The first here on my list is ''Live' footage' style videos. Simple enough, these music videos tend to show the artist in concert performing the song that the video is for. Like this video for Girls from Slow Magic:
This video is actually comprised of real live footage at real concerts, but there are also examples of videos where it isn't quite actually live, just made up to seem as though it is live. Furthermore, there are also videos that feature this faux-live style but also work in a form of narrative. Example below:
This video above is actually a pretty good example of the 'split screen' effect - something I'll go into later.
There are also music videos that follow a narrative without the 'live' element. They're sometimes referred to as 'interpretive' videos as the stories they tell tend to relate to the lyrics, but there are examples of (somewhat) instrumental songs that have a narrative. Case in point:
Instead of following a story presented by the lyrics the narrative follows the feeling or mood of the song itself. This also applies to 'impressionist' videos.
Impressionist videos tend to take the 'feeling' of the song, or how it sounds, and try to represent that the best they can through their video. A good way to understand the idea of 'impressionist' music videos is to turn to the art movement from which they take their name.
Impressionism is stuff like Van Gogh, or, pictured below, Leonid Afremov. The whole point of impressionist art is that it's based on 'relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, [and] emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities' in order to make an impression of the source material:
Same thing with the music videos really.
A good example of this is Gold by Chet Faker:
The song is rather slow, deliberate and minimal, and the video replicates that feeling in its simplicity. It certainly doesn't follow the lyrics in any overt way, and instead goes down the more subjective route in representing its song.
Another style taking its name from an art movement is surrealist. Videos in this category tend to be more 'weird' and different than other videos, since surrealist art is the notion of impossible or unlikely things painted realistically.
A good example of a surrealist music video is this one from Xilent for 'Boss Wave':
You can tell it's surrealist because of the realistic look of the robot coupled with the sheer impossibility of the whole situation.
Next on my list is 'Synergy/Allusion/Pastiche/Parody/Homage'. That's quite broad, so I'll find a couple examples for this one. 'Synergy' is where two different products or pieces of media come together to help promote each other. The example I used in my other post about the purposes of music videos was Pharrell's 'Happy':
The synergy comes from this song's relationship with the film Despicable Me 2. This is more of an 'allusion' in this video as the only reference to the film is where the 'minion' characters from the film show up:
'Homage' is where something references another text, but usually in a respectful or 'tribute' sort of manner, similar to 'pastiche'. 'Parody', while similar to 'pastiche', tends to mock the work it's derived from, rather than celebrate it.
Mark Ronson's music video for Just ft. Phantom Planet is a good example of pretty much all three of these. The song itself is a cover of the Radiohead song, and the video is in reference to the Radiohead video, but it also pokes a bit of fun at times.
Here's the Radiohead video:
And here's Mark Ronson's version:
Animation is used in music videos an astounding amount - I could probably list around 10 examples here, and I did list a lot back in my History of Animation post. Here's one I haven't brought up before, for 'Grave' by WeAreCastor:
So those are the main styles and conventions out of the way. There are a number of techniques used in music videos quite commonly, and probably the most common out of those is lip-syncing. This is where, when filming, the song will be playing and the vocalist / whoever else will sing along to it. Then, after the fact, the studio recording is lined up with the video to make it seem like the vocalist is singing the song. This is used so, so much in music videos, but here is an example:
Sometimes people will speed up / slow down the track played on set so that when the video is altered to match the original speed of the studio recording the video is either in slow-motion or double speed, yet the audio is at original speed. Take, for instance, OK Go's 'I Won't Let You Down':
You can see at the beginning that the video is in double speed. If you watch the behind the scenes video, you can catch them filming at real speed and moving reaaaaally slowly.And even then there are videos that take this concept and push it to the extreme by chopping and changing the song on set and then editing it together into a coherent song after the fact. Like this video for 'Red Hands' by Walk Off the Earth:
This was actually filmed in one take. Here's the unedited version as proof:
Another typical trope of music videos is cutting on the beat. This is a good way of making sure that the video and the song are more intrinsically linked than just by name. Here's 'Centipede' by Knife Party for a good example:
The effect is particularly noticeable at the beginning.
Let's take a moment to talk about mise-en-scene in the Knife Party video. It's set in a sort of 1930s, film-noir era, in an worn down old hotel of sorts.
If you look at this shot here you can see that director Elliot Sellers is using lighting very purposefully to create the atmosphere and mood of the video. You have the sort of shuttered beams at the middle left there that are a bit reminiscent of that old noir trope where someone would look through some venetian blinds or the like.
Look at the ceiling in this shot. I think this is probably the most distinct indicator of how crappy and worn-down this old hotel-style building is.
The effects really make this video what it is, and make it far more memorable than what it would be otherwise.
Another couple of really good examples for music videos with cool editing effects are from Watsky and Dizzee Rascal. I'm lumping them together because in concept these videos are quite similar:
Both of these videos put a unique spin on what would be a kind of generic video in both cases (Maybe not Dizzee's, the whole 'period dress' thing isn't exactly played out), and it has that 'magician' quality about it where the viewer wonders how they 'pulled it off'.
Next on the list is split-screen. I already mentioned Alors On Danse earlier on in the post as a good example, but funnily enough Watsky has another strong example here:
Split-screen is an interesting effect for music videos because it splits the viewers' attention between multiple things at one time. This forces the viewer to pay closer attention because they don't want to miss anything.
Another editing effect I have listed is the use of green-screening and chroma key. Usually these kinds of things are used for more abstract style videos, like this one from Graffiti6:
For a good example of use of camera movements I'm going to have to come back to OK Go for their video for 'Writing's On the Wall':
The camera movement really improves this video, especially in having to line up the optical illusions exactly, and the part where the camera turns around on its axis:
As well as camera movement, another thing that some videos employ is the use of camera angles to help with the mise-en-scene. Like, for instance, the video for Dan Croll's 'From Nowhere':
All the angles and shot distances for this video are very meticulously composed and set up, for instance this one of the stopwatch:
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