Review of my favourite previous student video

There are many past student videos that each have their own individual qualities, however, my favourite previous student video would have to be the version of the track; 'The World is Yours' originally created by the well known HipHop/Rap artist, Nas.




However, in this student video (http://vimeo.com/2277407), we can see that the editors have chosen to use a fish-eye camera which I believe works very effectively because its almost as if they are only showing the audience small aspects of street life, which is very similar to real life, where you are only exposed to certain areas of it.

Moreover, the video is in black and white, much like the original video by 'Nas' (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5PnuIRnJW8&ob=av2e)  - this is a choice that I definitely believe works well since it gives it an old, gritty, street feel to it which strongly matches the theme of the video, the lyrics and the clothing worn by the people seen within the video.

Also, I like the scene setting idea at the start of the video after the tape begins to play because it produces an immediate atmosphere and also establishes different places which links directly to the title, 'The World is Yours' because it invites you to look at different areas in the world, or in this case, the street.

Furthermore, I like how the editors have purposefully linked the lyrics to what we see on screen, for example, when we hear the lyric; 'writing in my book of rhymes' the camera appears to hover above lyrics that have been written down onto paper - this form of illustration, I believe works excellently in this particular video.

Lastly, my favourite aspects to this video are the vast amount of shot types and angles they have chosen to incorporate, for example, we see a low angle shot at 0.49 which makes the main artist look bigger and thus more powerful, this is a direct connection to the title because the illusion of the artist looking powerful indicates that the world is his. We see a lot of mid-shots/middle shots of the artist which allows the audience to see what he has to say as well as how he feels, this is shown through his body language and facial expressions. In addition, there are many close up shots of different people's faces which illustrates how everyone in the world is different and what the world has, is offered to everyone.