Best Example of a Music Video Form

Chris Brown ft. Busta Rhymes & Lil Wayne – Look at me now

I think the video for this song is a great example of what a video should look like.

·     The function of a music video is to promote the artist and the song. This video does this really well as there are many close ups of the main artists.

·     The visuals within the video are the strongest point of the video to me. There's so much going on that makes the video look so fun and exciting. It grabs the audience’s attention which is important for promotion. For example, there’s dancing, bike riding, skating and spray painting all going on within the video. This all adds to the fun of the video and relates directly with the target audience of the video.

·     The mise en scene in the video is extremely creative. Firstly, the genre of the song is Hip Hop and the mise en scene reflects the genre. An example of this is the use of clothing; Chris Brown wears a hat saying Brooklyn, Brooklyn has historical background in Hip Hop as it is the home of many Hip Hop artists. Furthermore all the clothing is colourful reflecting the new Hip Hop era movement.                                     The beginning of the video shows Brown wearing a mirrored mask inside a cage and then a dance routine in a graffiti covered parking garage. The location is great for the events that take place within the video. Additionally there’s a scene of them on top of a car rapping and dancing which makes the video appear really fun.

·     The editing in the video consists of several jump cuts, and each jump cut is action filled. Slow motion is used in the video, for example during the dance routine. The match cuts are really fast during Busta Rhymes verse reflecting his fast flow when saying the lyrics. Moreover a fish eye lens is used for Busta Rhymes verse adding humour to video as his eyes swell outward from his face.

·     The lighting helps add to the fun atmosphere in the video as there’s flashing lights all over the video. Additionally a music video should have several camera angles and shots; this had low angle, high angle, track and panning shots, close, medium shots. The effect of having various shots in this video is that the viewer can see aspects of a video differently. For example, the high angle shot of the artists on a van also shows us the other things taking place in the shot like the dancing and the skating/bike riding, these things wouldn’t have been seen if the whole video was filmed in medium shot.

Kanye West – Touch the sky is also a great example of a music video