The song "Tranz" was released in September of 2018 as a part of the album "The Now Now". Directed by the aforementioned Jamie Hewlett and animated by a team listed in the video's YouTube description, this video follows the art style of the rest of the album as well as being unique in its own way. The song itself is fairly relaxed, though not necessarily slow; the lyrics are quiet, and it generally has quite a surreal feel to it. The music video, of course, fits with this theme perfectly.

The video is a performance music video with a surreal spin and has no real tangible plot; the band members are standing on a white circle with a backdrop that changes throughout the video. At the beginning of the video, the background is a shifting white and black pattern. As the lyrics are being sung, the lead singer, 2-D, is shown both far away in the context of the rest of the band and also close up; this means you get to see his face a lot more clearly as he sings and also get a better shot of the top of his microphone, which shows up occasionally with important words being spoken. At around 0:54 of the music video, when the beat drops, light begins to shine out of 2-D's eyes, and the background changes from black and white to a variety of bright, saturated colours, shifting in an almost psychedelic way. From this point on, there's a much more dramatic colour scheme and a bright chromatic aberration over the entire scene. As the music video continues, it gets generally more chaotic and ends with some trippy shots of the characters distorted.

When it comes to colour theory, of course the song is supposed to be very upbeat hip-hop, contrasted with quieter and calmer lyrics; this is reflected by the colour scheme. The characters are made up of a variety of different colours; however, all of them are quite desaturated. This gives the colours a more toned-down base to work off of, as desaturated colours can be pushed and pulled depending on the background. So, at the start of the video, when the background is black and white, the colours seem to be quite dull and inoffensive, which matches the tone of the first minute of the video. Then, once the beat drops and the tone changes to be more chaotic and lively, the background changes to be bright and saturated. This draws the viewer's eye and makes it so that instead of viewing the video as dull and desaturated, you view it as lively and chaotic. The chromatic aberration helps with this as well; the casing brings blues and reds over all of the characters, which make them pop. Overall, the colour palette really helps add to the video's tone and aesthetic and makes it look chaotic and psychedelic.

As for the style of animation itself, of course Gorillaz has a very distinct style that is very reminiscent of western comics and cartoons; in fact, Jamie Hewlett himself, the character designer and animator of Gorillaz, is a comic book writer and has created works such as Tank Girl and other similar graphic novels. This style is iconic and gives the band a very retro look and feel, especially when paired with the style of music. Gorillaz music videos tend to feature live action or 3D animated sections, and Tranz is no exception. The piano and drum set, for example, seem to be 3D animated. This gives the video a bit of variety and allows the creators to experiment with newer forms of animation. It also gives the creators more room to try out special effects, such as the dynamic background shown in this video, or SFX, such as those in the music video for "19-2000", released in 2001. These effects may have looked out of place in a completely 2D animated music video, and so by mixing in other forms of animation, there is more room for experimentation.

In conclusion, I love this style of animation when put to music. The attention to detail given to the characters, their expressions, and especially 2-D's lip-syncing all create a fluid, dynamic music video that is worth aspiring towards. The comic book style is not dissimilar to my own, so it's likely I'll take great inspiration from this video for my final piece.

The song "Humility", which was part of the same album as Tranz in 2018, is an upbeat song animated by Jamie Hewlett and his team. This music video is a concept music video, with a vague structure but no real plot, set much more in real life, in a beach-like setting, and shows the animated band members interacting with the real world a lot more.

The video depicts 2-D, the lead singer, skating around a beach, and shows the other band members doing other things as well - Noodle is playing chess, Ace is messing around and annoying some basketball players, and Russel is generally standing around enjoying the view. They're joined by guest star Jack Black (using the music video style of pastiche), and a bunch of other real-life actors credited in the video's description (including, interestingly, Remi Kabaka as the chess player, who is the real life drummer and producer for Gorillaz) and are generally interacting with the other people around them. The video stays cheerful throughout, except perhaps at the very end where Russel trips up 2-D and he gets agitated, his white eyes turning black.

When it comes to colour theory, this video is quite straightforward; the song is cheerful, and so the colours remain bring and saturated. The bring sun casts lots of harsh shadows over everything, and because of the fact that the characters are in a crowded city, there is a huge amount of different colours. For the most part, however, the most prominent colour is that sandy beige that we associate so much with sand. This gives the entire music video a calm, but warm feeling, as orange and yellow (which are the roots of beige) indicate brightness and warmth, but the fact that they are desaturated alludes to its dulled down effect. This, overall, gives the viewer the impression that they are on the beach, along with the characters. Even the pavement is this colour, and lighting overall is very white and yellow.

As for animation, this music video is simply spectacular. The smoothness of the characters, especially 2-D as he's skating around, is beautiful, not to mention the perfect lip-syncing. I won't gawk too much over the 2D animation, however, since what makes this music video unique and interesting is definitely the way that the digital characters interact with the real world. The attention to detail is truly astounding, especially when it comes to the lighting and shadows. Not only have the animators played close attention to where the light source is coming from in each individual shot, but they have also lined the shadows up perfectly with where they would be in real life. This includes things like accounting for the curves in the environment - take a look at the second-down right screenshot. If you look closely at 2-D's shadow, you can see that it actually bends around the corner of the building as a real shadow would. This proves just how talented the animators behind this music video must have been, and how much time and effort are put into these animations.

Of course, there are other impressive features about the animation of this music video. As I mentioned before, the characters interact with real life elements, such as chess pieces, basketballs, and even other people. This means that there's a mixture between special effects and 3D animation in order to make this look realistic, which is not uncommon for Gorillaz music videos. Take, for example, the shot where Noodle is playing chess with a real life actor (between times 1:14 and 1:27). He interacts with the board first, showing how a real person would interact with it, and then Noodle picks up her piece and moves it. If you look closely, you can see that the piece she picks up is 3D animated, a slightly different shade of grey to the rest of the white pieces, but if you're not paying attention then you really can't tell. The same goes for when Ace pops the basketball; this is a mix of real-life effects, SFX, and simple animation. The ball turns animated when it flies away, so that its movements can seem more interesting. It's this kind of attention to detail which allows the digital band members to blend completely in with their surroundings, and make it seem like they're really here, in the environment. 

One of the things that I love about Gorillaz is the band members' well-thought-out character designs. I recently found out that the Gorillaz band members have a whole lot of stories behind how they met, how they got to be the way that they are, etc. Some of their design aspects are very obvious, and the fans understand why they exist; however, they also have subtler character traits that you might not see.

Firstly, each member of the band adheres to one type of shape language. 2-D is triangular, Noodle is circular, and Russell is square. Murdoc and Ace are also triangular, but in different ways. This goes along with their personalities. 2-D is spunky, cool, and unpredictable; Noodle is young and sweet; Russell is strong and hardy; Murdoc and Ace are both mischievous and mysterious. Furthermore, while their colours often match in order for the band to look cohesive, they each have a different hair or skin colour to give them a unique look.

I want to specifically look at 2-D's design since I think it is interesting. Each of the band members has seven "phases" of designs, showing their development as time goes on. 2-D's eyes are either pitch black or white, on account of him canonically losing both of them in two separate car accidents. His front tooth is missing, and he has large bags under his eyes. The fact that his tooth is missing and his hair is so spikey gives him a very youthful appearance, and he looks very much like a teenager in most of his art. This is in order to keep up his image as a hip, pop-punk artist.

The song "My Future" was a single released in July 2020 for Eilish's album "Happier Than Ever". Directed by Australian artist Andrew Onorato and his team, this song is supposed to be melancholy, nostalgic, and introspective in its lyrics. The music video, in response, is meant to evoke these feelings in the viewer further, and I think it does so in a variety of interesting ways.

The video depicts an animated version of Billie Eilish in an art and animation style reminiscent of Studio Ghibli or other such older anime styles (using the style of pastiche). The backgrounds are painted by artists @genemachfour, @rickspictures, and @jarrodprince on Instagram and give a soft, textured feel to contrast the blocky colours and hard lines of the main focus of the animation. The video starts off very dark, matching the soft lyrics; then, at around 1:43 in the song, the tone shifts dramatically as the music turns more upbeat, and the animated Eilish begins to grow flowers with her hands, and the previously dreary forest sprouts around her. The sun rises, and the colours and pace of the video shift. Eilish is lifted by the plants, and the video fades to black against a shot of the now brightly coloured forest. Based on this, you can tell that while there is a structure and sort of a plot, it is in disjuncture with the lyrics and is much more concept-based and thematic than an illustrative narrative.

When it comes to colour theory, right off the bat, you can see how it applies to this video. The colour palette of the first minute and a half is very blue, black, and stark white. The shading is harsh, as you can see from the top-right screenshot—the moonlight bounces off Eilish's arm and shoulder brightly, almost outlining the character. The entire video has a desaturated blue overlay, only broken by the light, and so overall gives a very dreary look, since, as I discussed in my colour theory subpage, desaturated blue is pretty much the epitome of sadness and melancholy. Further on in the video, however, once the scene changes and the light seeps in, the colour palette also changes. Before, all of the leaves, grass, and trees were a dark blue or black to reflect the general colour scheme; however, as the light hits them, you can literally see them changing to be green before your eyes. The light coming from the sun is a bright orange-yellow, with tints of light pinks and purples typical of a sunrise, though I would still say it is fairly desaturated. This was done in order to not lose the calm atmosphere of the entire song while still indicating a change in tone. These desaturated but light pinks, yellows, purples, and greens all allude to calm, tranquil happiness for the viewer. At this point in the song, not only do the drums and general tone of the song turn more upbeat, but the lyrics also become more optimistic. This overall shift in the tone of the song is reflected by this shift in colour palette, which was, of course, a very educated and smart choice on the part of the video director.

When it comes to the animation style, as I mentioned, it is very reminiscent of older anime styles (think My Neighbour Totoro or Spirited Away). This was done intentionally, both to fit with the soft, desaturated colour palette (which is a staple of this era of anime) and also to contrast the song's lyrical meaning of talking about the future. By using an animation style so grounded in the past, Eilish has created a sense of nostalgia to go alongside her song about looking to the future, creating some real juxtaposition of themes. As for the 12 principles of animation themselves, the entire video is very slow-paced, and for the most part, the character is very still. To account for this and keep the viewer's interest peaked, the animation uses drag in the clothes and overlapping action with things like the facial expression, hand movements, and the hair in order to keep the entire video engaging.

In conclusion, this style of animation is one that is similar enough to mine that I could utilise it in my final piece; however, I would have to look into the nostalgic connotations of this art style and compare it with my eventual chosen video in order to make sure that I was getting across the right themes. For a slow-paced song such as this, a nostalgic art is very appropriate, but for a faster-paced song perhaps not so much.

This is one of two songs I have analysed in this section of my research that I thoroughly knew before going into it. I very much like this song. I have never, surprisingly, seen the music video before since I was not aware that it was animated. "You Should See Me in a Crown" was a song released in April of 2019 as a part of the album "WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?". Its music video was animated by Takashi Murakami, a Japanese contemporary artist and theorist who is known for blurring the lines between "high" and "low" arts. The song has a dark, pop-punk vibe to it, with the lyrics exploring the mind of a psychopathic tyrant. The music video very easily goes along with this theme.

This music video is a very surreal narrative video, which amplifies the lyrics but does not necessarily illustrate them exactly. Pretty much the entire music video is 3D animated, with an animated version of Eilish standing in a completely blank space with a background reminiscent of computer screensavers or code. She is wearing a light green and white outfit at the beginning of the video, depicting a pattern of people with their heads slightly offset. She then changes into a completely black outfit with a red person on the back with six arms and their head offset. She then looms over a small city with green lights coming out of the windows, populated by the green people depicted on her original outfit. She then, unprompted, transforms into a grotesque spider-human creature, the setting background changing to a twisted red with spiderwebs all over. She begins destroying the city, eating the fleeing green men. She then gags and throws up waves of a 2D animated multicoloured liquid, which floods the city and transforms the remaining green men into red, six-armed spider people.

Colour language is a big part of this music video, of course. The green and red are obviously simple, representing good and evil characters, respectively. The same is true for the white in the original outfit vs. the black in her second outfit. There are other reasons these colours have been used, however; take the green city, for example. Yes, it's green to symbolise the good nature of these hypothetical people, but it also looks quite reminiscent of code and futuristic computer things; saturated green is often associated with binary or pixels, being one of the main RGB colours. The fact that it's coming out of square windows as well further pushes this idea of pixels. Furthermore, the multicoloured liquid that the spider monster pukes out is not only supposed to be a reference to Takashi Murakami's trademark art style, but it may also be to create a contrast against the dark background and character; adding diversity to your colour scheme can keep the viewer engaged while also defying their expectations.

As for the animation style, this is the only music video out of the six I looked into that is primarily 3D animation. On account of this, the movements are a bit jarring and unnatural; however, if I'm being honest, I think they fit with the music. The erratic movements make Eilish look slightly more unhinged, which fits in well with the theme of the song. Furthermore, I think that the giant spider monster being 3D animated makes more sense on a practical level, as smooth movements make the creature look more real and therefore more terrifying. Of course, I already went over why making the multicoloured liquid distinct from the rest of the animation was an interesting choice, and you can apply the same principles to it being 2D; it's a reminder of Murakami's art style and creates intrigue and contrast from the rest of the video. Animation techniques being used in this video include drag with the hair, a great deal of anticipation before the creature pukes, and a hell of a lot of fine drawing and appeal when it comes to the character design of the creature and Eilish's character.

Overall, I don't think that I will be producing an entirely 3D animation for my final piece since that's not really my style; however, that does not mean that I can't take inspiration from the techniques displayed in this music video for any and all 3D components I end up adding.

"Hidden in the Sand" is a song released in May of 2010 from Tally Hall's album "Marvin's Marvellous Mechanical Museum". Animated by Steve Loter, a well-known animator and producer, this song is supposed to sound cheerful, nostalgic, and peaceful. Played entirely on the ukulele, with help from acapella-style backing vocals, this is definitely supposed to be reminiscent of old campfire-esc songs, and it all feels generally quite tranquil.

This music video, compared with the song, is very interesting. The animation style is definitely in line with the theme and style of the song; however, the narrative is in extreme disjuncture with the lyrics. The video consists of an old loony-toons esc style of animation and a load of people on what appears to be a cruise ship. The video begins with the captain strumming on a ukulele and singing into a megaphone. The passengers start dancing and generally look quite cheerful. Then, at about 0:55, a bird flies down and punctures a hole in the ship, causing water to spill out. Everyone panics and runs around. They begin to defy the happiness that they previously showed, pushing each other over and such. Their actions get more and more manic, and they all end up presumably dying as the boat sinks.

Of course, there isn't much to say in regards to colour theory when it comes to this particular music video since the entire animation is in black and white. This is to match up with the style of animation chosen, which is a pastiche of the older Disney-style animation, similar to the 1920s Mickey Mouse cartoons. The shade of grey tells us the basics of colour, such as depth and context (for example, we know that this music video takes place at night based on the colour of the sky), but not much else. This style of animation was chosen for a reason: the entire song being played on the ukulele in a very scratchy, lo-fi style is meant to sound nostalgic and evocative. This style of music was around at a similar time to these old cartoons and was often paired together since syncing audio to hand-drawn cartoons was very difficult at the time. Of course, the music video doesn't really match up with the song from 0:55 onwards, as everything begins to go wrong while the song stays peaceful and nostalgic. This is meant to symbolise how these old cartoons often come across as being sweet and innocent when looking at them through rose-tinted glasses, but in reality can be quite dark and controversial.

On a technical level, this animation of course utilises many of the 12 principles of animation, as it is based off of the animation that Disney was making at the time the principles were popularised; exaggeration can be seen all over the place; staging and timing are of course essential to making sure the animation syncs up with the music; and things such as squash, stretch, and anticipation can also be seen across the entire music video. These are, more than anything, to help the animation look and feel like an old 20s cartoon, but also to keep the viewer engaged and to help the animation look interesting.

Overall, while I love this animation style and would definitely be able to utilise my research on animation techniques a lot easier if I chose to do something like this, I think that a cartoony style is a lot better suited to a song that fits with its era. The ukulele and barbershop quartet style of this particular song is meant to sound nostalgic and retro, so pairing it with an animation style that does the same thing makes complete sense. I think using this style for any other genre of music would waste its potential impact.

The music video to this song, released in 2011 as a part of Tally Hall's album "Good and Evil", was animated and directed by Drew Mokris, a flash animator from Michigan. The song itself is a very upbeat electropop song based around the idea of nightmares and sleep paralysis. The song as a whole has a very spooky feel to it, but it also sounds sort of childish in its lyrics and instruments. The music video, as such, follows these themes as well.

It's a generally chaotic and surreal music video, but despite mostly seeming to be conceptual, it follows a vague storyline. This boy, who is the central character in this video, is enjoying his life at the beginning—riding his bike, going to school, etc.—when he tries to go to bed but finds monsters in his wardrobe. The music video takes us through this monstrous world and shows the little boy terrified and trying to escape. He manages to wake up but is now nervous about going about his life. The rest of the music video pretty much follows suit and shows him being thrown between real life and this nightmarish life. During the bridge of the song, it shows him silhouetted floating through dark space before being thrown back into the nightmare.

As far as colour theory goes, this video isn't particularly consistent. The general theme, however, is that in the real world, the colours are light and desaturated, while in the nightmare world, they're dark and saturated. This is, of course, to symbolise the thematic differences between the two worlds: one is calm and peaceful, the other chaotic and scary. The dark backdrop of the nightmare world, especially, is almost like spilled watercolour paint, which makes a great contrast to the smooth, meaningful backgrounds in the real world.

As for the animation style, there really is a lot to unpack. The majority of the animation is done in what seems to be a scrapbook style of art, looking almost like lots of different types of paper and materials stuck together to form the creatures. The backgrounds look a little bit like watercolour, both in the real world and the nightmare world (though the real world backgrounds look intentionally made, whereas the nightmare ones look, as I said, like spilled paint). This was done, almost certainly, to push those themes of childhood fears and to generally allow the nightmares to look quite abstract. An interesting detail that I noted after watching the video a few times was that when the boy is in the real world, the entire screen has a black border around it, almost like an old television screen, but as soon as the nightmares start, it goes fullscreen. This is no doubt supposed to represent nightmares breaking free from the real world and being unbound by the laws of reason. As for the 12 principles of animation, many of them can be seen being utilised in this music video; for example, squash and stretch, exaggeration, anticipation, and others. Of course, all of the nightmare creatures' designs are meant to be highly exaggerated versions of real-life scary things, such as spiders and skulls, which works out nicely for the leading theme.