R&B music videos tend to have quite dark
colour schemes and are usually quite
unsaturated if it has a slower tempo. Some
are even black and white.
We followed this convention by using an
unsaturated colour scheme consisting of greys
and blues. In addition to this our narrative
sections being in black and white.
Examples of this are 'If I Were A Boy' by Beyonce, 'Beneath Your
Beautiful' by Labrinth ft. Emeli Sande and 'Let Me Love You' by
Ne-Yo
Editing
As a big part of R&B songs is the rhythm and the beat
of the music, a key convention is that the music video
cuts to the beat.
We followed this convention and ensured that our
video cuts to the beat of the song. We feel that this
really emphasises the musicality of the song and also
helps to match the visuals to the audio.
Costume/Styling
Costumes for male R&B artists tend to consist of tight
vests and jeans and accessories whether that is a cap,
watch or jewellery.
We developed this convention by making his
costumes/styling more modern. We had AJ in short sleeve
muscle t-shirts and jeans. Instead of having any heavy
jewellery we kept it simple and had him wear a shark
tooth necklace. In addition to this he wore a beanie not a
baseball cap/fedora in order to stand out from other R&B
artists like Ne-Yo or Jason Derulo.
These accessories usually act as a visual motif for the artist. For
example Ne-Yo's hat is part of his image in a similar way to Usher's
necklace being part of his image. AJ's shark tooth necklace is his
visual motif and we made sure it was visible in all the shots.
Dance Breaks
Dance breaks are a key convention of R&B
videos as dance and rhythm is a huge part of the
genre. Typically for male artist the dancers are
also male. If female dancers are involved it is
usually in a provocative style.
We developed this convention by having both male
and female dancers. We had a group dance, duet
sections and solo shots giving a range of different
dancing throughout the video. In addition to this
the female dancers were not sexualised.
Voyeurism/Sexualisation
Typically R&B videos hypersexualise
both men and women in music
videos. If the artist is male, they are
commonly shirtless and if the artist is
female she is usually wearing quite
revealing clothing. The extra actors
are also dressed in a
sexual/provocative way.
We decided to challenge this convention as we didn't want to
represent AJ in this manner. Neither he nor any other actor in
the video has been hyper-sexualised. We feel that this makes
our video stand out within the genre.
An example of this is Jason Derulo's music video for 'Trumpets'