The music video represents an indie rock artist struggling through life. In the beginning, the main character is always seen with his guitar and has a rough past. Throughout the video, his difficult life and desire to leave for New York are shown. Though the narrative changed from the original idea, it was altered to better fit the indie rock genre. The low-budget, casual locations around the filmmaker's home were chosen to match the theme. The character's outfit and guitar were kept consistent to portray one day and avoid continuity issues. Overall, the video aimed to balance performance with narrative to tell the story and relate to the song's lyrics, though more narrative could have been included.

1. Evaluation 1
Marcus Catanzaro

2. The representation of the artist is complicated, in my music video we see the character
as a general musician, always has his guitar with him and never leaves it anywhere. As
the video progresses the audience begins to see what the character is like, what kind of
life he has and what his past contains. The artist is shown as a teenager who has a
rough life which cause problems for him in the future. He is ignored by most of the
people he see’s and does not really care for other people around him, this leads onto
why he hates his life and why he wants to move away to New York as the lyrics in the
song imply. The narrative for the music did change from what my original idea was but
this was only because I felt as if this would fit the indie rock genre better.
This nine frame
analysis shows
what I tried to
show at different
points of my music
video and the
representations I
tried to give off in
an attempt to
match the genre.

3. The location I chose for my music video was spread out, the areas I filmed in were
similar in some ways, this was done purposefully as the indie rock genre is meant to be
casual and low budget so that is the theme I tried to stick too. The filming either took
place in my house or around the area in which I live, the reason for this is because I
know the area and so it was easier for me to find places in which I could film in that
would keep to the genre. The first scene I filmed was in front of a garage, I chose a
garage door that looked old and rusty which I think helped to reflect the attitude of the
song and genre. The second scene I filmed was on a roundabout, this was one of the
longer sequences that took to film as it took time to set up the camera and for the traffic
to clear. The next two scenes took place inside my room and in the garage, these were
The other scenes side of my character and to relate to the lyrics.
to show the emotional
took place around
the area, this again
was sticking to the
general theme of
being low budget
and casual. The last
scene shows my
character lying
down in his
bed, this scene was
meant to show the
character for who
he is, no guitar or
any outside
influences affect

4. The costume was the same throughout the music video. The costume consisted of a
stripped shirt and plain t-shirt, some blue jeans and some lee cooper shoes, this is
casual clothing which fits the indie rock genre. The reason why I used the same
costume throughout my music video was so I did not get any continuity issues, which
would be easier to get if I changed the costume I was wearing in different scenes. I
decided on this costume as the audience would be able to recognise this as casual
attire, this was also done because I wanted the audience to know that this is all based
on one day of his life and not over a set period of days. The main prop in the music
video was the electric guitar, this played a large part as without it the scenes would
not have been fully represented and the guitar would appear to be something that
I only used two
would randomly appear into scenes which I did not want.
props for my
music video (the
electric guitar and
Santa hat), the
Santa hat was
used to link in
with the lyrics
'Christmas came
early for me’ I
thought this
would be better
than just
randomly
unwrapping a
guitar.

5. Filming the music video did not take along period of time as I worked out
what I wanted to do so quickly so I did not have any issues with running
out of time or just not knowing what to do. The editing was a slightly longer
process, this was because of the amount of time it took to match clips
together and to get the right timings, if I did not do this then the shots
would have been out of place and the lip syncing would have been off. I
did all of the editing on iMovie as it is basic software and easy to use and
get the hang of. But this meant that I was unable to edit anywhere else as
only the Apple Mac’s have iMovie so it would have been impossible for me
to edit at home. I used one of the school’s cameras to do my filming along
with a tripod to hold the camera steady whilst filming. The cameras are
simple to use but they do not always want to connect with the Apple Mac’s
so time the filming
Overall was lost transferring the clips to iMovie.
and editing
process went
well, this was
down to quick
planning and
already having a
basic
understanding of
how to use
iMovie.

6. The performance stage of the music video was mixed in with the
narrative. I tried to make the amount of performance I had equal to the
amount of narrative. The performance stage was mixed with the playing of
guitar and lip syncing, I did not do both of the sequences at the same time
as I knew that I would not be able to pull it off. For the performance of the
music video I tried to stick to what other indie rock artists do, stand
around, sing the song and play their instruments, I feel as if I did this in
my music video but something still could have been improved.

7. I did not include as much narrative as I wanted to in my music video, a lot of the
scenes turned into performance which was not what I really wanted. There are
different stages in my music video, these are performance and narrative
stages, we see the narrative in many of the frames but they are also mixed in
with performance which dominated a lot of the scenes. At different points in the
music video we see problems that the character is facing, whether it being
waking up in the middle of a roundabout or problems with drinking, these things
help to build up the character profile which is what the audience want to see. I did
not want to have a complicated narrative as it would confuse the audience which
could lead onto them becoming bored and not finishing the music video. The
lyrics of the song are based on a past experience that the band has had which I
think is quite personal, this can help the song to become more popular due to
how realistic it is and that the target audience can relate to it on some level.
A music video with
a good mix of both
narrative and
performance can
become very
successful and can
make a good impact
on the market.

8. The genre for the song is indie rock, the indie rock genre is not very popular as
a lot of indie rock bands do not make it into the mainstream side of the music
industry. The indie rock genre can be tricky to represent in a music video as
the meaning of it is greatly affected by the lyrics. In order for a music video to
make sense it has to elate to the lyrics of the song, if they do not then the
audience will be left confused and unsure of what they just watched. I tried to
stick to this rule in my music video as I did not want to make a music video that
was completely unrelated to the lyrics so I made sure to take into account what
the lyrics meant and represented as to give off the best affect in my final
product. By showing how hard it is in the life of my character I gave the
The genre of a song relate to, as this is something that can make a song
audience something to
even more popular.
can depend on how
successful it is, if it is
a pop song then it is
likely top be very
successful but if it is
an indie rock song
then it is more likely
to be unsuccessful
which is not very
good for the genre
and the artists it
holds.

9. The introduction of the character is at the start of the music video is crucial, it
can depend on whether the viewer stays or goes. If it looks unappealing or too
weird then a potential viewer could be lost so it is important to give off a goo
first impression, this can be done by having a character that looks appealing or
having something that makes it more interesting. As we can see the main
character of the video is playing the guitar this links in with the start of the song
as it is a guitar riff which starts the song, I feel as if this is something that
makes the song instantly more interesting. The character is placed in different
scenes that make the character more interesting and can make the audience
continue on watching. The main character was meant to look like a casual
The ending of that would be seen but would not be thought of as a weirdo.
guy, someone the
music can say
whether or not the
audience is pleased
with the way it has
turned out, if there is
an in-depth story and
it is left on a cliff-
hanger, then the
audience can feel
annoyed but also
wanting more which
can work in the
bands favour.

10. I did not use any special affects in my music video as I felt as if they were
not genre appropriate, the use of explosions or special affects would be
inappropriate and I would feel as if they were out of place. The fact that my
music video does not need me to be anywhere that is impossible to get
to, this also backs up the fact that I do not need any special affects. There
is only one thing that I would need special affects for and that would be if I
wanted it to make it look like my character was in New York, this would be
interesting to add but it would prove to stand out and would not fit with the
rest of my music video. The green screen would be something that would
be tricky to film with as it is so small and the size of the scene I would
need would have to be quite large so I would possibly have to film it
multiple times before I would be able to use it.