Notes to make sure students blogs are up to date

1. Blog Revision Notes
TERM 1 A LEVEL MEDIA STUDIES

2. A Level Brief
• A promotion package for the release of
an album, to include a music promo
video, together with two of the following
three options:
• a website homepage for the band
• a cover for its release as part of a
digipak (CD/DVD package)

3. Task
• Create a timeline of the history of music
videos using the notes you have made
• Remember to make it as creative and
interesting as possible!

4. The History of Music Videos
• In 1894, sheet music publishers Edward B. Marks and
Joe Stern hired electrician George Thomas and various
performers to promote sales of their song "The Little
Lost Child".
• Using a magic lantern, Thomas projected a series of
still images on a screen simultaneous to live
performances. This would become a popular form of
entertainment known as the illustrated song, the first
step toward music video.

5. The History of Music Videos
• 1926, with the arrival of "talkies" many musical short films
were produced.
• Shorts were typically six minutes in duration and played in
cinemas before the feature film
• Blues singer Bessie Smith appeared in a video for the song
St. Louis Blues in 1929 which ran in cinemas until 1932

6. The History of Music Videos
• Animation artist Max Fleischer introduced a series of sing-along short cartoons
called Screen Songs, which invited audiences to sing along to popular songs by
"following the bouncing ball", which is similar to a modern karaoke machine. The
sing along concept is still used today, especially with younger audiences such as
High School Musical.
• Early 1930s cartoons featured popular musicians performing their hit songs on-
camera in live-action segments during the cartoons. The early animated films by
Walt Disney, such as the Silly Symphonies shorts and especially Fantasia, which
featured several interpretations of classical pieces, were built around music.
• The Warner Brothers cartoons, even today billed as Looney Tunes and Merrie
Melodies, were initially fashioned around specific songs from upcoming Warner
Brothers musical films

7. The History of Music Videos
• Musical films were another important
precursor to music video, and several well-
known music videos have imitated the style of
classic Hollywood musicals from the 1930s to
the 1970s.

8. The History of Music Videos
• Tony Bennett was filmed walking along The Serpentine in Hyde
Park, London as his recording of "Stranger in Paradise" played; this film
was distributed to and played by UK and US television stations.
• Disk jockey-singer J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson was the first to coin
the phrase "music video", in 1959.
• With the rise of television, as the format allowed for many new stars to be
exposed that previously would have been passed over by
Hollywood, which normally required proven acts in order to attract an
audience to the box office.

9. The History of Music Videos
• In 1964, The Beatles starred in their first feature film A Hard Day's
Night, directed by Richard Lester. Shot in black-and-white and presented
as a mock documentary, it was a loosely structured musical fantasia
interspersing comedic and dialogue sequences with musical ones.
• The musical sequences furnished basic templates on which countless
subsequent music videos were modeled. It was the direct model for the
successful US TV series The Monkees (1966–1968) which similarly
consisted of film segments that were created to accompany various
Monkees songs.

10. The History of Music Videos
• The Beatles' second feature Help! (1965) was a much more lavish
affair, filmed in colour in London and on international locations.
• The title track sequence, filmed in black-and-white, is arguably one of the
prime archetypes of the modern performance-style music
video, employing rhythmic cross-cutting, contrasting long shots and close-
ups, and unusual shots and camera angles, such as the shot near the end
of the song, in which George Harrison's left hand and the neck of his guitar
are seen in sharp focus in the foreground while the completely out-of-
focus figure of John Lennon sings in the background

11. The History of Music Videos
• In 1965, The Beatles began making promotional clips (then known as "filmed
inserts") for distribution and broadcast in other countries—primarily the USA—so
they could promote their record releases without having to make in-person
appearances. Many clips were aired on "Top of the Pops" in the UK.
• The colour promotional clips for "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny
Lane", made in early 1967 and directed by Peter Goldman took the promotional
film format to a new level. They used techniques borrowed from underground and
avantgarde film, including reversed film and slow motion, dramatic
lighting, unusual camera angles and color filtering added in post-production.
Reflecting the fact that these studio masterpieces were impossible for the group to
perform live, their psychedelic mini-films illustrated the songs in an
artful, impressionistic manner rather than trying to simulate an idealised
performance or depict a narrative or plot.

12. The History of Music Videos
• The monochrome 1966 clip for Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues" filmed
by D. A. Pennebaker.
• Eschewing any attempt to simulate performance or present a narrative, the clip
shows Dylan standing in a city back alley, silently shuffling a series of large cue
cards (bearing key words from the song's lyrics).
• Many "song films"—often referred to as "filmed inserts" at that time—were
produced by UK artists so they could be screened on TV when the bands were not
available to appear live.

13. The History of Music Videos
• The long-running British TV show Top of the Pops began playing music
videos in the late 1970s, although the BBC placed strict limits on the
number of 'outsourced' videos TOTP could use. Therefore a good video
would increase a song's sales as viewers hoped to see it again the
following week.
• In 1980, David Bowie scored his first UK number one in nearly a decade
thanks to director David Mallet's eye catching promo for "Ashes to Ashes".
Another act to succeed with this tactic was Madness, who shot on 16 mm
and 35 mm, constructing their clips as "micro-comedic" short films

14. The History of Music Videos
• In 1975, The Who released their all-music
feature film Tommy, directed by Ken
Russell, based upon their 1969 rock opera of
the same name.
• Also in 1975, the band Queen ordered Bruce
Gowers to make a promo video for their new
single "Bohemian Rhapsody" to show it in Top
Of The Pops; this is also notable for being
entirely shot and edited on videotape.

15. The History of Music Videos
• On August 1, 1981, at 12:01 a.m., MTV launched with the words "Ladies
and gentlemen, rock and roll," spoken by John Lack, and played over
footage of the first Space Shuttle launch countdown of Columbia (which
took place earlier that year) and of the launch of Apollo 11. Those words
were immediately followed by the original MTV theme song, playing over
photos of the Apollo 11 moon landing, with the flag featuring MTV's logo
changing various colors, textures, and designs.
• MTV producers Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert used this public domain
footage as a conceit, associating MTV with the most famous moment in
world television history.

16. The History of Music Videos
• In 1981, the U.S. video channel MTV launched, airing "Video
Killed the Radio Star" and beginning an era of 24-hour-a-day
music on television.
• With this new outlet for material, the music video would, by the
mid-1980s, grow to play a central role in popular music
marketing. Many important acts of this period, most notably
Duran Duran and Madonna, owed a great deal of their success
to the skillful construction and seductive appeal of their videos.

17. The History of Music Videos
• Two key innovations in the development of the modern music video were
the development of relatively inexpensive and easy-to-use video recording
and editing equipment, and the development of visual effects.
• The advent of high-quality colour videotape recorders and portable video
cameras enabled many pop acts to produce promotional videos quickly
and cheaply, in comparison to the relatively high costs of using film.
However, as the genre developed, music video directors increasingly
turned to 35 mm film as the preferred medium, while others mixed film
and video

18. The History of Music Videos
• In 1983, the most successful and influential music video of all time was released — the nearly
14-minute-long video for Michael Jackson's song "Thriller". The video set new standards for
production, having cost $500,000 to film.
• That video, along with earlier videos by Jackson for his songs "Billie Jean" and "Beat It", also
was instrumental in getting music videos by African American artists played on MTV.
• Earlier, such videos had been rare: according to MTV, this was because it initially conceived
itself as a rock-music-oriented channel, although musician Rick James was outspoken in his
criticism of the cable channel, claiming in 1983 that MTV's refusal to air the music video for
his song "Super Freak" and clips by other African-American performers was "blatant racism"

19. The History of Music Videos
• The video for the 1985 Dire Straits song "Money for Nothing" made
pioneering use of computer animation, and helped make the song an
international hit. Ironically, the song itself was a wry comment on the
music-video phenomenon, sung from the point of view of an appliance
deliveryman both drawn to and repelled by the outlandish images and
personalities that appeared on MTV.
• In 1986, Peter Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer" used special effects and
animation techniques developed by British studio Aardman Animation.
The video for "Sledgehammer" would go on to be a phenomenal
successand win nine MTV Video Music Awards.

20. The History of Music Videos
• By the early 1990s, MTV was playing a combination of pop-friendly hard rock
acts, chart-topping metal and hard rock acts such as Metallica, Nirvana and Guns
‘N' Roses, pop singers such as Michael Jackson, Madonna and New Kids on the
Block, and R&B quartets such as Bell BivDevoe and Boyz II Men, while introducing
hit rappers Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer.
• To accompany the new sounds, a new form of music videos came about: more
creative, funny, artistic, experimental, and technically accomplished than those in
the 1980s.
• Several noted film directors got their start creating music videos. After pressure
from the MVPA (Music Video Producers Association – later changed to Music
Video Production Association) MTV began listing the names of the videos'
directors at the bottom of the credits by December 1992.

21. The History of Music Videos
• In this period, directors and the acts they worked with began to explore and
expand the form and style of the genre, using more sophisticated effects in their
videos, mixing film and video, and adding a storyline or plot to the music video.
• Occasionally videos were made in a non-representational form, in which the
musical artist was not shown. Because music videos are mainly intended to
promote the artist, such videos are comparatively rare; three early 1980s examples
are David Mallet's video for David Bowie and Queen's "Under Pressure", and Ian
Emes' video for Duran Duran's "The Chauffeur".
• The video for George Michael's "Freedom 90" (1990), in which Michael himself
refused to appear, forcing director David Fincher to substitute top fashion models
in his place.

22. Encoding
• As a Producer, when you produce a text you construct messages
and meaning to it.
• This is the idea of ENCODING
• For example, imagine you are the Director for the Saturday’s. When
creating the music video for their single ‘Notorious’ you may wish to
construct the narrative that they are secretaries working in an office
through the use of costume, set and props. They work hard during
the week and like to go out at the end of a days work.

23. Decoding
• As an audience, we decode,or interpret the
media text based on our own beliefs, ideas
and situation.
• We may decode the text in the same way as
the producer intended (encoded) it.
• However, we may interpret (decode) it
differently.

24. Reception Theory – Stuart Hall
• Dominant(or 'hegemonic') reading: the audience
accepts what is being presented without question.
• Negotiated reading: the audience partly shares the
text's code and broadly accepts the preferred
reading, but sometimes resists and modifies it in a way
which reflects their own position, experiences and
interests
• Oppositional ('counter-hegemonic') reading: the
audience understands the dominant, preferred reading
but disagrees entirely; rejecting the reading. This is
often influenced by social positioning, cultural
experience and beliefs.
Example:
Party political broadcast
Documentary film
Big Brother/ TOWIE

25. What factors do you think may
influence your reading of a music
video?
• Musical preference (genre)
• Representations of the music artist
(constructed in the media)
• Lyrics
• Visual content
• Narrative

26. On your blog
• Use your notes to:
• Explain what encoding and decoding means
• Explain the three areas of the reception
theory
• Apply all three readings to a video of your
choice

27. What is Narrative?
• It is important to tell the difference between narrative and story:
• Story = a sequence of events, known correctly as the plot
• Narrative = the way those events are put together to be presented to an
audience.
• Therefore, when analysing a narrative we analyse the construction of the
story i.e. the way it has been put together, not the story itself. You also
need to consider what the story is about in its most basic terms, the
theme(e.g. Love, war, winning).
• All media texts have a narrative, whether they are a six hour TV miniseries
or a one paragraph newspaper story or a glossy magazine photograph.

28. TzvetanTodorov
• Todorov was a Bulgarian philosopher who
proposed that all narrative falls into a
standard 3 part structure.
• They begin with equilibrium, where
everything is balanced, disequilibriumas
something comes along to disrupt that
equilibrium, and finally reach a
resolution, when equilibrium is restored.

29. TzvetanTodorov
• Equilibrium
Disequilibrium
New Equilibrium

30. Vladimir Propp
• Vladimir Propp was a Russian formalist who
analyzed the basic plot components of Russian
folk tales to identify their simplest irreducible
narrative elements.
• Propp constructed a list of 31Functions and
8Character Types that occurred in all stories

31. Vladimir Propp
1. The Villain (Antagonist) — struggles against the hero.
2. The Dispatcher —character who makes the lack known and sends the hero off.
3. The Helper (magical) —* helps the hero in the quest.
4. The Princess (or prize) — the hero deserves her throughout the story but is unable to marry her
because of an unfair evil, usually because of the villain. the hero's journey is often ended when
he marries the princess, thereby beating the villain.
5. The Father— gives the task to the hero, identifies the false hero, marries the hero, often sought
for during the narrative. Propp noted that functionally, the princess and the father can not be
clearly distinguished.
6. The Donor—prepares the hero or gives the hero some magical object.
7. The Hero (Protagonist) — reacts to the donor, weds the princess.
8. False Hero — takes credit for the hero’s actions or tries to marry the princess.[4]

32. Claude Lev-Strauss
• Was a French anthropologist who tried to
apply a Structure (de Saussure) to
anthropology
• His work focussed on the theory of Binary-
Opposition that is present in narratives

33. Claude Levi-Strauss
• Binary-Opposition is a theory that all
narratives are driven by conflict of a series of
opposing forces.
Light/Dark Good/Evil Noise/Silence Youth/Age
Right/Wrong Poverty/Wealth Strength/ Inside/Outside
Weakness

34. Roland Barthes
• Roland Barthes describes a text as
• "a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of
signifieds; it has no beginning; it is reversible; we
gain access to it by several entrances, none of
which can be authoritatively declared to be the
main one; the codes it mobilizes extend as far as
the eye can read, they are indeterminable...the
systems of meaning can take over this absolutely
plural text, but their number is never
closed, based as it is on the infinity of
language..."

35. Roland Barthes
• A text is like a tangled ball of threads which needs unraveling so we
can separate out the colours. Once we start to unravel a text, we
encounter an absolute plurality of potential meanings.
• We can start by looking at a narrative in one way, from one
viewpoint, bringing to bear one set of previous experience, and
create one meaning for that text. You can continue by unraveling
the narrative from a different angle, by pulling a different thread if
you like, and create an entirely different meaning. And so on. An
infinite number of times. If you wanted to.

36. Blog Checklist
• 1) Introduction to your brief
• 2) Your Music Video presentation
• 3) Music Video Timeline
• 4) Music Video Analysis
• 5) Narrative Theory Notes
• 6) Narrative Theory Comparison table
• 7) Music Director Fact Sheet

37. Famous Video Directors
• Michel Gondry
• Hype Williams
• David Fincher
• F. Gary Gray
• StephaneSednaoui
• Mark Romenek
• Spike Jonze
• Michael Bay
• Hammer & Tongs

38. Task
• Pick 1 Director from the list whose work you enjoy –
You will need to watch some videos
• Create a fact sheet about that director using the
template
• Ext: Write a PEA paragraph explaining which video
you have watched by that director is your favourite &
why