Making Music Videos

Students in this class will complete a number of
collaborative music video production projects in
groups that include students from the schools of
music, dance, film/video and experimental
animation.

Music videos can be a wonderful tool for
filmmakers to explore and expand on their art of
image-making through rhythm and gesture, and for
musicians to explore how their sonic compositions
can be enlivened by moving images that respond to
what they hear.

In this production class, we will start by looking
at music videos to develop a critical sense of the
conventions and challenges of the media, in order
to confront, interrogate and re-envision them.
Students will be encouraged to conceive of music
video both as an aesthetic entity as well as an
opportunity to govern the narrative of the song,
and to push their audio-visual ideas further
through the elaboration of technique, language and
experimentation.

Considering narrative as our first approach, we
will explore how meaning is conveyed, either as a
reflection of or in contrast to the lyrics and
narrative content of the song, taking in mind
various levels of representation: literal, poetic,
metaphorical, and surreal.

We will also explore Visual Music and consider how
tempo, rhythm, phrasing, tonality and structure
can create a dialogue with the rhythmic and
structural components of the moving image by
controlling both the editing and the movement
inside and outside the frame. The possibility of
synesthesia and abstraction within music video
practice will allow students to research deeply
and boundlessly into movement and editing in both
the audio and visual realm, gaining tools they can
later apply to their own filmmaking, composition
and choreography.

The class will put a strong emphasis on
pre-production, creative development, and
treatment crafting, with talks by visiting music
video artists who will elaborate on industry
practice. We will look at music video treatments
from various artists to demonstrate how directors
have planned for their shoots through animatics,
references and mood-boards. We will also host
technical workshops that demonstrate ways of
shooting live music and how to direct play-backs
and/or live performances in unconventional ways.

After working on different groups through the
thematic exercises, each collaborative group
(which will include musicians, dancers and
film-makers) will create their own music video
project, starting with the development of a
treatment, through planning, shooting and editing
their project.

This class is open to BFA 2/3/4 students in the
Schools of Music, Dance and Film/Video and
Experimental Animation.