In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of

real media products?

My media products use codes and conventions as a set of guidelines of how they should look. All of the conventions I used were from existing media products I have analysed. For example, in the music video we wanted to give the performers’ instruments to play, this being a convention which is true across various genres within music videos. However, the video also steers away from conventions, like how it lacks a narrative. So I challenged some conventions in favour of others I was willing to keep.

Another aspect of our media product, the Digipak, followed codes and conventions effectively. It firstly follows practical conventions, wherein it has a typical 6 panel layout. It also follows aesthetic codes as it contains at least 2 pictures of the band and comes with 2 discs. On the other hand it does deviate from regular conventions within the particular Indie genre as it does pertain these images, which for a niche genre like Indie Rock, images of the band are usually not depicted.

The last aspect of the media product also stayed within the rules of it’s genre. It contained the image of the album cover, which is a code of promotional posters. But it’s also not free from challenging conventions as it doesn’t have tour information on it and is merely a logo accompanied with reviews.

How the music video uses and develops forms and conventions.The video uses images of the band playing instruments, this conforms to TDCC’s usual music videos as the band actually playing instruments is a large part of the aesthetic. Specifically, this is one bass guitar and one lead guitar, this is comparable to TDCC as they also include at least one guitar and a bass. This also conforms to Andrew Goodwin’s theory that all music videos include an element of stage performance, that being that all members of the band are seen playing instruments or singing.

The video has a large theme of music. The band is often playing music or visiting music shops. This plays into the usual convention of a TDCC video as they are often seen integrating with music. It also promotes the band as being largely musical as opposed to more mainstream bands where singers or band members may not even seem interested with music. Again this plays into said theory.

Throughout the video the lead singer is prominent. Usually walking in front of the members so he can sing, this is true of most music genres as the lead singer promotes the band as the main image of the band, thus making them easier to recognise. Visually, we have created a motif where the lead singer often gets close ups and this is true throughout the video. (See: Andrew Goodwin) This motif is presented not only in their videos but also as a visual style in all of our work, notably the Digipak.

The video mimics shots used in other TDCC music videos. Such as this shot with echoes the one used in “Something Good Can Work”.This uses the forms and conventions because it’s very similar tohow a TDCC music video would look as it’s their convention.Similarly it can be seen as an intertextual reference to said music video.

How it challenges forms and conventions.

Unintentionally, it challenges TDCC’s usual music video style of their videos having lots of transitions and effects, though it retains some of these aspects. The software we used to make the video doesn’t support these transitions so we couldn’t apply them to the video. This challenges the normal conventions as the final music video focuses more on the band rather than relying on good effects/transitions.

Throughout the video the band is usually seen fully taking part in a chorus/verse. There’s no cuts in-between singing the chorus/verse as the video focuses on the band’s talent, unlike the convention that TDCC’s music videos regularly cut out quite a lot of the singer actually singing. From a practical point of view this made it easier to film as we had less shots to make and musically it presents the band as talented, which fans of any music genre want. They want the band to be talented, so we tried to show this in our final video.

Our video doesn’t present much of a proper narrative like Andrew Goodwin’s theory. It presents a band’s live performance but there isn’t a story of why they are there and what they are doing. This challenges Andrew Goodwin’s conventions yet it doesn’t challenge the conventions of a typical Indie music videos. This is because Indie bands, such as Bombay Bicycle Club, don’t tell stories in their videos, they show a band having a relatively normal day out. Such as Bombay Bicycle Club’s video for “Shuffle”. The video also challenges Todorov’s theory that all mediums start with an equilibrium, lead to a disequilibrium and end in a new one. As our video lacks the narrative to have the disequilibrium it instead only relies on the equilibrium for the band. Where the band is having a normal day out. So it pertains one of Todorov’s elements, but not enough to suffice his theory on all mediums. Therefore it challenges his views as well as Mr Goodwin’s.

How the Digipak uses and develops forms and conventions.It uses the conventional Digipak design.

Lots of Indie media products don’t pertain to the band being displayed on the front or back of the Digipak, we have kept to this convention by having art displayed on it rather than the band. The reason we kept to this is because it meant the pictures of the band could be used within the Digipak making the product more exclusive.

The mise en scene in the photos plays to normal conventions of Indie photographs of a band. The band is displayed outdoors/indoors in an urban type area, this is used because fans of the band will live in urban cities as our audience research showed us. The urban image of the band conforms to the codes and conventions of the music genre we are portraying.

Two Door Cinema Club The Maccabees

How it challenges forms and conventions.The Digipak has a large focus on the band itself, lots of Indie media products have Digipaks that don’t feature on the band and have a hierarchical theme to them rather than ours which a large majority of the Digipak space used is displaying the band.

In terms of design, it differs from regular Indie Rock album covers as it strays slightly into urban style. The brick wall which makes up the background would much more be identifiable with the Urban genre than the Indie Rock genre. However, Indie is very vast and sometimes, like this, can combine many different codes from other genres. That in itself being a convention of Indie, originality.

The mise-en-scene also challenges normal codes and conventions as fashion is not a large element of the band’s clothing. Whereas within most Indie bands fashion is almost the priority with this band it refutes the large part fashion plays in their dynamic and this could possibly mean that it’s because they focus more on their music.

How the poster uses and develops forms and conventions.

How it challenges forms and conventions.

Generally, promotional posters are used in order to advertise a particular album. This is a convention across all genres of music. Therefore in order to do this they keep to the same design as the album. We followed this convention when making our poster as it has the same image used as in the album, ergo promoting said album. This convention is also seen in the band I portrayed, for their album “Tourist History” it uses the album’s front cover as the poster.

The album cover for Tourist History:-

Generally, promotional posters are used in order to advertise a particular album. This is a convention across all genres of music. Therefore in order to do this they keep to the same design as the album. We followed this convention when making our poster as it has the same image used as in the album, ergo promoting said album. This convention is also seen in the band I portrayed, for their album “Tourist History” it uses the album’s front cover as the poster.