Music videos: it takes more than scantily-clad, beautiful people to keep the MTV generation from changing channels

Post, Nov, 2002 by Ann Fisher

Kiss the Skull features a distinctive 3D x-ray look. Rather than the usual "pretty, scantily-clad girl" shots, the director asked the artists to invert the film layers and use filtration to vary the opacity and transparency of the footage. Viewers still see the 3D curved parts of the girl's' body and her body jewelry but they also see the skeletal structure inside, which connects with the song lyrics. Those effects are intercut with the band's performance, also not typically shot. There are no full band shots; each member was filmed individually so their images could be combined in various ways to keep the frames interesting. The director also varied the lighting, focusing intensely on the band members in the foreground, then creating background plates with an entirely different lighting scheme.

It is all held together with a graphic sequence of a planet that becomes a cerebral space inside the skull. A sculptor made a Danzig-like fetus that was placed graphically in and around the girl's midriff area and, from that, a molecular sequence forms tentacles that fill the frames as the song progresses.

"You have to design a visual hook that people will find memorable. Artists put a lot of time and effort into their songwriting and CD production, says Mignone. "The video needs to parallel that and try to capture an originality that distinquishes one artist from the next. I always try to focus on a very strong, single visual hook. For the most part, the director just gets handed a song and it's up to them to get inspired by it and think of something original and thought-provoking."

Mignone is also repped through United Talent for feature work. His company Doom worked on the Danzig video in conjunction with John Burns and Jeff Panteleo of the video/commercial house Partizan.

Making these Girlz go

FREDERIKSBERG, DENMARK -- TriGirlz is not your typical girl band. Developed by Mocap Copenhagen and Zinckernagel & Co., TriGirlz consists of three virtual teenage pop divas--Sneak, Spiff and Trix--who sing, dance and perform online at www.trigirlz.com.

Kaydara's Filmbox (now Motionbuilder) fit neatly into Mocap Compenhagen's (www.mocap.dk) production pipeline, facilitating the animation of the girls' dance sequences in real-time. The girls, clothes and sets were all modeled using Discreet 3DSMax. Motionbuilder was used for capturing, cleaning and tweaking the dance moves before importing them to 3DSMax's Character Studio for the final rendering.

In production, Mocap Compenhagen recorded three different dancers individually, with the company's magnetic wired Motionstar 16-sensor system from Ascension. Using sensors to record the moves of the girls, they were able to see the recording of the first girl, which was rendered and used as the background video for the next girl. When they recorded the last girl, they then had the two first girls as a video background so it was easy to see if the girls were in sync, while recording. Motionbuilder's animation capabilities were used to correct movement errors and smooth out the overall dance moves.