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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 28, 2011 17:16:44 GMT -5
4. I find it really cool that you come from a dance background, it seems such an obvious connection to music, but I never heard that mentioned before by anyone. So of course your perspective is influenced by your experience with music and to translate that to vids is awesome. I remember lim wrote quite a cool piece on dance = vidding a while back. Lemme see if I can find it... ... And the answer is no. She seems to have locked away all her journal content after the thing with the thing.  Such a shame on so many levels. But I digress. The essence of the post was to praise buffyann's Starlight, which is just... pure motion and movement and dance and joy. If anyone hasn't seen it, get thee immediately to it, I say.  |
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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 28, 2011 17:20:28 GMT -5
I used to do a lot of ballet as a kid and then modern dance a few years ago and I wonder, now that you've mentioned it, if that may be the reason why I'm, a lot like you, more interested in the aesthetics and "choreographing" of a vid rather than its narrative. I've never looked at it that way but I guess it makes sense. Those moments in fanvids where the movment on the clip seems to mirror the movements in the song--I can get completely giddy over that. Just to add to the mix, FWIW I did ballet for about 10 years when I was younger, and some Modern and Cecchetti as well. Although personally I'm not convinced it's the dance that caused my interest in musicality in vids though, more like the other way around - my interest in musicality caused me to gravitate toward dancing, IMO.  |
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Post by icepixie on Nov 28, 2011 18:30:27 GMT -5
3. Most vids I watch for fandoms I don't know are by vidders I do know. Chances are that if their vids impressed me in the past, I'll get something out of a unknown fandom one too. Sometimes this works for me, but...I dunno, it seems like unless the vid is the incredibly well-cut and I really like the song, I lose interest if I don't recognize the characters. I really find it difficult to imagine vidding without the experience of dancing; it really helps me to think what kinds of movement would look good at various parts of a song. I have been known to get up and physically dance a section of a song when I'm having trouble with a vid. obsessive24, I think you're right that what looks like a vidding philosophy monolith from the outside is a lot more varied upon further examination, which I'll readily admit I haven't done. I'm basing my impression of the "vidding community" on...I think the posts I'm thinking of were things I found on metafandom around 2007-2009, but I honestly don't remember many specifics or any names, sorry. I do remember one post where one vidder was giving some public concrit on another vidder's latest vid (this might have been a writeup of a VVC vid review?), and they mentioned wishing that whoever made the vid had used the lyrics more metaphorically than they had. This got a lot of agreement in the comments, and I remember thinking, "But that's one of the things I like about vidding!" There was also just a general focus on narrative and on deconstructing/subverting the source through vids, which isn't the main draw for me. I think it matters that I was reading this primarily through one community--metafandom--which, given the way the links for that were/are gathered, I think can make it into a bit of an echo chamber for particular viewpoints. Another reason that vidding as a community looks so monolithic to me in particular is that the three or four vidders on my flist pretty much only talk about vidding in connection with VVC. So over the years, I kind of got the impression that that was what people who vid do (although I know now that that isn't necessarily true), and because I'm not into cons, that I would never really be part of that community. To be fair, I'm also the kind of person who tends to gather a flist and stick closely to it, so I'm not out there talking to vidders (beyond giving feedback for vids I've watched or responding to people who comment on mine, which only occasionally segues into a longer conversation), and like I said, it's kind of my own fault that the vidding community looks so homogeneous to me. I meant to add something like this, but completely forgot about it. I can absolutely see that; once you've mastered something, or at least reached a relatively high level, it's natural to want to turn to something else and work on it. I used to do a lot of ballet as a kid and then modern dance a few years ago and I wonder, now that you've mentioned it, if that may be the reason why I'm, a lot like you, more interested in the aesthetics and "choreographing" of a vid rather than its narrative. I've never looked at it that way but I guess it makes sense. Those moments in fanvids where the movment on the clip seems to mirror the movements in the song--I can get completely giddy over that. Your last sentence--yes! That is what happens for me. I love those moments. I did ballroom dance all through college (plus a lot of ballet and tap as a kid), so I'm very focused on rhythm. I'm always aware of the beat of a song, and I like to both vid to the beat and deliberately vid against it before coming back in sync with it, which can create some nice moments. |
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Post by dragonchic on Nov 28, 2011 19:37:55 GMT -5
This discussion of dancing + vidding is interesting. The connection makes a lot of intuitive sense, particularly for vidders that place a premium on musicality. I'll go against the grain and admit to not only having no background in dance but also not being a particularly good dancer.  I still really enjoy visualizing music though and try to do that to the best of my ability in my vids. Maybe the visual part of my brain can process something the motor part can't. |
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Post by legoline on Nov 29, 2011 2:18:46 GMT -5
[Just to add to the mix, FWIW I did ballet for about 10 years when I was younger, and some Modern and Cecchetti as well. Although personally I'm not convinced it's the dance that caused my interest in musicality in vids though, more like the other way around - my interest in musicality caused me to gravitate toward dancing, IMO. Makes sense. I guess your fous in vids depends on whether you come from a "music" background or from a "storyteller" background, if that makes sense. (I'm both, so I wonder what that makes me ;D ) You could go, "I like this song, I need clips to move with it!" or, "I love this show, I must tell a story about it!" (In the best case both, I guess) Am I making any sense? It's early, I'm at work and I didn't sleep well last night... |
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Post by franzeska on Nov 29, 2011 2:41:00 GMT -5
Sometimes this works for me, but...I dunno, it seems like unless the vid is the incredibly well-cut and I really like the song, I lose interest if I don't recognize the characters. It may be that we're just different and you'll never care about vids that aren't for your fandoms, but one thing I've noticed is that a lot of vidders think they're making a vid that's accessible to anyone when they're really making a vid for die-hard show fans and nobody else. I wasn't interested in vids for the longest time because people kept showing me ones from Buffy and SGA and a couple of other massive fandoms that I happen to rather dislike. (I know. I know. Shun the unbeliever.) What I've noticed is that the bigger and more ubiquitous a fandom is, the more likely its vids are to assume a ton of contextual knowledge or even just that you care. And this is very hard to see if you're inside of the fandom yourself. I find that vids for sources without an organized fandom (most movies, for example) tend to be more interesting to me. I think people vidding those have a greater awareness of a non-fan audience. They may also be using a beta who's never seen the source. I've been talking to someone else about this perceived "right way to vid" in the LJ community as well. She also felt that there was this idea, this "mainstream approach" shall we call it, that's VVC-focused and structure/narrative/"need to have a point"-focused, and she also felt that it was limiting and didn't feel as though one had room to express oneself beyond that. I think you're right that this is more of an outsider's first impression than the reality, but it was my first reaction and so many other people's. There's definitely something distinctive about vidding meta about narrative. I wonder if part of it is that, in addition to narrative perhaps being easier to write meta about, a lot of groups of vidders have come out of organized pockets of fandom like Buffy where you do get a lot of different people all familiar with the same source and who've seen a lot of vids using the same footage. |
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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 29, 2011 3:26:10 GMT -5
I was just saying to dragonchic the other day that her musicality has the sense of a virtuoso performance to it. When the visuals look exactly the way the music sounds, there's just so much unbridled joy in that. I wouldn't necessarily say it trumps all other aspects of vidding for me, but I think it's the most fun and exhilarating aspect by a long shot. I'll go against the grain and admit to not only having no background in dance but also not being a particularly good dancer. I still really enjoy visualizing music though and try to do that to the best of my ability in my vids. Maybe the visual part of my brain can process something the motor part can't. You're the living example why we can't categorically equate great musicality = dance background. ;D icepixie - It's all well and good for me to say "go poke at individual vidders", but I do sympathise that it's hard to just randomly strike up a conversation, especially in the LJ format. The thing I find with LJ commenting and discussion about vids - especially when discussing a particular vid - is that an opinion will be voiced, and then the voices that agree with that opinion will pipe up, but often I find that there is a whole contingent of people who don't necessarily agree with it, but they don't think it's worth the effort/discussion/sometimes antagonism to speak up and actually have it out. So I often feel that judging the opinion of an entire group of people - based on what was said by a small component of that group - can be a bit misleading. Franzeska - you're right. The more I write about this and think back to when I first joined LJ vidding (having originated from the Buffyverse awards circuit), the more I remember how  I was at the time and wondering "Wut is all this meaning this community attached to everything, and do I have to do it?" |
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Post by icepixie on Nov 29, 2011 12:47:48 GMT -5
It may be that we're just different and you'll never care about vids that aren't for your fandoms This seems likely. I've watched vids off and on for ten years now, and I can't think of one that I've really liked where I hadn't seen at least a little of the source. I do notice that if I like the song, I have a much, much higher of finishing a vid where I don't know much or anything about the source. If you're an unbeliever, so am I. I tried several times to get into Buffy and failed miserably, and only lasted about a year and a half in SGA. Interesting. I vid for tiny fandoms (my most recent ones have been for Wonderfalls, Northern Exposure, and Caroline in the City...okay, and Fringe, which is probably my biggest current fandom), but it never occurred to me to try to make them accessible for people outside the fandom, because that's not how I operate as a viewer. I wonder if one reason for vids from movies being more inherently accessible is that the screen language of the source is going to be a bit different, since they only have two hours to tell their story vs. multiple episodes of a TV series. A TV show could build up years' worth of meaning on a single object or location or something, while a movie would have to make it more immediately, visually obvious that that same thing is important. So for a hypothetical vid for a movie, you would have footage that says, "This is important, pay attention," whereas for a TV show you don't necessarily get that from the source and you have to impose importance on it through your own editing. (It's been years since I took a film class and I don't actually watch that many movies, so I may be all wet here.) The thing I find with LJ commenting and discussion about vids - especially when discussing a particular vid - is that an opinion will be voiced, and then the voices that agree with that opinion will pipe up, but often I find that there is a whole contingent of people who don't necessarily agree with it, but they don't think it's worth the effort/discussion/sometimes antagonism to speak up and actually have it out. So I often feel that judging the opinion of an entire group of people - based on what was said by a small component of that group - can be a bit misleading. This is certainly true. On the other hand, if people who disagree with that small component aren't giving their opinions (and I'm not saying vidders don't; again, when I was reading these things that gave me my first impression of vidding, I was just reading the stuff that popped up in front of my face rather than searching for more varied viewpoints), then outsiders are basically left going, "Well, maybe there are people who don't agree, but I sure don't see any, so maybe they all think this." |
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Post by astarte on Nov 29, 2011 14:04:25 GMT -5
What icepixie said about a show building up important events and symbols is very true. I think that the visuals of a movie are accessible to a greater audience in general. They must be, even when they are not blockbusters. There is a visual language at play that we instinctively respond to, so it is easier to translate that into vids and give a strong impression even about a unseen movie.
Coming to LJ from Midnight Lair was in a way a culture shock dampened by the fact that I joined with twenty or thirty other people I already knew.
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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 29, 2011 14:30:49 GMT -5
Coming to LJ from Midnight Lair was in a way a culture shock dampened by the fact that I joined with twenty or thirty other people I already knew. I didn't know it was a mass migration like that. That's so cool to know.  I think - correct me if I'm wrong - outside of you, Xandra & Charmax, the great majority of those people are no longer vidding? I'm assuming it's the likes of Sassy Kitten, Ryan, Sweetie etc, but maybe I'm thinking of rather a different community. icepixie - agreed that if you don't say it, people don't know what you're thinking. Which kind of leads to an interesting question of where the onus of community representation lies or where it should lie - I don't believe there's any obligation on the people who don't speak up to do so if they don't want to; on the other hand, it does seem like it's useful to newcomers know that very different individual opinions exist within an apparently monolithic approach. I'm not sure where I'm going with this... clearly there's a bit of a communication disconnect, but it's hard to pinpoint where the responsibility lies to make it more accessible. |
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Post by astarte on Nov 29, 2011 15:30:36 GMT -5
Yes, it was a mass migration or at least a friending party when ML closed. I still have most of them on my flist and there are more still vidding, but not as regularly. We lost Trisha to crafting, she does all kinds of things with needles from dresses to purses. Strangely enough, my mind associates a lot of people like you, Milly, Brad and Andrea (thedothatgirl) still with Midnight Lair.
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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 29, 2011 15:33:10 GMT -5
ML was before my time and Brad started after me, so not us. Milly though, probably yes. I'm not sure about Andrea. I think we were far more involved in Reverie but that was sort of in tandem with LJ, not one after another.
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Post by astarte on Nov 29, 2011 16:59:27 GMT -5
Milly definitly, she was very charming member. So everything is connected by the third degree, because I was never too involved in the Reverie. Andrea was a member, but I think she joined in the last year or so. I remember when LJ was invite only and Trisha asked if I wanted to join it. My age, let me show it to you. Heh.
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Post by franzeska on Nov 29, 2011 17:14:26 GMT -5
What's Midnight Lair?
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Post by obsessive24 on Nov 29, 2011 17:29:04 GMT -5
Vidding forum mostly for Buffyverse vidders(?) that existed around - correct me if I'm wrong - early 2000s?
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Such a shame on so many levels. But I digress. The essence of the post was to praise buffyann's Starlight, which is just... pure motion and movement and dance and joy. If anyone hasn't seen it, get thee immediately to it, I say. 
I still really enjoy visualizing music though and try to do that to the best of my ability in my vids. Maybe the visual part of my brain can process something the motor part can't. 
I was at the time and wondering "Wut is all this meaning this community attached to everything, and do I have to do it?" 
I think - correct me if I'm wrong - outside of you, Xandra & Charmax, the great majority of those people are no longer vidding? I'm assuming it's the likes of Sassy Kitten, Ryan, Sweetie etc, but maybe I'm thinking of rather a different community.