Conventions of Indie Pop

Indie pop is a genre of alternative rock that originated from the UK in the mid 1980's. It has roots from the scottish post-punk bands.
    Indie pop is diffrent from Indie rock because is is more melodic and less agressive. It started off in small shop based record labels. British Musical Weekly 'New Musical Express' released a compilation cassete called C81. It featured a range of groups and styles. NME followed up the C81 with C86 5 years later which was seen as the birth of Indie pop.
      Indie videos are seen to be low budget and main settings are ususally in studios, citys, parks and woods. The videos sometimes include live performances of the artist and usually the artist is about passion and not success. Narrative in the music videos is becoming popular because it makes the video more relatable to the audience since there are different themes issued. Having a narrative is also more appealing to an audience because they can use different cinematography and editing rathr than just live performance shots.  Minimal props and costume are used in the videos so give it a sense of reality and purity. Usually the artists wear retro/ vintage clothing such as skinny jeans, shirts, leather jackets, vans, backpacks, Doc Martins etc.
    A music video that has become popular is 'Say something' by A Great Big World and Christina Aguilera. This is seen as an indie song because A Great Big World is  seen asbeing Indie. The video is pretty simple with just one location of a huge black room which just has diferent beds for different stages of life. For example the child has a small bed and the old couple have a hospital bed which is the main focus in the room. It is very simple as the there is just a piano with A Great Big World singign and the different beds however is very interesting and appealing.

      Ellie Goulding, whos song I am using for my music video, is represented as being an Indie style singer since she likes to use instruments and write her own songs that relate to her. She plays many instruments such as guitar, mandalin, bass, drums and clarinet all of which she includes in her song. Ellie is signed to Polydor which was originally an independent label but now is under Universal Music Group which means that they can spend more money on Ellies music videos making the production much more professional and higher standard than usual Indie videos.

Liiar Analysis 3

Liiar Analysis 3

Drake-Started From the Bottom

Language

Cinematography-At the beginning of the video there is a low angle shot of drake stood in a car looking down on us therefore making him look superior which links with his song being about being on top. There is then a long shot of drake when he is younger at a football match being carried by all of his team mates after he scored a goal which implies that he wanted success from an early age since he liked the feeling of being a winner. When they are in the shop that drake works in there is a close up of drake’s manager giving him a new badge which establishes the fact that he has been promoted again giving him success. There is a high angle pan over a billboard which overlooks the city which drake has climbed on making it look like he is above the whole city which again indicates that he is gaining more power. It then cuts to a medium close up of drake in a private airplane drinking champagne showing that he is getting more money.  

 Mise-en-scene

At the beginning of the video there they are at a football match when drake was a child which shows that he was just a normal kid playing with his friends. Another location is a supermarket where drake worked when he was in his early 20’s wearing just a plain uniform. This implies that he didn’t get his fame straight away and that he started at the bottom working in a shop. We are then shown a girl who one of drakes friends (who also works at the shop) is interested in. She is a very pretty girl, wearing a low cut top and a lot of makeup which gives the impression she is wealthy and a party girl. It then cuts to a party scene at an old mansion/hall which we can tell by the old lamps on the wall, paint coming off the roof and the arch ways. Drake is wearing chains and a top that says ‘dream crew’ along with his friends which tells us that he is starting to get success and money because chains are expensive and people are starting to want to be like him. In the private jet he is sipping champagne whilst a girl sleeps next to him which is typical of a celebrity life style showing that he starting to get fame. He then arrives at a huge modern villa that overlooks the sea with a private pool etc with his friends whilst wearing a top with an elephant covered in gold and decorations. He is also drinking wine and smoking cigars. All of this gives him the ultimate life style relates to the fact that the song is about making it big which he did y becoming a wealthy celebrity.

Sound

The non diagetic sound is the song being played over the video. Towards the middle of the video the song stops playing and we can hear diegetic sound such as the voices of the woman and drakes friends and the noise of the till.

Editing

Continuity editing is used at the beginning of the video when drake scores a goal because it is the same location and time however we see it from different points of view for example we see a bird’s eye view of the football team which cuts to a medium close up of drake, then a long shot of drake running away from the camera. Cross cutting is used when they are inside the shop when he gets given his new badge then it cuts to Drake outside in the snow wearing expensive clothing. This edits out time. Throughout the video there isnt much editing used apart from cuts from performance to narrative or to different location. In the pictures below you can see the difference between the performance and the narrative in the music video. The fact that they use limited types of cuts suggest that they want us to focus on the narritive whilst we watch the video.

Liiar anaylsis 2

Liiar Analysis 1

Idea 3

My third idea was to do quite an abstract video of a boy creating the perfect girl and deciding the colour of her hair, her size and what clothes she wore etc. There would be other shots of a girl transforming herself to be that girl. There would be a lot of non naturalistic movement and abstract dancing.

Idea 2

 

Final Idea

Initial ideas

The writing-Ellie Goulding

Locations.

• A country lane.(swine?)
• The theatre(Spotlight).
• The dance studio.
• The beach.
• Field.
• Music Studio

Costume.

• Plain black skinny jeans, plain top and hoodie at the begining, minimal make-up.
• Transforms to wear blue skinny jeans and white pretty top, natural but pretty makeup.
• Hair down, straightened.

Props

• Mirror with lights/Fairy lights hung over the top
• Model magazines.
• Smoke machine.
• Make-up.
• Stool.
• Different dresses.

For my first idea I was thinking of having a music video that shows the transformation of a girl from how she usually looks to how she looks when being with a boy to show how people will change themselves to appeal to the person they like more. I will do this by having her putting on make up and trying on different outfits so that she can look like how the boy would want her to be.

Media Treatment

Media treatment-Ellie Goulding(The Writer)

At the beginning of the video she will look plain and boring with plain clothing then she will progress throughout the video, after looking through magazines, to become stylish and pretty by putting on makeup and changing her clothes to suit how the man would want her to look.