A2 Media

1. Question 1: In what ways
does your media product
use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of
real media products ?

2. The opening of my video presents the main protagonist Max in a domestic setting which is
demonstrated by his non-verbal communication through actions such as waking up, eating breakfast
and brushing his teeth. The lighting here is also white and neutral which creates a sober atmosphere
and represents Max as pure or innocent. This is a common convention of the psychedelic rock genre
and can be seen in videos such as Mac Demarco’s ‘Passing Out Pieces’. I chose to conform to this
convention as I feel a relaxed, domestic introduction emphasises the disturbing and psychedelic
elements which appear later in the video through the element of surprise.

3. The location for my entire music video was a homemade set within my bedroom which included
numerous scenes such as a street, a forest and a psychedelic ‘wonderland’. The creation of sets is
rarely done within live action psychedelic music videos (presumably due to the cost) hence here I
broke a convention in order to create an even more psychedelic and mad atmosphere through
twisty, semi-realistic paintings. I also made use of bright colours as part of the mise-en-scene of my
locations (especially in ‘wonderland’) which is done in videos such as Tame Impala’s ‘Only Go
Backwards’. This shows that I both conformed and broke multiple conventions surrounding the
location of my video in order to make my video as surreal and insane as possible.

4. The costume of my main character included ripped jeans, old t-shirt and dirty jacket which are all pieces
of casual clothing. This sets him up to be a non-professional with no strong importance or significance but
rather an average youth. This follows conventions of the genre (as seen in Mac Demarco’s ‘Passing Out
Pieces’) and I feel emphasises the characters boredom and lack of purpose at the begging of the video as
youth are less likely to be career or family driven. In turn this exaggerates the action in the second half of
the video as the character’s boredom is alleviated and their ‘youthful’ innocence is removed. It also
relates well to the target audience (16 – 24 year olds) who wear a similar fashion.

5. I think that my camera work and editing style is typical of the psychedelic genre and works to effectively
convey the change in atmosphere through the narrative. At the beginning of the video all of the shots are
stationary mid-shots and wide angles which make the viewer feel comfortable and grounded with the
action on screen. This changes after the candy is consumed at which point there are many more close ups
(making the audience feel claustrophobic), Dutch angles (disorientating the audience) and moving camera
shots which track or pan to follow the action and make the audience for more involved. This is
supplemented by the use of a fisheye lens which further distrorts the image and is popular amongst the
genre in videos such as Mac Demarco’s ‘Chamber of reflection’. On top of this the editing pace increases to
reflect the anxiety of the protagonist as the narrative progresses and no wipes are fades are used in place
of hard cuts. This means the action feels more jagged and less relaxed.

6. My video is primarily a narrative music video with a few conceptual elements which don’t strictly follow
the overall narrative (such as ballroom dancing with the skeleton). This follows conventions of psychedelic
music videos however many also contain elements of performance (such as King Gizzard and the Lizard
Wizzard’s ‘Rattlesnake’) which I chose to avoid. I chose to avoid these as I felt they would break the flow of
the narrative meaning the audience didn’t relate as strongly to the protagonist. It likely would have
strengthened the star image but weakened the emotional impact of the intense visuals which I felt are
more important to my video.

7. In my video I think that the narrative is mostly told through the over exaggerated facial expressions of the
protagonist (highlighted through close-ups) and the way in which the audience reacts to this which is an
example of semantic code according to Roland Barthes’ narrative theory. The narrative is also presented
through the action such as the sweet eating (action codes) and the coloured lighting which reflects the
mood of the protagonist (symbolic codes). All of these are present in music videos of the same genre
such as Tame Impala’s ‘Let it Happen’ where lighting and close ups are used to reflect the thoughts of the
protagonist and hence present the narrative

8. The video mostly suggests its psychedelic genre through the surreal narrative and extensive use of coloured
lighting to modify the location which are examples of narrative and iconographic conventions according to Ryan
Hall (1997). This follows conventions of the genre, an example being Mac Demarco’s ‘Passing Out Pieces’ where
the protagonist goes on an exaggerated killing spree after being insulted and The Moonlandingz ‘Sweet Saturn
Mine’ which uses colour to suggest the genre. I chose to conform to these conventions as I think they are an
effective way to present my genre to the audience in an understandable and recognisable way.

9. In my music video the star (Max) acts as the protagonist even though he is the musician of the song as
clarified by my digipack. This is similar to other music videos of the same genre such as Mac Demarco’s
‘Passing Out Pieces’ which shows the star (Mac Demarco) performing both the narrative and the song. This is
an example of one of Goodwin’s 5 key aspects of a music video – that the artist acts as both a narrator and a
participant.

10. Throughout my video I used practical effects to bring the character of Candy Sam to life. This
involved using fishing line on poles to manipulate his arms while off camera which I feel worked
effectively. I also used Premiere Pro to speed up the footage that I had filmed while my actor had
been moving approximately 1/10th of normal speed in order to make the footage appear more mad
and erratic. The use of both practical and digital effects are a common conventions in psychedelic
music videos – a great example being ‘Passing Out Pieces’.