Research

Audience profile

Main profile

Age: 17-25
As mentioned by online article "What I learned from a vocaloid and 1500 screaming millennials", the writer was surprised that the audience to the concert "was mostly 17 to 25-year-olds" rather than "a load of 11-year-olds" like he expected. This also extends to the music videos and tracks that aren't featured in live Hatsune Miku concerts as the melting-pot of genres, themes, topics, and artists appeal to the faster way internet content is consumed. Since people of that age are the prime people using the internet in large quantities they are most subjected to the fast paced consumption of online products, and therefore, this collective of vocaloid artists producing inane amounts of tracks gives them a bank of things to listen to while also giving them a sense of community under the mantle of Vocaloid Fans.

Income: Various levels of income, at least enough to regularly use the internet (depending country to country)
While the tickets to see something like a concert for Hatsune Miku can be rather expensive, only a fraction of the people who enjoy Vocaloid have been to such a concert. Most live at home or with their parents and simply enjoy the music from the comfort of their own home. On the other hand, those who are into going to concerts often spend large amounts of money on merchandise, cosplays, and other such things to show their support to the fandom. These kinds of people would likely earn more or be close to people who earn more.

Ethnicity: Predominantly Asian and Caucasian
As shown here with what countries have been visited by the Vocaloid singer Hatsune Miku and therefore have an interest in Vocaloid in general, its safe to assume that the main listeners would be ones of the main ethnicity of those countries. This makes sense for a number of reasons, firstly both as a culture are predominantly more connected and interested in technology, so the concept of a virtual singer appeals more to them. Also due to Vocaloid's origin and boom in Japan people of Asian origin are more likely to be subjected to it, especially as Hatsune Miku has become a celebrity that appears everywhere in Japan. This also extends to Caucasian origins as western culture, especially the US, have taken a great interest in Japanese media, further spreading it.

Country: US, Japan, and other highly developed counties
From the statistics found here on the locations of Hatsune Miku's concerts, there have been 22 in the US, 5 in Mexico, 4 each in Japan and Germany, 2 in Canada, and 1 each in the UK and China. All of these countries are highly developed and the majority of their population has internet access, therefore allowing for the initial interest in Hatsune Miku and Vocaloid in general. I would use YouTube statistics on Echo itself, but unfortunately you no longer can. Luckily it's a fair assumption that the interest in one vocaloid soundbank would be moderately similar to the interest in others. Due to the predisposition that Vocaloid is a programmed, robotic singer it would make sense that their audience would be from countries that technology and the future are a big part of their modern culture and their day to day lives.

Conclusion

The intention of this was to create an accurate Audience profile to base more research on and base creative choices on. Unfortunately this didn't entirely work as a lot of what I found out was too focused on Hatsune Miku than Vocaloid in general, and the parts that did focus on Vocaloid as a whole where too broad and unfocused to do much with. Overall I feel it could have been a lot more accurate, but the nature of Vocaloid itself worked against me as it's so broad and diverse that its hard to pin down specific types of people who like it.


Internet research

Notice

Unfortunately there's almost no internet research on Echo in particular, and those that cover Vocaloid as a whole heavily view it through the light of Hatsune Miku, the most popular Vocaloid. This was a bit of a problem as Hatsune Miku is far more ecliptic than Gumi and has a much different culture to it. Unfortunately it was the closest I could get so I used it. Remember that as you read this.

Main analysis

The first website I looked into was an article called "What I learned from a vocaloid and 1500 screaming millennials". The main points this gave was about the culture and community revolving around Vocaloid along with an outsiders view into it. A main part of Vocaloid concerting culture involves glow sticks and using them to express yourself and interact with the performance. Also, there is a prominent cosplay community linked with it. Problems that the writer had with the alienation from not being apart of the community and how the singer was a robot incapable of making mistakes or interacting with the audience. These problems were however partially solved by his 11 year old guide of a daughter and how the risks and mistakes the performer lacked were made up by the crowd and how much they threw themselves into this.
Personally, I think I can use the idea of the glow sticks and the cosplay in some way by including them in my music video. The cosplay would definitively be apart of the main character and what they look like, while the glow sticks could inspire my use of lighting and graphics.

The second website I looked into was another article called "Why Hatsune Miku is the World's Most Popular Virtual Idol". This looks into the history of the specific vocaloid and how it gained its popularity. It also explains the history of vocaloid. While very interesting, this unfortunately focused more on Miku herself and not vocaloid as a whole, meaning I didn't get all too much out of it aside from background information on vocaloid.

The third main website I looked into was "This singer is part hologram, part avatar, and might be the pop star of the future" which was exceedingly helpful. Not only did it include interviews from Hatsune Miku's live concert coordinator and goes into detail about Vocaloid's appeal, but also includes an interview from the creator of 'Echo' and shows her personal feelings about Miku and Vocaloid in general. The main reason it gives to Hatsune Miku's success and vocaloid as a whole is its adaptability: as a program anyone can pick up and use, Anyone can make any kind of music in any genre, meaning any kind of audience can enjoy Vocaloid. "She can be anything. She’s like the world’s Barbie doll." is how Cien Miller, the creator behind 'Echo' along with many other Vocaloid hits, describes Miku's extensive popularity. Miller also mentions how she "was different because of the copyright rules." that removed some of the fear of using her since "You can use her image and her voice for your music without fear of breaking any rules." which also had a massive contributing factor to her success. This sort of freedom, while not as extensive as Miku's, is what drove the vocaloid industry forward. Unfortunately the rest of the article is too Miku specific to gain much for vocaloid in general, but what I've gotten so far from the article is what parts of vocaloid is enjoyed, such as its adaptability and ease of use along with better insight into how Cien Miller sees Vocaloid.

Conclusion

Unfortunately I feel my online research did not provide much at all for the actual production aside from the general idea that a costume would work well. While I am happy to get an insight into the freedom aspect the original creator values, I feel that would be difficult in itself to work into the final piece. All in all I'm disappointed by the ineffectiveness of this research.


Video analysis

Echo

Watching the original lyrical video there where  several aspects that I wanted to take on board, but at the same time things I felt couldn't be included very well. The first main thing I wish to incorporate would be the use of the TV head and the stylised outfit through Mise-en-scene to give a very distinct look. I intend to create a wearable TV head with a screen that can be keyed out. Along with that I would also like to create a specific wearable outfit that is thematically similar to the one presented in the video, although the mower half would have to be worked out though various fanart found on Google seeing as the original only shows the top half.

Also I would like to incorporate the use of greyscale in the original, probably using a simple adjustment layer over the majority of the video to give a specific ambience to it. Also it allows me to be more lenient with what I choose for the costume as colour won't matter as much once it's in greyscale, reducing the cost and difficulty to find items for the costume. It also means areas I do decide to use colour have far more impact, giving me more options to create impact.

Another thing that is rather prominent is things aside from lyrics appearing on the screen, which I would like to take much further as lyrics seem pointless to put on a music video such as this. Instead I'll have different images on the screen for almost the entire runtime, including lip-syncing, a feature Justin would like included in all music videos. This is one of the major reasons I wanted the screen to be able to be keyed out in the costume.

The other major reason I wanted the screen to be keyable is to easily include static into the production; a feature used heavily along with graphical glitches throughout the track. The static and glitching also appears as an enhancement to the Miss-en-scene through editing and helps create a robotic atmosphere to the visuals. The static would be primarily added to the TV screen, and later on to the background of the entire thing, while the glitching would have to manually be added to subject itself, and may have to skip out on it due to time.

The final thing I feel would be fairly easy to include would be the drawn aspect of the art style, making use of Photoshop to add in graphical elements in post production. I feel it complements the greyscale without taking away from the simplicity, creating intrigue without subtracting from the overall effect of the black and white. These graphics would likely follow the screen and also move around the subject in a variety of ways, giving them dynamic they would normally lack as 2D objects.

The only other thing I could take from this is the 6 arms, but unfortunately that would be very difficult to do in motion and would likely be restricted to a static object. In that respect I have decided against using it for now due to the complexity of creating the 6 arms and have them move. However if I where to use them I would probably stick to a static picture and move things around it rather than actually trying to move the arms while the whole body moves.

All in all, from the main video itself I'm definitely taking the outfit (including TV), the glitch and static, the black and white motif, the use of images on the TV, and the drawn graphical additions. I might also use the 6 arm idea, but I feel it would be hard to pull off well.

Bad Apple

Here I look at a fanmade music video for another vocaloid song much in the same way I'm making one for Echo. The song, Bad Apple, is performed by Hatsune Miku and uses 3D animation combined with distinct colour choices and movement. In relation to the animation, while I have stated previously that I cannot do 3D animation, I rather like some of the thematic uses of it. While I doubt I could use it to make transformative transitions I do believe some of it could be helpful in influencing me. For instance the use of fire and other more fluid moving objects could fit into my piece if done well. If I do use this I would likely animate my static graphics using effects rather than creating whole new animations for this.

Moving onto the use of colour, they use my previously mentioned black and white motif to create silhouettes, giving a very simplistic yet distinct feel to it. I don't think I would use this permanently, but switching to such a  stark contrast could be very powerful to the audience in the right moments, especially given some of Echo's lyrics. If I where to do this I would probably use keying to remove the background and then change the subject's colour though video effects.

The final major takeaway from this would be the use of movement in transition. It uses whip pans heavily and I wish to also use that as it gives the sense of a change in location while also possibly disorientating the viewer to a degree, which can help with the effect I want to get across. I would likely do the whip pans during production by whipping the camera into and out of necessary shots and then editing them together. If need be I can also manually create them in post production though movement effects.

All in all I feel I took a lot more from that music video than I expected. I'm planning to use the animatic choices, use of movement, and emphasis on silhouettes in my final production, and only sparing the use of 3D animation and making graphics transform as transitions due to my technical capabilities.

Caramelldansen

The final music video I shall look into, upon request of a comment, will be Caramelldansen, an originally Swedish song that later got translated into English and Japanese. While I personally don't see as many comparisons, I do feel there is one major area I can take from, which is the use of movement and camera positioning. The camera in this focus on the subject's upper torso or whole body, primarily straying as medium shots to long shots with eye level angles. This causes the audience to have less disposition towards the subject but still focus on them the whole time, only coming out to a long shot to show things happening around the subject as well. Unfortunately this is the only thing I plan to use from this video which means while it wasn't useless, it wasn't as helpful as it could have been.