Shadowmind - 3 music videos shot in one day

MiniMan

MiniMan

Well-known member
Hi everyone!

It's been something like 5 years since I've posted in this forum, as my focus has been drifting over to guitar playing and music production the last years. But I haven't left my interest for film making too far behind, so when it was time to promote my band Shadowmind again, we decided to shoot 3 videos in the same location/day, and I did everything except for the actual shooting. These music videos have a close to zero budget, only buying some work lights and a cheap fog machine. I did all the lighting, location work and editing.

We decided to scrap the whole generic story of scared hot girls running around in a forest and just go for a real "live" feeling to the videos. I think it turned out really good! It was shot 50/50 on a 550D and 5D II. The 550D had a Helios 58mm and the 5D had a MIR24 or something like that for the wide shots. Tried to acheive a 16mm film-ish look in post production, worked quite well. All editing done in Sony Vegas Pro 11. I have also produced all the music, if anyone would like to know.

We have currently finished 2/3 of the videos, the last one will be out in about a week, so stay tuned! Here they are:


 
I wasn't a fan of music but the videos do look pretty good. Are those just work lights in the background?

Just wondering...why shoot 3 videos in the same location. They look exactly the same to me.
 
Thanks :)

Those are just work lights yes, but the use of smoke instantly softens the light and makes them look way better. Without any smoke/haze, it would never look half as good.

Making them look the same was what we intended to do, so now we have 3 music videos that are almost like a really good looking live performance. We just thought; why not?
 
I hate it when people start off like this, but I have to.

"Working in both the Media & Music Industries"......this seems completely illogical, and a step in the wrong direction. I know that this isn't a Music forum, however, I'd like to explain why.

What you essential have isn't "3 music videos that are almost like a really good looking live performance". What you really have is 3 Music Videos that look exactly the same. Live performance has that "live" feel. You can just tell that it's live, regardless of set etc.

To me, you shot yourself in the foot, quite badly. Instead of spending one solid day shooting what would have been a pretty decent Music Video, and releasing that, you spent one day shooting two mediocre (I can't speak for the third, obviously), spending less time on each, and then "ruined" and chance of band progression through release. (Basically, even if you staggered the releases, they would still look exactly the same, with no progression). I'm sorry if I come across as harsh, I don't intend to, I'm simply giving you my opinion and experience.
 
To me, you shot yourself in the foot, quite badly. Instead of spending one solid day shooting what would have been a pretty decent Music Video, and releasing that, you spent one day shooting two mediocre (I can't speak for the third, obviously), spending less time on each, and then "ruined" and chance of band progression through release. (Basically, even if you staggered the releases, they would still look exactly the same, with no progression). I'm sorry if I come across as harsh, I don't intend to, I'm simply giving you my opinion and experience.
Click to expand...

Since these videos will never, ever, ever, ever, ever get any playtime on MTV or whatever else, they are more than sufficient for what the band needs. The only way these videos are actually useful to a band is if they land the band any gigs at upper-level venues. They make these videos almost exclusively to promote themselves to venues. The venue cares about how the band looks, how the band sounds, and whether the video looks semi-decent or better. My dad used to do the booking for a pretty big local venue back where I'm from, and he used to get these types of videos all the time from bands. When you're booking bands for a large venue, your ass is on the line if the crowd hates the band or if no one shows up to see it. You don't care about how "unique" the video is in even the most remote way. You care about the quality of the music and whether that band looks like it's got its stuff together.

Your comment didn't come off sounding harsh to me. It just made me understand that you don't quite grasp why local bands make music videos.
 
Raindog84 said:
Since these videos will never, ever, ever, ever, ever get any playtime on MTV or whatever else, they are more than sufficient for what the band needs. The only way these videos are actually useful to a band is if they land the band any gigs at upper-level venues. They make these videos almost exclusively to promote themselves to venues. The venue cares about how the band looks, how the band sounds, and whether the video looks semi-decent or better. My dad used to do the booking for a pretty big local venue back where I'm from, and he used to get these types of videos all the time from bands. When you're booking bands for a large venue, your ass is on the line if the crowd hates the band or if no one shows up to see it. You don't care about how "unique" the video is in even the most remote way. You care about the quality of the music and whether that band looks like it's got its stuff together.

Your comment didn't come off sounding harsh to me. It just made me understand that you don't quite grasp why local bands make music videos.
Click to expand...

Ok. Quite clearly the Music Scene in America is completely backwards to the UK. I shoot Music Videos day in, and day out. I also work for a venue & a promotions company (any UK people with bands, feel free to drop me an email - tim@advancepromo.co.uk), so your understanding is on the wrong spectrum. I can categorically say that if we had a band come through with 3 videos looking exactly the same, that clearly weren't live, we wouldn't book them. To us over here, it shows a lack of interest so to speak, that they would rather have 3 mediocre videos, than one awesome one.
 
Ok. Quite clearly the Music Scene in America is completely backwards to the UK. I shoot Music Videos day in, and day out. I also work for a venue & a promotions company (any UK people with bands, feel free to drop me an email - tim@advancepromo.co.uk), so your understanding is on the wrong spectrum. I can categorically say that if we had a band come through with 3 videos looking exactly the same, that clearly weren't live, we wouldn't book them. To us over here, it shows a lack of interest so to speak, that they would rather have 3 mediocre videos, than one awesome one.
Click to expand...

Granted, if it's between two bands with similar talent playing similar music, maybe the one producing the more "eye catching" videos for promotion will be selected. Maybe that's true. But if you're telling me that the venues give a crap about what the videos look like then I don't know what to say. I think that's nuts, but lots of things are different in the UK. Sure, you gave us Zeppelin, but you also gave us the Arctic Monkeys, so I don't really know what to think to be honest.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top