Rick Altman Theory

Rick Altman suggested that there were two factors that show what genre something is.

1) Semantic Element
This is the psychical things within a music video. For example camera shots, sound, the props and costumes. This is more easier to identify because it's a set way which all audience will be able to identify.

2) Syntactic Element
These are not visual and aren't always obvious. They are themes or moods that appear through the lyrics and video. Examples include rage, anger, love, passion etc. This is more difficult to identify because not everyone interprets the song in the same way giving it different meanings to different people.

EXAMPLE:

Meghan Trainor - Al about that Bass

This video contains both elements which tell the audience its apart of the pop genre.

Semantic- The Mise-en-scene is very bright with different colours of pink and blues standing out toward the audience. The video also contains different dance moves and the bass of the sound is very upbeat presenting the pop genre.

Syntactic- Its about  not caring what you look like and how much they weigh. This sends out a positive image to the audience conveying the pop genre.

MY WORK:
For my music video I will be trying to incorporate both elements to enable the audience to gather a basic perspective as well as having their own view of the song or video. Semantic elements will include different camera shots, instruments and certain costumes. However the syntactic elements will be more hidden and not fully explained to allow the audience to identify their own views.

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