Slug & Lede

The Deaf Kid Who Played Rock n’ Roll was a touching piece with plenty of emotion. I’m usually not the one to feel something and get emotional when I watch a video or a sad movie, but this was definitely one of the exceptions.

The piece started out with a great close up of Derek’s dad playing the guitar, I thought this was a great start and a good way to show you what this video will be focusing on. Also they do a great job of transitioning into the interview part of the video right away. I like how they stop playing the music at just the right time when Derek’s dad is playing the guitar.

Another thing I really liked was how they used most of Derek’s music for the video. I can’t say they should use different angles when showing footage of Derek, but that’d be hard since they were taking before he passed. I think having his videos and using his music makes this piece all the more touching, and real. I think this was the thing that definitely stood out for me, and one of the many things I liked about this video.

The video does a great job of transitiong into different shots and different segments of the video. I like the close up shots on the guitar, then medium shots when interviewing, and then an over the shoulder type shot when they went over a guitar into the window of the recording studio. Also they do a further shot that shows Derek’s entire room which was set up like like a music studio and it showed that they had wide interest in music.

Another part that I like about the video that wouldn’t always work well is the narrarator. I really think they used it enought where they were getting important information, but not enough to take the focus off the topic and main character. I thought this also worked well. Along with the narrarator were the shots of Bob Dylan’s music close up, and his Dad telling us that he uses this music to get out of bed every morning, made for another intimate part.

My favorite part of the video was the last shot. It was a split shot of Derek and his Dad. The shot shows them both playing music and finishing a song, then Derek gets up and turns off his camera and ends the show. I thought this just gave the ending a little more personality as it was very symbolic. It could have been interpreted in a few different ways, and I just thought it was a great shot and good way to end it.

Overall i thought this piece was influential, emotional, and it makes you think about a lot of various things. I don’t know how much I could actually say about this piece that I didn’t like. The only thing that was questionable for me is about 1:55 into the video, you could argue that they should have used a close-up shot. I think you could also argue it the other way, saying that it shows you he was in Derek’s old room and not in some random place. I probably would leave it how the creator of the video has it. This video was tremendous, and I’m glad that I had the chance to see it.