NEW VID: Love Turns 40
I can't believe I'm finally posting the Closer vid. Wow.
"Love Turns 40"
Music: Vienna Teng
Source: Closer (2004)
Debuted in VVC 08 Premieres
Summary: She's holding a secret that she'll never tell...
Download: [here] (65MB, xvid)
Update: I have posted meta on the evolution of this vid here with streams of drafts. (1/1/11)
obsessive24 and bradcpu had some very lovely things to say about the vid over at The Fourth Wall. Thanks again to them for doing so!
password: closer
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
Because the myth is not supposed to retire
We'd rather it lit itself on fire
or overdosed in a 4-star hotel
She's holding a truth that she'll never reveal
She's holding a truth that she'll never reveal
Because truth this time is an ugly child
and mother and daughter may reconcile but their faces will never heal
Don't go, she says, but he's sleeping
she says it to herself
don't go
She sees herself rising
packing a suitcase with all of her shoes
But something keeps you faithful
when all else in you turns and runs
love turns 40
the morning comes
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
Because we were once cinema gods in the night
and now all we've got is lunch-hour light
where nothing photographs well
Don't go, she says, but he's sleeping
she says it to the dark
don't go
She sees herself rising
dressing in silence for nothing to lose
But something keeps you faithful
when all else in you turns and runs
love turns 40
the morning comes
This vid would not exist without girlcakes. I'm finding that's happening in many of my endeavors, actually, but it's especially true here. We've discussed concept and themes and characters until we were blue in the face and then found even more to say. And then more. And then more. Then we'd start over and do it again. This one's for you, dude. Also, massive quantities of gratitude to renenet for the most amazing beta read I've ever seen in my life, and to sweetestdrain for giving me her Motion blessing when I fell prostrate at her feet. Also, thank you to everyone who said kind things about the vid to me or in Vid Review. It meant more to me than you know.
I started this vid a year ago, clipping the weekend before VVC 07, and finished it in June. That makes this officially the longest I've actively worked on a vid, balancing out my Hairspray vid quite nicely. This vid started as avi clips in Ulead on the laptop and ended as Avisynth scripts in Premiere on Biz. It went through various artistic incarnations along the way. The released file is actually the fourth very different version of this vid. Ironically, it ended up being most like the first version. Go figure.
I set out to do something fancy with this vid, something beyond the boundaries of my brain. Something artsy and different. Something very Not Me. Needless to say, it didn't work out. (Though I did get some lovely meta out of it.) Mostly, I tried playing with color, particularly black & white clips and fading from color to b&w to portray a particular emotion or POV change. When that wasn't working, I tried to avoid any POV changes whatsoever by changing which character I focused on. Then I tried creating an AU (toying with the source/chronology to fit the lyrics better). All failed. This is mostly due to incredibly limited source, as this is a movie based on a play with maybe 12 scenes in it, and trying to fight the lyrics. I realized I was trying to use fancy effects to distract from the fact that I didn't know what I was trying to say. That's...never a good idea.
Eventually I stopped fighting and let the vid tell me what it wanted to be. As a bonus, I found I didn't need to complicate the source to say what I wanted to say. I started the fourth version under the premise that I'd lay all the clips down and then go back and worry about effects later as they were needed. In the end, I added none. Other than fade-to-whites, the source is completely untouched. I think I even went back and took out almost every speed change to make it feel more "real." So, quite far from my original vision, but the vid is ultimately better for it.
Musically, it's quite different from what I feel is my "normal" kind of vid. There were some really interesting mechanics in the song that were fun to play on, namely the strings in the break after the 1st chorus and the random clicking noise in the background during the 2nd verse photo flash. I tend to vid so metronomically, but I made a conscious effort to break out of that as much as I could, cutting to both instrumental and vocal lines as the moment dictated. I could feel every sixteenth note of this song like a clock in my head, even the rests, and I tried to make something happen on every beat. I see this vid as a living instrument that plays the song, not just plays alongside the song.
I did try to cut down the audio in several different ways, but the general build of the song doesn't allow for subtle jumps across its timeline. At 5 minutes and change, it's definitely my longest vid, but it doesn't really feel that way. It feels like two separate vids, actually, due much in part to the fact that I did the first half four different ways and the back [instrumental] half once. I'm trying to refrain from commentary telling you what I want you to see, but I will say that to me, the first half of the vid shows what happened and the second half shows how it happened. It was really fun to let both my "match on action" and "omg motion!" children run wild. They seem to play well together.
This may not be my "best" vid or most exciting vid or most revered, but I'm quite proud of it. I pushed myself to do something different, and I still think I hit that mark. I almost gave up on this vid a dozen times, and I kept coming back because I wanted it badly enough. I'm proud of myself for seeing it through. This vid, more than almost any other I've done, makes me say, "...I did it."
If you haven't seen the film, I highly recommend it. Hopefully you'll want to if you like the vid. Hopefully you'll want to even if you don't like the vid. I will say that the original "secret that she'll never tell" which first gave me the idea to use this movie didn't even make it into the vid. There's more to this story than what I've shown you.
All feedback is loved and appreciated. Thanks for watching.
"Love Turns 40"
Music: Vienna Teng
Source: Closer (2004)
Debuted in VVC 08 Premieres
Summary: She's holding a secret that she'll never tell...
Download: [here] (65MB, xvid)
Update: I have posted meta on the evolution of this vid here with streams of drafts. (1/1/11)
obsessive24 and bradcpu had some very lovely things to say about the vid over at The Fourth Wall. Thanks again to them for doing so!
password: closer
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
Because the myth is not supposed to retire
We'd rather it lit itself on fire
or overdosed in a 4-star hotel
She's holding a truth that she'll never reveal
She's holding a truth that she'll never reveal
Because truth this time is an ugly child
and mother and daughter may reconcile but their faces will never heal
Don't go, she says, but he's sleeping
she says it to herself
don't go
She sees herself rising
packing a suitcase with all of her shoes
But something keeps you faithful
when all else in you turns and runs
love turns 40
the morning comes
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
She's holding a secret that she'll never tell
Because we were once cinema gods in the night
and now all we've got is lunch-hour light
where nothing photographs well
Don't go, she says, but he's sleeping
she says it to the dark
don't go
She sees herself rising
dressing in silence for nothing to lose
But something keeps you faithful
when all else in you turns and runs
love turns 40
the morning comes
This vid would not exist without girlcakes. I'm finding that's happening in many of my endeavors, actually, but it's especially true here. We've discussed concept and themes and characters until we were blue in the face and then found even more to say. And then more. And then more. Then we'd start over and do it again. This one's for you, dude. Also, massive quantities of gratitude to renenet for the most amazing beta read I've ever seen in my life, and to sweetestdrain for giving me her Motion blessing when I fell prostrate at her feet. Also, thank you to everyone who said kind things about the vid to me or in Vid Review. It meant more to me than you know.
I started this vid a year ago, clipping the weekend before VVC 07, and finished it in June. That makes this officially the longest I've actively worked on a vid, balancing out my Hairspray vid quite nicely. This vid started as avi clips in Ulead on the laptop and ended as Avisynth scripts in Premiere on Biz. It went through various artistic incarnations along the way. The released file is actually the fourth very different version of this vid. Ironically, it ended up being most like the first version. Go figure.
I set out to do something fancy with this vid, something beyond the boundaries of my brain. Something artsy and different. Something very Not Me. Needless to say, it didn't work out. (Though I did get some lovely meta out of it.) Mostly, I tried playing with color, particularly black & white clips and fading from color to b&w to portray a particular emotion or POV change. When that wasn't working, I tried to avoid any POV changes whatsoever by changing which character I focused on. Then I tried creating an AU (toying with the source/chronology to fit the lyrics better). All failed. This is mostly due to incredibly limited source, as this is a movie based on a play with maybe 12 scenes in it, and trying to fight the lyrics. I realized I was trying to use fancy effects to distract from the fact that I didn't know what I was trying to say. That's...never a good idea.
Eventually I stopped fighting and let the vid tell me what it wanted to be. As a bonus, I found I didn't need to complicate the source to say what I wanted to say. I started the fourth version under the premise that I'd lay all the clips down and then go back and worry about effects later as they were needed. In the end, I added none. Other than fade-to-whites, the source is completely untouched. I think I even went back and took out almost every speed change to make it feel more "real." So, quite far from my original vision, but the vid is ultimately better for it.
Musically, it's quite different from what I feel is my "normal" kind of vid. There were some really interesting mechanics in the song that were fun to play on, namely the strings in the break after the 1st chorus and the random clicking noise in the background during the 2nd verse photo flash. I tend to vid so metronomically, but I made a conscious effort to break out of that as much as I could, cutting to both instrumental and vocal lines as the moment dictated. I could feel every sixteenth note of this song like a clock in my head, even the rests, and I tried to make something happen on every beat. I see this vid as a living instrument that plays the song, not just plays alongside the song.
I did try to cut down the audio in several different ways, but the general build of the song doesn't allow for subtle jumps across its timeline. At 5 minutes and change, it's definitely my longest vid, but it doesn't really feel that way. It feels like two separate vids, actually, due much in part to the fact that I did the first half four different ways and the back [instrumental] half once. I'm trying to refrain from commentary telling you what I want you to see, but I will say that to me, the first half of the vid shows what happened and the second half shows how it happened. It was really fun to let both my "match on action" and "omg motion!" children run wild. They seem to play well together.
This may not be my "best" vid or most exciting vid or most revered, but I'm quite proud of it. I pushed myself to do something different, and I still think I hit that mark. I almost gave up on this vid a dozen times, and I kept coming back because I wanted it badly enough. I'm proud of myself for seeing it through. This vid, more than almost any other I've done, makes me say, "...I did it."
If you haven't seen the film, I highly recommend it. Hopefully you'll want to if you like the vid. Hopefully you'll want to even if you don't like the vid. I will say that the original "secret that she'll never tell" which first gave me the idea to use this movie didn't even make it into the vid. There's more to this story than what I've shown you.
All feedback is loved and appreciated. Thanks for watching.