Our music video uses conventions of indie music videos in several ways: 1) The band is dressed in old-fashioned costumes from the 1920s-1930s rather than stylish mainstream outfits, challenging conventions of pop music videos but developing conventions of indie videos. 2) The band members are middle-aged males, oriented towards a niche audience rather than teenagers, again challenging pop conventions but using conventions of indie genres. 3) The lyrics do not focus exclusively on love like pop music, and the band is portrayed seriously rather than happily, challenging pop conventions but using conventions of indie styles. 4) Technically, the video uses natural lighting and editing rather than special effects, and the setting is simple

1. In what ways does our music video
use, develop or challenge forms
and conventions of real media
product.
Dubrovskaya Kristina

2. In the first blog I wrote some conventions of music video
and now I am going to compare our music video to some
real world once to see whether it develop, challenge or use
the main conventions.
The first point was:
- Artists are clothed in fashionable, stylish
and mainstream outfits.
This code is not really applicable to our music video because our band
To reinforce to idea, I would like to compare our image to the mainstre

3. Here is an example of a basic pop music
video. The girl is wearing bright, pretty
dress, has perfect make-up and heir style.
overall, everything reinforces the idea of
attractiveness.
This is our music video ( as you could have
guessed) and we decided to dress our band
in old-fashioned costumes (that would
reflect 20s-30s) which is clearly the
opposite of what was done in the previous
example.
However, we can’t just say that the way we decided to
dress our band challenges the main convention of the
music industry because this choice was deliberately made
to reflect the music style. Here is an example of another
indie music video where main character is dressed
normally. Having said this, to sum it all up, costume-wise, I
think, we develop the convention because we not only
reject pop music look, but we create an original look that
was maintained throughout the whole music video and
this is what expected from indie- do something different.
Challenges?

4. Also, it is clear that most of the artists are young because more money are
gained from teenagers as they tent to spent more time and money on their
favorite artist. Adults are more likely to listen to the music silently- without this
obvious fan behavior. This is why such artists like Justin Bieber are so popular.
Justin Bieber is a goof example of using the main media conventions.
• pretty look
• young age
• clothed in fashionable, stylish and mainstream outfits
• portrayed as happy, enjoying and content with life
• lyrics are normally based around love and relationships
• bands express the unity associated with teens, which is
the main target audience for this genre
and so on…

5. Our band consists of males who are middle aged and thus it is more orientated for niche audience
(middle age people). Again, while some would argue that this fact challenges the main convention
of music industry, I would say that the style dictates the main rules and indie tells by all means: be
different. This means that having different audience, uses the main convention.
Also, in terms of lyrical content, it is not so obviously
about love. This is another thing that challenges the
music convention. This is even true for indie music.
The main artist ( as well as the whole band) is not betrayed as
happy at all. It doesn’t have melancholic feel either. They are
serious and this also challenges the pop music convention but
uses the main indie convention.

6. Technological convention
If you look at typical pop music video, you would expect a lot of cuts, different (even weird) camera
angles and overall the editing has fast pace. In indie music, editing is not the most important part.
Natural filters are often used and no special effects are used to keep it realistic.
here is an example of typical pop music and you can see how
editing was used to develop this convention.
Because I was responsible for editing, I
decided not to do this kind of thing. The cuts
were still fast to reflect the fast beat of the
song, but overall it seems natural and not so
synthetic. This uses the indie conception and
challenges the main pop one.

7. Settings
Indie Pop music videos are known to be low budget. Settings
are usually small studios, cities, parks, woods. These
locations are not expensive or free to use.
One of the most
expensive music
video ever made is
«Scream» by Michael
Jackson. It had the
budget of $7,000,000
here is an example of a great use of
special effects and colors which is typical
for pop music video
This is arctic monkey’s music video (an
example of indie music video) and as you
can see it is not so visually exiting. That’s
not even because of the low budget. The
reason is convention- indie music video
does not have to look bright.

8. This is our music video. As you can see,
the setting are kept to the minimum and
natural filters are used to keep everything
realistic and maintain indie atmosphere
This means that in terms of editing,
our music video use the conventions
of real media product.
Also, our band is performing live, using mics
and real instruments which is also typical for
indie music videos.

9. Narrative
As I already mentioned in previous blog where I was
talking about Codes and Conventions of Indie Pop
Music Videos, The story is important in the indie music
video. Lyrics are shown not literal, but still the story
should make sense and should have a link between
lyrical content and what we see on the screen.
Whereas in the pop music videos, you are likely to
see bright pictures without big semantic code, in indie
music video you would expect the opposite to happen.
This is true for our music video,
so in terms of narrative, it uses
the convention of indie music
video.