Media
Video- Tyler The Creator - Yonkers
Producers- Wolf Haley
Filmed
by - Luis Panch Perez
Synopsis
Tyler the creator stands out from other videos due to the
black and white theme incorporated with the creepy tone, aggressive lyrics and
suicidal imagery. The video is of Tyler creator rapping about his life
circumstances in and over dramatic manor.
Theme
The theme of this song is rather creepy and the use of
features such as blurring the camera, and close ups add to the disturbed tone
created from Tyler. They also rely on mise en scene features to maintain the
disturbing tone throughout the video. It’s a performed based performance
however, it does contain narrative elements such as when he’s rapping to the
audience as he creates imagery of us being his therapist by Tyler looking
through the camera lenses to give the impression of him talking us the audience.
They represent Tyler the creator as being, weird, abusive,
eccentric and aggressive, he comes across anti-social and, of one whom does not
care about the laws and constraints in society. His lyrical content in Yonkers
also shows he’s very opinionated and believes in free speech as he’s offends
other rappers during his song. This is shown by the camera angles, editing, and
mise en scene and does appeal to his niche audience in the hip/hop sector of
alternative hip hop.
Camera angles
They use a variety of camera editing techniques, below I
discus the ones I believe were the most effective.
Extreme Close ups & close ups –
They use extreme close up as this is an extreme version of
the close up mainly used to show features the human eye will struggle to see.
An extreme close-up of a face, for instance, when they zoomed into to Tyler
eyes and they were dark black which gives the video and artificial look and
adds to disturbing tone. They also use normal close ups such as when his nose
bleeds, the close up was used to highlight the fake blood (Mise en scene), as
this adds to the creepy tone.
Medium shot-
They also use medium shots such as when Tyler was bent over
being sick, this shot is a basic shot however, due to Tyler being in black and the
background being white it added and extra layer of visual imagery to the scene
by exaggerating the medium shot as his actions came across to the audience even
more clear, which was of him being sick. This intensified the scene adding to
the creepy tone.
They also used a medium shot when Tyler is about to hang
himself this was because they were not allowed to show a person fully hanging
himself. Although they were still able to create tension though showing a
medium shot of the rope hanging round his head and, then his feet dangling
which was a powerful scene as the visual imagery was disturbing but still
managed to fit in well with the dynamics of the video as, the whole concept was
that he felt distance from others.
Editing
They also relied heavily on editing, they used a slow
editing cut rate because, it was all in the same scene, they did not branch out
to different scenes because, he gave the impression that he was talking to his
therapist, so they kept it in an enclosed environment as this would portray his
feeling to the audience. However, during the video there is one instance of an
fast cutting speed which is in synch with the music, they use this fast cutting
rate to change Tyler’s eyes which gives the effect of him becoming demonic as
he eyes are dark black which is un human like which gives the impression to the
audience, that’s he is no longer himself, and has come possessed.
One of the main features throughout the video, I believe was
lenses (Perspective control lenses, tilt shift lens), this is when they changed
the lenses and gave the video a blurred outlook, this gave the impression of
him being intoxicated. Also the Mise en scene was prolific throughout this
video in continuing the dark tone, for example when they used the drip of blood
to fall out of his nose, showed signs of early symptoms of him being in pain,
which was reflective to the end, where they use a stall an rope in a medium
shot which suggest to the audience that he was going to hang himself.
Target Audience
The target audience Tyler creator targeted is for young 16 +
individuals who are interested in alternative hip hop and stereotypically known
as being open minded and are into skate boarding also being who likely pottery
as he’s very articulate in his rap as he often use metaphors and is able to
create visual juxtaposition through he’s rhymes.
What ideas could I
take?
·
Perspective control lenses, tilt shift lens,
this contrasted well with a black and white theme
·
The ability to create a performance based video,
which narrative structure and clear story line
·
The editing techniques, using a slow editing
speed correlates well with alternative rap videos I’ve realised during my case
studies.
