Friday, 30 September 2011

Brief History of Music Industry

What makes a music video a music video?

Music - the song the video is for.
For some genre its the 'video girls' , jewelry - The material things.
Lip syncing of the lyrics.
The lighting - sets mood etc.
Type of cuts - "Non-linear editing"
Transitions - Slow motion for slow songs.
Outfits - Changes frequently/type of shot depending on genre.
Repetition of images - following structure of song.
Dance routines and performances.
"Sexyness" - Women.
Edit is to the beat of the song.

Functions and Purpose.

Sells the songs/promote
Makes song memorable for audience.
Motivates audience through the story line of music video. Eg. Micheal Jackson - Earth Song.
Establishes artists image: Change of image. Eg. Rhianna.
Promotion of films/Brands - P.Diddy promotes his vodka in his music videos
Establishes genre - conventions of Mise en scene etc.
Visual links across promo material

Representation - Laura Mulvey

Hip-hop is a expected genre to represent women as a sexual object.

In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure which is styled accordingly.

Laura Mulvey talks about the male gaze. The male gaze comes from the fact the camera is held by a man (cameraman). The man holding the camera objects his fantasy on the female objects desires. This makes the woman become objective and passive and then representations of women from the point of view of a man emerge. She also talks about men disremembering women in videos by showing only body shots and rarely showing faces of the women.

Ying Yang Twins - Whisper song.

Sisqo - Thong song

A video I like:

If i could make a video like this:

The effects used.
The colours used.
Even thought the video may seem as if it has nothing to do with the lyrics, they are actually being illustrated by the images. Eg. When T-pain says 'yeah' the words 'yeah' are shown.
A VERY good example of visual pleasure for the audience.
A structure is also shown because when its the chorus the words 'yeah' are shown but in different ways.
The shots are simple but are still used effectively to make a good music video with 33,871,194

(I also have an obsession for Lil-Wayne)

Even though this genre is hip-hop like the genre I've chosen. It wouldn't fit the tone of the song we've chosen making the video a disjuncture.

Andrew Godwin

ANDREW GODWIN.

A traditional narrative does not apply to music videos because:

They are built around the song which doesn’t have the structure of normality – problem – solution.

The singer of song is the narrator and often a character in the video.

The singer breaks the fourth room – an extension of performance and trying to involve people at home.

Music videos rely on repetition of images because a song repeats the chorus and lines.

They also have particular expectations for each Genre.

There are 3 types of relations between songs and videos:

Illustration – The video tells the story of the lyrics: Bruno Mars - Lazy song.

Amplification – when videos adds more meaning to the lyrics: Lil-Wayne - How to love

Disjuncture - little connection between video and lyric or when video contradicts lyrics:(Couldnt find a good example)

Thursday, 29 September 2011

TINIE TEMPAH - just a little

This song has not got a video for it so we decided to come up with our own interpretation for it. This is better as we can be very creative/imaginative and take it to our advantage -making a video for a song from scratch.

Has a Great flow to the beat
Easy to lip sync
R&B/Hip hop
Male vocal from our group
Released not so long ago(New) so not alot of people have heard the song and we wanted to do something unique.

final song choice

'Tinie tempah - just a little'

Letter asking permission to borrow soundtrack.

To tiniemusic@hotmail.co.uk

From:	Beverley owusu (bevz1@hotmail.co.uk)
Sent:	30 September 2011 09:43:12
To:	tiniemusic@hotmail.co.uk

To whom may concern, i am student of A-level Media studies and for my Advanced Portfolio i will be working in a group to produce a promotional package for the release of a new album track. i would like to request permission to use the above track for this project.

The finished project will not be made available publicly and will be used solely for coursework purposes. The holder of the original copyright will be fully acknowledge in the finished project.

If you do not hold the rights for this song i should be grateful if you could forward this request to the appropriate person, or return it to me with the contact details in order that i might approach the copyright holder directly.

Yours faithfully

Beverley Owusu-osei

Example of a music video form.

In lesson we looked at varies music video's and analysed the basic music video form.

I found that the song 'All fired up' by The Saturdays gave me a clear image of how a standard music video should be.

The most frequent edits were match cuts.
I could see that the camera was moving in time with the music as the camera stayed in a contented angle

- It begins with movement, camera takes you into the Saturdays.

The artists only make eye contact with the camera when they are together - This is to address the audience, make them feel involved.
Each member may get equal time depending on how popular they are with there fans.
The bass track was when they were singing individually however the main master shot was when there were all dressed in black together.
I can see that the editing is in time with the beat of the song- from wearing a black to then white and then for the background to change to black and white.
however the music video does not have a narrative but does relate to the song (creates a party atmosphere)
Has a clear chorus and verse - influences narrative of the music video.
The mise en scene used also sets a mood towards the audience, for example; The costumes used are quite flamboyant and outgoing - makes me think of a girls night out.

Overall I thought this was a great example of a music video, as comparing it to other songs I can see that it shows similar functions that most of all other music video perform.

Function of a music video

To sell the song
makes song memorable
Promotes films and brands

For example: Diddy has his own vodka

To motivate the audience e.g. Jacksons 'Earth Song'
Promotes the artist
Establishes the artists image
Establishes genre of music
visual links across promo material
Give more emphasis to the song - Makes it more exciting for audiences to listen to and watch
Could create a dual story, making it more interesting for audiences
Helps to illustrate song
promotes visual pleasure for audiences (sets a mood)

What they sent back - Permission to use the song 'A Team' by Ed Sheeran

Hi Malika,

Thanks for your interest! I directed the video to the a team but am not actually anything to do with the musical side of it. But i have forwarded your email to Ed's A&R guy at Atlantic recs, who will hopefully get back to you directly.

Good luck!

Ruskin

his email: ruskin@riversrush.com

However as he did not have permission rights I still have to wait for the director to get back to me in order to use the video.

My copyright clearance letter

Dear sir/madam

I would like to request copyright permission to use part or whole of: A Team (Ed Sheeran)

I am a student of A level Media studies and for my Advanced Portfolio I will be working in a group to produce a promotional package for the release of a new album track. I would like to request permission to use the above track for this project.

The finished project will not be made available to publicly and will be used solely for the coursework purposes. The holder of the original copyright will fully acknowledged in the finished project.

If you do not hold the rights for this song I should be grateful if you could forward this request to the appropriate person, or return it to me with contact details in order that I might approach the copyright holder directly.

Yours faithfully Malika Watson

Email: aa28700@student.candi.ac.uk

The Music idustry

1) Summarise what you have learnt about the music industry

· In the music industry there were 5 majors left however now there is 4. The owners of the labels are Sony, Warner, universal and EMI.

· In the 21^st century we can see that the music industry has changed and became much more advanced towards technology therefore it is likely that the music industry will be heading towards everything being online however this is bad on the profit of CD’s bought in stores as it is much easier for people to download illegally free music online rather then spending your time buying CD’s from shops. Digital production is on an increase and musical merchandise is on a downhill.

· The roles in the 21^st century for music videos it to promote the particular artists image. It also could be for promoting products i.e. a mobile phone.

· Traditionally the most common formats that was used to reach audiences was radios, CD’s, TV and by analogue. However as now the technology of music has advanced there are much more software’s and formats that can reach a mass audience.

· Although there is an increase in online and digital production which help new coming artists it still has main issues today and this because piracy and illegal downloading has increased from online and digital usage.

· There is a wide branch of ways record producers and artists can target audiences, such as; TV, internet, social networking sites, the genre of the song, the particular artist, sharing websites ect.

· Audiences may have main pleasures of watching music videos this could be from visual pleasure’s as well as other aspects, for example; music videos gives extra meaning to the song, visually looks good- may create a mood, enjoy the actual artist performing, audiences may feel inspired by the song or artist ect.

Lastly I found that music videos have importances to certain institutions. For the music industry it would be that it brings profit enabling the music industry to sale CDs that people can buy. Its beneficial to the artist because they will get exposure meaning that they will use it to promote there image, this could lead to other revenue streams i.e. concerts. Another institution would be audience’s as they benefit from getting visual pleasure.

The state of the music industry currently

Laura Mulvey

1) Laura suggested that music video’s show a strong representation of women and men they portray men as the ‘active/male’ and women as ‘passive/female’ She argues that music videos give a ‘determining male gaze’ which then ‘projects its fantasy onto the female figure which is styled accordingly. She also argues that the term ‘Camera man’ means the man behind the camera will be the main person deciding what’s looks best on screen and project his own fantasy, portraying women as sex objects.

2) 2 video’s that illustrate on Laura Mulveys theory:

Sneakbo Ft Chipmunk & Mavado Starboy Remix - Official Video HD

Lil Wayne - Lollipop ft. Static

Carik Vernallis

Carol Vernallis studied editing and camera work closely in music videos.

She found that edits come more frequently in music videos then in films. The edits in music videos generally stand out ‘Disjuncture’ and there tends to be more of a ‘rhythmic base’ which has connection with the song. Edits can create an ‘broken order to draw attention to what is on screen’ which helps promote the music video, as the audience feel more excited to watch it. Most commonly used edit is ‘Jump cuts’ and a ‘Master shot (base track)’ which is when the music video frequently uses a certain scene. Another study carol found was that ‘the camera may move in time the music’.

Chris Brown - Look At Me Now ft. Lil Wayne

,

Andrew Goodwin’s theory on music videos:

1) Traditional narrative analyses of music videos don’t really apply to pop videos – they approach the narrative from a different angle to novels and films and for this reason there are 3 different structures music videos have. Firstly some music videos can be built around the songs and do not have a traditional narrative structure, Secondly music videos may show the singer as the narrator and as a character and lastly the signer often looks into the camera to address the viewers and involve them at home or wherever they are watching it.

Pop videos generally have repetitive images in the way the song repeats choruses or lines. It also helps the audience become more familiar with the song which also helps promote the video as audiences will remember the words. Another promoting aspect to music videos is the promotion of other advertisements that could be shown or heard on the radio and TV. I.e. youtube is mostly a music source however it still can promote other adverts.

Music videos do have a form of closure and ending. The song must end and this is often reflected in the structure of the music.

· It builds a climax or to a constant repetition before fading away.

· The visualisation of a song may go beyond the original meaning.

· It can provide a visual pleasure towards the audience which may encourage the viewer to watch the pop video more than once, have a repeated viewing.

· Films can promote over advertisements such as films, clothes ect.

There are 3 kinds of relations between songs and videos. Firstly Illustration, which is when the video tells the story of the video, secondly Amplification which occurs when a music video introduces a new, meaning which does not relate to the lyrics of the song and adds layers of meaning. Lastly Disjuncture which is when a music video does not have any connection to the lyrics or it may be that the video contradicts with the lyrics.

Example of illustration:

Pixie Lott- Its all about tonight

Aloe Blacc - I Need A Dollar - Official Video

Example of Amplification:

Jessie J - Price Tag ft. B.o.B.

Example of Disjuncture:

Chris Brown - My Last (Freestyle)

The new skills I learned in the completed lip sync tutorial in June

· How to lip sync in time with the music
· Using markers to mark were the song started on both clips (the footage we made and the original footage) and then lined them up. Making it much more accurate and in time with the video clip and the song.

The technical skills I developed during my course of the AS year.

The main aspects I learned from film-making

· How to use the professional cameras when filming

-how to put the stand up, making sure the legs of the stand were equal

- ‘Rec’ button

- Middle button to access our film

· The different angles and lightings that were appropriate for the shot we wanted, for example;

-180 degree rule

- reverse shot

-over the shoulder shot.

· Final cut pro, we used this to edit our film – from final cut i learnt how to get our footage onto the timeline in order to edit it, using the ‘I’ and ‘O’ button to cut the clip in different places and using the tool button to create a slow motion effect to our clip.

· Sound track pro- we first had to import our film, we could then search from different sounds and instrumentals.

- Finding the different genres of music, which then matched with a list of different sounds i.e. drums

- Dragging the sound onto the timeline

- Overlapping sounds

- Dragging the sound to make it Shorter or longer depending how long we wanted the sound to last.

- Making the speed and the time between each sequence in rhythm to the time line of the film.

- Changing the volume of the sound, some parts we might choose to be louder than other parts.

· Live type, we used to add credits to our film.

- Fonts- changing the style of the text

- Textures- the styles of the background

- Effects that can make the text more dramatic and move about on screen

- How to make each sequence 3second long

· Editing techniques I learnt

- Cut. Sudden change of shot from one viewpoint or location to another.

- Changing the scene

- Compress time

- Vary the view point

- Build up an image or idea.

Research - Skill Audit

My research skills has improved because I found it easier to find what I needed compared to my AS year. I already watch a lot of music videos so that must of helped with my research. Youtube and Vevo make it easy for me to find what I am looking for, some stuff I wanted to find in my AS year I couldn't or was harder to find. Also research was much quicker this year, I enjoyed it more.

Research - The Role of a Music Video

In the current situation of the Music Industry the role of a music video has changed

Music Videos struggle to have some impact on record sales For e.g. Lady Gaga - Telephone Ft Beyonce has 121,867,415 views on youtube but sold 7.4 million copies

Youtube means fans can access videos and songs for free
Without a video, a song is boring
Video needs to give an artist exposure and gain new fans
Videos gives the public visual pleasure. Music Industry are hoping that will make people buy tickets to come to the show to feel more visual pleasure

Research - Summary Of the music industry now

The music industry is owned by the 'Big 4'. Four big labels that own smaller labels that focus on certain genres. For e.g Universal own Def Jam and they focus on hip hop/rap. Universal also own Uni Music Latino which focus on Latino.

The Big 4 are: Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, EMI Group, Warner Music Group

The Big 4 however do not just deal with music. They are conglomerates. For e.g. Universal also makes films, Sony also makes products (tv, computers), EMI also makes films & Time Warner own AOL the internet service

However the current situation for the music industry is bad. Sales for albums has dropped over £100 million in 2 years

2010 - 319m
2009 - 366m
2008 - 428m

On the other hand sales for digital singles and albums have gone up

2010 - 160m digital singles
2009 - 149.7m digital singles
2010 - 21m digital albums
2009 - 16.1m digital albums

This is proof of the shift in consumers behaviour. We now consume music from Internet and web 2.0 soon web 3.0 also we buy more singles than whole albums. We choose our favourite track without listening to the rest of the artist music

Current trends to consume music

67 legal downloading services are in the UK alone
Itunes & amazon are the most popular and most cheap
3/4 of all downloaded music in UK is illegal
1.2 billion illegal downloads in the UK in 2010
Streaming allows music to be delivered to a user on demand e.g. Youtube

Other possible sources

Facebook will soon offer a music streaming/file sharing service
Google plus to offer similar services
Artist's websites
Independent Artist can sell their music on own websites

Research - My favourite student video

Research - Laura Mulvey Idea's on Representation

Laura Mulvey’s theory of representation is that due to media being controlled majority by men, women are represented as sexual objects in music videos. The man behind the camera controls what the audience sees and if he wants to see the female in front of the camera in a sexual way so will the audience. This theory is called the male gaze theory and does not just apply to music videos but also films, tv, photos and many more aspects of media.

Dizzie Rascal – Holiday music video is an example of this. Whilst Dizzie Rascal is dressed in a suit all the other females around him are half naked in bikinis. Also there faces are not shown in the video as much as there bodies. There are many dismembering body shots in this video. The representation in this video is that the man is dominant and females are less superior to him

Chipmunk – Every Gyal is also an example of this. Once again females bodies are shown more for example at the beginning of the video a female is lying down half naked and we see her hips and legs but no face. Also the artist and every other male is fully dressed in the video whilst all females are in bikini one even topless.

Research - Carol Vernallis Theory

In music videos camera work and edits are different to other aspects of media such as TV or film

Cuts in tune with the beat
Camera moving in time with music
Slow motion for slow paced music. Fast motion for fast paced music
Continuity edits are broken (more gaps & flow)
Camera work relates to lyrics or title of the song (Olly Murs – heart skips a beat the lyrics go “come on spin me around” so throughout the music video there is a circular motion going on. Also when he repeats “skips a beat” there are edits to create a feeling of skipping the beat

Jessie J – Do it like a dude the camera shakes with her first lyrics “stump stump I’ve arrived” this creates a dramatic entrance for the artist debut single. Also there are cuts to go with the bass in this song

Master shot is used to give a video structure. Kanye West & Jay Z – Otis the master shot is them standing in front of the American flag

Research - Andrew Goodwin Theory

Traditional narrative analyses do not apply to pop videos
Pop videos are based around song
Pop video use the artist as both narrator and character
Artist often use direct address
Pop videos rely on repetition. Images often repeat with the same line for the chorus. Also intertexuality (lil Wayne 6foot7foot took scenes from inception). Videos are repeated often on TV
Pop videos usually almost all the time have endings
Some videos may have more meaning than in the song

Illustration: Chipmunk - Oopsy Daisy the song is about a break up and the artist is both narrartor and character in the music video. The video tells the story of the lyrics

Amplification: Lil Wayne – How to Love the song is about a stripper and how she never learnt how to love but the video goes more in depth of how she got there and what she could of done different. There are two endings in the video. A sad one of her getting HIV because she never learned how to love and a good one where she is pregnant because she learnt how to love.

Disjuncture: Michael Jackson - Man In The Mirror the song is about changing yourself as a person but the video is telling the world to change as it shows drastic world events

Research - Analysis of favourite music video

Jay Z - Roc Boys is my favourite music video because firstly it is a clear representation of the hip hop/rap culture it highlights theelebration of where the artist hs come from and how he is living now this video is an Amplification because it introduces new meanings to the lyrics of the song such as the ending where someone tries to kill Jay Z there is nothing about this in the lyrics there is no verse chorus structure the music video is mor like a short film

It sells the album American Gangster very well because it plays a song from the album at the beginning before the music video really startand also the whole conext of an "Americcan Gangster" is put into this video

Research - Function of a Music Video

The function of a music video is

To sell a song/album
Makes song memroable
Promoting e.g. Dr Dre promotes his headphones in justin bieber, soulja boy music videos not only his own
Establishes genre
Establishes image

What makes a music video a music video?

•Music
•Lip sync
•Non linear editing
•slow or fast motion to suit the tune
•outfit changes a lot
•Repetion of images
•Dance performances
•Sexyness
•Verse/Chorus structure
•Edit to he beat

Planning - FINAL Final Song Choice

We choose this song because there is no music video so we can really put our own ideas and creativity on the song. Also I personally already know most of the lyrics to the song. Lip syncing will be easier than the last song we chose. For now were looking for another person to act like the singer as the feature artist and a female to be the model women I will be performing too. Finally we are looking for locations that will suit the song

Wednesday, 28 September 2011

Choosing to another music video

Changing our music video choice-

At first we decided on the song 'Rizzle kicks - Down with the trumpets' However we found that choosing this song would be extremely difficult to remake, this is because there is already a music video for this song which would mean we would have to make ours stand out more and avoid using the same kind of idea that music video had. Another problem would be that the song 'Down with the trumpets' was produced on a small budget therefore it may mean that we may have to spend more money in order for ours look better.

And for this reason we decided to choose a different song that did not have a music video.
We first looked at different artists and some of the songs in there albums as we knew some songs wouldn't have music videos to them yet.

Here are some songs we looked at
(New short list)