Typical Conventions in Music Videos.

Cutting/ editing in time and to the rhythm of the beat.


Cross-cutting shots of the story part of the video to shots of the band singing the song. This creates a strong visual link between the lyrics, music and visuals and gives the audience an idea of the band - usually used to show the band members, particularly focusing on the lead singer, to give off the image of star personalities. This is even more evident in mainstream solo artists music videos who are nearly always the main focus in the video.


(Parachute - She Is Love)


(OneRepublic - Say All I Need)


(The Script - Before The Worst)

Sometimes there is an introduction before the music starts that gives the context of the story and sets the scene for the video. It also lets the audience connect to the action in the video and makes it seem more like a film which encourages the audience to watch it to the end to follow the story and find out what happens.
However unlike in film as Carol Vernallis points out the editing in music videos can join two shots which have the same composition, shape or colour but are not in the same context.

The continuity does not have to flow like it would in a film for the audience to understand the change, they also wouldn't question if cuts showing the same action jumped to a different location. Like in Coldplay's Fix You the clip shows Chris Martin running in three different locations but not in the order he would have had to have travelled to get to the stage at the end - it cuts from the side of the road, to in the tunnel, to the main street again. The cuts and changing angles makes it more interesting to watch and is faster than earlier in the song which was slower - therefore the cuts were slower.



The most interesting aspects of music videos that draw in the audience are usually done in post-production during the editing whether it is speeding up scenes, slow motion, cutting the shots to the beats in the music or split screens.


Carol Vernallis also points out that a key convention of music video is the use of dolly shots to keep continuous movement for panning, 360˚ and following while walking or running.



We are planning on using some of the typical conventions in our video - the cutting and editing to the fit with the music, the movement in shots (however we can't use a dolly so we will have to use panning and other techniques to keep the video moving) and the cutting between actions to shots with the same action but in a different location (e.g. Katie walking in the same frame in the shot in the country then in the city). However we are breaking the typical convention for having the band performing mixed in with the narrative. We have chosen to not follow this convention because we think the video would be more effective if it is not linked to the music through the visuals of instruments and lip syncing. We also think it fits in better with our overall concept of isolation - Katie will seem more detached if she is the main focus and the video doesn't cut to other people.