Westlife - Swear It Again (Official Music Video)
How to make a music video
So, you're wondering how to brand a music video? It'due south an art course that's embedded into our pop culture, as musicians have been using music videos to promote their songs and further their artistic vision for decades. With the ever-increasing democratisation of tools and software, CG and VFX are becoming more and more prevalent in the art form. We've gathered music video pioneers to talk over their craft and provide a backstage pass to some of the most innovative VFX in music videos.
With all that in mind, let'southward see how CG and VFX can enhance a music video. Y'all can as well check out our pick of the all-time blithe music videos.
01. Understand that music and visuals are continued
"Music and visuals have e'er complemented each other and been closely continued," says multi-disciplinary artist Polygon. "I have a strong impression that today, we've finally come up to this realisation that the visual attribute has become as important equally the music itself, if not more than. There's a existent symbiosis betwixt these mediums at present."
He adds that in today's world it would exist inconceivable for an artist to promote their latest release without any visual support. "Music videos prevail as a promotional tool," he continues, "they are the almost-viewed type of video on YouTube and superstars have no problem exceeding a hundred million views or fifty-fifty a billion."
02. Push the boundaries
Aside from working with some of the biggest brands around, The Manufacturing plant has made a name for itself by pushing the boundaries of VFX in music videos. Bringing a musician'due south vision to life comes with its own prepare of challenges, including time and budget. Dan Warom, crowds supervisor at The Mill in Los Angeles, explains: "Film and Tv mail-production typically have significantly longer development cycles besides as larger budgets. Music videos ofttimes accept much smaller budgets and as such tend to require some pretty creative uses of technology."
Music videos are often experimental in their visuals, meaning creative briefs aren't always geared towards photorealism. "Motion graphics and blueprint tend to become a much larger focus versus the more traditional approaches of VFX or animated features," adds Warom. With these considerations in heed, The Manufacturing plant has to assess the creative value of every potential projection. "This tin can come up down to the idea, a managing director nosotros're keen to work with and support, a track or performer who we feel is going to get a lot of exposure, or a projection which enables u.s. to button one of our up and coming artists," adds Jonathan 'Wes' Westley, executive creative director at The Mill in London.
03. Collaborate with y'all young man creatives
"One of the main differences is the amount of artistic involvement the squad of artists accept on music videos," explains Westley. "On all projects nosotros push button to piece of work closely with the directors from pre-production, through the shoot, up until the stop of the post process. But on music videos, given that in that location tend to exist fewer people involved in the approval process, we frequently detect that they offer more opportunity for collaboration."
Wes and the team at The Mill embraced this collaborative nature when they worked with film directing partnership Dom&Nic on a video for The Chemic Brothers' single Free Yourself. "Nosotros were involved in that project from the very beginning," recalls Westley. "The initial conversation we had with Dom and Nic was virtually doing a music video total of robots who just want to dance."
The Mill's concept team dreamt up numerous designs for the robots, while testing began on the Xsens motion-capture suit, a crucial part of the project'due south success. "Nosotros were great to employ new motion-capture technology," explains Westley. "Besides as enabling us to easily capture performance on set, information technology also immune us to capture additional performances at The Mill once the video had been shot and the VFX procedure was underway."
04. Don't be afraid to go big
Warom and the team at The Manufacturing plant in Los Angeles were recently approached by the directors to work on the video for Ooh La La by hip-hop duo Run The Jewels. "We discussed ideas that the artists themselves had suggested and then explored those over several meetings," Warom explains, "essentially providing technological oversight to evaluate what would be possible, what would look crawly and what, if anything, could exist something nobody had ever seen before."
Having recently completed a project for Pepsi at the 2022 Super Basin that used like techniques, The Mill chose to take things further for the Ooh La La music video. "This primarily involved using an Xsens Link motion-capture suit on fix with a dancer performing choreography while the capture team recorded all that motility for use with our CG crowds later," recounts Warom. "Rob Wilson our dancer and Samo our choreographer did a fantastic task of not only capturing the end routine, but took the time to suspension down a whole range of classic hip-hop dance styles so we could bring more life and individuality to our CG dancers." Each of the clips were then integrated using the squad's crowd software of choice, Golaem.
The Factory leveraged its huge collection of vesture avails, also creating a whole custom streetwear casting library based on a brief from the costume section. To help flesh out the world they also pulled a range of vehicular assets out of their internal library for the video's helicopters and hot air balloons, giving their directors the power to select the assets they wanted. "Nosotros also had to simulate fire and embers in many of the burning money pile shots," says Warom. "These were completed in Houdini using its exceptional PyroFX toolset."
05. Observe your fashion
Multidisciplinary artist Polygon creates music videos in his ain glitchy, distorted visual style. "Existence a '90s kid and growing up through the 2000s, I witnessed a lot of changes from various kinds of media and mediums," he explains. "I got to grow upwards while the transition from analogue engineering science to the digital era was happening: VHS players became DVD players, CRT TVs slowly got replaced by LCD screens, etc." Polygon theorises that these shifts in applied science accept shaped the mode he creates art today.
"Over the years, I've been trying to residuum and intertwine analogue and digital through my work," he continues. "When I outset started, I was creating pieces that were entirely digital using software from the Adobe suite. It took no time for me to realise that emulating wouldn't be enough for me. Next matter I knew, I was ownership some analogue gear, CRT TVs, old VCRs and some video equipment used for broadcasting lying around on Craigslist. Information technology was the spark that I needed; I knew that it was through circuit-bending that I was going to be able to truly achieve the aesthetic I was looking for."
06. Experiment with different styles
It would have months of experimenting before Polygon'due south technique would evolve into a coherent manner. "Over the years, what used to be a cluster of colourful and abstruse textures became distinct lines creating silhouettes; pieces of work that are now more figurative and are tied to the fantastic universe that I peculiarly enjoy," he adds.
Until recently Polygon resisted digital post-product: "I'm rarely given boundaries when it comes to creating art, and then I tend to set some for myself in club to continue artistically inspired." Nowadays Polygon volition experiment with glitch fine art software like Acid Cam, which he calls a gilt mine for experimenting with digital glitches, and Lumen, which is primarily used by VJs creating geometric shapes. He continues: "everyone present has access to a huge diversity of resource, and it tin quickly get confusing knowing what to exercise and where to focus. That's why I like to limit myself when information technology comes to what I piece of work with and take full reward of the few tools that I utilise."
07. Go hands on
One of Polygon's recent projects saw him work with genre-bending Great britain rock band Enter Shikari on the music video for their single The Dreamer's Hotel. "I love working with Enter Shikari and their team because they're ever down for any kind of ideas that I'd come upward with," he explains.
When working on a VFX-heavy music video, Polygon starts past building a mood lath, doing his best to explicate his vision for the piece. "I try to appraise the percentage of the physical effects versus those that will be edited digitally before starting to shoot anything," he continues. "We rarely go a second take chances on the solar day of the shoot, simply it's non uncommon for ideas to bloom when nosotros are in the middle of filming or fifty-fifty in post-production." When directing videos like The Dreamer's Hotel, Polygon will make room in the schedule for improvisation, allowing him to reach shots he may non accept initially planned.
One of the video's last sequences, which sees horizontal scrolling with digital feedback take over the screen, was conceived at the very end of the post-production process. "Information technology was visually impacting and fit perfectly with the 90s vibe we were looking for," adds Polygon. "The idea behind this video was, 'if Enter Shikari had released this music video thirty years ago, what would it wait like?'. We had some videos past Blur and Talking Heads every bit inspiration. We really wanted to capture this retro essence and I call up people immediately understood what we were going for."
This article was originally published in 3D World , the world'southward best-selling magazine for CG artists. Subscribe to 3D World .
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Source: https://www.creativebloq.com/features/how-to-make-a-music-video
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