Montage Research within music videos

Research into Montage within music videos

montage

noun

noun: montage

1. the technique of selecting, editing, and piecing together separate sections of film to form a continuous whole.

In Music Videos from all genres, a narrative which features a montage is common and usually allows for a narrative to be expanded and fit into a short song so that the audience can understand it in more detail and understand the song and its intended message. 

In relation to Stuart Hall's Reception Theory, montages in music videos would allow producers to encode their intended message much easier within a short space of time which they have because it is basically just a sped up narrative, meaning that like the Hypodermic Syringe theory suggests, the audience will passively decode their message easier. 

Because of this and the way montages allow for an expanded narrative, my group and I know that we definitely want to include a montage into our music video so we can get our intended message of the narrative, in relation to the lyrics and conventions of the song, much easier. 

By researching the way in which montages are included into music videos we will not only be able to establish how to do this properly and effectively, but as an audience we will be able to evaluate and understand how the utilisation of a montage within a music video allows us to decode and personally identify (uses and gratifications theory) the narrative and the characters within it. 

After me and Kate produced the in detail story board we decided to include a montage at the end of our music video almost as a review of the narrative so that it is emphasised to the audience, this is also a really good way to reflect our skills and creative potential on Final Cut Pro X.

Some of the music videos we researched which feature montages allowed us to see the structural ways to utilise a montage as well as how the audience respond to them...

Lorde- Perfect Places

In this music video the montage is seen from the onset and throughout, as we immediately see the fast cut transitions into different settings and costumes, allowing the audience to see the narrative and themes of the music video quickly, whilst also allowing the audience to quickly and passively decode the genre and artist herself. 

This is useful in a music video because as mentioned previously, the producers only have a short amount of time to portray a certain intended message or meaning and by using a montage the audience will quickly establish the conventions of the music video and will be able to decide if they are amongst the target audience.

Luckily, Lorde having a music video which features a montage is useful to us as a group because we have chosen a Lorde song ourselves, so by reviewing and looking into the way she has the montages will give us the platform to gain inspiration from, but also challenge the aspects of this. 

Interestingly, this montage shows a part of it from a point of view shot, allowing the audience to almost be in her shoes and follow the narrative as if it is us. This links to the Diversion aspect of the Uses and Gratifications theory as it is almost an escapism from reality for the audience and the clever production aspects like this is what really gives the use of montages such potential. Also it allows the audience to relate and connect to the artist on a personal level (Dyer's Star Theory).

Because the montage here shows so much variation of many aspects such as lighting, costume and setting, it really shows the full potential of montages in music videos because you can quickly show an audience a full narrative in the limited time provided and you get to show the style of the artist and include more conventions of the genre. 

As a group we will be able to take inspiration from this and also consider using these techniques or challenge them to show our own ideas. Overall I think that by researching this video and the way it utilises montages it has shown me how to correctly incorporate one into our music video and how we could either do it similarly or challenge certain aspects of it, for example we aren't doing the entire music video as a montage but only towards the end, as if it is a review of the narrative as opposed to the whole narrative.