ef AMV: Nothing's Missing (Anime North 2011 winner)

Anime North 2011 MVC: Novice division GOLD MEDAL! Thank you everyone!

(DISCLAIMER: As per Anime North MVC rules, only one of the No Name Losers was involved in the production of this AMV. The rest of the team merely provided feedback and suggestions.)

ARTISTIC NOTES
Please bear in mind that this was our first attempt at an AMV. That being said, we wanted to avoid the cliched pitfalls of too many special effects and lip-syncing. They're good if they're done right, but we felt ef was strong enough to not require those.

The first challenge was to pay tribute to ef - a fairy tale of the two, or more specifically, ef - the first tale, since that's coming out first. In order to do so, we restricted ourselves to only using stills from the visual novel and not from the anime. This would make our music video unique, but introduced another challenge: trying to bring the stills to life. We read up on the Ken Burns effect [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Burns_effect] and applied zoom and pan transitions to many of the stills. As ef's CG is 800x600, this enabled us to pan at 640x480 with no quality loss.

Second, we wanted to focus on one couple. We settled on Hiro and Miyako, and removed everyone else in order to prevent confusion from those who haven't played the game or seen the anime. The first encounter, which makes up the first third of the music video, was easy to storyboard. However, as the story progresses, we found it was impossible to maintain the exact story while removing all supporting characters. Therefore, the stills for the second and third parts of the video are shown out of order. The second part captures the fun times Hiro and Miyako have before they become romantic, while the third part focuses on the chase scene and its aftermath.

Finally, we had to settle on an appropriate music piece. "Nothing's Missing" fit rather well, as Hiro and Miyako both state that they were missing something before meeting each other:

Hiro: "I always felt like I was missing something. The world I saw was missing a color."
Miyako: "The canned beverage was filled with milk and sugar. Nothing could match its warmth and sweetness. It tasted wonderful, yet there was this empty feeling inside of me."

It was easy to match the lyrics with some of the stills, especially the "eyes" and "reaching" part. There couldn't have been a more appropriate piece for what we envisioned. More importantly, the video's message is conveyed even if the viewer isn't familiar with ef.

By encountering each other, Hiro and Miyako eventually found what was missing in their lives.

Direct download - http://bit.ly/iWWHFA
No Name Losers - http://nnl1.com

Category:

Music

Tags:

• ef
• Nothing's
• Missing
• Anime
• North
• amv

[codyc67]

You guys chose the WORST chapter to do a video on...

GJ.

[1nnl1]

@codyc67 It was either Hiro/Miyako or Kyousuke/Kei, and we're pretty sure Kyousuke/Kei wouldn't have done as well. The other couples are all in the second half, so they weren't an option.

This AMV revealed enough of chapter 1 to get people interested, but it doesn't spoil the entire story. It would've been very difficult to do an AMV based on the other couples without revealing all the twists. Hiro/Miyako was chosen specifically because their tale is the most straightforward.

[110hinatafan]

Great artwork! Best Amv without moving pictures ever!

[codyc67]

@1nnl1 Eh,that makes sense I guess.

[EclypseM]

I love this amv!! So happy when it won at Anime North!!!

[neocelestia]

Congratulations! I fell in love with this video when we were still in the voting stages :)

~NeoC (judge coordinator and tired staffer XP)

[TheActingJern]

Saw this on Saturday (and at the AMV creators party). Good job!

[Serygito]

Поздравляю с наградой!!!

[ankan2k4]

I don't usually watch AMV's, but I saw this on the NNL website that I regularly lurk so I thought I'd pop over here and mention real quick: Great work - both with the translations and this video. The images and the song went really well together, I was actually surprised how well they fit at times.

Plus I just love Miyako. <3

[TDOMMX]

Congratulations, guys.

Here's hoping at least a few of the people who were impressed with the video will pick up the original game when it finally gets its official English release.