Assembling sounds in the kitchen. 

This week's video is the first stepping stone towards a larger production.  I've been able to play with form a lot - this is my first After Effects production. There's a lot that needs fixing but I've also learnt a lot and there's been a bunch of trial and error in creating it.  The plan for next week is to create a clip that is a fair bit longer, with more objects on the plate and a bit more of a narrative. PLUS we'll get to see the head bopping along to the pineapple fresh tunes. 

Trouble in Paradise 

This week's draft is about the form of assemblage. Whereby 8-10 layers are composited to create a whole sequence. This will be expanded next week with more objects that relate to Mighty Duke and the  Lords and their story. 

Calypso Heard Your Call...  This video ties together a 19th century poem with a revamped, high energy calypso band and its fans with an epic medieval soundtrack.  

Music: The First Dying Knight - Marco88 Poem: Hilda Doolittle, (1886–1961)

Quality[CNTRL]

Who are they?  [Sketch Video #1]

WEEKTWO

We've had a think and a look and a gander and come up with the realisation that we need to begin to circle in on our artifact with a tighter theme. We're thinking the concept of 'Assembling' is going to be the catalyst to bring all of our videos together and give us some clarity on the works we intend to create. 

The iterative nature of this project means that we don't want to over-plan our works and we understand that we'll start of being quite literal in our interpretation of the band and their genesis and begin to get more and more abstract and in-depth at the same time.  At the moment, the leading ideas are that of: Assembling the drumkit. An orchestrated, looping video on the creation of Lordy Lord's drum-kit, culminating in a drum solo.  Assembling the band  The band emerges in slow motion from the water dry as the sky speeds past them. They drudge along the beach lugging their instruments heading somewhere...  Who are they? A clip that assembles all of the exciting myths and ideas that have been created by MDATL fans constructed into an epic teaser-trailer style.  But it's still all open to discussion and needs to be worked more with the band itself. 

MIGHTY DUKE AND THE LORDS. Who. What. How.  ? 

1) WHO are we working with?  Mighty Duke and the Lords are a Melbourne-based Calypso band.    " Crisp linen suits and sharp witted lyrics meet junk percussion and double entendre. Calypso! Timeless tales of jaded lovers, boiled parrots, supernatural pub crawls and a mistaken hermaphrodite wedding."  There are 5 members:  Mighty           - Vocalising & guitarizations Duke              - Lyrics saying, trombonionics  Lord Fjord      - The Nordic bass maelstrom  Lord Ladyboy - Rhythmic junk percussion hurricane  Lord E Lord    - The saxophonic cyclone

2) WHAT is the artifact?  We're going to be using the band itself as our artifact. They've already established a really cool aesthetic that can be built upon in various video formats. Their online presence at the moment is fairly limited but already alludes to a reasonably broad backstory and narrative - leaving a great opening for us to experiment with form and expand on them.  3) What do we propose to convey conceptually ABOUT this artifact? Firstly, we want to state that we intend to go further than simply promoting the band - we want to explore and create a back-story and imply an entire world that the band inhabits inspired by their existing content that's riddled with Calypso vibes, daiquiris, 80's explorer ideals and a whole lot of fun. We want to play with different aesthetics to imply that the band was formed from the deepest pit of a daiquiri volcano and spat out onto an island where they fashioned instruments to appease the cannibalistic locals.  These are some of the ideas that were conjured up during our meeting: Skits: Actually building 'Bamboo HQ' - the headquarters of the Calypso Colossuses is on the cards, with a homemade Tiki bar set-up with various jokes and clips that all have their own stories embedded in them.   Mighty: "If we do have a Mermaid in there, she should be in a wheelchair, how else would they get around?"     Duke: "I'm pretty sure we can get an old-school diving helmet somewhere."  In terms of form for the clips that could appear here, we'd be looking to play off existing forms in a satiric manner. Ie. a Cooking show based on a song about cannibalism or a chat show that has all of the functions and gimmicks of a normal cheesey chat show but with elements of their bizarre world. These are really sub-formats that operate well in the online video environment.  The Genesis of Lordy Lord's Drum-kit.  Either shot at Bamboo HQ - Lordy Lord (the drummer) grabs strewn objects everywhere to construct his drumkit. It builds up with looping patterns as he taps along while he gathers his parts culminating in a Calypso drum-solo. We envision this with plenty of jump-cuts, possibly from a static frame only with cutaways to emphasise the looping drum patterns.  Stranded Landing on a Beach Mighty Duke and the Lords drudge through the sand on the beach with torn suits and their instruments; castaway they're bound for something, but for what? They could even emerge from the water itself in their costumes [we're also considering having them walk in backwards and reversing the footage - so they emerge dry]. Tongue in Cheek Glamour We're considering totally glamourising the band as if they are 80's Calypso Gods with slow-motion attractive mermaids, seductive sirens and ostentatious surrounds. This would be to the tune of some kind of elevator musac or corny creative commons tunes. We'd really be working of cliches of romance, cruise ships and castaways and voguing it as if it's almost a fashion video.  Did someone say Green-screen? We're also considering looking up old Calypso movies which we could place Mighty, Duke and the Lords in and grade them so they look like they're part of the action. We could even make a music video out of this.  Who are they?  Build off the suspicions and myths surrounding Mighty Duke and the Lords by interviewing avid fans at their gigs and encouraging them to create their own stories about the creation of the band and their backstory.  Vibin'  Showing the band in their element playing a gig would be really good, but instead of focusing on the music, we could focus on the vibe of the place - to really capture the atmosphere and show how much they can turn a room into a writhing pit of calypso hysteria.  Epic Teaser Trailer Get live shots or glamourising shots and use dramatic music and fade-to-blacks to make their presence seem exciting and almost Godly. This would be taking elements from film trailers and could be satirical in that regard as well as being a toungue-in-cheek representation of the band. 

Broader Concepts.  LORDS.... ASSSEEMMMMBBLLLLEEEE The series of videos could be bound by their sense of travelling towards something. The videos all leave a question at the end: where are they going? The answer is revealled in the final music video clip where they all find each other at the perfect gig (or something to that effect).  Minimalist advertisement:  Get a nice shot of a plate sitting on a window-sill looking out to the mediteranean (green screen) and play boppy elevator music as different things appear on it. A daiquiri, a voodoo doll,  a sailor's hat, a lei and perhaps finally, a head. That sings acapella along with the music.  

Relation to the prompt:  'What aesthetics have to be considered in the production of online video?'

We intend to be experimenting and exploring with a minimum of 3 different aesthetics that are prevalent in online video culture. We want at least one of our clips to really show off our cinematography skills [the glamour clip] whereas others that are more concept based [the drum kit] can be much more relaxed and less aware of itself. The cooking-shows/sitcom ideas would have a different aesthetic again and will be well placed in the online domain by their length and goal of satire. However, the length will need to be justified somehow. In terms of experimentation and pushing ourselves into unknown territory, our editing of live gigs will be quite vicious to get it down to a minute and we intend to colour grade with Davinci Resolve to get some wacky and wonderful aesthetics that reflect the band.

This clip has clocked up 13 million views over the past 6 years. It sits tightly within the realm of online video aesthetics.  The aspect ratio works as to alude to a home-made feel, it's shot with a handicam and the quality is rough. The fact that it's a one-shot clip further situates the clip into online movie territory and its length and skit-based progressive structure makes youtube a really good platform for it.  This clip would only work on TV if it was embedded in a skit-based show or aggregation of clips, but it works really well as a stand-alone video to parody the David Blaine TV show. As the parody exists between the two mediums of internet and TV - this clip (and its previous clip) justifies itself as the 'Youtube edition' of the TV show, the recognition of the form works in this case with the audience who (in 2007) were all very keen and interested in the variety of online video.