Michael Bay - What is Bayhem?
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN recommends it as a short, well-produced and eye-opening piece of film analysis.
What it is
An Every Frame a Painting video essay on Michael Bay's style, 'Bayhem', covering his camera movement, composition, color and editing. It argues that even if you dislike his films, they teach something about visual perception.
Recommended by 3 HN commenters across 3 different months, 2015 to 2025.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec wmeredith · 2015-02 · on “New Jurassic World Trailer Hides Improved CGI in Plain Sight”
Everything on screen matters. Modern Cinema is a HIGHLY evolved art form. If you have any interest in this at all, YouTube user Every Frame A Painting publishes, short, easily digestible, and well-produced YouTube videos about this stuff that are eye-opening. Here are a few of my favorites: Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy: [LINK] The Silence of the Lambs - Who Wins the Scene? [LINK] Michael Bay - What is Bayhem? [this video]
Recommends skepticaldrunk · 2017-06 · on “David Goyer and Josh Friedman Adapting Isaac Asimov's Foundation for TV”
That's fair, but being able to understand and direct the popular zeitgeist, be it by instinct or intellect, is a very formidable gift indeed. It's something almost none of us can do (certainly myself included), and those who can will always have detractors. I don't see success as a zero sum game, so I'm happy for people who are successful, even if I wish I had their insight. Total aside, you should check this out when you have time, pretty interesting analysis: [this video]
Recommends ripe · 2025-05 · on “Sneakers (1992) – 4K makeover sourced from the original camera negative”
> Some of the recent Michael Bay movies are so aggressive when it comes to cuts An excellent episode of Every Frame A Painting is "Michael Bay --- What is Bayhem?" It explains in detail in what way those particular movies are poorly made. [this video]
Cites vanderZwan · 2017-11 · on ““One Damn Slide After Another”: PowerPoint at Every Occasion for Speech (2016)”
I think the main issue with Prezi-style presentations is that it demands too much skill to use properly. A better interface with sensible defaults and much less emphasis on wow-factor would help a lot here. Normal powerpoint "only" requires a basic awareness of composition and narrative coherence, which already is too much to ask in practice. To make good Prezi presentation you need to have the skills of a cinematographer/editor. Specifically, the skill of continuity editing[0] so your audience can follow what is going on. What we want is the calm, easy to read compositions of, say, Yasujirō Ozu or Wes Anderson, and Akira Kurasowa's sense of movement[1][2]. Instead everyone uses it in a way
Cites Balgair · 2017-12 · on “Racing for Realism”
I mean, complaining about the color realism of a film with gigantic monster dinosaurs (whose coloration we may never know to begin with) seems a bit silly. Movies are not documentaries. I'd buy in a bit more for things like the BBC's 'Planet Earth' needing color realism, but even then it's ok to dramatize things. Every Frame a Painting goes over Michael Bay's work and includes some color content he uses and WHY: [this video]