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Information

• Member: MeriC
• Studio: Temple O' Trunks
• Title: Paranoia Rebirth
• Premiered: 2002-07-19
• Categories:
  • Drama
  • Character Profile
  • Serious
• Song:
  • Linkin Park A Place for my Head
• Anime:
  • Ceres, Celestial Legend (Ayashi no Ceres)
• Participation:
  • Shoujocon 2002, Shoujocon 2002 (2002-07-19)
  • Otakon 2002, Otakon 2002 (2002-07-26)
  • AWA Exposition Contest, AWA Exposition Contest (2002-09-27)
• Comments: Title: "Paranoia Rebirth"
  Anime: Ayashi no Ceres
  Music: "A Place For My Head," by Linkin Park
  Produced from April - May 2002
  
  Awards/Conventions:
  - 3rd place at Shoujocon 2002
  - Played at Screening 1/4 at Otakon 2002
  
  Technical Specs.:
  - Master AVI file encoded HuffyUV, 720x480, 44 kHz stereo sound
  - MPEG encoded 352x240, 2-pass variable bitrate (3000 max, 2000 ave, 300 min), 44 kHz 192 kbps stereo sound (TMPGEnc)
  
  Equipment Used:
  - "Ayashi no Ceres (Ceres - Celestial Legend)" DVDs 1-8 (ripped VOBs)
  - "Hybrid Theory" by Linkin Park CD
  - HP Pavillion, Pentium 4 1.5 GHz, 128 MB Ram, ATI All-in-Wonder Video Card
  - DVD Decrypter, DVD2AVI, Notepad
  - Adobe Premiere 5.1, Adobe PhotoShop 5.5
  
  If you would like the quick 'n easy one sentence synopsis of this video, then all you need to know is that basically, this video tells a story of a young man coming to grips with a past life, and goes a little crazy in the process.
  
  To know the full story behind this video, then please, do proceed with your reading!
  
  I worked on this video during the spring of 2002, as my primary submission for Shoujocon and Otakon. At the time, I had completed watching the series "Ayashi no Ceres" (known as "Ceres - Celestial Legend" in the English adaptation), and had this anime fresh on my mind as "potential for a music video source." I knew from the get-go that I didn't want to make a stereotypical Ceres video (ie- tragic love story revolving around Aya and Toya). Besides, the main characters in Ceres bore me. :P To me, by far the most interesting character in the series is the psychologically unstable Aki, the twin brother of Aya.
  
  Ah yes, now the song choice. Honestly, I don't feel as though I need to be defending myself for my song/band of choice (the only reason I bring this up is the potential thoughts popping in one's head when viewing the song choice, regardless of your stance on the matter). I was listening to my CD one day, heard this song, and though "holy CRAP, this *so* applies to what the character of Aki is all about." Putting the "artistic suicide" nature of choosing a Linkin Park song aside, I truly felt this song fit my idea perfectly. The song changes tempos and style throughout its duration, so that was helpful in setting various moods and scene changes in the video. Hey, at least I didn't use an overused Linkin Park song! :)
  
  The lyrics might be a bit hard to hear, so if you want to read along with the words as the song plays, read 'em here:
  
  *** BEGIN LYRICS ***
  
  I watch how the moon sits in the sky
  On a dark night shining with the light from the sun
  The sun doesn't give light to the moon
  Assuming the moon's going to owe it one
  It makes me think of how you act to me
  You do favors and then rapidly
  You just turn around and start asking me about
  Things you want back from me
  
  I'm sick of the tension, sick of the hunger
  Sick of you acting like I owe you this
  Find another place to feed your greed
  While I find a place to rest
  
  I want to be in another place
  I hate when you say you don't understand
  (You'll see it's not meant to be)
  I want to be in the energy, not with the enemy
  A place for my head...
  
  Maybe someday I'll be just like you, and
  Step on people like you do and
  Run away over the people I thought I knew
  I remember back then who you were
  You used to be calm, used to be strong
  Used to be generous, but you should've known
  That you wear out your welcome
  Now you see how quiet it is, all alone
  
  I'm sick of the tension, sick of the hunger
  Sick of you acting like I owe you this
  Find another place to feed your greed
  While I find a place to rest (x2)
  
  I want to be in another place
  I hate when you say you don't understand
  (You'll see it's not meant to be)
  I want to be in the energy, not with the enemy
  A place for my head...
  
  You try to take the best of me
  Go away (x8)
  
  I want to be in another place
  I hate when you say you don't understand
  (You'll see it's not meant to be)
  I want to be in the energy, not with the enemy
  A place for my head...
  
  I am so sick of the tension, sick of the hunger
  Sick of you acting like I owe you this
  Find another place to feed your greed
  While I find a place to rest (x2)
  
  *** END LYRICS ***
  
  Back to the video stuffage.
  
  Without spoiling anything, I'll just say the boy's got some major issues in dealing with legacies from a past life, and a *serious* sister complex that comes into play as a result of this past life. Aki, to me, is a severely underused character in "Ayashi no Ceres," so in this video, I hoped to explore his character and personality in my own way (I truly do love those tortured boy types. ^_^). In the series, Aki is abused by many people in his life that wish to use him for his power, or kill him *because* of his power and actions previously made in his former life. The anger and emotion exuded by Aki originates not only from his past life, but from the people around him who use him.
  
  One of the things I had lots of fun with in this video was using the emotional and powerful segments of the song, and applying them to specific scenes in "Ayashi no Ceres." One example of this is my personal favorite part in the video when, in the song, he sings "you try to take the best of me, go away" over and over again in a low, quiet voice, and then all of a sudden, starts screaming those lyrics. I tried to play with that change in tone of music to match with the visuals. I think that's one of the main goals I wanted to accomplish with this video.
  
  Time to talk about video structure! The intro of the video shows some of the background of the two main characters in the video, the first verse and chorus are "narrated" by Aki, while the second verse and chorus are more told from Aya's perspective. The entire rest of the video places an emphasis on Aki again. Throughout the video, I try to show some of the "supporting characters" in Aki's life, as it were. Ceres is the woman he is obsessed with, his cousin is experimenting on him, while his grandfather hopes to use Aki. Oh yeah, and in this video, Toya is used as something of a tool to show that he is one of the few people Aki can trust. Of course, Aki, being a crazy lil' man, manages to hurt one of his only true acquaintances. By the end of the video, Aki finds "a place to rest" his troubled little mind (and if you know how the series ends, you know just how true this is).
  
  Technically speaking, this video is very traditional and simple. I stuck to straight cuts and cross-dissolves. I used some fades to black and white to emphasize important moments in the video. There are also a small amount of simple special effects to clean up some aspects of the video, so those aren't really noticeable or worth mentioning. :P This video is *highly* edit-intensive, but this was mostly for me to learn and practice making my timing a little more tight, and to keep the video visually interesting.
  
  To sum it all up, this is a somewhat angry video that, I hope, evokes some kind of feeling. Much like my "Traces of Insanity" video of last year, I had fun with the "mentally troubled young man" type of character. While this is not my best music video, it is still something I am proud of, and enjoyed making. At the very least, I hope I can get you interested in this anime, and maybe want to seek it out!
  
  And yes, the title of this video is partly inspired by the Dance Dance Revolution song of the same title. :P When coming up for a name for the video, I thought "hmmm. Aki is nuts. And he's reincarnated from someone else. Paranoia Rebirth!" End of story.
  
  Please note: This is, I believe, a video that needs to be watched more than once in order to understand what's going on, since the scenes go by so fast. When I look back on it, this is something I would have done differently, but it's over and done now. :P
  
  Thanks for reading all this stuff. I hope you like my video. Feel free to let me know what ya think of it.