A video essay about video essays. Video essay-ception.

Moore’s video essay is a good example of how video essays can work well, whilst simultaneously analysing video essays. He starts off by explaining how video essays are a popular form, and indeed they are. They are more accessible and perhaps easier to produce than long winded academic essays. Examples of video essays such as supercuts, which can, for example, take common elements of different films and cut them together in order to re-contextualise them.

He proposes that ‘a video essay must collect its material from everywhere,’ and, that it is ultimately, a ‘film about ideas.’ In a written essay, the main tool is language, but video essays combined text, sound, and image.

Moore’s video essay did present a set of ideas. It was clear that his video was created with the affordances of the visual medium in mind – it was snappy, engaging, and entertaining, all the while remaining provocative in terms of ideas. Its structure was significantly less formal than an academic essay, but there was a certain structure discernible. There are almost visual paragraphs; whilst a myriad of ideas are presented, they are separated from each other in an order that is logical and easy to follow, and the essay is topped off with a conclusion.

I’m unable to link Nick Moore’s video essay here, so I’ll leave you with another excellent example Ingmar Bergman’s films that employs similar techniques as Moore.