Rough edit of music video- Street Lights

Street Light- Rough edit

This is my first rough edit (very rough). I have watched this through a few times from a critical point of view and realise there are quite a few adjustments that need to happen to the transitions between shots and the colour continuity. I feel that although the footage quality isn't as good as it should be, it is as good as I can get with the lighting equipment and cameras I have. Therefore I need to make sure that the other microelements of the music video are tweaked to the best of my ability.

I have gone over the whole rough edit and redone my warp stabilizer on some shots and the transitions are better synced with the beat of the song and the lyrics. This is the current version of Street Lights:

Slow Motion Editing Test Footage

Slow motion test footage

I managed to get a bit of test footage for my slow motion editing for Street Lights. For this I had to speed up the song on Audacity to 2x and then extract it and sing and express my actions as if I was in two times the speed. But although I did try and express my body language loudly, it wasn't enough and the actor in my background wasn't as a slow enough speed and was dancing more to the pace of the 2x speed song than the other. So I realised how I must make sure when I actually use slow motion filming I will need to make sure the performer is very expressive with their body language. 

x2 speed video

Edited to regualar speed

Recce/Test Footage for Music Video

My recce/test footage

Below are a variety of test footage for lighting, framing etc. and my recce footage for locations in London. Both in central and on the outskirts in Twickenham area.

Central London- the bridge of song, shot at London bridge/ South Bank

Twickenham- first chorus 

Twickenham- First Verse

Twickenham- second chorus

This recce/test footage work allowed me to understand the different outcomes of lighting from what my intention was, which is crucial for the music video I am going to produce. This has also enabled me to start to properly understand the equipment I will be using; the camera and the the tripod. And finally to see how the framing and focusing of different shots could work in the music video. 

The lighting in some of these videos are very poor and strangely coloured compared to reality in those locations, so I now know that at different angles I can get better shades of light, different colours and which lights will pick up more detail. 

Due to travelling back and forth to London and importing and exporting footage from different devices, some of my footage is not on my hard-drive or computer which has disappointed me. But the above footage can give an insight into the recces/test footage I obtained.

Pre Production- Film Plans

Pre-production filming plans

Filming plan not visual plan, purely written from Surya Gregory Robinson

Visual plans

Music Video Treatment
My video treatment was quite vague and was primarily for my own memory jogging so that I could look back at ideas. I made a few informal versions and one displayed below.

Treatment part 1

Treatment part 2

Treatment part 3

Pre-production planning

Adobe Premiere Pro

Because I won't be filming most/all of my footage in a close location to college's editing software, I have decided to download the months trial of Premiere Pro on my personal laptop so then I can do some quick editing when I am still filming in London. This means I will be able to see if I need to redo the filming in places, whether I have enough, or if I have the right amount. This will save time once I get back to college so then I don't have to make another trip back to London. 

Filming Dates

Between the 28th and the 1st will be the main bulk of filming for the music video. I have made sure that I have started filming quite early because of the location I am filming in (London) is not too close, so there has to be lots of planning to get there. Therefore if there are any problems I will still be able to go back in early November.

On this weekend we will be doing a bit of filming, but mostly just shots to fill the spaces between the lyrics and to do some official recce filmng and practice with the light, slow-mo filming and do a small amount of casting for extras that are needed in some scenes.

These filming dates are from teacher feedback, because my teacher reviewed my video and found that my choruses didn't work due to the poor lighting. 

Recce Checklist

  Participant Release Forms

Here are the participant release forms so far. 

Participant release forms from Surya Gregory Robinson

Call Sheets

Call sheets informal ones from Surya Gregory Robinson

Risk Assessments

Location risk assessment from Surya Gregory Robinson

Props Needed and Purchased

I have decided to use white manikin masks in the music video (as image shows below) because I feel that the best way I can express what Beth's lyrics are connoting is to use a prop or lighting technique to enable humans to look like manikins, therefore obviously white masks are a lot easier to create this because the lighting equipment I will be able to access won't be adequate.

Equipment List

• JVC camera
• Fluid head tripod
• Battery charger
• Camera bag
• Visual plans
• Location list
• London train times and tickets
• Wallet
• Phone and charger
• Contact details for actors and artist
• over night bag

Contact with artist

Contact with Beth and Band

• Skype call with Beth
• 
  
  Facebook conversation- artist and actors
  

  
  

Contact with artist and actors from Surya Gregory Robinson

Youth Fashion and Styles- video and artist.

Youth Fashion and Styles

I want to stick to how Beth's (artists) fashion already is, but if needed tweak it slightly to fit her genre more because it will keep a bit of continuity in the music and the music video. Her style now is a mix of 'jerk', 'hip-hop' and 'indie', which isn't too far from her music genres, but I feel I would need to tone it down more to indie, but still keep her style running in the theme. This is because not only is it her music video I am producing and there must be an agreement, but also her target audience will probably be from mid teens (15-16 up) to late twenties and her style fits quite well with the fashion for younger people in 2013, therefore it will make a connection to the audience. Now because of not needing to change her style too much it also creates a look, which in time could grow into an iconic style for 'Beth'. This will lead to her publicity being increased, therefore the awareness her music exists too will be increased! This kills two birds with one stone. 

Below are the types of clothes Beth already wares, the styles I mentioned above and the style I want her to be in the music video. 

Styles

 

Obviously these are exaggerated versions of the styles, but this give the basic idea of what type of fashion Beth best fits into.  (Left- indie, Centre- jerk, Right- hip-hop)

Beth's style

This can vary from more indie, to more jerk/ hip-hop fashion all the time with Beth. She likes to keep a fresh look, so mixes and matches with good taste within her style genres you could say.

 

                 

Mix and Match

Her style will be based around the pictures below. It is quite a unique (indie) style due to the contrast of unusual clothing pieces to place together, like the socks and the black dress etc. Yet it is quite pop like too which can fit with the genre of this specific music video although it is mainly indie.

     

Target Audience Research

Mood Board

Mood board designed around the audience for the Street Lights song- by Beth Guinness

All the images within this mood board are normally things, activities etc. that the audience of Beth Guinness would like. This is only what I have judged when researching into youth sub-cultures and genres.

The age group I am targeting my artist at is from mid teens to late 20's and these are normally the activities and products they like. The majority will probably be female because of the genre of music I have asked around my friends equally by gender and realised that with this genre it is more dominated by a female audience. 

The sub-cultures that fit with my target audience are 'hipsters' and 'indie' which usually come hand in hand with one another. Hipsters are a post-modern subculture that derived in the 1990's and can include a large variety of characters in the 21st century, especially now in 2013. It normally consists on mid/late teens to early adults who's dress sense is not 'mainstream' and consists of a lot of vintage clothing and unusual and un-labelled clothing. Also the music genres that most hipsters listen to is indie and alternative ones because of there 'non-mainstream' style. They like small, up coming artists too which I think works well with my music video project because not only will the target audience most probably enjoy the music, they will also be looking for up-coming artists. Indie in other words 'individual' is not only a sub-culture, but a genre, fashion and film genre. It is very closely related to the hipster sub-cultures because of their share in qualities; enjoying individual style, music and general activities being quite unusual. 

The general image of a hipster and indie person are presented below. The first image is indie and the second is hipster.

As you can see they look quite similar and that is because they are in both style,activities, hobbies, and music choices. They are normally quite an arty personality and if not they express themselves so.

Related music videos to music genre

Qualities of the videos

• Filled with dissolves 
• Acoustic guitar
• stylish clothing, but casual
• calm, natural environment 

• Natural environment
• Acoustic guitar
• stylish, but casual clothing
• Soft focus

• Night life, city scenery
• Hooded in stylish, casual clothing
• close ups
• panning shots/ tracking shots
• Use of constructed lighting
• lip syncing

Poster Analysis and Images

My Poster Analysis

Above are the preliminary plans for my poster along with an analyses, one detailed and one not. I have used the analysis to look for the conventions of an album release poster so it will help me in constructing my own. 

Final Image for Poster

The final image I have chosen for my poster will be used on my poster too, so I keep the continuity of the album present and tie them all to the music video. This will help direct the audience to purchase the right album.

Digipak plans and photographs

Possible Pictures for Digipak

Here I have a selection of different images that I could include in my digipak. I thought I could produce lots of pictures in a polaroid style for the inside of my digipak maybe scattered over paving stones/ pavement, mostly at night, but some also in the day too. Then on the front covers have the same house style colours but use one photograph of a silhouette in a street light.
After doing the photo shoot for the front image for the digipak I have realised the photo would look better if it is used on a four sided digipak, therefore I have decided to cut it down to a two cover digipak. Below I have placed the flatplan for it.

As you can see this flat plan isn't very detailed, but that is because of the images I am using for it are quite obscure to fit in with the text. Therefore I think it's best if I have a vague outline of how I want it to look and the images that are needed in it, but then find the best structure for the digipak by moving it around and trying different images and text in different places on InDesign.

The picture I have decided to use are ones that all signify towards a night life in the city. The lead images for the poster and digipak that I have narrowed down in my slideshare are ones that I shot in the TV studio at college and not ones I got using an actual street light due to a street light not giving my the contrast and shadow I needed to make an 'outstanding' photograph worthy of being on a poster and digipak. Below are the contact details between myself and the TV studio staff. 

Potential digipak images from Surya Gregory Robinson

New Images for Digipak

I started to design my digipak and found some fonts and different images to use instead that would look better and keep the continuity of the digipak and music video together rather than having multiple situations and scenarios squeezed into one small area. So below is the plan I sketched of the digipak I wan't to produce. With the new image for the inside of the digipak. 

New image using for inside of digipak. 

Digipaks- key facts and analysis

Digipaks- key elements and examples

Range of genres to explore the different conventions

A digipak is an alternative version of the jewel case for both DVD's and CD's. The DVD digipak especially are used for promoting a special release of a DVD, but this is also the case for CD's. They are normally bought by big fans of the artist/ band, because they are usually priced higher. Because of the packaging they are less robust than jewel cases (normally protect the DVD/CD well, but outer packaging isn't as protected), therefore more care is needed when handling, this implies they are also of greater value whether the contents is acknowledged or not. 

The packaging is also more environmentally friendly, which means it can be made out of recycled goods, so therefore implies it can be cheaper to produce than normal jewel cases. And because the size can vary you are able to personalise the casing with more detail and design than must jewel casing.

Digipaks-analysed

The Rolling Stones digipak

The below digipak is of the Rolling Stones, who are obviously a very well known band from the 60's. As most people know the Rolling Stones iconic logo (brand identity) as such is the big red lips, which is taken from Mick Jagger. In image two of the digipak, on the front cover you see that in the lead image they have incorporated the lips onto an illustration of a gorilla which would be noticed easily by a fan of the band. The reason they don't have to place an image of the artist on the front is because a digipak as stated earlier is aimed at big fans of the band, therefore the lips (iconic logo) are enough.
You can see there is a definite house style for colours; red, black, white. These colours all work with the iconic lips to and pull the digipak together. The fonts that are used (apart from the track listing are all done in san-serif, but almost with a painted effect which ties into their genre of band (rock/ rock and roll) because rock and roll is quite bold and loud and although san serif only denotes wideness it connotes to the audience rebellion, courageous music and some could say outrageous.  And you can see they have kept to the house style on the CD's too, using the same colours and fonts.
Usually in a digipak you have some form of imagery of the band inside it, but most likely because of their age they have chosen to not include them in it. This was probably the choice of the bands manager for profit/selling purposes. Now they have made an insert for the album which includes images of them and information on the tracks and the bands journey over the years, but this still only provides the audience with images of them from early years.
The positioning/layout in this digipak is quite slick, not very detailed and easy to be guided by. They have used black as the base colour and white and red to guide you around the digipak- the track list is divided into three CD's and are all white on black which stands out easily to the audience. And at either end of the pak is the date of the first songs on the album and the most recent- this allows the audience to know what have been included in the digipak. The spacing has been used carefully to emphasize the small detail that has been placed on the cover. And this choice in spacing can signify greatness; detail is not needed from this band because they have already reached the top and have won their audience already.
In the last picture (4) it shows clearly they have placed all the institutional information, bar-code and additional information in the usual place: the back cover. This is the normal convention for any CD, DVD etc. It allows you to view any additional info such as the producer and copy-right laws behind the CD before purchasing it. On this digipak it even has the logo of the Rolling Stones above the bar-code, showing it is property/ material of theirs.

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Evanescence

Evanescence is a Gothic rock band with a female lead singer, which is shown within the artwork of their digipak. You can see that this is a four page digipak but like the above digipak of the Rolling Stone's they have used an insert to give information to the audience. 

As you can see in all of the images, again there is a distinctive house style of colours, fonts and illustrations. The colours scheme for this digipak are blues both dark and light, beige/ yellows, blacks and whites. They have tried to make it look quite mystical and ghostly/dark which is a reflection of their genre of music (rock/ Gothic rock). They have obviously got the typical conventions such as a track list, all the institutional information and bar-code placed on their back cover. The writing colour used for these have again been incorporated into the colour scheme. The track list is in a yellow colour and the typeface they have used is serif and curly which is a signifier for ghost-like. And the additional institutional information is in a white which matches the main image on the front  which runs through to the back page and like most digipaks is on the back page under the track-list. 

The main image that has been used is of the main artist in the band and it has been used to promote the album name 'The Open Door'. She is as you can see walking through an open door into what can only be assumed the sky or heavens which again can be tied to the genre of rock, a lot of rock stereotypically focuses on heaven and hell, sadness etc and unlike the above digipak (the Rolling Stones) the artist is used on the digipak because she is young and not as well known.

As I mentioned earlier the front image runs through onto the back image which keeps the house style/continuity good because it ends up being one image on the outside. And once you open it up you don't have to keep as closely to the colour scheme which is evident here, but still have some form of house style colouring.

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Kanye West

Kanye West is a very well known rap artist with a slick r&b style in both his music and fashion. As you can see from the images of the digipak below this album reflects the type of image he has created for himself and also the type of music he produces.
On the front side of the digipak (2nd image) you can see there isn't much imagery used, but there is an image of a heart on the front which is emphasizing the name of the album 808's &heartbreak. Now although this digipak doesn't have much imagery it doesn't mean it hasn't been thought through carefully. Unlike the other albums I have looked at above there is a lot of white space used here very well. It emphasizes the attention on something and in this album it draws attention to the artist and the album name, white space is a technical tool when if used correctly it can be powerful at getting the attention you want. On the front/ back part of this digipak (image 2) there is very minimal detail, so where there is you will be drawn to it as a natural instinct. And also on the front the house style begins to show on the left hand margin of the front cover: there are a rainbow of pastel colours which run from one side of the cover to the other and almost direct you through to Kanye who has a red heart identical to the one on the front of the digipak which because it is repeated it begins to create an iconic logo for the album (the red heart). The house colours then arise from the rainbow and the deep red of the heart (just to note that the heart has been coloured red which is a stereotypical signifier of love and compassion), obviously here white is included but is used for a whole different purpose.
The image of Kanye is a very simple picture but includes the red heart placed where his actual heart is which signifies a connection between them, whether it is another's heart or his distance from his own that is broken, but yet still slick and 'cool' which is his iconic style and music genre's characteristics. I must say though it is not the stereotypical look of a rap artists CD cover because it is so formal and you could say visually prude, but that is another reason why it is very eye catching for the regular fans of Kanye and other rap artists. Most CD/digipak covers are representing rappers stereotypically with money, cars and women presented in the 'male gaze' (as sexual objects for the males).
In image three it best presents the look of typeface used in this digipak. Again minimal, but also very under-represented compared the the text in most digipaks, so it is breaking the conventions here by doing the opposite and attracting attention to the song titles/ track listing because they are so hidden.

As per usual the convention of the institutional text/ info has been abided by placing it on the back cover below the lyrics in a different typeface to the rest of the album, along with the bar-code and copy right information. 

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Indie, sub-pop and alternative genres

Audience Surveys

Audience Surveys

I have set up a small survey to see if the audience agrees with my ideas or not for the style and type of music video. I have placed the link under the video of 'Street Lights' and will aim to get a representative feedback. 

Click here to take survey. 

Although my results weren't as I wanted due to there being quite a small responce I am happy that I can see a pattern in the results that agree mostly with my initial ideas. 

Research Results

Here you can see that 80% of my response came back as an agreement to what I had initially planned- to shoot mostly at night. Although this is a small sample size for my audience response, due to it being a significant difference between the two options I feel I can use this as a reliable source to start my research for shooting times/ lighting etc. 

I tried to used the binary opposites to find out the theme that was created personally by the audience. My results showed that the theme in general was sad/truthful/calm and dark which shows there is pattern in agreement over the theme of the song (not a happy/chirpy song). This means that my ideas of using derelict and shadowed/ dark areas for shooting will fit to the audiences demand.

In the first image you can see that there is no question to what type of music video the audience want for this music video, therefore I think to increase Beth's image as an artist I will make a narrative music video which is part performance with her lip syncing. Because in the second image it shows that most people would prefer to see the artist/singer in the actual video.

Production Proposal

Production Proposal

'Not just another singer song writer!'

'Street Lights', the song that speaks truth in volumes about the acts of the night that are only visible when the yellow glows of street lights pick up on them. The night time brings many feelings to individuals, but insecurity and intimidation is something most people share as the lights fade. Home, happiness and comfort can disappear in the flick of a light, and sometimes this is literal.
This music video will venture into and push the boundaries of how societies social norms are seen, while also creating a new place in the world for the music of a pitch perfect and extremely talented singer song writer, Beth Guinness. The style of this video will be a narrative/performance which allows it's audience to use their own imagination and interpretation to make their own. The main footage is going to be shot in south/west London and sometimes use central areas such as London bridge and The South Bank to get the full potential of the city lights. Every shot will be exploring the the harmonies of this acoustic journey through the night life, and will be shot either fully in the night, or night/early evening. This video will try and reflect the true nature of the lighting and the props you would find in an industrial city life; waste, crime and insecurities, while also the whole power of the size (geographcally) and this will be done to pull viewer into the position of Beth. The audience will be aimed from late/mid teens up to very early thirties because of the genre of the music being quite a young indie style which is currently very 'in' within this age group.
The visuals of this music video as I stated above will be reflecting the night life and using a lot of unnatural lighting that is generally already found within the city, therefore it will be quite a soft visual style because the lighting being a warm temperature tone (street light yellows) throughout most of the video and the actual pace of the song isn't very fast, which means it already shapes the style for the visual being quite delicate with quite a lot of close ups of the artist and the scenery accompanying her in each location and quite a few sections of slow pace editing.
This music video is performance video with a narrative that can be played around with by each individual who watches it.

Band Reserch

Band Research- options.

Beth Guinness

Beth Guinness is a self teaching singer song writer who has composed many of her own pieces of music and done covers of other songs, but personalised them to fit how she wants them to be. All of her recording is done at home with her own equipment, based now in London, Twickenham. She has been playing piano and guitar, and of course singing from quite a young age and has ventured into a few different genres with her music such as country, soul, underground, indie/pop and many more as she has progressed. 

I have known Beth for many years and think her music is at a high standard, especially since she is only 16 years old, 17 on the 09 of September. Therefore I would like to have her as my artist to produce a music video for.

Beth's music- info.

This is personally one of my favourite songs by Beth, and would love to work with her to produce a music video for this song 'Street Lights'. Below I have placed a link to her full Youtube page. 

http://www.youtube.com/user/Beth14G/videos

Music video evaluation

Music Video Evaluation 

This project was a chance for us to get practice with the equipment that we will be using in the next year of our a-levels and understand the conventions of a music videos structure, this is the reason for the quality of the film that was produced and the timing that wasn't matched correctly while editing.

As Andrew Goodwin states in his music video theory, there are three types of music videos; narrative, performance and concept videos. The type of video we decided to make was mainly a performance video along side some narrative. We also could say that we used a tiny bit of concept because we used some narrative that only matched the lyrics but didn't explain the true meaning behind what they are describing in the song.
The song we were given tedit into each chorus o do was 'Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover' which was released in 1992 by  Sophie B. Hawkins. The music video that she shot was nearly a complete performance music video shot in black and white, so we tried to incorporate both her style (which fit with her husky but adventurous voice) while also going in a different direction (very obvious narrative, which almost sarcastically lacked in metaphors).

The skills I gained and how it was constructed

Preproduction
When we began our project I had never made a music video in any shape or form, whether it was miming or not, so this experience was completely new to me. I used my pears to figure out the best way for us to make the music video, especially how we were going to lip-sync to the song at the correct time. We all decided to break down the song into manageable chunks and learn the lyrics to each part, then find the props we needed before any real filming went under-way. Once we had the props we got the song on one of our smart phones because this allowed us to know our queues to lip-sync to. Plus, like Andrew Goodwin states in his music video theory we instantly thought we should try and keep to a specific style/ iconographic style, so each time we filmed I wore the same clothing for each shot, which you can see is quite 1900's with the jeans and plain casual shoulder cropped t-shirt (converse or no shoes). Plus the costume used in this video signifies quite a relaxed image and reflects the genre of the music; indie, soft rock because they are casual and the idea of no shoes is quite a 'hippy' look.  

Production
When we began to film we focused on the chorus and decided to get large pieces of film that could be edited in a slow pace and cut where we felt adequate. We decided to use props to express a lot of the lyrics in the verses: we used toys to express the lyrics metaphors but instead of using the toys/ other props as a way of connoting another meaning of the lyrics we went in the opposite direction and made the props take away the metaphors or deeper meaning and present the audience with the literal image of the lyrics. For example we took the lyrics "gonna' fill you up, gonna' make you cry" and simply filmed a water bottle being opened and filled. This was partly for humorous purposes and secondly to experiment with the conventions of a music video; normally the image is signifying the lyrics by using props in a serious matter or colours to express them, while we used a comical form which wasn't expected. 

Post Production

In post production we used the software Premier Pro which we all got a go on, but I feel I need a lot more practice at it to be confident enough to edit my own music video. We used this program to edit in the black and white for each clip, and also to slow it down using the slow motion tool. Sadly there are no clips of our editing timeline due to the drives being wiped in the editing suite at college. We honestly didn't have enough different shots to make the editing very varied with fast paced editing and slow paced editing to be included and this put us in a disadvantaged place due to our film affecting the quality of the editing. Also I think the lack of film affected the accuracy of the image being in-time with the beat and therefore produced a video that can be recognised easily as an amateur level of technological understanding.  

Improvements
I feel that the editing was at very low quality, not anybodies fault, but it just takes practice to gain a good sense of the program you are using. It didn't help that we didn't get enough film needed to make fast pace editing by cutting to lots of different shots and because of the lack of practice our slow motion editing wasn't as close to the beat as it needed to be. Therefore I will practice more with random pieces of footage until I am satisfied with my capability of editing and the amount of film I will need for a certain amount of time.

 Also the planning wasn't fully complete before we shot the video, so I feel I need to get a good amount of film and the right amount of close-ups of the artist/actor and a general variety of shots such as tracking shot to show movement and different angles to make sure the music video doesn't become boring to the viewer.

The camera work was not terrible, but far from the standard I would like to have on my final video, so as well as taking advantage of tripods more, I will practice different shots to find the best way to capture images I want. Lastly I will make sure that there is more continuity; clothing, props, lighting. The clothing in this video wasn't as tied in with the genre of music: indie, soft rock enough because as well as not researching enough into the general style of the sub-cultures that are tied with these genres we didn't pay much attention to it when filming, although I tried to make mine as close to it as possible.
Most recently another problem with the actual quality of the film was the framing we used, because characters aren't all framed correctly and are coming into camera and then disappearing again, which doesn't look very professional and also take the attention away from the performance. So when I film my music video I will make sure I test the sizeof the frame and cues for my actors/artists.
Finally I have realised that the chorus of this music video was lacking in any form of excitement because of the long shots that were edited at a slow pace, and again put in 'slow' motion. Which means the audience get tired of the video and will most likely stop viewing it. And that if I rush my filming for my music video and miss out on something I could use when editing it could interrupt any further production, therefore my planning must be detailed and I must allow a realistic amount of time for my plan, and make a realistic plan.

Royalty Free Track- Video Ideas and Mock Up Plans

Royalty Free Track

I used the website Jamendo to find this royalty free track. The artist I like is called FEAT THE WIBE and I chose the song called 'Blue Spirit' by them if my band/artist pulls out or there are any complications. Below is the link to the song and if any complications happen I will post ideas for a music video for this song. 

 http://www.jamendo.com/en/search?qs=q=name:%22feat%20the%20vibe%20-%20blue%20spirit%22

Not Needed!

It is now mid October and I feel confident enough to not have to use this song for a music video due to the artist I am working with being reliable enough and cooperating with my ideas for the music video.  

Music Video Director- Research.

Music Video Director

The music video director I have chosen is a man by the name of F. Gary Gray who has been the director for video's such as 'Ms. Jackson' by Outkast and 'Show Me What You Got' by Jay-z. His video's are normally based around genres of music that tie into rap and hip-hop, and they are mostly made to look quite 'old school'.

F Gary Gray started directing in 1989, with Ice Cubes music video 'It Was A Good Day' being one of his first successes as a director. At the time hip-hop and rap music weren't as globally listened to, therefore he aimed for the genres that most people would have classed as 'underground'. But now that rap music and genres based around it have become more famously listened to Gary is known as a talented director; working in both the field of the music industry and cinema.

In 2000 Gary directed the music video for the well known song 'Ms. Jackson' by Outkast which to this day is still popular with over 14 million views on YouTube. Like other videos directed by Gary there are certain  mise-en-scene that he seems to use frequently to emphasize the genre of the music;           expensive cars, 'bling' and baggy clothing.

In 2006 Gary directed Jay-Z's music

video for 'Show Me What You Got'. 

Again you can clearly see that in both Outkast's and Jay-Z's videos there is a big use of props such as 'bling' and  flashy cars, plus their wardrobe, yet  different still represents the same type  of clothing; baggy jeans and very 

accessorized. 

 When it comes to Gary's stylistic influence it is clear it is to do with the alpha male/ seductive female and the stereotypical 'Black' culture. The majority of the music videos he's made are based around the 'good life' whether it is shown by the actual story of the music video, or by the artists who start in them. In Jay-Z's music video it was clear that he had the 'good life' through the mise-en-scene (mostly in terms of props and costumes) such as the sports cars, 'bling' and the setting (Monaco) which all connote wealth and easy living. And in Outkast's music video it shows Andre 3000 topless and in a good shape, this signifier is used to portray him as alpha and gives him a 'cool' image because he is casually presenting what has been most probably hard-worked for.
From the interviews I have looked at and the research I have done Gary speaks confidently about his understanding of the culture around 'Black' areas of Los Angeles and I see that reflected in his ideas and infrastructure of his music videos, and it is not so much the particular Los Angeles culture for black people that he has captured, but it is the general (stereotypical) representation that the majority of black rappers and hip-hop artists portray of their lifestyles and their culture in their music.