What Makes a Good Student Music Video?

I am going to do my research into other student music videos to gain understanding of what works well and what doesn’t. I should then be able to apply this research into my own music video to make sure that it hits the target audience and the effect that I am aiming for. I am looking at student music videos as they are all shot by students like myself, so it will give me a realistic guide of what I could possibly create with the limitations I have for my own music video.

Editing

I have looked at a student music video by Ben Norris. In this music video he doesn’t use lip-syncing but does cut to the beat in order to show the beat of the song through the editing of the video which I think works well. The saturation has also been increased in the music video to make the shots more vibrant. I like this because it creates a bright and colourful scene portraying feelings of happiness and enjoyment. Although many scenes have benefited from increased brightness and saturation, many of the shots do not match the same colour theme. If I were to do a music video like this I would make sure that the high saturation was applied throughout the entire duration of the video to keep consistency. A lot of the shots used in this piece involve holding the camera by hand and following someone walking so the footage is quite shaky. To make the music video better they could have stabilized the footage in post production as I find this quite distracting as a viewer and unprofessional. I looked at another student music video to 'Run the World' by Beyoncé. This song is really upbeat and I like how they edited the shots fast paced to the music making it really intriguing and keeping the visuals busy. I also like the transitions used near the beginning because I think they work really well in terms of introducing the theme of the music video for example the fuzzy TV screen transition begins the theme of war and girls taking over. I also like the flash transitions between the shots at the begging where they strobe between them because I think it really works well with the music and upbeat / fast pace. I have noticed that transitions aren't commonly used in student music videos because sometimes when it is overdone it doesn't work well. I will consider using transitions where they would work well in terms of where it fits with the music and between certain shots.

Camera

The camera operator for this music video has used lots of wide shots. I think that these shots have been used to reveal the actors body language so that the audience can see the emotion of the character. Despite these being effective, if I were to do a video like this, I would use a wide variety of shots including close-up shots. Close-up shots can be used to reveal the face and theirfor the emotion of a character. This is more engaging with the audience so I feel that this would have been a better choice for a music video. I also think that this video was stabilised professionally throughout. This would be a feature that I would like to incorporate into my video as it gives a lot more viewer pleasure as shaky footage is often distracting and not enjoyable to watch.

Mise en scene

In this music video the Mise en scene was really considered carefully. I think that the lighting in this was shown really well as it was filmed in “golden hour”. This is where the light leaves the biggest shadows and looks the most visually appealing to the audience. I think that in my music video I am going to try and include this feature by filming in the evenings as it creates a brighter and more cinematic look to the footage. This music video doesn’t follow a costume continuity throughout the production unfortunately. It is clear to see that the costume changes half way through which doesn’t look professional. In my music video I will make sure that the actors wear the same clothes even if filming takes place over several shoots on different days.

Representation

In this music video there is not much representation as there is only one character but he is however still portrayed as a stereotypical teenager. The teenage character in this film is seen walking along with headphones in and his head down. This is stereotypical of teenagers and leaves the character in the headphones in being portrayed as the stereotypical antisocial teenager. In my music video I would like to break the stereotypes of youth being portrayed in an antisocial manner and portray them as the opposite in my production.

Conclusion

To conclude, I have learned a lot from this research and it has helped me understand what I would like to do for my music video and how I would like the final project to look. Studying a student music video has also given some concept of what may be possible for my music video and how I might accomplish that with little financial backing and no professional equipment.