A2 Media Evaluation Question 1

1. A2 Media Evaluation #1
Georgia Cuthbert

2. 'Bridges' Broods A2 Music Video
In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

3. Using Conventions
For my music video, I researched the conventions of pop music videos and I decided to go with the sub-
genre Indie Pop in which I analysed the micro and macro elements of these videos. I decided to create
an Indie Pop music video which would accompany the song ‘Bridges’ as I found the conventions really
interesting and fun to recreate, I was then able to make a list of conventions that I could look when
planning and producing my music video. The conventions that I used are:
● Frequent close ups of the artist to show emotion through facial expressions
● Contrasting colours, dark and bright whites
● Visual effects when the artist is in shot
● Slow paced editing to represent emotion
● Both narrative and performance, use of a backstory - usually boyfriend/girlfriend relationship
I also tried following as many codes from Goodwin’s narrative theory:
● Lyrics and Visuals – when there is a relationship between what you hear and what you see
● Music and Visuals – when the music cuts in time to the music
● Genre exists – when conventions of a specific genre/s can be identified
● Artist Close-ups – the artist features in the music video
● Star Iconography – when a specific symbolic representation can be seen
● Voyeurism – when the music video shows activities that the audience would not normally see
● Intertextual References – when a dialogic or dialectic relationship is made about another piece of
artwork

4. Developing Conventions
After following the conventions of Indie Pop videos closely there was one
convention in particular that I wanted to take to the next level to engage my
audience and to get them questioning what is going on. This was the idea of
having a backstory which drives the narrative, this is conventionally a
relationship between a girl and boy which is falling apart. Instead of having a
stereotypical romance in a music video, I decided to have two friends drifting
away from each other. I felt that my audience would connect with this easily
as it is quite a common thing amongst teenagers especially at the stage
where people are moving from college to university or work and they tend to
go their separate ways. I think that developing this convention worked well in
my music video.

5. Challenging Conventions
The convention I feel I challenged in my music video is having a clear
narrative. Rather than telling the story clearly to my audience, I used
narrative devices and character to show what is going on. I used photographs
to link the girls together and connect it to the artist who looked like one of
the two girls. I wanted the audience to work out what was going on for
themselves as oppose to me feeding them the information. My music video
doesn’t follow a particular narrative structure which challenges the
conventions of most music videos, including Indie Pop ones.