Evaluation question 1

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


I have done a lot of research into different genres and how the conventions from them genres, affect how music videos are created. Our genre was pop rock and therefore we had to research into this genre to find out what we needed to convey in our music video. The conventions of pop rock genre are:

• Most videos have clips of the band performing the song, with cuts to the narrative. There are usually many cuts back and forth between the performance and narrative. Within the narrative the band member or members, portray themselves and show their own experiences or act as fictional characters. By showing the clips of the band performing, it helps to draw in the viewer of the video more and make them feel more connected or involved with the band.

• Usually have a narrative within the video, which the band members feature in. It has a story which sometimes links to the lyrics of the song or sometimes is more random and not necessarily based on what the lyrics have to say. I think the narrative helps to make it more meaningful and interesting. Normally, the story is based on general issues and everyday life, like love, relationships and problems. It helps to show the audience of similar encounters the band may have had in their lives and also gives advice about certain situations.

• The clothing that the band wear is usually fashionable but not as revealing as in pop videos, and not as dull and dark as in rock videos. Usually the members are dressed quite casually, in jeans and t-shirts. They usually look quite laid back and you can see by their facial expressions of how passionate they are for their music.

• Unlike in rock videos where it is all very dull and dark, and unlike pop where it is all very colourful and bright. I think that pop rock fits well between the two. They use lots of natural lighting and colours, to simply show their song to their audience and show just how natural and real it all is supposed to be.

• The band normally are seen performing in a studio, stage and sometimes outdoors. the location is usually lit up well via ambient lighting. There are usually close up of their instruments when they are performing, which helps to show their passion for their music, and also again how natural it all is.

In Pop Rock music videos, these conventions are seen throughout and are relevant to the music video and relate to the lyrics. In our music video we challenged the conventions of this music as we tried to use as many conventions of this genre as we could so that our music video fit in perfectly with the others. The first convention we researched was the one where in the music video, there is a mix between narrative and performance shots throughout the music video linking to the storyline throughout. We have this convention present in our music video as we have a constant change or narrative and performance shots throughout our music video where the band are seen singing the song and our actor is portraying the key narrative that runs alongside the performance shots in this music video. We have a dream like narrative that starts the music video off during the instrumental introduction, then from there we have performance shots of the band and then the narrative is split into two different outcomes, the good and bad. In the good the actor is seen to have a good day and in the bad side, the worst things possible happen. This is a convention of pop rock as we have had an even mix of performance and narrative shots throughout our music video. Below is an example of this convention displayed in a music video from our genre:






The second convention I researched was that the band members feature in the narrative part of the song as well as the performance parts as well. This convention was one that we were unable to follow. this is because we couldn't have to band feature in our music video and they didn't have to time to do so. We therefore had to improvise and go with having my group member feature in the music video so that we could have a mix between performance and narrative shots. Therefore we were unable to display this convention in our music video as we didn't have the band starring in our narrative part of our music video.




The third convention I found when researching our genre was that the clothing was usually fashionable but not revealing like pop, and not dark and dull like rock music videos. But in-between them both. We displayed this convention in our music video as we have chosen for our main actor to wear fashionable clothing however, not revealing. Our clothing choice was definitely not dull as we went with a blue colour and naturalistic coloured clothing as this links best with our music video. We did this to fit into the genre and keep as many conventions of this genre as possible in our music video. Therefore we tried to fit in using fashionable clothing and not making it to bright or dull but fitting in-between both genres. Below is an example of a video from this genre showing the clothing of the band.

The fourth convention I found out when I researched was that pop rock music videos are all filmed with naturalistic lighting. Pop music videos are filmed in bright lighting and rock music videos are filmed in dark lighting to connote the genre. We filmed in naturalistic lighting however, added effects to our music video to link the three products together.


The final convention I found when I was researching consisted of the band usually singing/performing outside, in a studio or a stage. They are usually seen singing in these locations in ambient light and there is usually close ups of the instruments when they are playing them through out. We actually abided by this convention and used a recording studio when filming our band. We did this to allow us the opportunity to create a music video in this genre and get the conventions of it right.




Contrasting and Comparing


We next analysed our magazine advert and digipak and compared them to others from our genre that we chose. We then looked at other magazine adverts and digipaks from the Pop Rock genre and compared our ancillary tasks to theirs, also looking at the conventions of them.


Our magazine advert was a attempt to try and add the same conventions as ones from the genre for magazine adverts. The magazine advert I have compared my own to is Kings of Leon.

This is the magazine advert that I have chosen to compare to our one. The generic conventions of magazine adverts in this genre are merely the same as the music video. The band usually appear on the front of the magazine advert and the band name is usually large and bold at the top of the page. The record labels are at the bottom left and right corners of the magazine adverts and the album name is again very large and located near the bottom next to the record labels. Songs within the album are usually detailed underneath the album name in smaller print and The date or 'out now' appears in bold writing along the bottom as well. Therefore usually these magazine adverts are bottom heavy as they do no have much information at the top of the magazine advert. There is usually brighter colours as the band are usually made eye appealing or in fact outlined to show their importance. Not always bright colours but bright more naturalistic than the darken background.

 Based on the conventions of magazine adverts in this genre, our music video fits in fairly well with others from the Pop Rock genre. However, one thing I noticed when we did our research was that we actually have a top heavy magazine advert and the convention of magazine adverts in this genre are bottom heavy. However this doesn't take anything away from our magazine advert fitting the genre. We have a big bold band name and smaller but again bold album name. We have included a song within the name detailed beneath and also added reviews. The reviews are not present on the Kings of Leon one, however they are on other magazine adverts from this genre. We added a large picture of the band on the front of the magazine advert and used greyscale effects to make them eye appealing as well as the clock picture, which links to our music video. We have our record labels in the bottom right and left which is the same as the other magazine adverts in the genre. However, we haven't used bright colours but some could say that they were somewhat naturalistic.


We next analysed digipaks from this genre and made our own and compared them to see if we used the same conventions as the genre we aimed for.

I chose this as a good digipak to compare to ours as we used a Coldplay song and therefore I thought it was a good idea to get a digipak from our favoured band in this genre and compare its conventions to ours. This digipak has four sides to it which is unusual for a digipak however it still conveys the same conventions as the ones in its genre. In the Pop Rock genre, The title of the album is on the front with a picture that occurs within a music video from one of the songs featured in the album. The band members usually all come in inside the digipak with usually all 4 or however many on one side. The songs are on the back and they are detailed as a list of songs with the barcode at the bottom. On the other side are usually pictures of the theme or in fact more text about the band or album.

Our digipak had 6 sides as this is the common digipak. We had a few of the conventions from the other digipaks in the genre however, we didn't have all of them. Instead of using the band members, we used their instruments instead and then added them to the digipak sides. We also had the cd clearly displayed and used the same colour scheme of the magazine advert to link them together. We didn't have the band name on the front cover, however we had it on the cd and the back of the digipak. We did include the list of songs on the back in which is a convention for all digipaks and we also added links to Coldplay's website. We added the barcode to our digipak and the record labels to added to the conventions of the Pop Rock genre digipaks produced by other bands in this genre.