Task 1 - In what ways do your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The well known media theorist Keith Negus talked about specific conventions in music videos. Keith Negus said some acts are organic, organic acts follow these conventions: A naturalisric approach to artists The seeds of success are within the artists, who have to be nurtured by the record company. The artist is given time to evolve and progress through their career Emphasis is given to album sales and the contruction of a successful back catalogue Often aimed at older or more sophisticated consumers. Profits generated by this kind of act tend to be part of a long term strategy by the record company Keith Negus also reffered to synthetic acts that followed these conventions. A combinatiorial approach to artists and material Executives attempt to construct successful acts out og the artists and the songs at their disposal The image of the arist is often constructed by the record company The artist will be given a short time to prove their success before other combinations will be tired out Emphasis is given to single sales and to promoting first albums Often aimed at younger, less sophisticated audiences Profits generated by this kind of arist tend to be part of an immediate, short term strategy by the record company

Our group researched and analysed the major conventions of music videos with Beyonce music videos because she is a very popular music artist so follows a generic approach to her videos, although I would consider Beyonce quite organic because she is a raw talent it is arguable that she is a synthetic act because she came from a girl group called destiny's child.
Destiny's child would be considered a synthetic group and was one of the worlds best selling girl groups of all time, but it is arguable that once destiny's child split up and Beyonce went solo she was an organic act because she had such talent that her record companies saw her as a long term investment rather than a short term one such as a act like sugar babes, or Hannah Montana. For this reason Beyonce is still a very popular music artist 6 years after going solo in 2005. This according to Keith Negus would cattogarise beyonce as a organic act because one convention of the organic act was “profits generated by this kind of act tend to be part of a long term strategy by the record company”.

Still images from our music video This still from our video is used to make a unrealistic world a reality using special effects, in some ways it follows the existing forms and conventions of music videos because the special effects are used to make the narrative of the video more exciting and for that reason alone, it is conventional for music videos to have a narrative that is there to keep the audience intrested. However it might be possible to argue that this image challanges conventions as it uses special effects to create the scene and this is not considerd common in music videos as more often then not the narrative will not be special effects.