What better way to continue last years' vibe a la Beyonce's "Lemonade" than with the Lady Power screening and q/a! These videos prominently feature female leads, directors and feminist messages. #ladiesfirst
Pussy Riot "Straight Outta Vagina (feat. Desi Mo & Leikeli47)" Directed by Phillip R Lopez The Warning "XXI Century Blood" Directed by Abraham Marcos Ell "Heaven" Directed by Christopher Owings Emily Bell "Godess of Destruction" DIrected by Eric Hueber A Giant Dog "Bendover" Directed by Ed Dougherty Pussy Riot "Organs" Directed by Kiev and I.M. Candy Royalle + Free Radicals "Killing Us Softly" Directed by Emilie Boyard Xy!o "Plans" Directed by Lauren Bruno STRFKR "IN THE END" Directed by Aidan Brezonick and Chris Birkmeier Alice Tan Ridley "Try A Little Tenderness" Directed by Roy Wol Emily Bell "Can't Talk Back" Directed by Bryan Poyser
The Warning "XXI Century Blood" Directed by Abraham Marcos XXI Century Blood is a reflection on modern times, technology and lost values. At the same time, it had to show the chops these three little sisters have to rock a stage every time they step up.
The band had the idea of reflecting a socio-political reality in the piece, but had to be contained because of a limited budget. I was very conscious of the limitations but wanted to fulfill that thematic idea that the lyrics have. At first, it was a daunting, just because we were on a very tight budget, but then the concept was so strong and it touched the heart of every one in the team, to the extent of them wanting to actually make it work, that we were able to pull it off.
It took way more time to shoot it because we didn't have production lights every day, so that meant that we had to be at the perfect hour for the sun to match the light from previous days and things of the like. We couldn't have the same camera every day, so matching three different cameras and codecs was a somewhat tricky and laborious, but not impossible.
VFX were a monumental task. It was just one artist in charge of the 57 shots that required some sort of fx. Roto, tracking, design, fx, 3d modeling, motion graphics, etc. Everything but color correction. A titanic effort in deed.
All in all, it was a team effort. Clearly a passion project that, in the end, we couldn't be more proud of.
ell "Heaven" Directed by Christopher Owings The two-piece band ell, calls their sound precious metal, blending sweet sounds and raucous rage. Their music video for 'Heaven' creates a similar polarity between serene scenes in natural landscape and destruction of consumer goods. The lyrics of 'Heaven' beckon the goddess to eradicate damage and pollution on Earth. Maya Clark stars as the goddess, invoking destruction of capitalism and surrender to nature. A Giant Dog "Bendover" Directed by Ed Dougherty This was filmed as the third video in a production in which we made Sweet Spirit - The Power, Sweet Spirit - The Mighty and Bendover all in a row. There was only one off day in there. Throughout the productions of The Power and The Mighty, it was still up in the air if we were going to be able to use pyro or not. It was a truly insane process getting the insurance to approve it. We'd submit every doc and it would seem taken care of and then I would hear that it wasn't ready yet. It wasn't approved until the night before shooting. However, when we arrived on the rooftop in Austin where we shot this, there were cars parked in the vicinity. Because of this, they said we couldn't do pyro. Imagine! Then we made some necessary adjustments and moved the set from where we'd intended it to a safe distance away. Then we discovered we only had one hour left to get every single pyro shot. Me and Taylor Washington talk about this moment as the magical moment we became true creative partners. We quickly revised the shotlist and we were swinging the dolly track into new positions the second the camera rolled off. We finished with less than 1 minute remaining. The fire Marshall said she'd never seen anyone work that fast!
