Research

Centre Number: ID 136

Why music videos?

18 July 2023

Today, as my teammate and I were thinking about how we would go about our music video for our coursework, we figured it'd do us good to research about the purpose of music videos to better understand why we are creating one in the first place and how it can be used to benefit the company. We figured out that MVs of different musical genres have different conventions with aims to cater to their specific target audience's needs and ensure that they make as much profit as possible, which is why it is crucial for them to be executed well. The following are what we have concluded from our time researching.

'Despacito" with 8.4 billion views, garnering millions of dollars worth of profit and becoming much more famous in comparison to before the song was released.

Music videos can be considered as a vital method of "selling" the music to the audience.

Unlike times before the invention of television or other platforms that are able to air videos or images that aren't still where the only possible methods of consuming music are through the radio or through CDs/cassettes, the audience is now able to use not only their sense of hearing but also their sense of sight. Through this fact alone, it becomes well known that watching the TV or other newer forms of technology is more engaging and interesting in comparison to simply listening to it (although streaming platforms such as Spotify who do not display video every time the audience listens to the music are still very widely popular) For this reason, the musical industry began creating the so called music videos which acts as somewhat a short 'film' which highlights what the song is about with it playing in the background. With this we can really conclude that it provides a better listening experience as people will be more hooked and thus allowing them to become interested in the artist themselves as well as their other existing/future songs.

In the past, listeners would tune in to radio music. This indicates that the audience listened to the song using solely their sense of hearing because radios don't have screens. A few decades after televisions became widely available in the 1950s, viewers were able to watch and listen to TV shows using both their hearing and sight, which greatly enhanced and varied the viewing and listening experience. As a result, numerous music businesses have deduced that if a song engages the senses of sight and hearing, people may be more inclined to listen to it. As a result, these industries have created music videos, or MVs, which feature a brief scene or "film" with the song playing in the background.

Apart from that, music videos are often used as a form of promotion, whether it be promoting the artist or even promoting their sponsors through the music video. There are many techniques in which the MV can be used in order to attract the audience, one of which is the use of interesting 'thumbnail' to attract the listeners at first glance, allowing them to be curious and such. Due to this attraction, the listener may give the song a try and play the video, this simple action counts as a view and many of these views from various people will bring profit the the artist as a result. From the initial stream, it may also lead to the artist being able to attract many more listeners in the present and the future. Songs may also go viral from the music video produced which as a result can skyrocket the artist's fame and profit in addition to streams from streaming services and physical copies that are bought.

source: https://www.kahwatechnology.com/769-billion-views-on-youtube-despacito-most-streamed-song-in-the-world

Music Videos also act as a tool to help build audience.

For music videos produced by artists, especially those in the pop music genre, the music released will be widely recognized by a wider number of audiences. This may be due to the typical conventions of the genre such as: being an easy-listen, catchy, easy to understand, as well as making sure the music video will be generally accepted by the mainstream audience, not involving sensitive topics such as religion, thus becoming more widely accepted in comparison to the more niche artists who aren't in or from large record labels.

When the music produced has been consumed by the audience, if they enjoy it they will become what can be called as a repetitive consumer which, as a result, allows them to be a fan or part of the artist's fanbase, usually consisting mostly of the original target audience. Take, Taylor Swift, as an example - with her fanbase 'swifties' in which they constantly purchase physical copies of her album whenever she releases one, listening to her music through streaming platforms as well as - where most of her music videos blow up with five of her songs having over a billion views, shake it off with a whopping 3.3 billion.

Music videos also create and reinforce brand identity

Olivia Rodrigo's album "SOUR" serves as an illustration of how music videos can establish and strengthen brand identification. The primary colors used on the album cover and music video are purple and multicolored stickers. Because these colors are used so frequently, listeners may quickly distinguish Olivia Rodrigo's song from others.

Deciding Music Genre and Song for my Music Video

19 July 2023

Amongst the many music genres available to pick, my group and I settled on synth-pop, R&B genre, particularly because we enjoy and are familiar with this genre so it'd be easier for us to apply the conventions we already know of.

Afterwards, we decided that 'Blinding Lights' by The Weeknd. This song was released in November 2019. We decided to go with a theme of dark, flashy, energetic in order to capture the vibe of the song. To better understand the concept, we decided to read through the lyrics in order to further plan what we had in mind for our music video, as well as finding inspiration by looking at music videos for other songs with a similar style.

Conventions of a Music Video

20 July 2023

Quinella and I did some research on what is typically seen on music videos and we found as such; A typical music video (MV) features the singer lip-syncing to the song, actors performing, and props (which can be anything from little objects to buildings and cars). These components aid in telling tales that are appropriate for a song; yet, the artist must make sure that each component relates to the song's content in order to prevent confusion or ensure that the audience can understand the meaning correctly.

Since the genre we chose is synth R&B, we decided to take a look at other music videos of the same genre in order to make our moodboard so we could get the general vibe of what we wanted in our music videos. We found that "Slow Dancing in the Dark" matched the exact energy we wanted our music video to be like.

Amongst the noticeable features of the music video, we found that Joji made use of monotone colors - in this case blue - alongside cuts with different colors (though kept minimal) and he the entire video was cool-toned. We also took a look at other music videos of artists similar to The Weeknd such as Tory Lanez (see links below) which again also had the same monotone coloring. We took note that the music videos start off slow and become more fast paced as it nears the climax of the songs, so we kept this in mind for when we create the storyboard for our music video.

The main focus of these music videos throughout their durations was always the artists' visuals in different scenarios/sets, and that the camera angles commonly used are close-up shots and medium shots. Many tracking and reverse tracking shots can be seen throughout all 4 music videos, as well as cross cuts and cutaways to ahow parallelism and how the character feels at a certain point of the song. In addition to all this, we realised that the outfits worn by the artists in these music videos are similar or the same all throughout the music video so we made sure to remember this when creating the costume design for our artist.

https://youtu.be/cHHLHGNpCSA?si=KK6igO0ZMJwulBay

https://youtu.be/IcrbM1l_BoI?si=Xxxa3rNQPoVX4KJZ

Another typical convention we noticed is the use of title cards for the artist's name and song title as well as end credits stating who was tasked to do what for the music video, for example Avicii (see images above) made use of both of these conventions on two of his music videos, so we decided to put this into our planning for when I edit the music video later on.

Music Video Practice

23 July 2023

My media studies teacher Mrs. Detha had assigned us work which was to create a short practice music video (30 seconds) on any song we'd like to use

We decided to stick with the genre we were planning on doing which was pop, and ultimately made the decision to do a trial on the song 'Normal Girl' by Sza. I requested my teammate Quinella to lip sync and act since I was assigned as director, editor, and cameraman, it was good practice for me to get used to how music videos are typically shot.

We made use of different camera angles, movements, as well as experienced with editing. Although this is a relatively slow song compared to the one we chose, I believed it was best for me to start slow in order to practice syncing the lyrics to the lip sync. I made use of capcut as the editing software in order to achieve the final practice.

Social Media Research and Practice

28 July 2024

nickiminaj on Instagram

taylorswift on Instagram

coldplay on Instagram

For the social media, we decided to use the app Instagram, we made use of Nicki Minaj, Taylor Swift, and Coldplay as references as they are very well known and would have everything artists normally have on their social media. We searched for the typical features that made up an artist's profile. The first noticeable thing we realised was that all of the artists have the blue tick which shows the profile's authenticity as well as the large number of followers.

Additionally, we took note that the artist usually has their name/stage name as their name on the profile as well as announcements promoting their newest albums and the link to their profiles. Lastly, there's the highlights at the bottom of the profile so we decided to make a practice of the account through an app called Photonote

We decided on a fake name "Luke Kairo" based off one of our favorite pokemons 'Lucario' However due to the limited features of the app we were unable to create highlights.

The reason we chose Instagram is as it is our most used social media platform and majority of musicians use Instagram as their number one advertising tool for their new albums and upcoming events. as well as the fact that about 72% teens and young adults use the site (according to pewresearch.com) so we thought it'sd be the best platform to use in ocmparison to other apps such as X (formerly known as Twitter) or Facebook.

Another thing we took note of is that artists usually have merchandise designs sold in order to gain revenue and further strengthen their branding and brand recognition, so we made sure to keep this in mind when creating the page that we would make merchandise and post it.

In addition to this, we noticed that artists' posts correlate to their current activity such as new releases and tour dates (as seen from Coldplay on the right) Tour dates are especially common as going on tour is one of the best ways for celebrities to connect with fans as well as gain popularity and reveue. Due to this stereotypical convention, my teammate and I have decided to include tour dates as well in order to follow the convention and make the account look more authentic.

As conclusion, these are the social media account conventions based on our references:

Highlights: including footage from tours, artist dancing videos, or the follow-up to a song release.
Number of Followers & Following:
Social Networks Bio: states that the aforementioned account is the artist's official account and includes a link to the most recent music video the artist has released.
The artist's username has a blue confirmed checkmark next to it, signifying the authenticity of the account.
posts regarding nominations, the artist's products, concerts and tours, a "coming soon" post for their upcoming release, posts about the artist's current release (indicating that the song is out now), and even humorous images to amuse their fans.

Digipak Research

3 August 2023

Digipaks are the actual CD packaging used by artists. Each album has a unique design created specifically for the artist's record, making it easier to identify individual artists as well as their many albums or singles. I discovered that the digipak's design must have components that go well with the artist's branding and must be related to the album's themes for the songs.

The following is a summary of the digipak conventions:

An image of the creator or their illustrations on the front
The album's title, the artist's photo, and illustrations on the front cover
Back Cover: Credits, record label, background image, copyright, song list with titles, and record
Spine: Has the album's title and a serial number CD: features a straightforward design that occasionally includes the album's title. Occasionally, it may also have an incredibly intricate design.
Among them are photocards with the artists' images or artist photo booklets.

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