R&P Post 30: Conventions of Pop Music Videos

Hiya! For this post I will be talking about the conventions of music videos within the pop genre. This will really help with my research and planning for my own music video as, because me and my group have decided to create a music video for a pop song, it is important to know and understand the conventions of these music videos in order for us to use, develop and challenge them.

These are the main conventions of pop videos:

• Use of bright colours.
• Use of close-ups of the artist. 
• Use of fast-paced editing.

Bright colours

The use of bright colours is a key convention for this genre and is seen in many videos:

'All About That Bass' by Meghan Trainor:

In this video, bright colours are used throughout. This strongly emphasises the aesthetic of the video and really draws the audience's attention to its colours:



These bright and lively colours are very common in pop videos and Trainor's video for 'All About That Bass' especially emphasises this.Her video uses colours of pinks, purples, blues and yellows, making use of these bright colours to create a lively and exciting music video for her audience. Whilst this music video makes effective use of bright pastel colours, colours can also be used in a different way for pop videos through the use of neon colours.

'Middle Of The Night' by The Vamps and Martin Jensen:


This pop video also uses bright colours but uses them in a different way compared to Meghan Trainor. This video uses more neon colours, rather than pastel colours, to provide it with brighter tones. For example:





From the clips above you can see some of the main parts of this music video which show the clear use of bright neon colours. In this music video, the colours of pink and blue are the main colours that have been used for this neon-like effect. Whilst Trainor's video certainly uses bright colours, she uses pastel colours, whereas the video for 'Middle Of The Night' uses bright colours with neon tones.What these neon tones suggest is a more festival or party-like vibe which we could use for our own music video. Neon colours would be useful for us to use as they strongly attract teenage audiences, due to the connotations of parties and festivals, meaning that we would be able to market more successfully to our own audiences by using this type of colour scheme.


Close-ups
Close-ups are another key convention of pop videos and are frequently used to show the artist themselves close-up. Take Bebe Rexha's video for 'Meant to Be' (featuring Florida Georgia Line) for example:


This music video continuously uses close-ups of Bebe Rexha throughout:


These images show particular close-ups of the artist in this music video, demonstrating how these type of shots have been used throughout the music video. This is very common to pop videos and is also seen in music videos for very popular artists, such as Ariana Grande and Katy Perry:

Screenshots taken from Ariana Grande's music vide for 'Dangerous Woman'

Screenshots taken from Katy Perry's music video for 'Roar'

From each of these examples you are able to see how close-ups are frequently used for music videos within the pop genre and are used for the purpose of focusing on the appearance of the artist themselves, drawing their audiences towards the representation of the artist. 


Fast-paced editing and quick cuts
This is another very common convention of pop videos and is often seen in many pop videos. For example, Jessie J's video for 'Domino' clearly uses this convention in this music video:

The clips above show the main parts of this music video where fast-paced editing is most effectively used. From these clips you can clearly see how this convention is strongly utilised, creating a very lively and exciting music video which keeps the audience interested throughout, grabbing their attention.  This convention is also seen in Lorde's video for 'Green Light':







These clips taken from the music video for 'Green Light' also represent the use of fast-paced editing in pop videos. This convention is mainly used for the choruses of songs and emphasises the upbeat Rhythm, especially of pop songs since songs within this genre are generally fast-paced themselves, matching the visuals to the music which is also part of Goodwin's theory on music videos. 

So there we have the three main conventions of pop videos. The examples given demonstrate how pop videos often utilise these conventions, making effective and significant use of them to conform to conventions of videos within this genre. This research will be very useful for me when me and my group come to plan and film our own music video as we will have each of these different conventions in mind, and plan how we can use, develop and challenge them.