Style is a Reflection of Self

     She has no style. How do you know that? Better yet why do you think that? Style is a matter of perception. Style is a matter of categorization. Style is a matter of many different things. The music video is a style. MTV which was based on music videos also has a style. Style is a relationship to the world, body, and technology.

     After reading Chapter 5 of Why I Still Want My MTV by Kevin Williams and discussion in Music Video class the style of music video and MTV became more apparent to me. I already knew that a music video had a certain way of looking. A music video is fast paced, can tell a story, be non-narrative, or completely confuse the viewer. There is a way of shooting a music video that is different from shooting a film or television show. Even though a trailer for a film can follow music video style. A trailer “tells us something quicker, without need for traditional narrative.” That fast paced style of a music video. 

     MTV, the network formally known for music videos has it own style as well. MTV expresses the music, expresses visuals musically, and expresses perception. The way this is done is institutionalized. Even though MTV is no longer a music video based channel the way they present and edit their reality shows or more substantial shows dealing with politics or documentaries have a style. This style is taken from the music video style. An example in Chapter 5 described how presidential candidates on Choose or Lose in 1992 were presented in the mood of a music video. Even though that was in 1992 MTV still has a style today. Take the Video Music Awards for instance. Since the first VMA’s MTV’s awards show had more shock, more laid back vibe, more anything goes approach than The Grammy’s or more serious awards shows. During the show the camera will move the camera up to the balcony or cut to something quickly. 

     Morse said that MTV style is taken from the strong institutional relation to advertisements. Advertisements that are of pop culture and customer capitalism like cars. Commercials are fast paced and quick like music videos. MTV shows and the way or style that they produce things can look like they are selling something. Partying it up at the Jersey Shore or teen pregnancy for instance. MTV has been criticized by some people for glamorizing teen pregnancy with 16 and Pregnant. Glamorizing is to bring allure to something like advertisements do. MTV style is to shock, be like a music video, and be pop culture.

     Style can reflect pop culture or be a trend and be in or out but there is more to style. Style “reveals consciousness of the world” and the “sense of the world.” The thoughts, feelings, culture of a time or place. The study of style can help to understand the world for style is a way of perception. The video girl is a standard in the music video.   The female is thus still seen as an object. Style has relation to the body for style interprets the visual. Style allows us to come up with our own meaning for something. Therefore the visuals to a music video don’t have to match the lyrics. 

     Style is not only a matter of trend. Style is not only how something is done. Style is a way we can categorize something by how we understand it. The music video is condensed but doesn’t really have restrictions. A music video can be a music video in many different types of ways. 

The Very Beginning is the Best Part

     The lights go down, sound comes up, opening credits roll, and then the excitement dies. Well not with every movie but the opening credits to a film are important. If the opening credits of a film reflect the storyline or a character it sets up the story. Remarkable opening credits go further and engage the moviegoer completely into the film in just a matter of minutes. 

     Kyle Cooper has created many remarkable opening credits. The opening credits for Spiderman 2 caught my interest. Not to mention they were one of the best parts of the film. 

     In the opening credits for Spiderman 2 Kyle Cooper introduces the typography motif for the credits in the very beginning of them with the word, Marvel. Marvel appears through the flipping of comic book pages. The word however starts to appear behind the pictures but not in entirety. This happens fast but I noticed that not all of the letters appear at the same time. He did not have letters come in at different times rather he put some parts of the letters behind the flipping pictures. This is seen with the typography after the title of the film is shown. 

     After the title names appear after layers in front of them move to reveal the names. The layers were also on top of each other which gave the 3D effect. Moreover at times a name on one layer was larger than the name on another layer. The layer with the larger name also was closer to the viewer in terms of depth. This added to the 3D effect even more. 

     

     The reveal of the names and the use of layers inspired me significantly. There was a spark that was initiated in my mind. Since the beginning of this project I have tried to think of ways to show a part of my phrase that has the word behind in it. I wanted to show a behind action but didn’t want to be so obvious about it. Cooper gave me the idea to use layers and masks. How he revealed the names in the opening credits was unexpected to me and thus very interesting rather than obvious. 

     Kinetic typography can look engaging but can be simple at the same time. Turning words into images can be entertaining but Kyle Cooper showed with the Spiderman 2 opening credits that movement and layers are enough to intrigue. I have already learned After Effects is based on layers. Now manipulating layers is what I shall base my kinetic typography on. 

Making it My Own ("Own")

     How often does one see something and think I want to do that or at least like to try? As a lifelong music lover I have watched countless music videos. Being that I am visual person I enjoy to see visuals with music. I have even have thought of how the music video for a song would look...before even taking this class. This class is Music Video and I want to make the video my own but I am taking inspiration from others I have seen. 

     A music video is fast pace or at least a music video I would watch. If a music video was just one continuous shot and hardly any movement I would lose interest fast. That being the case, for my music video I want to put several different ideas together. These ideas I have seen in other music videos. I like the idea of stop motion. It is movement but not normal movement. Thus I think that it is interesting and I believe that it is more interesting to impose stop motion over another shot. This idea I got from Dev’s music video for her song “Booty Bounce”. The video is simple but does get boring after a while so I don’t want to do a complete video of stop motion. 

     To contrast stop motion I also like the idea of slow motion in music videos. In some music videos I have seen the artist run, walk,  or perform in slow motion. Furthermore I would also like to use masks on top of an object. As well as match cut and jump cut editing. Moving an object through two different shots or using two sequential shots of the same thing from different camera positions can link shots together but not in the traditional “movie making” way. Music videos can be short films....(Michael Jackson!) but “you can do things in video you can’t do in film” as said in class. I want to take advantage of this. 

     

     Going back to film making though I also like simple music videos if the artist has enough personally to keep my attention. Therefore I do want to just shoot people doing their own thing. 

     I do want to vary the shots on an action and add color sometimes. Again just to switch it up. The idea for color I first got from Jean-Luc Godard’s Pierrot le fou. Godard was all about unconventional film making and in an early scene from Pierrot le fou he uses different colors throughout a scene. The colors didn’t need to be there but they added to the scene. For a current reference, Kanye West’s “All of the Lights” music video also used color and this added to the song lyrics and vibe of the video. 

     There are numerous ways one can go when making a music video. I want to go with ideas that interest me. As well as ideas that I believe a relative beginner to video production can achieve. 

Drupal Therapy Indeed

     I need a remedy. Why? I am a college student dealing with a content management system for the first time. It’s name is Drupal. Screencasts from www.drupaltherapy.com have helped me and will hopefully help other beginners to Drupal. The screencasts deal with fundamental modules thus probably not for advanced Drupal users but great for us newcomers. 

     Each screencast is “a prescription by Sean Effel.” He has a calm voice that is not distracting so viewers can pay full attention to the screencast. Effel goes through each module needed, what the module does, and how to use the modules. For instance, in the Date + Calendar screencast he turns on the modules and shows how to make an event content type along with how to make an event on a calendar. 

There are 3 screencasts for Drupal 7.

1. Wysiwyg + CKEditor screencast 
2. Pathauto + Token screencast 
3. Date + Calendar screencast 

     There are 5 older screencasts for Drupal 6 as well. These screencasts can be useful to get a sense of how other modules work. Even though the screencasts are for Drupal 6 several modules included in the screencasts such as views, imagecache, and filefield now have Drupal 7 versions or included in Drupal 7 core.

     

     To get a stronger prescription Drupaltherapy is actually more about training sessions than screencasts. They can be contacted through their website for public or private sessions. Now time to get off the long chair and start to Drupal. 

 

The Internet Not the Web

      The Internet and the web, do you know the difference? For several years I assume that many including myself did not or at least did not think of them separately. If one got on the Internet they got on the web. Fast forward to today and the distinction is clear. The internet is used but more for apps, not web surfing. After reading the wired. com article “ The Web is Dead. Long Live the Internet ”, I agree with both Chris Anderson’s and Michael Wolff’s take on the matter but I’m leaning more toward Anderson. Wolff suggests it is them (media moguls) to blame for web’s demise while Anderson says that it is us. 

The introduction of the Internet and countless other technologies has turned our world into a very fast paced and impatient society. We want something and we want to it now. Anderson spoke of the convenience and reliability of apps. He gave the example of google maps being better to have on one’s phone they bring to their car than on one’s laptop at home. With apps information is given rather than having to search for it. It is easier for information to come to the screen than for one to go to the screen. “The web is not the culmination of the digital revolution,” says Anderson. It is the Internet that fuels many technologies and services with the web only being one of the many. 

On the other hand, Wolff focuses on the them. The media moguls of today like Apple CEO Steve Jobs. They are after control and power. Jobs and others like him have realized that product has power over technology. Apple has control over content, the delivery of content, and the devices that content plays on. This does not go with the openness of the web. Internet services like Netflix are taking people away from the web. Apps and Internet services give people what they want. People are looking for product and “them” know this. Product is more easily accessible through controlled apps than searching for it over the open web. 

I agree with both but I lean more toward Anderson’s explanation due to my own use of the Internet. Once I got an iPhone I do use it more than the web and I do this because it is faster, easier, convent, and reliable. The apps on my phone give me the content I want without me having to go on the web and search for them. I am rarely ever on Facebook on an actual computer. At times I can remember myself on my Facebook app while on my laptop. Why didn’t I just log in? I am already logged in on my Facebook app and can scroll and tap faster than clicking. The only time I am on the web is if I want to see something on a bigger screen than my phone or YouTube. Even though there’s an app for that..... There really is an app for EVERYTHING. There is now even an app store on my MacBook. Now I can use my computer for more than schoolwork and the pages application I use to write such things as this blog. Still not using the web so much though. 

Communicate before you draw

      Life is animation but....animation isn’t real, right? If animation were real it would be live action. Yet animation is real. Animation is life in the sense that it is based on realism and emotion in real life. This is what I have learned about animation. The real life aspect of animation comes from the communication to the audience of real life attitudes and situations. An animated sequence, film, or series does not take so long to complete to get the drawing right rather it is to get the communication right. 

      To get the right communication so many factors I had no idea about have to be put into consideration. To be a good animator one does not necessarily have to be the best drawer or know how to work the software. Walt Disney had animators animate his films for him but he understood how to capitative an audience, tell a story, and present “real” characters. 

      Animated characters become real to the audience because they can relate to the character and situation they are in. Their expressions evoke emotion that one can relate to or makes one feel a certain way toward a character. One feels emotion toward an animated character as if they were a real person. A fish can not talk in real life yet the audience feels bad for Nemo in Finding Nemo. He is a young fish who is lost and separated from his father. The real life aspect of family and family values is communicated to the audience throughout this movie. Thus turning Nemo into something real. 

In the following clip in another part of Finding Nemo family is seen through sea turtles:

In the clip Nemo’s father is with a sea turtle and his son. His son just swam back into current by himself. This scene shows family again and communicates it to the audience through the little turtle’s actions. Coming back to his dad saying “did u see that, did u see me, did u see what I did” is a very relatable situation. It is a familiar situation to the audience. Whenever a child, boy or girl, does something on their own they want their parents to see it and they want them to know they did it. For example like riding a bike for the first time.

      Animation is not successful unless it communicates something. Then it is reduced to a mere drawing. To give that drawing life, aspects of real life must be added. It is not about whether a character exists in real life. It is about how to make a character exist in the minds of the audience by giving that character a mind of its own. The mind of the character communicates to the mind of the audience. 

Music is sound is animate

Music is an animator. Even a better animator at times than a real life animator. Music can bring life to a character just as much as the animator who drew his actions. Chapter 11 of The Illusion of Life:Disney Animation speaks about music in animation. I found it interesting that music can be the personality in animation rather than the actions of a character. This is interesting to me because I overlook music and sounds in animation. Songs are part of story development and I think of them being made after the animation was complete.

Songs are written early. After reading the chapter this makes sense. Since music can add so much emotion it should be looked at early. Songs for animation are better if written to the story. Constant revisions are made back and forth through the music and animation to get the proper flow. 

As discussed in the chapter a good song will pick up the tempo of the story, add emotion, and tell it in a different light. It will make the audience feel more toward the situation and characters. Music adds more power to a sequence. Music makes the sequence memorable. It can add emotion that an animator just can not fully achieve with expressions and movement. 

The following clip is of the work or mouse song in Cinderella:

In the clip the mice feel bad for Cinderella and decide to finish her dress for her. The song adds much more emotion to the situation rather than the animation itself. The upbeat tempo of the song brings an upbeat tempo to the sequence which reflects how happy the mice are to do this for Cinderella. The song also brings the audience into the sequence rather than the animation itself. The audience would not be captivated by mice making a dress alone. The song brings a flow to what the mice are doing. All of the characters singing together also add more to the family dynamic of the animals in the house. The song too then adds more to the fact that these characters are the only ones who care about Cinderella. 

When remembering all the Disney movies I have seen songs start to pop up in my head. These songs remind me of the movies but also remind me of the characters and themes of the movies. These movies would not have been the same without the songs. They gave the movies that “Disney magic”. The music gave the movies a whole personality. Music can turn a movie into its own character.