Narrative theorists

Andrew Goodwin -

Andrew Goodwin has developed 7 characteristics which he thinks that should be included in all music videos. These are:

1. Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics. (e.g. stage performance in metal videos, dance routine for boy/girl band, aspiration in Hip Hop).

2. There is a relationship between lyrics and visuals. The lyrics are represented with images. (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

3. There is a relationship between music and visuals. The tone and atmosphere of the visual reflects that of the music. (either illustrative, amplifying, contradicting).

4. 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).

5. There is frequently reference to notion of looking (screens within screens, mirrors, stages, etc) and particularly voyeuristic treatment of the female body.

6. The artist may develop motifs or iconography that recur across their work (a visual style).

7. There are often intertextual reference (to films, TV programmes, other music videos etc).

While filming and editing our music video we hope to include some of those characteristics identified by Andrew Goodwin. Listing to our song we think that we can adopt a key characteristics in relation to the visuals and lyrics. The whole song has a specific meaning and story behind it, just like any other song. We are going to try and exhibit some of those lyrical elements, throughout our music video. The whole song ssrtas of at quite a slow pace which means that we have to be careful with what type of cuts we use and how we are going to achieve the main principal of the music video. In our video, we are also going to be using close-ups with shallow focus in order to contrast the artist's emotions across to the audience. The most upbeat section of the sing which will be around about 1:30-2:00 in will contain may cuts as we want to distinguish the difference between the slow and fast paced lyrical elements. In terms of notion of looking that will be determined by the the close-ups and various eye contacts which the artists will make with the camera.

Sven E Carlsson -

Carlsson’s theory refers to binary opposites which drives the narration of the video forward. An example of this would be the black and white theme. Another element of his theory was linked with the performance and conceptual context of the music video. He broke down the performance content of this theory into three different parts:

1. Song Performance
2. Dance Performance
3. Instrumental performance

Conceptual - This is when the audience watch something which is beyond the artist's ambitions.

I think that our video will have a perfect balance between the performance and the conceptual element of music videos. I will have instrumental performance based shots which will add an effect of auntrucutrty yto the video while mating key elements from Carlssons theory. Within all the different types of videos, Carlsson also looked at the ways in which the different types of performances are developed. These are:

1. Commercial Exhibitionist - This is where the artist sells themselves as a general exhibition.
2. Televised Bard - This is where a singing storyteller uses on screen images. This is the sort of style we would like to adapt in our music video.
3. Electronic Shaman - This is used when the artists doesn't have the correct “Image” which is hopefully something that we will not encounter.

As our video is somewhat performance based we can already see that we will have most of these characteristics within our music video we have the artist's image and the performance based element in there too.