Conventions of Music Videos

There are many different types of conventions which are used in music videos to portray different emotions, meanings, and point of view (POV).

Technical 

The technical technique is showing the meaning of a video through the equipment. The equipment would be things such as the camera and the way the camera angle presents certain objects and people within the shots. The technical technique also shows meaning through diegetic and non-diegetic sounds and the style of editing. All of the editing and the sound will form a certain genre.

Through the camera angles and camera shots, there are more symbolic meanings which would portray emotions. For example, a camera might do a close up on the artist and show their facial expressions or their gestures and body language towards other people. Long shots would show mise en scene which would once again show the emotions of a person (through pathetic fallacy or the colours and room/space surrounding the artist).

Why are there Conventions?

Having conventions which specific genres should abide by means that the audience will become familiar with what is within a certain genre and have certain expectation as it sets structure which the audience will understand more than no conventions which means that any music video can do any sort of video. This could be argued as a good thing, however some types of videos may be inappropriate for certain target audiences. 

Style of Music Video:

Performance - 

Performance videos consist of the artists performing to the camera as if they were on a stage, just doing the dances which they would do for a concert and singing while looking into the camera or facing towards the camera. Performance videos are not as common as narrative or mixed videos because these music videos are not as popular due to the way that the audience find it harder to engage or interact with the video. Unless the video has got very interesting costumes and the lighting is interesting, the video is unlikely to do well.

Narrative - 

This type of video is one which follows a storyline. This would usually mean that there is a beginning, middle and an end, however sometimes the story isn't told in chronological order to be different and get the viewers attention because they are confused and want to have a more definite understanding of the storyline.

Mixture - 

A mixture music video is a mixture of narrative and performance. This is often more interesting than being either performance or narrative based. Through having performance and narrative, the video will tell a story which the audience will understand (the storyline wouldn't be complicated however it would capture the audience's attention), as well as just performing to the camera which the audience would enjoy also, making the video more successful and interesting than other types of music videos. 

Cameo - 

A cameo video is when the artist (or band) would feature in the narrative performance, however does not actually perform themselves. This could be them acting a scene out for the music video, however not even miming the song, therefore not performing at all, simply just appearing in the video.

Camera Shots -

In music videos, camera shots and angles are very important. This is because camera angles and shots are what makes the music video interesting and different. If the music video was a longshot throughout the whole video, then the video would get boring as the video would only be showing the people either acting out a scene from afar or a dance. Dancing (or a performance video) is interesting, however it must be kept interesting by showing the performance from a different perspective or angle.