Music Video Analysis

OK Go is one of my favorite bands when it comes to ambitious music videos. One of their recent music videos was shot in about 4 seconds, but the one that I am going to analyze was filmed in (mostly) zero gravity.

The music video is a performative / conceptual piece. Performative given the nature of the setting (zero gravity), the choreography and the interaction with objects and other performers in the piece. Conceptual because, to my knowledge, an entire music video in zero gravity had never been attempted before.

The visual elements of the music video include vibrant colors, shapes created either by performers or objects, lightness of the set and characters and definite rhythmic qualities that are followed throughout. 

There are essentially 8 scenes in the course of the music video - one during each parabola. The top of the parabola, in flight, is when weightlessness is achieved. Each weightless period lasted about 27 seconds. Because the production could not remain weightless for more than 27 seconds, they needed 8 parabolas (or scenes) to capture an entire music video. They would sit perfectly still between scenes, cut the excess footage and stitch everything together in post. So, each scene would feature some sort of weightless performance, choreography or activity to draw focus. Each scene would be progressively more complex than the next. 

There's very little camera movement throughout the video and there are no cuts. This was done intentionally to make the video feel like one seamless shot. There is some camera tracking in the film, but only to pull or draw focus to a particular portion of the scene. The camera movement also helps tie scenes together in between parabolas.

The video adheres to the narrative 'Upside Down & Inside Out'. Note the movement of the band, stunt performers and objects. There are several behind-the-scenes videos on the band's YouTube page. This one in particular explains more about the production aspects of shooting in zero gravity.