Harold Williams - also know as HYPE Williams, due to his hyperactive nature as a child
Born: July 1970 (age 41)
Queens, New York, US
Occupation: Film director, music video director, screenwriter - since 1991 till present.
Graduated from Andrew Jackson High school of Art and Music in 1987. He grew up wanting to be a painter, yet not the traditional sort of Art - He wanted to be working towards the graffiti work.
Hypes first big break came from when he began working with Classic Concepts Video Production. But in 1983 he started his own production named 'Big Dog Films'
Other Work
He directed his first feature film named 'Belly' in 1988. He filmed it in New York as an urban drama which stars rappers DMX, Nas and the R&B singer from TLC, who all feature in his music videos which could be an easier option for both him and the artists as it could promote their work and also a lower budget for Williams.
He is also a photographer in which he shot the photographs of Kim Kardashian in the December 2007 issue of Playboy magazine.
He has also been a script writer - he wrote the Kanye Wests 'Runaway' film which was a short 35 minute film directed by Kanye West which included a compilation of songs from Wests album.
Key artists Hype Williams works with
He created a number of music videos for artists such as, The Notorious B.I.G, LL Cool J, Missy Elliott, Busta Rhymes, Kelis, Jay Z, Kanye West, Christina Aguilera, Beyonce, and many more. Judging from this set of artists, we can tell that Williams only seems to work with the more R&B, Hip Hop, Rap artists which comes out in the style of his music videos.
Style
Looking through many of Hype Williams music videos he has produced, I can see that he doesn't use any sort of narrative or performance, it is literally just the artist standing/dancing there and singing to the camera. But as his artists are mainly R&B, and not rock/metal genre, they don't tend to show a performance, as they are mainly there to promote their image which is normally attractive to make their music more successful as a whole. Whereas in bands/rock music, the camera normally shows the artists with them playing their instruments/equipment to really show off their skills.
His overall typical look uses a lot of colour, which occurs throughout his videos he has produced. For example, in his music video of Kayne West - 'Gold Digger' and Beyonce - 'Video Phone' has a solid colour background with a softer colour being shown in the centre of the background which gives a fading and merging together effect. This makes the artist stand out in the centre of the screen with them normally wearing brightly coloured clothes aswell.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vwNcNOTVzY
One of Hypes main motif throughout his music videos is placing shots in regular widescreen ratio, with the two bars that are split at the top and bottom. For example, this is used in Beyonce - 'Check on it,' Pharrell - 'Give it to me,' Rihanna and Kayne West - 'All of the Lights' and Neyo - 'So sick.' In some of these videos where he splits the screen to make two bars, he often uses the bars to represent the main motif in the video. For example, in Neyo's - so sick, he has mountains constantly then himself in the middle. Also uses this effect in LL Cool J - Freeze video, to contradict the lyrics by having roaring fire in the bars to contrast the song title with what is happening on the screen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1dUDzBdnmI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHHT7dTmw8U
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