main menu

• Members Main Page
• Search for AMVs
• Forum
• How-To Guides
• Site FAQ
• About us
• Login

Information

• Member: Kusoyaro
• Studio: Kusoyaro Productions
• Title: sex and caramel
• Premiered: 2005-09-23
• Categories:
  • Drama
  • Character Profile
  • Romance
• Song:
  • Suzanne Vega Caramel
• Anime:
  • Noir
• Participation:
  • Anime Weekend Atlanta 11, AWA 2005 AMV *PRO* CONTEST (2005-09-23)
  • Anime USA 2005, Anime USA 2005 (2005-11-18)
• Comments: This was an experimental video for me. The inspiration came from two places: the trailer for the film Closer and the DVD menu (yes, the DVD menu :P) for the film Garden State. It's pure coincidence that Natalie Portman is one of the main stars in both movies. Anyway, I first heard the song in the Closer trailer, and thought it gave the trailer a stylish, sexy feel. I wanted to make an AMV that could emulate that feel. The Garden State DVD menu has some stylish, simple effects that I thought would be a good fit to the song, so I ended up using similar effects in the video.
  
  I didn't set out to make a yuri slash video. The song came first, and I really wanted the delicate sensuality of the music to come through in the footage. In the end, Noir and the Utena movie were the only animes I could come up with that really had the look and feel that I wanted, and I've already done a sensual Utena movie video. Unfortunately, Noir doesn't have any major male characters that I could pair up with one of the girls, so Kirika had to become a lesbian. So, sorry, this wasn't based on some twisted fantasy of mine :P
  
  So the basic premise of the video is to imply that Kirika has some sort of love/obsession towards Mireille. Of course, this doesn't actually exist in the series, so my aim was to show it through creative manipulation of footage. As most of the scenes I wanted to use were scenes involving very little motion or action, I decided to do it montage-style, with lots of clips moving about on the screen. I liked the idea of keeping the screen rather sparse and bare, never filling it completely with a clip...it fits the stark sound of the song. After mulling the idea around for a bit, I figured it would be easier to do it all in After Effects, rather than having dozens of track mattes cluttering up a Premiere timeline. It was quite an experience, as I had previously used AE only for very simple, specific effects...and here I was, attempting an entire video in AE, and trying to do it with style. The Closer trailer had a really neat blurring in and blurring out effect that I wanted to emulate, but it ended up being too much work, so I just got lazy and filled the entire video with Gaussian blurs. I wanted the video to have "soft" edges, despite it being made up of square and rectangles, so that's where the whole blurring thing came in.
  
  In the end, it took a lot more work than I was expecting, but I'm more or less happy with the video. It's not a style I'd want to attempt again, but as far as experiments go, I've definitely done worse.
  
  Lyrics:
  It won't do
  to dream of caramel,
  to think of cinnamon
  and long for you.
  
  It won't do
  to stir a deep desire,
  to fan a hidden fire
  that can never burn true.
  
  I know your name,
  I know your skin,
  I know the way
  these things begin;
  
  But I don't know
  how I would live with myself,
  what I'd forgive of myself
  if you don't go.
  
  So goodbye,
  sweet appetite,
  no single bite
  could satisfy...
  
  I know your name,
  I know your skin,
  I know the way
  these things begin;
  
  But I don't know
  what I would give of myself,
  how I would live with myself
  if you don't go.
  
  It won't do
  to dream of caramel,
  to think of cinnamon
  and long
  for you
  
  
  *Nominated in Best Romance, Best Artistic Endeavor, and Best Technical in AWA 11 Pro.
  *Winner of Best Romance at Anime USA 2005.