Let's Tik-Talk About It

It feels a bit silly posting essentially “Hey, here are some cool TikToks I saw— probably wasn’t worth the brain cells I lost to hours of scrolling, but they’re neat!” yet here I am. I’ve recently collected* a few videos posted to the platform, and it seems the time has come to explain my thought process behind doing so. I’m drawn to how much character is revealed in just a few seconds of footage, and knowing I’ll have to accomplish that in my film opening, I took note:

I get that this one is mostly a joke, but something about the harsh lightning, extreme closeup, and tone development through panicky music is harrowing. I’m really drawn to dialogue-free character development, and I hope I can use some of this in my final product; it’ll likely have the most direct influence in storyboarding/shot composition, like I'm playing a zero-stakes game of “how much information can I pack in to the tightest possible closeup?”

The combination of framing and movement on this one was just stellar, creating a distance between the viewer and the character via a literal barrier. For the sake of a TikTok, the creator was probably just trying to create a cool-looking video, but the symbolism of framing a character this way is multitudinous. 1) We see them in fractured bits and pieces, as though that’s how the character’s personality functions (not quite self-assured/all-together), 2) it almost evokes the sense of spying, as if this could be shot from the POV of an unwanted observer trying to be covert, which could set up some spooky conflict, 3) the relief of finally seeing the character in an unobstructed closeup is far more impactful than if they’d been totally visible from the start. This storytelling through framing, movement, and (I guess set design? Is the gate mise-en-scene?) is something I hope to incorporate in our piece. Again, dialogue-free development. How much information can we express through visual storytelling alone? Additionally, it’s a case study for props: a yo-yo is incredibly expressive, the type/size/presence of bag can reveal a ton about a character’s immediate setting (briefcase vs. backpack vs. tote bag vs. lumpy duffle), and the headphones introduce the possibility of playing with sound perspective (e.g., if the character were to remove their headphones and the music was suddenly much quieter, it goes from non-diegetic background to diegetic, POV, and directly tied to character choice. I’d LOVE to put a character in headphones, just to be able to have some fun in this area.)

This one is the most simplistic, but also probably the most emotional. It’s mise-en-scene all the way down-- the lighting and music and meticulously thought-out acting choices (e.g., when to let the tear fall?) is just stellar. Not to toot my group’s horn, but it does sort of remind me of what we accomplished for some clips of the music video project. Like the previous video, I’ll try to keep this example on the front burner when I'm putting together visuals and deciding how to develop character. Projected colors are just such an effective externalization of a character’s inner workings, and I’d be hard-pressed not to overthink the color choices in our project.

Scratch that: there’s no way to overthink mise-en-scene. Every choice does matter, so it’s not silly to spend a ton of time on that.

P.S.: The background song in Video 2, “Who’s Sorry Now” by Connie Francis, has me thinking about the kind of music I’d like to use in my piece. Because you know what’s definitely copyright-free? Things in the public domain. Maybe once I have my character/tone down, I can poke around the oldies to see if one fits.

*On TikTok, one of the sharing options is “Add to Favorites,” and from there, users can categorize saved Favorites into named collections. These three are from my folder called "film"