The song, "Solstice" was released in 2018 by Yeek - a multimedia artist based in New jersey, USA. It has minimal layers and a monotonous chorus to reflect the artist's mood and feeling about the focus, rain. Yeek has a very strong brand identity and rarely releases new music whilst still retaining a fairly large following. In addition to creating music he also directs and features in his own music videos alongside creating artwork. His iconography is often strengthened in his music videos by abstract concepts, unusual effects and multimedia influence such as animation. 'Dream pop' songs tend to have a strong sense of minimalism and atmosphere which lends itself well to a concept style video however can be very uninteresting to a listener. It has been slowly emerging since its birth from the neo-psychedelic rock genre in the 80s but is still dominated by smaller artists compared to more widely recognised genres.
Personally I'm not a fan of the song or the 'dream pop' genre however I purposefully chose a song and genre I wasn't interested in for two reasons. The main reason I did this was to challenge myself, in real life there's a high chance that I would have to make a video for a song I didn't like. Furthermore the idea of rain which the song focusses on is something I have avoided looking at creatively for the 5 years I've been taking pictures and making videos so this increased the challenge for me. The second and less significant reason why I chose a bad song instead of one personal to me was so that the process of filming and editing a video wouldn't ruin a song that was special to me. In my experience the repetitive process of filming and editing using a song often ruins that song for me.
Style of Music video
As outlined in my M1 Justification of context post I chose to create a concept style music video. Although some dream pop videos are performance based there is always an underlying conceptual element which could even be seen in camera movement, motion graphics or special effects. Furthermore, the artist himself creates primarily concept style music videos so I felt that this style would best support his brand. For example in his 'only in the west' music video he used strange conceptual shots ranging from a mattress in the ocean to a face in a fish bowl to reference the effects of drug use - the focus of the song. This research led me to creating a concept style video with some unusual shot types and special effects in an attempt to support the artist's brand identity and add to the focus of rain.
Shooting to adhere with genre conventions
Typically music videos in this genre feature a surplus of wide and extreme wide shots to represent isolation and solidarity. In alignment with this genre convention I used many wide shots in my video for the same purpose.
Some of these wide shots included the actor and some were just of a stagnant scene however I felt it was crucial to include them as the song also has a very empty and deserted feel to it and therefore the visuals support the song. In addition special effects tend to be a key convention of music videos in this genre so I had to shoot with post production in mind. By this I mean that I shot scenes in ways that would make the editing process cleaner and easier when creating special effects ie. shooting on a tripod, collecting base shots etc. I shot many of the scenes from an eye-level angle which contrasted the purposeful absence of a close-up shot of the actor - this meant that although the audience felt on the same level as the actor they never got too close to him which represents the isolation felt by the character.
The only close up shot of the actor occurred when taking drugs which is symbolic of how the character feels more open and less solidary when intoxicated.
As mentioned, I chose to focus on rain in song choice and music video concept as a way to challenge myself which meant that shots taken in rain would be more effective. When shooting I tried to shoot in rain as much as possible to support the pathetic fallacy theme we see across Dream Pop videos however I didn't shoot in rain as much as planned. This was mainly because I would have to use a waterproof plastic cover for my camera to avoid gear damage which led to shaky and blurry footage which I am unhappy with. In terms of camera movement I wanted to primarily use stationary/ tripod shots s this emphasised the feeling that the character was alone and that us, as the audience were just observing. Obviously I did use some soft pan and tilt movements to diversify the video in an attempt to retain viewer attention however this was normally when the actor was entering or leaving a scene. I wanted to shoot in dark and under-exposed lighting conditions to support the solemn mood of the song and concept which often meant either shooting on dark and overcast days or using little external lighting indoors.
Having dark indoor scenes often meant that there was quite a lot of noise on the image however as I wanted the poor camera quality/vintage look this was not necessarily a negative thing. However the lack of artificial lighting meant that many of the indoor scenes appeared very yellow and warm as I didn't combat the incandescent lighting with my cameras manual white balance. This created a very unprofessional look and meant that there was a lack of continuity between scenes which I regret. In terms of mis-en-scene I followed my plan fairly well despite not shooting in rain as much as I thought. I shot time-lapses of traffic, weather and people like intended as well as the actor at different locations. His house where stationary shots of chess, TV, cards and smoking represented boredom.
The moors where wide shots of him walking through landscapes represented isolation and the church which supported the holy connotations of rain as well as representing the search for something more. Besides these main scenes I also shot a lot of supporting B-roll from different location, ranging from buildings in London to the river here in Ilkley. All of these B-roll shots supported the theme of rain and followed the same dark and gloomy look.
Editing to support genre conventions
Post production was where I tried to both emphasise the genre conventions that I didn't adhere to properly when shooting as well as follow editing genre conventions the other videos feature. Some of the shots I took weren't shot on rainy or dull days so I had to decrease the saturation and exposure of these shots to mirror a miserable day to add continuity - not only following the mood of the song but also the concept of the video. To add to the continuity of the video I altered the colour properties of every shot using the colour wheels and sliders to try and make each scene look more similar. Most Dream pop music videos feature unique special effects so I felt that I should also include some special effects in my video to adhere to this convention. The most notable effect I created when editing was the duplication effect where the actor appeared multiple times harmoniously in the same scene. This was to symbolise rain and I felt that it helped to draw viewer attention as well as differentiate the video from others which supports the artist's iconography.
In addition to this, another notable special effect which I created made time-lapse videos look like long-exposure photographs - this faded and hollow look showed time passing in a more retrospective and permanent way. 
At the end of the video I made the actor fade out of the scene through alteration in opacity which I purposefully meant to be interpreted in different ways (Stuart Hall's theory,) it can be interpreted as death/suicide or evaporation (following the raindrop theme created by the opening scene.).
There were some general effects which I added to all of the shots in the music video to not only add continuity but also adhere to specific genre conventions. Videos from this genre tend to play on nostalgia and almost stick to their roots of the 90s either through the use of retro mis-en-scene or special effects. As I didn't have the budget to effectively have the mis-en-scene be nostalgic I took the post production route to attain this outcome. This meant cropping the entire project by 14% on both sides to create the 4:3 aspect ratio typically associated with music videos and VHS cameras. I could have filmed on VHS to make this fully authentic however this would have been way more time consuming and the artist lends more towards HD videos as opposed to 480p. Alongside the 4:3 aspect ratio I also applied a faded film look to support the vintage feel. 
There were some less noticeable special effects used in my video such as the distorted edges and jump cutting, for more detail on how I created every single effect in my video you can see my P5 Editing and Post production post. All of the effects were to support the genre convention of different visual imagery and support the ideas in this concept video of rain, depression, loneliness and drug use. Only two logos/title frames were used in this video to emphasise the artist's brand identity, featuring his logo on a black screen at the end and the song's title/logo at the start. 
I mainly used simple cut transitions and sequencing on beat in this video as it meant that the shots weren't too intrusive and the audience felt distanced from the character like he does from everyone else however when the contrast between shots was too much, like from the smoking scene to the night shots in Leeds, I had to use more powerful transitions such as the 'luma fade' which blended shots better.
I didn't use much external audio in this video besides some diegetic sound nearer the start to ease the audience in - later on in the video it would have been a distraction.
Links to theories
Andrew Goodwin's theory:
The American theorist stated that there were 7 observable characteristics across all music videos. I'll be seeing if these characteristics applied to my music video. The first key characteristic states that there is a relationship between lyrics and visuals; this is clearly evident in the overall concept of my music video - focussing on rain as the song does. The second key characteristic outlines a relationship between the instrumentals and visuals which I also followed by cutting between shots on beat, jump-cuts on beat and zoom in camera movements on beat. The third key characteristic states that genres typically have their own styles and conventions which we know to be true by the previous segment of this post - I feel that my music video did adhere to some genre conventions. Goodwin stated in his 4th characteristic that their is typically a demand from the record label for some close-up shots of the artist performing however my video does not fit this statement as I didn't have access to filming the artist and it isn't performance based anyway. I believe that this video does align with/ develop the artist's iconography which they develop inside and outside of their videos (5th characteristic.) I unfortunately didn't follow the sixth characteristic which states that there is typically a reference to voyeurism (frame within a frame.) The seventh and final characteristic says that there is usually some direct or indirect intertextual references in most music videos, in my video I directly referenced "The queen's gambit" through demonstration of chess - it is popular Netflix show orientating around chess.
Bulmer and Katz's uses and gratification theory:
This theory was a popular approach to understanding the mass media consumer and states that there are 4 reasons why people consume different pieces of media. The first states that people consume media for the purpose of escapism/diversion - the thrill of pure entertainment to help them avoid thinking about what could be playing on their minds and worrying them. I don't feel that my music video was faced paced enough or entertaining enough to support this means of consumption and neither is the song. I also don't feel like people would watch my music video for the purpose of surveillance or to relate to personal relationships as the artist isn't featured in this video neither is human relation - instead a lack of human relationship is outlined in this video which means the consumer would gain no information to progress their own relationships. Instead I feel like the theme and concept of loneliness outlined in this video is something for consumers to identify with and relate to (3rd reason.) I think that the viewer could identify with the producer's concept and the characters identity created in the video. The feeling of isolation is something that is very relatable in today's current social climate which makes me think this would be the main reason for watching my music video as this is a key idea it looks at.
Stuart Hall's theory:
His reception theory asserts that media texts are encoded and decoded. The producer of the music video will encode their ideas, values and ideologies into the media and then the consumer will decode the media - different audiences will decode the message in different ways. There are 3 ways in which audiences can decode a message. The first is referred to as dominant or preferred reading which is when the audience decodes the message in the way the producer intended. The second is known as oppositional reading, where the audience rejects the preferred reading and creates their own meaning for the text. The third and final way is negotiated reading - where there is a compromise between dominant and oppositional reading (the audience accepts part of the producer's ideologies but also has their own.) For me, ideally I would like the audience to decode the video with a negotiated reading as I wanted the video to leave a lot of room for interpretation whilst my ideas still being fairly clear. I think that the target audience for this video being younger and culturally diverse helps to steer the decoding in a negotiated way as they are more open to different views but also have the experience and capacity to interpret how they want to.
Effects Theory:
'The Effects Model' (backed up by the Bobo Doll experiment) is still the main theory used by politicians, some parts of the media and some religious organisations in attributing violence to the consumption of media texts. One example of this was the influence from 'Child's Play 3' in the murder of James Bulger (1993). In some cases laws are changed, media is banned etc. However in each case it was found that no case could have been proven to show a link between the text and the violent actions. I don't feel that my video promotes violence in any way as there isn't any violence or public antisocial behaviour featured. There is a quick scene which portrays the character as an underage drug user however I feel that the video doesn't promote this behaviour or make it appear 'cool'. Instead some consequences are shown through the symbolism of the wide and lonely shots as well as the fading away at the end.
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