1. Evaluation Questions <br />In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?<br />The forms and conventions of a music video normally depend on the genre. For my coursework, I chose to produce a music video for a pop song. When considering what footage to use within my video, I had to take into account the common forms and conventions of a video situated within that genre. When planning my video, I took time to look at other pop videos. My song is by The Saturdays therefore I spent a large amount of time analysing their videos. I took in to account the use of costumes, props, camera angles and different camera shots. In order for my video to appeal to an audience I needed to be sure that it included the vital successful aspects of a pop video. <br />Pop videos, like The Saturdays, normally include many meat shots of the stars of the band. <br />The reason for this is that fans of the band watch their videos in order to see the girls performing. The music video can play a huge part in advertising a song and if people enjoy watching the video it can encourage them to purchase the song. Within pop videos there is normally a mass amount of colour used within in order for the video to have a ‘feel-good’ atmosphere. When bands such as The Saturdays produce a video they try to express their personalities through the video in order to appeal to their fans. When watching some of videos produced by The Saturdays I noticed that they involve a large variety of different outfits throughout helping the members of the band to express themselves in certain ways depending on the lyrics and purpose of the song. A video I paid attention to at the start of my research was ‘I just can’t get enough’ by The Saturdays. <br />This video is very fun and quirky. Throughout the video new characters are constantly introduced, bright and vibrant colours are used throughout and also a large of number of props and outfits are used. The changes throughout the video help keep you as the audience hooked and interested when watching. There are many shots where the girls are shown looking extremely glamorous. <br />Within the video they have a variety of different settings made up in front of just a plain background that changes colour frequently.<br />I took inspiration from the use of props within the video such as using mirrors, and a dressing table, bags and shoes as props however decided to shoot my video in more of a real – life setting.<br />I felt this would give the video a more realistic feel. Within many of other videos by The Saturdays real life environments are used such as their video ‘Higher’ which is mainly set outside.<br />Therefore I took the two conventions and tried to place them together in order to take an aspect from each of the different constructed videos and place them together in one. <br />When looking at a wide range of pop videos you can see a mass amount of lip syncing.<br />Artists use lip syncing within their video in order to help them give a performance. When you go to see a band or artist at a concert you go to see them perform, therefore when watching their video why would you want to see much less? Seeing the artist perform the song could increase the level of audience. <br />When planning my video I did originally aim to portray The Saturdays by creating my own group to be involved. However as time went on it was becoming more and more difficult creating a number of personalities, arranging times for people to be available and problems were going to occur if anything ever needed re-shooting. Therefore I myself decided to try and produce a video with one character. I studied the lyrics of my song and tried to find some way in order to express them. Many music videos do tell a story which can normally be explained within the song. This can enable the audience to relate to the song or video. My video has elements of lip syncing; however is more narrative based than performance. I believe this has worked best because in my opinion more narrative footage enables to keep the audience interested. <br />This can be seen as my video challenging the conventions of a real media product. I felt that this would enable it to be maybe more interesting as people would recognise The Saturdays as a band but see just one character within the video. When listening to the lyrics I felt this worked well because the song seems to be talking from the perspective of one character. I found this by looking at the lyrics: <br />I always used to be the shy girl<br />I never cared about the cool clothes<br />When he looks at me I'm beautiful<br />Im gonna feel that feeling<br />Im not used to being the first pick<br />Theres a fire going on in my heart and soul<br />The use of the words ‘I’ and ‘me’ and ‘my’ throughout enables the song to be concentrated on one specific character. I chose to shoot the girl getting ready to go out in order to fit in with the lyrics of the song ‘Im gonna feel that feeling, gonna loose control’. When listening to the song I felt that the character wanted to become something else therefore this is why I used all the different shoes and bags in order to portray the different personalities this one character could become. <br />When the lyrics spoke of a shy girl and a hot girl I tried to portray them by dressing up in different outfits to look like the people who this girl ‘never was’. Many artists try to act out what is happening within the song in their music video in order for the audience to understand what is going in and the whole concept of the song. In certain parts of the video I aimed to do this, however in some I tried to just create a sequence of events whilst this girl was getting ready therefore some parts did not connect directly with the lyrics but with the order of the filming. <br />I believe that my video does use and challenge the conventions of a real life music video however I believe it lacks in the aspect of developing. In my opinion the developing would be just having the one character however I would believe that comes more under the topic of challenging.<br />