Experiment 1

Visualising music through animation 

For my first experiment i have chosen the music video ‘Putty boy strut’ by Flying Lotus. From listening to the song with no video you get a digital/mechanical feel with the distorted synths to sound like stereotypical robot noises similar to the sound you would here the Star Wars R2D2 make and chopped claps and high hats to give a firm beat to keep the tempo. The animated video is very basic and cartoony with bold lines that goes with the music perfectly as the characters are little robots that move to the tempo of the song which puts them in sync like they were made for each other. Even as the song starts to get more intense with more drum sounds and keyboard sounds, the more intense the animation of the robots gets as they start to combine and gradually get bigger and turn into a monster.

As part of my experiment i found a softer more jazzy version of the song which is composed with  real instruments and makes it sound slightly more upbeat with a slightly faster tempo but also gives it a darker more dramatic feel put together by a band named "Badbadnotgood". I will merge together their version of the song "Putty boy strut" with the animation from the original music video to see if the bold outlines,flat colours and motion graphics fit the melodic feel of the "Badbadnotgood" cover version of the song. 

 

                                   

From doing this experiment I’ve seen that even though most of the robotic movements go in time to the melodic jazzy version, it doesn't  give the same jumpy, playful effect and doesn’t really go together like the original, almost like a juxtaposition with the soulful yet darker feel of the music compared to the movements of lifeless robot linear motion graphic animation. So to conclude this experiment I've learned to get the most out of this fun linear animation you need to give the same feel and tone in the music as if they were one. Where the animation is simple and bold the song is the same because there isn't too much going on sound wise, so you can still pick up the rhythm and tempo of the song. However put together with the Jazz cover there is so many other instruments and sounds it doesn't really have the same structure as the original, you can definitely tell its the same song with the melody rhythm changes frequently throughout the song like a jazz song usually does which makes it harder for the song and animation to synch with each other.

I have put together a short music video using the music from "Putty boy strut" animation and clips of real life/ natural situation with army cadets marching, and an army of ants edited playfully and retimed to match the beat rhythmic movement and tempo of the song. From this experiment i have found out that it doesn't really work with real settings with such a playful robotic/ mechanical song and would need a playful linear motion graphics with bold lines and flat colours.