OMONA'S PICK: MV Producers/Directors Part 1: VM Project Architecture 🎥

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Hey Omona! Let's talk about love music videos! aka the thing that attracts most people to kpop. Specifically, let's talk about production houses and directors. After watching possibly hundreds of music videos in my short voyage into kpop, I've noticed quite a few similar elements in some of the ones I'm particularly drawn to. As it turns out, they were all made by the same companies. I've decided to do this series to share with you my favorite production houses and the MVs they've made, starting off with VM Project Architecture.

VM Project Architecture (also called Low Laundry Media House) is a Seoul based production company, headed by Jo Beomjin. They've made videos for YG, SM, FNC, and Jellyfish to name a few.

Some notable elements repeated in their work:
- hallways
- fluorescent lights
- mirrors
- overhead shots
- smooth camera tracking
- highly saturated bright colours (really solid red reds)
- tables (filled with objects, shot from above or straight on)
- cars
- smoke
- glitching and cloning effects
- the mvs look expensive af (because they probably are)

Take a look at some of their MVs and tell me if you notice any other stand out elements (this list is by release date, just because I don't know how else to arrange it)

EXO - Love Me Right (June 2015)

Just one of the many MVs VM Project has done with EXO and SM. It has many of the elements that we'll see repeated throughout the rest of the MVs in this list.

They also did the Call Me Baby MV, the Star Wars Collab Project Lightsaber, and the Monster MV.

Red Velvet - Dumb Dumb (September 2015)

This MV made #9 in Rolling Stone's 10 Best Music Videos of 2015. It's my personal fave RV song too.

N.Flying - Lonely (October 2015)

The last time anyone ever saw N.Flying. My favorite part is Seunghyub in that tub, and that overhead shot where they all open doors simultaneously. Symmetry is so calming.

LADIES' CODE - GALAXY (February 2016)

A feast for both the eyes and the ears. There's so much going on in this MV visually. It cuts from black and white shots, to really colourful tables filled with food, and then that stark white room, all while giving us Illuminati vibes.

DAY6 - Letting Go (March 2016)

Back when JYPE still gave DAY6 a big MV budget they had their first comeback with this beautifully filmed video to go with their solemn song. Multiple YoungKs! What more could you want.

NCT U - The 7th Sense (April 2016)

My fave NCT song & MV! The camera work, choreography, graphic effects, and creatively decorated boxes make this MV look like so much more than it is (just hot guys dancing in a studio and being trapped in boxes). I miss Ten..

VIXX - Dynamite (April 2016)

You get a hallway, you get a hallway, you get a hallway, everyone gets their own hallway! Arguably the most beautiful MV in their 2016 Greek God trilogy.

They also did VIXX's Error MV & 2016 Conception Opening Trailer

AKMU - How People Move (May 2016)

Starting to feel deja vu? The color pallet for this is very very similar to that of RV's Dumb Dumb, as is the use of stairs.

Blackpink - Whistle (August 2016)

One of BP's two debut MVs. This has glitchy effects, a table, and lots and lots of crane and tracking shots. The whole sh'bang. Which is is overall great, but it also got a lot of people making comparisons to Red Velvet's MVs (which was really just the director not changing up his style that much tbh).

SEVENTEEN (Hip Hop unit) - Check In (November 2016)

Shot on location in Hong Kong. Did they dye Mingyu's hair orange specifically for this? Because it was thankfully gone right after.

They also did this HipHop Unit VCR for SVT's Japan Concert

SF9 - ROAR (March 2017)

The return of the boxes and studio dancing. It also has a hallway, glitchy graphics, and that really cool fluorescent lighting fixture on the floor! Parts of this reminded me so much of NCT U's The 7th Sense, so I looked it up and that's how I found out about VM Project.

They also did SF9's debut MV Fanfare

Monsta X - Beautiful (March 2017)

"Two finger thumbs up" for this absolutely lush MV. It features the hard hitting choreography while also giving us really great shots of their faces. So beautiful.

Special Mention: Seungri's EXPLICIT "Let's Talk About Love" Album Teaser (August 2013)

I'm shook.

Other VM Project MVs that would be too much to embed in one post:
Taemin - Drip Drop Performance Video
Taemin - Press Your Number
Tiffany - I Just Wanna Dance
GIRIBOY (Feat. Loco) - I'm In Trouble
MOBB - FULL HOUSE
LOOΠΔ (HeeJin) - ViViD
SECHSKIES - Couple
Jessica - Wonderland
VAV - Venus
Rapmon & Wale - Change


Sources: SMTOWN | N.Flying | LADIES CODE | jypentertainment | VIXX | Akdong Musician | BLACKPINK | SF9 | starshipTV | BIGBANG

So, your thoughts, Omona? Are you a VM Project stan? Which of their MVs is your favorite? Are you a sucker for good cinematography like I am?

Stay tuned for the next part in this series. I'll probably make posts for digipedi, lumpens, vikings league, and naive creative. Next week or next month. Who knows. :D

Comments

[aki-san.livejournal.com]

This is awesome OP! Looking forward to your series~

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Yay! Thank you for the encouragement! 😘

[bmo.livejournal.com]

this is so cool??? do digipedi next!!

check-in, dumb dumb & galaxy r my favs from this list. also ik a lot of ppl didnt like mingyu's hair but the fact that he pulled it off says a lot about his beauty!

[sra-interesante.livejournal.com]

MTE

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Haha alright! I have so many favorites from them too, I need to whittle the list down.

Looking back now, I actually appreciate how nice his hair looks in contrast to the surroundings in the MV. I was really shocked by it at first though, but he can pull pretty much anything off. A true visual.

[seulgibear.livejournal.com]

i adore their work. hire me please. i think my fav thing is their use of colours, lights and smoke & the transitions to black and white shots. i love the neon lights aesthetic in general and there's something really lush about their mvs. it's easy to tell them apart from others
i'm obsessed with the beautiful mv rn no big deal

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Let's go work for them! lol I'd love to be a part of anything they do.

And same. I've lost count of the number of times I've watched Beautiful today..

[seulgibear.livejournal.com]

i would love to do music videos *_* i say let's pack up and go

[giriboy.livejournal.com]

a+ for referencing the "two fingers thumbs up" iconic line. i'm in class rn but i'm def going to go thru this later for mvs i haven't watched

faves i've seen are "lightsaber," "roar," "how people move," & "i'm in trouble" (giriboy's best mv, in general)

[sra-interesante.livejournal.com]

what a fun idea! i should follow this serie since i like to know about video clips production but i'm lazy
lol i think i never pay atention to mv credits

i like how people move with akmu and taemin drip drop.... but i notice they have this colour palette that i find kinda annoying lol idk feels like i'm watching a pepsi, mcdonald, random sport car brand cf all at the same time

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

I wish they had credits! A lot of music videos never list the producers or directors, so I had to do a lot of googling and stalking of instagrams to find out who made them. Most of the production houses have distinct styles though, so I guess that's what this series is about.

I noticed red, yellow, blue, and pink are in almost all the MVs too, but I personally enjoy it. And omg at sports car ad, because that's exactly what the start of EXO's Call Me Baby is haha

[sra-interesante.livejournal.com]

true that ... now i think about it the few mvs i get to know about in advance (about their pre-production) is because i follow some zanybros staff sns lol

[miwa201.livejournal.com]

i love the whistle music video (dumb dumb too) but i remember people saying that some shots from galaxy were copied from a perfume music video?

[glider.livejournal.com]

I'm a (former) Perfume stan and it's a possibility VM Project may have gotten some ideas from their video for Spending all my time (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4znsXCH_2Y) (warning: awful song ahead), especially since Ladies' Code became a trio. stuff like the close-ups of their shoes/reversed footage and the shot of the three members' legs while they're sitting in chairs facing the camera. it's barely plagiarism tho imo.

[anonymous-loljk.livejournal.com]

*gasp* you did not just refer to spending all my time as awful?! It was a classic.

[roomgirl.livejournal.com]

It's so crazy to me seeing this pervasive opinion anymore because I remember the day it dropped and 90% of their fans hated it. I still pretty much hate it. :/

[anonymous-loljk.livejournal.com]

Lmao as much as i hated it, it's the first song of them that i've ever heard, and it definitely stuck in my head since the first listen.
Also i'm sorry i didn't make my point clear enough that it was a sarcasm haha. I'm not quite following their fandom to find out about the general opinion of each of their song, but to me it definitely a classic since it's basically the song that got me to listen to them more ;D

[tsuyoi-hikari.livejournal.com]

Former? Why did you stop being a fan?

[mamamoos.livejournal.com]

ahh great series op! so many of the mvs in kpop are just stunning. whistle is prob my fave of all time aesthetically

[sheisagentleman.livejournal.com]

op!! i love this post so much i can't wait for the rest! do lumpens next~!

also i love love me right, i wish i knew the location. and shout out to that vid of svt's hip hop line because the song is so so terrible but the music video is beautiful.

[myrrhcat.livejournal.com]

yes i love this concept op!! i've always been curious about kpop mv producers bc the only one i really know/can recognize is digipedi but i've definitely noticed common themes in different mvs as well and wondered about them

[xlovexlessxtyx.livejournal.com]

Oh I am so excited for this series! Great job OP!

[daikokudanji.livejournal.com]

I'm also a sucker for cinematography/photography/imagery, I really like VM style, but i feel like they are repeating their ideas now and some videos end up looking exactly like others ))):
Digipedi is a forever favorite, but Naive Creative got me with Baek A Yeon's "So-so", the video was just perfect! Lumpens also has some amazing videos~

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Yeah ia, some of their work and color palettes are starting to feel repetitive. There's very little variation in their work, that's why it's become so easy for me to spot now. lol

[daceymormont.livejournal.com]

Cool post!
The mv's are all really gorgeous imo

[kerrop1.livejournal.com]

This is such a great idea for a series, OP, I'm excited for your future posts!

and yes to multiple Young Ks

[shazz-chan.livejournal.com]

Great idea, OP! Looking forward to this series :D

I'm very familiar with the MX video rn, I've been streaming it all day haha

[strangerstheme.livejournal.com]

I always wanted to know who produced Love Me Right and The 7th Sense mvs. I figured they were the same people but I was so lazy to search for it haha.
Thank you for this post!

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

yess such a great idea op! i always love learning about the creative teams behing music videos especially in kpop because they're usually are so pretty

i really love dumb dumb and galaxy because those videos have more of a graphic (?) feel to them. i love love me right as a song so much but i'd only watched the video once and watching it again now and it's so random ??

[strangerstheme.livejournal.com]

I always wanted to know who produced Love Me Right and The 7th Sense mvs. I figured they were the same people but I was so lazy to search for it haha.
Thank you for this post!

[glider.livejournal.com]

ooo this is a cool idea for a series, I've always wondered about the directors of K-pop MVs! thanks OP!

[sheisagentleman.livejournal.com]

op!! i love this post so much i can't wait for the rest! do lumpens next~!

also i love love me right, i wish i knew the location. and shout out to that vid of svt's hip hop line because the song is so so terrible but the music video is beautiful.

[anonymous-loljk.livejournal.com]

Oooh i didn't realize that lots of my favorite mvs were made by them. Also dynamite was great visually but not so much on a story-telling department, especially because the story itself was the main point of the whole trilogy concept. I'm just salty that they cut so many scenes that could have made the plot a little more clearer :/

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Dynamite was the first video of VIXX's that I saw, so I was definitely confused by the next two installments of their trilogy, they were all so thematically different from each other.

[tsuyoi-hikari.livejournal.com]

Dynamite MV seemed like a joint of a random scenes together. No one will get that its supposed to tell a story instead..

[cinnamonbot.livejournal.com]

great post op!! it drives me crazy how kpop doesn't list mv producers and directors anywhere so thanks for doing the hard work for me lol.

i generally like this company's mvs but i really hate the cluttered tables. sensory overload.

[soyogi.livejournal.com]

now that i know these mvs are all from the same producers i can't unsee the similarities in their aesthetics. the only company that i'm familiar w/ their style is august frogs. this is such a great idea, OP! looking forward to future posts in this series :)

[tsuyoi-hikari.livejournal.com]

Not a fan of their work obviously. So far, not many MVs can make me watch them more than once. But I like the team behind SHINee's Dream Girl and Why So Serious or Infinite's Nothing's Over. Or interesting MVs like Leo x Ravi's Beautiful Liar.

And I like happy and laid back MVs like BTOB's 2nd Confession or dramatic story's like Hongki's Insensible or any other SG Wannabe's MVs.

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Ooh interesting. I personally like really artsy videos.

[misspoirot.livejournal.com]

I love most MVs listed above and now that I know they are all made by the same company I can see the similarities.

[psharp10.livejournal.com]

ahhh i've loved a lot of the mvs/teasers that they've made!!! and seungri's LTAL teaser remains one of my favorite of all time

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

I'm bummed they didn't make a full MV for that song, but I also don't know if I (or Korea) would've been able to handle it. lol

[1of1girl.livejournal.com]

i saw this post before but was too tired to comment so i'm late lol.

but i love the idea! it's really interesting to see other omona's picks besides music and also i think most people don't really know about production houses (myself included) so the post is really informative.

i love most of the music videos listed above and i definitely can see the similarities/recurring motifs now and really appreciate them.

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Never too late! I posted this before bed, so that I'd have comments to reply to in the morning lol

I think a reason people don't talk about it much is because the info isn't very accessible. Hardly anyone lists the production team in the MV descriptions, it's sad. I've made it into a game trying to guess who made what every time something new comes out. haha

[mjspice.livejournal.com]

Oo this is a very informative post.

[dio-elaclaire.livejournal.com]

wow, that's so cool, i didn't know they made so many of my fav mvs!

thank you, op!

[dynamite-state.livejournal.com]

I can't stress enough how interesting this series is to me, OP!! I pray you continue with it.

The truth is I had no idea who they were prior to this post. I knew The 7th Sense is a masterpiece and I think I love all the videos in this post but I've always filed this under "the latest SM aesthetic", kind of like I used to have LDN Noise-produced songs categorized as "the recent SM sound" before learning who they were.

I'm seriously in love with their work, now that it's put together like this I think they're my favorite current production house (and I've yet to learn of the rest). I hope there maybe is a poll by the end of the series to decide omona's favorite production team/#aesthetic.

[showminomoney.livejournal.com]

Oh yay! I'm glad you enjoyed the post! I only really found out about them in early Feb, it turns out I was a fan even before I knew who they were too. They're also my favorite, that's why they were my first feature. I'll probably have the next one up next week. A poll sounds like a great idea! :D