Evaluation Question #1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms of conventions of real media products?

Conventions of Hard Rock/Glam Metal music videos - Camera

• Lots Of Close-Ups
• Full Band Shots To Show Everyone Playing Instruments
• Establishing The Genre

Conventions of Hard Rock/Glam Metal music videos - Editing

• Straight Cuts
• Occasional Montage Shot Editing
• Few Transitions
• Sometimes A Time Lapse

Conventions of Hard Rock/Glam Metal music videos - Narrative and Performance

• Narrative Can Be On the Band Themselves As Shown In Previous Glam Rock/Glam Metal Music Promos
• Performance Is There To Show Of Their Skills

Conventions of Hard Rock/Glam Metal music videos - Mise-en-scene

• Concert Feel To The Location
• Props That Suit The Genre Like Guitar, Drums, etc.
• Dark Clothing

Forms and conventions I used:

Looking at bands music videos that are in the genre that I have chosen to do this year (Bullet For My Valentine, Yashin, etc), I noticed that the videos were mainly performance based with a little bit of narrative between shots of the band. I decided to do the same as the bands I looked at to stay within the genre and not go off on a tangent. I made it about 70:30 performance to narrative in ratio terms. I wanted to introduce the vocalist right from the beginning which is usually done within the first few seconds of the videos I looked at. The narrative is set during night time and the main character is dressed in all black which is a convention for band in this genre as they all dress in dark colours. I used straight cuts to jump from one scene to another as this is done in the videos I have watched in the genre. I noticed as I was editing the video, that my narrative is a little bit like Black Veil Brides' song Knives and Pens as they both have the lonely male walking round the street and the narrative is based around the vocalists life.

 

The still shot below is from the 'Knives and Pens' video.

 

The still shot below is from my music video.

In the video I also used the instruments that you would typically find in this genres music videos like guitar, bass, drums and microphone.

 

Below is a shot from Bullet For My Valentine's 'Scream Aim Fire' showing the whole band. 

 

Below is a shot from my music video showing the whole band

 



 

Forms and conventions I challenged:

In the genre I have chosen, one convention is that the members of a band wear some kind of make-up. I have challenged this by having my actors wear no make-up at all, because I didn't want to exactly copy the genre because it would have been hard to recreate everything. Another reason I had my actors wear no make up, was because if I had gotten them to wear it, they would have been too much like the band, so I didn't want to compare my performance parts with the band I got together with the band itself which is famous for their use of make-up and face paint.

Below is a shot from the video 'Rebel Love Song' with one of the guitarists filling the frame

 

And below is the guitarist in my video filling the frame.

My Digipak
 

As part of our ancillary tasks, we had to make a digipak which included the front and back covers of an album cover, and a promotional poster to go with the digipak.
 

Front and Back Cover
 

Inside Covers

 

 

 

Forms and Conventions of a Digipak Include:

 

Front Cover

Artist Name

Album Name

Image of the Artist

Image Relevant to the Concept

Image Relevant to the Album Name

Back Cover

Image of the Artist

Image to suit the Genre

Track Listing

Barcode

Copyright

Names of the Band Members

Record Label

Producers

Inside

Images of the Artist

Lyrics

Notes of Thanks

Songs Written By...

Spine

Artist Name

Album Name

Record Label
 

Forms and Conventions I Used

When looking at my generic conventions, I found that most of these conventions that apply to other genres, also fitted in with my genre. On the front cover of my digipak, I used the following conventions; Artist Name, Album Name, and Image Relevant to the Album Name. This is because the majority of the artists within the genre use these conventions. When looking at Black Veil Brides' "Rebels" I found that it used the same conventions that I wanted to use for the front cover.
 

Black Veil Brides' "Rebels" Front Cover
 

 

My Front Cover

 

For the back of my digipak, I used the following conventions to fit in with the genre; Track Listing, Copyright, Producers, Record Label, Image to suit the Genre, and although not many artists do it, I decided to put the names of the artists on as well.
Bullet For My Valentine's "Fever" back cover uses the following conventions; Track Listing, Copyright, Producers, Record Label.



 

My back cover.

Forms and Conventions I Challenged
 

When looking at the main conventions of the inside of a digipak, I found that the conventions were; lyrics, notes of thanks, images of the artist and the CD itself. I decided to challenge the convention of notes of thanks, even though they are very common in album booklets. When looking at the generic conventions of digipaks, I challenged the convention of having notes of thanks, even though this is extremely common within the genre. I also decided to challenge the convention of who the song was written by to make it different to other artists in the genre, because the majority of bands in the genre tell their audience who originally wrote the song.

 

 

For the inside of my digipak, I used the following conventions; Images of the Artist, and Lyrics.

My Poster

As part of our ancillary tasks, we were asked to create a poster to promote the album in a magazine.


Conventions of Magazine Adverts are:

• Name of the Artist
• Name of the Album
• Picture of the artist
• Release Date
• Brand Identity
• Band Logo
• Websites - Artist, Record Label
• Where To Buy
• Social Media
• Review/Ratings

 

 

Forms and Conventions I Used:

• Name of the Artist
• Name of the Album
• Release Date
• Brand Identity
• Band Logo
• Websites - Band Only
• Where to Buy - iTunes, HotTopic

When looking at the conventions of magazine adverts, I decided to keep the majority of them and not include an image of the artist as when bands in the genre bring out singles from an album, they don't tend to have an image of the artist. I have however, kept the conventions of; name of the artist, name of the album, release date, brand identity, band logo, website for the band, where to buy the single. I used brand identity by using the same artwork that I used on the front cover of the digipak.

 

Bullet For My Valentine's Magazine Advert for their album "Scream Aim Fire" has the conventions of; name of the artist, name of the album, release date and official website.

 

 

 

Black Veil Brides' magazine advert for their album "Wretched and Divine" has the following conventions; name of the artist, name of the album, release date, image of the artist and where to buy.

 

 

 

 

Forms and Conventions I challenged:

 

• Image of the artist
• Social Media
• Reviews/Ratings
• Record Label website

I decided to challenge these convention because they aren't something that are usually found on adverts within the genre I have chosen to do, except for the image of the artist. The reason I didn't put an image of the artist on the advert was because I wanted to keep the brand identity and have the artwork that had a reference to the song.