#103 What is a music video???

A music video is a short film using both a song and imagery, which is produced for promotional or artistic purposes. Most artists and bands these days, have music videos for their singles, in order to promote their song. 

Also, P. Fraser described it as 'A distinctive art form which can allow really interesting creative opportunities'.

Music videos use a wide range of styles of film making techniques, including animation, live action filming, documentaries, and non-narrative approaches such as abstract film. Some music videos blend different styles, such as animation and live action, or even both!

Main codes and conventions:

A man by the name of Goodwin, came up with the following conventions for a typical music video.

• A relationship between the lyrics and the visuals.
• A relationship between the music and the visuals.
• Particular music genres might have their own music/video style and iconography. 
• Demand for close ups from the record company and fan base. 
• There is usually a reference to voyeurism.
• There also might be some intertextual references. 

And then a man by the name of Peter Fraser, also came up with what he thought, were the important conventions for a typical music video.

• The lyrics will tend to establish a general feeling or mood. 
• A music video should usually make use of the tempo of the track, to drive the editing.
• Some videos transcend genre, so others can easily be categorized. These features may be reflected in the lighting, mis en scene, themes, the performance, cinematography and editing style.
• Editing such as fast cut montage rendering, and maybe some slow paced and gentler shot transitions, to establish different moods. 
• Some videos may choose to involve some intertextuality. Where the videos involve something that the audience might recognize from other music videos, books, movies, or tv. 
• The narrative and performance is also quite important. Most music videos usually involve a certain story line, wether it be big and obvious or small and hardly noticeable. 

We will explore some music videos in the next post to see if these conventions hold true and if we notice anything else about what music videos contain. By doing this, we can identify how we will approach our video, whether we will adapt all the above points made by the two people.