Music Video Conventions

The music video for Lighthouse by Mallory Knox uses a lot of very typical, yet effective conventions to create a professional and easy to understand storyline.

A large range of shots are used within the video, such as close ups and mid shots of the whole band, however, in music videos which consist of a band, the main focus’ are the singer/s and the guitarists, this is the obvious in this music video as the singer gets single shots of him singing, however the rest of the band only have them in group shots.

 They have used fasted paced editing, this is conventional of a music video as it allows the video to flow well when watching it and also keeps the viewers entertained, they have also used slow motion effects, this has allowed them to create a boom-like effect by going from slow motion back to normal time, this works well going into the chorus as it gives it more emphasis.

The location is very typical of a music video by being shot in a very picturesque area, this instantly gives the music video more of an aesthetically pleasing sense, and it also links to the lyrics as the song is called ‘Lighthouse’.

 The clothing in this video is very basic and gives off a very real life essence to the video as there are no fancy costumes; this also helps the audience to just focus on the video itself and the song.

The use of the singer being in the actual story of the video makes the song seem a lot more personal to him, giving it more of a powerful meaning to the lyrics he is singing, a lot of music videos use this technique. 

In the music video of While She Sleeps’ song ‘Our Courage, Our Cancer’, they have chosen to stray from some conventions to make an interesting and more tailored video to their song.

The main stray from convention is within the editing, instead of the editing being very upbeat and thrilling which it would be for a music video like this, they have decided to edit it to mirror the tempo changes, so for instance the starting is a very slow piano, the editing is mirrored by being very slow and smooth, it then builds up and slows down just at the end, this is an effective way of editing as it allows the viewer to get more of a feel of how the music has been written.

The music video uses amplification effectively and taken the memory of a person and uses the life of him to act as the video, this makes the story very intense and real for the viewer.

In this video, there are an equal amount of shots for each member of the band, each member is in the band shots and they each have singles, this makes the band feel very equal and there is no say that anyone in the band is more important, this is unconventional yet an effective way to promote the band as a whole. 

The video for Spanish Sahara by Foals stays clear of more conventions of a typical music video, this makes is very quirky and almost impossible to not want to watch as it very different.

Even though Foals is a very well known band, they have chosen to just have the singer in the actual video; this is unconventional as usually they would want to show the band to give off a sense of musical talent and performance.

The location is very different to normal video locations, it clearly an unpleasantly cold environment, even though the title is ‘Spanish Sahara’, you would expect a hot location, contrasting it like this has added to the interesting sense of the video as it makes you wonder why they have chosen there to film as it’s so dead and lonely.

The video is very bright, this is conventional of a music video as it keeps you focused on the video and also draws you in, it of course also helps you to see all that is happening, stopping you from feeling as if you are missing on kay areas of the video.

Looking at 3 very different videos has allowed me to see how they have used and not used conventions to create an effective video; these are aspects I will use in my video to make it as professional as these I have chosen.