Visit from Polydor Records

In class we had two guest speakers, Hannah and Emily, who were both from Polydor records (part of the Universal group), to talk to us about the process of making music videos. They were both from the video commission department in Polydor, a small department comprised of 3 people who oversee the whole process of music video production. They explained that there are other similar departments including digital and press departments, though in recent years these departments have crossed over due to the reduction of physical magazines etc.

Some of their artists:

Pre-production

The label often has a relationship with the artist so doesn’t have to seek artists. Once the department has received a track from the artist, they will talk with the artist discussing the video. They talk about things such as how literal the video is, the location (set/studio), narrative, what to avoid etc. On occasion the artist will have a clear vision of their video making the video brief very specific. The department will then search for directors either from production agencies or seek individuals, the department will often take risks by contacting new talent especially if it is a low budget non-commercial production. Once the department has found 5 to 10 suitable directors, they will send them the brief, the more specific the brief the fewer directors would be contacted. The directors would send back a treatment and the department would select the strongest ideas but the artist would have the final say on the director.

Treatment

The women gave us some examples of treatments, they explained the structure of brief, concept, references. The examples had lots of visual imagery to help the artist quickly understand the ideas behind the video.

They gave us the example of the ‘Years and Years’ video of 'King', which had a budget of around £20-40,000. The video had a large performance element so it really helped that the lead singer came from a acting background. They explained that they used different visual elements during the chorus, such as the water scene, to engage the viewer for the whole duration of the video.

Budget

The women explained that the budget is forecasted by sales of the artist’s previous work; music videos can range from £2,000 to £200,000; more popular commercial artists have a much larger budget, for instance Taylor Swift’s ‘Bad Blood’ music video had a budget of $1 million. They said that they enjoy working on low budget productions, as there is less pressure on the video so they can take more risks.

Overview

They said that their job is effectively “micro managing” the whole process, as they are responsible for deadlines and asking for the storyboards, shot lists, casting references etc. so everything and everyone is ready on the day of the shoot. Their job is also to make sure everyone involved is on the same page of the vision and process. It was explained that the video has a 6 week turn around, 1 week prep for the video, a 1 to 2 day shoot and a 1 week edit before the edit is sent back to them for their conformation. There is often two different edits of the video, one for TV the other for online release as there is much more censorship on TV. The release is often dependent on the marketing scheme as it is important for management to compare the industry competition.

Vevo

Once the edit is confirmed, the video is most likely uploaded onto Vevo as the label has a relationship with the platform; this is very typical for very commercial artists who generate the most money. Vevo is used as it often boosts the view count due to the banners and advertisements that they create.