'Example' Music Comparison

Example - Kickstarts


Example - Won't Go Quietly

For this post I am going to compare two music videos from the same artist and same genre.

The two tracks are ‘Kickstarts’ and ‘Won’t Go Quietly’ by ‘Example’. Both being in the genre category of dance and chart music. They are well known tracks by most young people. The first comparison of the two videos are that the first one is all narrative based in a big home/ building, and the second video (Won’t go quietly) is performance based.

The ‘Wont go quietly” video is about a girl having a dream about what happened before she feel asleep. It shows us dancing at a night club to the artist “example” and then at the end waking up in bed with him.

The other video is about a couple of people, and for each verse of the track it contains video footage relevant to the lyrics. As for the chours, I am unsure and don’t understand the logic behind showing different head/ top part, body, and legs. (sometimes its money for a head, or folks for legs. To the audience its clear they are trying to create a persons body, but its not clear why they used those props.

Camera Shots:

Both videos tend to use mid shots, which give the audience enough to see who the actors in the video are, but also see where the video is set in. ‘Kickstart’ uses a close up of peoples feet tapping to the beat, and contains other close up of hands, eyes and other features which relate to the video.

Editing:

The first use a lot of split screen editing, showing more than one camera at once. Sometimes up to 16 different shots. Then use of these shots flicking off to reveal the main video at 15seconds is a very good editing transition. The second video uses mainly cut shots, but some dissolve transitions.

Sound:

There is no diagetic sound in the ‘kickstarts’ video, it is the entire original record track. In the other video, the only diagetic sound we hear is the girl screaming at the end, as she wakes up from her dream.

Music Video Analasis

As well as comparing videos from the same genre I have also looked at videos individually. The first video I looked at on its own and analysed was Oasis – Stop crying your heart out. This was again from the English rock genre and also again from the 90’s, the video is a mix of both performance and narrative based.

The video starts off with a match being stuck we then see a image of the band this is showing us that straight away the video is a mixture of both performance and narrative. After this we then see the bands lead singer and then a shot of were they are playing. From this we can tell that it is either a studio or somewhere like a tv studio were they are performing. We then go into some of the narrative based, again from this we can tell that the setting is in a city we can tell this because of the large billboards that are displayed around the actor. As we carry on into the video more we see that it is a tv studio because of the lighting.

The band in the video follow the typical 90’s English rock look, this is apparent with there hair and they way they dress. The actor is the video also follows a 90’s look but this is more with a afro hair, this is not a typical English rock look but this is because she is not actually in the band.

The camera work in the video contains a lot of close up shots, these are usually shots of the lead singer but there are also close us of the actor. Some of the shots have movement in them these are in the form of dolly shots or in the studio more tracking shots. As well as this in the video there are also various pan shot. In the studio shots some sort of filter has been placed over the camera, this looks like it is either a tobacco or a red filter, this make it look like a old tv. In the city shots on the other hand they have used a graduated filter, this brings out the blue in the sky for the video. They also in both purposely try and get lens flare by putting the camera on a angle to the light source, in the studio this is tbe artificial stage lighting while the narrative uses the sun to get the flare.

Throughout the video they have put on a old TV effect, this is in the form of the filters and also in the editing they have overlaid a mask to make a old rounded rectangle 4:3 tv like the first tvs were. The editing of the video uses a lot of jump cuts jumping between the narrative and the performance videos, the pace of the editing throughout the video is quite slow as this fits in with the song that is also quite slow.

Music Video Comparison

The two videos I am comparing are Ian brown’s stelify and The Verve – bitter sweet symphony, these two tracks both have very similar idea for the video this involves the singer walking and the camera following the. This though has been created very different by the way the video is set and has been shot and edited.

The first major difference between the videos is the setting the verves video is based in a inner city this is very different to the Ian brown video that starts off in a small side street that does not have much action Unlike the setting the verve have used Ian brows video is not very built up and seems to look like a run down area. Were they walk is also very different, Ian brown because it is down a side street walks in the middle of the road, the verve singer on the other hand uses the pavement. This adds to the video for the verve as because of all the passers by it create the “Candid” look they wanted as though the film crew are not really there and he is just walking down the street singing.

The costume of the singers of both videos is very similar; this is because it is the typical 90’s English Rock look that both bands are. This look can be found in many other 90’s English rock bands such as oasis. The look the both go with is a leather jacket with a t-shirt and trousers, as well as there dress there hair is also very similar, again this is following the typical 90’s English rock look.

In both videos they used a number of props and actors, these are very different each video. Ian browns video slowly introduces a brass band towards the middle and end of the video, this is because of the marching theme the video has all the way though. The verve videos on the other hand have actors on the street that come running up to the singer and started at him. This is very different to ian browns video who just uses random people of the street as the video was done at a busy time purposely to get reactions of the people.

The camera shots in both videos are pretty similar, they use a lot of close up shots and mid shots to show the singer and most shots are done with a dolly to get the movement. The Ian brown video though unlike the verve’s video has more long shots in it. This is mainly at the start to show Ian walking alone by himself but is also used in the street to show the brass band as well as all the on lookers as well. In Ian browns video as well quite a lot of attention is brought to the brass band and also random people in the street using “candid” shots. The verve on the other hand is more focuses on the singer; they do though use a point of view shots in a couple of places unlike the Ian brown video that doesn’t use any.

The editing of the videos is very similar; it uses a very quick pace editing technique in both videos as the singers make there way though the street. The ian brown video does differ from the verve video though as it uses in some places they used jump cuts as well as in the street scenes use some special editing using slow motion.

Analyzing music videos

Before we started making our video we analyzed some music videos so that we knew the type of things that music videos include as well as there codes and conventions. To start i first looked at 2 videos from the same genre of music, these were Justice - We Are Your Friends and Fat Boy Slim - weapon of choice.

The first thing i looked for in the video was the setting, these were very different between the 2 videos, while the fatboy slim video was in a nice hotel the justice one was in a futuristic sort of room all in white with alot of things stacked. The justice setting is more typical of the electronic genre as they tipally use quite futuristic settings. The costume that the actors wear in each of the videos are very different, the justice video has very strange and futuristic clothing while the fatboy sim video has more traditional buisness dress in a suit. This is very unusual for a electronic genre that usually has more like the justice video.

The camera work in both of the videos are very similar they have a number of close up shots as well as longer shots in both of the videos. Also both of them use alot of movement in there shots this is more so with the fat boy slim video as it uses movement all the time to follow the actor. The editing is also very similar in the two videos it is pretty fast cutting and uses jump cuts quite alot. In both videos there is also a element of slow motion, this is partially viewable in the justice video were the cat hits the man. This is pretty common in electro but usually used more in performance based ones were the DJ is on the decks.

B.o.B feat. Bruno Mars "Nothin On You" Analysis

B.o.B feat. Bruno Mars "Nothin On You"

This is the video that I am going to analyse for the media project. The reason I have picked this video to analyse is because of the editing that has been used to make the video is unique, and is different from most of the other music videos that I have seen.
A lot of mid shots are used in the video which only shot above the shoulder and that shows facial expressions.
The editing is very quick as it uses lots of pictures to make the music video and all the shot have the singer in the middle. It uses lots of different images put together to make the video.
The lighting is focused on the singers head which makes him stand out and show the audience his expressions.

The Killers Music Comparison

The establishing shot in the first killers video is a close up of some wires in a desert. It is a low angle show of the wires and it moves up to show a letter K. The establishing shot in the second music video is another low angle shot of a man. This camera angle is used to make the man look big and powerful so we know he is important in the music video. The colours used in the first music video are most yellows which represents sand and in the second video it is shot in black and white. The costume that the man is wearing in the second music video make the man stand out more than the rest of the scene because he's wearing a very strong black.
The sound is both videos is just of the music track that the video is for. At the start of the first music video we hear one of the directors talking which is diagetic sound.
The setting for both music videos are similar because they are both set in deserted places which no one around.

David Guetta & Chris Willis Ft. Fergie & LMFAO – No Gettin’ Over you

A popular track that has been recently launch this year is “No Gettin’ over you”

It’s comes under the popular / dance music genre. There is both a narrative and performance sections featured in this video. It starts of with the artist performers recording there track in a recording studio with the music producer adjusting the levels on the mixer.

We see him write a tweet on his mobile, which latter on in the video lets people know where he is recording this track. But we do see the twitter start up page and also the Samsung mobile logo on his phone, which was most likely used to promote their services and devices in the video.

The narrative of the music starts when the bass beat of the track kicks in at 40 seconds. The narrative of the video continues alongside the performance of the artists recording their track in the studio.

Camera Shots:
The shots at the start of the video are generally mid shots to show where the location is. As the narrative starts we get different shots, such as close up of the mobile phone, speakers. Then long shots of the people running down the street.

The use of depth of field it used a lot in the studio to keep your on focused on the most important part of that shot. I like the shot from 2:12 to 2:14 where the camera blurs out. It finds into the music as it quiets down for a second.

Editing:

The editing in the video is very fast paced to keep up with the beat of the video. It seems to speed up when the beat of the track is playing, unlike the start of the video that has longer shots. I cant see any effects on the video, it is a very simple cut into the next shot. Very simple but effective

Sound:

Being a typical music video there isn’t many parts of the video that has diegetic sounds. Only the start where he talks from the studio to the artists and when he pressed the space bar on the video we hear diegetic sounds. We also hear at the end of the video where everyone in the studio is cheering. Apart from that, the rest of the video contains the overly of the music track. We can tell this as at 1:28 in the video she isn’t singing, but the audio of her from the real recording is playing. She then joins back in with the original recording at 1:34

Mise en scene:

The performance part of the video is recorded in a recording studio, alongside the narrative part of the video which also happens in the studio, But some events take part outside of the studio, for example when he puts the speakers outside, and we see every running from the village.
By the looks from the outside buildings it quiet a rural village area, with not many shops, buildings and people around. But by posting his message on twitter letting people know where the recording is taking place, everyone in that area is able to go to it.