John Legend has been a good friend to Google, starring in their Oscars ad for the Google Assistant support for Nest and playing at their CES 2018 party. And now the latest music video from the r&b superstar is not just a fun, musical journey but it is also a 3-minute advertisement for the latest flagship device from the tech giant. That’s because the official music video of A Good Night was shot “entirely on Google Pixel 2”.
The music video’s narrative is pretty simple: a woman finds the man of her dreams in a dance club (with Legend himself playing the DJ) after literally swiping away several date possibilities and they eventually, spoiler alert, get married and have a wedding reception dance party. But what makes the video stand out is that it was shot using the video capabilities of the Pixel 2. Legend says they were fascinated with the idea of using smartphones for a big budget music video and called the Pixel camera “amazing”.
While most music videos are shot using expensive high-end cameras and equipment, this one used (the also expensive) Pixel 2 cameras all throughout, whether handheld or placed on giant steadicam rigs. They also used a third-party camera app to be able to capture some of the shots and effects they wanted (which Google should probably adapt later on if they want to be updated). Legend believes that smartphones and other new technologies make it easier for artists and creators to not just tell their story but also make it “more accessible and democratized.”
We’ve had short films and full-length films created on smartphones, so why not music videos? We may see the emergence of more of these using not just Pixel 2 but other Android devices that are pushing their smartphone cameras to the limit.
SOURCE: Google
