Controversial Music Video

Viorar Vel Til Loftarasa by Sigur Ros is set in Iceland in the 1950’s, an era when homosexuals and homosexuality was looked down upon – even today there is a negative connotation with homosexuals and gay relationships. 

We first see the act of homophobic  brutishness from the father of a young boy playing with two old china dolls. The father runs towards the boy in horror with what he is doing, snatches the dolls away from the son and throws them out into the open water.

We then see the same boy in a football match with his father on the sideline supporting. As the boy scores a goal the team and spectators celebrate, in the celebrating we see the son on the floor kissing another boy on his team. The pair are ripped apart by the father, who charges on to the pitch to break them up.

The music video was directed by Stefán Árni Þorgeirsson and Sigurður Kjartansson, both from Iceland, as is the band too. The Band Sigur Ros actually have cameo’s in the music video as; the coach, scorekeeper, referee and a spectator. The choice to have the video focusing on homosexuality was decided as members of the band are gay. The video is more controversial than other music videos featuring gay action, such as Katy Perry's - I kissed a girl, due to the set up of the music video. It is a lot more serious than the upbeat curiosity of liking 'cherry chap stick'. However on the other hand the video might not seem as controversial as other music videos with scenes of; nudity, drugs or violence. Viorar Vel Til Loftarasa sends a powerful message out about homosexuality and the judgement that still hangs over it. The video actually won an award in Iceland for Best Video in 2002. 

Iconic Music Video

Sledgehammer by Peter Gabriel is and remains to be an iconic music video because of the use of stop motion and animation in the music video. The video was directed by Stephen R Johnson, who has directed other music videos such as Road To Nowhere by Talking Heads as well as Steam by Peter Gabriel which he won a Grammy for Best Short Form Music Video. Stephen R. Johnson also directed short films and the TV series Pee Wee's Playhouse. The music video had the Quay Brothers and Aardman Animations (from Wallace and Gromit) to work the stop motion and animation of the video which gave it its ground breaking success. 

The video stars Peter Gabriel as a man, fruit and play dough all in stop motion animation. In the video there is a direct visual link between the lyrics and what is happening.

Sledgehammer won nine MTV Music awards in 1987, a record which was beaten in 2011. The video won in the following categories; Video of the year, Best male video, Best concept video, Most experimental video, Best overall performance in a video, Best direction in a video, Best special effects in a video, Best art direction in a video, Best editing in a video as well as being awarded the Video Vanguard Award. "The video was number four on MTV's list of the Top 100 of all time. Number 1-3 were; "Thriller," "Vogue," and "Smells Like Teen Spirit”.

Green Screen Trial

In practice for creating my music video, I practiced using a green screen. This meant I was able to use the macs and software of Final Cut Express to edit the video. Being new to these feature, this task was especially helpful to get to grips with the different sections to Final Cut Express. The video below shows to scenes in which the background has been edited in using green screen. 

The next task was to make an instructional video of how to use a green-screen and edit it on Final Cut Express. (Insert video below and comment)