HOW EFFECTIV

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COLOURS

Our focus of colours is a dominant theme throughout our media product, as we exploited the use of tones and patterns to symbolise and relate back to our themes of Urban and Youth culture. The use of interesting colours was originally used in MIA’s “Paper Planes” video and appropriately represented how the city of Brooklyn was developing in a rich, modern way. Reflecting on our own music video, we successfully included vibrant backgrounds, some of which were consisted of graffiti patterns and sequenced cloths. To analyse, this clearly depicted how pop-culture has waned itself though in our British, modern society as there are colours everywhere. Furthermore, another interpretation we can argue is that the youth represent these outbursts of colour through these pieces of street art. When graffiti is sprawled across business type buildings, this could represent the rejection of conforming to society and remaining creative. Primarily, we aimed to use colours in order gain attention and interest throughout our piece as it is the number one visual competent that people remember. As well as being inspired by MIA’s original video, my partner and I researched Sam and the Whoomps’ “Bom Bom Bom’s” video. The exciting colours presented in their piece complement the booming chorus of the song as the combination of the two scream pop culture. However, a difference with this example is that this video is strictly a Pop song, whereas our song choice is a combination of Hip-Hop and Pop.

In our creation, primary as well as secondary colours are used. We use the colour blue, which is often associated with depth and stability, we included this to link with our star icon as she is a dominant female with a message. It also oozes confidence but truth, much like what the meaning of the our song . A reoccurring colour is purple. Purple is associated with royalty, wisdom, independence and creativity, purple is also a very rare colour in nature and can be considered "artificial" - this could symbolise the urbanisation of society perhaps.

Our character's major costume changes are seen mainly through the change of jackets she wears, her outfit underneath Is all black which helps the different jackets and contrasting backgrounds to stand out. The colour black is also associated with mystery and power. The lack of colour in our characters main outfit can symbolize that she is laid back and relaxed, this is a stereotypical depiction of teenagers nowadays.

CLOTHING

The importance of our actors clothing was focused on in our media project because her outfit not only represented/reflected her star icon identity, but also represented British teenagers. During our research process, we aimed for our character to wear brands such as such Adidas and Nike as these are stereotypical “stylish” clothing in today’s society and is predominately worn by the youth. This feature made our actor easy to identify to audiences. Furthermore, out choice of clothing strongly represents and links back to our major theme of urbaness, as LIA’s clothing originates from thrift stores and are casual. Her effortless but trendy image was inspired by Rihanna’s outfit choices in her “We Found Love” music video. Rihanna can be seen wearing an oversized bomber jacket and Underground Creepers. Based on the edgy but trashy 80’s style, this reinforces that brands are important in identifying an artist as she has made these items her own. We believe that our character also does this successfully.

These comparisons outline that brands are important as they provide an insight as to into the what the character is like. My character’s wearing of an oversized jacket can depict that she is laid-back, however this is counteracted by her choice of branded shoes (Adidas), This shows that she does care about brands and what is considered trendy. In the last row of images, the clash of patterns that between the two stars can illustrate that they are quirky and are expressive with the clothes they wear.

Vintage, oversized denim jacket

Vintage, Harrington oversized jacket

Adidas ‘Stan Smith’ trainers

Nike ‘Windruner’ oversized jacket

Underground Creepers

Striped polo neck

Denim patterned waistcoat

LIGHTING

In any music video, lighting is important. As the majority of our music video is filmed outside, we predominately used natural lighting because we felt it was the most appropriate. If we used artificial lighting, we believe that our video would have appeared less realistic or more rehearsed/produced. This was important because as we aimed for our video to reflect the how edgy the streets of Camden were, therefore we avoided using any flash lighting.

However, the scene where there is an extreme close up of our actors mouth lip-synching, required high key lighting. To achieve this, me and my partner used a high-powered torch and positioned it above her head, aiming down on her face. This created shadows underneath her nose and lips. This high key lighting effectively exposed the details of her face, especially her mouth which is what we were aiming for (as we wanted to focus on her lip synching). This creates a mood which demands for viewers to notice her singing to the song, thus reinforcing the message/lyrics. This shot was inspired by a shot in Taylor Swift’s music video “Wildest Dreams”, the shot effectively illustrated how if a specific shot of light is aimed at the center of a subjects face, their features are accentuated, especially if an extreme close up is combined with this.

The impact of using high key lighting in this shot softened the mood as the colours created are warm, orangey/yellowy tones. The same is done in Taylor Swifts music video. These tones ultimately show the softness and fragility of the female star icon and also places viewers to envision our actor’s beauty as her femininity is asserted.

LOCATION

Choosing a suitable location for our song choice was not difficult. Comparing our spot of London to MIA’s choice of Brooklyn, New York, we found that upcoming areas such as Brixton and Camden would be perfect as they heavily reminded us of Brooklyn. There were many characteristics of Camden which proved to be a suitable choice for a Urban music video to take place. For instance, the countless sights of spectacular graffiti pieces helped to bring our dominant theme of street art to life. Our addition of these pieces worked as very interesting backgrounds for many shots. Furthermore, as Camden is known for its graffiti-filled streets, these shots helped audiences to quickly identify the location we used. Evaluating, using this popular location was effective because it would ultimately help viewers feel more involved as it is set in an area they are familiar with. Also, with the variety of shots we included, the location would help to make viewers feel involved and understand the realness of the non rural areas which create modern London as a society. Despite our shots simply exploiting these graffiti filled locations, the unmissable beauty of Camden is also illustrated through a variety of shots. For example, our moving shots of Camden market which include its lights and attractions, whilst surrounded by tourists. Another dominant theme in our piece is the idea of modernism and development, Camden clearly demonstrates this as its conventions such as transport is heavily included. Our shots of the underground are effective in once again establishing where our music video is set, but it also depicts how advancing London is and how transport is a major part of the daily routine. Relating back to the lyrics, MIA sings “Sometimes I think sitting on trains, Every stop I get to I'm clocking that game”, our use of specific shots of public transport (the underground) support/reflect what she is singing about (this is an example of there being an evident relationship between the visuals and the lyrics – Andrew Goodwin). Furthermore, a video I was inspired by was Jay Z’s “99 Problems”, along with its obvious grittiness and heavy urban vibe, the location it is set in (which is also the same as MIA’s music video location) inspired shots in our music video. Shots we included aimed to exploit out location choice as we found that it was important to reflect Camden’s affluence of non-ruralness in our piece.

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A variety of camera angles was used in my product in order to interestingly display the narrative of our music video. Specific shots allowed us to control how an image was perceived and also gave us control on what was to be included/seen in the shot from the audiences perspective. For example, the use of our extreme close up when our actor is lip-synching encourages audiences to focus on the lyrics of the song as her mouth is centered in the middle of the frame. This interesting shot was inspired by female rapper Azealea Banks’ “212” as pictured. Despite the shot being fairly simple to demonstrate, it’s use effectively fit into our music video because it helped to re-establish who our star icon was and helped the audiences to focus on the meaning of the lyrics. Another camera angle which we used was positioned from behind our actor. The effect of using this angle was to create a sense of intimacy as audiences would feel as though they are with our star on her journey. Furthermore, this shot also evokes the theme of voyeurism as our actor’s face/identity is not shown in the shot. Ultimately, the feeling as though she is being followed or watched is created, thus increasing the audiences curiousity as they will be interested in wanting to know what happens next helping the audience to feel interested on what is going to happen next. Furthermore, for our on-beat-editing shots, we were inspired by MIA’s literal use of showing images of money as the cashier sound pings. For this angle, we used a close up to easily show our audience that there is a relationship between the visuals and the song/lyrics of the song, once again reinforcing that our camera angles matched a specific part of the song. Also, as each note disappears as the the beat persists, this angle clearly shows this making it easier for the viewer to understand what is happening in the music video. Another video which influenced a shot in our own piece, is Coldplay’s “Every teardrop is a Waterfall”. At the very beginning of our video piece, a 10 second time lapse of London is shown illustrating how busy it is. Although Coldplay’s piece uses a skyline of a city, the time lapse effectively shows how fast-paced these societies are. With our piece, we aimed to show a journey and we believe a time lapse shows this.

This shot mimics an over the shoulder angle which ultimately helps to involve the audience, as it is an intimate shot. Also, the extreme closeness of the shot creates the feeling that perhaps audiences shouldn’t view this personal text our second actor is about to send, thus reinforcing the theme of voyeurism.