Matthew Grainger 13B - Technical Analysis and Deconstruction of a Music Video Conclusion

3 Doors Down - It's Not My Time (2008) Directed by Shaun Silva

I deconstructed the video shot by shot in order to see the planning and storyboarding required when creating our group music video. The video is a fast paced 'running' video so the director mostly uses 1 and 2 seconds shot in order to set the pace of the video and the narrative. The video is a mix of narrative and performance. However in order to create a greater sense of reality the performance and narrative are both filmed in the same city and locations.

Throughout the video the director uses a wide range of different shots, angles, frames and landscapes. He uses all the length shots( Xtreme close ups, close ups, mediums, long shots, Xtreme longs etc) in order to mainly set the scene and put emphasis on such things as the time, traffic lights, instruments and also facial expressions. The quick editing used to blend all of these shots together has been intricately binded in a way to create a link between the music, lyrics and the visuals. As wells as these the director uses over cranking, aerial shots and also deep focus shots. In keeping with most performance/narrative videos the screen time is divided between the two relatively evenly. However what i found with this video is that where in most videos the lead singer is very much at the forefront of the performance section of the video in the 3 doors down production all the other members of the band have just as much screen time as the lead singer. This could be argued to be a way the director promotes the band as well as the song itself.
Whilst the director does use a range of shots i found that the majority were 1 second 'quick' shots of a medium range. Virtually all of the performance was filmed with these shots whilst the narrative frequently used them. In the narrative however i found that this was where the more unusual shots(over-cranking, aerial, deep focusetc) were used in order to give the story body and a climax.
The way the music has been weaved into the video provides an eye catching video which was nominated for numerous video of the year awards. I found by analysing other music videos in the post-grunge genre that by following the conventions of the genre, as Silva did, you can create a conventionally stable video by using costumes, dark or grey washes over the shots and landscapes.