Evaluation Question 1 Inspiration

1. INSPIRATION/CONVENTIONS OF REAL
MEDIA PRODUCTS
Evaluation Question1. The
sources of real media products
that we gained our inspiration
from.

2. SIA
One of the first media products we took inspiration from was the music videos created for the
female solo artist Sia. Most of her music videos, including for her songs “The Greatest” and
“Chandelier” include a female dancer which is a style both Ceri and I really appreciate and wanted
to use. We feel performance videos that include dancers add a different feel and individuality to
music videos, which is a convention of dance based performance videos that we wanted to mimic.
We chose to dress our dancers in simple black leotards with a delicate lace skirt; this minimalistic
and sleek look for our dancers we also gained inspiration for from Sia’s music videos. Her dancers
are often dressed in simple clothing which is a style we followed as we did not want any of the
costumes to distract from the dance. The dancers themselves performed extremely well during
filming and we believe their dancing looks professional and impressive and we are very happy with
their performance. We feel the dancing matches and conveys the song well to audiences.
Sia’s music
videos to the
left, mine and
Ceri’s to the
right.

3. FURTHER DANCE PERFORMANCE INSPIRATION
Other artists that have also used dancers/dance routines within their video, creating
a performance video, include P!nk and Ed Sheeran. The female solo artist P!nk use a
dance routine within her video for “Try” and the male solo artist Ed Sheeran within his
video to “Thinking Out Loud”. Both these artists have used duets, however have
employed the use of a stereotypical romantic duet of a man and a woman.

4. OUR OWN MUSIC VIDEO
While Ceri and I have taken inspiration from these videos we have also
made the dance element more individual by using two female dancers. As
we did not want to portray the song “Take Me Church” as romantic nor was
the song typically romantic, we used two female dancers. Both the dancers
are similar heights and the same age allowing them to look like an
effective, genuine duo which is another reason why we chose to use them
within our video.

5. DANCE SHOW
Another place we gained inspiration from for the dance aspect
of the music is a dance show that both Ceri and I attended.
Dancers performed to the original song by Hoizer, using a
contemporary dance style. This is a dance style both Ceri and I
really like, as this adds a dramatic flair and a real visual
aspect to our video. From our research into our target audience
we were able to identify the necessity of having a visually
engaging and interesting music video. From the dance routines
in professional music videos and the dance show we saw, both
media products, we decided on a performance video. We also
took inspiration for our lighting from the dance show as we
understood how the stage lighting and use of colour creates a
more interesting music video visually. This follows the theory of
Steve Archer who believes that lighting within a video heightens
the experience for audiences. The flexibility of stage lighting
and the many different aspects and options of lighting that Ceri
and I could use really appealed to us. The location of the stage
also appealed to us as we had good access to the school stage
and we also liked the range of idea’s and options the stage
gave us.

6. LIGHTING INSPIRATION
Professional music video’s also inspired us for the lighting of our video such
as: Believer by Imagine Dragons, Youth by Troye Sivan and the style of The
1975’s videos, predominately the music video for UGH!. After our research
Ceri and I realised how lighting can really be used to add movement and
interest to a video. By using a projected stained glass window Ceri and I
were able to create a focal point of interest and by basking the stage in
purple we were following conventions of the indie genre. We feel the use of
lighting really helped to match our genre and create interest during the
video.

7. SHOT INSPIRATION
For inspiration to include
movement while filming the solo
shots we looked at music videos
for solo artists in order to gain
idea’s relevant for our own artist.
Sam Smith’s video for his song
“Too Good At Goodbyes” was
highly influential in creating this
as we followed ideas of slow
panning (2.55-3.07) and
zooming (0.27-0.31) as well as
full circle shots where we
followed the artist. This way of
filming solo artists is a common
feature of music and a
convention we followed and feel
looks effective within our own
music video. Please see further
on within blog post for GIF’s for
this.

8. AUDIENCE FEEDBACK
We decided to change the setting of our music video; we had originally planned to
try to film in a Church, however after audience feedback raised the difficulties we
may face doing, this such as lighting quality and having enough room for the dancers
we changed our idea to using a stage instead. We also used the dance show for
inspiration for this change. Throughout this process we have continually altered and
adapted our idea’s using the feedback from our target audience. We have valued
our audience feedback highly and have found it very useful in creating our final
product.

9. STYLING/CLOTHING INSPIRATION
To stick to the indie pop genre, we
decided to use a solo female artist,
who we modelled off artists such as
Lana Del Rey, Gabrielle Aplin and
Birdy (as shown to the right). Clothing
wise we took inspiration from their
mostly simplistic style, dressing our
artist in ripped Mom jeans with a clear
statment black belt (both typical items
of indie fashion) and a black tee-shirt.

10. AUDIENCE FEEDBACK
We originally also dressed our artist in a
statement cardigan as well, for our draft
music video, however upon receiving
audience feedback on this we decided to
not include the cardigan. We agreed with
our audience that the cardigan did not
match well with the style of the dancers so
decided to re-film our final music video
without the cardigan. After our choice to
no longer include the cardigan we feel
our artist matched our genre well; our
artist also performed well during the
filming and we feel this helps to make our
video to look professional and authentic,
conforming with professional media
products.