The document discusses how the media product challenges conventions of music videos through its use of reverse footage. While unconventional, some elements fit conventional conventions, such as including hidden details in the background. More conventional elements include the use of time lapses and overlays. The media product also includes a narrative and abstract imagery to engage viewers and portray the song's meaning, which are conventional aspects of music videos and songs of this genre. The advertising and packaging for the media product also employs conventional design elements such as reviews, abstract imagery, and displaying lyrics.

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

2. To start, these stills show something that we have done that
is not conventional at all of music videos. Though it is hard
to demonstrate with a still, these images are supposed to
demonstrate the fact that our video is in reverse. This is
very unconventional because, as we discovered the hard
way, it is difficult and time-consuming to do. This method
involved reversing the sound of the song and figuring out
how to pronounce the lyrics backwards, so that we could
video Michael lipsyncing these backwards lyrics, so that
when the clip is reversed everything else changes and is
moving backwards, but Michael appears as though he is
unaffected.

3. Sometimes however, this reverse effect does fit in
nicely with other conventions of music videos. For
example, one conventional thing we have done is to
have a lot of hidden detail and things going on in the
background, besides what the main character is doing.
For example, this still represents a section of the music
video in which Michael stares off into the distance, but
in the background you can see water flowing upwards
and people all walking backwards among other things.

4. Moving on to things we have done that are conventional, we
have a still here showing one of our time lapses. Time lapses
are often used in music videos to show the passing of time (of
course) among other things, and are generally quite effective
at giving the video a sense of time. I believe this to be an
important aspect in most music videos, as they should often
feel like they are going somewhere. An exception to my
opinion on this is our own video, in which the narrative is
supposed to indicate that the video ends at the same point it
began.

5. This still shows an overlay effect that we have used in our
video. Although it is slightly unclear, it is liquid flowing down the
screen over the top of a time lapse of the country. Overlays are
particularly conventional, primarily because they can be used
to keep the interest of a viewer during clips that last for longer
than a few seconds. We used them often in our video however
because sometimes the lyrics we made for the reverse singing
were incorrect, and as such it was impossible to make it look
correct. Eventually however these overlays became transitions,
due to audience feedback.

6. These two stills represent our narrative. Narrative is one of the
most basic, conventional things done in recent music videos.
Some still choose to just be the band playing, but many videos
have a ‘story’ now to keep the interest of viewers, as well as to
portray the song’s meaning. They also demonstrate another
convention, which is random cuts to narrative that is happening
in a different location from where the major part of the video is
taking place (in our case, near the tree – Urban settings are not
the main location.)

7. Because our entire concept was quite abstract, we have used a lot of
abstract imagery in our video, which is highly conventional of songs of
this genre. Above is one such part of our video, which is referenced a
few times throughout the video (See: Small details in background.)
These abstract moments happen frequently enough to keep viewers
interested in the video and following the narrative, however in our
case we wanted our narrative to be a little mixed up and confusing, as
memories are never perfect and often not even in the correct order.

8. This is our magazine advert, which also
has numerous conventions on it. For
example, there are the reviews given by
established indie magazines. This is
extremely conventional of almost any
form of advertising, as those selling the
product want potential consumers to see
the opinion of others in an attempt to
sway them into buying the product. It is
also quite abstract, which is both
conventional as well as in line with the
theme of our work.

9. Finally, the above images are the unfolded version of our
digipack. This also follows pretty much all the same
conventions as the magazine advert, as well as a few
specifically for digipacks. For example, one page of the
digipack is devoted to displaying the lyrics of the single.
Once again, much of this piece of work is abstract to stay in
line with our work’s theme.