Evaluation Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I have produced a dubstep artist called Influx for my media products. Dubstep has been up and coming in the rave scene over the last 5 or so years, and more recently has firmly taken its place in mainstream music. The artist, Influx consists of two DJs, Red & Black, and a singer, Cassie. It is conventional of dubstep artists to promote the song more than the artist themself in videos and I wanted to challenge this convention through creating a strong artist identity. When constructing the artist identity, however, we did use conventions by devising a hidden identity, keeping the vision of Influx's stage presence in live performances at the forefront of my mind.

Our Music Video

Music Video by mdcassidy

Our Website

Website by mdcassidy

 Our Album Cover

Album by mdcassidy

Andrew Goodwin

1) Genre Characteristics

Our media product is of the dubstep genre and naturally our music video includes many characteristics and conventions. There is clear use of slo-mo and faced paced editing, cutting to the beat and frame-by-frame cutting to give a flashing effect symbolising the atmosphere and visuals of a rave or nightclub. Slo-mo shots and shots with increased speed are used for emphasis i.e. there are changes in speed of the visuals to match that of the track (01:30 - 01:33). There are many handheld shots, spontaneous zooms and tilted angles to give a realistic natural feel, since many dubstep videos share this aspect.

2) Relationship between lyrics and visuals

The lyrics at the chorus are "Promises, and they still feel all so wasted on myself" and they have no relationship to the visuals of the music video itself, thus giving disjuncture.

3) Relationship between music and visuals

The rhythm and beat of the music strongly correlates with the activity in the visuals. This means there is amplification of the heavy beat of track when in combination with the visual cutting to the beat and going through slo-mo as the track seems to warp. The cutting is moderately quick and to the beat during the chorus' and then as the drop is building up there is an increase in pace and crosscutting between narrative and performance, up to the drop where it gets very fast with many visual special effects. During the bridge, the strobe overlay matches the tone of the track at that moment in time, which in turn amplifies the music.

4) Close-ups of the artist and artist motifs

Since this is a debut music video beauty shots of each member of Influx were always going to be pretty frequent, as is the case here. The lead singer, Cassie, has many beauty shots which are particularly scopophilic (such as the jump shot sequence at 01:34 - 01:36). It is clear the male gaze is taken into account since a fair proportion of the target audience is male. Enigma is created where there are close-ups of the DJs since it leaves the audience question who their real identities are. The masks of our DJs are a clear motif of the band, just as Nero has the glasses and Modestep has the yellow face.

5) Reference to the notion of looking

When the DJs look round the door as they come to collect Cassie from the classroom, there is a clear notion of looking.

6) Intertextual references

There is clear inspiration from Modestep's 'Feel Good' in terms of the narrative style where both narratives start off fairly serious and change to chaos. The backwards track shot just after the drop (01:27 - 01:28) is similar to the music video which we did a remake of in the summer 'Everybody Get up' by Five. Also, the first spherise sequence at 01:29 - 01:30 giving this bass feel to the visuals was inspired by a scene from the film 'Limitless'.

7) Performance, Narrative or Concept?

There is an equal balance of crosscutting between narrative and performance, giving a narrative and performance hybrid. The common aspect of each part is Cassie who is the teacher of the narrative as well as the lead singer in the performance and is part of Influx. The connection is there because we see the DJs take Cassie into the performance which the audience has seen the whole time.

Carol Vernallis

1) Narrative

• The narrative visuals bear very little relationship with the lyrics, however they strongly correlate with the music. For instance, during the verses the action in the narrative very much sets the scene and consists of the students being bored and the teacher just getting on with her work. As the verse progresses, the visuals continue to match the music by showing the class become more rowdy and then when the drop hits the narrative shows the classroom in chaos.
• There is a balance between narrative and performance. They are shown equally, however the lead singer, Cassie is the connection between them since she is also the teacher.
• The narrative has closure at the end, although it may seem rather fragmented throughout the video. Nevertheless, the audience can accept this because it is typical of dubstep to have clear contrasts in tone in the track and so during the drop, the narrative visuals show many different clips and highlight individuals. All in all, the narrative still follows a path on a set direction, with the DJs taking the teacher to the performance, where the song ends.

2) Editing

• The editing style matches the phrases if the track, in particular detail in the drop. For example, as the track warps, the visuals slow down, speed up and slow down again, amplifying the music. Also, the single three notes that are clear in between each phrase in the drop have three shots which are emphasised by some editing technique, such as spherise or cutting to black.
• The editing style is incredibly unique, and so advertises itself. Clearly, the creative use of special effects and colour correction makes the video stand out against other videos of its kind.
• Continuity editing does not exist, although there is an order in which the events of the narrative progress. There is a large use of jump cuts, and breaking the 30 and 180 degree rules.

3) Camera Movement and Editing

• The camera movement and framing depends on the tone of the song at that moment in time or in individual phrase. For example, the first verse consists of many slow pans and stationary shots in both narrative and performance. The distances always vary from long shots to close ups with the use of extremes for emphasis.
• Jaunted angles, handheld camerawork and fast zooms dominate the visuals during the drop sequences since they connote a rave and underground vibe.
• There are specific points where there are zooms which match the visuals or the music. At 01:59 there is a zoom from LS to ELS and then back to LS in time with the music. Similarly, at 03:34 there is a faster zoom which is on the beat and matches the action of 'Red' the DJ.

 4) Diegesis

• It is clear that the narrative takes place in a classroom due to the role of the teacher, the students and the fact that there is students' work on the walls. The lighting in the narrative starts of as low key and naturalistic, however after the first drop the lighting changes instantly to high key with high contrast settings in the grading. This remains for the rest of the narrative.
• The performance has three lighting set ups. Most commonly used is the set up which shines a white spot light on Cassie, a blue spotlight on the DJ 'Black' and a red spotlight on the DJ 'Red', with blinder lights around the back. Another set up has no coloured filters and no spotlights to create a silhouette. The finally set up is the use of strobe lighting which appears throughout the video even though it may just be a few frames at a time.
• It could be suggested that the performance is in the same kind of world as the narrative, because the DJs collect Cassie and take her to the performance just before the second drop.
• Often, actions will be disrupte by repeating frames to give a fast paced although static visual which matches the electronic element of the track.