any video guys here?

[MetalSound]

my band is thinking about shooting a video for our next album (which will be out in march 2011 on spv).

so we are currently gathering some guys that are good in this.

anybody here doing this (cutting, editing, filming)? preferably in germany but not a must.

 

[BlackSA]

a friend of mine does this kinda stuff. i already worked with him (did the light-operation for the "Vorboten" video) and that was pretty productive fun. great and talented guy!

have a look:
http://www.rosenthalpx.de/

 

[coreysMonster]

I know a bunch of dudes who do this, considering I'm studying the subject. We're centered around Frankfurt, if that's any help. What exactly did you have in mind?

 

[MetalSound]

thanks guys!

@blacksa: will check him out.

@coreysMonster: we just want to do a simple music video. no concrete plans at the moment. but as a promotional tool it´s always great to have one. ;-)

 

[dcb]

over here in hamburg i have someone amazingly talented :



its a band i produced, they did the video with him.
i love working with this guy. hes from california (actually) (und spricht perfekt deutsch ;-)!,
but lives here in hamburg. i can give oyu the contact info if you like.

 

[MetalSound]

looks (and sounds) great.
immer her damit.

 

[coreysMonster]

so how exactly do you want this to be done? do you want to have a small film crew travel to you, do you want the band to travel to the film crew, where are you situated, what is your budget, your quality expectations, how much are you willing to invest in postproduction and editing? What is the style of video you are looking for, do you want an actual story shown in the video, just a video of your band playing, do you have any sort of concept for what you want?
Asking for people to film and edit a music video is very similar to asking people to record and mix a song from your album. Are you looking for someone professional, semi-professional, amateur, are you even willing to spend any money on this at all?
If you're not, then I suggest just hanging out a flyer at a local film, media or arts school and have a student film it as a university project or something.

Also, dcb, while the quality and editing of the footage is really professional, and the guy obviously knows how to work a camera, a lot of those shots really aren't that good or interesting. They're either lacking in energy (especially from the guys in the crowd) or stereotypical (I mean, seriously, how often have we seen metal videos with a small crowd moshing to a band filmed with a shaky, zooming in and out of focus camera with hard contrast lights?). I'm not trying to bash the guy, but most first year film students with a decent camera could do that easily. Maybe it's because I come from a more (perhaps even elitist) artistic viewpoint of video making, but I get bored really quickly with videos like that (then again, of course, it depends on what the band wants; if that's what the band wanted, then he did a decent enough job I guess)

 

[MetalSound]

we haven´t made a concept yet. i just wanted to gather some different options and then we will sort them out.

it´s really like recording an album. i ask guys for some stuff they did and then we will decide if we like what we see or not. if you have some references from somewhere i would be curious to see them. we don´t want to spend thousands of euros for something we don´t know how it will turn out in the end.

we got an offer from a student of sae college last year to do a video for free. what can i say....it was total crap and we all wondered why the hell do those guys are paying a hell of money for their education. my grandma could have done that!!!
so there is no need for graduated a+ students. we just want to see if someone is able to do some stuff we like. and if it´s done by an unemployed electrician who does it as a hobby or a professional who is doing it for a living we don´t care.......as long as it is cheap.

 

[coreysMonster]

Good lord, stay away from SAE guys. The entire SAE academy is nothing but a sham from what I've seen, designed to take your money, give you little instruction, but give you access to good equipment to basically teach yourself (seriously, for the tuition money you could buy an amazing camera and go and teach yourself anyways).

If I may make a suggestion, I suggest you make at least a rough concept of what you want your music video to be like, at least give some samples of other videos that are in the style of what you're looking for. That will make it much easier for people to guage what you're going for, it will give you more control over what the video is even supposed to be about, what the visual style is supposed to be etc, and also give a rough idea of what kind of equipment will be needed.
For instance: if you want a video like this



You'll need several lights, a good camera, several hours (we're talking +12) of shooting, the location and the ability to set up instruments there, not to mention having several people to take care of lighting, camera work, supervision and editing and sorting of footage (which would take at least several weeks)

On the other hand, if you're looking for something more like this:



You can make due with just room lighting, any old camera and a much lower budget, and editing could be done by anyone in the band, really.

Or, if you want to go all out and make something like this (which I doubt):



You can spend an assload of money on several CGI artists, and have loads of fun while waiting the number of weeks it would take to render by an amateur.

These are all three pretty cool videos if you ask me, but all three are made with different budgets, ranging from nearly no-budget to oh-lets-get-a-CGI-studio-involved budget. Still, all three are enjoyable.

For these reasons, I'd suggest you first think of a concept, decide what song it is you want to make a video for, what kind of video you think would fit most to it, decide on a budget and then look around from there. Give people a song and a rough concept, and THEN you can start asking around for work samples, and then you'll be able to get samples from people who have already worked in the style that you're looking for.
I mean, what you're doing right now is just like posting a thread asking for people to mix your album, without any expectations of quality, budget or idea of how you want it to sound like, and basically just asking everyone possible for samples. You're not gonna get far that way.

 

[MetalSound]

Give people a song and a rough concept, and THEN you can start asking around for work samples.

this is not what we are aiming for but thanks for your post anyway.

just asking everyone possible for samples. You're not gonna get far that way.

THAT´s exactly what we want. if you don´t want a possible job you don´t need to apply.

 

[coreysMonster]

this is not what we are aiming for but thanks for your post anyway.
THAT´s exactly what we want. if you don´t want a possible job you don´t need to apply.

so in other words, you guys have no clue what you're looking for, no idea of what style or type of video you want, and you dont even know what song you want a video for?

 

[MetalSound]

did you read my first post?

 

[coreysMonster]

yes, you said you are "gathering some guys that are good at this" to make a music video for an album that isn't out yet for a song that isn't specified in a style that you made no specifications of. How exactly are you "gathering some guys that are good at this" when you dont even know what it is you want?
I'm not trying to be an asshole here, I'm just saying that it would be very beneficial for you to actually have a plan for what it is you're going for before you start recruiting people.

 

[MetalSound]

you show me your references and i will decide if i will be interested in working with you at all. this is how it´s done.
i won´t bother everybody out there in the world with my ideas if i haven´t seen any of his/her work.
as you didn´t show my a portfolio of anyone you know i must assume you don´t have any.

 

[coreysMonster]

you show me your references and i will decide if i will be interested in working with you at all. this is how it´s done.
i won´t bother everybody out there in the world with my ideas if i haven´t seen any of his/her work.
as you didn´t show my a portfolio of anyone you know i must assume you don´t have any.

Why would I bother any of my film collegues with someone who doesn't even have any idea of what it is he wants to do?
You have no concept, no idea of budget, style or even what kind of media you want it in, so why would anyone worth their salt waste their time with you? I'm sorry, you're looking to HIRE someone. You NEED to know how much money you can spend and what the project is supposed to be about, what the length of the song (and hence film) is going to be, etc.

I mean, you wouldn't go around looking for someone to mix your album without having written any songs or even knowing the general direction of music style, would you?

 

[SimonTaddio_Qc]

That Meshuggah video rocks so much even if the budget is probably one of the smallest ever for a music video.

 

[dcb]

Also, dcb, while the quality and editing of the footage is really professional, and the guy obviously knows how to work a camera, a lot of those shots really aren't that good or interesting. They're either lacking in energy (especially from the guys in the crowd) or stereotypical (I mean, seriously, how often have we seen metal videos with a small crowd moshing to a band filmed with a shaky, zooming in and out of focus camera with hard contrast lights?). I'm not trying to bash the guy, but most first year film students with a decent camera could do that easily.

99.9 % of music videos (excluding tool, maybe radiohead or even dredg for me at least...) and ESPECIALLY in metal are clichee, boring, and done a million times. the example of tesseract is not 1% better or worse than the video i posted. because : thats not what these videos are about.
they dont wanna be groundbreaking indi movies... i mean they could be,
but that would be a whole different budget (as you should know).
if you have a great concept, youll need people that can work with you on that. obviously neither the band i posted nor tesseract had better ideas than : lets film us perform. (i dont like that approach either, but still in both cases it looks pro enough, to make people think : this band has to be good somehow...)

if metalsound has his ideas for the video, im sure that most guys offering
professional "looks" will get him there.

i dont know how often you have workedon a video like this,
but its a huge amount of work. you cant get a first year student
to do that, because it takes a huge amount of planning,
writing a script, getting the equipment, looking for locations, finding dates to shoot, postproducing, AND finishing the project in time.
this cant be done by someone whos dad bought the newest canon h20...

its hard hard work.
like what joey sturgis does in music : you gotta have a routine in what your doing, so you can deliver pro quality. the content
is up to the artist. always.

 

[coreysMonster]

99.9 % of music videos (excluding tool, maybe radiohead or even dredg for me at least...) and ESPECIALLY in metal are clichee, boring, and done a million times. the example of tesseract is not 1% better or worse than the video i posted. because : thats not what these videos are about.
they dont wanna be groundbreaking indi movies... i mean they could be,
but that would be a whole different budget (as you should know).
if you have a great concept, youll need people that can work with you on that. obviously neither the band i posted nor tesseract had better ideas than : lets film us perform. (i dont like that approach either, but still in both cases it looks pro enough, to make people think : this band has to be good somehow...)

if metalsound has his ideas for the video, im sure that most guys offering
professional "looks" will get him there.

i dont know how often you have workedon a video like this,
but its a huge amount of work. you cant get a first year student
to do that, because it takes a huge amount of planning,
writing a script, getting the equipment, looking for locations, finding dates to shoot, postproducing, AND finishing the project in time.
this cant be done by someone whos dad bought the newest canon h20...

its hard hard work.
like what joey sturgis does in music : you gotta have a routine in what your doing, so you can deliver pro quality. the content
is up to the artist. always.

Well.. I was aware that the style of the tesseract video wasn't any better than the one you posted (I DO think that they had a couple of more interesting shots, and the lighting was better, but they had a professional team as opposed to one guy making a video so you can't really compare it from that point of view), but I'm so insanely hooked on their EP that I posted it anyways

Well I haven't worked much with actual video (I'm an animator and designer), but I'm well aware at the amount of work that goes into producing even the shortest of videos (be they live action or animation).
You need a concept layout and storyboard before you even start shooting the first shots. I know this may not sound neccessary for a "normal" band video like your friend's for most people, but I would never start doing anything without having each scene or shot at least roughly planned out and at least doodled on a piece of paper. Sure, you can experiment and gather extra, spontaneous footage while doing the actual shoot, but you need structure on paper first, or else you're gonna waste loads of time during shooting, and as such lose money (I've made that mistake before, and the end result was horrible).

Sure, most bands are just looking for a simple, performance video, I just wish most bands wouldn't slap together something boring like that. I mean, many bands put so much effort in their music, experimenting with tones, getting the arrangement perfect etc, that is just seems a shame to slap so much effort on a bland video idea, no matter how professionally it's shot.

Also, about the TS, I'm honestly not bashing him or trying to undermine his efforts, I'm just saying that he's better off looking for video people once they've chosen a song, know how much money they can afford to spend, what kind of style they want etc. I'm positive your friend from Hamburg could definately deliver professional results.

And I'll take back what I said about a first-year being able to do a video like your friend's, I keep on forgetting that most of the first years I know at my uni have worked professionally in video or animation for at least 2 years.
You're right, you need experience and structure in the way you work, you need to be organised, work quickly, efficiently and well, you need to have an eye for lighting, composition etc., ESPECIALLY if you're not gonna do a stereotypical "check out our band performing" video. Not to mention that once you have all the footage, you still need to piece it all together, pick the best shots, make sure the audio and video is perfectly in sync etc. etc. etc.
I could go on for hours about making videos, but I think I'll stop now, because I'm just rambling on and need to get things ready for a stop motion seminar tomorrow, which I am really not looking forward to.
I hate doing stop motion, I'm too much of a clutz to handle the dolls decently. Grr.

 

[StefTD]

Ich find die Deadborn Videos ziemlich cool, ein besonderes hohes Budget hatten die wahrscheinlich
auch nicht umbedingt. Such einfach mal bei Google danach.

@Coreys Monster, I totally understand your viewpoint (especially on the artistic and concept part,
being a parttime designer myself) but most bands nowadays just want a video that looks halfway
decent, so they can put something on facebook, myspace and youtube.
It's the same as with the music, that most modern stuff are just decent at least.

But I have to agree to dcb that I don't see something more special in the tessecrat video than in
the video he posted.

@Metalsound, I think Coreysmonster just means that it's like a band saying: "Hey guys, we want
to record a few songs, we have no idea what we're looking for, so no idea about the budget and
what style we're playing. So we're gathering for guys who are good at that".
So there's a chance that basemant rap "producers" (or metal or whatever) gonna hit you up,
who use Fruity Loops and a headset...but at the same time-with that description there's a way that
your budget and style would fit Andy Sneap, too.

 

[MetalSound]

so one last time and that will be the end of this discussion:
to remain in the analogy of recording it´s like listening to other´s people´s cds, browsing the internet sites of the studio they recorded in, looking for prices and comparing them with other studios. that is what we are doing right now. if we make a concrete plan which song we want to be filmed, we will also make a concept. BUT NOT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

/end of discussion
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