The song we chose to produce a music video for is called “Boats” by a local band Soft Corporate. Before jumping into brainstorming ideas, we took a moment to “dive” into the song and really feel it. We listened to the song several times in a row and wrote down words that, in our opinion, represented the song best. This is what we came up with as a group: youth, blue, green, air, freedom, melancholy. These associations became the pillar for our video, and we started to elaborate on these words.
After careful consideration, we decided that we want to make a conceptual video: a set of nonrelated video sequences that create a certain atmosphere when put together. For that purpose, we chose to script our video in a nonnarrative way: it served the purpose, and it suited the song best, especially since the lyrics are extremely vague. So we came up with several different nonrelated atmospheric sequences, taking into consideration the associations we came up with before. They are the following:
– Playing with transparent, “airy” fabric, preferably in the wind. This sequence needs to be filmed outside, somewhere in the open space. We chose to film it at the beach.
– Paint. The sequence starts with straight lines painted with a brush on a piece of paper, then the colours get mixed up together, and, in the end, it’s all over a model’s chest, face, and hands.
– Mirrors. We want to play with mirrors and reflection to create something surreal.
– Closing eyes with hands and/or eyes painted on the hands.
– Unusual, futuristic makeup.
– Fairy lights.
To film these segments we only needed two locations: a beach and a green screen studio. For the beach, we chose to place our video at St Kilda beach, where we had to arrive at 5:30 in the morning, when there is still no people and the lighting is perfect for filming, and as for a green screen studio, there’s is one available at RMIT.
For the props, we needed some paint, a painting brush, a mirror, fairy lights, and a transparent fabric. Since we already had most of it, the budget is fairly moderate- around 35$.
Unfortunately, we lost two team members since the beginning of the studio, so we are the only two in the production crew. Because of that, we decided not to separate roles and just work together,doing everything necessary to produce a high-quality music video. We worked together on the script, both found necessary props, and when one of us was in front of the camera, the other one became a director and a cameraman. We plan to continue working like that in post-production and edit together as well.
We already finished filming, and are going into post-production phase, Hopefully, we have everything we want as we want it, and there will be no need to reshoot anything. For now, we are aiming to start editing and putting things together to produce our ultimate music video as soon as possible.
The music video I chose to analyze is a song called “Eksponat” (Rus. Экспонат), which translates to English as “exhibit” or “piece of art”, by a famous Russian band Leningrad. This video tells us a story of a two-faced gold-digger and the “struggles” she goes through in her hunt for a wealthy husband while laughing at the extreme preparations she is willing to undertake to succeed. This video clip was a huge success in Russia: it reached over 116 million views on youtube, it was on every social media platform for at least a few months, and they were even talking about it on the official news TV channel. Naturally, I found out it would be interesting and insightful to dig a little deeper and see how such a success was made.
By the time “Eksponat” was released in 2015, Leningrad was already a successful and famous band, so the budget for the video was never a problem. The filming took place in a 700m2 studio in Moscow, where the production crew spent 4 days working on the video, the director being Anna Parmas. It is interesting to note, that everything we see in the video, was built and designed specifically for the clip. So, assuming that the crew already had all necessary technical equipment, the cost for the studio and on-location constructions was no less than US$3000, although it was perfectly possible to film in an already existing apartment. Obviously, Leningrad spared no expense to produce a high-quality video, so, naturally, the casting was taken very seriously as well: over 200 girls auditioned for the lead role until Julia Topolitskaya was cast. As for the props, such as makeup, face masks, wax strips, the bicycle simulator, etc., they could all be bough for under US$500, or even borrowed for free. These are all casual things that can be found at almost everyone’s house, but with Leningrad’s tendency for going over the top, there’s no way of knowing.
What makes this work so unique for me, is it’s unusual over-narrative. As discussed in 1st week’s reading, most of the music videos don’t have a narrative at all, or just a hint of it, fearing that a storyline will put a song in the second plan. “Eksponat” however, even interrupts for the characters to say their dialogues, its storyline is unusually distinct. Moreover, this clip exists within comedy movie genre, which is extremely rare for music videos. Maybe that’s why the song was such a success- no one expected to see a story in a music video, especially the one that makes people laugh. I don’t think that anything like that was ever done before in music video industry, so it’s really difficult to say what might have influenced it. As the scriptwriter, Dmitriy Murav’iov said:
“You go outside and observe. It’s the best idea generator. It’s funny because you wouldn’t come up with it on your own”.
V. Elistarov (2016)
All in all, I think that this music video deserves recognition for its originality and boldness. That’s definitely what captured my attention. What I think I can take from it, is an unusual approach to creativity. When I think of “creative”, I imagine something strange, and weird, something you wouldn’t normally think of. But then, every music video tries to be creative so hard, that they end up more or less the same: extravagant costumes, unusual setting, weird lights, setting things on fire, breaking things, etc. etc. “Eksponat’s” creativity, in its turn, is so simple and plain, that no one expects that. Now that’ s truly creative.
It was difficult for me to choose a music video to analyse for PB2 because I know a lot of beautiful, creative videos that I would like to share with the class. My main choices were “Intoxicated” by Martin Solveig , “Strawberry Swing” by Coldplay and a Russian song “Экспонат” (Eksponat, rus. exhibit, a piece of art) by ” Ленинград” (Leningrad). The first one appealed to me with its masterly visual representations of the song: although neither the lyrics or the video made sense, it just went well together and high lightened the song’s mood. “Strawberry Swing” stood out with its unusual creative solution for the slow motion: the whole video was filmed at one place with a locked camera, while artists draw and erased multiple chalk paintings on the asphalt. They managed to make it look so believable and mesmerising, that by the end you forget its all just pictures. Lastly, the video I ended up choosing, “Eksponat”, struck me with a distinct narrative and a storyline, which is highly unusual for a music video. As discussed in “Telling And Not Telling”, most music videos are “afraid” of using narrative, fearing that it will steal the spotlight from the song. “Eksponat”, on the other side, takes narrative to another level, pausing the song for the characters to say their dialogues. I found it intriguing and unique and that was what motivated me to choose this song for the presentation.
After listening to our chosen song excessively, we sat down with a group and reflected on what we associate with the song. That’s what we came up with:
Youth
Blue and green
Air
Freedom
Melancholy
After, we started looking for something, anything, that can help us visualise it in a video, so that’s the result. Some of those ideas are probably gonna become sequences in our video.
I found this week’s reading “Telling And Not Telling” extremely interesting: narrative and non-narrative dilemma is intriguing. Although the article explores different arguments and evidences for different opinions on the necessity of a storyline presence in a music video, I think it’s rather simple: just do whatever will expose, uncover, reveal the music. I am a very perceptive person, I can always sense a certain atmosphere, a vibe to every place, person, event, or song. And, I think, for different music, there are different approaches. Some songs benefit from an intriguing storyline, some songs just fade behind a plot; some obtain a strong perception, a “soul” from a non-narrative set of videos, and some make no sense. My point is, it is all very different for every song.
The song my group are working on, “Boats” by Soft Corporate, has very blurry lyrics. There’s no certain story behind it, they don’t exactly make sense, instead, they create an image with words and sounds. So, we decided to go for a “perceptual video”- a set of unrelated sequences that interline with each other through out the video. We are going to enhance the image that song already create with an actual image. So to say.
I am not a very sensitive person, especially when it concerns someone other than me. I am not at all emotional and even a little too insensitive, according to some of my friends. So, when we were watching biographic film “Control” by Anton Corbjin, I was very much confused by the actions of the main character, lead singer of a band called “Joy Division”. It’s just so unnatural and weird for me to see a man, who has a relatively happy lifeset, suffer so much because of such, the way I see it, minor obstacles and challenges. You are not happy with your wife? Then why ask for a baby? Why not leave? Why stay in the band that affects your health so much? Why not just be with the only woman you have feelings for? I have so many “why’s” and not nearly enough “because’s”. So much pain and suffering that I just don’t see the reason for: Ian could change every single thing that was making him unhappy, except for the disease.
This film made me question the nature of songs I listen to: what was the artist going through that he came up with this certain melody, these lyrics? Was he suffering? What was going on in his heart and mind? When I came to think about it, the most beautiful songs I know reflect so much pain. “Hallelujah” by Jeff Buckley, “Hurt” by Johny Cash, “Creep” by Radiohead, pretty much every Nirvana and Elliot Smith song, and so many more. Apparently, the best music, “alive” music comes from extreme pain and suffering. That’s something I haven’t really though of before.
I have always enjoyed good music videos: the right picture, colour, light, or just an object can enhance a song a thousand times and change the perception of it. I feel like music videos create a certain atmosphere to a song, make it more bright and alive. Unfortunately, there is not so many good music videos aroumd. It’s just so difficult to find the right visualisation for a song, to match the music with the image.
I was genuinely excited about this course the moment I knew I was doing it, it is both challenging and inspiring. There is so many creative solutions to a music video, there are endless possibilities to express the music through film, but it’s also extremely difficult to work with such loose limits, to always think outside the box. What I expect from “Egghunting”is to learn to apply creativity to music videos, learn to “feel” the song and be able to illustrate it with a beautiful video. I really want to try myself as a director/art director as well, I feel like this is something I will be good at. Another skill I’m hoping to get out of this experience, is ability to work fast and efficient, and since we only have 6 weeks to produce our final video, I am certain this will be something I’ll have to adapt to. On a bigger scale, my goal for now is to find out who the hell am I? I somehow thought I would be able to figure it out by the end of high school, but here I am, already in the uni, and still not sure what I want to do for a living. Or even what I can do. So, hopefully, this course can shed light on that as well.
All in all, I really enjoy the course so far, and I see no signs that it might change in the future. Creativity is something I thrive on, and, hopefully, something I am good at.
