1. In what ways does your media product use,
develop or challenge forms and conventions
of real media products?
2. A convention is a arrangement codes and traditional
rules which dictate the way that something is usually
done. These norms are often widely acknowledged within
regular culture, and help audiences instantly recognise
the genre of certain products. All forms of media conform
to conventions when creating products in order to comply
with what an audience expects to see. In relation to
music videos, conventions are often based around
elements such as camera work, editing, set design and
cast. The genre of our band was Indie/Rock, therefore
meaning that we were searching for conventions within
this bracket of the music industry.
3. Set design was a key element in being able to convey the
accurate ‘star image’ for our group. In the first set-up we
wanted to project a scenario that felt ruthlessly
manufactured. In many ways this challenges the
conventions of Indie/Rock. However, we aimed to execute
this section in a completely ironic way therefore subverting
the regular connotations of the set. We drew inspiration
from The 1975 and their music video ‘Girls’, where they aim
for a similar thematic message. Their video presents a
band of young men who clearly are not endorsing the
corporate image that has been designed for them. They are
passionate about the music, but are completely
disenfranchised by the industry and what it expects them to
be. This message is communicated clearly through their
satirical video and it is something we desperately wanted to
emulate in the first half of ours. We adopted the same
minimalistic set design, using a highly saturated infinity
background to make it look sterile and fake. This was
furnished only with instruments and amps much like in
Girls, and clearly didn’t tie in with the visual image of the
band, as was our intention.
4. The 1975 proved a great source of inspiration for our band in terms of star image, using both
types of our two contrasting sets in two different videos, showing their full stylistic variety
whilst also confirming to us that these ideas are realistic in the music industry for bands like
ours. For the last section of our video, we wanted to create a set that was enigmatic, ‘cool’
and much more in-keeping with the style and genre of our band. We did this almost entirely
through exploitation of lighting, as the studio space we filmed in was bare aside from lighting
and simply had a black curtain draped around the outside that was hung from the rigging.
Much of our creative ideas were derivative of The 1975 music video ‘Heart Out’. Parallels
were created with the way we chose to backlight the band using five rows of high intensity
‘blinders’, that were operated spontaneously during each take from the control deck. To add
mood and a sense of enigma we placed a ice-blue neon triangle in the middle of the band,
which the drummer was able to play within. Almost entirely on its own, the lighting created an
environment that felt suited and appropriate for a band of this genre.
5. Once established within our third and final set of the video, we wanted to be more
experimental and expressive with our camera work to create visuals that were more
dynamic and that corresponded with the lighting and musical climax of the song. A key
facet of achieving was through our use of the camera track which we laid out in a crescent
moon shape surrounding the band. This is something we had seen in The Kooks music
video ‘Forgive & Forget’, which is shot predominantly on a track that fully circles the
Indie/Rock group. It makes the video quite dramatic visually and makes it infinitely more
watchable. Unlike them we weren’t able to go around the entire circumference of the band
as we didn’t have the studio space required. However, this did mean I was able to move
back and forth at relative pace during their performance. This helped to give the video
added tempo and a more energetic feel at this crucial part of the song. Furthermore, it gave
us a better way to express the relationship between the musicians and their instruments.
6. A crucial section of our video was based in the recording studio, where we aimed to
present the band as an unfiltered, commercialised and charming group of lads who are
simply doing what they love – actually making music. This is a really well established
convention amongst Indie/Rock bands as it is seen to make them more endearing,
respected and likeable. It was arguably first posed by The Beatles in their video ‘Hard
Days Night’, where they are seen to be behaving mischievously while on tour. It can also
be seen readily today with more modern artists such as Kings of Leon in their video for
‘Red Morning Light’ and George Ezra with ‘Leaving it Up to You’, where in both the
artists are shown actually recording the song within a casual looking studio environment.
However, something that all three of these videos and any of this style have in common
is that they are always shot using handheld camera techniques. Our recording studio
section features the band playing pranks on one another, laughing and joking and
legitimately recording the music. The entirety of this was shot handheld, which offers an
unmistakable ‘home video’ aesthetic. This helps to show the group in their natural
surroundings and look as though it could have been filmed by them alone. Despite being
reasonably choreographed in reality, it becomes difficult not the warm to these boys
within the context of the video and this illusion is created largely through the ramshackle
way in which it was captured.
Another advantage of shooting in this way
is the affect that it has on the bands fans. It
gives them the impression that they are
viewing ‘behind the scenes’ footage and
have been granted privilege access to the
group and the process of making their
album. This creates an inclusive, intimate
relationship with the fans which in turn
makes the band more respectable from a
publicity perspective.
7. Editing is crucial to any music video as it is the act
of piecing otherwise meaningless footage together
and making it coherent. It was important for us to
cut clips to the beat of the music. This is
conventional with any genre of music video as
subconsciously it is more aesthetically pleasing to
an audience, and makes the general cut more
seamless. Furthermore, we also gradually built the
pace and regularity of the cuts to coincide with the
crescendo and high points of the track. As means of
challenging the conventions of the genre we also
featured a wealth of discontinuity editing, where we
jump-cut between shots to show a passing of time.
This discontinuity editing also presented how they
were being directed by a group of cynical
producers. This too referenced The 1975 ‘Girls’
video and was very effective in the first section of
our video in showing the extended period of time
that the band spent in the studio making the video.
Furthermore, this jump-cut style of editing is
relatively modern due to it not being conventional. It
was popularised by teen ‘vloggers’ on YouTube,
and has only began to become filmically acceptable
in the last decade. Therefore, this suits the young
target audience that our band are marketed
towards.
8. Given the fact that our video is largely performance based and featured
the band heavily, it is important that they were cast appropriately and
looked as one would expect. We chose boys that already had a certain
look that would comply with the star image of the band, and based this
decision on popular bands within the same genre such as Bastille.
We then individually crafted each member to bring out specific
personality and style in each of them. Some of this didn’t take much on
our part, like with Ben (drummer) for example. He has a very strong
look with dark features and alternative hair cut, which helped us to
create an 'edgy' persona for him, as is common with drummers.
However, with members such as Chris we went into considerable more
detail in creating a character. We thought we would explore the idea of
him being the smartest of the group in terms of his clothing. In
Indie/Rock bands there is normally one member who has a slightly
more alternative clothing style compared to the others. We aimed for a
bold look derivative from ‘Punk’ fashion that was based entirely on Artic
Monkeys lead singer Alex Turner. Chris also looks similar to the
frontman facially meaning some audience members may even make
this link. We used the trend of an established artist to inspire our own
group and give Chris more of an identity and therefore charisma. We
also wanted Callum (singer) to wear quite casual, indie clothes. This is
quite similar to what Callum wears in real life which meant he felt
comfortable during the shoot. It is most important that Callum felt
comfortable during the shoot as he is the frontman and will have the
most audience attention. Also, this style is reminiscent of George
Ezra's fashion, who is the original artist, meaning there is a subtle link
between them so that the video didn't seem too distanced from reality.
This acts as a further example of real life, conventional artists informing
our creative choices.
9. PERFORMANCE
9
We also complied to various Indie/Rock conventions in terms of the performance style
within our video. We had extensive rehearsal sessions prior to our shoot day so were
therefore responsible for the performance of our band. We were keen to include some
direct address, where our lead singer (Calum) looks directly into the camera lens whilst
lip-syncing. This is a rather common convention and can be seen with many artists such
as Tom Odell. Odell looks into the camera for the entire 4:07 minutes of his music
video for ‘Another Love’. Despite not going to this extreme, the performance technique
undeniably strengthens the bond between artist and audience, and also strengthens the
meaning of the lyrics. Furthermore, this makes the lead singers look and face more
recognizable to audiences through the detail. Another extremely regular convention we
adhered to in performance was employing the diamond formation for the band to stand
in, with the lead singer standing in front of the drummer and being flanked by the
guitarist and bassist. Due to our lengthly rehearsal period, we were able to hone in on
specific performances within our band - such as Joe (bassist). Joe was without doubt
the most tentative of the group, being the only band member that doesn’t take Drama A
level. We decided that instead of simply cutting Joe, we could work on bringing out
slightly more of a performance in order to convey him as the ‘moody bassist’. This is a
well established stereotype in the music industry and doesn’t take and overly zealous,
charismatic performance to achieve. Joe was perfect aesthetically for the role as he
looks mature despite his boyish features. With some individual work Joe managed to
achieve this and I believe he looks entirely believable within the video. Part of Joe’s
individual work included us showing him some conventional bassist performances from
videos we were taking inspiration from such as The 1975 ‘Girls’ and The Kooks
‘Forgive & Forget’.
10. Bands of a similar vein to ours such as Kings of Leon and Blur have utilised a similar
concept in terms of condensing different band members faces onto one album. The Kings of
Leon Digipak for 'Only By The Night' is very similar in style with very clear-cut editing points
between the different images. This makes it obvious what has been done as opposed to
blending the faces more subtly. However, I prefer this as I feel it adds something
aesthetically and makes it harshly striking visually. Blur have experimented with a more
'pop-art' styled design. However, in a similar way to our idea it still includes all members of
the band and has distinct recognisability. In addition, this makes the Digipak a completely
unique piece of artwork making it more of a collectable item. It is clear that to some extent
there is a convention with this style of Digipak that includes the band members. However,
one could also argue that our Digipak challenges modern conventions as lots of popular
Indie/Rock bands such as Alt-J stray away from having their own faces on the Digipak and
instead opt for a seemingly miscellaneous image.
For our Digipak we had the simplistic yet bold idea of taking individual portraits of the four
members of our band before then chopping them into clear pieces based on their facial
features, before amalgamating them to make one image and thus one face. This was done
using high quality editing software's Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom, in which we
cropped the images and also edited them into a ‘hyper-real’ style making the contrast and
shadows more intense.
11. The website is very important as alongside
the Digipak it sets the tone for the visual
styling of the band. We took great
inspiration from Alt-J’s current website
layout, especially their homepage. Both of
these homepages have a distinct aura of
simplicity. We adopted a minimalist and
abstract brush stroke across the centre
which harbours the band name and the
name of the latest album. We continued
the London tube element and did so
throughout the whole website as we felt
this was hugely important, given that it was
so prominent in our Digipak. Websites of
real life bands will often adapt and evolve
based on the style of their most recent
output. The homepage also has a
reference to social networking, which is a
mainstay of the marketing of any artist in
the music industry today. Furthermore, like
some other websites within our genre the
latest song release also plays
automatically once entering the site.
12. Before completing the website,
we decided that we wanted to
include a merchandise page on
our website. We confirmed
through our research that the
most common item available on
sites of a similar genre was a t-
shirt. Our hand-drawn logo is
individual to our band so we
decided to make this the
mainstay of our t-shirt design,
coupled with the very simplistic
'tee's' which are very in-trend
at the moment with the type of
demographic we are aiming for
with our band.
I then came up with the idea of the band also distributing vinyl
records as merchandise. The recent influx of vinyl sales in
the music industry is something I am well aware of, after holding
an interview with my local music shop owner. Furthermore, similar
Indie/Rock bands to ours such as Arctic Monkeys and The XX do
a similar thing to reinforce their image, or simply out of admiration
for the more traditional format. We selected what we might
imagine to be the bands three biggest hits and then created vinyl
records for them which we displayed on the same page, selling for
£2.50 each - the regular price for such an item. This would give
the fans a physical object relating to the band which they can own
and cherish. In many ways it is an extension of the Digipak and
allows then to legitimise their support for the band in another way.
13. After researching the modern music industry
on the whole, we were very aware that touring
is a hugely prominent aspect of the business
as it acts as the primary way of acts making
large sums of money, especially with the
fading of physical CD’s and record shops such
as HMV. Therefore, we were keen to include a
‘Live’ page on our website as this is
conventional for any reasonably successful
music act. This includes a list of upcoming tour
dates, detailing which specific ones are sold
out. The tour information was taken from
George Ezra's website as we felt this would
be more realistic and accurate than us making
up our own. We are pitching our band at
around the same national success as Ezra,
with an identical fan-base given that the song
we chose for our video is his. Both this page
and the previous merchandise page represent
perfectly how the website is a primary source
of cross promotion for other products
distributed by the record label.
14. Font and typography may appear to be a minute details, but can
actually be hugely influential as once a font is chosen they usually
become synergistic with all of their output of the band, both
commercial and creative. We wonted a font that was stylishly
simple yet bold and trialed various different fonts using web font
catalogue Dafont. We ended up using Bebas Neue, which was
heavily inspired by the band Bastille. Bastille have always
used this font and cleverly paired it with their iconography of a
triangle. We wanted to emulate this but with our elephant symbol,
which appears in various different places throughout our
products. The font is legible, clear and in-keeping with our genre.
15. Branding is a hugely important component within the music
industry as it becomes synonymous with the band and helps
them to be recognisable. One could easily argue that our strong
London tube branding challenges the status quo by including
such heavy branding based on the origins of the band - instead
of going for more stylised, miscellaneous imagery. Our Digipak
features instantly recognisable imagery as well as the name
deriving from a real tube station, something referenced on the
website biography. However, citing a bands roots in this way
isn't actually very unconventional. Bands such as The Arctic
Monkeys and Oasis reference their homecomings (Sheffield
and Manchester) heavily in all of their output, seeing it as a key
influence in their music. They even include it in some of the
architectural visuals from their Digipak’s (‘Favourite Worst
Nightmare’ / ‘What’s the Story Morning Glory’) This is a trend
that of course dates back to The Beatles and their famous
affinity with Liverpool. It is something that reassured us in our
creative decision to brand the group in this way.
