Ellie Goulding - Goodwin Analysis

Ellie Goulding - Lights: Goodwin Analysis

Immediately the visuals relate to the title of the song ad the first thing we see are bright spotlights moving around the frame as the intro of the song starts. Ellie Goulding then fades into the frame wearing a black dress and her hair is down and make up is well done. This automatically makes her the main focus of the music video and the audience are attracted to her appearance. As expected with pop music videos, she begins to dance as the beat picks up and she dances in the light. As the song progresses she swings her hair back and forth, bringing attention to her thick hair, showing that it is a big aspect of her image, which is similar to many other female solo artists.

There is a relationship between the music and visuals as she sings "shining when I'm alone" as she is dancing alone in the lights, shining from behind her. There are cuts to her dancing, surrounded by special effects lighting, as if she is creating them. The camera frequently come back to her, showing her dancing in several different coloured lights, each with different designs. This could apply to Goodwin's point and be due to the demands from the record label, showing that she has to be the main selling point and her performance is key.

Her outfit changes a few times into things more exciting such as a glittery dress, which again makes the light reflect off of her, showing that she is the centre of the entire music video. There is no narrative in this music video and there is no other person to be seen, all the attention is on her, her appearance and the lights surrounding her. As the drum beat kicks in slightly, there is a shot of her hitting a drum, which also applies to Goodwin's point of having a relationship between the music and the visuals.

Whilst the music video included some dancing, it could be classed as a performance video, as all she does in the video is perform her song. It also has an artistic element to it due to the amount of reliance on the contrast between the dark background and the many many lights and special effects, which actually makes the video a lot more interesting that it should be. The shots are quite repetitive and we frequently see the same ones, which makes the video become quite boring after a while. As the music and lyrics start to stutter, so does the video itself, showing a relationship and making it look more exciting and visually interesting. The shot of Ellie Goulding actually slows down as the music does too, which also contributes to the previous point. 

Overall, I think that the video could have been made better with a bit more of a narrative and glamour but it was still interesting to see how much the music and visuals related to each other. This is a technique which I would definitely want to include when I make my music video. The video was quite artistic with it's use of lights and how towards the end they looked like paint. I will take this into consideration when it comes to planning my music video.