It's something we all want to make, isn't it? We've grown up with them, Music videos. The flash, the pomp, the sex appeal and the outright coolness of a music video star. It's one of the things that draws us to making music, that desire for recognition. Sure it's easy to say we just make music for ourselves, but lets be honest. We make music because we want people to like it, and vicariously us.
The problem is that an indie band just doesn't have the money to put out a real awesome video. Or at least that's what most people believe.
With the proliferation of cheap and functional video editing software the production part isn't a real problem anymore. Having a camera that can connect to your computer isn't a big deal anymore either. If you wanted to, you could shoot a music video with a phone. It wouldn't look professional, but anything you shoot at home most likely wont anyway. Unless you happen to know a film student. In that case you really have no excuse.
So lets be honest, the only thing limiting anyone from doing a music video these days, is the imagination and guts to make one. It's not like there's a lack of places to put them. MySpace and YouTube come to mind readily.
So I guess you're wondering where you should start. Well, you can start by listening to your songs and deciding which would make a good video. Once you know which song you want to work with, listen to the song and think about what would make an appropriate video for it.
If you do folk songs, getting some people together around a campfire and doing the song would work just fine. I did a video for a song called god is a dom in my basement with a webcam that a friend was holding. We set up some props and I just did some weird stuff with them. It looks silly, cheesy and the editing is horrible, but it is still a music video.
Well I hope you've learned that there are no excuses for not making videos for your music. They don't need to be professional. The Whole point of a Music video, is for your audience to see you, to experience your vision. So what are you waiting for? Go out and make something cool.