The document discusses how the media product follows, develops, and challenges conventions of real music videos in the indie rock genre. It follows conventions through the actor's costumes, uses of shots showing performance, and sticking to typical cinematography. It develops conventions from Jason Mraz's music video by changing the type of performance from guitar playing to dancing. It challenges conventions by using color instead of black and white, avoiding special effects, and not including party scenes to match the lonely theme of the song.

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

2. Conventions
For my music video I had to follow conventions so that my video would be relevant to the
genre that I had chosen to do. Some of the typical conventions that you would expect to
see within the „Indie Rock‟ genre would be things such as costume, editing and lighting.
Within these aspects the costume would be expected to be smart and casual so things such
as jeans, chinos, chequered shirts, polo shirts and many more. I took this into account and
made my actor in the first shooting wear chinos and a red and black shirt so that he would
be sticking to some of the conventions shown within indie rock. For the second shoot my
actor had black jeans a jumper and a black coat, so once again he was dressed to fit the
conventions of indie rock. Within typical conventions of indie rock, performance usually
includes a band or one person performing on their own, I took this into account and
decided to have my actor singing to the camera in most of my music video, to add to the
performance I also wanted my actor to perform a little dance on a few of the occasions so
that this would of meant that I had included more performances. Within the
cinematography of the music video I included some of the conventions such as using shots
that show my band member performing to the camera for all of the music video apart
from one or two shots.

3. Developing Conventions
Within some of the conventions that I used in my video I would say that I stuck with most
of the conventions that I saw in Jason Mraz‟s video for I‟m Yours, for example within his
music video we see a lot of performance from the actor himself, so I thought that I would
keep with his theme of having my actor dancing in some parts of the video. So although I
kept to the performance aspect of the video, I changed the type of performance as Jason
Mraz was performing on his guitar whereas my actor was dancing to the audience. Other
areas in which I developed his own video was mainly just based on performance by changing
it to dancing, this is why when Jason is sat playing his guitar to friends (performing) I
decided to once again have my actor dancing to the camera so that I would still be
performing. I developed the costume as in Jason's video he is very casual as he is mainly seen
wearing a straw hat with either trousers/shorts on with sleeveless shirts. Whereas in my
music video I had my actor wearing trousers with a chequered shirt and then in my other
shots I had him wearing black trousers with a black coat. The reason that I chose not to
make my actor wear the same type of clothes was because in other indie music videos band
members sometimes wear chinos, jeans and look smart which is the type of look I was trying
to portray with my character.

4. Challenging Conventions
Some of the ways in which I challenged conventions included the colour, because in some music indie
rock music videos they tend to be black and white. Whereas in my music video I avoided this because I
wanted to show colors and try to portray some happiness, this is the same in the real music video as we
see a lot of bright colors and that also avoids showing black and white which is why I wanted to involve
using shots where they are black and white. In some music videos it can also be common to see some
uses of special effects within the videos, but once again I wanted to avoid this because I felt as if it
wouldn‟t have matched my video at all as my actor was always on screen performing. If I had have
included conventions I think it would have ruined my video as looking through my lyrics I felt as if
there wouldn‟t have been any shots that I could of linked in to use special effects. Locations can be
focused either at parties or fancy locations that will include uses of alcohol. In the real video it does
appear to have a small glimpse of a party scene as they are having a barbeque and all watching Jason
perform, as the song is about him being in love with a girl who doesn‟t seem to feel the same and is
scared to fall in love I didn‟t want to include any party scenes. The reason that I didn‟t want to was
because if the song represents love in which he is lonely I wanted him to be lonely throughout the video
so that this could kind of reflect the lyrics and show him being lonely.

5. Music Video Theory
There are many different theories that have been said so that music videos can be broken down easily so that we
can find out the real meaning of the video. Walter Lippman said “Stereotypes are standardised simplified
conceptions of groups based on prior assumptions”. So this is trying to say that based on the music that
someone listens to they will be stereotyped and then this can sometimes be evident in some videos to portray
this theory. I kind of took this into mind because people who are classed as „indie‟ will dress in jeans, chinos etc.
so that they are smart. I took this into consideration which is why my two different costumes used in my music
video were chosen to try and match this theory, as in one costume my actor was dressed in chinos and a smart
chequered shirt then in another shots he is wearing some jeans and a black coat. Other theories that didn‟t fit my
video that I could of used and then twisted the other way round could have been Laura Mulvey as she says that
women in music videos are dressed so that the males will be made to focus on there body. I could of used this
theory and twisted it so that audiences would have to focus on my actor as he is my star image and the only
person in my video that the camera is always focused on. I chose not to take this theory and apply it to my work
because I don‟t think it would have worked effectively and it would of meant challenging conventions and
having some shots of my actor topless so that females would be then called the gaze.