Is Technical issues outstripping Artistic issues?

[Vlad G Pohnert]

Although to be serious: The other problem I see more and more is that people think that con competions are the only thing that matter. And of course they want to set themselves apart from the "Susie that used a few Cartoon Network SM episodes", or they don't want to lose to somebody else who made an effect-video, so they knock themselves out on technical quality rather than thinking more about their idea. It's like the 90's of web-design: doing a complicated one requires technical skill, but the succesful ones are by people that don't let the framework drive the content.

Yes, both trends tend to be there. I myself tend to see this in myself as well and have been looking back and re-examining where I want to go with AMVs....

Vlad

[TaranT]

I myself tend to see this in myself as well and have been looking back and re-examining where I want to go with AMVs...

Glad I'm not the only one trying to figure out which direction to go.

I suspect all the technical interest in video quality is a natural fallout from the publication of EADFAG. This is a good thing in many ways, although my personal position w.r.t. these technical issues is to basically ignore them. I've read most of the Guides and skimmed the rest, but I've never ripped a DVD, never done IVTC or any of that other stuff. I really don't see the point in doing it. While using DV/NTSC from end-to-end (following analog capture from DVD), I've never had a complaint about video quality even though I know it's never as good as the original source. And as a method, it works consistently and easily.

Besides, I prefer to watch my projects the same place I watch the anime: on my TV. Making a video for online (computer) viewing is something I would rather leave to TMPGEnc and be done with it. In other words, "interlacing is good" (I still hate it ).

That said, I still think the Guides are a excellent thing to have, and I wouldn't hesitate to follow them if I didn't have a working alternative. However, the drawback is that new creators are given the impression that this is the only way - or the only accepted way - of doing things. I wonder how many people gave up after numerous frustrating days wrestling with AVIsynth or Premiere's crashes? And maybe that's ok. But there are easier ways of making AMVs. Some of them require thick stacks of cash, but that's another story.

[iserlohn]

I do have things to say on this issue, but finding the right words is more difficult than everyone may think.

AMVs have been moving to a tech-first position for a long time. The trend is nothing new, but the level to which it can be taken is. It used to be that having a product where you could make out who Shinji and Rei are was enough. The happy point was probably when it became possible to control what you wanted to do with the video and the net made getting source and equipment possible.

Once prices plummeted and NLE became popular, the instinct has been to let it take over and push the computer as far as it can go - be it re-animating fight scenes, repainting scenes, overlaying a weirder mishmash of characters than Sailor and the 7 Ballz, whatever. The philosophy of KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) is now seen as something for newbies and the technical side, especially in contests, is worth more and more as each development and price break occurs. A lot of the scene (just by reading boards if nothing else) is now about "how can I make my video pretty" and not "what the fuck am I trying to do with this?". We need more of the latter, not just because the former has been done to death, but the latter can't be answered simply.

The artistic side of AMV has declined in general, I'm as guilty of it as everybody else. Most contests now are like pop music - that which can be the most fan-pandering wins. All that matters is that it's upbeat and maybe, if Dick Clark asks, you think you can dance to it. This leads us to the impossible questions about what art is, and if we can really consider what we do art. Most of us live in a country where painting your face blue and chomping on Cap'n Crunch is considered an artistic event worth paying $70 for. Would you pay $70 to see AMVs? Where do pop culture and art seperate themselves? This is the type of question that could (and perhaps should) be discussed in AMV. I don't think this will happen until we start getting serious long-form AMV (read: not mindless stuff like DDR project but a feature length AMV with story, emotion, character development, etc.) projects. The problem then is who wants to watch them?

The answer is both more and fewer people than you think. Most of the typical AMV crowds aren't interested, but those who shun AMV for substantive material may find what they're looking for.

Where did this come from? It's the question we all have to ask ourselves when we make a video: Who are we making this for? Are we doing it for ourselves? Are we doing it for other creators (like I did with my Katsucon video)? Are we trying to get our videos on the equielant of American Top 40? It's hard to tell the target audience of most creators nowadays, and AMV is having an identity crisis because of it. Fans are needed from outside the community to keep fresh ideas coming, but if you can't go above and beyond the LCD in your projects then what's the point? Crowds are easy to please, but people who know how some of the tricks work take greater things (similar to magicians) to be satisfied.

Anyhow, I've ranted long enough for now, just another €0,02 worth from my head

[Brolli411]

Klinky, AD, and iserlohn, Amen.
I don't know if my opinion would really qualify in such and in depth debate such as this, on the fact that I haven't made an AMV in a long while, but oh well.

To me, with one of my videos, and probably the only one that could be clarified as an AMV, thus not random scenes put together, I strived for what I wanted in the video, not what I though would be more crowd pleaser. This may be because I have no thoughts of going to any kind of con any time soon, and if I did, I would probably make an entire new video for it. But What I did with this video, is made something that I wanted to see, I wanted to use the song. I didn't know how it would turn out. The result, in my opinion, could be turned out from luck, artistic ability, or technical usage. But when I made it, I didn't care. Though thinking back to when I made it, I don't think that I was going for any kind of artistic view, unless you find rolling an interesting topic.

Now that I can finally make AMV's again (Computer problems prevented me) it will probably take me a while to find the right song. The song I choose will either be an already used song, but I recreate it with a different anime, and/or different mood/attitude. Another option, which would be the more time consuming one, would be to find an totally unused song. This is what I did in my 'Old School Rolling' video.


This is something that I would like to say about the topic in general. The debate with art and Technical. I, as well, say both. In most of my favorite videos, the usage of Technical and digital effects are what bring out the art in it. They (Who shall remain nameless) Blend their Technical Skills in to the anime, and make it look almost natural to the series. But not only to the series do they make this so. They blend it to the music as well. Almost like it is the feature film that iserlohn is talking of. It was strange, when I went to submit an opinion of this video. Every time I went to watch it, to find something good, bad, or whatever, I would get memorized, and watch it beginning to end. It just appealed to me so much.

One thing in particular to this subject, is the 'fading' effect. If you would call this a technical effect. Imagine how much this effect has effected emotional aspects of a video. And not only emotion, but other artistic (If you consider them to be separate). I'm sure that most of you could say that you have used this effect, in at least some kind of emotional manner.

I personally seem to have become more worried to what people will say about the quality of my videos rather than the artistic side myself. This is a trend I think that will take away from my videos in the end and I and reconsidering this of trying to achieve video perfection to please the audience watching it and not getting labeled by all the tech gurus and my videos being "technically inferior" in favor of artistic and emotional merits

Very well put. I, personally, would not worry what anyone would think about my videos. If someone who was labeled a 'Tech Guru' had labeled my videos something like that, I would ask the 'Tech Guru' to make an emotional video, and see how it came out. (Nothing against all those 'Tech Guru's' out there.



Back to something Klinky said:

You can write a guide to tell you how to make most any DVD look it's best, but you can't write a single guide to make any song match the footage it's best. It all depends....

VERY VERY well put. It's how the creator feels about their video that's really important, not how the audience and viewers fell. If you look at a DragonBall Z fan boy/girl, who has just completed his/her first video. You can't find someone prouder. That is...Until they come to the AnimeMusicVideos.org Forum. There's so much discrimination. And that's where the whole, 'It's what I think, not what you think." (Sounds like something your mom would tell you to say, Eh little boy's and girls?).
And I'm sure that not many of you really care either.

And finally, one last thing. This sorta’ goes with the topic, but may be a little off. Anyway... What if the song already has all the art in it? It is a true masterpiece? Then someone goes and sticks a few clips on it and call's it an AMV. People are impressed, but are blinded by the awesome music. There are a few thing that people can do about this. But the someone takes it to the next level. They actually use their Brain in making an AMV, not just their Mouse finger. They take all, and any, technical inspiration and effect that they know, and make the crowd pleasing video, as it has been put. I have seen this happen, and it has been admitted. I want to know what you think on something like this. If it looks REALLY good, Technically, and Artistically. I have before fallen for these kind of creations, and have only been told after an in-depth opinion has been wrote (Makes me sound stupid, now doesn't it.)

...That about sums everything I have to say up. Now my hands hurt.

[trythil]

I had a very long essay written up here, and then my Web browser crashed. So I'll make it brief. Here's my contradictory, convoluted, redundant, and repulsive $.02:

The two images above are one frame from a video I am currently working on. The top image was captured from a roughly encoded MPEG-1; the bottom from a high-quality MPEG-1.

The difference is more than cosmetic. On my screen, Rei and Shinji's smiles and eyebrows are either significantly distorted or totally lost in the compression artifacts in the top image. They are much more pronounced in the bottom image. Such a difference has major implications for the storyline and theme of the video.

The feeling that I get from reading the previous posts in this thread is "technical issues don't matter as much as artistic issues". If I'm wrong, feel free to correct and/or flame me for it.

Anyway, what I am attempting to illustrate is that technical skill and artistic skill are strongly linked. If you have a low signal-to-noise ratio in your presentation, no message, no matter how profound or touching, will be communicated.

This is, I think, a major reason why technical merit has become so paramount lately. It is only in the recent past that the means to produce high-quality videos has been made available, and every reason exists to use the available resources for clearer communication.

Another possibility: the growing popularity of anime music video editing. While neither the technical nor artistic skills are easy to acquire, I do think that the technical aspects of AMV creation are simply perceived as easier, and people have a tendency to perfect whatever is easiest first and then move on to harder subjects.

Take encoding, which is what much of the discussion has focused on with regards to technical aspects. Encoding can easily be considered an art in itself, but there is enough information available so that somebody can create a decent-looking product by following a step-by-step guide.

Artistry is different. As AD pointed out, there is no guide to sharpen one's artistic sense. There are ground rules -- e.g. choose appropriate footage to match your theme; a consistent timing scheme is a good thing; keep your color schemes consistent and appropriate with regard to the video's theme -- but they are far fewer in number, and much more vague.

Is it, then, a bad thing that technical issues might be taking the forefront? I don't think it is, because, in all probability, it's not something that's going to be permanent. There will always be those who have the passion to experiment artistically and learn from those experiences.

AMV editing has always been a fusion of art and science, more of one than another at many times. I think that the perception that technics are overtaking artistry is just something temporary; I have seen enough recently produced videos to convince myself that artistry in AMVs is far from gone.

Wasn't a good deal of time devoted to learning the various quirks of VCRs in the days when AMVs were made with analog equipment? It's no different from now.

[Chaos Angel]

I don't really have anything to add that hasn't already been touched upon, as I am no wealth of information either technically or artistically, but I do want to say this.

Some videos that I really like have obviously sloppy compression, etc. But I like them because of the way they are put together. Technical aspects can, and should, be used to enhance the video and make the presentation of the work visually appealing. Technical aspects are secondary to artistic qualities when deciding whether or not I like a video.

[Vlad G Pohnert]

The feeling that I get from reading the previous posts in this thread is "technical issues don't matter as much as artistic issues". If I'm wrong, feel free to correct and/or flame me for it.

Anyway, what I am attempting to illustrate is that technical skill and artistic skill are strongly linked. If you have a low signal-to-noise ratio in your presentation, no message, no matter how profound or touching, will be communicated.

This is, I think, a major reason why technical merit has become so paramount lately. It is only in the recent past that the means to produce high-quality videos has been made available, and every reason exists to use the available resources for clearer communication.

Don't get me wrong; good quality is important thus the technical side should always be considered. The point I am making is that the trend seems to be that the technical side is taking precedence over the artistic side! In your images, quality is important, very true. But if the artistic concept is poor or not enough consideration is given to it, then the images not matter what the quality may not help the video at all. I agree with you that balance is important and why not use the tools when they are there, but you must use them in equilibrium with creativity.

I look at it like an artist. Yes, it's important to know the paint you use so that the art turns out right. But if you spend too much time analyzing the paint under a microscope, you'll not have proper time for the painting of the picture! So in the end, use what works and get you comfortable with the technical side (do some homework as they say), and then go ahead and actually paint the picture letting your artistic side free!! Only then can one achieve a true "balanced" work of art....

BTW, A funny thing about the comment of analog capturing from DVD. That's exacly what I did for one of my videos about 2 years ago and I got a lot of feedback on how good the DVD rips really were!! Just goes to show that not ripping DVD is the end of the world! It's acceptable quality for the video in the end that's important! (Yes, I rip all my footage nowadays excelpt for the use of Laser Disks (I have tons of those). I was just making a point of waht was siad in this thread...)

Vlad

[madmallard]

whats the saying. ..

Diamonds can be wrapped in paper, and gold can wrap trash?

techincal ability = quality of execution with relevance to artistic intent.

it does not equal quantity or diversity of execution.

Jeff, get in on this one. . .you didn't have a video effects board at first or anything did you? Yet the quality of'why me's' edits seem to keep it more interesting for me to watch than most new stuff.

other videos which used primarily straight cuts in a well executed way, like only in dreams, shows me more about technical ability than say. . .believe, or sleep now (either). No offense, as all three videos are nifty, but i can't use them as object lessons to make myself better either a) the editor had a very specific idea and knowledge of tools, or b) the impression wasn't as strong on me for whatever reason.

but then that would be trying to be everything to everyone. ;p

unfortunately, i agree with vlad that the new crowds that have gotten into amvs in the last 4 years or so are dominated with people who put bells and whistles high on their quality lists. I say this because i and my friends tastes while relatively similar in our circle, are wildly different from alot of the community. ..

[monthenor]

Dunno what I can add here, but I'd like to say that I've always felt effects should be left to professional rigs, and the harmony of the anime and music should come first. I've never used anything more complex than a cross-fade in my videos, but people seem to like them a lot. I'll never be a famous editor like Caldwell, and I'll never enter a contest, but I think my videos get the point across. People have to just be willing to watch the different vids for what they are rather than what the "state of the art" is.

It comes down to the originality score. If you try to push past the average video, whether in effects or intent, you'll get noticed.

[the Black Monarch]

Koop and I are currently discussing this very topic in relation to his Damaged Rei-Mix video. I'll let you all know how it turns out.