Channing Tatum’s Lip Sync Battle performance recently splashed news feeds for a couple days. As a quick synopsis: Channing Tatum dressed up as Beyonce, danced as Beyonce, and tried to sing as Beyonce, but isn’t Beyonce… nor is the track played his. But Tatum used the public’s paradigm of his being a masculine sex symbol to remix Beyonce’s song, the original media object, and it’s hilarious. The humor is the intention of the remix by Tatum to win the  competition: Lip Sync Battle, but the level of hilarity could not be achieved without Tatum’s juxtaposition of what the public expects of his being a masculine sex symbol in his emulation of Beyonce’s music video. It adds shock. Joe Sixpack from down the street would not have garnered as much public attention for the performance simply because he does not have the privilege of being a media star. Nobody would know who he is or what to expect from him. For all they know this could be Joe Sixpack’s hobby of dressing as Beyonce and shaking his shoulders. Tatum leverages his privilege in Beyonce’s choreography as if he has taken two original art pieces, the second being his public image, and made them into something new. A remix.

The intended audience of Beyonce’s original music video was obviously as many patrons to the music industry as possible, but more importantly, the message it sought to deliver was an empowerment for women: a sort of fight song. Tatum on the other hand remixes her media piece for self-humiliation (but could it really be considered humiliating if you’re famous…?) to create humor for his audience, who is to ultimately decide his success in the competition.

“Your Grammar Sucks” is a popular YouTube series created by Jack Douglass of jacksfilms. It can be considered a remix in that the host takes comments written by many different people across the internet on various social media sites and reads them to show how grammar errors can change a sentence dramatically, along with original commentary by the host.

The comments shown in the videos are taken out of context and all contain grammatical errors which range from a simple misplacement of a letter in a word to comments written solely using special characters (such as the ampersand or dollar sign) and numbers. Most of the time this grammatical error will change the meaning of the comment from what was originally intended by the original poster. The host changes the way he reads the comment in a way such that it further alters the meaning of the comment to either emphasize the importance of correct grammar or to increase the entertainment value.

Some comments have parts cut out so as to focus only on the parts of it that are grammatically wrong and contain necessary context. This is done to keep the focus of the video more on the grammar side of the comment as opposed to what the commenter was talking about.

The remix of these comments changes the audience from what may have been originally intended. The original source’s audience was intended to be the people who would have normally seen their posts and comments (such as close friends and family) on whatever social media site it was originally posted on, while the remixes are intended for those who find grammar mistakes comical, predominantly the young adult and teenage demographics.

These videos are very popular across YouTube. This popularity has driven Jack to create a number of spin-offs of the series based on the original format such as rap songs and skits. Hopefully, this popularity has spurred a decrease in the number of simple grammatical errors posted across the internet.

“Dare to Believe” by Boyce Avenue can be considered a remix in the sense that it is an original composition that uses video taken from various news networks, and stitches them together to create a music video.

The video footage taken from the news networks are from various tragedies or disasters that have occurred.  The video doesn’t essentially change the meaning of the remixed content, but rather strengthens it to intensify the feeling that the viewer may have felt seeing the original footage unaltered.  However, at the same time it is possible that the original content that is laid over the original footage could instill a sense of hope rather than a feeling of desperation.

The footage is cut out at various points in length.  This is done to show the vast amount of tragedy that has occurred in such a short amount of time.  In addition to being cut out in length the content is missing audio at certain points throughout the video so that the creator can overlay their own message over the footage.  The creator does incorporate the original audio from the footage into the newly made music video.  This works well with the message that both creations are trying to instill in the viewer.

The remix of the footage does introduce the original content to a new demographic and audience than may have been originally intended.  Where as the news network footage may have been intended for middle-aged and older audiences the new content created from the footage seems to be aimed more towards young adult and teenage populous.

Though many may look at this creation as just another song it is easy to see that there is an underlying message that is intended to be understood by the viewer.  This is remix is done well in both the addition of new content laid over top the original footage.

Beyoncé’s ***Flawless is an example of “remix” done right. She uses samples from two different sources, both removed from her current audience, and presents them in a way that is not only appealing from an entertainment stand point but also as a modern feminist anthem. This particular example of remix  is also compelling as Lessig brings ups the different ways quotes are cited across varying media. Beyoncé uses the typical “ft.” title to reference her quotation of Adichie’s speech within the song. What’s interesting is there’s no formal acknowledgement of the Star Search clip also used, again begging the question when and where citation is important an appropriate in different forms of media.

The insertion of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s speech into Beyoncé’s ***Flawless brings a new energy not only into Beyonce’s work, but also into Adichie’s work and to feminism itself.

For Beyoncé, her song evolves into one that extends beyond personal empowerment, but also one of female empowerment. This idea lends itself to the song Pretty Hurts, also on the album. It links the song to feminist ideas of the negative impacts of viewing women in a superficial light. By association, Beyoncé herself becomes a feminist icon. The sampling of Adichie’s speech becomes not only an artistic choice but also a profitable one for Beyoncé in a time when feminism and being feminist is popularized.

In the song, Adichie’s message is cut up, piecing together various “highlights”. As a result, the message of a thirty minute TED talk becomes condensed and palatable to Beyonce’s younger demographic. Adichie and feminism are brought forward in front of an audience that might otherwise be ignorant to what seem like a dry, scholarly and dated topic.

Now, while Adichie’s speech in ***Flawless brings new energy to the aforementioned areas, the sampling of Beyoncé’s stint on Star Search seems to rework history. What might have previously been seen as a failing, her group lost, is now seen as a triumph. Pairing her loss with lyrics that are empowered and demand respect send a clear message: I came out on top.

The early roots of remising began in the 70s when nightclubs become more popular in modern culture. DJ’s started with original disco songs and began adding loops and more eclectic sounds to encourage people to continue dancing at the club. Remixing has come a long way since and is more popular in this day and age than it was in the 70s.

When choosing a form of remixed media, I decided to go with the artist Girl Talk, which was acquired from YouTube, and his song “Let it Out”, in particular. Girl Talk is known for taking a total mashup of difference songs from different genres and mixing them together in a way that ends with a sound-pleasing song. “Let it Out” has over 20 songs that are sampled throughout, mixing songs like “Can I Get A…” by Jay-Z ft. Amil and Ja Rule and “Tenderness” by General Rule. Both songs come from different decades and have completely separate meanings, yet Girl Talk mashes them in a way that allows for a differed meaning. With one coming from the 80s, during a time of 80s pop overload and another coming from the 90s, a time of street rap, these songs were made to cater to a certain type of audience. Together, though, the catered group of people widens to an entirely different type of person who enjoys fast-paced and upbeat dancing.

“Let it Out” is a very cut down version of many of the original songs that are sampled throughout. Most songs are sampled from the beginning of the song but never make it all the way through or anywhere near the end. And since the song uses over 20 different samples of songs, no song or lyric is really ever repeated causing a long continuation of similar sounding, yet completely different songs and lyrics.

Girl Talk, Greg Gillis in particular, is somewhat the epitome of remix culture and what can be done with a handful of songs and proper programming.

The original video was around fifteen minutes, but this video was cut to only a minute and forty seconds. It cuts out many of the boring, uninteresting sections and contains only parts where the player receives points and does not repeat any parts of the original video. Rather than just being a recorded gameplay, the editor(BakersTuts) uses many programs to enhance the video.

For the motion tracking at the beginning and end, he used Boujou for the cinematics. The file that had been motion tracked, was then imported into Cinema 4D. In Cinema 4D, the 3D text was created as well as the shadows on the ground.

The second program used was Adobe After Effects. Firstly, he used this program for making the color correction by adjusting the brightness and contrast and a plug-in called Magic Bullet looks. Secondly, at about :13 he uses another plugin called twitch. This allows for a RGB split allowing to create a nice effect which was used throughout the video many times. Thirdly, flares were also added such as at :23. Fourthly, twixtor is used many times. Twixtor allows the editor to slow a section of the video down without dropping the frame rate allowing for a smoother slow motion video. Lastly, Baker used the pan/crop tool many times. This allows for the the editor to scale the video creating what many call a “pump” effect. Though subtle, is is used many more times than any other effects throughout the video.

Due to how different this video is from the original, it is not intended for the same audience. Some people that watch, look for new ideas on how to improve their own editing style. Now rather then being a lengthy video, people can now watch it in a more entertaining way. There are now effects added as well as music.

A good example of a remix would be Garfield Minus Garfield. The web series (at garfieldminusgarfield.net) consists of classic comic strips that digitally remove the eponymous character, leaving only Jon Arbuckle. The original series drew much of its humor from the interactions between Jon and Garfield. Usually, the dialogue would consist of Garfield being chided by his owner, or by the cat getting in a few quips at the expense of Jon. It creates a light, easily-relatable, safe sense of comedy, which is predictable and warm without being too offensive.

By removing Jon Arbuckle though, the comics take on a much different tone. Instead of being playful, they take on a less playful, benign quality and alter their message to the reader. Jon is no longer speaking to the cat, but either wondering aloud about his own thoughts and feelings, or talking to himself about his own actions at the time. The interesting aspects of the remix come from the juxtaposition between what Garfield is known to be versus what the comics do in their altered form. They also offer commentary on feelings, thoughts, and emotions that were never addressed in the official comic strip by Jim Davis, the creator.

In one particular strip (posted below…Click for a larger version.) Jon proclaims that he is going to “adopt a more positive attitude on life.” His expression, wide-eyed, happy, and animated, is changed in the second panel to a gloomy frown.  In the third panel, his mouth is slightly agape, as he stares into empty space. The dialogue normally spoken to Garfield is removed, so Jon is completely alone and isolated with his thoughts.

These themes are not something ever addressed in the original comic and open the work up to different critiques by different audiences. Not only are the works now available in a digital format, but with added depth, people interested in reader deeper can do so. It offers an online audience the ability to consume the comics with a different goal, but ultimately recycles the same body of work used in print at an earlier time.