloured clothes to symbolise them as part of a group or boyband. 

Also props used such as the red nose add a comical value and charitable value to the music video. They use lots of other people as actors and they work well because they blend into the background but by performing a dance routine they also show that it has a creative side to the music video. The setting is a large house, with shots filmed in all of the different rooms, this is effective as it doesn't focus the viewer into where its set, but focuses more on the comical value of the music video and the meaning behind the music video.

Editing:
The editing in this music video is very very good, the main part of the video involves the camera tracking each different member of the band, and each member manages to reveal where the next member of the band is. It all flows very smoothly into the next part, each clip flows into the next one with no obvious cuts. The whole idea of the music video is the band arent meant to be making a perfectley executed video they are just meant to have fun with it. Therefore although it looks sort of sloppy as they are just messing around, the wonderfully carried out camera work makes it a joy to watch. This promotes the band as fun and outgoing which makes them very appealing to teenagers and young people, they try to relate to having a youthful spirit and looking like they enjoy every minute of what they are doing.

Brief

A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with two of the following options;

- A cover for its release as part of a Digipak (CD/DVD package).

- A magazine advertisement for the Digipak (CD/DVD package).

This is an Album cover for one of Nirvanas albums, it looks tricky and intricate. It has a meaning behind it and makes the audience wonder what that is. This is a well known and successful album cover and I strive to make my CD cover as successful.

The individuality and how controversial the music cover is (As it has a naked child, swimming after money) Makes it successful and striking. 

'In the Sun' - lip synch task

Reflecting On Music Video Challenge

My roles on the day of the 'In The Sun' full class remake was to direct some of the shots, film some of the shots and also to perform in most of the music video. I was one of the main dancers that was in the gym scene and also in the main corridor scene. I also was the person responsible for the costumes involved in the whole music video and had to decide the costumes for each character in the music video so that it replicated the real one as best as possible.

This was me doing my part of the filming in the gym:

This is me doing my part as a director of a shot and filming a shot of the shot of Elenya that i wasnt in:

 This is me in the corridoor shot doing my part as one of the dancers: 

WWW: I think that all the people involved wore the correct costumes and that they all replicated the real music video really well and it looked very proffessional.
I also think that the whole class performed the music video really well and they all made the video a success.

EBI: I think that the costumes organisation could have been a better because some of the characters still did not bring the correct costumes and I could have changed that by chasing them up more.

My progress from year 12 into year 13 in Media

I have really improved on my work since year 12, i feel i have made lots of positive progress in lots of different aspects of Media Studies.
I have improved on my planning and organisation skills for Media. When we were planning the Lip Synching task of our own to our own song, we decided to get a song and learn the lyrics so that the lip synching was exact. We also had to research different music videos so that we could see how exact the lip synching was and what ideas we could get for the different shots we are going to use in our final music video.
I also had to improve on how seriously I took the work, as in year 13 the work load goes up and i need to put in more effort in order to do successfully. With year 13 work our whole class have had to put in extra time outside of lessons to finish the tasks. My friends and I had use a lot more free time to put together and edit our individual lip synching task so that it looked professional and was finished in time for the deadline. When i was making the individual lip synch I had to work in a group, and had to work round other commitments of individuals to get the work done. I had to work really hard as a member of my group so that the group worked successfully, and being in year 13 working in a group is key. 
Our group had to understand what the audience wanted to see in a music video. So when we made the individual lip synch task we decided to add a comical value to it, through research we knew that the comical side to a music video made it sell well.
When we performed our individual lip synch task in year 13 we performed it a lot more proffessionally and confidently, and it made it look like we knew what we were doing. This is a huge improvement from year 12 media where i was very timid in the filming and felt very camera shy.
The editing and camera work of our new tasks is very important so that they work successfully and look proffessional and look like they are real music videos.

This was the Costume managers list of different costumes to stick to. We printed this off and stuck to it on the day of the recording of the video.

Shot Number

Assessment 12/07 SJA

'In The Sun' - first small group lip synch post still missing
'What Make a Good Music Video' - needs visuals
No other posts completed.
Has not responded to earlier teacher feedback since work was last assessed.

EFFORT WILL BE 'Pr' (Poor) if I do not see blog up to date by first thing tomorrow morning
SJA

Assessment 28/6/11 MCU

WWW
Lipsynch task complete and some good evaluation.
Strong and emotive performances, well done!
Love the wind machine!

EBI
Not all posts complete.
Lipsynch task could be improved by using a range of shots and editing between them.
No visual material on 'what makes a good music video' post.

Effort - IN

What Makes A Good Music Video?

A good music video must have a variety of different and interesting componenets to make the viewer want to carry on watching it until the end.

• It must use a variety of interesting colours.
• it must always keep the viewers interest the whole way throughout the video
• Often the video must tell a story that relates to the song.
• The video will work if it relates to the song, either through humour or storytelling.
• The video should have a small amount of dialogue with it so an not to make it too cheesy.
• Most music videos aspire to be either comical or like a film.
• Perfect Lip Syncing so that it sounds like they are actually singing the song.
• an energy filed and enthusiastic performance

Free choice – own lip Synch

I worked with Abbie Graves and Elenya Grant on doing an Evanescence-Bring me to life video where we lip synced throughout the whole video.

WWW:

• We used a fan for dramatic effect.
• We lip synced in time to the music.
• We showed expression and feeling when we were singing the song.

EBI:

• We were laughing at the end of the video which wasn't very professional.
• The music seems to be lagging like a couple of milliseconds at some points.

'In The Sun Lip Sync' Task.