>The Completed Music Video: In November 2013, "Weird Al" Yankovic asked me to direct an animated video for "Word Crimes", a parody of Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" about the supposed abuse of proper language.
>The result of 500 hours of work in After Effects, Photoshop, Illustrator and Premiere goes by in 3 minutes, 44 seconds. I hope you find each one of them entertaining.
>This storyboard-in-motion took about 100 hours. Al signed off on this design on January 25th, 2014, only 3 weeks after he gave me his homemade "demo" for Word Crimes, which you can hear on the animatic soundtrack.
>If you watch very closely, you might notice a gag or two that didn't make it through to final animation or some very subtle changes in the lyrics.
When I first met with Al about this project, I was quick to point out that linguists would disagree with about a third of the "advice" he's giving out. His immediate reply was "WELL THEY'RE WRONG"--really loudly in the "Weird Al" character voice.
In my mind the joke is that the song's narrator is a know-it-all character that shouldn't be taken entirely seriously. But on the other hand, a lot of educators have contacted me to tell me they use the song as a learning tool.
DonHopkins on April 9, 2020 | prev | next [–]
Jarrett Heather is the artist behind Weird Al's "Word Crimes" video released in 2014 (at 48.4 million views now).
"Word Crimes" is Weird Al's spot-on parody of Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" with T.I. and Pharrell Williams. I think Weird Al's version is better and more educational than the original -- smart and catchy like a modern Schoolhouse Rock.
Weird Al contacted Jarrett Heather after being impressed by "Shop Vac", his previous work with kinetic text (typographic animation), which he made using animation tools like AfterEffects.
This page on Jarrett Heather's web site tells the story and shows the art and technology behind the "Word Crimes" video. He's also published the Animatic storyboard-in-motion that took about 100 hours, to Weird Al's original home-made demo of the song! It's fascinating to compare them, and see how their ideas evolved from storyboard to final video.
>The Completed Music Video: In November 2013, "Weird Al" Yankovic asked me to direct an animated video for "Word Crimes", a parody of Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" about the supposed abuse of proper language.
>The result of 500 hours of work in After Effects, Photoshop, Illustrator and Premiere goes by in 3 minutes, 44 seconds. I hope you find each one of them entertaining.
>This storyboard-in-motion took about 100 hours. Al signed off on this design on January 25th, 2014, only 3 weeks after he gave me his homemade "demo" for Word Crimes, which you can hear on the animatic soundtrack.
>If you watch very closely, you might notice a gag or two that didn't make it through to final animation or some very subtle changes in the lyrics.
Jarrett originally designed the Live Journal logo back in 2000 or so, and parodied it in the video, with a broken pencil tip.
Here's a great "Local Boy Makes Good" article and TV interview about Jarrett Heather from around the time the video came out, that was previously posted to HN -- I love his down-to-earth advice:
Elk Grove animator thrives as ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic’s partner in ‘Word Crimes’:
"draws" instead of "drawers", "brought" instead of "bought", "aircrafts", "softwares", and "could care less" can also DIAGF.