EVALUATION - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Before we came up with an idea as to what our video was going to be about, we watched a variety of existing music videos to help determine what the general conventions are in a music video. We discovered that the general codes and conventions of a music video include a performance of the band/artist playing, a narrative within the video telling a story of a one or a few main characters, a mixture of a performance and a narrative, the mise-en-scene being appropriate for a certain genre/song and the editing reflecting the the song and pace of the music. We watched a variety of videos to make sure we knew what the conventions were of a music video to make sure that our final piece looked professional and realistic. We focused mainly on the alternative rock genre. However, we also individually looked at a number of other genres such as heavy metal and pop. This was useful as we could determine the differences between genres. This helped us gain an accurate understanding of the elements within an alternative rock video as from looking at other genres we knew that we shouldn't use that style in our music video as it would not conform to our genre.

The key conventions that we discovered within an alternaive rock genre was that the artist/band is featured throughout the video and that there is a narrative running alongside the band shots. There are also a variety of camera shots and camera movements used such as, close ups of guitars and a pan and track of the band as a group. The alternative rock music videos settings tend to be set in dark locations, such as a small and dark studio or room or a dark venue. The darkness of the colours within that location enhance this element which is a key factor to this genre as alternative rock uses dull colours as opposed to bright colours. From watching several existing music videos of the alternative rock genre, we recognised which elements needed to be adapted into our own music video. Therefore, our music video conforms to real life media products, as from looking at this existing material, it helped us to create an accurate and conventional product.

Here are some screen shots that demonstrate the similarity between a real life alternative rock band (The Cribs) and the band in our music video.

Across both videos, similar shots are used. An extreme close up is used on the lead member of the band singing into a microphone. The fact that these two shots are so similar, supports the idea that our music video conforms to the style and conventions that are used in exisiting media products.

The Cribs was a useful example to compare our band to, as there are 3 members in each band so it was helpful to see how The Cribs positoned themselves in the studio. From watching a number of The Cribs music videos, I noticed that the lead member is always in the foreground and the videos main focus is on them. I also noticed that the lead singer/guitarist and bassist stand in the foreground with the drummer positioned behind in the centre. This is common among most bands and because of this, this is why we chose to have our band positioned in this way.