While researching music promotional videos and deciding upon a storyline, you may remember me talking about possib;y using an Action Man doll and a Barbie doll in a kind of animation during the video. Yet, now that we have decided to take this doll animation element out of the video, I couldn't help but notice someone has actually made a video with toys in their video.
Owl City's video for Fireflies contains a lot of toys that I remember from my childhood, but even though it is too late to analyse their video I thought I would put it up on my Blog just as an interest in both the song and the video - I saw "Brum!" as well as many other toys I remember.
I was initially asked to analyse three Music Promotional Videos as part of our Pre-Production Research. However, it was whilst editing in Post Production, before the Easter Holidays in 2010, that I came across the “Fireflies” video by Owl City. It had been out for a couple of months, and the video itself seemed to have similarities to my original, initial ideas for our Group Music Promotional Video. The music from the “Fireflies” Video is a mix of Pop and Electronic Pop genres, mainly because of the sounds and instruments used. However, the video doesn’t illustrate any forms of these genres as the video is set in a boy’s bedroom, where all his toys come to life. This gives the video more of a nostalgic feel. This nostalgia, in terms of boys’ toys, acts as further promotion for the artist Owl City, as boys who had played with the toys in the video would have noticed these references to their childhood. The toys included are old and new, with some obvious contrasts, including a 1960’s Tin Robot, and a more mechanical robot ‘Robosapien’ from the 2000’s, highlighting that boys still play with the same toys even now. For me, it was the video that sold the song, as I remember playing with train sets and Scalextric. Therefore, this proves that a Music Video serves a purpose in the Promotion of a song and artist.
Visual Stylistics:
MES: The video is set in a boy’s bedroom, as can be seen by the untidiness of the room with toys scattered everywhere around the room. This contrasts to the portrayal of his age - the connotations therefore are that he could be remembering his childhood. The room has simple colours so that your attention is drawn to the objects in the room and the basic, yet effective, storyline. Pale green walls and a pale brown carpet reflect the light from the window, giving this video more of a summery feel, maybe late afternoon, early evening. The light from the window seems to be natural, with a slight breeze catching the curtains, but the breeze and the light could be artificial and deliberately placed to create that happy, summery mood.
The props used could go on forever. With as many toys, the list could go on, from tin robots thorough the ages to Brum, and from train sets to finger-controlled boxing rings and radio-controlled model airships. Therefore, I have concentrated my efforts on more important props. The electronic piano/organ plays a key part in the video; the ‘Magic’ and ‘FX’ buttons control the imaginary life of the toys and choruses in the song. Obvious artificial lighting is used with various desk lamps, giving the video a definite late afternoon, early evening setting. A dinosaur has been placed on a record on the record player (vinyl turntable), which is used at the start of the video to mark the point at which the introduction finishes as the song commences. The dinosaur is seen to speed up, a time-based reference to how Gramophones would have been wound up and how modern and 20th Century vinyl record players ran at different speeds (normally ‘33’ and ‘45’). The word-spell toy is used to spell out some of the key words in the lyrics, in synchronised time with the music. The disco lights are used together with the Disco Ball to create a teenagers’ life shown through objects. The jar near the end of the video (2 mins 34 secs) and the supposed ‘dreams’ inside it, as described in the lyrics, could have been used to illustrate how this video and the life of the toys is part of his ultimate, ‘strange dream’.
The closet and closet door (2 mins 35 secs) shows this is an American boy as these cupboard storage and closet-style wardrobes are more commonly used by Americans. It should have been used as a wardrobe for clothes, but instead acts as a storage cupboard for more of his toys. The closet door is opened after the boys presses the ‘FX’ button on his electronic piano/organ, and reveals a ’Funship’ airship.
The boy wears a simple brown t-shirt, brown/pale blue/grey jeans (it is not clear what the colour is, maybe a mix) and dark brown socks - dressed informally as you would in your own bedroom. He doesn’t seem to be wearing any makeup, his simplicity therefore attracts you away to the toys in the room.
Cinematography:
The establishing shot is a Medium-Shot of the on/off switch on the boy’s electronic piano. It is interesting to note the Extreme Close-ups at the start and throughout the video on the “Start/Stop”, “Magic” and “FX” buttons on the Electronic piano, as these will play a key part in the continuity of the video. As the song starts, the Wide Shot of the whole room seems to tilt up, or track up, suggesting the camera is attached to a crane, creating a Crane Wide-Shot which shows us more of the room than a still frame. Also at the start are three or four shots of the boy playing his Electronic piano, starting with a Medium Close-up, then zooming-in to a Close-up of the boy, then to an Extreme Close-up of the boy’s hands as he continues to play his Electronic piano. In quick succession of one another, there are various Big Close-up and Medium Close-up shots of lamps (toys and actual desk lamps) lighting up around the room as the song starts, after the boy presses the “Magic” button on his piano. (see screenshot images below)
The video contains mostly still camera frames, with one or two shaky frames on the handheld shots. At the start of the pre-chorus, at 0 minutes 43 seconds, there is a quick pan left-right of the notes that are played on the piano, where the last notes to be focused on together are ‘A’ and ‘A sharp’/’B flat’ using a focus-pull. On the pre-chorus, the shots are longer, more relaxed, as to keep with the mood and pace of the song at this moment.
At 1min exactly, there is a clever overhead Crane Medium-Shot of the piano lights, piano keys and boy’s fingers. After this, at 1min 5 secs, there is a Big Close-up of the boy’s mouth, in time and in-sync with the lyrics and music, with the foreground (his mouth) in focus and the background out of focus.
At 1min 34secs / 35secs, there is a nice Medium Close-up of the boy’s fingers as they play two or three different chords. Also at 1min 34secs, handheld camera shots have been used for effect, focused in on the record player/turntable. A few of these handheld, shaky camera frame shots are used on various objects in the boy’s bedroom.
At 1min 38secs, there is a contrast of timescales, in the background and in focus is a 20th Century silver and red tin robot toy, with ‘Robosapien’ a 21st Century robot in the foreground and out of focus. At 1min 39secs, there is a pan-right frame, focusing on the toy train set, as the train follows the circular layout of the train track.
At 1min 41secs, there is a Medium Close-up of the tin toy ‘Monkey-on-the-drums’, and a focus-pull between the lit-up model balloon and the tin toy monkey. At 1min 55secs, the bedroom door is opened from the outside, which is a stage effect as the boy sits absolutely still with his back to the door and all the toys. As the door opens, there is a focus-pull from the door knob to the contents (toys) in the room and on the floor near the door.
At 2mins 18secs, there is an interesting Medium Close-up and contrast of colours - a black and red robot in the foreground (in focus) and behind it is a silver, mirror-covered disco ball (out of focus), the one which had obviously fallen from its thread earlier in the video.
At 2mins 44secs, there is a very interesting ‘Robosapien’ Wide-Shot, where the toy robot appears to be pointing his right arm-gun at the viewer. At 3mins exactly, there is a tracking-down Wide Shot framed on the room, similar to the crane shots at the beginning of the video yet a contrast in the tracking direction (this time tracks down instead of up, connotations of the closing stages of video), including a lens-flare as if there is exposure to light or the Sun, with the toys alive in the room at the very top and high-pitched notes of the song so far, again the song is suggesting an approach to the ending.
Between 3mins - 3mins 19secs, there are various shaky camera shots (Big Close-ups) on toys, and on the record player again. These shaky camera frames are used effectively as they add atmospheric tension and a sense of happiness. After this 19 seconds of shaky camera shots, we see the opposite of the start (the ending), where the toys are winding down, losing their clockwork lives and slowly dying, some immediately, the connotations of which are that the magic has vanished and therefore the toys lose their almost real ‘moments’.
At 3mins 49secs, there is an interesting track/zoom out and we lose focus of the boy’s face in the foreground and the background, at the same time as the song itself fades away. The final shot commences at 3mins 52secs, and focuses on a Medium/Extreme Close-up of the boy’s hand as he turns the on/off switch on the piano to ‘off’, a complete contrast and an anaphoric reference back to the opening establishing shot of him turning the knob to ‘on’.
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Editing:
In terms of editing, transitions, pace, and continuity or lack of continuity or Match-On-Action (MOA), with a touch here and there on the ‘Relationship between Lyrics and Visuals’ and ‘Relationship between Music and Visuals’, both the start and the end of the video contain slower cuts and longer shots than where the video is faster at the pre-middle (43secs onwards), middle (1min 50secs) and post-middle (3mins - 3mins 27secs) stages. The appear transitions are used to give the video a bit more pace to try to keep up with the average-paced song, and also to add more of a film/television programme structure to the editing.
Between 23-25secs, there is a ‘whoosh’ sound effect, where the dinosaur of the turntable speeds up to the pace and beats of the song. At 1min 8-9secs, the globe acts in the same way as the dinosaur on the turntable earlier at 23-25secs. At 1min 10secs, I spotted ‘Brum!’, so I’m happy that this toy has been included as I remember watching ‘Brum!’ as a child. Straight afterwards, between 1min 11-12secs, the lights on the robot light up in-sync with the music.
Between 1min 46-49secs, the ‘Word-Spell’ toy (as seen in the Toy Story films – could be an exophoric reference and intertextuality) is used in-sync with the boy’s singing to spell out the corresponding lyrics “Never as” when the boy continues the sentence “it seems”, i.e. “Never as it seems”.
At 2mins 35secs, the boys presses the ‘FX’ button on the piano, which in turn opens the closet door of toys at 2mins 36secs. At 2mins 39secs, again as I mentioned earlier under the ‘Cinematography’ section, there is the lens-flare which could be artificial, but it is used to hide the cut and possible fade into the next shot.
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Between 2mins 49-50secs, there are several shots in quick succession of each other, of the new and the old toys (contrasts), again between the 1960’s tin robot toy and 21st Century robotic remote-controlled Robosapien toy. At 2mins 51secs, the transitions are a lot quicker than throughout the rest of the video, at approximately the rate of three-shots-per-second.
Relationship between Lyrics and Visuals
Refer to Editing.
Relationship between Music and Visuals
Refer to Editing.
Intertextuality
Refer to Editing.
Close-ups of artist & star image motifs
Only a boy on the piano who seems to be the singer, though in real life the band is someone else (almost like a one-man band) and the singer is a special guest, so from this video you only see the special-guest singer and not the actual “Owl City” one-man band member.
Narrative or Performance-based, a bit of both, or Concept-based?
Performance-based, artist and toys add a bit of ‘dreamworld’ narrative-based references.
Conclusion
This video promotes the band and song and also the toys as viewers are given the chance to nostalgically return to their happy, exciting childhoods and childhood Christmases. Therefore, as this ‘nostalgia’ is added into the video, the video itself can be aimed at a much wider target audience than Electro-Pop listeners as many more people will find pleasure from listening to a song which contains their toys in the video which they used to play with as a child, although from the look of things I’d say more boys than girls will take an interest in the video itself as it contains the imaginary life of boys’ toys.
