Diddy - Dirty Money feat. Chris Brown - Yesterday (Video Analysis)

CINEMATOGRAPHY
Diddy and Chris Brown's music video contains a wide variety of different camera shots and angles. The music video starts off with an establishing shot with Diddy to the left of the screen. This suggests that the cinematographers wanted the audience to focus on the cinematic location of the music video rather than Diddy in this particular scene. The reason being that this allows audience can become familiar with the scenery from the start so that know where the performance in the video is taking place, but they are also intoduced to the artist at the same time. High angle shots are also used on a number of occasions, particularly on Chris Brown throughout the music video. In relation to the lyrics in the song, this suggests that he may feel vulnerable or inferior. At 2:33, he says 'knowing inside i'm broken and torn up', which is at the exact moment that a high angle is used in the video. Close ups are also included in the music video which helps to build up ideas about the artists emotional state. These type of shots are used to amplify the artists facial expressions to show the audience how the artist is feeling. At 2:06 I denote Chris Brown displaying a remorseful, yet frustrated facial expression along with a hand movement, connoting that he feels regretful frustrated at himself.

MISE EN SCENE
The music video is set in a large rural desert landscape in the middle of nowhere, as shown in the establishing shot, which is effective in the sense that it creates a feeling of isolation and confusion. This huge, deserted location may have been chosen particularly to represent both artists mind frames in relation to the lyrics of the song. In terms of props, there doesn't seem to be much going on. There appears to be two barrels with smoke emerging from them and a gun throughout the whole music video, which isn't very exciting. However, the emotional performance by both artists and the dancing performed by Chris Brown contributes towards making the music video visually exciting for the audience. I denote a number of elements being used in the music video which may have been used to create drama within the video, i.e. Fire, Lightning, Wind, Earth. The Fire may have been used to connote deep emotional feelings such as passion and love, the Lightning may have been used to connote complications and confusion in the artists love life, the Earth (the ground they are standing on) may have been used to connote stability, to show the audience that the artists are still standing strong through their individual problems, and the Wind (shown when smoke from the barrels is moving) may have been used to connote misdirection, to show the audience that the artists are unsure about what to do in terms of relationships.

EDITING
The most common transitions used in this music video is the 'dissolve' transition, which is when one shot is slowly fading out whilst the next one gradually becomes clearler. This type of transition is also used to convey to the audience that some time has passed. These are effective because they are visually entertaining for the viewers. They are also used to show a correlation between the shot fading out, and the shot fading in, e.g. at 0:24, Chris Brown says 'Shouldn't have been so beautiful', referring to the female he is singing about and at this point, the scene dissolves from a shot of Chris Brown to a shot of the female. This shows the viewers that their is some sort of relationship between Chris Brown and the female. Also, at 3:22, a match on action is used while Chris Brown is dancing. This is when the same action is being performed from a number of different camera angles and shots, for example, we could have 3 different shots from different angles of someone opening a door, with jump cuts inbetween each shot.