conventions of a music video

All music videos cater to a certain genre and audience ; the images, types of performances and narrative all depend on the genre of the music.


There are three types of performances:

Commercial exhibitionist: A commercial exhibitionist is a performance in which the artist sells their voice, face, lifestyle, hair and so on - their whole image. The artist wants fame and for their records to sell. 
Normally the artist will have various personas, costumes,  hair and makeup. There will be an array of dance moves and narratives.

Typical conventions of this performance would be:

• Close ups/extreme close ups of the artists face and outfits
• Strong female or male personas which are inspiring to the audience
• Choreographed dance routines
• Jump cuts between different shots/narratives
• Montage editing of different scenes/props/costumes and looks

Televised Bard:A televised Bard performance is when a singer uses on-screen images to tell a story instead of inner, personal images. The images often represent the artists own personal issues or unfufilled wishes. Images could include other people or abstract things but they create a story about life and death.

Typical conventions of this performance would be:

• Strong, clear narratives, could be understood as a short movie.
• Audio - visual poetry
• Inserted images to help tell the story

Electronic Shaman: An electronic shaman performance is a visual matches the music. The shaman can be invisible and you can only hear his/her voice. The visuals go along with the beat and rhythm of the music. The electronic shaman promises there is normally a hidden meaning in everything, that we live in a magical, mythical relaity. The electronic shamans voice and rythm connect images and sound together.

Typical conventions of this performance would be:

• Visuals match the beat and tempo of the music
• The visuals are often computer animated or digitally enhanced

Visual music video Styles

• Standard clip: A music video that contains more or less three visual traditions; a filmed singer is blended with images and the presentation is artistically influenced by the experimental film tradition.
• Performance clip:If a video contains mostly filmed performance then it is a performance clip. The performance can take place anywhere.
• Narrative clip:If a music video is mostly appropriatlly understood as a short sielnt movie to a musical background then it is a narrative clip. A narrative clip contains no lip synchronised singing.
• Art clip: If a mucis video contains no perceptible visual narrative and contains no lip synchronised singing then this is a pure art clip.