The Importance of Story In Video Exampled by Musicbed’s Beautiful New ‘Artist Spotlight’

Musicbed has just released their latest “artist spotlight” in-house production which focuses on world-renowned pianist Chad Lawson. This short six-minute video isn’t a tutorial, it doesn’t feature a videographer or photographer, and it isn’t about the filmmaker behind the camera. What this video does have, and why I’m sharing it, is excellent storytelling and beautifully crafted scenes pieced together in postproduction to create an emotional, touching film. The inspiration given in this video is beyond teaching one how to film with a camera, rather it inspires how to tell a personal story and gives example to creating an emotional tone in moviemaking.

At the core of every beautifully shot scene by master cinematographers is the story. Many photo and video websites really emphasize the technical qualities and gear behind getting  solid work, which I agree makes sense because of their audience, but it is the storytelling that is going to really engage a large audience outside of camera geeks. It’s widely agreed upon that when it comes to photography, the gesture and emotion — the story — of a photograph is more important than having pristine image quality. I think this is also spot-on true for video as well.

You can watch other well-crafted “artist spotlight” videos from Musicbed on their Vimeo page. If you happen to enjoy Lawson’s beautiful music, you can actually license the music that accompanied this video as well as other works from his Musicbed profile.

Do you have storytelling references, website resources, tips to share, or questions to ask? Leave a comment below and let's start a discussion.

Ryan Mense's picture

Ryan Mense is a wildlife cameraperson specializing in birds. Alongside gear reviews and news, Ryan heads selection for the Fstoppers Photo of the Day.

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5 Comments

Very nice. Thanks for posting this - it's outstanding work.

Never been so inspired by a single video!!

Stunning. The cinematography in this is so gorgeous and I absolutely love the way it is graded. There is so much to learn from a video like this.

wow that was ridiculously amazing

Never would've known

very simple and touching indeed. a very different type of what I usually enjoy watching,...still had a great effect on me very inspiring thx for that!