Thursday 28 June 2012

Life Is Life - Noah And The Whale


The lighting for this video is a natural bright light and it starts off showing a girl in white and red clothing which as the video goes on we see that this is a certain colour theme for most of the people that are evident. The establishing shot at the beginning of the video shows the setting and we can see that all the colours of the buildings and trees are washed out colours and the young female is positioned in the middle of the shot wearing bright clothing which immediately makes the audience focus on her. 



We then see a close up of the young girls face, this is to show her emotion which is evidently a confusion and frustrated look. At this point there is no music playing and we can hear the ambient sound of the wind which adds to the eary and emptiness of the scene.


We then see her walking towards the camera and the shot switches to focus on the water melon that is in her hand. I think this is symbolic in this video as we see it being smashed on the floor and the camera focuses on it, however i don't actually know what it is meant to represent. We then see the girl running and the camera follows her. At this point we see that the road is also set in a way that makes the audience's attention drawn to the young girl. The fact that the girl is running makes us think that she could be running away from something or towards something. As she starts to run we hear the music kick in and and various shots of cheer leaders all wearing similar clothes as the girl we see at the beginning.


A low angle shot is used when we see the lead singer of the band "Charlie Fink" singing with a formal dark suit on. This shows his importance and makes the audience recognise that he is a main part of the band. We can also see that he is wearing a red, blue and white tie which fits with this colour theme that is throughout the music video and these colours help stand out.



Each time we see the young girl running through various scenes she is always positioned in the centre of the shot which again makes her the focus of attention. The follow shot helps include the audience into the actions and make it seem like we are part of the scene by following the girl.




A low angle shot is used again when we see another member of the band. This again makes this person seem more important. He is again wearing a red tie with a white shirt which fits in with the colours of the scene. As the scene goes on we see that the camera is positioned behind the girl instead of in front, this could suggest that the things she fears or whatever she is running away from is now behind her.
We then see a balloon behind the bind with the same red, blue and white colours that are featured throughout the music video.


The hot air balloon that we see near the end of the video also fits to these colours and this could signify the link between the happy cheer leaders and the young girl who is running towards the balloon. When she gets in the hot air balloon she is shown in a high angle shots which now shows her as being important and powerful, like the members of Noah And The Whale are shown.

Tuesday 26 June 2012

Genre of choice: Indie Pop


Indie folk started around the 1990's. Singer/songwriters of indie rock music were influenced by folk and pop music, country music and indie rock inhe 50s, 60s and early 70s. Some of the most successful artists that fit with the genre are:
  • Noah And The Whale
  • Florence and the Machine
  • Laura Marling
  • Mumford and Sons
  • Paloma Faith
  • Ben Howard
  • The Vaccines
  • Bombay Bicycle Club
  • Lenka
Some typical intruments used for indie Pop music are acoustic guitars, pianos and drums. these are usualy evident in the majority of the music videos and the artists tend to walk around playing the instruments throughout the video. Most of the videos are quite simple and usually live actions with footage of the narrative and the artists.
A music video is usually a short story and imagery in order to promote music records. Music videos become popular around the 1980's when MTV based alot of their work around them.
Music videos used various filming techniques such as animation, live action and abstract film. Some use technological convergence by using both animation and live action, this is shown in the music video for "Take on me" by A-Ha. Some simply just show a live performance of the song.





MTV is an American network first launched on August 1, 1981. MTV was made to show music videos and help promote music records. The first aired music video was "Video killed the radio star" by Buggles. MTV was originally created by Robert W. Pittman who later became MTV's president and chief executive officer.