A Good Script: The Secret to Making a Good Music Video

The secret to making an impressive music video that delivers the impact you want always lies in a good script. While you definitely want to take up all the creative space while writing your script, it’s best not to go too crazy, because an overcomplicated and overambitious script can result in an overblown budget. So how do you write a script that won’t break the bank but still brings the vibe?

Better Not to Do it Than Do it Badly

There’s nothing worse for the reputation of a band than a terrible clip of a gig on YouTube or social media. It’s always better just to not do it all rather than do it badly. Often, you only get one chance with a booker or record label, so if all they get to see of you is a live video that’s shot really badly and has even worse sound, then any interest they might have had in your work will be quickly killed off. You’ll stand a much better chance if you take things into your own hands and make your own music video. It’s not all that hard to come up with an original and creative concept (you do the same thing when approaching songwriting), and it’s that clear concept that’s going to form the base for everything else.

Copy-Paste Videos

The first method for putting together a music video is the simplest: copy-and-paste. This is where you take a bunch of photos and short clips of the band and band-members and everything that fits your band philosophy and put it all together to create a sort of montage that captures the vibe of the song. Edit it all together, add a couple of lines from the lyrics and then stick the music under it all and you’re done. You can actually get some really great results using this method and do it without having to spend too much money or time. Also, this kind of music video is still going to be way better than one of those bad YouTube clips we mentioned earlier. The only trick is that everything needs to be pieced together with a good sense of style and rhythm, rather than just being thrown together and hoping for the best.

The Performance Shoot/Musicians Only Video

The second approach is the ‘Performance Shot Video’ or ‘Musicians Only’ video. This is one of the most convenient ways to put together a real music video, since you already have all of the gear you need to hand. This kind of video doesn’t actually need a script either and can be made on a pretty small budget. You simply set up, perform, film everything and then edit. You could also film an actual gig with a live crowd. With this kind of shoot, the trick is to spice things up by using a range of different shots: wide shots, close-ups, moving shots, detail shots, shots from above or below, from behind or from the side. If you have the budget for it, you could also hire some more advanced filming equipment and get some crane shots and rider shots.

The only rule is to focus every shot on the musicians, which means that what the band members are wearing will also play an important role. Obviously, your performance and your energy needs to be on point as well. The band needs to be able to play with and to the camera. If you do decide to film an actual gig, then it’s worth thinking about the fact that there’ll be a lot of noise which might not work so well. Also, setting up a sort of ‘fake’ show as it were can be more handy because you’re free to play the same song over and over again, giving you plenty of material to edit down into a video later. When it comes to making a video, it’s always better to have too much footage than not enough. In this scenario, you can also find an interesting location to shoot in, just don’t forget that, for the best results, you need to play in time with the recording of your song – so the drummer might have to deal with a click track. This will make things much easier when you edit things together later.

When it comes to the location, the kind of music you’re making is likely to dictate where you film. So, if you make straight-up rock then maybe an abandoned warehouse or busy city street would work. If you’re making a video for a lullaby or ballad then maybe the local woods or a meadow would be better. Of course, you could apply the Tarantino effect and choose somewhere completely different to flip and subvert the cliche. Just note that, if you do pick an outdoor location, there are issues like power supplies and the weather to consider.

A variation on the Performance Shot Video is to film everything in an entirely white room that’s overlit. This creates a really static background so you can do some really fast and active camera work. Another recommendation, to get the best feel and performance, the band needs to actually play live, rather than mime to the track. Otherwise, there can be a risk of things getting boring. But I will say that you can achieve a lot by using quick edits to spice up some otherwise boring footage. After viewing the first edit of Star Wars, George Lucas fired the editors on the spot. Shots were held for too long, making the narrative slow and empty of any tension or excitement, removing all of the drama from the laser battles and light sabre duels. After some fast-paced editing applied by Lucas himself, a boring B-movie was transformed into the iconic film we now know.

The Guerrilla Shoot

The third method is the ‘Guerrilla Shoot’, which still focuses on the musicians, but unlike the ‘Performance Shoot’, this time they might not even be touching their instruments. Instead, we see them moving, dancing, walking – you name it – and they can be doing all of that inside a building or out in the wild and on the street, where unsuspecting members of the public can make cameo appearances. This kind of music video is popular in rap music, and the director Spike Jonze really loves this method. In the music video for Drop, which he directed for The Pharcyde, he put all the members of the group on the street of a busy city centre and then played the whole video backwards to create some surprising effects. As you can see in the clip, attention to detail is important when making this kind of video. Everything has been recorded and performed backwards so that, when the footage is reversed in the final edit, it’s the people walking backwards in the background that finally give the secret away.

The band Left had the audacity to make a video shot in the middle of Dam Square in the centre of Amsterdam, at the docks and even in a supermarket. The video was made on a really small budget and the effect is great.

The indie-pop band Wolf in Loveland also shot a spontaneous jam session that served as a great music video. The sound quality isn’t the best, but the atmosphere really works for their vibe. They also show that a simple idea can be incredibly effective: you can take the old holiday video concept and turn it into a music-video-worthy short road movie. The artist Ben Howard also filmed a performance on a balcony in the centre of a busy city to all the passers by who cheered and clapped as the whole band slowly walked away at the end of the video.

While the above was less about spontaneity and more about good organisation, it still confirms that a really simple idea can make for a really great Guerilla Shoot. Ed Sheeran has also used the same tactic and it’s worth pointing out that this method really works when applied to singer-writer-style numbers. Another nice thing about guerrilla shoots is that the music can be woven in with the sound of the street to create a really surprising effect.

The Narrative Video

With a ‘Narrative Video’, or a music video that tells a story, you step over into an entirely new realm of film making. This approach demands a really good story and a real script, a storyboard, actors and the right locations. For the entry-level film maker, this kind of project could prove a pretty big challenge. The most obvious storyline you could reach for lies in the song lyrics, which have to be about something. Listen closely to the words and music and try to create a story. It doesn’t have to be anything big. Because you’ll only have a few minutes to tell your story,, it actually needs to be very simple and straightforward. While you might use the lyrics as a starting point, you don’t have to go about things literally, or even tell the whole story of the lyrics. The story could just be inspired by one line or what you view as the essence of the song. Once you have an outline of the story in your head, you can write a synopsis (summary) of the narrative. From there, you can divide your story into a beginning, a middle and an end. The secret to writing a good story is the story arc, where events occur and work towards a climax.

From there, the three sections are split into scenes – this is scripting: where you write the details of every second of the video. In the script, you need to specify the location, the timecode (so when in the song the scene occurs) and a description of the action, which will ultimately give any actors and maybe any extras an idea of what they need to be doing in each scene and what needs to be made clear in the video. At every step, ask yourself what the essence of each scene is. Film scripts also include dialogue, of course, and while adding a little bit of dialogue to your music video script can have a really nice effect, it’s something you need to think long and hard about since it can sometimes risk muddying the impact of the song and adding nothing to the work. This is why any dialogue in music videos usually only happens at the beginning or end but, again, if you do have any dialogue, it needs to actually add something.

If you’re struggling to find inspiration, it can be helpful to find a good location that you can then use to base your script on. The right location can help pull out some great ideas that you can work into your story. Of course, new ideas can also come up during the shoot, but be careful. This can take the process off track and end up being counterproductive.

Once you have your script, you can start dividing up each scene into different camera shots and putting together a shot-list per scene. Some script writers make a short-list of shots, but ultimately it’s the director who decides which shots are actually filmed. A shot describes a camera angle, a camera movement and the kind of shot (wide or closeup, etc). Then, in practice, each shot is repeated, so you have a bunch of takes from which, during the editing process, you can pick the best one.

Fragmented Thinking

Because you only have a few minutes, it’s often difficult to tell a story in a flowing line. The best way to go about it is to think in fragments or as film makers put it: be more editorial. So you basically make your video using a series of consecutive edits. If you look at your script, this makes sense, since it’s also divided into fragments or edits.

Here’s a short example of how you might need to think when scripting a music video: a man and woman are fighting. The man strolls down a street alone. The woman is seen kissing someone else. Fine, but we can make things more exciting: a man and woman are fighting. The woman is seen kissing someone else. The man strolls down a street alone. In the second version, the story is made much clearer in the viewer’s mind. Are they fighting in the first scene because she’s seeing someone else or is she seeing someone else because he pushed her away? Is he now leaving heartbroken or is he busy formulating a plan to get her back? A simple change in the narrative order of a film can make a world of difference to the story. Think about this when you’re writing your script. For a lot of writers, the narrative arc is the core of the entire story. You therefore need to build your story towards a clear climax and then let it fade away.

The Storyboard

When the story and the script are finalised, it’s worth making a storyboard. This is where you draw the scenes you have in your head, like you would a comic strip, and the lyrics can be written into your storyboard to indicate where the action takes place in the song. This gives you a really good overview of how the visuals will fit with the music. It might sound like a lot of work, but the filming process will go much smoother if you’ve already made these kinds of detailed preparations. Without them, you’re unlikely to get the best results. So much happens during the actual shoot so, by the end of it, you’ll be really thankful that you had a script and storyboard.

The Combo

The fourth method is to combine a couple of the methods above. Maybe you want to tell a story while splicing through a few ‘Performance Shots’. In that case, during the performance shoot you can probably get more than enough footage by sticking to wide, close-up and half-zoomed shots. No matter what kind of video you’re thinking about making, before you even start brainstorming, writing and filming, it’s worth watching as many music videos as possible. Try dissecting and analysing them and ask yourself why the director selected specific scenes and shots. Hidden in that mountain of music videos you will find something that really suits the music and the song you’re working on. So don’t fear taking inspiration. As with writing music, when you’re making a video, stealing good ideas is always better than using bad ideas.

Make the Image Fit the Music

The first step in the process of making a music video is, of course, selecting the song you want to make a video for. Any song will have its own vibe and feel, but also a specific kind of beat, arrangement of instruments and, naturally, a set of lyrics. It can be really useful when the song has a really clear message that it wants to share with the world because you can use that as your starting point. Then there are all of the ingredients of the song which you can use as reference points for developing your concept. The imagery used to tell the story within your music video needs to fit with these ingredients. Directors like Quentin Tarantino are magicians when it comes to combining image and music. There are moments in his work that prove that, by combining two polar opposites you can make things feel even more unexpected and otherworldly. Basically, if you have a good idea and you can feel that it’s a good idea, then don’t fear it, just trust your gut and do it. Who knows, you might be this generation’s Tarantino. The sky really is the limit. So if you’re working with a heavy rock track, you might go for some powerful imagery and quick edits or decide to do the complete opposite. For an all-out ballad you might keep the vibe romantic and flowing, drifting from one image to the next or make the experience brutal and unexpected to mimic the heartbreak echoed in the lyrics. Listen closely to your source material – the song – and let your creativity do the rest. The images usually come by themselves. If you have the whole band working on it then you can workshop things later but, during the brainstorming phase, anything and everything goes so give every idea space. Of course, you might want to filter out anything that will require a Hollywood-grade budget to produce like car chases or trains exploding as they fall into a ravine. Extravagant ideas can often cost more money than they’re worth and will also cost you a lot of time and resources to make. So, keep things simple and focus on a concept that you can realistically produce. As the ideas start to form, you can start thinking about what kind of style you want to film it in, the clothing you might wear as well as the location, the colour scheme and lighting – all of which will inform the ultimate style of your video.