New Video: Can you help?

One way to think about this video is that there are four sections: four characters doing something spiritual; characters doing something everyday (perhaps showing similarity despite difference, or showing how someone who might seem exotic is "just like you" after all); characters walking; characters crossing paths (showing connections between us? reminding us that every face on the street has a story behind it?).

Section 1: I thought this was well executed and the best part of the video. Images look good and great production design. Cutting on movement made it fairly smooth. Could cutting have been more economical? Perhaps. But also depends what sort of pacing/mood you're going for. Maybe missed an opportunity to do a more interesting reveal of the line of people during the Islamic man's scene. The main thing anyway is that you're showing us worlds we don't normally see, so there's an inherent interest in that. The rest of the video seems less "inherently interesting" by comparison; you climaxed too early.

Section 2: Five minor thoughts:

-- We don't get to see the New Age lady doing anything particularly interesting.
-- Could the Islamic man have been engaged in something more active, to match Hindu lady and Asian man?
-- The dissolve at around 0:57 stuck out, during the Hindu lady's bit; this seems to break the pattern you've set up of dissolving between scenes rather than within them.
-- By design or accident, good production value during the Asian man's scene -- like the fan, the candle, and the redness. Without that fan, you'd have bare wall.
-- Could they all have been doing the same thing? For instance, all drinking tea, or all getting ready to go out, or similar? Depending on what message you wanted to communicate, this might have made the point clearer...

Section 3: The image of the Asian man walking, because of the composition and the colours, might be the best of the video.

I have to say, though, that this sequence was a slight let down. Probably just a personal thing, but the drab overcast look seemed a let down in comparison to the start of the video (warm, vibrant colours), walking isn't inherently interesting (I don't think so anyway), and some of the shots weren't as creative as the rest of the video. This is a general problem with journey sequences -- how do you show someone going from A to B without it being boring?

Anoter note: great job on getitng the colours you did in overcast conditions; this is something I invariably stuff up.

Section 4: I think this section represents the second "little surprise". (The first little surprise was similarity despite difference in section 2.) A few thoughts:

-- Nice camera movement, composition, blocking. Yay for glidecam.
-- I've got a feeling that the New Age lady again got a bit of a raw deal -- the other characters are distinctive and stand out, because of colour and style of dress; the New Age lady only has the red bag to help her stand out, and somewhat gets lost in the crowd. Cruel to say, but could you have considered a more distinctive actress?
-- Possible to do more economical cutting here?
-- Missing some sort of climax or closure or memorable final image?


Thanks for sharing!
 
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