If you collectively gather a range of music videos, you will notice they all have various styles and use different techniques to help reflect the particular genre or image of the artist. These styles set different moods and tones so the director and artist can choose how they want the audience to connect with the song/music. I will be discussing many techniques used to sell and promote the artists music and image.
In-concert and 'as live' footage
Many music videos take the route of showcasing bands and artists in a concert to help attract the audience to buy tickets to see them. It gives people/viewers a good insight before actually paying to see them and if you are already a big fan that for some reason can't go to a certain tour then it gives you a chance to still see them. Including footage from a concert can also give the director a break as this would just be shot from numerous cameras by different people during the performance. Aswell as this, it doesn't require as much thought processing as it just simply uses footage from tours which can keep the overall production value down much lower. On the other hand, some music videos feature concert footage that had been specially arranged just for the video, in this case it would have cost more to setup up and hire people to be casted in the video. It is always more controlled and the director can make the footage look much better than using standard concert footage, this is why most artists tend to chose this route than using average clips. Daughtry and their song "Battleships" have a music video that features both live concert footage and setup concert footage. This is more attracting as a viewer as you get to watch a professionally directed music video aswell as seeing them perform on-stage. The director would get promotion from the video and the band will get good marketing from the concert footage, aswell as the directed video. Most music videos just include one or the other, which is why this song is rather unique.
Narrative and Interpretive
It is a convention for most videos to include some sort of narrative that can be interpreted from the lyrics of the song. This is usually done through lyrics or just the motion picture itself as not all music have words. It is a great way of story telling and can create a lot of emotion for the audience depending the meaning, it also helps the audience connect with the song more as they can relate the video with the words and help create a better understanding of what the song is trying to tell them. It's also common that song repeat a main phrase of a song which is usually the title, to highlight the main them of the song. A piece of music by Keane "Sovereign Light Café" has a music video which lyrically narrates spending their childhood in Southwold and attending "the" café on a regular basis as a stand-out memory. The narrative digs deep and gradually goes on about them growing up and doing different things after eventually leaving. We can also hear the title of the song as the main phrase in the song which helps reflect the whole point of the narrative. What was so strong about this is that they are returning from where they came from and looking back to how things used to be, this can strongly connect with the audience as it is a relatable story for most people and conveys a strong emotion because of the theme of returning and looking back. The fact that the music video was shot at a local beach at Southwold means it will appeal to many more locals and will surprise many others that they actually came from there, it also helps the audience get to know the artist more as a person/people.
Surrealist and Absurdist
Surrealist videos are often unconventional and normally have little to no relationship with the lyrics to the song. When thinking about it, it does seem pointless quite confusing but at the same time it can have quite a quirky spin on things and can lead to being quite entertaining to see whee it finishes. It leaves it open to interpretation so audiences can judge what the narrative behind it is themselves and maybe create a stir on the internet which induces huge amounts of views and in some cases making the video go viral. In some cases, music videos that use this style can fail hard and not have the audience hooked at all, but songs like "Where's your head at" by Basement Jaxx and "My Homies Still" by Lil Wayne took off hugely, this has a lot to do with their popularity, meaning that using this technique when you are a small or independent artist may not end up successful. "My Homies Still" is a very weird and confusing video by remains exciting and funny to watch, if you like the song you are likely to carry on watching the video. The fact that it is so strange makes it stand out from lots of other videos that the artist has done, if it is not common for this artist to have videos like this then it is more likely to stay in your head amongst all the rest. From skeletons dress up in clothes to pink painted elephants, it definitely doesn't make a strong connection to the lyrics.Impressionist
These type of music videos attempt to capture the true vibe and emotion tone of the music instead of the meaning behind the lyrics. As the whole video is not based sincerely around the words, it makes the performance and visuals more artistic - usually anyway. Back in the 19th century there was an art movement called impressionism which was focused soley on how the artist's surroundings affects them and what they feel, rather than recording the world itself. A main convention of this artistic movement is commonly soft light and edges, flowing and intermingling colours. Editing is normally used to show interesting and engaging effects to draw the audience in, bazaar lighting effects and fluent crossfades make a video more dreamy and sets a better atmospheric tone. It is easier for lower budget productions to create these effects in post production, as for higher budget, directors are able to use different tools and equipment, aswell as cameras to illustrate different effects which can create meaning like intense lens flares and bokeh effects on the screen. In the music video for Nero "Guilt" a mixture of CGI at the beginning and flamboyant colour effects transitions have been used to set a very dramatic vibe an powerful atmosphere. Some elements prove this video fits into other types of music video, however the main conventions of this video allows it to be seen as impressionist. the audience wouldn't focus purely on the meaning of the lyrics, they would be distracted by the cool visuals on screen which is what this video is all about. The words help to set the tone and abide well with the movements and editing. The environment of the video which is set in a nightclub/stripclub really sells the song as it is what you would expect to hear inside these places.
Intertextual: Synergy, Allusion, Pastiche, Parody and Homage
Music videos can often refer to other subjects and issues to give a wider meaning to them. It may be a soundtrack from a movie which includes footage from the film, therefore creating some element of synergy. Some videos can also allude to other sources of media text, events, people or sometimes even historical or cultural references. A pastiche is a light hearted imitation of another persons band or style and some artists use music videos as a way to respect and thank other groups or solo artists for their influences, this is known as a homage. Parodies tend to 'rip-off' big hit songs and transform them into something more entertaining for their audience. Sometimes this causes a big controversy with the subject artist of the original track and can end up with the parody being removed from the media. Usually this isn't the case if the parody doesn't offend anyone and respects all legal issues.
An example I found for synergy is "Sucker for Pain" which was sung by many listed artists. This song isn't the main soundtrack but it help hugely to promote the film "Suicide Squad" directed by 'David Ayer'. It includes genuine footage from the film of the main characters which is seen as iconic to the audience. The fact that this song has had over 30million views on YouTube alone means huge recognition for the movie. Also because there are 6 artists in total that are featured in this track, each person will receive huge recognition from other artists audiences as they will watch the video because they know they are in it.
'The Midnight Beast', a small group that originate from a YouTube channel made a parody of the song "Tik Tok" by 'Ke$ha'. The band completely re-worked the lyrics to make them more entertaining and recorded the video in such a way that it directly imitated the original but with more amusing visuals of young lads dancing around in their kitchen. The video received around 16million views on YouTube which have them the boost they needed to get them where they are now, recording their own music and still making more parodies. Luckily there was no up-raw when it was release, but as already said, as they was nothing wrong with the video and they had all rights to be able to publish it then everything is okay. The fact that the original music video was a high budget production and then parody had a very low budget, makes the video even more funny as it was just recorded in presumably one of there (very messy) houses.
Animation
Animation is another style in which music videos can be presented, they usually offer more unique and interesting visuals on-screen to get the audience interested as to what is being shown. It enables the director to include many imaginative things that would be impossible to capture in real life and allows a story to be told in a more interesting way with normally exaggerated visuals. This technique is seen as a very creative way of telling a narrative and as audiences aren't as familiar to these videos as they are to other sorts, it is likely they will remember more about it and absorb more of what they see.The 'Gorillaz' are an alternative rock band that have their image based soley off of cartoons - their early fan base grew up having no idea what they look like in person. This may seem strange to most but this idea has set this band apart other groups to make them extremely unique and stand out from all the rest. The music video for "Feel Good" is purely an animated video with some presence of real life imagery, featuring the Gorillaz and a floating windmill. Because this isn't your usual music video, people will react slightly confused by it and later stay stuck in their heads.
Lip Sync, Miming, Playback
Most music videos nowadays include some form of lip sync, whether it is through miming the songs lyrics or a technique called playback. Using these techniques allow the artist to change the pace/speed of the song whether it is slow or fast and fit the lyrics to it. Miming the track is also used when the artist might be moving a lot in the video or in a particular scene, they would usually get out of breath actually singing the lyrics so instead they just mime.In the music video for "The Scientist" by 'Coldplay', a really cool and innovative idea was used to get the main singer to mime the lyrics backwards. The video shows the artist singing whilst everything is being played backwards, including himself. The singer had to actually learn most of his song backwards so in the editing stage when it's reversed the words will be heard as normal, a very clever idea. Again, as this is such a strange idea, people will remember it for such an awesome idea. Aswell as a music video it can also be seen as a piece of art.
Cutting to the beat
Cutting to the beat is another technique music videos use, it is where shots are cut to match exactly with the beat of the song, as a result this creates rhythm to the edit. The song "Sexy and I know it" by 'LMFAO' has a music video which cuts to the beat on the build up to the drop. Because the cuts fit perfectly in sync, the video flows really smooth and gives good pace with the music. The shots only cut to beat on the build up to make that part of the song stand out, this is the bit just before the drop so it needs to be dramatic and long winded so the drop can be exaggerated.Post-production Effects
Post-production effects can be used for a number of different reason to serve different purposes, they may sometimes be added as a way to impress and 'wow' the audience or maybe because you have no choice and need to add CGI for a specific effect you need. There may also be a chance that some people don't really like the music track but really love the visuals and effects in the video so they keep on watching it. Depending on budget, the type of effects and scale of them will differ, on lower budget productions it may be very difficult to add CGI into your video due to cost but are able to adjust lighting green screen work. On the other hand, big budget productions can pull off almost anything CGI and effects wise, like in the video "Light it Up" by 'Major Lazer'. In this video, nothing is shown other than CGI and post effects from editing softwares. Although the simple backgrounds for every scene, they have used extremely well created CGI characters to dance on-screen. This would have been done by dressing professional dancers in motion capture suits and recording them with lots of different cameras. The recordings would then be passed onto computers and then models and different skins would be placed onto the animations to make them carry out the same movements. This is a very expensive process and will only be carried out by big budget companies. The other effects they use in the video is pretty simple (lighting, camera movement) and could be achieved by low budget teams aswell.Example of Particular Effect: Split-Screen
Split-screening is where multiple pictures or videos are shown at the same time, it is an effect that is there to impress or engage and if it is to engage then the most common use is to show two things happening at the same time. Split-screen is different to multi-imaging but is now the modern equivalent as non-linear editing makes the process more efficient. An example I have is "Lovers on the Sun" by 'David Guetta', this video uses this effect a number of times during intense scenes to make them more dramatic. The point where to the cowgirl is staring at the villain, the screen splits in two and shows a close-up of both their eyes. Another moment is where they are getting chased on horses and the screen splits into three to show different perspectives of the scene. This usually makes scenes more diverse if used correctly and makes them much more engaging for the audience to see two things at once.Example of Particular Effect: Chroma Key
Chroma keying is an effect that is added in post-production where a blue or green screen is used. This effect removes the coloured area behind the subject to reveal a transparent layer, this then allows the background to be changed to make the person/people seem as if they are somewhere different. In the music video for "Hurt" by Yung Lean, a green screen has been used constantly throughout specifically for shots with him in. By the director choosing to do this, they are able to put multiple images behind him without having to mask around him. It is a great way to be creative and gives the opportunity to make the impossible possible. Because of the ability to change backgrounds it can place the artist in different scenes with different images in each shot, this can be a great way to 'market' their look. This gives Yung Lean his image as true artist of 'Vaporwave'. This technique also always the audience to understand the theme better, if real life imagery was used instead of CGI and green screens, the message wouldn't be as strong and would make your imagination flow as well.Camera Movements
Camera movements are the use of different camera angles, tilts, pans, crab and tracking shots to show a variety of multiple movements, it can create excitement for the audience by providing more diverse and dynamic footage. The the music video for "Stressed out" by 'Twenty One Pilots' mostly every shot is hand held which is evidently shown through the camera wobble. this slight shakiness to the camera gives a casual look to the video and makes you feel more involved with what is going on. You can really picture how important camera movement is if you imagine every shot being static with no movement at all. It would be very slow and each shot wouldn't flow as nicely. Movements bring the video to life which is very important for a music video as camera work has to fit with the tone/mood of the song.Camera Shots/Angles
A huge mixture of shots, angles and lengths are used in a music video, quite like camera movements it gives the director an opportunity to create a specific mood and tone for a media text. This technique allows to show different elements of mise-en-scene which brings across a broader perspective of the narrative to the audience. In the music video for "I'll Show You" by 'Justin Bieber' the variation of angles and shot types tells a unique story from his perspective. The massive contrast in shots really gives a diverse look to the video which shows off the location in all it's beauty, the wide/long shots help to capture the whole environment whilst still showing the main vocalist. The types of shots that are used in a music video can really setup the artists image, for example if in almost every music video for an artist there were low angles of them, they could come across as intimidating or aggressive and the opposite for other shots. For this video it was important to show the audience that the singer is free and enjoying life. These shots really show this perspective.Mise-en-Scene
Mise-en-scene is most commonly seen as the biggest thing in music videos, the way each scene is structured is what drives the narrative forward. It is a way to create an atmosphere and set a tone using lighting, costume, and location without the use of dialogue (however, sometimes dialogue is used). The story it creates has the power to highlight key social issues or promote a political message, the mise-en-scene is what the audience will associate the artist with, for example Lady Gaga is known for having quirky, and out of the ordinary music videos, this attracts a certain type of audience to her music. Therefore it shows as a positive way in which an artist can market themselves and their image, how they was to come across to their fans.The aspects of mise-en-scene in "Hymn for the Weekend" by Coldplay, is very strong as it uses multiple elements to create a powerful message. The location for the video is in India which we know is significantly covered in poverty, the colours we associate with this are very dull and boring to set a miserable and depressing tone. This video however, uses bright colours, fireworks, fancy coloured clothes and children smiling to make people see the good side of the country. It really shows the place in a new light.
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