starlady: (ultraviolet)
Electra ([personal profile] starlady) wrote 2011-07-28 09:34 am (UTC)

LOL, I did just go back and reread the epic post(s) on my journal before I wrote this.

I know people disagree with me, but I really honestly haven't seen anything that makes me question my fundamental conviction that AMVs and vids are not the same thing (which, obviously, they aren't, but I mean at more than the surface levels). I would buy the idea that in the middle of the last decade, say around the time when [personal profile] absolutedestiny converted to vidding, there was a brief point when the digital technology available to editors and vidders and the technical level of anime was equal enough to enable crossover and a moment toward convergence, but I remain convinced that the mainstream of AMVs is barreling towards this strange new semi-transformative semi-original horizon (I actually think "Pure Thrust" above is a great, subtle example of this), while vids are, for better and for worse, solely transformative.

As for what I think makes AMVs and vids distinct…with the massive disclaimer that most of this is still a roiling mess in my head, I think the easiest thing to do here is to talk about Blame It on 2009 above, and t'wings vid about manpain, because they're both relying on the visual grammar of their chosen medium to do what they're doing. But whereas t'wings is using the multi-fandom footage, paired with a linear song, to point out the ways that that visual grammar warps narratives and refocuses all stories on the (white) man's pain (and yes I'm simplifying here), the point of Blame It on 2009 is slicing and dicing dozens of anime to a sliced and diced song--the point of it is a celebration of the visual grammar, of what makes anime anime, and it's hella confusing if you're not a fan of anime and AMVs, as the crowd reactions at WisCon made clear.

I think that's one example; another thing I'd talk about is motion within the frame of the vid/AMV. Check out Pure Thrust again, and look at what the way anime moves enables Nostromo to do with the clips, and to not do with the clips; compare that with [personal profile] kuwdora's Poker Face (Royal Flush Remix) of [personal profile] talitha78's Poker Face, and remember that Abrams' camerawork is nauseatingly kinetic. There are a lot of technical differences like this, and individually I'd agree they're secondary, but they add up to a very primary difference.

I should probably try to keep talking about this, because writing it all out is making me think in productive ways, but I have to get back to a fic that's due in 2 days. So! I will leave it here for now. Let me know what you think; this is all, obviously, from my own narrow perspective.

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