How artists are filmed/Performance

This video contains 3 R&B artists collaborating in one song, this is one of the reasons I have chosen to analyse it for how R&B artists are filmed as you see this throughout the video.


Low angle shots are used frequently in this video, giving the artists power and making it appear they are looking down on you. This is common in R&B music videos, as the artists often go for the 'powerful' look which usually links to their song. This song especially links with the power aspect as they lyrics are "We gon' run this town tonight" making them look like the leaders of a crew/pack/army of people, other shots of the video back this up, showing crowds of people looking up to the artists.
The pictures below show the low angles, making it look although the viewers are looking up to the artist. This pictures also portray an intimidating image of the R&B artists as they have very straight faces, and almost look angry. This again is a feature of R&B videos, the artists keep a straight face (especially male artists)

There are some cult images in this video, which could be taken as intimidating such as Rihanna making the Illuminati triangle. This is something that artists often do to show rebellion and iconic originality as many people don't know what the Illuminati sign means, this would enforce the enigma code making the audience want to find out what it is.

This image is of all three of the R&B artists, this shot is close to the beginning of the video, straight away enforcing the style of this video as it shows they are wearing black, and you cannot see much of their face/features, creating a sinister, intimidating feel to their image. In the last picture, Jay Z is covering his face with a scarf, linking to the cult image given from the video.

The next screen shot from the video shows a cross dissolve/fade between Rihanna and the crowd of followers the R&B artists appear to have surrounding them in the video. This is a good effect as she is almost in front of them in the shot, giving her power over them. The raised arm in the air also gives off the idea that she is rallying her troops for battle. There is a strong war theme of this video due to military outfits and the people with fire and such.

This is something we may do in our video, a cross fade between our artists face singing, and the girl character dancing in the background, giving an effective shot of both our narrative and performance.

The shot of the artist pointing at the camera below makes the audience feel although she is singing directly to them, Rihanna is making direct eye contact too which is an important thing with R&B conventions as they connect with the audience and build up a relationship with them.

These shots focusing on Rihanna do bring in sex appeal and femininity. The first image shows a prominent pout from a side shot of her face, making the video appeal to the male audience as she is an attractive artist so they are still using this slightly in the video although they have stripped most of it away.

These shots show 'girl power' which is something Rihanna as an artist is known for, as she gives of the impression of being very independent. These low angle shots of her give her power over other characters in the video and over the audience again, this is a common convention of R&B music videos. In the bottom image, Rihanna is shown standing in front of the men in the video, giving her power even over them in these shots, which is sometimes unusual especially in the R&B genre, men are usually seen as powerful and protecting the women in the videos. This adds to the edginess of the video as it is breaking some usual common conventions of the genre.

Very dark lighting is used in some shots of the video, with a green hue to the shot, this portrays an evil nature as its dark, and green, both convey images of sinister darkness. The light is coming from behind both artists in the shots too making them look shadowy and their features are quite unrecognisable, again adding to the sinister effect.

These shots of actors in the video enforce the army of people shown following the R&B stars. Quick shots of lots of the characters faces are shown cutting in time with the beat of the music. These people again look dark and sinister as you cannot see much of their faces.