Music Video Essay

Music Video Essay: (1000 Words)

The Director I have chosen is Hype Williams, Who is known for directing videos by Busta Rhymes, Drake, Jay Z, Kanye West, Notorious B.I.G and 2 Pac. Some of the songs that Hype Williams has made videos for have made it up to the top charts, for example, Jay Z's Empire state of mind, Kanye West's Stronger and All of the lights, which are all the videos I'm going to be talking about. Williams Started his career in 1998 with a film called Belly, Starring DMX and Nas, but this was the only feature film that he has made to date because since then all of the film projects he has helped or done have either been canceled and made again with someone else or have just been canceled overall. Since he moved to doing music videos he has won many awards including the Billboard Music Video Awards for Director of the Year, the Jackson Limo Award for Best Rap Video of the Year etc.

Kanye West - Stronger 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsO6ZnUZI0g

Firstly, we start with Kanye West's Stronger, Developed in 2007, this video shows a kind off Techno, Futuristic Theme to it, which suits not only the song but the artist. The Reason it suits the artist is because stronger is the remix to the 2001 daft punk song "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"  and being a remixed Daft Punk song you would assume that there would be a techno type of theme to it, being that Daft Punk's song genre is Electronic. It suits the song because if you listen to the song it has a lot of techno aspects, for example, the way that music repeats it to create a sort of beat pattern.

Even though the video is techno themed, it does have its moments of other types of genre, including, the scene during the end with the soldiers, that has a action type theme because of all the guns. Another one would be when you see Kanye West singing in that basement type room it gives a dark thriller type genre because of not only the way its edited but the way its shot.
When it comes to the Cinematography, it uses a lot of medium close ups to shows Kanye West and also sometimes during the video it shows Daft Punk a couple of times to show the audience that the song was originally made by them. In some of the scene's it shows a couple of action type shots of some motorbikes by panning the camera quickly to show how fast they are going, which I think kind off mixes with the original song because it has "Faster" in the title.
In this video, it shows a lot of performance and concept based to give it a music video vibe but also try and make it look like a film type video to show that it has a story towards it. In the video, it using more performance based (Kanye West and Daft Punk) to remind you that it still is a music video, because if it used concept based then you would of completely forgot that it was a music video and would of thought that it was a random story based video with some song in the background.
But on the other hand it is a good thing that it used concept based, without it you wouldn't of  understood why the video is called stronger because just having him singing there would of not gave you a clear understanding about what he is singing about.

Most of the shots in this video were handheld to kind off show a broken down future look and to give it a quick paced look, for example, when Daft Punk are on the control panel thing, the camera is moving around with handheld shots so it makes it look like they are in a rush to get it finished or something, during the end it using the same handheld technique but this time they use it in a running way and start shaking the camera to make it look like Kanye West has gone out of control.
Talking about shots, sometimes they use a couple of dolly type movements to give you a sense of where he is, like when he is in the factory type place the camera is moving back to give a sort of establishing shot of where he actually is.
In some scenes in the video , I noticed that the camera did this shacking thing where it had looked like it had be punched or pushed, the scenes that this did this was when Kanye West was (Using his power) and they did this so that it would give a sort of power to him showing that he has got "Stronger" which obviously links with the name of the song.

Out the video, some of the shots show a woman, from looking at the video this woman is either a ex girlfriend, is his girlfriend or someone that he loves, the way they show this is they keep pan into her on following her using handheld techniques or even going around her with the camera. Another thing that comes up unexpectedly is when they show shots of either the Japanese government or their army, for this they use the same type of thing as the concept they did for shaking the camera for Kanye West, they did it so that it would show power, because the Japanese have become very powerful now.
When it comes to Colours, because this video is based in Japan the colours that they use are going to have to be very colourful and bright, also because Daft Punk are a techno type of band so you need the neon type of colours like blue, green, red etc.
At the start, they show this machine thing with the artist inside, the colours they use are very bright and blue to show that it is very futuristic, not only that but the next shot of Japan also shows a very futuristic theme by using the bright, colourful signs on the buildings.
During the motorbike scene, if you look behind them there are these glowing particle ribbons behind them. They use this so that you think that they are going really fast because, for example, when you see though quick videos of the road, you really see the cars but you do see the headlight moving ans stretching, so if they was to do that they it shows that they are going to a quick speed.
The only thing in this video that is not colourful are the scenes where Kanye West is singing in front of the camera, this is to show that he is trapped from all the outside, which is colourful, that is because if you notice any scene you see without Kanye West singing he is in that machine unconscious also the lyrics say "don't kill me" and "make me stronger" which shows that he is sick and he needs to get better.

During the end of the video, when Kanye West is getting surrounded by police, you notice that all of the soldiers are in black uniforms and Kanye is in a white costume. That is to show that he is the one that people should be looking at (the important one).
Out of all the things in this video, lighting comes up the most because of how important lighting can be in videos (especially in this one), its important in this video because in some scenes they cant count on background light because some where filmed in sets and green screens so the room wouldn't be light when filming.

During this entire video the most common thing is glowing neon lights, the reason for that it because it is trying to get this futuristic look and what's more futuristic then a bunch of glowing LED light flying around a CGI machine. Another type of futuristic thing they use in this video is where they use a lot of UV Lighting to give it a dark evil futuristic look, also some of the scenes with the UV make it look like its a nightclub because of the way it is positioned and some nightclub use UV lights in separation to normal lights. The last futuristic type lighting they use to theme the video is in some of the scenes they use some optical flares to really brighten those scenes up, the director himself must of researched some futuristic type films and noticed that nearly most of them use flares to make the light on the video look like it was made in the future, the places he uses it is during the time the CGI machine is reviving him, on the pod part all of the outer light are flared to make it look brighter and more epic.
Another one that I noticed was during the outside scene's they didn't use any of their own lighting and relied on natural light from the city, The reason I think they did that was because naturally in some area's Japan is quite bright due to their bright building signs, so they must of took that as a good opportunity and plus because that scene isn't as light as the scenes where they are using light, it gives it more of a darker look which really works for the video.

When Kanye West is singing in the video, there wasn't much lighting made in this because you didnt need that much, the only lighting used was one light on him and by looking at his shadow you can see that the light was slightly moved to his left, because the shadow is in the opposite direction. Also because this scene is quite dark it was good to only use one light because then it you can really see how dark it is.

The editing in this video is very keen because to pull of a techno video you cant rely on natural things unless you find a very futuristic look place but then you would still need editing to make it look more futuristic.

At the start of the video if starts with this CGI machine thing that looks like it is reviving Kanye West, clearly looking at it you notice that it has been editing because comparing CGI to then and now you can tell that it has had enough done to it to make it look like it was actually built, they made this so that instead of using a hospital like they did at the end, they ended up making it look very futuristic with all the technology they have now.

This video overall has a lot of fast and slow paced scenes, including the beginning when Daft Punk are on the machine thing the camera keeps cutting at a very fast pace which makes it look a lot quicker then way they was in production. Another one is at the end and some of the middle when its on Kanye West, the video will sometimes use this sort of slow stop motion thing to it, making the video look like it distorted in some way (giving a broken down video type scene).
Sometimes during the video it will stop and show some Japanese written captions. This is to let the audience know where it is based and to make it look like a Japanese video, because if it was in English then you wouldn't get why they are in Japan.

After watching this video you can clearly tell not only does it have a bit of performance base, by showing Kanye West himself, but it is mostly narrative based, because if you listen to the lyrics he says things like "I need you to hurry up now" and when he says that it shows the people on the motorbike, which shows that he needs to hurry up, the reason it isn't concept based is because if it was then it would have a completely different story or even not even have one, it might just have random clips.
The Reason that Kanye West made this video was to not only show himself off as a singer, but also for marketing reason because in the video it keeps showing him, so he is trying to show himself off and this video ended up getting to of the charts and won a couple of awards.
The Target audience for this video I would say is probably for teenagers and older, not because of language or anything like that, purely because anyone younger don't really listen to that type of music or really watch the videos.

Jay Z - Empire State Of Mind
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjsXo9l6I8

The next music video I want to talk about is Jay Z's Empire state of mind. The theme towards this is a happy, cheerful type because of the way it sounds and the artist's on the video look very happy she they are mentioning things about New York. It not only shows a happy theme but a Memory/Flashback theme, by that I mean videos that show previous pictures/videos, kind off like Justin Timberlake's Mirrors, where it shows the couple from when they met, but the way they show it in this is they use old picture's of Brooklyn whilst Jay Z is singing about all the places he has been in there.
This video shows a lots different type of shots and angle, one that stands out is the wide angle helicopter shot of New York, which shows quite a lot during the duration of this video to not only try and show how beautiful New York can be but also to show what they are talking about.
During the beginning of the video (before and during Jay Z singing) it shows these pictures of either street signs, people or roads in New York, Brooklyn) the reason for this is to show people what Jay Z is rapping about, instead of using just shots of him singing.

For both Jay Z and Alicia Keys, when the camera if facing them, both there angles are completely different. Every time the camera is on Jay Z it is either a medium close up, so that not only you can see his hand movements but to also show the background, close up, so that you can notice more than the background and finally a wide shot, so that you can see what part of New York he is in.
For Alicia Keys she has more medium shots and wide shots, so you can also notice the piano and the background, but what makes her camera shots and angles different is that every shot that is on her is (no matter what angle) it is always panning across her, because of the fact she is in the heart of New York City and they not only want to get her but show her surroundings.

During Jay Z's last verse it shows him in an apartment, this scene using medium shots and wide shots to let the audience notice where he is, when he gets to the window it does this midway between a medium shot and medium close up, the reason for that is so that you can not only see him but the background because in the background there is the Empire State Building and if you notice that is the name of the song. These are not the only times you see the Empire State Building in this video, most of the pictures in the video are of the it and also during the helicopter shots they manage to get a lot of good shots of it as well, so you notice they really wanted people to notice this building more than anything else.
During this entire video clearly colour wasn't the main priority because most of the video was in black white, they did this because in this video Jay Z is rapping about his past (when he use to live there) and the best way to show someone past when filming is to give it a black and white look, to make it look older, I think that was a very cleaver way of doing it because then it gets people to understand that after they have watched it.

After watching the video you notice that as the video goes on it gets more and more into colour, this links in with the previous point that he is talking about his past, but as the song goes on he starts to sing more and more into the future until it gets to the present and thats when all the colour is back to the video, they did this so that the audience could notice that its getting into the present because of the way it went straight into colour.
Like colour, lighting was not the most important thing in this video because they was filming outside in New York they in the middle of the day they didn't really need to use professional lighting, all they needed was the natural light. The only scene they looked like they used the lighting was during the night scene at the end when they was singing in the street, they did this because they couldn't rely on the natural light because the street is not bright enough and the sun is not out.

During the video it keeps showing these pictures, to resemble Jay Z's past, when editing this they looked like they wanted to make it fast enough so that you could get a quick look before it faded away, if they would of done it any slower then it would be to slow and people would of got bored with the pictures but if they had done it any quicker then it would been there and gone to quickly which would of meant that no one could have seen them and there would of been no point putting them there in the first place, so they got a good speed.
During the time the artists are singing the video sometimes quickly cuts into a shot of either the pictures or the shots of New York, they did this so that the audience wouldn't get bored of just watching the artists singing.
In this entire video, nearly all of the cut aways are fades between shots, the reason for that is cause the video is so quick they needed something to slow it down a bit, over wise the video would of looked way to quick and it would of been really hard to see shot from shot.
Overall the pace of the video is quite quick because the song is mostly rap and rap is mostly quick, so you would have to keep matching up to the speed of the lyrics with the video.

Watching this video over a couple of times I have notice that it is mostly performance based, due to the amount of time Jay Z and Alicia Keys make an appearance (which is most of it) and the video itself does have a few narrative based elements in it, you can tell that it is narrative and not concept because Jay Z is rapping about all the places he has visited it shows all of them on the video, using the pictures and videos, if it was concept based it would of looked completely different and with different shots.

The purpose of the video was to not only let people know how amazing they think there home town is but also for marketing and promotional reason, the reason for marketing is because most songs that make music videos are usually because they are going to sell it on CD. When it comes to promotional reasons, they are nearly always in the video so it could be that they are trying to promote themselves as singers.
If I had to choose an age limit, I would say this video is suitable for teenagers and above, the reason for that is it has the same thing as Stronger, the video and song is not that bad to use for people younger but its only cause teenagers would watch the video more that younger people.

Kanye West - All of the Lights
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAfFfqiYLp0

Lastly, I want to talk about Kanye West's Hit All of the Lights. After watching it I can see that it has a few different themes to it. at the start it shows a very depressing type theme because its all in black and white, the instrumental to it is very sad and soft and also the scene is a little girl all by herself looking upset and walking through what looks like New York City. After that it kind off cuts to this flashy angry type theme, because it starts all flashy with loads flashing lights and text, then when it cuts to the artist its starts to sound a bit angry and starts to show this evil type look towards it.

In this video, like Empire State Of Mind, all the artists except the main one, has different shots. Rhianna and Kid Cudi both have the same exact shots (which is a medium shot of them and then sometimes switch to a close up) where as with Kanye West, he is in a completely different set and instead of having medium and close up shots he has wide shots and panning medium shots, they did this so that you would know who the main artist of this song was. At the start of this video it shows a little girl walking out of a train station and then walking down the streets of New York, this part of the video looks kind off like a home made video because of the way it was shot, which was using mostly handheld and not the best quality camera and shots. Also after watching the video you notice that the girl ends up appearing in the video again at least twice, after noticing this I realised that this girl is quite an important part of this video because he mentions how he lost his girlfriend and that he couldn't see his daughter because of that, so that girl could be his daughter who is on her way to her mums house. Another thing that links with Empire State of Mind is that this video also shows scenes to show that its in New York as well and they did it for the exact same reason (to show were they are).

The colour in this video is pretty obvious, because most of it has loads of colourful lights and text. When the video starts, the colour of it is quite plain (black and white) to show this emptiness and depression because there of the way the scene is. When that scene ends it straight away cuts into loads of different colour throwing at the screen, it starts with a load of flashing colourful text, then cuts to loads of different types of colour correction. If this video didn't have any lights I don't think it would of been as entertaining or explosive as this video was because it would of looked plain and boring, also if it didn't have any colour then nobody would of understood the beginning with the girl (because of the way it changes colour immediately).

Lights in this video was probably the most important thing to use, because of the fact the video is called "All of the Lights". The beginning doesn't really use that much lighting because that part was kind of a seperate back story towards it, so instead of using bright, flashy lights it ends up using the natural light (which links with the previous point of the home made look). As soon as the actual song cuts in it straight away explodes with all these bright lighted text, which really change the mood straight away. Once it gets to the scene with Kanye West it shows a lot of lighting, including, police lights, background studio lights and street lights, which really makes you understand that they really wanted to make the audience attracted to the video. When it gets to the scenes with Rhianna and Kid Cudi it kind of shortens with the lights, because they only use a background studio light (you can tell from the spotlight on the wall behind them).

When it came to editing, the video at the start looks very poorly editing, which was the thing they wanted because they wanted to show this home made look and most home made videos are very poorly edited. When it gets to the actually singing part of the video the editing starts to look better. A very unique edit they used was instead of using fade out or flash transitions they used bright colours to switch clips which I thought was a very good way to do so because it linked with the video very well. During the video I noticed there are a lot of colour corrections when it is on one of the artists, they did this so that not only does the audience stay interested but also because its trying to link to the video as much as it can. Another good thing it does to keep the audience interested is it using the lyrics on the video in different custom text and lights, this also kind of gave it a Vegas look towards it and they actually mention Vegas and lastly it makes the video look a bit 90s which attracts a older audience.

After Watching over this video a few times, you can clearly tell this video (like the others) has a performance and narrative based. It shows performance base because it shows every artist a few times after a couple of shots. The reason it is also narrative based as well because it when Kanye West is singing about coming home it shows a POV (personal view) of him doing what he raps.

The purpose of this video, after watching it, is to not only promote themselves as artist's but to also market this song, because like I said with the previous video, if they make a music video it means they want it to go on the charts and get noticed and then people buy it.
The target audience for this is probably (like the others) teens and above, this time because this on is about sex and violence so I think the age limit would be 15+, also it shows the warning at the start so you would understand why.

In conclusion, All the videos use very fast paced, brightly colourful and highly edited. They use a lot of good techniques to link not only with the lyrics but also with the way it sounds, for example, in All of the lights the lights flash with beat and also with lyrics. In my opinion after watching these videos a few times each and dotting out some of these things I have written I can say that they are very detailed and work very well with the genre that it is. All three of these music videos are very entertaining for the way that they have been made because they never just stay on one thing, they always switch to other scenes to keep not only the audience but me very attracted to the video. They are a great way to promote the artist's cause they always use performance based either in most of the video or some of it.