Research: Music Video Analysis 2 Black Eyed Peas - Where is the Love

The song I am researching is "Where is the Love" by the Black Eyed Peas. The genre of this song is R&B and is in the style of performance and concept based.

There are many features of this video especially that relate to Goodwin's Conventions.

Looking into camera is one of Goodwin's conventions. Viewers like close ups of the artists as it allows them to see who the artist is. This is very important in a promo video especially artist trying to establish a fan base. In the past, artist close ups were for members of the audience that weren't able to get to concerts.





Matching Music and Lyrics

There are threelyrics and shots that stand out for me. The first one is the lyrics "Where is the Love". When these lyrics are sang, the majority of the time there are close ups of a red question mark on a black piece of paper synchronized with the lyrics. This shows views that questions about society are constantly asked and the black background on the sign could symbolize the bands name and the segregation between black people and white in America today.


The second is when the words "negative media" are sung. The shots of the TV screens suggests that the media are a bad thing and always manipulate stories etc.








Finally, one of the sequences shows one of the members of the band pushed onto the bonnet of the police car. This is synchronized with the lyrics "feeling under".







Throughout the video, there are jump cuts that are on each beat of the song. There are some actions, handheld and steady cam. The fast ASL shows the speed of the song and each shot last for approximately 1-2 seconds.

Genre Characteristics of R&B include specific hand gestures, certain costumes like black tracksuits, jeans, vests and nearly all of the clothes are black. The Black Eyed Peas go against some stereotypes in this video because the colour black is mainly associated with evil or bad. However, in this video they are on the good side and trying to stop or fight evil.

Concepts

The question mark is a symbolic and iconic which has multiple meanings. This means it is polysemous. The Black Eyed Peas try and get us to question how we act and behave and what effect that has on our children.

Genres that feature in this video are future, science fiction and religion









How this helped my creativity and planning

I liked the way close ups of the artists were used which allowed us to see all of the singers. shots I will consider using in my video are high angle shots, long shots, ELS, CU, MCU, Establishing shot, hand held cam, blur effect, frame positions and tracking.

I will find it difficult to access large urban environments and famous buildings, crane shots and flying cam.

I liked the idea of using pieces of paper with writing on them. I also liked how they got the community involved.