Planning - Justin Timberlake Cry Me A River Analysis

Planning - Like a Prayer Analysis

Like a prayer analysis

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-BYRAN FERROL-

Planning - Common Motifs Of A Music Video

Common motifs of a music video

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-Michael Ikeji-

Planning - Music Video Aspects

Music Video Aspects

  The main aim of a music video is to keep the viewer watching through the duration of the video,
which ultimately means they have to create an innovative piece of 'art' that would ensure they will be interested. To do this producers have come up with many concepts that would attract the attention of TV viewers.

  The only place where music videos are accessible is on TV, this is an advantage seeing as television is a free method of entertainment. Researchers have recorded that approximately 200,000,000+ people watch television in a single day and Psychologists state that it only takes 7-12 seconds for a viewer to make up their mind on whether they are entertained and change channel.


  The disadvantages of a music video is that on average songs are only 3-5 minutes long, so in comparison to other film media such as movies there's not enough time for the video to develop story-lines and characters. However, producers have avoided this is by using narratives to tell stories this is best shown in music videos such as "Eminem - Stan"(1) and especially in this era, music videos carry a lot of messages and concepts like in music videos such as "Black Eyed Peas - Where Is The Love"(2).
Although they are relatively short they do tend to cost a lot of money with the average budget of music video being around $500,000. The most expensive music video ever created was "Michael Jackson & Janet Jackson - Scream" which had a budget of $7million.


-MICHAEL IKEJI-




(1)http://youtu.be/aSLZFdqwh7E
(2)http://youtu.be/WpYeekQkAdc

Planning - What has been learnt by looking at the history of Music Videos?

By looking at the history of music video we have learnt how music videos have evolved since the 1920s. Firstly we have learnt that music videos have become more visually experimental with the use of graphics and special effects. In the early 20th century technology wasn't advanced as it is today so music videos generally followed the same format. As time passed and technology became more advanced artists were able to incorporate new styles into their music videos thus setting apart from other artists around at the same time. This occurred due to the competition between artists and the introduction to MTV as artists wanted their videos to be played. This can be seen with A-ha's Take on Me video which uses a sketch graphic for most of the video. Something that was rarely seen at the time. Because of this A-ha won awards for the video such as Most Experimental music video. This will affect our video because it causes us to think away from the generic conventions of a music video which is the artist lip syncing to their song. We will be forced to think of ideas that will make our video memorable and be something that people rarely see.
Moreover we have also learned that music videos have always been controversial. During the Soundies era we saw the rise of black stars which was controversial at the time because black people were seen as inferior to white people. Also around this time we saw the objectification of women in music videos. Women were showing skin and is something parents wouldn't want their children watching. Artists such has Queen brought forward the idea of challenging sexuality in their video I want to Break Free. During this era homosexuals were still frowned upon in some areas around the world. Towards the end of the 20th century controversial subjects were more towards drugs, violence and sex especially in the hip pop genre.  Being controversial means people want to watch the video so making the artist more known. This may affect our video as we may include controversial subjects such as violence as it makes the video more popular.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - Survey Monkey

A survey was created on Survey Monkey so we were able to get a general idea of what people like to see in music videos. This will help us in the creation of our music video as we will know what people like to see meaning we will be pleasing our target audience. The survey was put onto facebook as this is the perfect place to target our audience. This also means the survey is being distributed to a number of people.

Results

The first question that was asked was the individuals favourite music genre. Luckily enough for us the most popular answer was RnB which is the genre which we chose. This means that a large amount of our target audience will watch our music video because it is of the RnB genre.

The second question asked for a suitable length for a music video. Most people said that a suitable length was around 3-5 minutes. When producing our music video we now know that we should try our best to keep it in this time frame to please our audience. Our audience may get bored if its too long and if its too short then the video will not be interesting enough.

The third question asked the target audience asked about themes they liked to see in music videos. Two answers were very popular. These answers being Party and Comedy. This will have an impact on our music video as we may have to find a way of incorporating these themes into our music video. If we can not then it may prove crucial to the amount of views we get.

Question four was an open ended question. It asked for the individuals favourite music video. This question will help drastically as we can then study these music videos and pick out aspects that people like about these music videos. We can then take these and interpret them in our own way so we are able to incorporate them into our music video.

We noticed in our research that many videos make use of product placement so this was an aspect that we wanted to use in our music video. Our fifth question was “What is your favourite brand?” The most popular answer was vans. This means that in our music video we may show the vans logo or vans products as the audience will then be able to relate to it as it is their preferred brand.

Our sixth question asked what scenes our audience liked to see in a music video. The answers for this question were quite varied meaning that we could include all the themes that that audience chose from or none and go with our own ideas. Because we fall into the age range of our target audience our ideas will be valid and suitable.

The last question asked if the individual’s favourite artist was a group/band, male or female.  The most popular answer was group/band but our chosen artist was male. However a large number of people still said that their favourite artist was male meaning our chosen artist was still an advantage for us.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - Demographic Data: Country

Music sales by Country 2006

These are the music sales by country in 2006. The graph shows that Britain spend the most on music closely followed by Japan and the US. This may be because these countries make up most of the music industry so people in these countries will want to listen to music from their own country. Canada spend the least on music per person maybe because they make up considerably less of the music industry. The different number of sales could also be due to the economic climate of the country at the time and people may be more conservative of how they spend their money. The graph also shows that europe are the biggest buyers of music maybe because they are the continent that make the most music. Knowing this data helps with creating a music video as you know what countries and cultures to represent in the music video.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - Demographic Data Podcast

This pod cast shows what we learnt from our demographic data we researched and how we will implement that into our music video.

Research - Interviews about music video

We interviewed various students from our school about their opinions on music videos. Our questions ranged from 'what is your favourite genre' to 'what is your view on music videos that tell a story'. All the information we obtained was beneficial to the group in terms of knowing what we needed to put in our video to attract our target audience.

Research - Demographic Data: Kanye West

Kanye West

The song we have decided to make out music video to is called 'The Blame Game' by Kanye West ft John Legend. Kanye West was born June 8, 1977 and is an American rapper, singer, and record producer. West first rose to fame as a producer for Roc-A-Fella Records, where he eventually achieved recognition for his work on Jay-Z's album The Blueprint, as well as hit singles for musical artists including Alicia Keys and Janet Jackson. His style of production originally used pitched-up vocal samples from soul songs incorporated with his own drums and instruments. He has also sold over 11 million albums in the United States, over 15 million worldwide and and over 25 million digital songs in the United States placing him second for solo male artists on the list and sixth overall for best selling digital artists. Kanye West has had 5 songs exceed 3 million in digital sales as of July 2011, with "Gold Digger" selling 3,086,000, "Stronger" selling 4,402,000, "Heartless" selling 3,742,000, "E.T." selling over 4,000,000 and "Love Lockdown" selling over 3,000,000 placing him third in overall digital sales of the past decade.

As well as this since the boom of social networking sites, Kanye has accumulated many more fans over the years as the chart shows. As you can see facebook makes more than 50% of Kanye's total fans on social networks with over 800,000 fans. These fans on these social websites either mention the artist or plays one of their videos giving it more popularity which is why they are such good sites to promote music.


Source - Musicmetric

The next graph shows the percentage of male and female fans kanye west has Myspace. From 2005 until early 2008, Myspace was the most visited social networking site in the world, and in June 2006 surpassed Google as the most visited website in the United States. In April 2008, Myspace was overtaken by Facebook in the number of unique worldwide visitors. Even though it is in decline, it is still known as one of the top entertainment websites in the world. The chart below shows that over 55% of kanye west fans on myspace are male and 42.6% of the remaining are female. This data can be seen as an overall perspective of the world being that the majority of the kanye west fan base are men due to the genres kanye west do whether it is rap/hip hop or RnB.



Source - Musicmetric

The final myspace graph i am going to show is the age distribution his music is sent across to. The graph below clearly shows the majority of people that listen to kanye west's music are aged about 16-33 years old with the largest distributes aged being 21. This is good data to our group because it shows us that our music video should be targeted toward teenagers and early adults due to the 'boom' of the age distribution from 17-21 there is a huge increase in number of listeners.

Source - Musicmetric

However it is not only social networking sites that contribute to an artists fan base, it is also the country where fans are located. Note that the united states of America make up over 40% of the total music distribution around the world due to the amount of top selling artists that come from the country. America is then followed by the united kingdom and the rest of Europe. This theory is backed up by the following map as it shows the distribution of kanye west fans around the world and he has a heavy following of fans in the united states followed by Europe.



Source - Musicmetric

 Through all the controversy that he goes through, Kanye west has still managed to be one of the top selling RnB rappers of all time with a huge following to support it. He has his own record label with the acronym G.O.O.D which stands for Getting Out Our Dreams. Kanye West has received 47 awards out of over 140 nominations, including 14 Grammy awards and with a long career ahead of him, he has bound to get more awards and more fans.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Research - Demographic Data: Music Access

Below is the demographic of where the audience of Kanye West access his music from. As you can see the majority of users access his music through social networking sites such as youtube and myspace as well as online stores such as itunes and amazon.

The demographic proves the reason why artists such as Kanye West releases new music on these sites to gain a larger audience rather than inrtoducing it on the television. The data shows that we must do the asme to enable the maximum number of audience members to view our music video.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Research - Demographic Data: Music Genre

Demographic Data for genre

Most music genres in the world are falling in sales due to the availability of music available on the internet to download.

Genre	2007	2006	Growth
Alternative	88,604	109,672	-19.2%
Christian/Gospel	34,017	39,715	-14.3%
Classical	18,044	19,447	-7.2%
Country	62,696	74,886	-16.3%
Jazz	14,047	15,720	-10.6%
Latin	31,853	37,774	-15.6%
Metal	52,951	61,557	-13.9%
New Age	3,210	3,412	-5.9%
R&B	95,555	117,005	-18.3%
Rap	41,662	59,534	-30.0%
Rock	149,414	170,726	-12.5%
Soundtrack	24,570	27,177	-9.5%

The chart shows that Rock was the highest sold genre worldwide in 2007 even though it had fell 12.5% from 2006. Our chosen genre is R&B which was the second highest selling genre in 2007. This means that our chosen genre is a good choice as it has a large fan base meaning it will appeal to a large amount of people. These results are from 2007 and 2006 so may not be valid today but the results still give a rough idea as to what music genres are most popular. The song we have chosen comes under both rap and R&B so means we will be appealing to two audiences therefore more people will want to listen to our song and watch the music video.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - The 90s

The 90s

The 1990s was the start of the hip pop era. Music became more rebellious and glamourised gangster life. Many artists portrayed gang violence, drugs and sex in their videos during this era.

NWA - Alwayz into Somethin'

This is NWA's Alwayz into Somethin' music video. It conveys the group causing violence and murder. The group are eventually tossed in jail which shows that crime always has a consequence. The video depicts scenes of robbery and the artists carrying firearms. This music video gives an idea about how the themes of music videos are becoming more controversial. Music videos would not show violence and crime as it would have a negative influence on society and may cause a moral panic. As taboos in society become less common music videos followed this and exploited such themes. As well as the visuals of the music video the lyrics are also controversial. This can be clearly seen in the lines "1 2 3, Then I see the nigga. Hop in de Benz and it was Ren on the mothafuckin' trigger" Words such as "Nigga" are being used which can be seen as offensive as well as swears and a reference to firearms "trigger". From the 90s onwards music videos like this have become more and more common mainly in the hip pop genre. However other genres have also experimented with such controversy.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - 1980s MTV

1980s MTV Era

A-Ha - Take on Me

Released: 1984

This is the music video for A-Ha's Take on Me. It was produced during the MTV era where artists were competing with each other for the best music videos. The video shows how music videos evolve over time with the use of graphic effects. Because A-Ha experimented with this particular music video it won them several awards including Best Concept Video and Most Experimental Video. The video uses a pencil sketch animation called rotoscoping. The real footage is traced over in each frame to give the characters realistic movements. This video is a representation of the volution of music videos and how technology affects the music industry. There on after this video we see a huge change in the conventions of music videos and it is not unusual for music videos to include animations or special effects. This is due to the MTV era as it made music videos widely accessible to the public causing competition between artists.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - 1970s Glam Rock Era

Glam Rock Era

Gary Glitter - Rock n Roll Released 1972
David Bowie - Life on Mars Released 1973

Glam rock also known as glitter rock is a style of rock and pop music that developed in the UK in the early 1970s, which was performed by singers and musicians who wore outrageous clothes, makeup and hairstyles, particularly platform-soled boots and glitter. The flamboyant costumes and visual styles of glam performers were often camp and have been connected with new views of gender roles. Glam rock visuals peaked during the mid 1970s with artists including  David Bowie, Roxy Music and Gary Glitter in the UK and New York Dolls in the US. The glam rock era emerged after the phychedelic era and was seen as a reaction against those trends with with musicians mainly male dressing provacotively having people questioning their sexuality.

 

These two music videos are perfect examples of glam rock as both show an overview of the era. The first video of gary glitter shows him dressed in a low cut glittery outfit and dancing in a sexual nature whereas the david bowie video shows him with a heavy use of makeup which makes him look like a female. This goes to show that people didn't care if they looked like a women or acted like a woman as all top chart bands began to use them and it became a social trend for others to copy.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Research - 1960s The Psychedelic Era

The Phycadelic Era

The Bealtes - I am the Walrus Released 1967

This is a music video made by the beatles during the phycadelic era. The Psychedelic era refers to the time of social, musical and artistic change influenced by psychedelic drugs, generally described as occurring during early 1960s to the mid 1970s as people were more care free which was showed by artists in their videos. as you can see in the video, the beatles represent this era by using a chilled beat and having people dressed up in the videos as if they didn't care which weas pretty much the views of people during that era . Also in the video near the end you notice the 'hippie bus' which is a custom volkwagen painted to the needs of the user which usually expressed their mood or views. The hippie bus is usually stereotyped with the phychedelic era these days.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Research - 1950s Scopitone Era

Scopitone is a type of jukebox featuring a film component. Scopitone films were a forerunner of music videos during the late 50s and early 60s.
Brook Benton - Mother Nature, Father Time

This video demostrates what the scopitones were all about which more more sexual than previous generations which coincided with the current trends. In the music video, there was two women dancing in bikinis which was seen as wrong during that point as women weren't seen as that. Also again a black person was the star of video which upset people as some hadn't gotton over slavery yet. All in all the scriptone had 'sexier' videos as previously seen and was the model for a music promo however the era couldn't last long due tothe hepty pricetag that came with a jukebox which alone cost about $80,000 to produce. By the end of the 1960s, the popularity of the Scopitone had faded. The last film for a Scopitone was made at the end of 1978.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Research - 1940s Soundies

The Soundies emerged in the 1940's. This is when videos where used to compliment a music piece instead of pictures. This era also displayed a lot of social changes, especially in America.

It was during this era that the perception of black people in media changed dramatically seeing as there was a huge rise in mainstream black jazz musician this resulted in them being seen as "superstars". There was always racial seperation between blacks and whites in the southern states of America and media contributed to this by giving them a bad image in movies and so on, so for jazz musicians such Louis Jordan who was from Arkansas this was somewhat a revolution where blacks were finally accepted.
From the video it is clear to see that the music video is set out like a short film and the footage is like a performance. So there is still similarities between the "talkies" and the soundies therefore making it apparent that this era was influenced by the 20s/30s productions.

-BYRAN FERROL-

Research - 1930s "Talkies"

The first ever form of music video is believed to be from the mid 20s to the late 30s when what was known as the "talkies" progressively became more recognisable. The talkies were short musical films; one of the most popular releases was a series known as "Spooney Melodies" which was produced by Warner Bros in the 1930s.

This is the only surviving 5 minute production. It is clear to see that Warner Bros configured a way of representing audio into a visual art piece that compliments each other well. This became really popular to the public and led many musicians and film production companies to adopt this technique.

-MICHAEL IKEJI-

Briefing

Our assignment for the year is to create a music promo video along with a promotion package, which would include a website homepage for the band/artist and a digipak for their album release.
As a group our role is to be the production company behind the marketing that would support the album release. We have been instructed to record a video for the lead single of the album and edit it to ensure the video is at least 3-5 minutes long.

Introduction to the group

The following video is an introduction to our group.

From left to right (Byran Ferrol, Jeremiah Kalukembi and Michael Ikeji)