Here is an exert from an interview with Chris Cunningham talking about the pre-visualisation of his music videos. He talked about the pre-storyboarding stage of making a 'graph chart' of the music track.
QUESTION: Do you have the edit pre-constructed in your head before filming?
Chris Cunningham:
"Pretty much. I'd say it ends up that 60% are shots that are designed to go in one specific place and won't go anywhere else. But the other 40% are accidents or tangents you go off on. That ratio is determined by the limited amount of time you have. I'm not sure I'd change that because you have to be surprised by stuff, else it's no fun."
"So much you are going to have to do (in the edit) is already laid down for you (in the music track)"
MUSIC VIDEO TIMELINE TASK
Using the TIMELINE SHEETS, breakdown your MUSIC TRACK into verses, chorus, instrumental parts, key phrases and sounds - (USE COLOURS to help differentiate the parts).
Once you have deconstructed the track - start to annotate the timeline explaining which part of the song is accompanied by what type of visuals.
Try to be as detailed as you can - HOWEVER - this a visualisation to help you understanding the structure of your track and video so use the template appropriately to HELP you.
Here's an example of the wonderful work of Chris Cunningham.