Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something else?

General discussion of Anime Music Videos
outlawed
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by outlawed » Fri Oct 19, 2012 9:25 am

Zarxrax wrote:I've always been of the opinion "who the hell cares what you call it, if its an amazing piece of work, you can call it a dead fish for all I care, its still an amazing piece of work."
I think this is the better point. Ultimately AMV/MAD are just a shorthand label certain groups came up with to designate their thing.

I think a far more interesting analysis is JP MADs a lot of times are these sort of quircky joke things like a far side comic that either you get or you don't. The USA AMV scene was clearly heavily influenced by the fact it was the MTV generation pumping them out early on (dominance of the story based AMV). Also contests had an effect on the dominance of early Ranma or Weird Al videos (give the people what they want =p).

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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by DJ_Izumi » Fri Oct 19, 2012 1:38 pm

Kionon wrote:If a Japanese studio hired you tomorrow to edit for an official music video with all new animation for some anime series or anime short, and you really liked it, and you were fan, and you worked with the animators to do all the things which we normally do in AMV editing, and your work was released in Japan, would you honestly tell me you hadn't just made an AMV?
Except, ya know, it would NEVER work like that. Almost everything 'fancy' done in AMVs is done because it's pre-rendered output for broadcast. Everything else is just basic editing.

I can sorta imagine it now...

Editor: "So, I'm gonna mask out the characters from this scene, and layer them together with this, using this plugin to do this effect, and..."
Animators: "Or we could just animate it like that... Which would be far less retarded..."
Editor: "Oh good, then can you animate it like that for me?"
Animators: "No, it's the DIRECTOR'S job to tell us what to animate, not yours. You just edit our animation like he tells you to do."
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by DJ_Izumi » Fri Oct 19, 2012 1:40 pm

Oh! And before you say 'Well, what if the AMV editor was hired as a director?' No, no AMV editors are going to be hired as animation directors, not when 90% of AMV editors don't even know what 'The Rule Of Thirds' is without Googling it.
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Kionon » Fri Oct 19, 2012 7:29 pm

[quote="outlawed"]The USA AMV scene was clearly heavily influenced by the fact it was the MTV generation pumping them out early on (dominance of the story based AMV)./quote]

Actually, I strongly dislike official MTV style music videos. Most of them have no story and have nothing to do with the lyrics at all. There are exceptions, Tear For Fears' "Head Over Heels" is pretty cool, because the whole "in love with a librarian who ignoring me while I keep trying to convince her to go out with me" goes very well with the lyrics and the song, and there's some nice sync.

Most music videos I've seen since the late eighties on have left me thinking, "and just what did that have to do with the price of tea in China?"
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Zarxrax » Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:06 pm

Kionon wrote:Most music videos I've seen since the late eighties on have left me thinking, "and just what did that have to do with the price of tea in China?"
Ah, well you see, they aren't selling chinese tea, they are selling music :)

I think its more the fact that a few people made some amvs early on, and then people saw them at conventions or wherever, and then just copied it. "Hey, why don't I make something like that?"
I mean, why are AMVs even a *thing*? When people watch anime, is their natural inclination to imagine the scenes playing along to a song? Most people would only have such thoughts if they had seen it done before.

I mean how did almost all of us get into AMVs to begin with? We saw other AMVs.

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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Kionon » Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:47 pm

Zarxrax wrote:I think its more the fact that a few people made some amvs early on, and then people saw them at conventions or wherever, and then just copied it. "Hey, why don't I make something like that?"
I mean, why are AMVs even a *thing*? When people watch anime, is their natural inclination to imagine the scenes playing along to a song? Most people would only have such thoughts if they had seen it done before.

I mean how did almost all of us get into AMVs to begin with? We saw other AMVs.
"Almost all of us" is the key here, I think. And the further we go back from today, how does the percentage change?

It isn't my inclination to imagine scenes playing along to a song when I watch anime... but it *is* my inclination to imagine scenes playing along to a song, when I hear a song. I may not edit to live action, but I have plenty of live action ideas. And I've been doing this since I was a small child. When I started editing in the late 90s, I made what I call now proto-AMVs, my thought process came from a type of fanfiction called songfics, and they were independent of anything I had seen... Until I met Quu. And found that this was an actual thing, and there was an entire hobby for it. Prior to that point, it was merely me fussing around with footage and songs based on this concept of "what if I could actually take the animation and create a visual songfic?" While the idea of AMVs had certainly been around for years and years at this point, when I was 13, I had no idea anyone else had thought of it, because I was so steeped in another and admittedly non-visual hobby, that of fanfiction. Encountering Quu, and later Phade and Waldo, etc, in #fanfic on Nabiki, pretty much changed everything.
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Brad » Sat Oct 20, 2012 8:32 pm

Only lightly skimmed the thread, but yeah, it's just an original animated music video. If you WANT to call it an AMV or a MAD or whatever, go for it. Eye of the beholder and all that. But I've seen PLENTY of music videos (official or otherwise) that were just something somebody animated (either by cel animation or CG or stop-motion or whatever). It all comes down to your definition of an AMV.

I could make the same argument for something like Pencilhead, which to me pushed the boundaries enough into complete original composition, using.. I guess you could call them "samples" in the remix vernacular, or other sources, along with a ton of original stuff. I'd just call it a motion graphics piece (or music video, if you want) that happens to use some pre-made anime visuals.
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Kionon » Sat Oct 20, 2012 10:23 pm

Well, we apply the label "AMV" to a lot of things which don't technically meet the definitions of the words used. Trailers and comedy videos which are all dialogue come to mind. This video, official or not, animated for this specific purpose, has all three elements: Anime, Music, and Video. The animation used, while specifically created for this purpose, is still animation made in the same way as series or movies, made in Japan for a Japanese audience. If I were to use this animation as the basis for my own new AMV, it seems to me, it would fit the definition of anime which the Org recognises for inclusion in the catalog. Clearly, since this is an official music video, it has the music. Loose sync, but the music is still there. And of course, you can't have animation set to music without it being a video. Animation presupposes video. Thus, it seems to me, that this is an AMV. I accept it could be called a M@D because of the meaning of M@D itself is very close to AMV (Music Anime Douga, douga meaning animated video) if not identical in meaning and because all aspects of it are a Japanese creation.

I guess my biggest issue with the argument that it isn't an AMV/M@D is the argument that officialness somehow makes the definitions inherent in the words used in AMV/M@D no longer applicable. I don't see the logic in that.
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Brad » Sat Oct 20, 2012 10:54 pm

To me (that's a huge qualifier here. Again, personal definitions, eye of the beholder, etc.) it all comes down to 2 key criteria. Intent and content. I don't really take the specific words that make up "AMV" to be the only criteria for how I define it. On the intent side, I've always seen it as being a fan-made work, as opposed to something that was either commissioned by somebody else (usually with money involved).

When I decide to take The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and combine it with Today by Halou, I am a creator with the intent of making a music video, using sources I didn't make to create something totally new. And that's where the content plays in. Primarily using something that I did not create, or was not specifically given by a third-party and asked to craft something out of it. And I made the conscious decision to use those sources for artistic reasons, either because I was a fan of one or both sources, or I just simply had a vision for how they could go together. So, with those 2 criteria are taken into account, something like, an official movie trailer no longer applies. The content side applies because they're using something they didn't create, to make something new, but the intent was not based on their own creative impetus. They were hired to do it. Same goes for the flip-side, but mostly as far as the visuals are concerned. For example, if I decide that I really like some song and I want to make a music video to it, but rather than use a pre-made video source (like anime or a movie or whatever), I either animate something totally new or I shoot something or whatever. In that scenario, I had the intent to make a music video based mainly around my love for a song, but the content was solely created by me.

Now, I know I brought up Pencilhead as something I don't see as an AMV, and that certainly skirts the line with respect to both criteria. There's definitely a ton of room for gray-area with my definition and if somebody saw Pencilhead and told me "that's an AMV" I would certainly not fault them at all for it. Just one of those things where I don't see it that way.

So, as far as this video is concerned, I'm ASSUMING that because it's an official music video, somebody was tasked with creating it, by the band/label/whoever and they didn't use a pre-made source. So to me, it fails both criteria, and is simply, just a music video.
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Re: Livetune new official music video, AMV? M@D? Something e

Post by Kionon » Sat Oct 20, 2012 11:46 pm

That makes logical sense, Brad. And I fully respect your view of it. I see where you draw a line both with content and intent.

I suppose, ultimately, however, I just don't agree with it. What you use as definitions for distinct categories appear to me to be merely subcategories. I've argued elsewhere that due to historical considerations, M@Ds and AMVs are not inherently identical, and that is true. I would say that under the category of "Music Videos with Animation" you'd have "Music Videos with Anime" and under that you would have AMV and/or M@D, and under that (or those, if you choose to separate them in regards to historical considerations), then and only then, would you get to a division between "official" and "unofficial." So at least two levels down from AMV/M@D.

And I'm still curious how you would define a work where the person paid to do the work was actually a fan and had direct input in the various aspects of production. Whether it would actually ever happen or not is immaterial to this mental exercise.
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