Feedback on my cinematography

N

Neutral

Active member
Hi there,

Recently finished up a music video that I directed. Would love to get some feedback, positive and negative.
Was shot on the sony FS5 mostly with some A7s and FS7 sprinkled in there. I directed, shot, edited and colored everything. I was working with a very small budget, and absolutely NOTHING went as planned (when do they ever?). So I was pretty bummed once it was finished. But with that said I think it's still probably some of my better work I've been able to produce so far in my career.

Would love to get some feedback on the cinematography, editing and coloring choices I made. What you thought was good, what could have used improvement or have been done differently. This was the first video where I made an effort to use things like the rule of thirds, and other DP tricks here and there. Tried to expose everything correctly.
Would also love to hear what you think the budget was and how much a video like this would normally cost? I'm still in that phase of trying to "prove" myself to record labels. But can't help feel like I'm constantly being taken advantage of when it comes to the budgets I'm given vs what I deliver.

Anywho, here's this video!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGQwL4_x3MA
 
Not that I am a great music video DP at all but here are my observations

1. Very professional looking overall. You obviously know what you are doing in regards to the technical aspects of cinematography.
2. Might just be me but there is an overall "haze" to the look of the images, a bit washed out looking overall. I don't know if that look works with this style of music? I have seen other music videos from bands that play harder edged music that are really contrasty with deep, dark blacks and vivid, more saturated colors and to me, in general, your looks works better with acoustic and more mellow types of music, not that it can't work with this style. Just a taste thing on my part I guess? Your colors look muted and the overall look has a low contrast, washed out look to me that seems at odds with the music. Personally, I think this has to do more with Sony color science than your settings or grade. I am not a fan of the Sony look at all, the only Sony camera I shoot with that can be more easily graded to a look I like is the F55. All of the others, especially the lower end Sonys and mirrorless Sonys look awful, even with a grade. Skin tones are dreary and the overall look is just tired. But that is my personal preference, I just think the looks from Canon, Panasonic and Arri looks much, much better, more organic and dare I say, much closer to 35mm film. Even RED, unless the image is massaged a lot, looks "off" to me.
3. I think you overused the blue "lens flare" effect. It only has impact if used once or twice. Seeing it on so many shots, it becomes a gimmick.
4. Edit and cinematography are both excellent overall. I would just evaluate your camera choice in the future. You don't see many higher end music videos shot on Sonys, they are almost all shot on RED or Arri these days.
5. The last thing to consider if you really want to make your mark as a music video director is, and this comes from Mark Romanek and some other high end 80s-90s music video directors when music videos were a huge cultural force, no matter how good of a director you are and how hard you try to make something significant, your music video is limited by how good the song is. This is not a great song. It's a decent song for the genre, but continue to strive to hook up with a visionary artist on the rise and do great work on a great song that makes a mark. Problem is, there are few great songs being written these days, pop, rock and hip hop are not innundated by great artists making landmark songs in general so go outside of genres you are not familiar with. There is some ground breaking music being made in bluegrass, folk, jazz and perhaps a few other genres. Definitely think outside of the box. EDM is huge but it is not really about "songs" that much so it is tough to make great music videos but as far as audience and interest, these days it's all about EDM. If you can hook up with some really talented EDM artists, you could have a breakthrough video for a great piece of music that actually transcends the genre and becomes a "hit" although who is to say what a "hit" is these days?

Nice work and thanks for sharing it.
 
Here is my input for your music video from a directing point of view:

If you were to take out the band performance and the music from the video and edited the only the cutaway shots in the video to a song with no lyrics...how well would it stand? In my opinion music videos have to complement the structure of the song; intro, verse, chorus, verse, bridge, chorus...etc each section adding to the song (or visuals) with something we haven’t seen before.

One of the best examples of this is Foo Fighter's "The Pretender". If you apply the same formula of taking away the band performance and only keeping the shot with the Riot Police to an escalating track you would end up with a very solid video. Each part of the song as it expand to chorus and bridge and breakdown some visual in the video complements the music. This I think is a little lacking in your video, I get the story but it doesn’t flow as easily I would like for it to. (When you look at the pretender video, there really isn't much there: Band+30 riot cops.) I also agree with puredrifting, the music lacks the song needed to add to your creation.

Now having said this I think you have done really good job with cinematography, coloring and overall directing so thank you for sharing.

As far as getting value for your work is something that will come in time but please be mindful that this job is 20% art 80% business. Being a good artist will only get you so far; the better business man you become the more money you will make. I think of all the years I could have been making better money :)

Cheers,
 
C'mon Neutral... I know you know that this is superior work.
Song aside (always a matter of preference no matter who you are),
this was excellent!
 
1. The look or direction of the video means very little in a grand scheme of things - everyone who you show it to will look at the view count - if it's high = "awesome video man!" and if it's low...
2. If you were to show the video outside of the youtube (thus view count) context then all is good but then again the ones looking at the video (and thus potentially hiring you) will not necessary be the best judges of quality.
3. The pros among us will point out that you don't have 3 acts. You can scroll through and see similar shots at the beginning and the end (and the middle). Is it a big deal? Well, not really as pros have lost their power and their opinion - even if well supported means very little. That said if you were living in the 80s or 90s you would get trashed for lack of this structure.
4. Which leads us to the final point: "is it a good video?" Well, unfortunately only qualities outside of it can give you the answer. The work in itself has very little value (not because it's not good in some intrinsic terms) but because the times we live in don't particularly care about the quality.
 
Well done!

The interior scenes were very well lit. Actor performances were convincing. I didn't mind the low contrast look. Although I watched it without the sound so I don't know what the music is...yet.

You have a lot of camera movement. Most of it works. But, as an armchair quarterback, I would say some points didn't need as much. But I understand that music videos sometimes go more toward eye candy. I agree with the structural comments made in terms of acts and story telling. And we should all strive for that. However, I didn't think you were so far off, either.

The last drone shot was great. But the others didn't do much for me.

All in all, great work! specially considering you did this with FS5 and A7S. Just goes to show there is no excuse for bad work. Certainly not the tools.

So, you had what. 5 locations? This must have been a 2-3 day shoot. Ensemble cast of at least 8 or so people? Production design on interior performance scene. Lighting and gimbal and drone work. Color and edit. At $500/day, even if you comped gear and cast were friends, that is still at least two days production, two days in post and paying for props and dressing. That puts you at around $4,500. And that is withou insurance, without equipment rentals, without paying cast or crew, without craft services, and you getting a single fee to do the work of three people. If this was done on a Red package or Amira package with all costs incurred, could easily be upward of $10k. But honestly, it's not super helpful to think about what you "should" be getting.

Just have a hard look at your cost of doing business, think about what connections you are making, and think about what you want in your body of work and how you can leverage those things to get to where you want to go. And I totally agree about the song needing to be interesting. It doesn't have to be genius, but it should have a good market and it should help promote you as much as your video helps promote the song.

I should have prefaced by saying that I'm not in a position that is superior to you in terms of industry or skill, so my opinions are not necessarily coming from a "master" perspective. So take it with a grain of salt.

Yo, keep it up. I'll definitely be checking for your work in the future.
-All the best, Rafael
 
My favorite part was the writing on the girls back. Pretty smart. Didn't listen to the music but the idea was clear. Very consistent look and feel dramatically. I have a pet peeve about people smoking but not smoking. I took him fot a kid who was experimenting with drugs and didn't know what the hell he was doing anyway. :) way to go.
 
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