Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site unccvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!mcnc!unccvax!dsi From: dsi@unccvax.UUCP (Dataspan Inc) Newsgroups: net.music Subject: Re: Videos, in general Message-ID: <224@unccvax.UUCP> Date: Wed, 26-Jun-85 09:36:34 EDT Article-I.D.: unccvax.224 Posted: Wed Jun 26 09:36:34 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 29-Jun-85 01:30:26 EDT References: <1584@dciem.UUCP> Organization: UNC-Charlotte Lines: 62 I don't think you've much to worry about. Since 'music videos' have caught on, CBS has decided to charge rent for airing them, which in major markets can be up to $2000/mo. I suspect the other recording conglomerates will follow suit. This will have the effect eliminating minor stains like Ma and Pa's UHF station attempting to compete with MTV Networks' channels. (Do you detect a connection here? Noooooo. . .) Perhaps music will then regress back to being audio only, at least in non-cable households! And now, a flame about music videos: Just what is it that the music video people don't want us to see? Despite the best efforts of your SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) to provide you with high quality standards for the production of both film and videotape programmes, music videos in general look like death warmed over. (My spouse would say that they expose the film way too much in the toe of the D-logE curve). The blacks are consistently compressed, the colours are highly pasty and unrealistic, and the programme in general is always penalized with heavy doses of film grain and / or electronic noise. No, MTV does not have the ultraenhanced look, of, say, The Nashville Network (which seems to insert their chrominance about 3 dB hot) but whoever produces this garbageola needs remedial composition courses. I'll be happy to show them news actualities shot by tech school grads with much more pizzaz! Video with music can be an enjoyable experience, disjoint or related (Cat Stevens' compositions for "Harold and Maude" come to mind here) and in and of itself isn't such a bad thing. Music videos, on the other hand, are such a depressing experience, because there seems to be a (not necessarily overt) conspiracy to present the visual material in an obviously depressing way. No, I don't accept that the present technique of playing a music bed over actors who obviously don't have the slightest idea of what they are doing as being some new art form, it is just extremely poor videography/cinematography. If videos could convey some sense of the acoustic space of the music (which your brain has no trouble interpreting) rather than present the exact same music we here day after day on top 40, they would take a giant step forward in maturity and class. I just don't buy that most music video productions are high buck affairs! If this stuff is going to major national laboratories for processing and transfer, then I'd vote for a conspiracy (then again, no amount of processing can correct for bad composition and exposure). However, there is better quality control at your local Jiffy Foto Prints-In-An-Hour place! (above paragraph, I meant hear, of course, not here) -- Flames off -- Now, I can see their point of view... they're aiming this crap at people who obviously don't give a damn about audio, much less video; if the music's dynamic range is going to be flat, loud, and lifeless, why not the corresponding video, too. Whoever follows up to this, please move (or add, as appropriate) this to net.video/net.tv. Thanks David