Hannah Alley, Media, Mr Daley.

The genre of my coursework video Guns and Horses by Ellie Goulding.

My music video to Guns and Horses by Ellie Goulding uses many typical conventions of the Pop genre. I made sure to use a love story narrative aswell as a performance which holds typical pop ideology as the majority of pop videos include some sort of narrative, along with performance shots. The effect of using performance in my music video is that it conveys a sense of the in-concert experience to the audience (as said by Firth 1988). It reminds the viewer that the soundtrack is still important. However, the effect of a narrative storyline is that it develops meaning to the lyrics that the audience can pay attention to. It adds an emotional attachment to the music video. The main protagonist female, Georgina, is both the actress in the narrative and the artist performing to the audience. The effect of this is that the audience can appreciate both the song itself being sung by the artist, and be able to empathise with and understand her in narrative ways. Furthermore, my music video definitely uses the mode of effects convention as it assumes that my young teenage target audience will appreciate the love storyline. I, as the producer, have assumed that most teenagers have been through what I convey in my Guns and Horses storyline, so they can relate to it and therefore it will be successful. My music video functions like a mini-film. It uses flashbacks throughout, especially in the choruses, to trigger an emotional reaction from the audience as its bringing back previous moments from the couples relationship. Similarly, my music video follows many typical conventions of the pop genre. I have followed a pop genre ideology because I believe this is how it would most appeal to my target audience. My main protagonist is represented in fashionable, girly and casual clothes, so that there is a variety in her image to portray unpredictability but also so that the female viewers perhaps look up to her and see her as a role model. Many pop genre music videos have a main female protagonist who is fashionable to trigger this successful effect. Furthermore, I wanted to create a contrast between my two actors so that their characteristics stand out as a couple, so I made sure that my male actor, Matt, wore masculine clothes in the music video. This uses the idea of Binary Opposites by Levi-Strauss, which again is a very common convention in pop music videos. Furthermore, the effect of this is that when Matt rejects Georgina in the storyline, the audience may feel even more sympathy for Georgina as Matts image is masculine and hard, compared to Georgina who is soft and sensitive, emphasising her hurt. For my music video to appeal to the target audience even more so, I used many shots including pieces of technology that teenagers often use such as mobile phones, laptops and tablets. I used Andrew Goodwins Dancing in the Distraction Factory (1992) theory of frequent reference to notion of looking, where I filmed the couples phones or laptop screens as they typed/texted. I also used his postmodern theory of intertextual reference, where I made reference to Facebook, iMessage, etc. because I knew the viewers would recognise these aspects. Aswell as this, in many pop music videos there is a relationship between the lyrics and the visuals so that the soundtrack is also apparent in technical codes, as said by Andrew Goodwin. For example, during the build up of the

Hannah Alley, Media, Mr Daley. couples relationship, time is stretched to intensify and grow on drama, and shots go quite slowly. However, on the first chorus the couples shots of their time talking together flash into eachother quickly. The lighting on these shots are high key aswell, to represent happiness and lightheartedness which is what many pop music videos do. However, when things start to go wrong and Georgina gets rejected, the lighting instantly becomes low key and shots fasten up to represent her frustration and overwhelming emotion. I also use a slow motion effect on shots such as where Georgina throws her phone in anger, which makes the shot seem dramatic and emotional. To go in sync further with this falling-apart of their relationship, I begin to use shots that signify Georginas entrapment and hurt, such as her miming to the camera behind a fence, which looks like she is encaged behind bars. Also, I use slow motion shots of my friend Jessica doing her rhythmic gymnastics, and the ribbon she uses represents Georginas flowing of emotion. So, as we can see here, there is a true relationship between the lyrics/music and visuals, and many signifiers of emotion, just like many other pop music videos. I also use many close up shots of Georginas face as this allows the audience to relate with her more and it adds a personal feel, and also exemplifies her emotion. Lastly, to go with the acoustic guitar in the song, I used many shots of the nature, especially at the start of the music video, and throughout many performance shots have been filmed in the woods or fields. This highlights that there is a correlation between the music and visuals because if my music video was filmed in clubs and shopping places, the guitar would not go with it at all. Overall, my coursework music video also has a clean, morale element to it as firstly it represents females (Georgina) as angelic, innocent and traditional, as she is covered up in my music video and isnt presented as overtly sexual. Furthermore, it hints the idea to the audience that too much is revolved around the internet nowadays and that most relationships based on social networking sites etc do not work out. Therefore, there is a hidden meaning to my music video. This is quite conventional of the pop genre as many pop music videos present an idea underneath that you can learn from it, either through the lyrics or the narrative.