The document provides guidance for completing a case study assignment on music video production. It outlines 3 tasks to be completed: 1) discussing the purposes and strategies of music videos, 2) examining the styles, techniques and conventions of music video production, and 3) conducting an individual case study analyzing at least 3 music videos by an artist of choice. Tips are provided for illustrating points with images from video examples and structuring the response. The document also includes example questions for each task to help structure the response.

1. MUSIC VIDEO PRODUCTION
CASE STUDY
JA M IE B R O W N

2. MUSIC VIDEO PRODUCTION
• We will look at Music Videos from a number of perspectives, this template is for
you to write up your notes and to complete your case study.
• The document is split into 3 different tasks, each with separate questions to
answer.
• Task 1 is concerned with the purposes of music videos and the strategies
employed by labels and artists
• Task 2 is concerned with the styles, techniques and conventions of music video
production
• Task 3 is your own case study into a minimum of three music videos where you
can unpack and discuss the videos considering everything you have looked at in
Task 1 and 2
• You are expected to submit each section on a weekly basis during your remote
learning weeks.
• If you get stuck, talk to/email your tutor for guidance.

3. NOTES ON COMPLETING THE
CASE STUDY
• It is often easier to show something you are discussing than to
take time describing it. With this in mind, feel free to add lots of
illustrative images from your chosen video examples. Links to
YouTube/Vevo/etc are also encouraged.
• Remember, when you make a point or define something, you
should follow this with an example, an explanation of this and
then link to further texts/videos where possible.
• If you don’t think there is enough room to add your full
response to a question, don’t just reset the font size to really
small, add an extra slide wherever necessary.

4. TASK 1 -
PURPOSES
Y O U S H O U L D O P E N T H E M U S I C L E C T U R E
P O W E R P O I N T A N D L O O K AT S E C T I O N 1
B E F O R E D O I N G T H I S TA S K

5. TASK 1 - PURPOSES
• 1. Branding - is one purposes of a music video as it advertises
the song through a visual representation
• 2. Sales – Music videos is a way too increase the sales of the
song by using visual representation to entice people to watch
and listen to the song at the same time
• 3. Entertainment – People can relate more to song with a video
along with it therefore it creates more entertainment for the
viewers

6. TASK 1 - PURPOSES
• Q2 – What are some of the broader purposes of music videos? Try and
outline a minimum of 3. (Think about some of the strategies employed by
artists in their videos and how they represent themselves, you could
consider where the artist is on a major label, independent label of
unsigned, is there a difference between them?)
• Some music videos create visual images that could portray some form of
meaning in the song that can be related to the lyrics or music.
• There can also be intertextual references in music videos that could relate
to the song, or it could just be a hidden reference that only some people
may notice.
• Music videos are a chance for the artists to show what they look like so
the audience can relate the music to a face.

7. TASK 1 - PURPOSES
• aldn is a up and coming rapper/musician and producer, his
music focuses on rap/pop that is combined with electronic
sounds that sound almost like dubstep which is identified as
hyper pop. In his music videos he wears outgoing clothes and
acts calm even when the beat picks up and gets faster. Aldn
appeals to teenagers, male and female, this is because is music
is sometimes at a faster pace whereas others are slower and not
as electronic. His music videos can also be quite strange and
include shots that are taken inside of his mouth.

8. TASK 1 - PURPOSES
• One Direction have long shots that don’t have much cuts, they are
looking directly into the camera, they also have some visual tricks
when walking along the pier during the long shot. There music
videos have a repeated formula with a closed meaning which
makes their music videos quite bland but easy to follow, their music
videos are more aimed at teenage girls because of the way the
video is shot.
• Animal Collectives music videos are very abstract and obscure, they
can be seen as all over the place and don’t really follow any
structure, their videos are more non-representational with no story-
telling, they could be doing this because they want the audience to
try and gage what the meaning of the video is, and it makes it a lot
more engaging.

9. TASK 2 – STYLES,
TECHNIQUES AND
CONVENTIONS
Y O U S H O U L D O P E N T H E M U S I C L E C T U R E
P O W E R P O I N T A N D L O O K AT S E C T I O N 2
B E F O R E D O I N G T H I S TA S K

10. TASK 2 – STYLES, TECHNIQUES
AND CONVENTIONS
^^ In this shot the camera is on
the top of a building filming the
artist walk down the street
This shot is before the song starts
and is a good way to show cool
shots
before the main music video
begins.
^^ In this shot the camera is in
a low close up shot
To create that intensity of the
scene.

11. TASK 2 – STYLES, TECHNIQUES
AND CONVENTIONS
^^ There is lots of film grain and
blur used in this shot to make it look
more vintage and artistic when the
girl is by herself looking outside.
Then the camera cuts to them both
sat on the bed
^^ In this shot it is
briefly shown for about
1 second
Which is a break from
the other shots that
show the artist walking
around with the VR
Headset.

12. TASK 2 – STYLES, TECHNIQUES
AND CONVENTIONS
Lots of people, hoods up,
wearing mostly dark
Nice Cars and the artist
in the main point of view
Dark tone with flashing lights
in the background

13. TASK 2 – STYLES, TECHNIQUES
AND CONVENTIONS
• Intertextuality is when something is used in a movie or music
video that people may be familiar with and can relate to that thing
from something else that they may have seen, this will then make
the experience more memorable.
• One example of intertextuality is in Iggy Azela and Charli XCX
‘Fancy’, the whole video is almost like a parody to the 90’s movie
‘Clueless’.
• Another Example is in the Music Video to Taylor Swifts ‘Bad Blood’
it references the Hunger Games and the film Kill Bill in the
Scene,
• Finally, Jake Buggs almost always includes intertextuality
referencing TV programmes such as ‘This is England’.

14. TASK 3 – CASE
STUDY
Y O U S H O U L D O P E N T H E M U S I C L E C T U R E
P O W E R P O I N T A N D L O O K AT S E C T I O N 3
B E F O R E D O I N G T H I S TA S K

15. TASK 3 – CASE STUDY
• For your individual case study you must study an artist of
choice, focusing on a minimum of 3 videos [ideally 5+ videos]
• This should provide discussion on the usage of the following:
– Style[s] & Techniques employed
– Intertextuality
– Camerawork/editing
– Genre conventions
– Critical approaches [you should be applying some of the critical
approaches from your lessons and some of your own, to your
selected videos]

16. MIDWXST
Midwxst is a more niche artist but is also quite mainstream as his
music videos are sometimes quite diverse and have weird editing,
however some music videos are normally focusing on him lip-syncing
and have a more normal vibe to them which makes his music videos

17. VIDEO
NO.1

18. In this opening scene the colours
are all similar and work well
together
Such as the blue and red on his
jumper are working well with the
blue sky and red air strip from the
plane and the red on the x in his
name. The target on his jumper
could be a correlation to the jet
that flies from the bottom of the
shot up to the top. The angle in
where the camera is in a position
where the jet can fly through the
middle but still have the main focus
of the artist to the right side of the
shot
The opening shot then cuts to the
next scene which starts of the song
by still having the red jet strips in the
air which may have been green
screened. The main subject focus of
this scene is the rocks because the
artist is looking at them but it also
creates that magical and usual
theme, they are also more in focus
than anything else as the rest of the
image is slightly blurred.
midwxst - trying (Dir. @DanielJordanK) -
YouTube

19. PART 2 In this cinematic shot it is a long and high angle
this could be to show where exactly the artist is
and is almost like he lost. The water has also
been edited to give it more of a green effect but
almost looks over saturated, this is probably
because the artist is trying to go for more of a
fantasy magical theme at the beginning of the
video but also matches the music, as the start is
slower but when the bass comes in the scenes
change and become more dark.
The camera slowly zooms into the artist
and then cuts to a close up shot of his
hand in the water which is still green.
The camera movement in this shot is
zooming in and out quite quickly while
moving the camera to get fast different
angles.
When the bass drop hits, The scene
changes and becomes much more fast
paced by using quicker camera movements
and fast cuts to the bass of the song. The
camera is at a low angle but is supposed to
look like it is underwater they have done
this by putting the water in a see through
glass bowl and then place the camera

20. PART 3
There are many uses of CGI in this
video, for example the mushrooms
keep popping up from the ground
throughout the video.
There are occasional sparkles and
light effects on the mushrooms that
add that little bit more extra detail.

21. VIDEO
NO.2

22. In this music video there is lots of fast
cutting editing and the video is cut to
the beat. The music video is
representative and is related to what
the song sound like and is going
along the same sort of theme. The
artist is lip-syncing which creates that
illusion that he is rapping, however
the video is not just lip-syncing the
whole time as there are loads of fast
cut edits that have different shots that
you can only see for 1-2 seconds, e.g.
In this scene the camera is in a long shot
position but is also quite a high shot as it
isn’t level with the artist, this could be
because they want a wide shot as it will
briefly show him running from one side of
the screen to the other side.
There is also an animated effect on the
artists back which creates that fire illusion,
however this is intertextuality because the
run and the animation is related to the
popular anime series ‘Naruto’ and the
artist also said a line that is related to
‘Naruto’

23. VIDEO
NO.3

24. The starting shot is an animated version of
the artist, this was animated after seeing
the original video and overlayed it with an
animation. This animation lasts for about
1 second and then does a fast but also
smooth transition to the original video of
the artist.
The black background fades
and turns into red to then
transition into the non
animated version of the artist
with the same red background
so it becomes a smoother and
well suited transition.
The red background is very prevalent
in this shot as it’s the first thing that
meets the eye as its very bright and
contrasts well with the white t-shirt
and black hair and sunglasses.

25. EDITING
In this portion of the song the beat picks up
a lot and there is heavy use of a fast cut
montage, the colors of this section is unique
in the fact that they are inverted almost and
looks like something from a Disney film.
However, the music is not related to Disney
in any way as the music is hard hitting and
fast rapping, this works well with the fast
cutting because of the amount of 808’s that
are used in the song. The editing could have
been done by using the chroma key to
invert any colors into more vibrant and
unnatural colours.

26. CAMERA MOVEMENTS AND ANGLES
In this scene the camera has a
twisting effect on the transition into
this shot, the camera is placed on
the floor and the field of view of this
shot is amplified to give it that
stretched out look and makes the
shot look weirder and more unusual.
Throughout the song this shot keeps
appearing for a few seconds however
in this specific shot the FOV of the
camera is smaller and doesn't look as
stretched out, in addition to that
whenever the scene transitions to
another shot it zooms back out to
create that smooth twisty transition.

27. VIDEO
N0.4

28. In the start of this music video there is
already some dialogue which could be
implying that there is a story in the video,
for example it starts out with a bunch of
guys walking down the street and spot
something in bush that is glowing, the
artist goes to look at what it as and then
touches it. Once he touched it the music
started playing and there was special
effects on his hands which made him seen
like a superhero.
The focus of this shot is his hands
that have an electrified effect on
them. I like this idea as I think it
looks really cool and makes the
scene look more interesting. The
theme of that blue colour is very
noticeable in the video as most of
the shots have an edited blue tint
to them to add to the effects on
the hand.

29. In this part of the music video
the artist says, "I know people
watching me, they stalking
me". When he says those lyrics,
the main shot zooms out into a
transition of him on a
television screen with people
watching him, this is also
related to the video because it
shows that the people that are
watching him are trying to
catch him because of the
superpower that he has.
This scene shows the same people watching him form a side portrait angle that then
switches to another scene of the artist in a dark room miming the lyrics, I feel like this is
a good way to show the story of the video but also show the artist singing to it as well.
This tecnique is also used in many other artists music videos such as Post Malone

30. TASK 4 – LINKS
TO YOUR OWN
WORK

31. LINKS
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt4DNa3LoE8 - 1
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdLSJAAF-kc - 2
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdLSJAAF-kc - 3
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt4DNa3LoE8 -4

32. SUMMARISE
• From midxsts videos I have found I lot of inspiration with the
different camera angles such as low shots beneath the feet and
long shots that could zoom into the focus of the image, but also
different and quick camera movements that lead into different
shots. I would do this to the beat of the song to create a more
impactful experience. I feel like I would like to create similar videos
to Midwest as I feel like the music that he creates works well with
the videos as the music is normally quite strange but very fast
paced.
• I like the use of colours in his music videos as they are sometimes
inverted which creates an unrealistic magical effect on the video or
a colour that is being repetitively shown throughout the video, as I
feel like it creates a theme throughout the video.
• I also like the use of the head underneath the water shot as I
feel like it looks really realistic and creative as I haven't seen
many other music videos that include it.