Analysis of Student Films

Daniel Cope - I'll Show You New York - Jenna Bolingbroke

The genre of this music video is maybe a slow pop/soul. It doesn't have a particular genre that it fits into as if it was pop it may be more upbeat but there is nothing else it would be classed as.
The narrative is that there is a young couple who have broken up and they are reminiscing of the good times they used to have for example going to the beach.

A black and white filter was used at the start which connotes there is going to be negativity within this music video. As I starts quite negative it is showing the Todorov theory of it starting with a problem and the filter comes back at the end showing it ends on the problem as well. I found it quite unexpected at the end where the couple walk back past each other but did not say anything and just ignored each other because I thought there may be a happy ending where they make up but it surprised me it ended negatively.

The video shows a theme of love with some tension. You can tell that the love is still there as they are still thinking of each other however they are broken up so there is still issues with their relationship.
As this is only a student film they could not use the actual artist of the song in their music video but the male character was used to be the artist as he does some lip synching from time to time. I thought this was quite good because it is a hard thing to do and it looked fairly realistic.

This music video follows Andy Goodwin's theory of where there is a link between the lyrics and the visuals. This was shown when the artist sang about a 'skyline' and it showed a skyline. Although this shot underneath might not have been perfect, you could see what they were trying to show and for a student film they are showing the idea is there.

This video had a variety of different locations where it was shot which is good because it shows they out a lot of effort into making it and the audience didn't have to look at the same shots throughout the clip. this is good because if the audience are looking at the same shots they will eventually get bored which isn't going to help promote the song which is the purpose of the video.
A lot of the video was shown at the beach of the couples. This location is stereotypical for young couples to go to because it is a fun place to go to and you will often see a lot of music videos with similar narratives at the beach.

The lighting throughout the clip was naturalistic and quite bright because they were reminiscing on the positive past. At the start and end of the video a black and white filter was used to make everything look grey and negative which connotes the characters were sad and not as happy as they used to be.

A problem I found with the camera work for the music video was how shaky the camera was. As soon as I noticed this I looked the whole way through and this was consistent. The camera shots were good but this was definitely a problem because it made it look quite unprofessional when they had used a good use of shots.

Lots of mid shots were used to show the couple together so you could see both of them and how happy they were. There was also close ups throughout the negative parts of the video so the audience could see the facial expressions of the characters and see they were upset.
In particular I saw a shot with the artist playing the guitar. He was trying to look like the artist whilst lip synching. I think that he done a good job because it is a hard thing to do and he managed to make it look realistic and pull it off.




The editing for this music video was good. It had frequent cuts which went with he music and you could tell they had spent a lot of time doing the editing. The frequent cuts also meant that it gave the audience new things to look at and would have kept them interested within the music video which is important.
It was quite slow editing however which suited the song because it was a slow song so it meant it would have to have slow cuts. This however picked up for the chorus when the music started to pick up pace which is good because it shows the link.

The target audience for this music video is quite wide because it is a popular genre and the video its self is about love and romance which lots of people can relate themselves too. If audiences can relate themselves to this then it means they might be more interested in the music video and more engaged.


Frick Park Market- Mac Miller

The genre for this music video is hip-hop. This song doesn't have a clear narrative but shows a variety of shots of teenagers having fun and messing around which they are stereotyped to do. It is shown to be a fun video which is aimed at people their own age so they can relate to this video and it is shown as exciting. The video uses lots of frames and is primly fast paced editing which helps to identify the genre it is. I think this student film has done really well with this because they made sure that the music video matched the song and it was relevant. I think this music video is what was wanted from the song.

The characters played in the part were good because they again matched the music video, he is what you expect to see within the music video. You can see that they planned what this actor was to wear within the music video as they have used props such as the snapback with clothes that are stereotypically used by teenagers which are seen to be mainstream. People who are in this teenage bracket would look at him and class him as quite 'cool' and would maybe want to be him or act like he does. If this was say an 80 year old women in the music video instead, it may look a little odd and make the music video look of a poor quality as the students haven't thought about who is going to star in their video and have just got anyone in.

This video also used Andrew Goodwin's theory of where the lyrics match the music video. An example of this is where the lyrics said "my socks stay blue" whilst showing a close up of someone's blue socks.

This is not the only time this happens in the video but they have followed this theory throughout in order to help the audience watching understand what the lyrics are saying. It works as an aid to understand what the artist is talking about.

This music video used a large variety of shot compositions as well as locations. This is one of the most important things to do in a music video of this genre because that is one of the generic conventions. It used hundreds of quick shots of all compositions which was aided with the editing. It used jump cuts within the editing which were used effectively and could be the reason as to why they got full marks on their piece.

This was potentially my favourite bit of the editing because when watching it, it flowed really well and it worked. This would have been hard to do but they have pulled it off well. This editing has helped me give me some ideas of what I could do in my music video because I wouldn't have thought about doing things like this. It has widened what I could use in my video and has given me something to think about.