CAROL VERNALLIS

Music videos break down visual, lyrical and musical elements to the smallest constituent parts - a prop, a colour, a gesture, a few words, an intriguing riff" - Carol Vernallis (2001)

Vernallis' theory is based around 4 ideas

Narrative
Editing
Camera Movement and Framing
Diegesis


Narrative
Whatever is on screen must reflect the meaning of the song/lyrics, thus creating a narrative. However she says the narrative doesn't necessarily have to be complete and it can be disconnected or appear in fragments.

Editing
Music videos do not have to follow a conventional style of editing, so they can break rules. It's acceptable for the editing to be noticeable, however it might only be found in niche music videos. This can be achieved by the following:

Cutting to the beat
Jump cuts
Breaking the 30 degree rule
Dramatic changes in pace
Juxtaposed frames

Camera Movements and Framing
If there was an instrument in a song that might go unheard if not pointed out, there could be a close up of it being used to draw attention to it. Another example would be, rapid camera movements when there is an extreme change in the song's pace.


Diegesis
Drawing attention of specific shots with fragmentation by using less relevant shots woven in. These less relevant shots will also sometimes be unfinished which will not really develop the plot in any way. Due to this, Carol Vernallis states that the diegesis of the music video will be drawn out quite slowly.


Sources:
- VERNALLIS, 2001
- The Kindest Cut: The Functions and Meanings of Music Video Editing

ANDREW GOODWIN

Andrew goodwins 5 aspects of music videos.

Thought Beats - Seeing the Sound
Narrative and Performance
Star Image
Relation of Visuals to Song
Technical Aspects


Though Beats - Seeing the Sound

Step 1 - Looking at the structure of the song, separating it into verses and chorus
Step 2 - The artist's voice. The trademark to the video and the song. Easily recognisable and helps with brand identity and star image.
Step 3 - The story the artist is trying to tell is complimented by the music video.


Narrative and Performance

Goodwin believes it is important for an artist to be in their own music video. He thinks it gives the viewer a better understanding of the song, as they know who's perspective it's coming from. A good example of this would be Foo Fighters - Run. The whole band features in the narrative and the lead singer is Dave grohl, the frontman. The anarchist themes fit in with the angry lyrics and rock n roll genre.






3. Star Image
When the the artist of the song is featured in the music video, they will be positioned in a way to make them unique from the others. This can be done though costumes, framing or lighting, in association with the music.

The Shoes 'Submarine' does this by making everyone but the artist have skin over their eyes and mouth.









4. Relation of Visuals to Song

A music videos' visuals must share similarities with the song, or show direct contrast. An example of this would be 'Warning' by Green Day. the character in the song goes through a police tape while a raid is happening just as the lead singer says "oh crap a police line, better not cross".





5. Technical Aspects
Godwin said that technical aspects help hold a music video together through mise-en-scene, camera shots / movement, editing, and sound. A great example of this is 'The music scene' by Blockhead.
Everything moves as the music does.

EVALUATION OF SURVEY

I should have included a larger variety of answers here.







These answers are far too specific, and there are not enough of them, however, this is fixed slightly by including 'other' as an option.




I should have been more specific, maybe including 30 seconds between the numbers.




This didn't really have a bearing on the music video so i could have left it out.

HEALTH AND SAFETY

Hartshill Hayes is a public area so we had to abide by the safety regulations in the PDF's Paula sent us. Those in the video had to sign consent forms show below. This was to avoid legal action. We were also informed that normally we would have to provide a fee of £60 an hour for filming promotional footage on this land, but we were exempt since we are students and we were doing work for the council. 

Filming had to take place on sunny days to get the best possible footage. The downside to this is that there were more people in the Hayes at these times. We had to make sure we were not causing obstructions with our equipment, while also making sure we were not in remote enough places to have our equipment stolen. We worked around this well as we had three members in the team, so we always had one person with the equipment at any given time.

The Tamron lens is very large, we had to be careful with this, as without proper support it can break. We had to always have someone holding on to the large end of the lens, and also make sure the tripod was always secure.

TESTING FRAMES

ROUGH DRAFT

 

NEW VIDEO

Finley and Joseph;
-battle royale
-famous music video/film scenes
-finley is a crime boss

Possible songs;
-heads will roll

Crime boss idea;
-Fin is sat at the end of the garden with his two bitches
-Joseph drags conner up to him with bag on his head

drawing idea
-go over PROPFILM in after effects

STARTING AGAIN

First attempt was a complete disaster with most of the props now being useless, and the actors not being available again, so won't be able to try again.