Vocaloid Fanmade Promotion Video, which is commonly abbreviated to Fanmade PV,is a term often used in Japanese and it is what is called music video(MV), music clip or video clip in English. They can be considered similar to MAD/AMV (movie anime dojinshi/anime music video) works, and some PVs even claim to be these.
Concept
Pvs are short film or videos made by fans of the vocaloid original work, not by the original creator, and accompanying of the work sung by vocaloid (including cover). Various vocaloid fanmade PVs have been made and uploaded on video-sharing sites, such as Nico Nico Douga or Youtube, to support original works/videos/songs from which they derived. Most vocaloid fanmade PV creators use CG works, their own hand writing pictures, photographs or live-action films to create them. As relatively few PVs are completely animated, the false etymology of "picture video" has entered some parts of the English-speaking fandom.
Since vocaloid fanmade PVs are offsprings of the original works/videos/songs which are often called 本家(honke/the original) in Japanese, they are regarded as a kind of derivations of those originals just like fanfiction.[1][2]
Use of PVs
Advantages
Vocaloid fanmade PVs can make the original works more attractive with their renderings and arts, and also they can make a much wider audience aware of the originals. The most viewed vocaloid fanmade PV on Nico nico video is 「3DみくみくPV♪(3D Miku Miku PV)」Nico Video broadcast YouTube broadcast which accompanies of 「みくみくにしてあげる♪(Miku Miku ni Shite Ageru)」 sung by Miku Hatsune. It was viewed more than 2,330,000 times as of May 30, 2010.
In Japan, they are often made with authorisation or commission of the original creator and/or groups. It is not uncommon for groups, or circles, to include a illustrator or PV maker to help make PVs. This is due to the more organised and professional level of the overall VOCALOID producer scene in Japan as many are indie, amateur or otherwise student musicians. The illustrator and animator scene is often absence from overseas fandom. Illustrators or animators of PVS are often paid or receive royalties from their work.
Some Vocaloid songs have become famous for their PVs and are often associated with them, with cosplayers and artworks being made based on the attire of characters within them. In addition due to the support of Crypton Future Media, Inc.s KARENT and Piapro website, a number of PVs have had figurines based off of these PVs. Project Diva has also included modules based on the designs of the characters.
Below is an example of how a PV has lead to multiple types of tie-in promotions.
When it comes to searching for songs overseas fans have often recalled odd details about the PV and that has led them to be useful in quickly identifying forgotten songs. So PVs have an advantage of making a song memorable to viewers.
Negative Side effects
While those PVs can make the original works more popular, it must be noted that what vocaloid fanmade PVs show are not always faithful to the original works/videos/songs or the original authors’ intents, for they are created with each fanmade PV creator’s own intention.
This is not Hatsune Miku despite having a vague resemblance to her and the voicebank being used for the related song. This is "Black★Rock Shooter" from the song of the same name
Some PV creators are misinterpretations of the original works and feature unrelated topics. Quite a few PV creators depict their own stories and settings which are unspecified in the original videos/songs with free interpretations and imaginations of their own. In some of those fanmade PVs, what they depict are completely different from what the songs mean is an can even be completely the opposite. Songs like ブラック★ロックシューター (Black★Rock Shooter), Corruption Garden or Secret have featured characters that have been mistaken for the Vocaloid singer even when they are their own seperate character.
Though the fact itself does not take away from the value of them, it is one of the reasons why they often invite misunderstandings among fans and make fans clash with each other over how to interpret the songs.
One such example is Secret, whose title, song and famous PMV do not match each other. The song was a plagiarised work and its title referred to its hidden status as a song on the website Nico Nico Douga with it never been labelled as the title of the song. In addition the songs meaning has never been stated. Fans have often tried to guess the meaning of the song and due to the famous PMV associated with it , the meaning has often been misinterpretation with the PMV often greatly influencing the interpretation, even though it has nothing to do with the song itself.
References
- ↑ Nico Nico Pedia - Vocaloid PV (Japanese)
- ↑ VFCA Guidelines for Secondary Use