Adam Donald

Adam Donald is an American music video director from Texas. In 2009, he started his own
production company in New York and began expanding his work to commercials, documentaries,
short films and feature films as well as music videos. Some of the mainstream artists hes worked
with include Fall out Boy and Melanie Martinez who both fit into the Alternative music genre.

Throughout his videos there is a clear aesthetic and editing style as well as a relationship between
both the music and the visuals (Goodwin). The visuals of the video amplify the music with shots
cutting on beats and performers moving in time with the music. The music video for Where Did
The Party Go by Fall out Boy uses canted framing and fast editing combined with the use of
handheld camera for dramatic effect to portray disorientation, madness and frantic action
reflecting the narrative of a group of people being chased by a zombie. A variety of shot types are
used such as extreme long shots of the narrow hallways which create a sense of entrapment as the
space allows for little movement; mid-shots and close-ups of the performer lip-synching (Gow).
Slow-motion is heavily used for dramatic effect and portrays the power of some of the characters
as well as to draw more attention to action shots. In the opening of the video there is a text overlay
with the band name in bold capitals, followed by the song title. The purple colour of the font
matches the visual style of the individual video as it frequently features throughout. This has been
done for all the videos that he has made for the band.

The shots below demonstrate the use of multi-coloured artificial light that he uses for indoor shots
of the performers. This is an example of the relationship between the lyrics and the visuals. The
title of the song is Where Did The Party Go? which is repeated throughout the song. The cutting
between rooms with different lighting give the effect of a disco or party.

The majority of his videos are filmed in outdoors locations at night with dark expressionistic
lighting. For example, his series of videos for Fall out Boy called The Young Blood Chronicles
follows a narrative, each video leading on from the next despite the fact that the eleven videos were
uploaded separately online. This challenges Carol Vernalliss theory that music videos dont
embody full narratives. A large number of shots in these videos are filmed in fields, woodland and
country lanes as well as stereotypically creepy settings e.g. churches, hospitals. One of the
conventions highlighted by Andrew Goodwin is reference to voyeurism; in Alone Together there
are shots of a TV screen showing whats happening in another room. His work for this was in part
inspired by Daft Punks Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem.

Themes of gore and the fantastical play a significant role in a number of his videos. For example,
his music video for Carousel by Melanie Martinez has the performer flying through the air
towards a man as seen above and towards the end of the video she is seen spitting up pink liquid
and the image becomes distorted before it cuts to black. Unlike his videos for Fall Out Boy, this
video cuts between shots filmed in a studio of the performer lip-synching in front of a screen
projecting different star/glitter effects.
I really like Adam Donalds work because the techniques used are very effective at creating a
disturbing atmostphere fitting for the genre and narrative told by the artist. I also like how there is
no live performance and instruments as I think that would take away from the immersion into the
story. For my own music video I may decide to use some of these ideas as inspiration.