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Music Videos - Creating Audio Visually

Beatlesfan1225

Beatlesfan1225

Hey Everyone,

So I've noticed in recent years, at an increasing rate, most bands and artists release a Youtube video for their early singles on albums, and the video is often either a static image of the album art, or a video that utilizes the audio to create the visuals. This tactic is a nice one - because it gives the viewer more than a blank image, but less than a full music video, which you may not even be close to crafting.

What is the best way to go about creating a video where the visuals are dominated by the sound? Essentially, the product would be a fancy visualizer of sorts, utilizing the ups and downs in the audio to produce something visually entertaining.

I've linked three recent projects I've noticed who have done this. The Keys one is fairly straight forward, just a rotating spectrum. The other two, however, are a bit different. The Monkeys one looks like it was actually animated later in the video to have the lines create images. The Jack White one, though, is the one I find most intriguing - utilizing the beat to make the visuals.

I ask because I have a new album, and two great singles, but really don't have the time/means to release full music videos, and I want to get the album to my Youtube community, which is significantly larger than my following on musical sites.

Any suggestions on how to create visuals that utilize the audio, I'd love to hear them!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRbnAxrS3EM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpOSxM0rNPM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5a1Cl_JOJM

EDIT: This might be an even better example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYF0LtfUvJs
 
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Thread is also relevant to my interests. I've been doing the album cover thing (it's good to at least get it out there). There are a lot of visualizers out there that offer a paid version without watermarks that you can use for videos. I've tried editing together stock footage too, but the overall consensus was that it was too much effort for not that much benefit over just an album cover. There are also some VJ software packages out there, but I'm really out of touch with that sort of thing these days. You could also try putting a basic meter visualizer (http://au.tomatl.org/ for example) on one or more tracks in the mix (I like the idea of it just responding to, say, the drums, or maybe the vocals and not the drums)

My next thing is pretty abstract so I've been getting some good ideas over here:
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=52692
In particular, some of the datamoshing videos Chimp posted have inspired me to try something along those lines!
 
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Interesting - So it sounds like all of us could use someone who has some ideas on how to create visuals like this!
I agree that stock footage would likely be too difficult - it's such a fine line with that stuff to make sure it doesn't LOOK like you just threw stock footage together.
 
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the jack white vid was based on some non-newtonia fluid (corn starch and water) experiments Iv seen online before.. If its Jack white its probably analog and not CGI...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7v0c0Al5X0g

The OLD TV thing is pretty light weight.. small animation. as is the pudo sound wave one..

AE has some built in functionaltiy for similar tricks.. "Convert Audio To Keyframes" is an animation tool that you can use to trigger AE animation on various widgets..

Red Giant Trapcode soundkeys(I think) has a more advanced frequency filtering option so you can triggers actions on different notes..

Some more options..
http://mamoworld.com/faq/how-make-things-after-effects-react-audio


Always check VC first..
http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/audio_to_animation/

This type of animation, is called "procedural" That means that you write a bit of code and use the sound as input variables. You don't need to match the animation up with the music, it just happens.. its in the math..

Once you have a visual interesting procedure, you can reuse it...


NOTE: You can buy other peoples procedures and projects.. even some are free..

http://www.freeaetemplates.com/2013...fer-sounds-free-after-effects-music-template/
 
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Great examples - thanks Alcove!

So I started a new series today - where I'm releasing analog recordings of my favorite folk songs. So, I tried my hand at what we have been discussing here. I just went with a simple radio tuner - for some reason, it seemed apt given the intentional crudeness of the recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2I_TN2xew4
 
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