What is a music video - Miss Miller

What is a music video

 Katy Perry - California Gurls belongs to the genre of pop music and is sung by Katy Perry and features Snoop Dogg. A music video can have many different purposes including:
- to promote an artist
- portray a representation of the artist
- identify an artist/group
- buy into different lifestyles
- to show different conventions of genres
- to make the audience remember the video
- make a song available to a wide audience
- show more about the artist
- build a relationship with the artist
- understand more about the song.

These are all reasons why an artist would create a music video and the ways it would appeal to different audiences. Katy Perry's music video - California Gurls is a narrative fun video which shows Katy as a figurine on a playing
board going along and saving other girls who are trapped, whilst Snoop Dogg is controlling the game. The video is fun, colourful and girly and appeals to a wide audience. The purpose of this music video is to promote Katy Perry as an artist as she appears within the video throughout as she is the main character, this is done by portraying her in a positive light where young girls may look up to her as a role model. This helps the audience to build a relationship with the artist as they get to gain an insight into Katy's lifestyle and tastes. This is all achieved through the music video as it shows Katy is kind, fun and creative within her video and is fun and enjoyable to watch. 

The style of this music video is narrative as Katy is exploring a surreal candy world where she is surrounded by sweets, cakes and ice cream shown by quick shots which show the singer in different locations in the board game. The video has been edited quickly to show her different costume changes which show the vast journey she is taking within the board game. The purpose of this narrative for this particular song, is that the audience would be able to understand the lyrics and music a lot more as there are visuals which correlate with both making the songs meaning a lot clearer to the audience. 

The codes and conventions which are evident within pop songs are shown within the video such as the main artist is shown frequently throughout by close up camera shots. This is done to promote the artists popularity and to attract audiences to watch the video as they want to see the artist.

This video appeals to different audiences as different portrayals of Katy are seen throughout. For example, when she is laying naked on a cloud. This would attract a male audience to watch the video as they would enjoy seeing her in this portrayal.