Music video productions

Musicians tend to go with the flow and want to "play it by ear".  But good videos are made with good planning, not shooting from the hip.

We'll want to have a copy of the music track, a full text of the lyrics and we'll have a questionaire for whoever we're working with, our "contact person".

Before I go any further, let's talk about that contact person - Promoters tend to want to keep us from talking with the "talent".  Maybe it's because they're charging them for this video several times what it is actually costing.

Regardless, we never discuss our fee with anyone other than the person who will be paying it.  But it is vitally important that we get to collaborate with the songwriter or at least the performing musician(s).

It will be our job to interpret the song visually.  We need to understand what the songwriter is saying, what part of his life story relates to the song (if any); what emotions he hopes to evoke from listeners, etc.

Artists tend to not be detail oriented, but it is details we need.  We'll need to create an outline and a storyboard.  If we're going to various locations, we'll need information on each so that we can plan the best times of day for lighting, etc.

Sure, we can "ad-lib" and "shoot from the hip" too, but let's have a good shot list to fall back on.

The music video demo we have posted now is one where they didn't do a storyboard, so people were constantly figuring out what to shoot next and half the scenes they'd talked about doing were just forgotten and others were missed because we ran out of time.  We fixed it in post as much as we could and the song is really good which helps pull it through.

Music videos take longer to edit than any other kind of video production.  Because of this, they are a litlte more costly (but not much) and editing takes a minimum of two weeks and possibly longer (up to one month).

We've seen musicians who've paid obscene amounts of money to have a "master" recorded, only to have that "master" turn out to be a piece of junk.

If your recording studio isn't mic'ing each instrument and each singer separately, in a sound room, then mixing afterward, you may want to start asking questions.

OK, maybe your group is the next worldwide sensation, you'll never know if you don't get things rolling. Give us a call today!