KEN NGUYEN

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

2. The purpose
My task was to create a music video within my own choice and interest from a particular
music genre. I had to ensure to have solid knowledge and understanding of the music
genre, theory and it’s conventions as well as carry out in depth research into existed
music videos. This was beneficial as it has allowed me to be creative and original with
mine and how I view other existed products.
Through carrying out in depth research and understanding of theory, this has built a
foundation to help me to prepare for the planning stage of my music video and to create
my ancillary products which included a digipak and a music advert.
RESEARCH  PLANNING  PRODUCTION  EVALUATION
This has taught me to know the differences between a digipak and a music advert.
Although they both are for promotional purposes but the differences are a digipak is the
album cover for the artist’s creations and a music advert is to sell the artist’s image. As
well as knowing the differences between digipak and music advert, I was able to figure
out the conventions of music videos and what genre they belongs to.
A music video is a visual interpretation of a song, produced for promotional or artistic
purposes. Common features of a music video include dancing and images or moving
images as interpretation of the lyrics references.

3. Does my product develop or challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
I believe that my products does follow the conventions and development as well as challenging forms of real
media products throughout my music video. This has been illustrated through various ways.
THEMES - Every music video has its specific themes that usually compliment the visual images and is dependent
on the genre that it falls into. My music video consists of love, relationship and illusions. My group and I have
decided on this because we thought it was conventional to the Hip-Hop, R&B and Neo-soul genre. Therefore, the
themes would be easy to illustrate and easily understood by the audience.
CHARACTERS REPRESENTATION - I believe that my characters representation within my music video are illustrated
strongly to the Hip-hop, R&B genre but with a little mixture of Neo-soul so that my artists can appeal to both
mainstream and niche audiences. We have chosen characters who are able to perform and act at the same time
to represent love, relationship and to build a connection to the audience who can relate to the narrative portrayed
within my music video.
ARTIST REPRESENTATION - Both of my artists are represented well in terms of enhancing the music genres and
themes of the song. This is evident in my music video as both artists are shown as being young, reckless, naive,
rich and carefree.
LOCATION - The locations used within my music video depends on the themes that our music video portrays. We
filmed in multiple locations to represent the male artist, the female artist and their relationships all separately. This
is evident as for the male artist as we filmed at a private property where different type of lights are mainly used to
enhance his imaginations. For the female artist we filmed her in a room to portray her as shy and down to earth.
To represent their relationship, we filmed both of them together in bed, playing games and flirt with each other to
really show that they are young and in love.
THEORY- We followed Goodwin’s theory on the use of cinematography to enhance star image, Mulvey’s theory to
show elements of the ‘Male Gaze’, Popular culture to include dancing and performing and lastly, Hebdige’s theory
to have an active audience instead of being passive.
EDITING – We made sure that the editing match the pace of the song and to emphasize certain part of the song in
relations to lyrics references. This is influenced by Goodwin’s theory.

4. Artist similar to my idea
Vic Mensa was used as an example of an artist that influenced our artist image through the way he present himself as an artist
that appeal to both mainstream and niche audiences.
CINEMATOGRAPHY – Mid shots are used often to enhance star performance of the artist, their emotions and attitude my the music
video. This has inspired us to represent our artist in a similar way to Vic Mensa.
MES – Natural and High-key lighting are used when the artist performs lip syncing and dancing to highlight star performance and star
image as well as showing off his other talents and style. Street style clothing with a hint of classy by including a fedora hat to make
my artist look more diverse to attract wider range of audiences.
ARTIST IMAGE – Costumes was inspire by Vic Mensa where he appears to look street casual but still very stylish and clean. This
has influenced us to have our artist dress similar to the artist hoping to achieve the same effect. Also, star performance wise is also
essential so we ensured to have a dance choreography where the artist can perform in his own style to flow with the song.
EDITING – Throughout our music video, jump cut and slow motion editing was used mainly to emphasize important moments that
highlight the narrative and the themes of the song. Jump cut was edited to match up with different instruments used within the beat of
the song to make the video flow more and look more professional.

5. Identifying Conventions
CINEMATOGRAPHY
In order to achieve success within a music video, having the relevant and
creative use of cinematography is essential as it could create an impact and
increase the success of the music video on a whole. Identifying shot sizes
and angles should be planned out in details to save times and keep the
whole filming process organised as not every single shots from all different
angles would look as effective as choosing one that show the most
efficiency.
Cinematography would need to be changed frequently through different
scenes to portray the narrative in the best way possible as well as getting
the message across to the audience. Through the used of cinematography,
this will satisfy the audience’s viewing experience as well as allowing them
to feel more engage and maybe relate to the narrative of the music video.
The more appealing the music video is to the audience means more
success, this would automatically contribute to the overall success of the
music video.
In relation to my music video which include the themes of love, relationship
and illusions; mid shots, mid close ups and close ups are mainly used to
show the emotions, attitude and expressions of both characters/artists.
Handheld shot was also used whilst the male artist performance dancing to

6. Identify angles
Within my music video, high angle shots were used for the female artist’s verse
where their relationship is being shown in our music video. We was inspired by
Jhene Aiko’s ‘’Bed Piece’’ where she uses high angle shots to represent her
relationship with Childish Gambino which is the male artist shown in the same scene.
We have applied the same cinematography technique to our music video hoping to
achieve the same effect and to represent love and relationship. For the male artist’s
second verse, we was inspired by Cashmere Cat ‘’Wedding Bells’’ where the angle
used was low angle showing the male actor being dominant and hold more control.
Instead of using low angle, we thought it would be a better idea to use high angle to
put the female artist on top to show a more friendly and loving relationship.

7. Theory
The two theorists that has inspired us the most were Goodwin and Mulvey.
Goodwin suggested that a connection could be created between the artist and the audience
through various close ups showing the artist’s emotions and feelings; allowing the audience to
see how the artist feels and maybe relate to real life situation for themselves. From this, we
have applied various close ups to both of our artists to clearly show their emotions and attitude
throughout our music video.
Mulvey’s ‘’Male Gaze’’ theory is illustrated through the use of cinematography within our music
video. This theory focuses on the female body parts where the camera act as the heterosexual
male’s perspective. We have applied this to our female artist where ‘’Male Gaze’’ is included but
in a way where she doesn’t reveal too much skin as we wanted a mixture of our female being
sexy and innocent. This is evident through close ups, and mid close ups focusing on enhancing
the revealed parts of our female artist.
These theories has helped me to make my music video to appeal to a larger audience and
enhance the quality of my music video. By applying these theories as well as the use of
cinematography, this has helped to make my music video more conventional where I developed
and used conventions of real media products.

8. Camera movements
Camera movements are as important as cinematography. It is used mainly
to associate with the male artist. Handheld, tilt and pan movements was
used whilst the male artist portray star performance plus dancing at the
same time. This was used to capture all the movement that the male artist
make to put together a sequence of footage where it all flows with the music
as well as dancing on beat and lip syncing on time to the lyrics.
Camera movements was used for other purposes such as capturing the
footage of both artists spending time together in a natural way where it looks
believable to the audience and this relates to the themes of my music video.

9. Mise en Scene
Mise en scene consisted of five important aspects to consider when making a music video.
Each of these aspects work together to enhance the impact of the generic conventions to the
audience. Mise en scene could be a demand from the audience according to the music genre
and could also rely on the artist. As having high demands, the audience would expect to see
specific aspects of mise en scene to be used in a conventional way. This was successfully
achieved by my group and I.
Five important aspects of Mise en Scene consists of:
Lighting and Colour
Setting
Iconography
Costumes, hair and make-up
Body language and Facial expression

10. Lighting & Colour
Lighting & Colour help to create extra effect to make the scene look more effective
and allows the audience to understand the emotions or situations that’s being
portrayed.
This is evident through my music video as low-key lighting was used in the bedroom
scene to highlight the themes of love and relationship between a young couple. This
is conventional to the R&B genre especially to show two people making love in a
romantic atmosphere. This creates a positive impact and emotional feel of the music
towards the audience as they could easily identify the situations and the scene also
make sense according to the lyrics of the song.
Natural and high-key lighting was also used when the male character perform his
verses through dance and lip syncing. This enhance his star image and star
performance as well as being on time with the beat of the song.

11. Colour
The use of white colour are used whilst the female artist perform her
verse showing that she’s pure, innocent and vulnerable but at the
same time attractive and seductive. This is further supported to when
the female artist lay in bed with the male next to her. The colour
became darker with a slight of orange to make the scene look more
dreamy and add to the bedroom atmosphere of relationship where
two people are in bed making love.
Characters from
Jhene Aiko ‘’Bed
Piece’’

12. Setting
We have used various different settings for our music video. This was dependent on
the themes and the lyrics of the song. We have done this because in order to match
up with the narrative as well as making sense in relation to the lyrics where the
audience are not confused of the narrative, we had to choose different settings
include indoor and outdoor to highlight the narrative as well as star image and
representation for both of your artist. This was done purposely to match up with the
conventional features of the music genres that our song falls into which mainly is
R&B. The setting chosen within our music video was inspired by Jhene Aiko and
Chance The Rapper as they have used the same setting for their existed music
videos which helped to make our setting look more relevant and easily understood by
the audience.

13. Iconography
Iconography was used in my music video to add more feels into the scenarios
and to highlight the themes further. This was an important aspect that needed to
be discovered in order to develop conventional features of the R&B genre.
Iconography used was a white pillow when the female artist perform her verse to
show that she’s in her comfort zone and to show that she’s pure and innocent.
The blanket was also used when both of the artists are laying together to
enhance the themes of love and relationship to create a closer feeling of a
young loving couple where the audience could relate to their partners. Through
the use of iconography, the conventions of real media products have been
discovered to show the relationship between two characters.

14. Costume, hair and make up
The idea of costume, hair and make up is to make the artists look unique,
attractive and stand out. We applied this into our male artist being combining
the style of street wear by having him to wear all black clothing with ripped
jeans and bomber jacket. Also with a hint of smart casual to have a fedora
hat on top of his hair. The male artist’s hair was dyed blonde on top to match
up with the female artist’s hair to highlight the theme of relationship where
two people matches each other. I believe that this has challenged
conventional features of real media products as well as enhancing star
image.
The male artist is shown in all black but the settings around him always look
colourful connotes that he’s stuck in his imagination where his dream girl
(female artist) makes everything better when he thinks about her. Where as,
the female artist is shown in casual white jumper and shoulder less top
showing that she’s more down to earth and to balance out their relationship
issues.

15. The artist’s star image and star representation was highlighted by
their costumes. The clothing was based on the conventional
costumes of R&B artist. Within the R&B genre, artists are
represented in a unique way and attractive which could influence the
audience to aspire to be like. Clothing such as ripped jean and big
jacket are conventional to the R&B genre and is used quite often by
artists. We have chosen to do this to sell our artist’s image hoping to
achieve success from wider audiences as well as challenges
conventions of real media products.

16. Body language & Facial
Expression
Body language and facial expression is essential to star performance
in order for the artist to be comfortable on camera to be a role model
for the audience aspire to be like. Within my music video, the male
artist is shown to look comfortable as his body language shows that
he’s confident and look intoxicated which leads to him being floppy at
some parts of the music video. Our female artist’s body language is
shown to be in her comfort zone and her facial expression is shown
as shy but flirtatious at the same time.

17. Conclusion
Throughout our music video, we have ensured to use and
challenge the conventions of R&B genre by carrying out in
depth research, planning cinematography and mise en
scene in details to achieve the most efficiency. All the
elements of Mise en Scene have been demonstrated well
and I believe that we have used and developed
conventions of real media products. All the five elements
have been taken into consideration well and used
effectively throughout.
I believe that I have related and used all the best features
possible to create a successful music video and to
highlight the fact that I have challenged conventions of
real media products.