POSSIBLE INFLUENCES 3: Playing with focus

From David Bowie's 2013 penultimate album The Next Day, when he went into a huge creative spiral of releasing videos.



So cross-cut between two running scenes, a sharp-focused narrative and a soft-focused performative, or vice versa. 

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Muse's Dead Inside

If the element of the mies-en-scene that goes into sharp focus is shocking, a real eye-catcher for the audience.

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Maybe also keep the shot going a second or two longer. Or have them start singing.

To have a shot completely in shallow focus can look careless if not careful, but as is used here it can be a very good form of narrative enigma


*Insert GIF of shallow focus*

Depeche Mode's Goodbye

Also the beginning of this Live Studio Session video of Goodbye 

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In this video when Dave Gahan is in close-up there are multiple uses of shallow focus, breaking with the convention of having the lead singer in full sharp focus.

THE CRANBERRIES

From 0'27 to 0'28, the camera shifts focus from sharp to shallow, on black and white.