Rough storyboard:
For my storyboard, I mostly took note of the kind of effects that I wanted to use, but not the order or how I would use them, because that was very experimental. I knew I wanted to use lots of squares and rectangular shapes, as 8-bit, chiptune or videogame music is often associated with pixels and square sounds.
Flash visual music video:
Once I figured out the bouncing rotating square effect, I had originally planned to use that for the entire video, but when I did that I realised it needed more variety to make it less predictable and thus more visually interesting for longer. With that in mind, I replaced the middle section with a new rectangle effect that would lead the eye to the right where the square effect would continue. I also introduced the background changing colour in time with the chorus, so that the chorus would have its own effect, but not one that could intrude on the main effect. I chose bright blue for the foreground effects, but darker colours for the background, so that the foreground could stand out.
Final visual music video:
In the final video, I ended up changing the ending effect as well, again for the purpose of more variety, and then I took it into After Effects for some finishing touches. I took a picture of a computer monitor, placed it on top, and cut out the screen to show the animation underneath. I then brought the screen back in on a separate layer and set the blending mode to add, to give the animation the lighting effects of the screen. I added some scan lines and graininess to add to the effect. I also copied the animation, blurred the new one immensely, and then track matted it to the monitor image, to give the effect of the screen lighting up the sides of the monitor as well.
The reason I made it look like it was happening on an old computer monitor was because of the associations between the videogame music and old arcade machines or computer games. I think I really like how this project came out, but if I were to improve it, I'd make the effects smaller, so I could make room for even more variety.
