ipod commercial look for music video HVX+AE

cheezweezl

cheezweezl

Veteran
i was hired to shoot and edit this persian music video.

the director wanted to emulate this mary j blige ipod commercial seen here

so we shot the artist and dancer on greenscreen. we couldn't afford a group of dancers and a choreographer so we just hired one dancer and had her change clothes a few times to look like multiple girls. anyway, i just finished the edit and before i finalize it, i'm looking for ideas to make it better or closer to the ipod commercial. i already have a tweak list started but looking for outside opinion/critiques. fire away.

right click - download

cut in FCP and all keying and comps done in AE CS3 pro.
 
Some thoughts...the Mary J Blige commercial works because it's a :30 spot. In the music video, it gets slightly repetitive over time, but the intended audience would probably find that less of a problem since they know all the words (i only picked up on a few of them, being half-persian).

Either way, I would lose the shine effect, the mandelbot fractal in that one scene, and work on thee shadows, they stick out really bad. Maybe think about using the graphics in the background as a narrative that runs through the video in some way. It can be a mere graphic interruptation of the song, but it adds movement and motivation to what's going on.

It's a pretty direct take on the iPod commercial, not sure if this what the client insists, but sometimes it's better to re-interrupt an already done idea, do something to make it your own.

Maybe add a few camera moves on the dancer scenes to vary it up.
 
Nice work. I like the evolution stuff. Great use of it. It looked really nice. I agree with the fact that it was a lot of the same thing but for an MV on a budget it looks very good.

If they wanted to emulate the MJB video I'm sure they will be blown away with it.

And my two cents, I'd keep the shine.

-rook
 
thanks. one thing that hit me about the shadows that was already on my list is that the angle is off in some shots. the light is coming from center frame and when subjects are off to the right or left the shadows should be skewed accordingly. i will soften as well...

...and i'm keeping the shine
 
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You did a very nice job on this. I would recommend animating the source point for your shine layer, either by image tracking the person the shine is behind, and using that data to move the light behind them, or if that isn't working, you could just manually keyframe some motion into the shine effect. While you're at it, you can animate the size of the shine to "blow up" on major music hit-points in the soundtrack. If you really want to get fancy, you can animate some of the shine parameters from the audio amplitude. I think you have to use a script to do this, but I know it's possible.

-Tom
 
oh sweet idea!! i didn't even think about triggering using audio. i know AE does the convert audio to keyframes thing. i've never used it but i will check it out. i also have this plug called soundkeys that allows you to trigger from specific frequencies. i have not used it either but may try it out. i did some animating of the shine source point but for the most part just let the talent's movement do most of the work. i like the idea of "blowing it up" here and there.

great ideas so far from all. keem em coming!!!
 
Very nice. Watching the commercial you are working to emulate, what is distinct about it is they are very selective in particular details they draw out of Ms. Blige (sunglasses, clothes seams) and the dancers (iPods and wires). My guess is they shot it to pull these details out later, so it may be difficult to reproduce wholey in post. Rotoscoping would work to hold onto specific details, but it would be quite a job!
 
Since you're keeping the shine, as it's intended to be a source of light, then you should add some light wrap/blooming around your subjects. It will blend it in more and make it more dynamic.
 
gdiguy said:
Very nice. Watching the commercial you are working to emulate, what is distinct about it is they are very selective in particular details they draw out of Ms. Blige (sunglasses, clothes seams) and the dancers (iPods and wires). My guess is they shot it to pull these details out later, so it may be difficult to reproduce wholey in post. Rotoscoping would work to hold onto specific details, but it would be quite a job!
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ya i agree. the details are cool. also, a lot of what makes the ipod spot cool is the great performance by the talent. i think our dancer was pretty good but the singer lacks the energy of mary j. i may go in there and roto some details. depends on how much time i have left for this.

what are your thoughts on how they do the ipod and cables? is it all drawn in in post or is it shot that way? i thought maybe they have ipods and headphones that are painted a bright color besides green so they could be keyed seperately from the BG and replaced with white. but then that couldn't be controlled as well as if it's all c.g. i may do a test sometime with some bright blue or purple objects and try to pull this off....
 
oneinfiniteloop said:
Since you're keeping the shine, as it's intended to be a source of light, then you should add some light wrap/blooming around your subjects. It will blend it in more and make it more dynamic.
Click to expand...

ya i get that for sure. in some shots i added a second shine layer on top of the talent which helps sell the shot but i didn't use it on every shot because i wanted to mix up the look. maybe i can find a way to wrap the other shots without making it look so much like lit up haze or fog...
 
There's a couple good techniques on how to control light wrap, I use the one outlined in After Effects Studio Techniques...it's a combo of silouhette alpha, stencil alpha blending modes and blurring the matte.
 
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