An anime music video (sometimes abbreviated
AMV) is a music video consisting of clips from one or more anime
television series or movies set to a particular song. Most are not
official music videos released by the musicians, but fan
compositions taking clips from various series and synchronizing
them with a musical track. As such they are most commonly released
over the Internet. Anime conventions often run AMV contests or AMV
exhibitions. While AMVs are traditionally limited to anime,
anime-styled video game footage is also a popular option, featured
in over 10% of current AMVs according to AnimeMusicVideos.org
statistics (as of September 2005).
AMVs are not to be confused with the original animation films
produced as music videos for such groups as Daft Punk, or with such
short music video films as Japanese musical duo Chage and Aska's
song "On Your Mark" by Studio Ghibli.
AMV creation
The creation of an AMV centers on using various video editing
techniques to create a feeling of synchronisation with the audio.
Several techniques are available to achieve this:
* Editing - Using different clips from the video source and
changing between them at specific times is the most important tool
the AMV creator has. Often both the events in the video and the
transitions between the clips are synchronized with events in the
music.
* Lip-sync - the synchronization of the lip movements of a
character in the original video source to the lyrics of the audio,
to make it appear as if the character were singing the song.
* Digital Effects - Using video editing software (like a non-linear
editing system) the video source can be modified in various ways.
Some effects are designed to be unnoticable (such as modifying a
scene to stop a character's mouth from moving) whereas others are
intended to increase synchronization with the audio, or possibly
create a whole unique visual style for the video.
* Some editors use original and manipulated animation, both
two-dimensional and three-dimensional, in AMV works. Such additions
are often used for visual effect or to convey a story that cannot
be done using only the original video source.
