Planning Setting and Iconography- Miss Georgiou

When planning a music video is essential to decide the location and iconography. They are important elements to a music video as they can present the codes and the conventions of the indie genre. They can give the audience a better understanding of the video and what is going within the video. I believe that iconography is most important as it gives a music video a deeper meaning. The location, also, is important as it can represent the artist in certain ways and can give the audience a sense into their lives and how the artist lives.




Throughout our music video, we have decided on several different locations in order to create a successful indie music video. The first location we have chosen is Camden Lock in where there is a river, shops and places you can eat. We have chosen this setting as it reflects the look of the indie genre. It is a highly conventional location for an indie music video so we believed that this would be a successful location to convey typical stereotypes of the genre. It is also a place where we can portray a loving relationship and people having a good time. When we are filming here, we will film many different shots in order to get the benefit of the location. We will firstly have a long shot of the couple walking along the camden lock, the canal, holding hands. This will portray the loving relationship that we want to create and the sense that they love each other and want to show each other off and they do not care about anything or anyone else. The long shot will be shown when the lyrics say 'we don't have to worry about nothing'. This portrays their relationship as healthy and that they do not worry about anyone else and what other people think. The next shot will be a close up, handheld shot of them taking a picture of themselves with the canal and the lock in the background. This again shows off and portrays the loving relationship and they want to capture every moment together. This shot will be shown when it says 'we got the love', to again portray their loving relationship and to portray to the audience that they are in love. With it being in a open setting, it seems more natural an realistic. However, because of this setting, it limits what me and my group can do as there are many people that will be around us. Because of how busy it will be, we will not be able to fully focus on the couple as there will be many people passing by. There are also some health and safety risks when it comes to this location. For example, the river can cause a problem. The walkway is very narrow and there will be many people walking by meaning that there will not be much room causing, perhaps, someone to fall into the canal. However, we will take extra care when filming and wait for the right time when there isn't many people in order to create a successful shot and nothing go wrong. As this is outside, the weather plays a massive affect on our filming. If it is raining we will not be able to film as it will not be as successful and will not convey the typical indie conventions. As this is our main location we have no other back up plans therefore we will have to wait for a time when the weather is suitable to film. This can cause an impact however as it may delay our production and when it comes to editing we will not have enough time to complete it as we have to meet our deadline.

The next location we will be using in our video is an alley way. We have chosen this location in order to convey the meaning of the bad side of a relationship. The darkened alley way and the hidden area can represent the dark side and the argumentative side of a relationship.  Within this location we will film the arguments between the couple and what happens after an argument. This is  conventional to an indie music video because the setting is low in cost and many people prehaps  have been in the same location and can therefore can relate to the music video. Also, it will be filmed at nighttime meaning the lighting will be low key. The low key lighting will portray to the audience that this is a negative part of a relationship and that the artist is in a dark unhappy place. This setting will be first seen when the lyrics 'when the lights turned down' are sung. The lyrics and visuals then link together and match eachother, showing Goodwin's theory to the audience. We have decided to use this here in order to enhance the bad nature of the relationship through the setting and lighting. My group and I want to make the video as relatable as possible to the audience so by doing it in a setting like this, in a real life location, we hope that many people as possible can relate to it and therefore connect with the artist more.  When fliming this shot, we will use long shots and close ups in order to show the couple together. The long shots and close ups will show off their body language and their body langauge and the way they are feeling towards eachother at that moment. The body language seen will portray them as unhappy and fighting which can make the audience feel bad for them and slightly on edge as they are in pubic and will not know what will happen next. The location does limit what we can do as it is a small space and this could be disturbing the public. It also proposes some health and safety risks like the small space we have, when the couple are arguing and fighting this can cause for sonmeone to fall over or trip up so we will have to be extra careful when moving.


The next location will be in the home, outside in the garden. This location will be used throughout the video portraying the good and bad sides of a relationship. During the relationship and the good times hey have together, the garden will present them as simplistic meaning they dont need to go out to have a good time together just being in eachothers presence is enough. This will also be used in the break up scenes where there will be a fire and she is throwing things onto the fire. The fire will be shown in the video in the chorus towards the end of the song when the artist sings 'and we gonna let it burn burn burn burn'. We have decided to do this here in order to again link the visuals and lyrics together. This also gives the audience more of an idea of what is going on. This will be relatable to the audience as they can see what the artist is going through and can relate to it as it may be the same experience as what the audience have been through. This can give the message across to ther audience that she is going through a traumatic experience and is letting all of her emoptions out. Close ups and establishing shots will be significant in this location in order to show the artists face and the location that sheis in and the different things that are happenng. For example, her throwing stuff on the fire and the facial expressions she is making which will express hersel and what she is feeling underneath. There are some limitations to this location because of the fire we intend to make. However, we do not want to make the fire out of control so therefore we would only be able to make a small fire which means that it will not look as effective when we film the scene as the fire will be small. The health and safety risks that could occur is the fact that the bonfire could get too out of hand and someone could end up burning themselves or it could set a tree on fire. To avoid these risks we will keep a safe distance away from the fire when filming and when the main character is acting she should also keep a safe distance. We will also keep a fire blanket nearby and a fire extinguisher in case such problems occur. The weather also plays a massive issue in this location, it may rain on the day we decide to film this scene and create a bonfire therefore making it impossile to make a bonfire. If this occurs we will have to film on a different day as this is a key part of our video which we do not want to miss out. 

The iconography we intend on using are all items that are conventional to the indie genre. For example we will be using a guitar, beanie hats, alcohol and cigarettes. We will include these items as we believe that they will help to reinforce the genre and make the scenario more realistic and believable. 

The first iconography element we intend on using is the guitar, specifically an acousitc one. We want to use this in order to show off the artists talent that she has. The acoustic guitar is highly stereotypical of the indie genre as it a main instrument used within an indie song. The guitar will be seen when she is singing into the camera or when she is playing to herself.  Specifically at parts when she is performing to the camera at the chorus when the song says 'strike the match, play it loud, giving love to the world'. This makes the video have a more personal feel and makes it seem as if the artist is singing and playing her guitar to the audience. The inconography of he guitar shows off her talents and allows for the audience to see she is multi-talented and be attracted to her more. We believe this is a successful element within the video as it will make the video more realistic and make the audience want to get to know more about her.

  The next iconography elements comes under the use of costume. We chose to dress the artist in a big denim jacket and big boots after analysing many indie music videos, we noticed that many indie artists wear this and therefore we will include this in our video to make the video more realistic and relatable. The costume is highly laid back which is conventional of the indie genre. The costume will be seen throughout the music video in order to portray the indie genre throughout the whole video. We will also dress the artist in a beanie hat as they are extremely casual hats which is another reason why we added this into our video. The relaxed look of the hat reflects how the artist feels, feeling comfortable with themselves and that they can wear what they like and dont feel the need to change for anyone yet at the same time still portraying the indie genre.

The next iconography element that will be included in our video is the use of alcohol. We wanted to include this to show the audience that the couple are having a good time together and simple things can keep them happy and like to do things just the two of them. However we also want to include alcohol to portray the abusive and negative sides of a relationship. The use of alcohol can portray to the audience the idea that they want to forget about their problems within the relationship and just want to swallow their sadness and feelings and alcohol is the only way the feel they can do this. This is conventional to the indie genre as it can be seen as rebellious and not of the norm which is part of the indie genre. The alcohol abuse will be seen at the bridge of the song when there is no music playing. It will be shown through the use of long shots, close ups and low angles to make the audience have more of an understanding of what is happening. The clips will also show flash backs of happy points of their relationship, enhancing the sadness and anguish that the artist is in.