Visual Rhetoric Rewrite

0:00-0:05

We first see an African American man and what seems to be his daughter or someone to play the part of his daughter. I can tell that she is his daughter from the way that he is lifting her in the air. The little girl seems to be about 4 or 5 years old. She is wearing a yellow long-sleeve shirt, gray leggings, and sneakers. The father is wearing a white tee shirt and blue jeans. It looks like they are in some kind of video recording studio. The room is all white and the only contrast against the color is the father and his daughter. He is spinning his daughter around in the air. He is holding her under her armpits. They both seem to be very happy because they are smiling.A black microphone makes its way into the scene through the first 5 seconds. At this point we realize that this video is completely staged. We have to wonder if this really his daughter. We wonder many things like does he act like this in real life, or is he just following the stage directions? A bit of text pops up on the screen that shows the man’s name and profession “Keenan Allen. Wide Receiver, Los Angeles Chargers.” At this point I begin to wonder what the point of this video is and why they chose Keenan Allen to be in this video. Is it to show that if even a busy man like Keenan Allen has time to spend with his daughter, you should too?

0:06-0:10

The scene switches to Keenan Allen and a little boy. The boy is very young, maybe about a year old. The little boy is wearing a blue shirt with light khaki shorts and no shoes. Keenan is holding this little boy. Based on the way that he is holding him very closely and bouncing him around, I am going to draw the conclusion that this is his son. Keenan was dancing with his son and they both seemed to be pretty content. Keenan was smiling while his son was making what I would consider to be happy baby faces, not crying. The baby also looks to be very comfortable with Keenan, which also leads me to believe that Keenan is his father and they have a good relationship.

0:11-0:13

The scene switches to just Keenan’s fingers playing piano and some of his torso. I can tell that it is Keenan still based off of the clothes he is wearing and the tattoos on his arms. He seems to be pretty good at playing piano. His fingers look like they are all hitting the right notes, but I am not too sure because I have the video muted. I see a blur of someone or something to his left side. I see yellow so I am wondering if it is his daughter. I wonder if he is playing piano for his kids or to display his talents/interests?

0:14-0:16

The frame pans out and now we can see that Keenan is playing for his kids. He has one daughter on one side of him, leaned up against him. She is wearing a gray short sleeve shirt. She seems to be about 2 or 3 years old. I cannot tell her emotion too well because I don’t really see her face, but she seems to be content. I can also see the blur of someone else right next to them. I am assuming that the other person is his son. All three of them are sitting on the bench next to the piano. His other daughter in yellow is playing on her drum set. The drum set is clearly child sized because it is perfect size for his daughter. She seems to be very excited based on the way that she is banging on the drums. It looks like they have their own mini family band formed. We also now have a fuller view of the piano. It is made out of wood and it is painted either dark brown or black. The back of the piano is open and the wood is unpainted. We can also now see that Keenan has blue sneakers on.

0:17-0:19

The next scene is of the inner workings of the piano while someone (probably still Kennan) is playing it. There is a great contrast between the light colored inner workings of the piano and the dark colored outside. The piano is shiny and you can see some form of reflection on it. This is a truly beautiful scene, maybe trying to represent the beauty in the relationship between Keenan and his children or maybe just trying to take up time in the video to make more money on YouTube. If they were trying t represent the beauty it would be through all of the parts of the piano working together to make a beautiful sound, like how Keenan and his family together is beautiful.

0:20-0:26

The last bit of the scene with Allen is him and his daughter dancing. She is on the standing on the floor and he is holding her hands. They are jumping around and dancing. They still look very happy. As they were dancing, the director’s clapperboard moves into the scene as the director shuts it to signify the end of the scene. When the focus was on the clapperboard, Keenan and his daughter dancing in the background became blurry, but for the last couple seconds of the scene, the dancing became clear again when the clapperboard exited the scene. At this point we are once again reminded that this entire interaction was staged. Although the relationship between Keenan and his “children” seemed to be genuine, we can never really know the truth because we know that the whole video was staged. Is he really like that in real life, or is it just for the video?

0:27-0:37

The last bit of the clip shows a black screen with “Make a Moment” and “#DanceLikeADad.” It is now made clear that the point of the video is father involvement in the life of their children. They want fathers to spend time with their children. The director used a lot of ethos and pathos to get their point across. The director used ethos by getting Keenan Allen to be in the video and promote the concept of fatherhood involvement. Many people view Keenan Allen as a role model and would take the message to heart if they heard it from Keenan Allen. Pathos was also widely used because display of emotion was apparent all throughout the video. The smiling and laughing displays the idea that if you spend time with your kids, maybe you would be happy too. At the bottom of the screen there is a link to a website fatherhood.gov and when I looked it up, it seems to be a bunch of resources on how to be a better father. Also on the bottom of the screen there are a list of logos which could have either been involved with the production the video or are just sponsors.

After watching the entirety of this video, I have come to the conclusion that it was ineffective at conveying the message. We are left to wonder if the interactions between Keenan and his children, if they really even are his children, are genuine. Especially from seeing the microphone and the clapperboard come in the scene, I get the reminder that all of this could simply be staged. I could be led to believe something that is not reality. Although the video seemed to be upbeat and positive, I don’t think that this was the best way to convey their message. Maybe if they made a video of recording fathers and daughters out in public and had a message saying something like “these are all true interactions” it would have been more effective. If I were able to evaluate the sound behind the video, I may have a different feeling about it, but the video alone does not make a strong enough argument.