As part of our advanced portfolios, my group and I created a music video for the song 'I'm 17' by Rizzle Kicks. This video was a debut for our artist and therefore required a strong performance on screen. The genre of our video was urban and could be specifically classified as a rap/indie hybrid due to the use of rap vocals but an indie instrumental.
For a debut record it is important for the artist to receive maximum exposure from the music video. This is so that their image can be established and they become recognisable in the future based on this piece. To establish our artist's image camera-work was important. Our artist was the focus of the majority of our shots, including many close-ups to give everyone a good look at him, and to improve the effectiveness of the lyrics through close-ups of lip syncing. Goodwin identified the use of close-ups as a vital convention in music videos, and it is especially important in our genre as the focus is all on one individual and his vocals, with there being no other band members and no instruments used. We also used many mid-shots in order to show a variety of performance rather than just lip syncing. This included shots of our artist bopping humorously, interacting with the camera, and dancing his way down the street. We also used a close-up shot of his feet as he danced to focus on the elaborate movement he was making with this part of his body. With the amount of movement involved in the performance we also decided that camera movement was important. This led to the use of many tracking shots, most notably when our artist is facing the camera head-on as he walks through the park, and when he is being tracked from the side walking down the street. We also used pan shots during the recording booth scenes in order to keep them exciting and spice them up. The camera movement here, metaphorically kept the video moving with the pace of the song.
Editing went hand-in-hand with filming techniques in creating an effective video. With the songs uptempo feel, it was important that the video reflected that and conveyed the fun, upbeat instrumental and lyrics. Therefore the technique of our editing in terms of pace, would have to be similarly fast. This meant we used many short cuts, and had many different scenes and settings interlinking and being re-visited rapidly in a sporadic and unpredictable order and fashion, which we felt conveyed and reflected the hectic feel of the song. One key editing technique we used was the use of jump-cuts from long to short distances as if to increase the anticipation, and build to an explosive climax of the video, similar to a sudden dramatic zoom effect. This shows how we broke continuity rules, similarly to how our artist could be seen as a rebellious rule-breaker for example in the shot where he kicks a can while walking down the street. We also used many effects on Final Cut Express in order to add to the messages in certain lyrics. For example when our artist refers to being drunk we use an overlapping/double-vision effect as if the viewer is watching through impaired 'drunk' eyes. This shows the language of our editing in full force as it aids the communication of the lyrics to the viewers. Hall (1980) cited the fact that producers always have an intended way for visuals to be read; a preferred reading. In this case the preferred reading was that our protagonist is maybe mischievous for drinking, but it is all good-humoured and light-hearted. However an oppositional reading could be that we are condoning 'binge' drinking, however we tried to avoid this by not showing any particularly negative effects or consequences of our protagonist's drinking.
Our video's narrative followed no particular structure, but also played a key role in backing up the lyrical content. We only used narrative where we felt it specifically related to a particular line or few in the song. To exemplify this; there is a line which reads "6 o'clock already? get the booze in!" therefore we showed our artist bursting through his front door with a box of beer.
Mise-en-scene was also a key area in our video. The mise-en-scene creates a diegetic world full of connotations. These denotations are a signifier, and the consequential connotations are what is signified, for example the use of an urban setting connotes the idea that our artist is from a grounded, working background. We also showed this through our artist's dress code which portrayed that he was 'cool' and in touch with his youth culture, but by no means rich or flashy, therefore making him easy for our audience to relate to. One definition regarding semiotics was by Fiske (1982), who stated "denotation is what is filmed, connotation is how it is filmed". An example of this was when we filmed our artist dancing but used a hand-held filming method, to connote the up-tempo and unorganised nature of the song.
Overall media language was very important in our video as it performed the function of letting the audience get a feeling of how we wanted our artist to be portrayed, and how we wanted the song to be interpreted in a light-hearted fashion.
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