Planning - Outlining the Narrative

Outlining the Narrative...

This task required each group in my class to analyse the lyrics to our chosen song for our music video. Me and my group then printed out the lyrics to the song and annotated line by line what we had planned specifically to happen at a particular verse, line or word. Having the lyrics printed was essential and benefit my group as it helped us understand the meanings and connotations of the song through the lyrics. We listened to the song whilst analyzing the lyrics and by doing this we could implement some ideas on the types of edits and transitions we could use according to the pace of the song. This was clear in our annotations as by listening to the track whilst observing the lyrics we took note of the exact second/time of the song a lyric or sound effect would occur. By doing this, it would benefit my group during the filming stage as we would have been prepared and already know where and what to do at lyrics in particular as well as certain music transitions.

Goodwin - We will include Goodwin's idea of relationship between lyrics and visuals as well as using the relationship between music and visuals. This means that we will display a clear idea of the lyrics matching and relating with the visuals e.g. in the chorus of the song when J Spades sings ''Got drink all in my cup dawg, IM WAVEY'' we will have our performer use props of non alcoholic drink in a see through cup which will resemble the idea of drinking alcohol. We might also use smoke props that the artists will use to portray the idea of marijuana. The alcohol and drugs idea will show a representation of visuals linking with the lyrics, as ''I'm Wavey'' is an urban term of saying one is drunk or 'high'.
The music to this track is very urban and bass dropping so when editing our footage we will create edits and transitions aligning with the beat of the song in order to portray the idea of relationship between music and visuals.

Dyer - Dyers theory of 'star image' will be applied through the focus of our two performers representing the artists J Spades and Young Teflon. Dyer's theory of celebrities having a constructed image in order to sell to an audience will be used through our performers. Me and my group will represent the same style, trends and ideologies of the artist through the use of  a brotherhood relationship between the artists, recreating their entourage of a crew, luxuries, marijuana etc. These realistic ideas are conventional within young black artists in the music industry as they can relate to their audiences.

Mulvey - The use of Laura Mulvey's theory of the 'Male Gaze' is very stereotypical and conventional in the Hip Hop/ Grime genre of the music industry. I will be implementing the most mainstream method of her theory of the male gaze through the use females lingering on our artists and using movement in a sexual way to represent them as sexy and promiscuous.

Video narration

The scene starts with an establishing shot of the area to show the local area the artist lives in. The area is shown to be run down in order to portray the 'gritty' lifestyle the artist lives. The first line the artist will sing will be under a bridge which has graffiti in the background with the other performer next to him. Both performers will engage with each other whilst lip syncing and the shots will vary from the party scene back to the performance area. In most shots at the party there will be high angles and close-ups of the girls in order to represent Mulvey's 'Male Gaze' accurately and also many close ups on the star himself in order to represent Dyer's 'Star Image' accurately.

Conclude

Overall, annotating our lyrics helped significantly as we were able to discuss what we wanted to shoot for each line in the song. As a group we were able to discuss angles, shots and movement with also the different edits we plan to use which helped us create a vision for the music video.

Planning - My Audience

My Audience

During this planning lesson, the objective was to find the exact target audience specific to our music video and artists. This would help me and my group decide what interests audiences of the hip hop/ grime genre which would help us to know what content we should distribute to the audience in order for them to engage with our music video to succeed in a result of audience satisfaction.

It is important to know about audiences when creating a music video because it is easier to know the exact target audience the music video is being produced for. This then helps us decide what to include in our music video in terms of content and conventions because we know what age groups, genders, races and audience categories generally like. Also, by having a target audience, we do not have to impress everyone who listens to music, we only have to appeal to those we have selected. Knowing our audience will allow us to apply conventions of the UK rap genre because we know they will like this. This will ensure our success when releasing the music video because it will gain popularity from the right audience.

Our target audience for the song "Wavey" by J Spades ft. Youngs Teflon can be categorised into the following;

Age: The age group of our target audience is 16-30. This is because there are older themes in the song that is inappropriate for the younger audience. The song portrays themes of love, sex, drugs, and money which are more suitable for the audiences over the age of 16 as these are adult themes.

Gender: The gender that we are targeting is mostly males as this gender listen to UK rap over females as they are more likely to relate to the themes. Also, as both artists are males, this may allow a higher chance for our audience to form a relationship between the artists.

Race: We are targeting the ethnic minorities such as Black Americans and Latinos. This is because UK Rap is usually listened to by these cultures and so we will follow this convention. Also, both our artists are Black British which means that they might then be able to form a bond between the public that are the same race.

Audience Category: Our audience category is C2-E which include skilled workers, trades persons (white collar), semi-skilled workers and unskilled manual workers (blue collar) and unemployed, students, pensioners and casual workers. We picked this target audience because they are most likely to be interested in the UK Rap genre, as anyone from the categories A-C1 will usually listen to more classical music or jazz due to their higher job status. Mainly students and young people aspire to a better life and sing about hardship, therefore I believe they will be more interested in our genre.

Income bracket/status: The status of our targeted audience is mostly working class due to the genre of the song. It is more likely that working class people listen to UK Rap because the ruling class tend to listen to classic music or jazz. Also, the people in the working class category are not earning much money which meaning their income bracket may be low. This suggests that people that will be most attracted to our music video will be from the working-class.

Audience reaction to your video:

We hope for the audience's reaction to our music video to be positive. We hope that the audience is able to engage with the video and understand and relate to our artists and their friendship. We hope to entertain our audience as we have targeted this video specifically for them so we would want them to be interested in the content. Also, we want the audiences’ reaction to be positive in ways that they will then also promote the song in other ways, like word of mouth or using social media to give back positive reviews to other audiences.

Why have you identified this group as your target audience?

We have identified this target audience because we have planned each demographic in detail and decided that this is the convention for the UK Rap genre, therefore, we will follow this. Also, we identified these groups because our questionnaire and research into existing products helped us to also identify the answers to these categories which has benefitted us.

Overall, this task of planning the audience has been beneficial because it has allowed me and my group to track our target audience making it easier for us to gain overall success. This would include audiences being satisfied with the type of artists we are selling towards them which would then ideally lead to a more consistent financial success in the music industry.

Planning - Questionnaire & Graphs

Questionnaire:

What category do you fall into?

10-15            16-21            22-27            28+


What’s your occupation?

Student            Employed            Unemployed            Retired


What genre of music do you listen to?

RnB            Hip-Hop       Pop            Rap             Rock         House         Jazz


How often do you listen to UK Rap?

             Always       Sometimes        Never


What would you expect to see in a UK Rap music video?
   _____________________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Should the music video be focused on the artist?

                     Yes                No



What themes should be included in a UK Rap music video?

             Love             Wealth            Death            Violence            Sex


Should there be references to other artists/events/videos in the music video?
                                     Yes             No


Do you think there should be women being shown in a sexual way?
                                   
                                     Yes           No


Do you think the lyrics should match the visuals?

                                     Yes           No


Do you think the pace of the music should match visuals?

                                     Yes           No


Would you like to see slow motion being used with the editing?

                                     Yes           No


What are your thoughts on the music video being purely concept/performance based?

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

What iconography (objects) would you expect to see in a UK Rap music video?

Money         Cars          Knifes         Spaceships        Jewelry


Do you think the ‘star’ should be emphasised by using close-ups?

                                    Yes              No


Do you think there should be a male and female relationship shown?

                                    Yes              No


What setting would mostly suit a Hip-Hop genre?

Party        Carpark/Streets    Warehouses    Forests      Schools      Prison


What are your thoughts on the music video being black and white?

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

What makes an artist a ‘star’?

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

What type of costume should the artist be wearing?

Suits Tracksuits Jacket&Jeans

Graphs: