Regulation

Beginning on the 1st October 2014, all music videos now have to have an age rating to prevent children from seeing harmful material. These age ratings will appear on YouTube and Vevo. All music videos will be classified within the categories PG, 12, 15 ,18 and restricted. They will be evaluated on drug misuse, dangerous behaviour presented as safe, bad language, sexual behaviour, nudity and violence. Although, these restrictions will only apply to music videos made by UK production companies. This means that music videos like 'Blurred Lines' and 'Anaconda' will remain uncensored.
This is seen by many as a pointless exercise as children will still be subject to harmful materials as not all videos are classified and due to the growing internet children can find a way of seeing these videos as they are accessible. Also, parental controls can be easy to get around and children can learn this at a young age. However, there have been many studies suggesting links between sexual material in songs and early sexual activity. This could be largely due to explicit material in songs.
I think my music video would be classified as a PG because it deals with some controversial themes but is not anything harmful to children. If I was to show a darker side to this subject I would probably regulate my video to a higher level. This would only be for the reason I would not want to introduce young children to issues of an older generation early in life. I think it would be important to not regulate my video to heavily as it would show a younger generation that there is a positive side to things they may experience in the future. 

CD Cover Analysis

Album Cover Analysis- Abbey Road, The Beatles

At 11:35 am on August 8^th 1969 the traffic was stopped by police for just ten minutes whilst freelance photographer Iain Macmillan took the iconic shot that Paul McCartney had sketched for him.

The first thing that can be noticed about this album cover is that it does not show the artists name or the name of the album. Many would find this strange as how are you meant to recognise who the album is by? Whilst researching the reason for this I realised that there would be no need to write their name on the cover. They were undoubtedly the biggest band in the world at the time and their faces were probably the most recognisable worldwide so there would be no need to state this.

This exact scene was used as the band wanted to show the people where they had spent the last seven years. This shows to an audience that although they are the most famous people in the world they are normal people. This is contradicted by the fact they have no title or band name because they are famous enough to be recognised and the fact that John Lennon leads the group dressed in all white. White is often used to represent an angel or messiah figure which could highlight the fact they are so recognisable and are the most famous people on the planet.

This album cover, although simple, created a lot of conspiracy. This album was released in the height of the ‘Paul is dead’ conspiracy. Paul McCartney is noticeably the only band member who is barefoot and out of step with the others. He is also the only Beatle smoking although many dedicated conspiracy theorists point out that he is holding his cigarette in his right hand although being left handed. This could have been used as a clever marketing technique by the band, in the height of conspiracy some people would buy this album to find hidden clues about Paul’s ‘death’.

Arctic Monkeys, Whatever people say I am, that’s what I’m not

This album cover shows a picture of a close friend of the band, Chris McClure, taken in the early hours of the morning.

This picture caused some controversy when the head of Scotland’s NHS criticized it for ‘reinforcing the idea that smoking is okay’. This was contradicted by the bands manager when he said that you can clearly see that smoking is not doing him the world of good. This symbolism however does show that the band are not afraid to be controversial and could highlight the fact they will not hold back in their music. This theme is run throughout as the physical CD is covered in cigarette ends. This shows that the band are rebellious and could highlight the fact they effuse to conform to society’s ideas of a role model and will stick to their roots.

This album cover shows the stereotype of a regular working class man. This shows that the contents of the music will share the views of someone of this social class. This could be a marketing scheme by the band to attract a wide audience in this sector of society.

The black and white aesthetic of the album cover is stereotypical of the indie genre. This is often done by bands so people will not what to expect when buying the album. It will also attract an audience of people who may not have listened to their music before but are fans of the genre.

Oasis, Definitely Maybe

This iconic album art is a photograph taken by rock photographer Michael Spencer Jones in bandmember Bonehead’s front room. It represents the band as normal people which is often a technique used by artists so their audience feel as though they can connect with them.

We can see a globe in the corner of the image perhaps showing that the band have big aspirations of becoming known worldwide. Liam Gallagher lies on the floor with his face being the closest to the camera. This shows he is the frontman of the band and puts him as the main focus.

There are many connotations of the bands working class past in this album cover. We see a packet of cheap cigarettes in the foreground showing that the group are not planning on forgetting where they came from. To further enforce this on the fireplace there is a Manchester City framed photo as this is the football team all of the band members support. There is also a photo of Burt Bacharach which is one of Noel Gallagher’s favourite musicians. To contradict all of this though there are two wine glasses in the image to represent the new lifestyle the band members are living.

The bands logo in the corner is a lot darker than the rest of the colour palette. This means it will stand out which would have been necessary as this was the first Oasis which means they will have had to make a name for themselves.

My Creative Journey, October 11th

For the last two days I have been filming all of the footage I need for my music videos. The locations I had previously found fitted the requirements of my shot list perfectly and there had to be no changes made. I shot my video on a Samsung smart camera as it was easy to carry around with me due to it being small and I already know how to use it. I had issues with lighting as it was a very bright day, in some cases this has given a good effect but in others this may have to be edited in post production. Some of the lip syncing shots that I wanted in the street were not possible as the people around us filming either looked at the camera or clearly avoided it, this made the video look staged and unnatural. To stop this I changed the locations to other places that were being used at other times of the video however this does mean that some of my music video does not match my storyboard.  

Risk Assessment

Hazard	To who	Risk rating	How to control risk
Tripping	Actors and production team	6/10	Make sure everyone is wearing suitable footwear and make sure floor is stable and all loose wires are covered. Make sure the areas of filming are well lit.
Cuts and scrapes	Actors and production team	4/10	Inspect equipment for sharp edges and rough surfaces. Make sure a first aid kit is accessible.
Fire	Actors, production team and surrounding people	8/10	Make sure electrical equipment isn’t faulty and make sure there are nearby fire extinguishers. Organise a fire procedure and make sure everybody knows it.
Antisocial behaviour	Members of the public and actors	7/10	Make sure each individual knows that antisocial behaviour will not be tolerated and they will be removed. Film when there will be few members of the public around.

 

 

Permission email to Polydor Records

info@polydor.co.uk

Dear Polydor Records,

I am writing to you from Landau Forte Tamworth Sixth Form regrading my A level media studies production. We have been given the brief of creating a music video to rebrand an artist.

With your permission I would like to use The 1975, Loving Someone. I feel I could really create an interesting music video and digipak really highlighting the importance of the message in this song.

This song would only be used for education purposes and not to promote my own brand. My music video would be posted onto our schools’ media studies YouTube channel only so it can be shared with the OCR exam board and with my fellow classmates. Your band and label will be fully recognised throughout the whole of my research and planning and will be given full recognition.

I very much look forward to hearing from you soon. Thank you for taking the time out to read my email.

Yours faithfully,

Phoebe Hughes

Target Audience

Whilst researching narrative ideas for my music video I decided to look into the target audience for the band I am rebranding. The target age for my music video will teenagers and young adults probably in a 16-25 category. This is because the depth of my narrative is quite a serious subject which could be too heavy for younger teenagers and children. I wanted to target the age category in which my video narrative will be about as a way of giving them opportunity to express themselves and showing them it is okay to go against the norms of society and be who they want to be.

I do not want my target audience to be just females like this yougov screenshot says. I think it is important to target both male and female as both genders are affected by the constraints of society and the social structures set by the media on what people are expected to be.
I think it is highly likely that the politics of my audience will be left wing like this screenshot says as my video will have a progressive and not a very conservative message.  


To further research into the target audience of my music video I played my song to people of all age ranges. Many people of around 30 plus did not understand the message from the song alone and only understood once explained. The issues of celebrity culture and expression affects an older generation less than young adults, this is another reason they may not have understood the message. However, once explained many an audience from around 30-50 thought the message was a good one and one that needed to be expressed. I thought that this may have been as they could have children from the age range this is made for. For this reason, I thought that they could possibly be a secondary audience as although not affected by these issues typically they do understand the importance.
From around 50 plus many of the people spoken to did not see the real issue and saw no need for the song. This is therefore not an age range I will focus my music video to at all.