Royksopp- What Else is There?
This highly abstract yet visceral music video directed by De Thurah successfully uses emotional dreamlike images and mise en scene of a woman floating through a desolate world, a similar style to which we discussed. The video is particularly fluid and dynamic creating a mystical sense through the blue colour wash and darkened lighting. De Thurah presents the fragility of life through this emotionally attaching meta narrative; an illustrative arthouse modernistic style breaking down the beauty of life, similarly to 'Little Comets' music video 'Isles' showing traditional harsh lifestyles and the beauty of the characters personalities.
De Thurah successfully amplifies the meaning of the track using the video as a promotional tool, reflecting his personal style of complexity, as he describes 'a four minute distillation of strange feelings; complex, turbulent, micro narrative'. Although De Thurah relies heavily on meat shots as a promotional tool, a technique we do not particularly want, on deciding against a performance based film; but similarly to what we would like by rejecting the traditional voyeuristic treatment of the female body.
The obscurity of the video is particular appropriate for our group matching already discussed ideas including the use of animals as props, mise en scene such as dripping milk from the artists foot and strong central eye contact shot through static camerawork at a central eye level, with varying shot lengths but particularly MLS.
The slight narrative link to the non verbal language of the woman gazing into the surroundings I believe works very well and is a style we should consider. Similarly to 'Little Comets' music video, this uses montage editing with static shots and an unusually slow cutting rate to match the slow melancholy tone of the song, reoccurring techniques. Look out for the compression of time and the reverse shots used as well as the combination of 2 lines of action; also the establishing shots of the locations, desolate areas.
Although we haven't yet decided how closely linked we wish our video to have with the anti comercial lyrics we will use this video provides an example of a very close link particularly with the words, 'I am the storm'.
Little Comets- Isles
This montage edited video by 'Little Comets' has always been a favorite of mine created by a series of still shots particularly MLS and MCU. The close up shots of the faces displays an array of cultures and personalities, cutting to longer shots and other parts of the figure to allow the audience to develop a sense of their plight. I love the movement shown on the static shots, particularly the wind blowing on the British flag and the horses running free. The use of compression of time on the high canted angle extreme long shot of the housing estate is a particular technique I wish to experiment. The locations work extremely well to create a low class urban setting. The equal lengths shots work well cutting on time to the soundtrack displaying appropriate mise en scene to the lyrics. The assesability of the video is shown through these strong cultural codes, famous coastal towns allowing the audience to form a connection with both the video, the song and the artist. These are anchored by the visual signifers, the traditional cafes and caravan parks as well as the beach and the ice cream prop connoting an indie feel; the aural signifiers also, including the British grain of voice. An idea 'Richard Dyer' suggests in his 'First Paradox' contrasting varying personalities, including the artist and the public.
Look out how the cutting rate changes throughout the video, starting slow with motion images then faster on static shots. Also the facial expressions act as semiotics allowing the audience to build a narrative around the video; particularly the characters eye contact works to draw in the attention of viewer. The artist also uses first person mode of address to connect to the audience.
The contrasting props of a dolls head and a football used in the scene with the young 'thugs' I believe is very successful in creating an appropriate obscurity for the video. Only at the end of the music video do we experience a performance by the artists gently singing to just a few of the lyrics; I think this is similar to what we discussed about introducing a quick performance at the peak of the video. I believe the reason the characters performance is so successful is because they do always not conform to traditional gender stereotypes, however the 'thugs' performance does represent sterotypical behavior due to their realistic non verbal language.
And so this video beholds many ideas and techniques we suggested for our music video, the montage editing with a variety of cutting rates, the use of masks, movement and animals and the selection of camera angles and lengths; the use of tracking shots and compression of time.
Ben Howard-The Wolves
This handy cam style video by 'Ben Howard' provides a certain degree of narrative fuzz to the audience. Although the weather plays a large part in the success of the mise en scene I particularly like the establishing long shots of the exterior locations and how the camera follows the road in the car, creating a soft idea of a long journey. I love the canted angle shot of the barbed wire with the blurred yet beautiful sunset in the background. The use of low angle shooting is also very successful in this video, we should deffinately consider shooting with this technique when it comes to our filming. I would also like to experiment using slow motion on the breaking waves and attempting to catch individual water droplets as the light hits them.
Ben Howard- Promise
This song by Ben Howard has no official video and I believe could be a very successful choice for us to create our music video. The lyrics:
And meet me there, bundles of flowers, we wait through the hours of cold
Winter shall howl at the walls, tearing down doors of time
Shelter as we go
And promise me this; you'll wait for me only, scared of the lonely arms
Surface, far below these words
Maybe, just maybe I'll come home
Who am I, darling to you?
Who am I?
Going to tell you stories of mine
Who am I?
Who am I, darling for you?
Who am I?
Could be a burden in time, lonely
Who am I, to you?
Who am I, darling for you?
Who am I?
Going to be a burden
Who am I, darling to you?
Who am I?
I come alone here
I come alone here
These non commercial lyrics provide a variety of shot ideas similar to those previously discussed and the tone of the soundtrack matching the indie/ folk genre we have been researching.
DJ Fresh- Gold Dust
I love this cultural video by 'DJ Fresh', the locations and uplifting narrative creates an enjoyable music video which captures the cultural codes of city suburbs allowing the viewers to connect to both the video, setting and artist. The video cleverly begins cutting from various areas around the urban setting from different perspective and heights. Again this video successfully uses slow motion on the shots with the basketball and extreme close ups of different faces, two techniques which may be appropriate for our music video. The non verbal language and facial expressions work to draw the audience into the narrative with direct eye contact of eye level close ups, shots I like a lot. The close detail on the water droplets is also a shot I wish to experiment with after researching the surfing mise en scene in Ben Howards 'The Wolves'. The soft blur and focus switching on static shots works well to establish both characters and settings and create a softer feel to the harsher lower class setting.
I particularly like the fast cutting rate at about 40 seconds where the camera cuts to different children sitting in different distances, positions and angles. The characters presented do not serve to represent traditional gender stereotypes but emphasized is both gender and racial equality particularly through the smiles and happy facial expressions.
The cut from the same shot of skipping from a slow motion medium long shot to a normal speed long shot works very well (see 2.20), also similarly to 'Little Comets' music video 'Isles', a thug style character is first introduced with a stern aggressive facial expression which is softened into a smile by the end, a very appealing shot to watch.
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