Q1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge

forms and conventions of real media products?

Nicole Atkinson

GenreThe genre of our chosen song is indie pop, however we altered the genre by creating a video, digipak and magazine advert which would attract audiences of more indie folk music opposed to indie pop. We were more comfortable with this genre so came up with a concept for the video which would fit with this genre, following conventions prolifically used by other indie folk artists. By following the conventions of this particular genre, we knew our products would appeal to them, as it would fit in with the norms of indie folk.

Having a close up of the star is also conventional and some featured throughout the video as it enables the audience to identify with the star, therefore increasing their enjoyment of the video and artist.

Having the star in the foreground and the other characters in the background shows the audience who to focus and who is the star. In this particular case the use of overlay also makes her look vulnerable, as she appears slightly faded and diluted. This matches the song as she’s singing about how she’s vulnerable to these sins/addictions, another convention of the indie genre, illustrating the lyrics of the song.

Cinematography – Close-ups

Here we have used the convention of indie folk music videos, as having close ups (which we’ve used fluently throughout) helps the audience connect with the star, which is what artists try and achieve through their music.

As seen in…

Freelance Whales - Generator ^ Second Floor

Dog is Dead – Glockenspiel Song

Grizzly Bear – Two Weeks

Boy & Bear – Rabbit Song

Laura Marling – Rambling Man

Feist – I Feel It All

Another convention of the indie folk genre is displayed here, and that is the use of landscape shots in the video. A lot of indie/folk artists use shots of the sky and other landscape settings in the video, because this once again adds to the artistic value and aesthetics of the video, which is what we wanted to do by incorporating the shot into our video.

To make it more conventional by increasing the visual appeal of this shot we have increased the contrast and altered the colours using the colour corrector effect on Premiere Pro. The colours have almost been inverted, to give this dark and more sinister look, adding an element of darkness to both the song and video, matching with the lyrics in the song.

We’ve used this location because it’s conventional of the genre, and including things which are conventional is a good way of ensuring the target audience will like the video, therefore helping them engage with both video and artist. Here we are challenging the convention as we have taken landscape shots but made them more visually pleasing by increasing contrast and incorporating a kaleidoscope.

Location – Visual Landscapes

As Seen in…

Dog is Dead – Young

The Paper Kites – Featherstone

The Gaslight Anthem - Handwritten

Bon Iver - Holocene Benjamin Francis Leftwich – Atlas Hands

Local Natives – Ceilings

The heavy use of a forest/wooded location is perhaps the most conventional thing about our music video. A similar sort of location is used a large amount throughout the indie folk genre. This is because the wooded area and open space means there’s lots of room for the abstract and diverse things to unravel in the video, it also helps add to this artistic and aesthetically pleasing image that a lot of indie folk artists try to achieve with their music videos.

Wood locations are commonly used because they make a good visual accompaniment to the mellow and rustic songs which fall under the indie folk genre.

We used a wood location for not only the conventional element it has to it, but also because it was a suitable location for us as it fit in nicely to the abstract narrative, because it doesn’t draw the viewer away from what it is happening, but also manages to make the video look both professional and aesthetically pleasing. We have used the convention here because we felt it was appropriate for the narrative and would fit the style of video and song.

Location - Woods

As Seen in…

The Low Anthem – Boeing 737

Dog is Dead – Two Devils

Bon Iver - Towers

Bon Iver - Calgary

Fanfarlo – A Distance

Keaton Henson – Kronos

Here we have incorporated a very abstract element which is featured throughout our video through the use of the dipping of ink. Having something which is very visual and abstract is very conventional of the indie folk genre – the genre we have chosen to follow in the making of our music video. Because the music is typically very artistic, they have artistic visuals in their videos to fit with the artistic nature of the video.

Effects – Abstract (Ink + Paint)

This show that our video uses conventions of the indie folk genre because we’re incorporating something commonly used throughout the genre. We have done this because we wanted to make the video very visual and interesting to w watch, similar to what many indie folk artists do in the music industry today.

The convention of abstract visuals has been used because we set out with the intentions to create a visual video, so this would fit nicely.

As Seen in…

Bon Iver – Minnesota, WI

Bon Iver – Beth/Rest

Transitions – FadeThese shots taken from my video show the use of the fades throughout our video. This transition technique used between shots are conventional of the indie folk genre because like the other conventions we have used they add to the visual-ness of the video, and make it more appealing to watch.

We used this technique throughout as we felt it was appropriate for the calm and mellow song, as this editing is more suited to the mood of the song, and more hectic and fast jump cuts wouldn’t match the song and mood we wanted to create. Having shots fade into each other is a good way of changing shots and keeping with the mood of the song. This demonstrates us using a convention because we feel it would fit with the song and therefore attract more people to the video and ensuring they’d enjoy the video.

We have challenged the convention though by using a jump cut at the end of the video, where the colours change to black and white, and instead of the video fading out at the end like most indie folk music videos, there is a sudden cut which signals the end of the video. Many indie folk music videos have some form of fade at the end, and don’t usually include sudden quick cuts. We’ve challenged the convention because it fits with the indie feel, as indie is all about not conforming, and doing things out of the norm; what we have portrayed by using this jump cut technique at the end.

As Seen in…

Daughter – Youth Beirut – Santa Fe Benjamin Francis Leftwich – Atlas Hands

Cloud Control – Gold Canary First Aid Kit – Emmylou The Decemberists – Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect

Going in and out of focusThis camera technique which we have included a couple times throughout our music video. We included this as it makes the video look more interesting and it gives it that almost home made video sort of feel, which Lana herself uses constantly throughout her music videos; something we wanted to use ourselves. Having the camera slightly out of focus at parts could also infer a sense of mystery throughout the video, as it makes it look as if the audience aren’t supposed to fully identify with her.

This is therefore an example of us challenging a convention, as it’s conventional of indie folk music videos for the audience to idetnify with the star/character in the video, but here we show that our star is slightly mysterious and also plagued with some form of secret which is being revealed or clearly shown to the audience, matching the lyrics because Lana in the song is singing about how she’s being plagued with addictions, her ‘monsters’. Although not allowing the audience to fully connect and identify with the star in the video is not something very conventional, and shows us challenging a convention, illustrating the lyrics via the visuals is conventional, and something we’ve done here in our video.

As Seen in…

Bon Iver – Minnesota, WI Fanfarlo – A Distance The Last Bison – Switzerland

Benjamin Francis Leftwich - Pictures

The Acorn – Restoration Keaton Henson - Charon

Lighting Lighting is something which is important in not only indie folk music videos, but any music video belonging to any genre. The different lighting techniques can reflect and translate a certain atmosphere/mood for the whole video. In this case we’ve used natural light sources throughout our video, and as the screen shots show, we’ve used a naturally lit and bright forest to film in, which is conventional of our genre, as in many indie folk videos natural light is used.

We’ve used this convention as we feel it contradicts the harsh and brutal topic of the song, which makes it the video therefore more interesting and intriguing to the audience, making them to want to keep watching. Lana is singing about her addictions, such as drugs etc, and having something very natural such as the natural light source juxtaposes this not natural habit Lana is singing about. Some indie folk music videos do not have a strong correlation between visuals and lyrics, and this is what we have done, as it makes the video more interesting and the audience have to figure out what the narrative is, therefore engaging them more.

As Seen in…

The Last Bison – Setting Our Tables

The Lumineers – Ho Hey The Acorn – Restoration

Keaton Henson – Lying To You Keaton Henson – You Don’t Know How Lucky You Are

Emmy The Great – God Of Loneliness

Speed – Slow and FastChanging the speeds of the visuals in our video is something which is used a great amount. This is because it demonstrates us not following the norm, which is what the concept of indie is all about, and something featured throughout the indie folk genre. In our video we’ve used both slow motion and increased the speed of some shots.

The screen shots taken from our video demonstrate just a couple of the places where we have altered the speed of the shots. We’ve used this convention because we feel it adds the abstract nature of the video, and makes it look more professional, as this is used a lot in real music videos.

We sped up the shot above as it makes it look as if the addictions she’s suffering with have taken over her very quickly and had a rapid effect. The slow motion is used on the masked men running as it prolongs the shot, and shows that this has or will be a problem for a very long time. Having techniques to display deeper meanings and interpretations of the song is what we wanted to do as it adds another layer to our video, and will engage the audience.

As Seen in…

Deer Tick – Main Street Beirut – The Rip Tide Beirut – Santa Fe

Dry The River – New Ceremony

The Lumineers – Ho Hey Benjamin Francis Leftwich - Pictures

Editing Techniques – Kaleidoscope and Mirror

One of the main things we have included in our video which displays the indie nature of the video is the use of kaleidoscopes, which we applied to visual shots by applying several mirrors onto them in Premiere Pro and then altering the angles etc. to create the effect.

The use of kaleidoscopes and mirroring is conventional and shows we have used conventions in our video because it’s used a lot within the indie folk genre as it makes the video more abstract and visual, what many indie folk videos try to achieve, as it doesn’t take away from the audience enjoyment of the song like a lot of videos do with complex narratives.

We used a kaleidoscope with the sky and used it as an overlay as the audience may get bored of just looking at the kaleidoscope, hence why we used it as a layer. We mirrored the shot of her lip syncing at the top because it displays the two sides of her personality; the one in touch with herself and the other which has been tainted by these sins that Lana is singing about in the song.

As Seen in…

Bon Iver – Beth/Rest Cloud Control – Gold Canary

First Aid Kit - Wolf

Bon Iver - Perth

This particular shot displays a convention seen throughout the indie folk genre. The editing technique of overlay displayed here is something which is used a large amount in music videos belonging to this genre. It makes the video more visually engaging and aesthetically pleasing for the viewer. We have used the convention throughout the video.

Editting - Overlay

We’ve overlaid shots with very visual ones as this adds an abstract and very visual feel to our music video which is what we wanted to achieve. It also makes the music video look more professional because it has this editing technique used throughout. The audience will appreciate the aesthetically pleasing nature of the video, therefore engage with it more.

We used overlay in these particular shots because we wanted to incorperate the masked men into the video from early on, and felt an overlay of her lip syncing would look good and fit nicely. The other shot from our video in the top corner adds another layer to that particular shot, making it look more interesting and good to look at.

As Seen In…

First Aid Kit – Emmylou Half Moon Run – Call Me in the Afternoon

Laura Marling - Ghosts

Beirut – Santa Fe Sea Wolf – Old Friend Noah And The Whale – Tonight’s The Kind Of Night

The image to the left is a screenshot of our digipak, which we have created on Photoshop. We used images that have been taken by ourselves and drawings by people we know and just layered them on top of each other. The whole thing is very conventional of the indie folk genre because of the cold blue/green tones, making it look very earthy and natural, very conventional of the indie folk genre. The drawings included on this are of deer and more abstract drawings, relating to both the abstract nature of the video and the abstract nature running throughout the genre.

There is a clear link between both of the ancillary tasks, which is conventional of any music genre, as it’s important for audiences to be able to tell what the album may look like from the magazine advert so they can be able to find it in a shop, and this is achieved from our magazine advert. The colours used in the magazine advert are the same as the colours used in the digipak, and this running theme is conventional of albums and magazines adverts. The thing which would be first seen by audiences would be the large circle with the star’s name in it and the tour dates labelled underneath. This is the same circle which is pictured on the front cover of the digipak, keeping up the consistency between these two products. The actual circle it’s self is made up a picture taken from a larger image of a stained glass window. This in itself can relate to the star we have created, and also relates to our chosen song because of the religious iconography and symbolism. This is something which is prolific within the indie folk genre, so it fits with the pure and raw sounds are made, and religion is used a lot within building indie folk artist’s persona’s.

Conclusion

To conclude, I can say that we have used many conventions of the indie folk genre throughout our video. This is because conventions are what the audience will expecting of a product belonging to that genre, so they will know what to expect when viewing our video. This is good for us, as if they’re a fan of the indie folk genre, then they’re more likely to enjoy the video as they’ll know roughly what it will look like before even watching it.

On the whole, our video was a success because it fulfilled the typical conventions of indie folk genre, which have been highlighted in this task. The ancillary tasks also went very well as we believe they reflect the genre correctly and suit both our target audience and the portrayal of the star which we have created in this task.