Student Video Analysis

I have chosen to analyse this video of 'Akon - Beautiful'.
To start with, I didn't particularly enjoy the video as it wasn't very professional, and there wasn't much of a variety of shots. The video didn't keep me intrigued either, which you want to do when making a music video to be successful.
Costume:
The costume throughout the video was consistent. However, a Liverpool shirt is not something that Akon would wear, and is definitely not a convention of hip hop. The other actors clothing also does not connote Hip Hop. If they want to make this more professional, the actors must be wearing clothes that suit the genre, else it doesn't really work. The connotations of their clothing doesn't really signify anything to do with the hip hop genre. They should connote gangsta lifestyle, and show some kind of rags to riches throughout. Instead of connoting a football hooligan.

Lighting:

The daylight high key and natural lighting works well as everything is clear. However the inside shots which i think was meant to be a club scene did not work as well as it could of. The disco lights work well in some videos, but again, for this genre the sort of artificial lights you want to use are more like strobe or spotlights. It wasn't clear who the artist was by the lighting in the club scene.

Actors:
There were three main actors consistent throughout this music video. They all seemed like young lads just having a laugh through parts. The quality of acting was poor in most parts too. However there gestures and expressions were often very exaggerated which was good. These gestures are like what i would like in our video too. Akon is one singer whom sings this song 'Beautiful'. In this video, all three main actors were singing the same parts which was quite distracting and for those who haven't heard of Akon, may be quite confusing.
The use of extra actors was good, as the girls showed the sexualisation and promotes the artist as the idol. Still, they could of been more exaggerated and a bit better actors.

Location:

There was a variety of locations throughout this video, which is good as it helps to keep the audience intrigued in watching it. The outdoor scenes were well thought about, but feel the club scene could of been more realistic. It would be good to have a club scene in our video too, however we hope to make it a bit more realistic unlike this one. The more people in the club the better too. The way the three actors were framed in the outside shots was always good, besides the scene sat on a swing, where the camera was quite shaky and composition wasn't quite right in the frame.

The above is a well framed shot of the two actors.
The one below is a not so great shot, which is also unsteady.

Props:
There aren't many props used in this video. One they do use is a cider can. This really connotes a typical teenage yob, drinking in the park. They could of use things like jewellery, headphones and microphone when they're performing in the club. One other prop they use is the disco lights. These are not really the best sort of lights they could of used for this video. A strobe light is more of a convention of their genre hip hop than disco lights are. Those two props that they used took the attention off the more important things on the video because it makes everyone think 'what's that for?' More appropriate props would give this a more realistic look on the whole video.

Camera:
There are a variety of camera shots throughout the video. However there were many hand held shots. In the club scene, it could be effective to use handheld shots as it could show how the camera is pushing through the crowd. This was not the case here because there wasn't enough crowd to give that effect again because the scene wasn't realistic enough. The above images of some more shaky handheld shots also didn't make the video look very professional. This video could of been better if there was more efficient use of the tripod whilst filming.

Overall, I think they could of done a better job of this and promoted the artist a bit more successfully by making a few amendments so that it fits with the music's genre.
In our video, I would like to see a club scene like what's in this video. But with more people and different lighting to create more of a hectic atmosphere that there is in artists lives.