Distribution Process

If you click here you can view a power point presentation I created on the distribution process in the music industry.

Marketing and Promoting

Here is a prezi I created on the online methods of marketing and promoting. This can be viewed by clicking here.

Production Process

In the music industry, videos are essential in helping the artist form an identity and aid the audio with visual images. There are 3 main stages of video production: pre production, production and post production.

Pre-production
In this stage, this is where everything takes place before you shoot the video. For example planning. Planning may involve tasks such as;

• Understanding the intended target audience.This will allow you to create a video that is suitable for that audience.
• Creating a storyboard. In this area of planning the creators will draw their initial ideas for the music video and use it as a basis for a shooting schedule. 
• Gathering a cast. This involves getting appropriate actors for the music video you want to shoot who are comfortable being filmed. 

Production

This stage is where everything is captured that is needed for the video. Using the storyboard created in the pre-production stage means that none of the shots will be missed. The production team will be required to ensure that shooting runs smoothly which may last from one day or many days depending upon the complexity of shots used.

Post-production

Once all the shots used have been captured, they need to be edited together, which is done in the post-production stage. Essentially this involves adding the visual imagery to the audio track produced by the artist. Editing is usually one of the slowest processes involved with creating a music video because the visual aid (especially if it includes lip syncing) music be correctly synced to the audio track so it appears professional. 

Examples of music video production companies include:

1. Silvertip films
2. Armonica Film
3. Blind Aura Pictures
4. Chied Productions

Imagine Dragons CD Cover Practice

Here I have created a CD cover for the band 'Imagine Dragons'. Their song ' On Top Of The World' is my teams choice for our A2 music video piece. The cover and insert was created using photoshop CC.

Front

Back

Insert

Our Pitch Video

In this post you can view our music video pitch which was edited by myself and my work partner, Jamie.

You can view the video by clicking here.

Website Analysis

Here is a link for a website analysis that I created for the American rock band: Paramore. The prezi can be viewed by clicking here.

'The Kindest Cut' Textual Analysis

In this post I will use the knowledge gained from this post I created previously and apply it to a music video. The song I have chosen to do a textual analysis of is called 'St. Patrick' by a band named Pvris (pronounced as Paris) and the music video can be viewed here.

Mise-en-scene

In this video the sequence of shots is set on various different locations. However as the video continues its apparent that it consists of two main pieces which are: a continuous string of outdoor shots and a string of indoor shots which has been filmed in a studio. The use of this setting allows the audience to become familiar with the band members but the images don't distract them from the audio. Vernallis states that the editing of the sequence of shots and setting used is key because it enables a relationship between the song and image to be formed.

The band members (actors) in the video are positioned in the frames consistently throughout, with Lynn (the lead singer) positioned in the middle. This will clearly indicate to the audience that she is the lead character but by having the two male band members (Alex and Brian) positioned either side of her this gives the audience a sense of unity and that they're a team.
Vernallis' says that a close up of the singer's face in a music video is often shot and edited in such a way to leave us with a way of grasping hold of some musical element, which might be the main hook or a small detail. In the music video close up of Lynn's face is repeated to allow the audience to form a connection between imagery and audio. 

Camera shots

The shots used in the video are mainly long shots that are at eye level for the audience. This is  possibly done to allow us as an audience to get to know the band members and see essentially what they look like, which is reinforced by the short track shots where the camera follows them walking in the long shots used. 

The other main focus of shots is close ups of the band members which can be used to show expression/emotions. Using the 'Kindest Cut' theory, Vernallis says that music videos often present a flow of images that are too rich and materials that seem to dissolve too quickly. The use of a close up gives the and something to commit to memory and the intense isolation of the shot keeps the viewer present. An example of this is the close ups used to break up the string of continuous long track shots. 

Editing

Vernallis says that music videos may avoid continuity editing because these techniques would give a visual track too strong a forward trajectory and the image might seem to overtake the song. Which is something a music video will try to avoid because its purpose is to provide a visual image that will support the song used and enhance the audience's experience whilst expanding the artist into subsidiary media platforms. 

The editing used in the music video is quick paced and on beat to the track itself. This means that the images shown are more complimentary to the sound because it keeps the video as a whole from becoming disjointed. 

Vernallis' 'The Kindest Cut'

In this presentation provided, I explore some of the key areas involved with editing music videos using Carol Vernallis' 'The Kindest Cut' methods which can be transferred onto my A2 music video. 

The presentation can be viewed here. 

Star Theory



Dyer has written extensively about the role of stars in TV, film and the music industry. Irrespective of the medium , stars have key features in common. Dyer states that a star is an image and not a real person that is constructed out of a range of materials. Furthermore that stars are commodities produced and consumed on the strength of their meanings they portray in their particular field.

The extent of the popularity of a particular star depends upon the integration between various different subsidiary media platforms e.g magazines, TV, radio and the internet to allow them to maximise their potential audience for their products.

Dyer also states that the star image is incoherent and incomplete and this is due to two main paradoxes:

1. The star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer
2. The star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer

The incoherence of the star ensures that the audience is continuously striving to 'complete' or to 'make sense of' of the star. This is achieved by the consumption of the stars products but will always be left unsatisfied. Which means that fans will go away determined to continue consuming the star in attempts to complete their image.

Hayley Williams:
Hayley Williams (aged 25) is the lead singer of the American rock band 'Paramore' which was founded in 2004. Today Paramore consists of herself, bassist Jeremy Davis and guitarist Taylor York.



Applying Dyer's 'Star Theory' to Hayley Williams would show that she is considered a star but also a music performer. This is because Hayley is in the successful band Paramore, who have 3.3million followers on Twitter and 29.8 million likes on Facebook. Dyer would argue that Hayley is a star because her own personal Twitter has 3.9 million followers, which is even more than the official band Twitter account.

Therefore it satisfies paradox 2 as it means Hayley is simultaneously present (a large online presence) and absent (difficulty of actually engaging with her) for the consumer. Also, her presence in a wide range of subsidiary media (social networks, appearances on TV shows such as The Talking Dead, she also features as a playable character in one of the Guitar Hero games) means that Hayley can construct an image that she desires to portray to the target audience.

Dan Reynolds:
Dan Reynolds (aged 27) is the lead singer of the Las Vegas based rock band 'Imagine Dragons' who were founded in 2008.

Applying Dyer's 'Star Theory' to Dan Reynolds would show that he might not be considered a star but without a doubt a music performer. This is because he only has 102k followers on Twitter which is considerably less than the amount Hayley Williams has. Also, he has less presence with subsidiary media platforms and that means that he has a lesser star image that has been constructed which will attract a smaller, niche audience.

Our music video pitch presentation

Here is a link to my groups music video pitch in the form of a presentation. The presentation was used as a basis for our pitch containing:

• Song/artist choice. 
• Our main ideas for the video we want to create.
• The equipment that we would be using etc...

Key Company Case Study

Certain media conglomerates/companies have become so successful they can be considered absolutely essential in determining how profitable an artist can become. With the popularity of the internet at its absolute peak, video sharing/viewing sites are paramount in an artists career. An example of this is Youtube.

What is Youtube?
YouTube is a website specifically created for the uploading/sharing/consumption of videos. It acts a distribution platform for content creators and advertisements. One popular form of videos to be uploaded to the site is music videos. Music videos generate billions of views and revenue which created profits for the artist and the site itself.

When was YouTube created?

The site was founded on February 14th 2005 by: Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim. Here is the first ever video uploaded to YouTube featuring one of the creators (Jawed Karim) which has over 19 million views today.

Music videos on YouTube

Since the website was founded, artists/musicians from all around the world have been using the site to upload their music whether it be simple audio tracks, lyric videos or music videos. Successful artists can gain millions or even billions of views on their music videos which generates a huge amount of popularity and profit for the artist/record label. For example: Beyonce, Paramore, Psy and 

Michael Jackson.

 In some cases, artists careers can be formed on the site which can lead to become huge successes purely because they gained large amounts of views which lead to them being recognised by record labels. Perhaps the most known example of this is Justin Bieber. 

Advantages/Disadvantages

There are many obvious advantages to uploading content as an artist/producer or prosumer such as:

1. The site allows you to distribute your product to a possibly huge audience easily. 
2. There is a possibility you can generate a large amount of money/profit from putting your product on the site through advertisements and revenue.
3. By opening up yourself to a larger audience it can lead to more opportunities, for example in recent times the integration between YouTube and the television industry. 

However there are also some disadvantages to distributing your product on this site: 

1. There are increased chances of cyber bullying, specifically on the internet a popular form of this is known as "trolling" 
2. Accessing the target audience may appear very difficult 
3. The extreme competition between other creators can become intense at reaching the target audience 

Genre Conventions

Genre: Country
Within the large genre of 'country' there are many subgenres, for example: alternative country, country gospel and honky tonk, bluegrass and more...

Country pop is perhaps the most listened to subgenre of country today. It's a mixture of country and hip hop. Examples of the modern artists who are in this genre are: Taylor Swift and Jessica Simpson... Pop country artists will be classified under this subgenre if their songs cross over and make it into the top 40 radio lists available.

Bluegrass is a combination of: country music, jazz, ragtime and traditional music. Typical sounds that are associated with this genre are:

• fiddles
• guitars
• drums
• banjo
• vocals
• harmonicas

An example of a famous bluegrass artist is Dolly Parton. Dolly Parton is the most honoured female country artist of all time. She has had 25 songs reach no.1 on the Billboard country charts which is a record for a female artist. Parton has also received countless awards for her music including 8 Grammy Awards.

Information on the music genre country was gathered from this source which lists a large amount of genre in music ever created.

Company Logo- Graphic Design Idea

I decided to recreate the company logo for "Throne Cinema" using Photoshop CC to experiment and eventually making a new logo using triangle print/ mosaic design. This involved more work within the layers of photoshop and rotation, use of filters on those layers etc..

This logo originally started life as 3 different layers that were manipulated and with the addition of pixelation and filters used created the triangle background. 

This photo shows the 3 different photos being grouped together to form the background layer that would then be duplicated twice to allow for the filters to be added.

In this image it shows the background being formed with the mosaic/triangular design. The circles visible in the background were removed by adding a filter on top and lowering the opacity. The font was then added along with the black triangle which had a lighting effect of "hue" placed on it to match the background, which ultimately lead to the creation of the first photo. 

Music Video Regulation

Who regulates music videos?
Certain organisations are in operation across the world, and more specifically the UK to regulate the imagery, lyrics and generally music videos that are shown to the potential audience (which may be on television or on sites such as YouTube). If these organisations feel that a particular music video is inappropriate in some fashion for the audience they may: either remove the video completely, have the artist re-create a more appropriate video, or not show the video on television before the watershed at 9pm in the UK.

One example of this organisations in the UK is the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) they are held responsible to pilot voluntary age ratings for online music videos. Another company that is in charge of music video regulations being broadcasted on television for the UK is 'Ofcom'

Examples of banned music videos

Some music videos created by artists, producers etc may be so explicit that they can be banned completely from being shown on television or hosting sites such as YouTube. However this in most cases increases the popularity of the song and sales, which is the opposite of the organisations aim.

An example of a video that was banned off of YouTube for its explicit content and the sexualisation of women in the video is Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines". However after a certain period, YouTube re-uploaded the uncensored version which has resulted in millions of views.

Another example of a banned music video is the Prodigy's "Smack My B**** Up". The video and song title were considered so bad its name wasn't said in the charts when it was released in 1997. The video was obviously banned due to featuring: sex scenes, drug abuse and violence.

Changes in standards

Over the years and development in music videos and what genres have become mainstream, the audiences' taste has also changed and therefore our standards have become more open-minded. What may be seen as completely unacceptable and could have been banned, may not even seem a little unusual to the younger generation in today's society. For instance, the sexualisation of women in music videos, scenes depicting sexual imagery in music videos created years ago that were banned or censored, most likely would be shown on television now without those regulations put in place.

Difficulties of implementation of regulations

The obvious difficulties of regulations is that once a music video has become popular and banned for specific reasons, the demand for that song increases so much that organisations/sites may crumble under the demand and pressure from the audience, which will lose them profit if the product isn't provided for them at all. For example the video to Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" was banned and then uploaded due to the demand for that music video. This shows that its very difficult to balance censorship to protect the vulnerable audience members and to keep the audience happy in general by supplying them with products they demand and want to see. 

Company Logo

 Here is my company logo/title that I created using Photoshop CC over a period of time. The companies name is now therefore "Throne Cinema" and the cuts in the font are meant to resemble sword marks to add greater depth to the image.

To create the finished product it involved isolating and selecting each individual letter and cutting them, placing them back together and eventually grouping them into one layer. 

The background for the image was created by a close up photograph that I took of a piece of scrunched up paper. I then edited the colour schemes and levels, highlighted the shadows in a program called "Lightrrom 5.3" which allowed me to give the effect of a stone background. 

Laura Mulvey's "Male Gaze" Theory- Textual Analysis

'The Male Gaze' theory was developed in 1975 by Laura Mulvey in her work "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" she outlined the various ways in which the male gaze works in media texts. The concept of the gaze is how people are presented to the audience. From a feminists perspective this can be viewed in 3 different ways:

1. How men look at women
2. How women look at themselves
3. How women look at each other

The main idea is the representation of women as a sexual fantasy from a heterosexual male point of view.  An example video of this idea portrayed in the real media platforms today is Nicki Minaj's video for her song "Anaconda" on YouTube. 

This is the opening shot to her video, immediately the audience is confronted with the sexualisation of the three women due to their costume and posture and position. This clearly suggests that they are purposefully positioned to make them more appealing to the audience in a sexual fantasy manner which is most likely from a heterosexual males perspective using the Male Gaze theory.

This second medium close up shot shows Nicki Minaj obviously in a provocative position, using the theory it would be stated that she is purely that way due to women being seen as an image and the general objectification of women and their bodies. This statement can be emphasized by the sound itself as the main hook of the song which is from a male who remains unseen throughout the entire video can be linked to the needs of the male ego is: "My anaconda dont... My anaconda dont... My anaconda don't want none unless you got buns hun". Which could also denote the idea that men are the controlling subjects as he is clearly an active male (in the song only, not visually) but he has hierarchy over the passive women in the videos because he is actively choosing and objectifying the females to satisfy the needs of his male ego. This could be further investigated to suggest that the reason the male singing the hook of the song isn't visually seen is because the audience may be in the position of said heterosexual male and they are viewing the video from his perspective.

In this long shot featuring the 5 women being fairly candid in the shot with the mise-en-scene being a plain white background with white chairs adds to the simplicity of the shot, but it also draws the audiences attention purely to the women. Using the theory it would suggest that men (in this case it could be seen as the audience) do the looking and that the women are there to be looked at, which can be reinforced by this particular shot since all the attention is being directed to them.

In this shot, featuring the only male in the video fellow artist Drake, the mise-en-scene still remains simplistic. One factor to focus is the proxemics between Drake and Nicki. Nicki's proxemics in relation to Drake's is much lower as she is seen crawling on the floor towards him. The theory would suggest that Drake is on a higher level to satisfy the needs of the male ego and it allows for the objectification of Nicki due to her costume. It also could suggest that the proxemics are portrayed in that way to show the male as the controlling subject as being higher up will give him more power. The blue lighting has male gender connotations and may have been added to possibly add masculinity to the shot because of the males presence. 

Music Director Research

The role of a music video director is to create the artistic and dramatic aspect of a music video but to also conduct the artist/musicians/actors/models and the tech crew. Music videos can become viral purely because of the music video director if they are very well known.

Successful music video directors include: Hype Williams who directed Daft Punk/ Pharrell's 'Get Lucky', Spike Jonze who directed Kanye Wests 'Flashing Lights' and Adele's "Someone Like You"

Jake Nava (pictured above) is an English music video and film director. His clients for music videos include: Britney Spears, Beyonce, Pink, Usher, Destiny's Child, Artic Monkey's and many more artists. 

Arguably one of Jake's most famous projects is Beyonce's "Single Ladies", the video was successful on a world wide scale and gained millions of views on different platforms and has been considered an iconic/classic music video. The video features Beyonce and 2 backing dancers using a plain black and white background which was inspired by Bob Fosse who choreographed  a performance by Gwen Verdon in "Mexican Breakfast". The video for "Single Ladies" was shot alongside another single called "If I Were A Boy" by the same artist and Jake Nava. Both videos are completely in black and white and Jake Nava stated that this was inspired by a vogue shoot, which is an example of a repeated motif seen in his work. 

Here is the link for Beyonce's "Single Ladies" music video where you can see his work: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m1EFMoRFvY

Here is the link for Beyonce's "If I Were A Boy" video where the obvious comparison of similar colour effects can be seen: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWpsOqh8q0M

Significant CD Covers

CD covers were once absolutely critical in relation to the sales for a particular artist. The cover allowed the artist/band to express themselves and their music in another artistic fashion for a multitude of reasons. Those reasons may have included: self expression, the attraction of a larger audience, to form a theme with previous releases but mainly it was to visually recreate what the audience may have expected to hear on the CD itself. In some cases artists did the opposite which may seem fairly abstract however it still typically represented the music genre as niche or abstract itself. Ultimately, what defines a CD cover as a classic is subjective opinions of the audience, however objective methods such as statistics involving sales can be used to reinforce the subjectivity.

An example of what may be considered a classic CD cover in mine and many other opinions is Nirvana's 'Nevermind'. Nevermind is the second studio album released by Nirvana in 1991, the album has sold over 30 million copies world wide which shows obvious success. The album cover is abstract and some may even consider it crude, but even today people will easily identify the artist and the album if it didn't have the logo in the lower left corner and that's essentially why it can be considered a classic, because its become timeless.

Another example of an incredibly famous album cover is Pink Floyd's ' The dark side of the moon'. This shows that an album cover alone can set an artist apart from the rest and become instantly recognisable.

Significant Music Videos

There are various different factors which can determine whether a music video can be considered a 'classic' including: the playtime it receives on television, the sales of that particular song, the artist themselves or the director of the video. However the main deciding factor is personal preference of the audience and the prevailing opinion of the individual.

Different sources of music reviews and critics etc have created numerous amounts of lists of what they believe is the best collection of music videos and CD covers in existence, these lists can and do vary greatly. For example the NME have provided their own list of what they think is the best 100 music videos of all time.

An example of a 'classic' music video due to the content and the artist, which received a huge amount of play time and millions of hits online would be Micheal Jackson's 'Thriller' released in 1983. In 2006 Guinness World Records listed it as the "most successful music video" due to it selling over 9 million copies. The video on YouTube currently has 194,676,565 views on the website.



A 'classic' music video appears to generally refer to a music video created previously that still remains popular in current genres/sources of viewing the video and may be considered "mainstream" music, however ultimately it is a subjective approach that defines 'classic' music videos.

Views/hits/playtime are a key component in what makes a video a classic. An example of this would be Psy's 'Gangnam style'. This was released on the 15th of July in 2012 and in 2 years it has accumulated 2,087,878,242 views and was the most watched video on YouTube for a huge amount of time.

Since this mainly involves subjective methods although statistics like sales and views etc one video that I would consider a 'classic' is Green Day's 'American Idiot'. The song was released with the album on the 20th of September 2004, but the video was uploaded on the 21st of August 2012 and since then has received over 16 million views.

In some instances, the simplicity of a video which still remains powerful in some form can be considered a classic. An example of this is Beyonce's 'Single ladies' where the choreography is the main focus of the video, which currently has over 320 million views on YouTube.

Practice Music Video

Here is my groups practice A2 music video: 'Wastelands' by Linkin Park. This was created by myself, Jack and Tom.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWvWbvtSAZ8&list=UUht5fxUjha19_XNfG0mi2EA

Our CD cover

Here is the cover for our music video 'Wastelands' by Linkin Park that was designed by Tom and Jack.

And here is the back to our CD cover featuring the lyrics to the song 'Wastelands'.

The History Of Music Video

In this post I will explore the brief history of the development of the music video.

1900- Thomas Alva Edison invented the gramophone

1923- John Logie Baird invented television. This allowed for the mass movement of music videos entertaining millions around the world to begin.

1927- 'The Jazz Singer' was the first half silent movie was created

1940-Disney created arguably the first music video 'Fantasia'

1963- The first episode of 'Ready Steady Go!' was first aired. This was significant because it first introduced bands to a large target audience which created major profits for the bands that featured on this programme.

1964- 'Top of the pops' was first aired, which was another very popular television programme that had bands perform on stage. Once a target audience viewed a band play a song, they became increasingly popular and sales would rise.

1981- MTV was invented, which became a very popular music channel playing upcoming and famous.

1981- 'Kerrang' was first shown on television. This allowed the channel to show a few select genres and the bands within them and their music videos to the target audience that desired to see that particular genre videos.

1989- Tim Berners Lee created the world wide web, which is the beginning of the mass cultural movement to streaming music videos online.

2005- Youtube was invented. This was incredibly significant as it allowed thousands of artists to upload their music videos to the internet which gained millions of views. Some artists even gain billions of views. which enables both the company youtube and the artist to benefit profit wise.

2009- 'Vevo' was launched. This is a video hosting service that many artists and genres use to post their music videos.

CD Cover Analysis

In this PDF i will analyse Paramore's self titled album which was released on the 5th April 2013:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_wbbn-00c0ONS1JeUduejVuTVk/edit?usp=sharing


In this second PDF the back of Paramore's album has been analysed by myself.


https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_wbbn-00c0OcndYbTN6WVEtTEU/edit?usp=sharing

Music Video Analysis

In this post I will analyse 'Tonight Alive's' music video for their song 'Breakdown' featuring Benji Madden from a band called 'Good Charlotte'.

Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics
Tonight Alive are a well known Australian pop-punk band, whilst Good Charlotte are an American rock band. These two genres are similar in sound and style.

These introductory shots reinforce the bands genre as their clothing is typical of pop-punk/rock fans. Furthermore skateboarding and carrying around the guitar case in the shots above also shows the bands genre as these are both commonly associated with the pop-punk genre and even the band itself which helps to create the bands image that ultimately reflects their music. This unison of image and sound helps the band and record label attract fans and to make a profit.

At this point in the video Benji Madden from Good Charlotte is introduced and fans of his band will be attracted to this video because of his vocal parts in the song, which may lead them to listening to Tonight Alive later on.

There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals

In this shot Jenna is waving her hands in a 'goodbye' fashion, this is coupled with the lyrics 'if you left'. This obvious connection between the lyrics and visuals help to amplify the message Jenna is trying to portray in her lyrics.

This links to the shot above as Jenna continues to sing 'if you left, id be alright' followed by the universal hand gesture for 'ok'

There is a relationship between music and visuals

This shot shows a link between the music and visuals as its showing Whakio (the guitar player) as he is playing guitar which he plays in the song.

The  demands of the record label will include the need for lots of close ups of the artist and the artist may develop motifs which recur across their work ( a visual style) 

This shot is a close up of Jenna with many more similar this that follow to allow the audience to really gain an understanding of the bands clothing style choices etc...

There is frequently reference to notion of looking

In this close up of Jenna and Benji there is an obvious reference to the notion of looking as they are looking into each others eyes as they sing the lyrics of the song. This helps to connect the two singers together as well as their individual music they've created.

There is often intertextual reference

This shot of the video showing the crowd and the band performing along side Benji is similar to Good Charlotte's previously existing video for their song 'Girls & Boys' where they also use a crowd shot at various points throughout as shown below.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog. Over the course of this year I will develop my skills through the 3 stages of creating a music video: pre-production, production , post production.

Introduction

Welcome to my media blog. On here you will be able to find my practice music video, planning and research and in due time, our final music video product.