You're Hungry Bruce

Outcome

https://youtu.be/8hIxc1dGZXw

Intention

Re-contextualization can have a great effect on the mood of the original work. Especially with movie scenes, the most serious scene can be turned into a joke with a few changes. My goal is to have that effect on the following scene:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWgyKDfFC_U&t=3m35s

I plan to make it a short Instagram video in order to reflect the current state of viral videos and the qualities of the type of videos that go viral today.

Context

My main inspiration for my project was the following vine:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BJCr-RoY2I

I really found it funny and I wanted to know how it triggered such a response in such a short amount of time. I believe it was because it took a fairly intense scene and dropped it in just everyday life. That sudden transition from normal life to intensity and then back to normal life is enough to capture attention. Also how the person in the video just treats the intensity of Brad Pitt as trivial and annoying was really funny to me. So I thought that I wanted to do the same thing and I ended up choosing the Dark Knight Joker interrogation scene where he demands Joker to tell him where his hostages are.

Process

Initially I wanted to create a compilation of remixed serious movie scenes. But then I thought more about the goal of the project being to make a viral video. Compilations of original work are harder to make go viral unless you already have a fan base interested in your work.  So I decided to do just a single piece and think about what qualities it needed to go viral beyond just the content. One quality that it needed would be that it could attract people to watch it at a glance and a way to do that is to make it short which is why I decided on an Instagram video. There is low risk and little commitment (i.e. it won't take up much time) so there is a sort of "Why not?" response to watching a 30 second video versus a 3 minute video. So once I decided on that I just had to think of a scene to remix. I chose the Batman scene because he really showed a very intense fixation so I wanted to put that fixation in a normal setting to make it look more over-the-top and even annoying.

Product

The finished product was a video using cuts from the interrogation scene of Bruce Wayne and I as if we were close friends hanging out. I notice the Cold Play is gonna be in town soon and Bruce, like a crazed fanatic, yells "WHERE ARE THEY?" I offer him a Snickers in efforts to calm him down and then the scenario plays out and ends with me getting a little to fresh with Batman and his threatening me with a Bat-a-rang.

I used Windows' Movie Maker to edit my cuts with those of the Dark Knight scene. I did them in a very similar style in my inspiration for the video referenced above. I just used my laptop webcam to record my part of the video.

Critique

My work definitely could have been more polished. I definitely think the premise was good but the execution is where I feel I was lacking the most. I should have made the transition between my part and Batman's part smoother. Using a better program such as Premier would have probably helped with this problem. Also a better camera/having someone else record me could have made it look better as well. But it was definitely concise enough, I feel, to get that "Why not?" response from viewers and I think the humor is still there enough for people to like it and share it.

Reflection

So what I took away from this project is the real nature behind viral videos. A lot of people think things will go viral based purely from its content and that can be true, but only if it is really commands attention or already has an audience. So the most important parts of making a video go viral is the ability to catch attention quickly as well as having content that is straight to the point and easily relatable making it more likely to be shared. Which is why there's no real way to tell whether or not a certain video will go viral. Because even if the content is good quality it must be able to do these things effectively otherwise it'll just be lost in vast number of videos being put out every minute around the world.

Sources

Clip from Dark Knight used in remix:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWgyKDfFC_U

Sword sound effect:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqujcCBgwkU

References

Inspiration:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BJCr-RoY2I