Q1-In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The huge stereotyping of R'n'B/ Hip-Hop videos in my opinion has pushed artists to start to challenge these stereotypes and bring a new dimension into the world of the genre. Chris Brown in the early stages of his career was seen as a typical R'n'B artists and song such as "Forever" and "Kiss Kiss" followed the common conventions of R'n'B songs and music video's such as money, girls, and partying.





A common these in these videos is dancing, mostly by Chris Brown himself, but in some parts he is assisted by a group of people. Dance is a convention of R'n'B/Hip-Hop, but it is one that we have challenged in own own video by not including it. We chose to challenge this convention because we feel that 'Shouldve kissed you' is one of Chris Browns softer songs and it therefore needs more performance to generate feeling and emotion.

As Chris Browns' career developed, his status in the industry allowed him to experiment with his music without much of a risk, and subsequently some of his music has ventured into the genre of rap, and some softer songs, such as 'Shouldve kissed you' could even be classed as more pop than R'n'B. The song is slow in tempo and not really the that you would expect to find on an album by an artist renowned for being a big name in R'n'B.

As you can see in the video for the song, the focus is purely on the performer and there are no other actors involved. This is not the case in our own music video for the song, as we have an extra actor as well as the performer, giving us the chance to include a lot of narrative to get the story of the song across to the audience.

The constant attention on the performer is one of the main conventions of R'n'B music videos, and in my opinion this is linked to the stereotypical view of artists in this genre as being self-centred and naive. As this is the case, we have in fact challenged this convention as well be including a fair chunk of narrative. In fairness, overall our music video is probably about 70:30 in favour of performance over narrative, but this is still more than in most R'n'B videos, such as 'Riding Solo' by Jason Derulo.




There are very few occasions in this video which shots could be classed as anything to do with narrative or the story of the song, but on the other hand it could be argued that the song is about doing things for yourself and living your own dream, or 'ridin solo' as Derulo says.
The lighting in the video for 'ridin solo' is also significant because it highlights the fact the the artist is doing well in terms of his career, and the large board of lighting behind him helps to add superiority and status. Quite frequently in our video we used natural lighting therefore most of it is set in the daytime, but whilst this challenges a convention in itself which is the nightlife, it also means that costs were kept to a minimum when it came to production. High costs of production have become a convention of hip hop and R'n'B music videos as more and more money enters the industry, along with technological advancements that make it possible for videos to have the quality that they do nowadays.

We did use a common convention of R'n'B/ Hip-hop music and this was the sexy female. We chose Fade because of her looks and I think this has a positive effect on our overall video in terms of the look and the pairing of the two characters. We enhanced the sexiness of the girl by having her walking around in a towell, highlighting her shape and figure. However, with the use of the sexy female convention came another challenge. Commonly in R'n'B videos there is a situation in which a rich black man chases a white girl, but in our video we reversed this and had a white man chasing a black girl. This was an important stereotype to challenge from our point of view, because it is something that is almost never seen in todays music videos and because of this it makes our piece more individual.

Ancillary task complete

                                                                           POSTER

                                                            DIGIPAK FRONT COVER

                                                              DIGIPAK BACK COVER

                                                       DIGIPAK INSIDE COVER (RIGHT)
                                                             

                                                      DIGIPAK INSIDE COVER (LEFT)

The design that we have chosen is inspired by Matt Cardle's album 'Letters', in the sense that it demonstrates emptiness felt by the subject. The poster consists of a shot that we were happy with as soon as it was taken, because the mise-en -scene turned out just as we planned. On the ground around the actor are autumn leaves which represent a season associated with sadness and loneliness as the vibrant colours of the summertime darken and the leaves fall leaving distant memories. This relates to the similar surroundings of Matt Cardle on the front cover of 'Letters', where he is isolated in the location with only the hills around him. The white font we have used on top of the black and white colour tone is also inspired by 'Letters'. We chose it because not only does it stand out, but it is in tone with the calm atmosphere and doesn't take the attention away from the actor, who we are trying to promote. 'OUT NOW' is in a big font and this commands the readers attention, encouraging them to purchase the album.

The inside covers of the digipak have similarities to the front cover in the sense that these also follow the overall calm and sensitive tone. The picture focussing on the leaves gives a great effect and this would be on the side where the disc is held, maybe personifying the disc to relate to the actor with regard to the fact that the disc will effectively be surrounded by nothing. Opposite to this is a picture of the actor sat down with his back to the camera. He is in the bottom left hand corner of the frame and therefore is relatively small in comparison to the overall picture, showing his feeling of inferiority to his thoughts about the girl.

The back cover is a shot that was taken in the same location as some of the footage in the video, and this relation provides a key link between the digipak and the music video. We framed the shot so that there would be a clear space in which to list the songs, while at the same time showing the stairway which links to the video.

The front cover is the same shot as the poster, however we changed tot font to black   to make sure there are some differences between the two. We chose the record label 'JIVE' because this is Chris Brown's actual record label and it therefore shows authenticity.

Digipak

A digipak is a style of CD or DVD packaging used to promote a particular artist.

This is the album cover for Matt Cardle's debut album 'Letters'. The colour scheme is just greyscale and i think this is because, even though he won The X Factor, he is not yet an established name in the UK music industry. The lack of colour on the album cover could therefore represent a career that has not yet fully blossomed. But also on the other hand, the fact that it is not completely black and white could represent that this is someone who is going to become something big. Other features of the design also coincide with this thought of representing a career with no substance, such as the location and the text. The location is in the middle of nowhere which could symbolise isolation, and the white colouring of the text prevents it from standing out.

Mike Posner, like Matt Cardle, is an upcoming artist. However, whilst Matt Cardle participated on the X Factor and got the votes of millions of viewers before he signed a contract, Mike Posner was relatively unknown and the fact that this single cover has even less colour than 'Letters' reflects this.Mike's pose is also similar to Matt Cardle's in 'Letters' as they are both looking to the ground. This is yet another similarity between the two and they both give the same feeling of isolation and loneliness in their thoughts.

I think it is obvious now that will use both these album covers as inspiration for our own, as the feeling that they give off and the sympathy that we feel for them links to how want our audience to empathise with our actor in both our music video and our digipak.


We had a shooting session yesterday for our ancillary tasks, where i was the subject of the shots and my partner was in control of the camera. The session went well and we have drawn up a short-list of our four favourites:

This is a favourite of ours because it portrays the songs feelings well, however my partner did not like the fact that there is a bin present in the background so we will choose not to use this one.

Me and my partner both agree that this picture is perfect for an inside cover.

I think this is perfect for the front cover of the digipak as well as the poster. The actors pose is good and the fact that he is looking down makes it seem like he is in thought and this links the songs bottom line of the performer thinking to himself. There is also room on the right for text.

Too central. Although the picture in itself is good, the framing is bad and there isn't  enough space for text.

Editing

Our editing process has been progressive throughout the time that we have been filming footage, however now that we have captured most of the footage we need, we can now focus on perfecting our piece section by section.

Production

This morning we expanded our range of footage by shooting in my bedroom. We feel that these shots improve the overall emotion of the video because he is in his own personal space. The calm atmosphere surrounding the song is represented by limited movement and this is because these shots are less performance and more of him reflecting.

Shot List

At the mid-way point in our editing, we have decided that more shots are needed to add much needed variety to our video. To organise ourselves for this we have produced a list of shots that we still need to do, which will help us greatly as the shots can just be ticked off when filmed.

Risk Assessment

To ensure that we will be safe whilst filming, we produced a risk assessment, and in doing so we have highlighted all the possible problems that we could come across.

Production

Further footage was filmed yesterday on the school field. We didn't want it to seem like a school field however, so we positioned our shots in a way which made it look like a regular field or park, avoiding catching things like the school or other pupils in the shots.

New ideas

When I was watching music videos on YouTube today I came across "In The Morning" by J Cole. This video makes use of a split-screen (0:19-0:36), in which we see J Cole and his girl both at home getting ready before we go out. The impact of the split-screen on the viewer is that we see an instant connection between the two of them.

My partner also had an idea whilst watching "U Smile" by Justin Beiber. In this video it is easy to distinguish between past and present because of the use of black and white colouring. We could use this in our music video when the performer is thinking about times he's had with his girl.

Production

Last night we began the filming process of the music video at Lincoln Cathedral.

We filmed almost the whole song, but with the same shot throughout, so therefore we will re-visit the cathedral on Thursday night to film again using different shots.
Before we caught the train to Lincoln we had a bit of time in hand, and therefore decided to take some practise shots at the station. However, looking back, it seems that we could make some use of these in our video, perhaps as flashback to amateur footage of them together.

Target audience research

Demographic/Pschographic info

Further Planning

Actors


This song is purely about two characters, and due to this we only need two actors.

The part of Chris Brown in the video will be played by myself. We have decided that I will do it as I have a lot of  experience acting and performing, and this could help our music video to look genuine. We feel that the performer has to be confident for the video to work, as performance will be the backbone of the video.

The female part will be played by Fade Owoaje. Like myself, Fade has done a lot of performing and this should help to produce a confident performance from her. Because she is an attractive girl, this fits with the convention of 'hot girls' in R'n'B/Hip-Hop videos. This will appeal to the male audience who will be attracted to her, but also other females who could see her as a role model.

Because of the age of the actors (both 17), this will also help to reach our target audience of teenagers, and to some extent, young adults.


Costume


As we consider this song to be soft R'n'B/Pop than Hip-Hop, the costume shouldn't exactly be as exaggerated as much as in 'grime' hip-hop/rap. Instead, we think it would be more suitable to follow the costume convention of pop videos such as Rizzle Kicks - "Down With The Trumpets".

Props

In discussions we found that other objects will be needed within the production of our music video, this is to enhance the realism of the story. Things such as mobile phones have been prepared so filming can be done without any problems. I used the memopad application on my BlackBerry to create a screenshot:

This screenshot will be shown in a scene where the actor is by himself, reflecting on times he had with the girl. He will check his phone and see this, which will show the audience that he is waiting for he to say something, and although she perhaps might not, they can empathise with the character.

This is the sort of towel that Fade will have wrapped around her as she leaves the bathroom. By wearing only this it will add an element of sexiness to the video, which is in line with conventions of an R'n'B video in the charts today.

Locations

We have formed a shortlist of locations that we can use for our music video.

 This is Lincoln cathedral. At night it looks spectacular and we really feel that it could add a really romantic and epic element to the video

This is near the port in Hull on the river humber. It would be a really nice location to use for a few shots, however it would be extremely difficult for both myself and my partner to get there so it is unlikely that we will persue this particular idea.

This is the field on which we wish to do a lot of our filming, mainly because in the sunlight the grass looks healthy and the trees and benches in the middle of it make it a nice place to be. Also, the fact that it is a large field means that, if the actor is alone here whilst we are filming he would be pretty isolated and this links to the song.

Shooting Schedule


We have constructed a shooting schedule to organise our filming, ensuring that everything runs smoothly.

Storyboards

A major part of our planning is to construct a storyboard that will allow us to enter the filming stage with a lot of planning and scheduling to go by, as well as knowing exactly how we want the scenes to look. My and my partner thought of these ideas together, however her drawing is far superior to mine and for that reason i allowed her to do the illustrations (i dont think we would understand the pictures if the drawing was left to me)

Conventions of Hip-Hop/R'n'B

After analysing many hip/hop music videos, these conventions appeared most frequently.

Planning

The Song
Me and my partner have decided to choose the song 'Should've kissed you' by Chris Brown. To start the process of this we had to request permission to use the song du to copyright issues. We chose to contact Chris Brown himself by facebook:

"Should've Kissed You" is an album track off Chris Browns most recent album 'F.A.M.E'. The lyrics tell of a man (maybe Chris Brown himself) reflecting back to a time where he didn't take his chance with a girl, hence he says "seems like every time you gave me signs and I missed it". I would class this song as soft R'n'B/Pop, however its beat and the conventions of the video such as costume suggest that it could also fit into the category of hip hop. To represent this genre in our video I think costume is an important thing, therefore we will dress our actor accordingly.

Visual effects are used in this video such as numerous dissolve effects, and example of this is at 0:18. The dissolve makes the transitions look smooth and this adds to the calm flowing nature of the song and the soft waves on the beach.

This is the current video for the song. The artist Chris Brown is the star of the video, which is a common factor in music videos, and provides a foundation to build upon. However, in this particular video, unlike most others, there isn't really a storyline to go alongside the performance element apart from a small and in my opinion pointless 'party' scene starting at 1:30; and therefore sometimes it drags on and gets a bit boring in my opinion. Because of this, we will be cautious not to let this happen to ours. One option that we have is to edit the song, however me and my partner will discuss this. The issue that I have with the song already is that it seems very repetitive and some parts, in my opinion, are not needed in the sense that they don't add anything more to the song.

It is particularly handy that we chose this song as our final choice because we have already done in depth-analysis and research of songs within the R'n'B/Hip-Hop genre.

Research questionnaire

We conducted a questionnaire within our media class to gain a better knowledge of the kind of expectations that are present for a music video by our peers.

Our results were as follows:

1) Gender?

5 of the completed questionnaires were by males and 2 by females.


2)Age?

5 of the completed questionnaires were by peers within the 8-16 age bracket, whilst the remaining 2 fitted into the 17-25 category.


3) How many music videos do you watch per week?

2 people said they only watch 1-3 per week, 4 said 4-7, which was the most common answer, and 1 person said they watch 8-11 music videos a week.

4)What is your favourite genre?

Research/links to planning

Ideas

An idea that i have for the music video is to include shots of the artist recording the song in the studio, aside from the main body of the video itself. This is becoming a popular trend in music videos today and i think that no popular music video would be realistic if we weren't to include these trends in our own. he act of performance in music video by the 'star' is a backbone in the majority of music videos.


I have found an example of this on youtube.com, where i searched for a music video that included shots of an artist recording in a studio. This particular example is at 0:29 of the following video link from YouTube.



Songs?

A song in contention for the music video is "Karaoke" by Drake. Drake is an American rap artist who is enjoying a growing reputation in the industry. As of yet there is no video for this song, which would be an advantage if we were to choose this song because because our viewers wouldn't have any pre-interpretations on how the music video for it should look.



The song itself has a soft R'n'B feel to it with a slow beat and little bass, and this gives the oppertunity to introduce negative emotions to create feeling towards the characters in the video itself.

Wiz Khalifa is an artist that is a favourite of mine at the moment and such songs as "When i'm gone" from his new album "Rolling Papers" are attractive to me in terms of creating a music video for them. This song begins very slowly with a long intro, which is fitting because it also kicks off the album as this is the first track. I can imagine a video for this song being set at night, showing bright lights of casinos and clubs as this represents wealth and also the narrative of the song which is him "spending his money up".



"When i'm gone" is basically Wiz telling his fans that he spends his money as if there is no tomorrow, he says "I cant take it when i'm gone". Therefore, my ideas for this song would be to include things associated with the 'high life' such as champagne and gambling.

Research
One problem i am thinking about for the filming of the video is that the right amount of shots need to be films so that the video doesnt repeatedly show th same boring shots and the same characters. To help gain a knowledge of the different shots used in music videos i looked at the video for "This Plane" by Wiz Khalifa. "The Race" is the second promotional single by American rapper Wiz Khalifa from his third studio album, Rolling Papers. The song was written by Wiz Khalifa and produced by I.D. Labs.



In this video a variety of different shots are used in one particular seeting whcih is where he is sat on the stairs of a plane. This shows how directors can be efficient in using the same location for a length of time in the video without it dragging on and becoming boring. The particular section i am refering to is 0:43-1:30.
Also included in this video are titles at the start which are edited in at the editing stage of the music video production. There are 2 options if this is used in my music video. The first is that titles are used to introduce the artist, or in this case the actor which is me. Another way in which titles could be used is to show lyrics giving a different affect depending on the fon and colour.

One video that makes good use of titles is "All of the lights" by Kanye West. After a long introduction the the video, the song kicks in and the lyrics at first are covered by titles which give the music video a movie feel, and gives the impression that the song is building. At the end of the song the titles are re-introduced for the outro, so it is obvious that the director has thought of a clear structure in which he has both started and ended with titles, again like a movie, this shows that titles could be used in my own video in either of these instances.



The lighting is also another main factor in this video, the constant flashing and quick cuts are in keeping with the tempo of the song and the genre as a whole. Kanye West is the main star of the video, which is in keeping with conventions of Pop/Hip-Hop videos.

As well as titles, visual effects such as words can be used to provide symbols that link to the story of the song, such as in this song by John Legend-Everybody Knows. In this video there is an effect starting at 0:42 which makes it seem as if there are words appearing and disappearing on his body. This suggests that the words are engraved into him, and also support the lyric - "its written all over my face".

Opening the coursework

I am beginning the A2 Media Studies course alone as my partner is on holiday in LA. Due to this, communication has been minimal. Fortunately, me and Anjola have a reasonably similar taste in music, and because of this i can press on with the research myself in full confidence that it will be constructive and a positive start to the coursework.

Brief

A promotion package for the release of an album, to include a music promo video, together with

• a cover for its release as part of a digipak (CD/DVD package);
• a magazine advertisement for the digipak (CD/DVD package).