Video dj'ing with clips

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djstarr · #1 Post by **djstarr** » Sat Mar 20, 2004 4:27 pm

Thought I'd give a shout out on this forum to Chris Chapman and Alex Yan; Chris runs a weekly dance here in Seattle and Alex is an up and coming DJ who spins for him a lot.

This week they presented about 2 hours of clips at the dance; Alex hooked his Mac up to the projector and sound system; the screen was set back on the stage - this venue is just the right size for the setup; you could easily dance to the clips w/o getting in the way of people on the sidelines and in the back who were watching. It was a big success.

Anyone else tried something like this? I had a great time; I don't watch clips that much, and it was fun for me as I recognized the songs to see what folks looked like - like Lucky Millinder and Sister Rosetta Tharpe for example.

This venue also has a lot of new dancers and college kids; I thought it was a great way for them to get exposed to dance history.

ScottieK · #2 Post by **ScottieK** » Sat Mar 20, 2004 6:10 pm

The venue I DJ at is a sports bar so we have 5 projectors and 20 or so TVs, sometimes I bring in old dance clips and play them on a few screens for people to watch. Never done it with sound though.

Matthew · #3 Post by **Matthew** » Sat Mar 20, 2004 6:28 pm

They do that a lot at Zendah Grotto here. They run DVDs, but not with sound. One night they put the Windows Media dancers (Hep Jen and ???) on in front of the movie. There is wooden moulding on the wall, and it looked like they were dancing on the moulding. Pretty cute.

Kirk · #4 Post by **Kirk** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 10:47 am

djstarr wrote:Thought I'd give a shout out on this forum to Chris Chapman and Alex Yan; Chris runs a weekly dance here in Seattle and Alex is an up and coming DJ who spins for him a lot.

It was an awesome idea and really well executed. It was so good that sometimes it was hard to dance because the clips were so great. They did a nice job of mixing in some fun stuff to--at least 3 clips from the Blues Brothers.

Kirk

wheresmygravy · #5 Post by **wheresmygravy** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 11:13 am

has anyone tried using actually music clips instead of dance clips, they are obviously kind of rare and i doubt you could fill a whole night of them, but there seems to be quite a few DVD's now of jazz musicians. the most obvious to me is the Diana Krall Live in Paris DVD.

the challenge with some of the music DVD's, especially the vintage jazz, is that alot of them are in the form of a documentary and they pops up in the middle of great song to tell you about it.

Nate Dogg · #6 Post by **Nate Dogg** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 11:40 am

wheresmygravy wrote:has anyone tried using actually music clips instead of dance clips, they are obviously kind of rare and i doubt you could fill a whole night of them, but there seems to be quite a few DVD's now of jazz musicians. the most obvious to me is the Diana Krall Live in Paris DVD.

the challenge with some of the music DVD's, especially the vintage jazz, is that alot of them are in the form of a documentary and they pops up in the middle of great song to tell you about it.

I was in attendance at Sammon's on one of the nights that you DJed using the DVD/projector (Diana Krall playing on the wall as we danced). That was cool. Too bad there are not enough of of library of complete songs to provide us with enough material for full sets.

Swifty · #7 Post by **Swifty** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 11:51 am

There's a ton of Swing Era jazz DVDs here.

wheresmygravy · #8 Post by **wheresmygravy** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 2:39 pm

Swifty wrote:There's a ton of Swing Era jazz DVDs here.

Great set of discs. Do you know if they are complete songs with indexes or are they snippets?

I think it would be a blast to integrate the "live" band with the dancing. But that's just me. I could also see it as a distraction to the music because you might want to watch the musicians.

djstarr · #9 Post by **djstarr** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 12:32 am

Matthew wrote:They do that a lot at Zendah Grotto here. They run DVDs, but not with sound. One night they put the Windows Media dancers (Hep Jen and ???) on in front of the movie. There is wooden moulding on the wall, and it looked like they were dancing on the moulding. Pretty cute.

I asked Hep Jen about this, since I didn't quite know what you were referring to - she sent me this link:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/plus/d ... p#jen-dave

Dave Atkinson was her partner for a long time; he ran a very popular swing dance back in '98-'99 -- he taught lots and lots of people in Seattle how to dance.

Greg Avakian · #10 Post by **Greg Avakian** » Mon Mar 29, 2004 8:50 am

wheresmygravy wrote:
Swifty wrote:There's a ton of Swing Era jazz DVDs here.
Great set of discs. Do you know if they are complete songs with indexes or are they snippets?

If you live in a big city, there might be a lot of jazz DVDs in the library; you could preview them and buy the ones you like...

Toon Town Dave · #11 Post by **Toon Town Dave** » Sun Apr 04, 2004 11:22 pm

The regular venue we used to have had a big screen and projector. For a while it was common to have clips playing. The other DJ here even put together a couple of "videos" from various clips with dubbed over music. The only reason we stopped is because the venue didn't maintain their equipment and the lens or laser in the both DVD players probably got too dirty to read our burned VCDs.

I don't think the videos did much for the dancers on the floor but they definately added some atmosphere and people tended to hang around longer even if they weren't dancing.

Our current weekly venue is too small but I'm thinking about unofficially borrowing the projector and portable screen from work next time I organize a dance/workshop weekend.

CafeSavoy · #12 Post by **CafeSavoy** » Mon Apr 05, 2004 6:13 am

Swifty wrote:There's a ton of Swing Era jazz DVDs here.

Tower Records is now starting to carry a few too under the Jazz Legends series including some single artists (e.g., early Duke Ellington) and compilations (e.g., The Black Big Bands and The Small Black Groups).

When i saw this topic i thought it was about djing from videos, not just showing videos for dancers. Although it would be nice to have a projector, but they are pretty expensive.

Toon Town Dave · #13 Post by **Toon Town Dave** » Mon Apr 05, 2004 8:15 am

The projectors are relatively cheap, particularly if you don't need to use it in a not so bright room. Replacement bulbs are horendously expensive. I'd fear having to replace the bulb from lugging the thing around.

Does anyone have much experience using a projector in a portable/DJ situation?

Jerry_Jelinek · #14 Post by **Jerry_Jelinek** » Mon Apr 05, 2004 9:33 am

wheresmygravy wrote:
Swifty wrote:There's a ton of Swing Era jazz DVDs here.
Great set of discs. Do you know if they are complete songs with indexes or are they snippets?

Along with being a music junkie, I'm also a music VIDEO junkie.

What is referenced above are releases on the IDEM label.

Here are DVDs of that I own from the label:

The quality of the video and music varies from disc to disc.

I have bought all of these at:

http://worldsrecords.com/cgi-bin/startN ... e=DVD.html

There are others that I own. If you have specific questions on one of these let me know.

My generally impression is the quality is good. I never thought of trying to DJ the videos. You need some serious bucks to project and possibly mix the stuff seemlessly.

Nando · #15 Post by **Nando** » Tue Apr 06, 2004 12:11 am

I'd love to see more video clips at a dance venue.

It would probably be a little tough mixing two DVD or VCR's at a dance. But, how about just throwing one in once every once in awhile if you have a venue with monitors. Like the first song during a band break.

A projector would be better, but even a monitor over a bar would be cool.

SwingDJs

Video dj'ing with clips

Video dj'ing with clips

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