J-Pop

The song Sunaoninaretara (Final Night) that I’m going to be making a music video for is of the J-Pop genre much like the song by Mihimaru – Kibun Joa Joa. Using that music video as an example J-pop usually has the conventions of music being fast much like the speed of editing. Usually people dancing at some point in the video. The singer singing as they look and perform towards the camera. A second example I would like to use is that of Hikaru Utada
a Japanese artist who performs in both Japanese and English. (Much like Bentley Jones except Bentley Jones is English).

Hikaru Utada – Passion


The opening sequence of (first part of the music video) is that of an anime sequence (AMV) which lasts till roughly 1:15 into the video. It then fade transitions into live action with the artist Hikaru Utada Singing. Special effects are used here where what appear to be waves appear around her, these look as though they were hand drawn and do much to compliment the sequence it follows. A lot of CGI is used here with the sorrounding environments and people being rendered using computer technology. In the the next part there is a very good use of dance where the artist is standing in the middle of an area singing while people dance around her, its a good thing to note that for any dance sequense to be any good it usually has to be choreographed, its not often that something can be done off the cuff like that and be good enough to get into a final product. A scene is then shown of the artists head half faded into a picture of clouds as she sings (though I'm not sure what type of effect this called so any answers would be helpful). The music video ends how it began, with another anime sequence.

The speed of editing for this song seemed fairly slow (well slower than other music videos on my blog). This seemed to fit the song perfectly with the tempo of the song. The costume of the people in this music video was fairly odd but stream lined with each other. All of the colours in the video are blue and pink, the costumes all look very regal in a certain way aswell with the artists costume looking like a dress someone might find in a royal wedding or something.

The use of anime isn't a very odd choice when it comes to japanese music videos. A lot of J-pop, rock etc becomes famouse through the use of it on the openings and endings of animes. A single series of anime can have up to 8 different opening songs per series so through this medium a lot of people find out about certain artists and songs. Shows partcularly like Bleach, One Oiece and Naruto are the best to have artists music shown on because at the moment these are the best selling mangas and animes so any band fortunate enough to have their songs played on these is likley to get a large increase in sales.