Vid: Hummingbird Song
Dec. 29th, 2007 11:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccatoriaWow, I've been busy today! Don't worry - I've not forgotten about the scribbling project below, but I also finished my vid today. So here it is:
Title: Hummingbird Song
Music: Tom McRae
Characters: Kendra, Cain, Gina.
Spoilers: Razor
Summary: "It is such a quiet thing, to fall. But far more terrible is to admit it." (Quote: Kreia SW EU).
Download: right-click-save-as.
Or, for the rest of my videos: click here
Password: vidses
This was another of those, ZOMG I MUST VID moments. I didn't take a lot of time preparing or scripting the vid which was refreshing. Partly because it was so (comparatively) short, and partly because I wanted to keep a sense of mess in it. A sense of entropy and collapse in the chorus sections where the music didn't demand darkness and quietness and restraint. I'm not sure how well I succeeded. Certainly I think there's mess there. Hopefully not so much as to make it simply sloppy editing. It's hard to be...deliberately sloppy, you know?
Though the lack of scripting made me less sure of some of my clip choices and while that made for an interesting excercise and I think made this vid more organic, it also meant it took me about twice as long to vid two and a half minutes as I think it otherwise would have. Well, maybe one-and-a-half times as long. Though that could also be because I usually stick slavishly to lyric-symbolism and here I deliberately tried to be more open to interpretation. Finally, I didn't use anything outside of the footage provided in Razor. Though that does include the footage used in the beginning "recap" from season 2 episodes. Still; it was very limited and that challenge was interesting. Certainly the most limited palette I've ever used. Which probably added to the vidding time again.
Actually of everything, I'm least sure about the song choice here. Which is to say, I think it's the right song to have picked but I sort of wish the right song to have picked had been something...weirder. Tom McRae may not be quite mainstream but he's well-loved on the net and quite...vidderly? Not that I dislike vidderly, but I'd rather have had a piece of music that made people go, "HUH?! You vidded to that?"
Because my first goal in this vid was to make something where the violence of the video went against the grain of the audio, and where the lyrics were nearly irrelevant except for tone, I immediately thought about this awesome Farscape vid I once saw to Unchained Melody which was basically just a montage of them blowing up a bank. And I remembered thinking that it went absurdly well with the music. But I didn't want to steal that song and I couldn't think of something else as good from that style, so I figured, quit trying so hard. Go with the piece of music that's asking you to use it, not the piece of music you wish was asking you to use it. And thus...this.
Oh, hey, I just found a link to the Farscape Vid! Look, reccs and vids in one post!
I hope y'all enjoy.
Title: Hummingbird Song
Music: Tom McRae
Characters: Kendra, Cain, Gina.
Spoilers: Razor
Summary: "It is such a quiet thing, to fall. But far more terrible is to admit it." (Quote: Kreia SW EU).
Download: right-click-save-as.
Or, for the rest of my videos: click here
Password: vidses
This was another of those, ZOMG I MUST VID moments. I didn't take a lot of time preparing or scripting the vid which was refreshing. Partly because it was so (comparatively) short, and partly because I wanted to keep a sense of mess in it. A sense of entropy and collapse in the chorus sections where the music didn't demand darkness and quietness and restraint. I'm not sure how well I succeeded. Certainly I think there's mess there. Hopefully not so much as to make it simply sloppy editing. It's hard to be...deliberately sloppy, you know?
Though the lack of scripting made me less sure of some of my clip choices and while that made for an interesting excercise and I think made this vid more organic, it also meant it took me about twice as long to vid two and a half minutes as I think it otherwise would have. Well, maybe one-and-a-half times as long. Though that could also be because I usually stick slavishly to lyric-symbolism and here I deliberately tried to be more open to interpretation. Finally, I didn't use anything outside of the footage provided in Razor. Though that does include the footage used in the beginning "recap" from season 2 episodes. Still; it was very limited and that challenge was interesting. Certainly the most limited palette I've ever used. Which probably added to the vidding time again.
Actually of everything, I'm least sure about the song choice here. Which is to say, I think it's the right song to have picked but I sort of wish the right song to have picked had been something...weirder. Tom McRae may not be quite mainstream but he's well-loved on the net and quite...vidderly? Not that I dislike vidderly, but I'd rather have had a piece of music that made people go, "HUH?! You vidded to that?"
Because my first goal in this vid was to make something where the violence of the video went against the grain of the audio, and where the lyrics were nearly irrelevant except for tone, I immediately thought about this awesome Farscape vid I once saw to Unchained Melody which was basically just a montage of them blowing up a bank. And I remembered thinking that it went absurdly well with the music. But I didn't want to steal that song and I couldn't think of something else as good from that style, so I figured, quit trying so hard. Go with the piece of music that's asking you to use it, not the piece of music you wish was asking you to use it. And thus...this.
Oh, hey, I just found a link to the Farscape Vid! Look, reccs and vids in one post!
I hope y'all enjoy.
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no subject
Date: 2007-12-30 11:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-12-31 08:14 pm (UTC)I'm glad that you liked it, and even more glad that I managed to convey what I intended and that it works.
Thanks again for taking the time to comment. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-01-01 12:09 am (UTC)watched it three times in a row. this is going to sound perverse, but I found the vid so achingly... romantic. it's the music. but also my personal ability to see all Razor's horrific violence as the fruits of profound and tragic love between women. you have some of my favorite Cain/Gina sequences so far in a vid -- they just gutted me. and the Kendra POVishness is great, totally chilling (and with Kendra and Gina, glee!).
it feels dreamlike, with all the fades to black. I love that. so gorgeous! it's hard to explain how the material juxtaposed with the song (which totally worked), to me -- it was like hallucinating? sort of hushed or hazy, not tempering the impact of the violence, which you laid out very potently, but making it seem far far away, a memory.
putting it on the femslash masterlist -- probably as Cain/Gina + Cain/Kendra. I could read it that way, at least.
have I shown you my list of possible weird audio to vid BSG to, by the way? I'm trying to work on a collection.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-01 07:20 pm (UTC)And I'm really flattered that I managed to affect you that much with the vid. It sounds like you really understand what I was going for. Which was absolutely a sense of violence numbed by distance in time, but not - as so often happens - excused by time because...there's no excuse? Like when you blunt a razor you can't cut with it, you can only use it for blunt force trauma. It's a hazier, quieter weapon, but more shocking, too. Except now I'm babbling so I'll move on.
I'm honoured you want to put it on the femslash masterlist. I didn't want to advertise it as such mainly because I wasn't trying to make a romantic video (though I have no trouble with people interpreting it that way), even though I did set out to make it entirely about the relationships between those three women and their various acts of violence. Relationships which include a romantic one between Cain and Gina and, if not a sexual crush then certainly a traumatised emotional crush on Cain from Kendra.
But I suppose for me, the vid is ultimately destructive and nihilistic, and I didn't want anyone walking into it thinking that the main point was going to be a 'ship. But Razor is one long, tragic love story. It's just impossible to excise that. No matter what video I'd made, it would have Kendra-Cain-Gina as it's underlying pulse.
Anyway, thank you again for taking the time to write such detailed feedback; I really appreciate it.
have I shown you my list of possible weird audio to vid BSG to, by the way? I'm trying to work on a collection.
I think you may have linked it to me once, but could you again for I seem to have lost the link? I doubt I'll be vidding anything else any time soon, but you never know as I always seem to start vidding at inopportune moments and more ideas for cool songs to vid to are always welcome!
no subject
Date: 2008-01-02 07:00 pm (UTC)to point you to particular things: I should really give you What's He Building in There? because, as a kinda fanboy, I think you'd be well situated to appreciate its genius vis a vis fanboys and/or cylons. and check out the mashup Dissolved by the Water from comments -- it's remarkable. I actually saw a Lee vid to Carmina Burana somewhere in
no subject
Date: 2008-01-02 05:03 am (UTC)Because my first goal in this vid was to make something where the violence of the video went against the grain of the audio, and where the lyrics were nearly irrelevant except for tone
I did get this. I watched the vid twice and I tried to find ties between the images and music and while I did at times, more often then not I didn't. Yet, the tone seemed perfect to me. The vid had a dream-like quality (or should I say nightmarish given the subjuct matter?) to me. And I got a sense of Kendra's regret. I saw this as more her POV, but that was probably influenced by the film largely being her POV. Nice work. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-01-02 09:02 pm (UTC)No worries; it means a lot to me that you read it and took the time to comment. :)
I did get this. I watched the vid twice and I tried to find ties between the images and music and while I did at times, more often then not I didn't. Yet, the tone seemed perfect to me. The vid had a dream-like quality (or should I say nightmarish given the subjuct matter?) to me. And I got a sense of Kendra's regret. I saw this as more her POV, but that was probably influenced by the film largely being her POV. Nice work. :)
Thank you - it sounds like you got everything I intended. While Cain and Gina and their twisted relationship was always intended to be a large part of the vid, it was always supposed to be told from Kendra's perspective as...she's the one of the three who would understand what the vid was about, maybe? ;)
Either way, thanks again for the feedback.
no subject
Date: 2008-06-29 04:13 am (UTC)Thanks for sharing!
no subject
Date: 2008-06-30 10:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-26 06:11 pm (UTC)I loved this from "count the cracks in the ground" -- fantastic vid. Even before I read your notes, what struck me about this vid was the artistry of the guns and fire and things blowing up, and somehow it manages to work in a gentle, quiet, melancholy song. You mentioned that Tom McRae is more vid-typical than the songs you usually work with, but to me it was unique and surprisingly effective to see it in a "Razor" vid, against such a violent backdrop. At times the intense visuals are chaotic (not in a negative way) and then it comes back to an emotional place with slow, meaningful moments and looks, and the slow-motion dropping of bodies. (Particularly love what you did with Kendra shooting the woman and the smoke leaving her gun, at that specific moment in the song.)
This vid really made me feel for Kendra, even though I wasn't majorly affected by her when I saw the movie. The last shot is perfect.
(Um, I hope you're not getting tired of my comments yet, 'cause I still have to watch "Tricks." *g*)
no subject
Date: 2008-07-27 10:54 am (UTC)I always liked Razor, even though I understood why some people had issues with making Cain an eeeeevil lesbian, but basically this vid was my, um, argument about what was powerful about it? Which was, essentially, quiet, nihilistic, pointless violence. I go into detail here (http://beccatoria.livejournal.com/36427.html) - but please don't feel obligated to read it - just figured I'd provide the link for context in case you were interested. I certainly don't want to make you spend any more time with an episode you dislike!
But, what I'm trying to get at is, I'm really pleased you enjoyed it even if you didn't like the episode. I take that as very high praise, so thank you.
Also just to clarify about the music - I don't actually think I usually work with unusual vidding music, much though I'd like to. I've worked with Tom McRae before, lots of solo, emotional singers, not to mention Snow Patrol and that John Cale cover of Hallelujah that I think EVERY fandom has at least one vid to! So, while I think I occasionally pick a weird song (like my most recent vid!), and I at least try to do interesting things with the music, my actual choices aren't all that unusual from my point of view. I just...really wanted to pick something weird for this vid.
But ultimately, I agree with you. I think it worked much better than I thought it would and gave me just the right effect in contrast to the video footage.
You have no idea how pleased I am you enjoyed the smoking gun because that was, literally, the first clip I had in mind, and the clip that wouldn't leave me alone or let me choose another song even when I wanted to.
And I'm never tired of your comments! I hope you enjoy Tricks when/if you get around to watching it! :)