If you are an enthusiast of pop culture, you probably should have already wondered how it would be to live some adventures in Narnia, to fight for the universe’s balance aside from the Avengers, or flying with the Millenium Falcon in a galaxy far far away. And, even after many years past the requirable age, a doubt still comes to your mind: where is my Hogwarts letter, anyways?
Well, in this context we have people like Nonô Franco (@nonofranco), a 19 year old pop culture enthusiast who have always imagined that, and decided to go even further in this universe.
- Who is Nonô Franco?
-
Manoella Franco is known in social media as Nonô Franco, and is a design student who joined Tik Tok when it was still the good old Musical.ly, back in 2016. She got really popular there specially in 2020 by creating videos called “POVs”, which means point of view.
A POV is basically a fictional video, produced with a specific narrative about any subject. It can be something more reasonable, from our routine, a story that involves our real lives but in a dystopian reality, or something that relates to something apart from us – a fictional world from a movie or TV series, for example.
That is what Nonô does in her videos: she chooses a context from famous productions, such as Harry Potter, Star Wars, Teen Wolf, Narnia, Maze Runner and many Marvel ones, and produces a Tik Tok video with a digital scenario, editing it to make people feel like she is really interacting with the characters, like a part of the scene.
To know more about this universe of creating short stories on Tik Tok, we talked with Nonô about her process of creating videos, how this idea came out, what are her inspirations and much more. Check out below the interview!
- The POVs weren’t always a trend on Tik Tok. What inspired you to do this kind of video, where your first ideas came from?
-
I have always loved pop culture, I was always a huge fan of Marvel, Harry Potter, everything! I used to read a lot of fanfics, and I have always imagined myself in those universes. And then the Tik Tokers of other countries, mostly after July 2020, started doing this kind of video, of you being inside a scene with your favorite characters. I found it incredible, so I did one of Harry Potter, and it was a success, became my most liked video. Then I saw it was really fun for me to do it, and fun for people to watch as well. I saw in this an opportunity to do videos that I like and that in the same time my public would love, and would help me grow. And that was what happened! I used to do them in a very simple way, inside my room, and later on I started investing, getting better with the edition, backgrounds, to turn everything more real.
- How is your creative process for these videos? How long does it take to produce one, and where do you record them?
-
I can tell you that my creative process comes in many different ways, but always in the dawn. I work with creativity, cause I study design at college, so many ideas come from my head, but others don’t. I inspire myself a lot on people that make the same content as me on Tik Tok, on the foreigners that started this trend in july 2020, and surely in brazilian content creators too. I see a video and I think “well, I liked it, how can I do it now in my own way, how can I reformulate it?”. Because I always get the inspiration, but I never do the same videos. And when I am out of ideias, I watch some movies and think about where I could fit in. As soon as the video idea is ready, I script everything on my phone notes.
I would say that it [the time of production] varies, but it takes on average two hours. Until it gets all ready to post, even with the filters I must use to edit, it is basically that. I record them in my room, I put a green fabric on my wardrobe, fix them with clothespins and record with my ring light.
Probably one of Nonô’s most famous series of videos is the one where she pretends to be a grown up Morgan Stark, Tony Stark’s daughter, that showed up only as a child during Avengers:Endgame. In this context, Nonô is Morgan already as a teenager in a world where her dad is still alive, so she helps Tony with his missions, takes part in Avengers discussions and, especially, develops a very close friendship to Peter Parker (Tom Holland), exploring even a romantical side of their relationship. Nonô makes videos about Morgan and Peter, and also about her and Tom, giving two sides of narratives: one, more related to the Marvel universe, and another in a more personal view connected to the actor itself.
To get videos of Tom in many different angles, Nonô says that it requires a work of searching deeply these videos on his social media and in his friends social media as well: I follow Tom since 2015, when he had 500k followers on Instagram, and today he has 41 million. As a crazy fan, I have a memory about all the stories he has already posted, I remember everything well and I follow his friends too. This is really important for POVs content creators. Usually, on videos for POVs, you’re the one who should be recording the person, so follow the friends, cause there are videos that they filmed Tom and then it will work for your video.
- Is there any video that has already gone wrong, or that a funny story took part while you recorded it?
-
There are always some videos that don’t work, and in this case I just don’t post them or try to redo it in another way. By the way, there is a video about Wanda that I just couldn’t get it right. I didn’t like the result, these little mistakes always happen. About a funny story, I think the funniest one was when I broke my parent’s paint-brush! It was inside a bowl with glue, and I tried to pull it out to do a Morgan Stark thing and it broke. It happens!
- Is there any movie, series or character from pop culture that you still would like to make a POV or other video about?
-
I would enjoy a lot doing a Hunger Games POV, it is a saga that I like a lot. I didn’t read the books but I watched all the movies, so it is already on my plans, including because people ask me a lot. I want it to be really thematic, truly inside the movie, like all my other videos, with clothing characterization. I also like the idea of making one about The Lord of The Rings, I watched this when I was little so I need to rewatch it first. I guess it fits well on my style of favorite saga.
- If one day you could meet Tom Holland, what would you say to him? Would you mention your videos?
-
A lot of people ask me that and I never know how to answer! I don’t know how I would act, probably I would be really ashamed meeting him. I am a very outgoing person, but I guess I would feel shy talking to him. If I would show him some of my videos, I would show him one where I am Morgan, like one with the Science Fair, something with Peter. Because those ones where I make like a couple with him, that Snapchat trends, I am ashamed. I mean, yes, I am very proud of my videos, but to show him I would choose one about Morgan.
And if you got inspired by Nonô’s work, and would like to try doing this kind of content for Tik Tok but don’t know how, she has a message for you: I leave here my encouragement. Record it, because it is really nice to record, you feel close to your favorite characters. You do not need to be 100% professional, that perfect thing, with backgrounds. I started with nothing, but I found it really great and people loved it. Just do it in your own way, and people are gonna love it too!
—————————————————————–
The article above was edited by Gabriela Sartorato.
Liked this type of content? Check Her Campus Casper Libero home page for more!