Genre Conventions

Initial Ideas

I have come up with three initial ideas that tell different narratives of what i will be possible choices for my music video. Each idea tell a different narrative but based around my chosen song.

initial idea 1-
song: The 1975- chocolate

The beginning of the narrative starts by expressing about the boy being tempted to start a relationship with the girl which is expressed as a temptation. The temptation is represent of related to as chocolate, even though they're friends he is unsure on whether or not to express his feelings to develop his feelings to develop their feeling and friendship or ruin it. He decided to pursue his love for her which will show his is failing to temptation and going for the chocolate. This is shown throughout the narrative of him trying to avoid the temptation but showing he can't. At the end of the narrative it shows that he didn't do the right thing and ended up breaking up the friendship by going for the wrong temptation and everything ends badly.

initial idea 2-
song: The 1975- chocolate

This narrative will start the same by expressing that the temptation is chocolate, he is thinking of the temptation he is showing he looks normal but he is fighting the temptation of liking. Because he shouldn't it is becoming more of a temptation. By expressing that is hiding something and that is not actually showing what he feels. In the middle of the narrative he decides not to go for the girl who is expressed as 'chocolate.' The end of the narrative shows that he did not develop his feelings and linking back to the beginning he is hiding something.

initial idea 3
song: The 1975 - chocolate

The beginning of the narrative shows the relation of the girl being the temptation of chocolate but them being just friends. It shows him wanting to go for the temptation but not knowing if he should. The middle of the narrative stays the same and he is still not expressing his feelings for the girl and is trying to stay away from the temptation. The girl also has the same temptation as him and the temptation is broke from both of them which it both matches up to the temptation of chocolate.




My chosen initial idea: idea 2

The chosen initial idea is my second idea, which is explained above. I chose this one because I think it is the best one I will be able to express over my music video. From choosing my initial idea I will now go on further to create my planning and researching. Thinking of costume ideas based on my chosen genre and the main story line in my video. I will chose my characters and who is going to take part in my music video and create different filming schedules of when my filming is going to take place. Choosing this will also be a big part towards my story board and anamatic.

History Medium

While carrying out my research before producing my music video I want to find out background information of the history of music videos and how they first emerged. A music video is seen as a short film integrating a song and imagery it is produced for promotional or artistic purposes. The modern type of music video and primarily made and used for marketing the device intended or song. It is to promote the sale of music recordings, although the origins of music videos date much further back and they first became prominence in the 1980s, when MTV based their format around the medium. Prior to the 1980s these works were described by various terms which included illustrated song, film insert, promotional film, promotional clip, song video, film clip.

1902- 1917

The phonoscope was a combined chordophone sound recording with a chronograph film shot that created a sound film. They would record the sound and the singer would lip sing which they then synchronized to create the phonoscope. The first one was presented by Leon Gaumont in 1902 and the first presentation of a phonoscope was presented in Buckingham palace in1907 and the last presentation in 1917. Below is an example of one of the first pronoscene made which shows that basic understanding.

1926- 1959

‘Talkies’ where first introduced in 1926 this made the music industry followed by producing ‘soundies’ these where 3 minute musical films, that where played on visual jukeboxes that showed short films of music. They mostly showed the singer or band on stage they were usually found in restaurants and bars. The majority of the music was jazz musicians. They was produced in New York, Chicago and Hollywood in between the 1940s and 1950s. They often included short dance sequences and soundies covered all music, from classical to big-band and so on. In 1958 the soundies led to the development of the scopitone which featured colour film.
      

1960- 1973

In 1964 a performance clip of the Animals was made House Of The Rising Sun which was a high quality colour clip and filmed in a studio on a specially-built set; with the group lip singing. The Beatles stared in their first feature film in 1964 and in 1965 they stared in their second. In 1965 The Beatles began making promotions clips they videoed 10 black and white promotional videos. Other well-known bands had the strategy.  The colour promotion clips for ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ and ‘Penny Lane’ were made in 1967. Making promo clips where the new range and suddenly all the stars where making them such as, Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones, The Who and many more.  





1974- 1990s

This was the time music television the long running tv show top of the pops began playing music videos in the late 1970s. Music videos went mainstream when the U.S launched MTV in 1980s the first music video played was ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’. In the 1983 the most influential and ironic music video of all time was realised. Which was Michael Jackson’s Thriller, it is almost 13 minutes long and is still very popular today. In 1985 MTV released VH1 featuring softer music that appealed to an older audience. In 1988 hip hop music gained a mass audience because of the launch of yo! MTV raps. MTV began an ear of 24 hour a day music television. In my 1990s MTV allowed the directors name to be shown next to the artist, this allowed directors such as Mark Romanek and Michael Gondry to start their careers. Mark Romanek directed the most expensive music video of all time which was Michael and Janet Jacksons 'Scream' which cost $7 million to produce.  

2005

In 2005 I Tunes made it possible for listing and viewings and downloading full length music videos. 20 days later after this was allowed to happen music video downloads reached 1 million. Also in 2005 YouTube was launched this had an even bigger impact on the music video industry this is because it was easier and quicker for people to access music videos to watch without having to pay for the video to download.

2010

Around the world the views of watching music videos reached 34 billion. In the month of may there was estimated 183 million views.

Target Audience

From the genre I have chosen to look at which is indie, I have decided my target audience will be 16+. From having a high interest in this type genre I think picking out a specific age and target audience is highly important because music brings groups of people together. Indie attracts a particular group of people which all have the same interest on one paticular subject this has a massive influence on the way my audience reacts and feel. Some people think it highly important to feel part of a group and different genres of music can create this. An example of this is looking at Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs he states that life is one journey but in reality we live in a hierarchy. Once you fulfill one level, you move back down to the bottom. Once you work your way up the education hierarchy and move up to university you move straight back down to the bottom and that is the circle of life. From looking at this is shows that once you move up you make different groups of friends through life and sometimes these groups are made by peoples choice’s in music. Which makes it highly important to target the correct Target Audience the different steps are Physiological which means breathing, food, water, sex, sleep, homeostasis and excretion this means the basic needs which everyone needs. The next step is safety which means feeling a need of security for example body, employment, resources  morality, the family, health and property. As you get further up it means the person is finding themselves as a individual which expresses themselves as a person. Next step is Esteem which creates the confidence of a people and the achievement of that person, they look for respect of others. Self-actualization is the top of the hierarchy which shows the person having morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, lack of prejudice and acceptance of facts.   

From looking at this triangle I think my target audience will fall into the esteem category of steps in life. This shows that they need to belong to a group and their main important things are self-steam, status respect and admiration of others.  This shows that when socializing you become highly interested in a particular genre you want people to admire you so you focus on a main genre and have the state of mind that people admire/ look up to you if you listen to a particular type of music and more people will respect you. By my target audience this shows that people who listen to indie music will want a need of other people that are very focused on what kind of person they're and what group they want to be part of. By looking at this hierarchy it has given a clear understanding and research of my basic interest of what i want my target audience to be like. To look at demographics and psychographics will give me more of an outline of my target audience. Psychographics is a system of measuring consumers beliefs and interests, this system gathers psychological information which are called IAO variables which stands for interests, attitudes and opinions. Therefore groups can be classified in terms of variables like personality, values, attitudes, interests or lifestyles. Early psychographics research described consumers or audience members on the basis of psychological characteristics gathered from standardised questionnaires . Four main categories were subdivided into nine lifestyles:

Groups driven by needs: survivors and sustainer 

Groups who are outer-directed: belongers, emulators and achievers 

Groups who are inner-directed: experiential and societally conscious 

Groups who are outer and inner directed: Integrated   

These four different groups show different ideas and values but either choose if  they belong to be part of a group or if they're at the stage of achieving and also achieving different status's as they get older. Different people have a status which they expect to get respect from and this is all based on the type of music they listen to the psychogrpahics describe the way the consumer and audience members react and their attitudes and opinions I will produce a questionnaire which I will hand out to my target audience which will tell me the pyschogrpahics of what they're as an individual and it will help me find out what type of a group they belong to. Either driven  by needs, who are outer- directed, inner-directed and groups who are both outer and inner directed.


Questionnaire

This is the questionnaire I produced to give to a selection of my target audience. I asked 20 students who are 16+ and have a strong interest in indie music which is my selected target audience. The results I got back from both 4 question was that 15/20 said they feel like they belong in the group who are outer-directed which means they're belongers and emulators also achievers this is where my target audience will fall into because it gives a clear understanding that this is what they believe they're part of. The results I received from question 2 which was, do you think it is important to earn respect from the type of music you listen to? 17/20 said yes which shows that more than 50% believe that respect is earned from different peers and consumers who listen to indie music this gives a clear understanding of my target audience and I think the results I am receiving from this questionnaire are shaping my target audience into clear groups from pyschographics and the hierarchy of needs. My third question asked as Do you feel more part of a group if you all share the same interest in the same genre of music? 12/20 said yes course and 8 said sometimes and none said no. This shows that more than 50% said yes and the others said sometimes. This backs up the idea that people do want to belong and this shows them as an individual group which show strong interests. My final question was does music effect you as an individual? The results of this question show that 15 said yes 4 said sometimes and 1 said no. This shows the the majority are effected and the results from the whole questionnaire itself have shaped my target audience and shown how they believe it is important to belong and respect is a huge thing when it comes into a particular genre of music.



Focus Group- Auidence research

 

While carrying out my audience research I thought it would be a good idea to ask some of my target audience some questions about my particular genre which would help my research and planning more. The questions I asked where:

1. Do you prefer music videos telling a story or more abstract?

2. What do you normally expect to see in a music video?

3. What conventions do you expect to see for this genre?

4. These are my initial ideas what do you think of them?

5. What form of media do you use to listen to music?

6. What would you like to see in my music video?

After asking these questions I gathered the information which I found very useful because I think the information gathered helped understand my target audience more and get a real opinion. From creating this focus group I will take into count what my target audience have said and apply this to my planning and final product.

 

 

Timing and lyric analysis