Music Video Analysis (1)

1. Her Morning Elegance - Oran Lavie



This music video is constructed out of several different still photos which create the effect of movement, otherwise known as stop motion animation. This is a distinctly unique video as it uses the stop motion technique on real life objects and people as well as creating surrealist imagery in doing so, using different common household items to represent different things. In that regard this music video is very conceptual.
The concepts that this video presents are very unique and inventive. This implies that the video contains elements of experimental movie making. Qualities such as the aforementioned use of common household items representing different things through movement. For example the use of pillows cleverly positioned underneath the woman's feet can be perceived as a flight of stairs. The combination of the movement of the woman's walking pattern and the movement of the pillows creates the illusion that she's walking down said flight of stairs.

The video maintains a simple feel as it is staged simply in one space, captured at one angle. It flows well as different occurrences in the video occur at different audio cue's, such as the violin appearing when the strings in the song are introduced. This is an example of illustration in music Videos.

There is a running theme in this video which is the setting seems to change overtime the chorus kicks back in. First its on the train, then in the clouds and then in the sea etc. This technique is used to amplify these sections of the song.

As the song progresses the events seem to pick up the pace and transition much more quickly. This is all to do with the pacing of the video which gradually builds until the subtle climax at the end.
This video is set in a very intimate location. Bedrooms are always seen as very personal so therefore to set a music video in a bedroom would suggest that the topic matter is very personal to the artist.

Music Video - Contextual Research

Research:

Andrew Goodwin - 'Dancing in the distraction Factory' 

In Andrew Goodwin's Book, he states that in each music video, there are 3 sections, Music, Lyrics and Band Image. 
The Music relates the the song in a way that a cut could occur on a beat so that that beat is amplified visually and how fast the shot is cut depending on the song.
The Lyrics may relate to what we see on screen, for example if David Bowie were to sing about Life On Mars, then we would see beings existing on Mars.
The Band Image relates to how we see the artist, if at all. Is the artist/band portraying him/herself in the Music Video or are they playing a fictional role which has something to do with the narrative of the video.

 Illustration in Music Videos: 

Music:
Illustration is what we see on screen in coherence with the song that is accompanying the visuals. Sometimes in songs we can visually see the beat and makes the video and the music appear to be in unison.
Lyrics:
Images we see during the video should sometimes represent the lyrics we hear either literally or metaphorically. On the other hand, the images can simply reflect the mood of the lyrics, i.e. sad lyrics, sad atmosphere.
Band Images:
The band appear as they usually do, playing, singing etc.





Amplification In Music Videos:

Music: 
Most of the time the visuals are cut on the beat however sometimes they are cut off of the beat. This is done in order to amplify the the song and the narrative so that the viewer understands and keeps them entertained.
Lyrics: 
If the images we see amplify the lyrics then this means that the images are making sense to the narrative as well as the context of the song. Sometimes the narrative don't match the lyrics specifically however they tend to always match the context in which the song was written.
Band Image:
The majority of the time, the band/artist will supply narrative by converting a certain character within the music video. They may appear as they normally do but something specific may have been altered to fit the context of the music video.



Disjuncture In a Music Video 

Music: 
In this case the music video primarily cuts off the beat of the song. This has been stereotyped to dance music videos as they don't tend to focus on narrative however this is not always the case. This can seem a little weird for the viewer as it seems natural for the video to cut on the beat.
Lyrics: 
Images don't match most of the time and the narrative does not relate to the song in any sense. It is just something on screen for the viewers to observe during the music video. More established artists are more inclined to do this as they have already established a name and style for themselves and therefore a band image nor narrative isn't as necessary.
Band Image: 
The artists/bands don't really look like themselves in their music videos, in fact on some occasions they look the complete opposite than what they usually look like. In some rare occasions they don't even appear in their videos and have someone else appear in the video for them.

Laura Mulvey: The Male Gaze - Case Study

Mulvey's theory suggests that we as a cinema audience are subjected to viewing films through the eyes of a heterosexual male, including what the camera focuses on during the film (this is also known as the male gaze), the game of the audience and also including the maze of the characters featured within the film.
In fewer words: it is the way the visual arts are constructed around the more masculine viewer. 

Sigmund Freud reinforces this theory by way of his perception of scopophillia.
Scopophillia is the pleasure that is received whilst observing a certain thing of interest, i.e. in this case, the female form.
Freud suggests that fro infantry we have a natural instinct to gaze and fixate our gaze on objects and that we never completely grow out of this instinct even when we obtain more control of ourselves as the years go on. This is why Mulvey suggests that cinema is the perfect medium to fulfil this natural instinct as well as the fantasies that accompany this instinct.

There are specific technical elements that contribute to the cinematic male gaze. These include; Close ups, Focus, Fragmentation, Slow Motion, Lighting and Spotlight as well as an editing style which involves a shot reverse shot of the object of desire and whoever is observing this object.
It is still very evident that cinema is still very patriarchal as women are seen in either tight or little to no clothing, as well as the combination of women and objects such as cars which implies that women too are also seen as objects for men to own.

This can all be seen in the following example clip:

History Of Editing

Development of Editing Technology: 

The editing process can be dealt with by way of many different approaches. However primely, the editing process involves compiling a group of moving images together in order to create a smooth tradition between each shots which will subsequently create a cohesive narrative.

Before technology advanced and editing could be completed purely using as computer and the right software, other methods had to be adopted. These including physically cutting and sticking rolls of film together using glue (or a specialist kind of adhesive which did not damage the film). The way the editor knew that that this was the frame of film that he desired to cut between, was by holding the film close to a light sourse which would then reveal which frame that piece of film contained. Even though this was a very tedious process, it became the foundation of what editing became as we know it today.

Later on long the line, the Moviola was designed in 1924 in order for editors to create much more precise cuts which made the process much more easier than what it was before. This device also involved "edge numbering" which allows editors to cut video as eel as audio in synchronisation.

Flatbed Edit Suites

The manufacturing company Steenbeck made a name for itself for manufacturing some of the most widely used film editing, viewing and controlling tables since the early 1950's.

In 1953, Steenbeck released the the first ever flatbed 16mm 4 plate, known as the ST200. This editing device provided optics, sound and playback of 16mm perforated magnetic tape and was seen as revolutionary technology at the time. Despite these breakthroughs i editing technology, the process of editing itself remained very impractical and hands on, including the use of splicers, tim bins and a light table.

Another well-known flatbed editing table was the KEM (Keller-Elektro-Mechanik). While the Steenbeck was more dominant, the KEM was also commonly and widely used. It notably had a modular construction and supported up to three sound tracks.

There is another important difference in the technology behind the original Moviola and the flatbeds. The Moviola used a Geneva drive (or “Maltese Cross”) mechanism to advance the frames, whereas the flatbeds employed a rotating prism. Aside from the fact that the rotating prism handles the film more smoothly with less wear and tear, it is also a lot quieter and, more importantly, allowed for high-speed operation. Due to these factors, as well as its soft nylon rollers, the Steenbeck was known to have a gentle touch on precious film stock, although editing was usually done with a work-print positive so as not to damage the original.

Other manufacturers also developed flatbed editors including Moviola itself and credit is given to Francis Ford Coppola and his longtime collaborator Walter Murch, A.C.E., CAS, MPSE — among the first people in America to embrace flatbed editing enthusiastically.

In the 1940's live television editing became the pioneering form of editing. These advancements in editing technology led to kinescope recordings which entailed picture and audio recording during a live broadcast. There were some bumps along the way however. This form of broadcasting was very impractical and unreliable and commonly resulted in issues such as ghosting and banding. However the tv industry was still using more raw footage in their kideoscope  than most Hollywood film studios combined.

Bing Crosby's production company excelled in recording images onto magnetic tape in the early 50's. Later on in the decade, around 1956, manufacturing company Ampex released the first 2" quadruplex video tape. Due to the fact it was magnetic tape, it had to be developed with extremely fine iron filings suspended in a toxic, carcinogenic carbon tetrachloride solution. This method was utilised so that the magnetic bands on the video tape were made visible when viewed through a microscope, so that it could be aligned in a specialised splicer much more precisely. Video and Audio read ads were several inches apart in the machine. This means that it was much more difficult to make a physical cut that would function correctly for both audio and video. As a compromise, the cut is made for the video and a section of the audio would then have to be re-copied into the correct position. 

In order to get from one position to another on tape, you are required to scour through every other piece of footage in-between. It is commonly believed that more time was spent wading through the footage than making actual specific cuts. To make the matter even or impractical, linear editors are not particularly flexible and it is difficult to build up separate sequences, especially if it is required for the editor to revisit the footage to make additional cuts. This meant that the only method of changing an edit is to perform a new edit on top of the old one. However if a scene you wish to replace over the old edit happens to run longer than the old scene then the editor would have to cover up a bit of the next scene on the tape. On the other hand, if it happened to be shorter then you would have a bit of the old shot still in the program.

Non-Linear and Digital Editing

Non-linear editing is a non-destructive process and a much more natural way of editing. However the requirements for this form of editing are much more demanding. These include; computer power as well as data storage. It is obvious that non-linear editing and digital technology will have many positive effects such as a much more practical way of editing. As the process becomes more simpler, the more coherent the story can be produced. It also gives the editor much more freedom by which they can explore different narrative structures and techniques. As it takes up a lot of fantail resources, the shorter the post production stage of movie making is, the less money will be spent which of course is a positive impact on the post production budgeting process.

Not only does the advancement of technology mean a more practical and less time consuming editing process, but also means the creation of special effects that can be used to enhance certain pictures. For example the well known disappearing and repairing of the time machine in 1985's Back To The Future and of course many other effects such as these. As well as these advancements in special effects, the ability to remove potions of the image seen on screen was also developed. The same technology can be used in film or sound restoration also.

The CMX 600 which was introduced in 1971. However only 6 of these units were produced.  They lay down the foundation of what would soon become non-linerar editing. The EMC 2 and the Avid 1 followed in its path, which was a macintosh based non-linear editor (1989), it became the highest form of editing in Hollywood during that time. Storage capacity however failed to keep up with the advancement of technology.
This issue was addressed when in 1993, Avid debuted a 7 terabyte system. Editor Walter Murch won an oscar for best editing in 1997, for The English Patient, which he edited using an avid.

Digital Editing

Digital editing has many benefits including; it is easy to copy, is resistant to noise, it is not subject to generation loss and finally it is much more easier to sync audio and visual together. In 1990, a manufacturing company known as New Tek released the first "Video Toaster" on the Omega system. Despite its limited capability, it brought video production to establishments such as small television studios, production shops and schools. It came with the ability to apply various effects and even a 3D effect which was known light weight 3D and proved that there was a market for small scale media production.
In 1995, there was the introduction of dvd optical discs, using new types of compression referred to as MPEG-2.

The first ever US public HD broadcast occurred in 1996, which was around the same time in which hollywood studios began using digital intermediary to create special effects. This process involves sending 35mm film through a telecine, which scans the film and creates a digital file, that can then be manipulated in a computer using special effects and composing. Once this is complete, the optical printer would then place the video images back onto film.


References:

https://www.editorsguild.com/Magazine.cfm?ArticleID=1104

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