archived-videos My First Music Video

sfoster

sfoster

Staff Member
Moderator
A friend of mine wanted to make a music video parody of 4tays playaz club.
So I ripped off the sound track, produced the vocals for him and made my first music video.

Color grade was done by indietalk member Daniel S.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-JAvo7UoyM
 
Upvote 0
film_autre said:
what did you think of it?
Click to expand...

For a guy who has never rapped and a director thats never made a music video i think it turned out pretty well. Most importantly the 'client' was satisfied.

It was also done entirely handheld.
I don't have a dolly or jib or drone or anything fancy, which can help a music video a lot.
 
Last edited:
I'll chip in, there was a lack of excitement for me, the song, the video, all of it was single tone and the quality of video between indoors and outdoors was quite jarring for me.

I saw some frame wobbling dont know if that was due to some sort of Warp Stabiliser? I cant offer anything else other than had it contained some sort of narrative story with the guy walking and rapping it would have been a decent video.

but you have completed your first music video, which is a feat I know as most music artists are a pain in the arse.

I look forward to your next video.

I dont mean to offend you but no one else ever comments until I do.. so i'll let the rest chip in now.
 
Last edited:
film_autre said:
I'll chip in, there was a lack of excitement for me, the song, the video, all of it was single tone and the quality of video between indoors and outdoors was quite jarring for me.

I saw some frame wobbling dont know if that was due to some sort of Warp Stabiliser? I cant offer anything else other than had it contained some sort of narrative story with the guy walking and rapping it would have been a decent video.

I dont mean to offend you but no one else ever comments until I do.. so i'll let the rest chip in now.
Click to expand...

I'm not offended. I know I messed up the focus at the craps table in the first verse.. I've never actually DP'd anything myself lol. I have magic lantern now with focus peaking so I don't f it up again in the future.

Was the quality difference still jarring for you in the second verse?
I don't know where there was frame wobbling but I didn't do any sort of post stabilization. My camera only shoots 1080p so if I do stabilization it starts to look like crap.

Thanks for saying it would have been decent had it contained a narrative. I think that's the path I would generally go down but this video was meant as a parody of playaz club so we kept the narrative content in the same vein.
 
so I watched music videos for 4 hours yesterday then rewatched this. Yeah it would be nice to have some film burns in there but the thing that bothers me the most is how shaky it is.

2-axis gimbal just doesn't cut it. I have the shakiest music video out of everything I watched.
 
the important thing is to learn from what you didnt do right, what you did do right was finish the video and give it a good go, its not a terrible video it just needed some umphhh in it..
 
film_autre said:
the important thing is to learn from what you didnt do right, what you did do right was finish the video and give it a good go, its not a terrible video it just needed some umphhh in it..
Click to expand...

So what didn't I do right?
Only thing Im taking away right now is that I'm too poor to make high quality music videos because I can't afford a good stabilizer.
 
sfoster said:
It was also done entirely handheld.
Click to expand...



sfoster said:
2-axis gimbal just doesn't cut it.
Click to expand...

clarify please :)


first of all, congrats on a successfully completed project with a happy client!
not bad for a first music video! most of the shots were in focus, composition wasn't bad. however, the shots lacked a sort of uniqueness that made the video feel sort of blah. i think doing more rack focus stuff and using more closeup/super wide shots would have given it the extra punch it needed to keep me visually engaged. too many medium shots made it feel like a 90s rap video. the color grade could have been pushed further as well.

these are my harshest criticisms, as i feel it's important for us as filmmakers to give each other real, valuable, practical feedback. (and most of the members here don't care to even view other people's work, let alone give feedback about it)
 
sfoster said:
So what didn't I do right?
Only thing Im taking away right now is that I'm too poor to make high quality music videos because I can't afford a good stabilizer.
Click to expand...

You dont need a stabiliser, my first music video was shot with a Tripod and Video head using the arm to rest on my shoulder and I held the tripod with one hand and focusing on with the other..

I didnt really care for the shake I didnt really notice it, It was more the content that put me off, I hated the snooker table shots coz they apeared just a bit lax.

it needs style and content a parody is great but it also needs to be livened up.

get variations in your shots, get cutaways of stupid things, make the rapper do stupid stuff make him more lively etc etc
 
Sure handheld - I wasn't using any dolly or jib or tripod. that's what i meant.
Handheld like my back was hurting at the end of the day :D

It wasn't raw handheld, I was using a cheap little glide gear thing but I would always assume people use SOMETHING when doing handheld. even if it's just a block of wood. which is basically what I had for the first verse :lol:

WhiteOpus said:
first of all, congrats on a successfully completed project with a happy client!

too many medium shots made it feel like a 90s rap video.

the color grade could have been pushed further as well.
Click to expand...

The client literally said he wanted a 90s rap video, so this explains why he was happy :lol:

One of my biggest film making frustrations is that my pos macbook cannot run resolve. I'm stuck with fcp7's 3-way color corrector and it's always discouraged me from investing significant time in learning to grade. I was lucky Daniel S volunteered to do the color grade for free.

WhiteOpus said:
these are my harshest criticisms, as i feel it's important for us as filmmakers to give each other real, valuable, practical feedback. (and most of the members here don't care to even view other people's work, let alone give feedback about it)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the feedback and for taking the time to watch.
It's amazing how hard it is to get an audience for videos.

There is a band that I'll do a video for in a few months and I'll definitely keep in mind what you said about adjusting the composition.
 
WhiteOpus said:
actually, if the 90s look was intentional then gold stars all around! haha

i look forward to your next project.
Click to expand...

Thanks :lol:
It worked out I suppose that 90s rap videos aren't as flashy.

You guys are right that more flare is a good thing - especially when your artist isn't a dancer or dressed by lady gaga's stylist. You've got to make up for that somehow and still keep the audience engaged.

It's amazing with videos like gangnam. they have a 30 second long take at the end of the video with the two dudes just dancing and it's completely engaging. no fx no special camera movement just two guys doing their thing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top