Conventions of a music promo

My video is the pop genre. The whole video is about being strong after a break up. Within it you will find:

•          Urban locations

•          Dancing

•          Fairly straight forward narrative

•          Anti-establishment activity

•          Destroyed environments

•          Mean and moody men

•          Deserted locations

•          Singing whilst acting

•          Trying to portray a certain image

•          Self-appreciation

Katy Perry – Part of Me

www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuwfgXD8qV8

The typical camera work used is very much close-ups so you can see them singing or mid shots. They tend to be from the angle of someone looking at them or an over shoulder shot. This makes it look like the viewer is looking on while the video is happening (like they are a part of the video). In the Part of Me video we see a lot of P.O.V shots and over the shoulder, this makes you think as though you are the main character in the video (as you can see in the picture below).  Also in music videos there are a lot of establishing shots to show where its set or the location e.g. in Katy Perry’s they include a lot of shots of the marine camp. This adds to the narrative of the video and shows what is happening.

The lighting in the whole video is very bright and shows the main character (Katy) clearly. This is the same in most pop music videos.  The lighting in the video is very natural almost like sunlight.  The location/ setting are in a marine training camp - this creates a sort of tough meaning to the video which is reinforced by the lyrics. The costumes used are mainly marine uniform as seen here. At the beginning of the video we see Katy as a more girly dressed person whereas towards the end she becomes more of a strong dressed person. There are many props used such as scissors which are used to cut her hair creates the meaning that she’s letting go of her past.

Another prop used is the gun in which its cuts to a flashback of her playing with a toy one then transitioning to a real one showing her character develop. This also helps with the narrative of the video. The storyline of the video is Katy witnessing her boyfriend cheat and running away to the marines. This is reinforces with the lyrics as she says ‘This is the part of me that you’re never going to ever take away from me’ – this suggest that she is strong which is shown within the video and montage of her at the training camp.  The performance itself takes place at the training camp. The way she is performing is singing while doing certain tasks but the video doesn’t show her always singing which is typical in a pop music video.