Conventions

Camera;

Music videos tend to include a range of different camera shots,

Long shots are usually used in order to show the setting of the music video, particularly if the setting reflects a theme or feature of the song or lyrics.

Close ups are used mainly to show emotions of the actors in the video or to attract the attention of the audience to focus on the artist themselves. This is particularly used for female artists in order to convey a theme of lust throughout the video.






An extreme close up may be used to portray emotion, particularly sadness by having an extreme zoom on the eye perhaps if the actor is crying, like a close up an extreme close up could also make the video sexual as the close up may be on a body part.


Mis-en-scene;
The mis-en-scene in music videos often refers to the mood of the song, the lyrics themselves, or the genre of the music. The mood may be shown by the colours used, for example red to represent love or passion, or alternatively dark colours may be used to show a bad situation or a song that has a dark meaning behind it. The lyrics themselves would be shown through the acting in the video, the actual story may be acted out or props may be used that show the story behind the song itself, additionally the costume and makeup of the video may tell us something about what the songs about, and often the story can be shown ultimately through the mis-en-scene and can be understood without the music. Finally the genre of the song can be shown through the mis-en-scene, again with the use of colours the genre is often shown, dark colours usually being used for rock genre and bright colours being used for pop. Additionally effects such as smoke or dark lighting may again be used for rock or punk whereas wouldn't usually be used for a pop or hip hop song.

Editing;
The difference scenes of a music video are usually put together using jump cuts in order to keep up with the lyrics of the song and whats happening in the song. During the editing stage animations or special effects may be added in to portray more of the meaning of the song, additionally there may be a filter added like black and white or the colours may be made more vibrant depending on the theme of the genre.

Sound;
Predominately the sound in a music video is the song itself which is usually lip synced with the actor or artist in the video. However on some occasions sound may be added in like for example if the video is a narrative dialogue may be added to set the scene and show the relationship between the characters in the video, usually before the song begins or at times may come whilst the song is on. Other sound effects may be added which may help set the scene or add extra meaning to whats being shown.