Editing music and creating music video is easier when you understand music!

Creating any music video is a mix of project management, technical and musical skills. These are two videos I planned, shot and edited for Generation Jones, a very talented duo in Gloucestershire, UK. Following much valuable discussion with the band, I shot the videos over two half-days, with editing and colour treatment guided by the duo.

For the first day, Geoff dressed his kitchen to look appropriate for the subject, and we shot additional outside footage at a local stable. To make the vehicle appear to be in the US, I flipped a print of a US license plate and attached it to the vehicle, then flipped the final shot so the plate would come out the right way, but the vehicle would appear to be left-hand-drive. The mix of interiors and exteriors works well, and the opening shot was a composite of several stills taken on the way back from the shoot and treated to look like old film.

Angel from Montgomery sung by Generation Jones from Mark Harmer on Vimeo.

The second video was shot the following day in the other singer’s house and opens with a composite shot made up of green screened paintbrushes to create a pull-focus effect. Some tracking in AE and Syntheyes and basic colouring in Sony Vegas. Thunder sound specially created by me for the Blockley Mystery Plays in 2005 and re-used here (all made from recordings of aluminium foil, slowed)! The beautiful artists’ materials make for a suggestion that the story the singer tells is vivid whereas the reality of his telling it is dark and confined.

A Case of You from Mark Harmer on Vimeo.

Both very atmospheric pieces which I and the clients are proud of.