Conventions of a contemporary music video

Performance Based: Artists or band who appears in their video, e.g.

• JLS
• Artic Monkey
• Tulisa
• Rihanna
• Beyonce

Narrative music video: Storyline is evident.

Abstract music video: Creative, artist music video by Radiohead.

• Most videos are however a combination of both performance and narrative in a traditional sense.
• Music videos often have the artist performance with some visual storyline interwoven.

N.B: Live performance based are traditionally a bad idea and the synchronisation becomes a real problem.

The best way to make a music video - Tips

a) Either, make it completely abstract with no performances.

                                      or

b) If you are going to have performance - have an artist mime the song in at least 5 times well-li, different locations.

• Make sure they mime the song start to finish.
• Take the 5 separate scene sequences and assemble them on the 5 different timelines on adobe premier.

Cods and conventions of a Documentary

It is recommended that your documentary should tackle the first 5 minutes of an opening documentary.

Key Points:

• The opening needs to capture the audiences' attention as quickly as possible.
• the central question of the documentary has to be posed at the beginning in order to communicate to the audience about what the programme is about. E.g. Why is Britain the teenage pregnancy capital of Europe?
• Some quick snippets of interviews with good responses can also draw an audience in
• incidental music or a soundtrack, relevant song should usually accompany the opening sequence during some visual montage. The music should not overwrite the voice over.
• Titles are important; you need to announce the title of the documentary is some dramatic way. The name of the show should burst onto the screen.

Actuality
Filming real events as they happen are a convention of real documentary, but this could prove difficult with certain things like trying to film a hurricane or explosions in Iraq and thus may need archive footage.

Fly on the wall
This is when you film real people as they do real things focusing on their lives. In terms of your documentary you may be able to film things like people having genuine conversations about an issue relevant to your topic, a live sporting event, following an individual around as they do a job etc.

Voice over
Most documentaries have a voice over, a narration of what the programme is about, giving key information about introducing the topic of debate.

Graphics
Documentaries often use graphics with written texts. Maps, drawings, still photographs can be incorporated into the opening sequence through jpeg files. Graphics should also appear as a banner at the bottom of the screen when showing who your interviewee is and what they do for a living. E.g. Andrew Mitchell, Conservative MP.

Interviews
An expert interview with someone who has ample knowledge of your topic and can give a clear insight into issues is vitally important. This could be a real expert, parents, students etc.

Vox Pops
This is more of a random interview with ordinary people on the street with a hand held camera, with a microphone popping up asking people what they think about your topic.

Talking head
A shot of someone talking directly to the camera as a presenter of the documentary could also be used. This is called a 'talking head'. The talking head is the authority figure and presents the facts.

Music
Music is critical for the opening sequence but the sound of the song or music should not dominate and override the sound of the voice over. You need to balance sound and images very carefully and fade them in appropriately.