carol vernallis

carol vernallis is an editing theorist. in her work 'The kindest cut', she explores how editing in film and in music videos differ from each other. she talks about meaning, sound and visuals, editing as a whole, continuity and the star image.

she talks about four main categories: 

• camera - close ups are very common shots used in music videos to show the importance of the parts the band or artist is playing and the way that they look. establishing shots are also commonly used to show the location. the camera sometimes may move in time with the beat of the song. vernallis also argues that framing in music videos is very distinctive 

• editing - music videos tend to usually break the rules of continuity. an editing technique used in music videos is jump cuts, as music videos usually go straight from one thing to the next. the frames are mostly cut to the beat of the music

• narrative - the narrative is a visual response to the song as well as what the artist or band wants the meaning to be presented as. vernallis argues that the ending of a music video is not always clear which allows the audience create their own interpretation. sometimes music videos can be seen as disjointed or disconnected

• diegesis - the 'world' created within the music video. the diegesis is something that is slowly revealed throughout the music video. vernallis argues that music videos are sometimes left 'uncompleted', making the audience want to know what happens next