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Fanvid Appreciation Post
Exactly what it says on the label.
I have wept tears of blood and pulled out of my huge collection fifteen fanvids that you should watch regardless of fandom knowledge or musical tastes, because they are Just That Good.
Firefly/Serenity
New Frontier - by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
heresluck
In these days of absorbancy past the point of decency
Where good deeds are few and far between
Everyone's seen this, right? Surely? This is edited to the point of pure professionalism, sharp and clean and effortless storytelling.
Buffy
Five On The Dime - byshati
Love's a dead dog barking at the sparrows
Tell me - do you cry for what you can't find?
This is one of my favourite fanvids of all time. (It is very unfair that Shati can write AND vid with equal skill. Surely these talents should be handed out sparingly. LEARN TO SHARE, GIRL.) It takes a song that seems like an odd choice, and bits of footage that you wouldn't think fit together, and somehow the gestalt is absolutely jaw-dropping. Sometimes all you see is half a second of a scene, but the impact is brutal because of what it signifies.
Queer as Folk (US)
Epic - bysisabet
You can touch it, smell it, taste it so sweet
But it makes no difference 'cause it knocks you off your feet
I picked this one because I think it's a very good example of a character study - and building up the journey of a character is something that QaF does unflinchingly and honestly. This vid is the journey of Justin Taylor - it's trauma and discrimination and art and tenacity and love and idealism and finding your own identity. (And because it's QaF, it's remarkably porny in parts, so I'd better add a NSFW tag.)
The Office (US)
Knock 'Em Out - bysophia_helix
"If you insist I'll have a white wine spritzer"
"Sorry love, but you ain't a pretty picture."
This is hilarious. Just. Hilarious. It's the best possible advertisement for the show I could imagine - I mean, watching this with no knowledge of the show, I would probable think: so this is footage from the DVD extras, right? With the cast just fooling around? NO. NO. THIS IS WHAT THE SHOW IS ACTUALLY LIKE. Anyway, the vid makes me grin foolishly for at least ten minutes afterwards.
due South
Goody Two Shoes - bypipsqueaky & laurashapiro
Two weeks and you're an all time legend
I think the games have gone much too far
OMG. THIS. JUST. NO WORDS. This is Benton Fraser, in all his door-opening, politely-smiling, hat-tipping glory. What makes this vid isn't the hilariously appropriate song, or the masterful selection of footage from four seasons' worth of episodes, but the fact that every second frame is one of the Rays rolling his eyes. HEE. This one has a lot of footage of CKR looking hot in it, too. You know. As a bonus.
You Can Call Me - bysdwolfpup
If you'll be my bodyguard
I can be your long lost pal
I never stop marvelling at how neatly the three verses of this song fit the three men of due South. I was going to descrive this vid as joyous, because it is, but it's also got this really strong and well-crafted sense of pathos. Because this isn't JUST a show about a Mountie with a deaf wolf who has crime-fighting hijinks with a laid-back Italian and a Polack with a serious case of adult ADHD. It's also about brief moments of connection, and broken people whose edges fit together, and trying desperately to hold on to your place in the world and the values that you believe in. And this vid kind of draws you along with its clever editing and its hugs and smiles, and then all of a sudden it whacks you with the amen, hallelujah and with Kowalski throwing paper and Fraser under the ferris wheel. Uh, I can talk for a long time about this one. Just watch it.
BSG (I had so, so many vids on this list. Cutting them down was a nightmare.)
Every Other Time - byhumansrsuperior
I said "Let's talk about it"
As she walked out on me and slammed the door
UBIQUITOUS PILOTS VID #1. This one is happy and bouncy and colourful and hilarious and very well-made. It can cheer me up without fail.
Cold Cold Water - bysdwolfpup
And if you think I've gone too long
Listen, the sky will sing this song
UBIQUITOUS PILOTS VID #2. This is the kind of song that you'd think would be absolutely impossible to make an effective fanvid to, so it's utterly to SDW's credit that it turned out so amazing. It captures the tension and the problems between these two as well as the attraction and friendship, and so presents you with a very canonical, tangled, inexorable, painful portrait of what they mean to each other. Also it has Tom Zarek in it, so, uh, FTW.
Set The Fire To The Third Bar - bydiff3rent_light
Your soft skin is weeping
A joy you can't keep in
This is my newfound one true love. It covers PILOTS all the way up to 3x19, and it's breathtakingly insightful. I want to keep it in cotton wool and sometimes bring it out and stare at it reverently, but that would mean I would have to abandon my current habit of watching it three times a day.
Proud - bydualbunny
You could be so many people
If you make that break for freedom
This song and this vid make me want to weep happy tears. It focuses on the four main players - Adama, Roslin, Lee, Kara (OH MY SPACEFAMILY) - and the decisions that they've had to make and the things that they've had to do in the name of protecting humanity. Deceptively gentle. Gorgeous. It covers S1 only, and I think you should have seen at least part of the show for the footage to have a real impact, but it's so, SO worth it.
Prayer - bylithiumdoll
Bring to life everything that you fear
Live in the dark, and the world is threatening
This is NOT a 'shippy fanvid, but it's one that I'd recommend to anyone who has watched - and anyone even thinking about watching - BSG. Again, footage is from S1 only, and not explicit enough to be very spoilery, and it's about war - about things blowing up and conflicting belief systems and people falling apart and torture and religion and conflict. It's fan.tas.tic.
Anime (You didn't know that in my previous life I was an anime fangirl? Hoo boy. Now you know.)
Paranoia Rebirth - by Meri (Ayashi no Ceres)
The sun doesn't give light to the moon
Assuming the moon's going to owe it one
I feel that everyone should watch this so that they then go and watch the anime, which is one of my favourites - it's a very dark version of the Seal Wife tale, in which a twin brother and sister get possessed by the reincarnations of these powerful figures from myth, and there are government conspiracies and doomed teenage romances and creepy set pieces. The art style isn't fantastic, but plot-wise it's great. This vid pretty much captures the tone of the series - the opening sequence is especially well done.
Liberation Of Memories Past - by Meri (Utena movie)
Do you ever see in your dreams
All the castles in the sky
I think this was one of the very first fanvids I ever saw! It's absolutely visually stunning, which is partly because of the aesthetics of the source, but also because of the way fades and overlays and flashes are used. Most vidders can't pull off this many effects without the whole thing looking busy and awkward, but Meri does it very well.
Pompeii - by NHMK (Hellsing)
This is one of the most technically brilliant fanvids I've ever seen - watch it, watch it, watch it. Fair warning, the source anime is very violent in a Stephen-King kind of way - lots of vampires and ghouls and blood - but this vid edits it together in a way that is shocking, yes, but also fast and sharp and breathtaking.
Between - (Ouran High School Host Club)
We are the same but our lives move along
And the third one between replaces what once was love
I don't have the file of this one, and YouTube's quality is less than fantastic, but I think this is a very beautiful, careful look at one of the more serious dynamics on this (admittedly insane) show, the Hikaru-Haruhi-Kaoru one. The song choice is absolutely perfect.
Mine
(Not ALL of mine. I actually have a couple more anime-based attempts buried on my hard drive, but I'm pulling out these ones for nostalgia or actual-quality value. Neither of them are by ANY means as good as any of the above, but I figured I'd include them.)
99 MTV (Mixed anime)
Haaaaaa. Um. This is actually the introduction to a song performed by Britney Spears and...NSYNC?...(I have no idea) at the 1999 MTV awards, and we did an advanced street funk concert routine to it, and I found the intro hilarious and decided on a random whim to start a vid to it. This - one minute 14 seconds - is as far as the vid got, because it was more an experiment in getting stuff on the beats of the song than anything else, and it was very effort-intensive. I rediscovered this years after the fact and was actually very proud of it for an early effort.
Movin' On (BSG)
On without the things we've lost
The things we've gained we'll take with us
The last time I dared to touch vidding myself, this is what happened. I'm fond of it. It's a very haphazard, celebratory kind of fanvid, in which I cram together lots of footage from a show that I adore, and sometimes the timing is right and sometimes it's less right. WOW, I SELL MYSELF SO WELL.
~
In conclusion: I need someone to rec me a very good Doctor Who/Torchwood vid, because I have a few, but nothing spectacular. I have the concept for one in my head, but I lack the time and the software (I use WMM, and don't really need anything fancier, but it has a habit of freezing or crashing my computer).
REC ME VIDS, FLIST. I love me some good vids. So much more efficient than having to watch a whole episode of something, when all you want is a brief burst of fannish joy.
Oooh, you know what I want? Crazy heart-warming Scrubs vids. Surely they exist. Somewhere
(& also tell me what you think of any that you download!)
I have wept tears of blood and pulled out of my huge collection fifteen fanvids that you should watch regardless of fandom knowledge or musical tastes, because they are Just That Good.
Firefly/Serenity
New Frontier - by
heresluckIn these days of absorbancy past the point of decency
Where good deeds are few and far between
Everyone's seen this, right? Surely? This is edited to the point of pure professionalism, sharp and clean and effortless storytelling.
Buffy
Five On The Dime - by
shatiLove's a dead dog barking at the sparrows
Tell me - do you cry for what you can't find?
This is one of my favourite fanvids of all time. (It is very unfair that Shati can write AND vid with equal skill. Surely these talents should be handed out sparingly. LEARN TO SHARE, GIRL.) It takes a song that seems like an odd choice, and bits of footage that you wouldn't think fit together, and somehow the gestalt is absolutely jaw-dropping. Sometimes all you see is half a second of a scene, but the impact is brutal because of what it signifies.
Queer as Folk (US)
Epic - by
sisabetYou can touch it, smell it, taste it so sweet
But it makes no difference 'cause it knocks you off your feet
I picked this one because I think it's a very good example of a character study - and building up the journey of a character is something that QaF does unflinchingly and honestly. This vid is the journey of Justin Taylor - it's trauma and discrimination and art and tenacity and love and idealism and finding your own identity. (And because it's QaF, it's remarkably porny in parts, so I'd better add a NSFW tag.)
The Office (US)
Knock 'Em Out - by
sophia_helix"If you insist I'll have a white wine spritzer"
"Sorry love, but you ain't a pretty picture."
This is hilarious. Just. Hilarious. It's the best possible advertisement for the show I could imagine - I mean, watching this with no knowledge of the show, I would probable think: so this is footage from the DVD extras, right? With the cast just fooling around? NO. NO. THIS IS WHAT THE SHOW IS ACTUALLY LIKE. Anyway, the vid makes me grin foolishly for at least ten minutes afterwards.
due South
Goody Two Shoes - by
pipsqueaky & laurashapiroTwo weeks and you're an all time legend
I think the games have gone much too far
OMG. THIS. JUST. NO WORDS. This is Benton Fraser, in all his door-opening, politely-smiling, hat-tipping glory. What makes this vid isn't the hilariously appropriate song, or the masterful selection of footage from four seasons' worth of episodes, but the fact that every second frame is one of the Rays rolling his eyes. HEE. This one has a lot of footage of CKR looking hot in it, too. You know. As a bonus.
You Can Call Me - by
sdwolfpupIf you'll be my bodyguard
I can be your long lost pal
I never stop marvelling at how neatly the three verses of this song fit the three men of due South. I was going to descrive this vid as joyous, because it is, but it's also got this really strong and well-crafted sense of pathos. Because this isn't JUST a show about a Mountie with a deaf wolf who has crime-fighting hijinks with a laid-back Italian and a Polack with a serious case of adult ADHD. It's also about brief moments of connection, and broken people whose edges fit together, and trying desperately to hold on to your place in the world and the values that you believe in. And this vid kind of draws you along with its clever editing and its hugs and smiles, and then all of a sudden it whacks you with the amen, hallelujah and with Kowalski throwing paper and Fraser under the ferris wheel. Uh, I can talk for a long time about this one. Just watch it.
BSG (I had so, so many vids on this list. Cutting them down was a nightmare.)
Every Other Time - by
humansrsuperiorI said "Let's talk about it"
As she walked out on me and slammed the door
UBIQUITOUS PILOTS VID #1. This one is happy and bouncy and colourful and hilarious and very well-made. It can cheer me up without fail.
Cold Cold Water - by
sdwolfpupAnd if you think I've gone too long
Listen, the sky will sing this song
UBIQUITOUS PILOTS VID #2. This is the kind of song that you'd think would be absolutely impossible to make an effective fanvid to, so it's utterly to SDW's credit that it turned out so amazing. It captures the tension and the problems between these two as well as the attraction and friendship, and so presents you with a very canonical, tangled, inexorable, painful portrait of what they mean to each other. Also it has Tom Zarek in it, so, uh, FTW.
Set The Fire To The Third Bar - by
diff3rent_lightYour soft skin is weeping
A joy you can't keep in
This is my newfound one true love. It covers PILOTS all the way up to 3x19, and it's breathtakingly insightful. I want to keep it in cotton wool and sometimes bring it out and stare at it reverently, but that would mean I would have to abandon my current habit of watching it three times a day.
Proud - by
dualbunnyYou could be so many people
If you make that break for freedom
This song and this vid make me want to weep happy tears. It focuses on the four main players - Adama, Roslin, Lee, Kara (OH MY SPACEFAMILY) - and the decisions that they've had to make and the things that they've had to do in the name of protecting humanity. Deceptively gentle. Gorgeous. It covers S1 only, and I think you should have seen at least part of the show for the footage to have a real impact, but it's so, SO worth it.
Prayer - by
lithiumdollBring to life everything that you fear
Live in the dark, and the world is threatening
This is NOT a 'shippy fanvid, but it's one that I'd recommend to anyone who has watched - and anyone even thinking about watching - BSG. Again, footage is from S1 only, and not explicit enough to be very spoilery, and it's about war - about things blowing up and conflicting belief systems and people falling apart and torture and religion and conflict. It's fan.tas.tic.
Anime (You didn't know that in my previous life I was an anime fangirl? Hoo boy. Now you know.)
Paranoia Rebirth - by Meri (Ayashi no Ceres)
The sun doesn't give light to the moon
Assuming the moon's going to owe it one
I feel that everyone should watch this so that they then go and watch the anime, which is one of my favourites - it's a very dark version of the Seal Wife tale, in which a twin brother and sister get possessed by the reincarnations of these powerful figures from myth, and there are government conspiracies and doomed teenage romances and creepy set pieces. The art style isn't fantastic, but plot-wise it's great. This vid pretty much captures the tone of the series - the opening sequence is especially well done.
Liberation Of Memories Past - by Meri (Utena movie)
Do you ever see in your dreams
All the castles in the sky
I think this was one of the very first fanvids I ever saw! It's absolutely visually stunning, which is partly because of the aesthetics of the source, but also because of the way fades and overlays and flashes are used. Most vidders can't pull off this many effects without the whole thing looking busy and awkward, but Meri does it very well.
Pompeii - by NHMK (Hellsing)
This is one of the most technically brilliant fanvids I've ever seen - watch it, watch it, watch it. Fair warning, the source anime is very violent in a Stephen-King kind of way - lots of vampires and ghouls and blood - but this vid edits it together in a way that is shocking, yes, but also fast and sharp and breathtaking.
Between - (Ouran High School Host Club)
We are the same but our lives move along
And the third one between replaces what once was love
I don't have the file of this one, and YouTube's quality is less than fantastic, but I think this is a very beautiful, careful look at one of the more serious dynamics on this (admittedly insane) show, the Hikaru-Haruhi-Kaoru one. The song choice is absolutely perfect.
Mine
(Not ALL of mine. I actually have a couple more anime-based attempts buried on my hard drive, but I'm pulling out these ones for nostalgia or actual-quality value. Neither of them are by ANY means as good as any of the above, but I figured I'd include them.)
99 MTV (Mixed anime)
Haaaaaa. Um. This is actually the introduction to a song performed by Britney Spears and...NSYNC?...(I have no idea) at the 1999 MTV awards, and we did an advanced street funk concert routine to it, and I found the intro hilarious and decided on a random whim to start a vid to it. This - one minute 14 seconds - is as far as the vid got, because it was more an experiment in getting stuff on the beats of the song than anything else, and it was very effort-intensive. I rediscovered this years after the fact and was actually very proud of it for an early effort.
Movin' On (BSG)
On without the things we've lost
The things we've gained we'll take with us
The last time I dared to touch vidding myself, this is what happened. I'm fond of it. It's a very haphazard, celebratory kind of fanvid, in which I cram together lots of footage from a show that I adore, and sometimes the timing is right and sometimes it's less right. WOW, I SELL MYSELF SO WELL.
~
In conclusion: I need someone to rec me a very good Doctor Who/Torchwood vid, because I have a few, but nothing spectacular. I have the concept for one in my head, but I lack the time and the software (I use WMM, and don't really need anything fancier, but it has a habit of freezing or crashing my computer).
REC ME VIDS, FLIST. I love me some good vids. So much more efficient than having to watch a whole episode of something, when all you want is a brief burst of fannish joy.
Oooh, you know what I want? Crazy heart-warming Scrubs vids. Surely they exist. Somewhere
(& also tell me what you think of any that you download!)
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My favourite DW vid is Wonderboy by Mexx, which can be found here (http://wild-dystopia.net/videos.html). It's set in the first season of newWho.
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Ray, where do you get all those sealswhere I could find DS videos, and you not only provide, you provide Adam Ant.You are my hero.
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My favourite is 'Stress' though, a McKay vid, and the link is dead and I can't get it and I neeeeeeed it. D:
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XD
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I'm going to be up till midnight! And I should be studying! But you are going to be spammed with Naruto, darling.
And one FMA, because I'm feeling nice.
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Also; Circles (http://www.sendspace.com/file/lk070i). A West Wing vid. I don't know who it's by.
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- Ordinary Day (http://serpensortia.org/media/videos/doctorwho.html) (Nine/Rose)
- Stop Crying Your Heart Out (http://www.alter-idem.com/index.php?now=2&category=Doctor%20Who) ("Parting of the Ways")
- Chasing Cars (http://independently-happy.org/insomnia/?p=173) (Nine/Rose, Ten/Rose, and the ONLY vid to this song I'll ever rec)
- Dr. Who on Holiday (http://sockkpuppett.livejournal.com/357140.html) (Actually a multifandom vid with DW, BSG and Farscape, but freakin' awesome)
And have some Jossverse recs, too:
- Crucify (http://bronze-ambition.net/wp/?p=68") (Buffy, seasons 2 and 3)
- Holding Out for a Hero (http://blah-mah-gah.net/wp/?p=24") (Buffy/Angel/Spike, and it makes me incredibly happy.)
- Two Words (http://www.sisabet.com/) - (Angel, and I'd venture to say if you watch one AtS vid it should be this one.)
- Far Away (http://independently-happy.org/insomnia/?p=159) (And this is the only vid I'll rec with THIS song. Firefly, part 1 of 2 in "the only Mal/Inara vids you'll ever need" series.)
- Candleburn (http://bronze-ambition.net/wp/?p=382) (the other only Mal/Inara vid you'll ever need.)
I've got a bunch of BSG, too, but I assume you've seen most/all of the ones I'd recommend. (Although, have you seen The Special Two (http://youtube.com/watch?v=hEJ6OUJTO2U)? SO FABULOUS.) And I don't know if Farscape is anything that interests you, but I made a vid rec post for that fandom here (http://carrielh.livejournal.com/174906.html#cutid1).
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You wouldn't happen to have the "Effortless-Lee" (Sister Hazel) pilots vid or the one to "Sugar We're Going Down" (Fall Out Boy) in your collection, would you?
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Thank you! I am pleasantly surprised, because Five on the Dime is so weird I often feel it must only work in my head.
And dude, you got no grounds to complain about talent-hogging.
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I am waiting with bated breath for you to watch BSG so that you can vid for it, because there's some really good stuff in there and I know you'd do something amazing with it.
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again, and yet is inspiring. I think my favorite was the Firefly one, but that may just be because I am most familiar with that canon. And the BSGs, of course, but I haven't seen them all and so am reserving judgment. Due South was a close second - both of them. They make me want to watch the show obsessively. Pompeii was technically incredible, you're right, but I felt a little like I was being assaulted. That was probably the point. I am still amazed at all the dead-on-rhythmic words you managed in your BSG one. Tomorrow I will have to see the rest.*thwaps html*
*DIES*
Meant to Live (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=4MQI5Z03)
We want more than this world's got to offer
The backstory one I was talking about in the car! In which everyone submits their entry for the Most Fucked Up Ninja Childhood award. Gaara probably wins (the redhead), though Sasuke (raven duckbutt) sure as hell gives him a run for his money. One of my favourites, because I am an absolute sucker for backstory - I think my love of Naruto can be directly correlated with how many backstories we know. :D
Toushi (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=82MCTISX)
You don't like being second
I don't like being wrong
Honestly you probably already have this one somewhere (it's been on my computer for yonks), but if you don't it's a crime. You don't get timing and editing better than this. Action-oriented though, as with most Naruto vids. :P At first glance it looks like a just an excellent fighting video, but once you know the characters you get a feel for how it's flowing and how well it matches up to the lyrics.
Naruto's World (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=ZH9FJQ12)
The OT3 vid I told you about! Awesome song, excellent and creative editing (possibly a wee bit over done in parts) and it makes me wah. :D It makes a good profile for the characters too, plus the song really feels like....Naruto, I guess (the character, not the series :P).
Disney in D(wchang) Minor (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=LTK6JN57)
Lolz, is all I have to say. Naruto = Aladdin. :P
Listen to Your Heart (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=OC48XTWL)
Spoilers omg. The whole thing is one massive, gigantic spoiler. But hey, you don't care, right? It's one of the few slow Naruto vids out there. Probably won't have quite the same effect on you as it has on me, but hey, you might pick up why I ship SasuNaru so hardcore. :P Keep it till last, so you at least have SOME idea of the characters before you watch it!
Always Hardcore (http://www.megaupload.com/?d=KIZ6R742)
Aaaaaaaand an FMA one for kicks. Completely spoilerfree too (very important in FMA vids! Spoilers for FMA are total suckitude). I watched this one once a day for like a month. Ed is seriously the hottest thing in the world, for reals. There isn't exactly much plot to it, but I love it dearly.
I have a couple more awesome Naruto vids, but I figured you wouldn't be interested - one's awesome because it creates, through editing, a whole storyline that didn't actually happen (but that'd mean nothing to you :D) and the other because holy SHITE the editing but it's just techniques and editing so you probably won't care. Ne?
Will try to get the Ouran ones up soon (these took so looooooooong)!
Re: *DIES*
How was the personality mid-semester?
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Re: *DIES*
I forgot about this one, but it's AWESOME. There are some spoilers scattered through, but they flash by so fast and out of context that I don't think they matter.
Also the song is French (probably) so I figured you'd like it. :P
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Thank you for this list! I've only seen a couple of them, and clearly I must remedy this.
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~Hazyshade