Thursday, October 01, 2020
Silent Partners on the Scene at the 2020 MTV VMAs
LiveDesignOnline: Silent Partners Studio was invited to handle the broadcast content package for the 2020 MTV VMAs early in the year. But after their work on Katy Perry’s extended reality performance for American Idol in mid-May, creative director Paul Caslin inquired about the xR possibilities for a virtual awards show that could adhere to COVID-19 restrictions. Take an in-depth look at Caslin's vision.
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My roommates and I watched the VMAS live and one of the first things we noticed were, “Hey - are those random people in the audience?” Not random in person people, but yet another reminder that everything is virtual. It was sort of weird, like having an audience full of Mii’s. However, we were also struck by the lengths they went to to make sure that there was an engaging set and screen for viewers to watch, and acts to perform on. I was a really big fan of Miley’s performance, and part of that was my fondness for the single, saturated red. It was a bold choice and I had no concept of where she actually was. As the article puts it, she was performing in a “void.” Based on the success of the VMA Award show, it will be interesting to see how future shows (pandemic or not) utilize these visual media designs.
I usually have not interest in the VMAs, but this definitely piques my interest. There's a part of me that is kind of suspicious about the "screens as set" phenomenon in theatre since I feel so attached to the feeling of a physical set and how it can effect performance, but for concerts and vocal performance, I feel like this is the future. Concerts (usually) are not dependent on a narrative and setting, so they could be in a different place (or color) for every song. The creative visuals of high-budget concerts always boggle my mind and they images were so larger-than-life looking, it makes me excited for the innovation to come with this technology. I feel that a lot of creative ideas could come from this, using the screen as a part of the lighting design to add to the mood, like how Miley Cyrus became drenched in red. The pandemic has caused a lot of innovation when it comes to media design, including many things that I believe will not die with the pandemic.
Personally, I've never been big on watching the VMAs, but I always hear about them in some capacity. What Silent Partners did for this year's event is really spectacular- the combination of the city with Zoom audience members in the windows created this alternate universe for me when I looked at the photos. And with the performances, I think the artists were actually able to have more freedom with their sets because it was created virtually and Silent Partners had much more versatility in changing the set from act to act. And at the very end of the article, they do mention the idea of moving things more virtual going forward for these events. This makes a lot of sense to me because of the versatility of virtually designing the events. It will be very interesting to see how this moves forward as we come out of the pandemic; maybe I’ll start watching more award shows from now on!
I have not watched the VMAs since the infamous Miley Cyrus performance and found there to be no great need to watch it anymore. I thought it was very interesting to read this article without watching the show itself as I felt like I could fully focus on the backstage process. I loved how this article seemed to fully focus on the backstage aspect and the onstage designs rather than the award show itself. I thought it was interesting to see how the lighting designers and Silent Partners as it reveals how much virtual theater and the other aspects of tech need to collaborate to make an amazing show. I think this pandemic is really helping those who are in the media design areas of theatre and tech as it did not seem like a fully defined area of tech but rather a working area that it ever changing. Hopefully this pandemic will give more recognition for media designers and technicians, possibly having a Tony's category opened for them. I am excited to see how this technology will continue to be used and hope to see more work of Silent Partners.
I find it very surprising how dedicated the VMAs were to having this virtual stage. It seems as if all producers and content makers are trying to go back to ‘the old way’ of creating shows which were cheaper and to be honest much more effective. This idea of pretending you’re somewhere you’re not I think is a very good idea for the entertainment industry in general. Using this method, you could shoot scenes in a realistic version of New York City without having to close down twelve blocks of the city. You could utilize this tech for the creation of more realistic scenes for, one day, a cheaper budget. I hope that this VMAs project allows them to cheapen the price of these ‘virtual’ events and that they can hopefully use this technology for smaller names. This technology could also be great for virtual concerts for a band. As opposed to traveling all over the country, you could have a virtual concert and stream it to everyone for one night only.
I think that virtual sets will definitely be a thing that carries on in the future, after COVID. While this virtual set and performance isn't new to me (thinking of the Vocaloid concerts), it will be exciting to be able to see more of this style of performances in concerts and awards ceremonies, as static sets can become quite boring to look at after a while, even with clever lighting. I am curious as to the nature of Zoom that they used, and also the fact that they used Zoom. It makes me wonder the reasons for choosing that and if any part of their system had to be designed to work with Zoom (as Zoom has it's own set of problems). I think that this type of set allows for a lot of creative freedom that sets of the past have not and that potentially might increase views and interest in these types of shows, instead of just finding out the results from google and rewatching important clips on YouTube.
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