Carol Vernallis

Carol Vernallis had a theory based on music editing which consisted of 4 key concepts:

Narrative
Editing
Camera movement and framing
Diegesis

Vernallis said that Music videos break down the visual, lyrical and musical elements to the smallest
constituent parts- a prop, a colour, a gesture, a few words, an intriguing riff.
Narrative
This part of the theory suggests that the video is a visual response to the narrative, this basically
means that the video tells the story in correlation to the lyrics and music. She then goes on to say
that the narrative may not always be completed and that this can create a disjointed, fragmented
video which gives it a more interesting appearance. If the narrative is left incomplete it could prompt
questions that wont always be answered throughout the video.
Editing
Traditionally, for music videos, the editing is cut to the beat. However, the prime purpose is to
reflect the properties of the sound. Also, the camera movement can produce the illusion of an edit
where there hasnt been one.
A clear convention of editing music videos is that you can break the conventions of continuity
editing. The editing may not be clean-cut and invisible as would a continuity edit, but is visible. This
allows the style of editing to be unique and distinctive to that video.
For example, you could see:

Cutting with the lyrics

Jump Cuts
Changes in pace (usually according to rhythm)

Camera Movement & Framing

She states that the singer should mainly be positioned at the front and centre of the frame but that
other body parts could have equal significance. I think that this especially relates to modern day
music where a lot of artists use their bodies and star image to sell their music (e.g. Rihanna, Miley
Cyrus). However, the most common camera position is below the subject and to one side. The style
of framing can also be quite distinctive, this can add to the mood of the video.
One of the most common camera features of a music video is the establishing shot which is
frequently used as well as close-up shots.
She has also said that frequently the flow of images is too quick for us to properly acknowledge and
so therefore we need close-ups to help us focus and provides us with something to remember.

The camera may move in time with the lyrics, to demonstrate the rhythm.
Diegesis
The narrative/plot will generally be slowly revealed to create anticipation and keep the audiences
attention. The actions throughout the video dont always need to be completed and may be
discomposed in one way or another. The video will contain repetition throughout and some frames
will seem more meaningful because of the way they have been shot/framed.