Rodney McKay's Sunscreen

Vid
Title:	Rodney McKay's Sunscreen
Creator:	Purpleyin
Date:	16 October 2005
Format:	wmv
Length:	33MB
Music:	"Wear Sunscreen" by Baz Luhrmann
Genre:
Fandom:	Stargate Atlantis
Footage:
URL:	*AO3 Streaming link Streaming and Download Link *Vidder's Download Vid Listing (archived link) *LiveJournal announcement post
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Rodney McKay's Sunscreen is a Stargate Atlantis vid by Purpleyin. It was posted to the vidder's LiveJournal in October 2005.

Vidder's summary: "An insane project - team/friendship - with one surprise non-main character fun ship, if you even notice it. Turned out humour/drama."

Reactions/Reviews

This vid was reviewed by Paraka at the reel vidding community on May 31, 2007:

Overall impression: This is a random song, and the video comes off a bit random, but for the most part is held together decently.

Little disclaimer first: I respect Purpleyin as a vidder, and love a lot of other vids (s)he made, but this vid has a lot of stylistic elements in it that turn me off right away, which are going to come out in this review. Sorry Purpleyin.

Titles: Simple and to the point. I liked them. They also really made effective use of the trailing music at the end of the vid.

Music choice: It's definitely different. I wouldn't really call it a song myself, but I know it was played on the radio forever as one. As a vid watcher this isn't my first choice of music simply because (for me at least) to enjoy a vid like this you have to pay really close attention. If I just have a playlist going of vids, I'd be likely to exclude this one based on the non-song, but that's based entirely on my personal preference. *Shrugs*

Narration, Tone and Movement: The narration for most of this vid was ok, but I think the vidder made a big mistake in the beginning. This vid would have been much more effective had they kept the "sing" as the narrator, and just related the words to the characters. Instead in the first 15 seconds or so, Weir is the one narrating. After that there's an abrupt switch from Weir to Rodney. It's a little jarring, and then it's abandoned as the narrator starts talking about the characters instead of through the characters. The vid moves much more smoothly once that occurs.

Cuts, Transitions, Effects & Colouring: A few of the transitions from similar scene to similar scene might have benefited from a different type of transition. For example at 2:15 or 3:45, I understand you need some sort of transition, but the one chosen just make the picture look distorted. That type of transition can be used effectively, like at 2:39, but sometimes a more visible transition is needed so that you have two distinct clips rather than trying to mesh two together and make it look like one. Some clips just aren't meshable in a discrete way.

I did notice that you managed to get a couple clips put together by splicing out middle scenes, and they worked really well, but chances are if you aren't able to get them to work with a straight transition, overlapping them isn't going to work.

Specific vid & music notes: As I mentioned in the narration portion, I had some problems with first 35 seconds and having Elizabeth and Rodney talking for the “singer”, not just from a POV standpoint though, but from the “talking” point too. You know the stylistic choses I mentioned that turn me off? Well having the characters of a vid become the “singers” is a big one for me. It always seems to pull me out of the story of the vid, puts the character in a position where they don't always fit, and where it's really impossible to consistent (either you do it for short periods of time as you did, or you do it for the entire vid which tends to be boring). Also I've seen it pulled off in anime vids where mouth movements aren't nearly as specific, but I've only ever seen it done well once in a live action vid. It just doesn't mesh, since you see the mouth moving, but it doesn't fit what's being said. At all.

I really liked how you used Before I Sleep clips for a lot of the age lines. It was a really nice and effective arc in the vid.

For the most part there were good clip choices that related to the song. As I mentioned in my summary, it comes off as a bit random since the clips are all over the place, but I think that randomness adds to the charm of the vid and really reflects the meaning behind the song ( a lot of random advice). There were a couple clips that were more random than others (although really, what can you put for “Floss.”?) and a few that I didn't quite understand the motivation for using it, I also think a few clips were chosen based on what was being said during that scene which doesn't translate all that well in vids since some people won't remember what was going on. Some clips were rather amusing, like showing the wraith queen screaming for the line “Sing.” or John and his sticks when the song is about knees (that made me smile). I particularly like the Rodney clip you used for dancing.

Final notes: Overall the vid as a good message and does a nice job of featuring the entire cast."