Music Videos
Making music videos is one of the most enjoyable projects of the year. Use this guide as a checklist to design your videos. Work alone or in groups of up to 3 at the most. Borrow students from other groups or classes to be your actors. For inspiration, watch music videos that other students have produced, watch your favorite music videos from today, or research some classics from back in the day. The music video is such an innovative form of entertainment and artistic expression.
Mandatory Requirements:
Choose 1 of the following storyline / plot techniques:
Execute a minimum of 3 (no maximum) of the following cinematography and editing techniques:
Mandatory Requirements:
- Choose a song that has zero curse words and zero adult content. No bleeping out existing curse words. No songs with illicit or offensive content. No violence in your lyrics or in the videos. Children must be able to watch.
- Get permission from teacher if song is not majority English.
- Don’t copy the existing video for that song. Make a unique new version, no similarities to the original video. Try to pick a song that doesn’t even have a music video in existence yet…
- Must choose a song that will not be flagged for copyright violations on YouTube. Research and make sure other student videos exist for this song. Or record your own vocals for the song.
- At the very beginning and the very of the video, on the screen long enough to read:
- Original artist or group name (or your group name if you are recording a completely new song)
- The song name
- No ending credits
- No repeat songs. First come first serve.
- If filming for several days, the actors must wear the same costumes / clothes throughout the video (continuity and consistency)
Choose 1 of the following storyline / plot techniques:
- Must tell a story that is easy to understand. There should be no confusion about what is happening. Must have beginning, middle, and end
- Total opposite of the above requirement: Avant-garde / artistic / arthouse approach. Story can be harder to understand, can jump around between past, present, future, can be discombobulated. Doesn't have to have a clear storyline.
Execute a minimum of 3 (no maximum) of the following cinematography and editing techniques:
- Choreography
- Montage, jump / quick cuts
- Whip pans
- Pass by / wipe transitions
- A big collection of excellently executed cinematography techniques that we studied in Boot Camp
- Shots going in and out of focus (rack focus)
- Animation at some point in the video but doesn't have to be the entire time. Stop motion, human, draw my life, etc. Any style of animation you want
- You write and/or record the lyrics of the song.
- Scenes of musicians playing instruments. Maybe the drummer, guitarist, lead singer, full band performing. Synching their playing with the music.
- Lip synching. Not the entire video, but for parts of the video that you choose, such as the chorus
- For perfect lip SYNCHING, you must sing the song out loud while recording. Don’t just lip the song silently, it is much harder to match the original audio with the video you shoot
- Any other innovative technique that is not listed above (but must be approved by the teacher)
Watch the following examples to help guide and inspire you:
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