- It creates shape for the video
- It reflects the music
- It gives the video MEANING!
Song Choice ONE.
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO LISTEN/VIEW THE SONG AND FULL VIDEO
I am going to find three videos to which I can view and analyse them to compare the editing process. My first video I am going to look at is "The Fray-How To Save A Life." I chose this because it is so well known to many generations with impact of both the video and lyrics, as they both have powerful meaning. The song also fits in my genre and I think gives out passion and emotion to viewers/listeners.
Throughout the whole video, there is excellent use of editing, with close ups, shallow focus, fast pace editing but also the video includes both narrative and performance based. The video is introduced from a fade from black transition shot, where the writing "How to save a life" moves horizontally across the screen in a glowed gray text, showing a blurred pianist, which gives confusion to the viewers, to wonder whats going to happen and what the video is going to be about.
The camera then pans horizontally again to show the band (The Fray) still in blurred focus, extreme close up of the lips, to which zooms out before changing to show the lead singer, giving him privilege as he is the first person they see clearly. However this is a to see his face to show the emotion of the lyrics.
Writing, both computerised text and handwriting have been used to emphasize some of the words, for example "LISTEN" "DON'T BE SCARED"and "LET IT GO" followed by a few more. The whole video consists of many different people, mostly young, showing their pain and emotions in close up or medium shots. The pace of editing changes with the song, the chorus a bit faster than the verses. The expressions on the peoples faces are mainly upset, crying or have blank expressions, standing in front of a white background to show maybe hurt, pain, loss or confusion about something or someone in their lives. Zoom, fast pace editing and different closeup shots are shown within the narrative part of the video.
On the other hand is the performance side of the video. The editing is used fastly paced and different angles of the camera is used to influence the use of the music and the beat. There are many close ups of the instruments and the musicians faces, hands etc, but mainly the main character/singer gets most privilege. A focus pull is used frequently throughout the video to show each musician playing the instrument, where he is clearly seen and foregrounded, whereas the other two are in the background and blurred.
Whilst the lyrics "Where did I go wrong? I lost a friend, somewhere along in the bitterness" plays, the hurt, loss and depression expression are shown throughout both young children and young adults to show the emotion and passion of losing someone close or someone that means a lot to you, which makes the viewer sympathize.
This video relates to my ideas for the music video, not only due to the genre, but also the storyline of missing someone, or people who have lost loved ones. In our group, we were thinking the lyrics related to missing someone special, with memories etc in the video, and I think that doing close ups and fast pace editing could be used.
Song Choice TWO.
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO LISTEN/VIEW THE SONG AND THE FULL VIDEO
The next song I have chosen to analyse whilst looking at the Editing of music videos, is "Hey There Delilah" by the "Plain White T's." This song also fits in with the genre of my chosen artist for my chosen song.
The editing in this video has given me inspiration for my video when thinking of ideas, as most the whole screen of the video is split into three boxes, with one half the screen showing the narrative side to the video and the other showing the performance side with the band. The video includes things like shot angles, zoom, close up shots, emotions and many different locations in order to get a good music video. I also feel the video stands out due to the screen being split into three.
The use of editing is powerful in the video, not only because of the third way split in the screen but due to the way two things are being shown in the screen as the same time. Constantly, one side of the screen shows the performance side, the band playing the instruments, singing etc whereas the other half of the screen shows the narrative side of the story, which gives the video a unique edge to it, and separates it from other videos in the music industry.
Another editing technique that has been used in this video is the use of Close-Ups. Close-Ups have been used throughout the video to show the pain and emotion of peoples faces, so the viewers and listeners can translate and sympathise. Also, the close up clips are mostly shown together when the screen is divided into two. (shown below.)
The lighting effect is key in the music video by the "Plain White T's." As you can tell from several screen-shots, a low key lighting effect has been used for the narrative side of the story, and this can be used to create a low or sad mood, making the viewers and listeners sympathise for the character and the story the lyrics are translating to us. On the other hand, the performance side of the screen is usually a little lighter, as they are sitting in a bright room with natural sunlight shining through, rather than artificial lighting.
This video gave me a idea for my chosen music video of Alex Lloyd-What We Started. The idea was that I could try and split the screen during the editing process to give two shots; one of the male character, and the other the woman character, to see both emotion, situations and the atmosphere. I feel this is a good idea and I will talk to my group member, Emma to see if this is a good enough idea to input this into the video.
Song Choice THREE.
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO LISTEN/VIEW THE SONG AND THE FULL VIDEO
My final song I have chosen to look at for editing purposes is "Oasis-Wonderwall." I chose this video as it is very well known and the editing used in this piece of music is very unique and different compared to others in the music industry. The whole video throughout the song is placed in Black and White effect, which can give out the signals that the song is going to be a a slow pace song with a unhappy mood to it.
A very unique editing technique is also used right at the beginning of the video, at around 0.18 seconds into the video. This includes a Jump Cut but instead of the camera changing position of around 30 degrees, the camera stays straight and zooms in so the camera movement is continuous but jumps, so the narrative story still makes sense.
Fade transitions have also been used throughout the music video in order to change scenes, locations and shots throughout the 4:40 length of video. Fade transition shots are a good way to change scene as the current shot will fade and the new shot will look less transparent until the past shot cannot be seen anymore.
Another way of editing that has been used in the "Wonderwall" music video by "Oasis" is the way that the whole video is shown in Black and White, but effects have been added so that some of the objects throughout the video are in blue/colour, rather than black and white.
I got ideas from this music video to change the colour to black and white for parts and to change some of the things in the video to coloured. This could be done and used in my music video for some parts, or the other way round where the whole video is colourful with a few things in black and white to give the effect.
