alexdecampi, 17. July 2008, 17:58
In Flames, "Come Clarity" (dir LEX HALABY, Sep 06)
COMPARE AND CONTRAST:



Mysterious red dress chick!
Pointless driving about!
Pretentious cutaways!
COSMIC ending!

Lacks a reference to a Stones greatest hits album though.

(Note: for some reason In Flames' European label, Nuclear Blast, credits this to Patric Ullaeus)

Weirdly, while the MJ vid is in my opinion more prettily shot, and SFX at end of this vid is a little cheap and cheerful, I like this one better. I think it comes down to the band feeling more committed and a childish glee at the bit at the end. Bit at end of MJ vid just made me think of Feist.
         
Dir. Lex Halaby
MOV

if you're going to be sarcastic, at least get the facts straight. especially since lex frequents this site. sorry lex.

haha.
         
I am not being sarcastic! I really like this video! Better than the MJ one shot 2 years later which has thematic similarities and not nearly as awesome an ending! And I'm surprised no one's posted it on the 'ville yet.

And the label (Nuclear Blast) credited the video to Ullaeus. Click through the youtube link to see. I have repaired, however, and apologies to Lex for mis-crediting his work.
         
what is the MJ video? I dont understand what MJ refers too. Amazing Photography in this video, great cinematic movement and those skies, wow. Who was the DP?
         
MJ
         
Judging by the halo'ing around the artists and a little crawl I saw at one point, I'm guessing "those skies" are in part thanks to gradient filters in post. But they're still lovely, as are the colours throughout this video.
         
Oh ok got it, don't really see the connection but ok then. I figured there was some post savvy involved with the skies, but that's great if they look that good, besides you need great photography as a basis for great effects.
         
You know there are many places in the US where these kind of skies are possible. And judging from a lot of the moving shots and the lack of continuity of the skies I have a feeling at least a portion of the shots are untouched. Maybe Lex can inform.
         
female in a red ress in the desert. hello?! ripping off the movie "babel"?!
band performing in the desert??? shall that impress me or what?
I cannot smoke such amounts of crack to understand how someone would write that down in a treatment, hand it in and win the pitch.
         
the chances of thinking up "hey, I'll put a female in a red dress in the desert into the video" are much greater than thinking "hey, I'll rip off this one scene in the fairly recent movie Babel".

that dress could have been blue and had the same effect, visually. The dress wasn't on fire or dripping green goo or anything, so I don't see what the problem is. And, you know, even if it was borrowed, one man's "ripping-off" is another man's "inspired by".

but, yeah, I can't imagine pitching the video and winning over a crowd. Then again, it's hard to ever imagine most music videos being pitched...for me anyways. Some of the best AND worst music videos are like that.

furthermore, I have yet to see one of my own videos come out exactly how I wrote it or pitched it, for better or worse.
         
Yeah, I agree with Birdsonfire here. Putting a woman in a red dress to make her stand out against a green/earth tones background is a pretty common directoral choice - I've made it, countless others have made it, and it's not ripping off. It's just that red is pretty and people look at big blobs of red on screen.
         
Damn. I step away from Antville for a week and come back in a little late to comment on this posting. But what the hell, I'll throw in my 2 cents in case anyone ever bothers to look beyond the front page.

First off, that youtube quality video kills Johnny Ching's cinematography, so if you wanna see the quicktime check out the posted link. I'll spot you on the bandwidth from my site.

Not sure if the original post was a cheer or jeer, but I'll try to answer any and all questions about the video...

This video came about through a special set of circumstances. The band was very familiar with my work from my Killswitch Engage videos, with whom they'd shared numerous tours. They wanted to make a video in the US with a US director and ultimately chose me prior to a treatment being written. I got on the phone with the singer and we discussed the meaning of the song. Turns out the song is about his daughter and the inclusion of a girl was important. I've never seen Babel, so I'm sorry I can't substantiate any claims of ripping-it off, but Alex is right that it's not re-inventing the wheel to put someone in brighter color clothes to stand out from the background.

I literally only had the band for a couple of hours to shoot their parts. They were coming from a concert up north and passing through the desert, so I figured shooting in the desert could be a good angle on the concept. Plus I'm always drawn to expansive spaces...usually desolate. What can I say, I'm a sucker for getting out of LA :-)

I wanted a big punch going into the final chorus, something unexpected. Something that upped the anti and delivered a "wtf moment". Yes, I'm a grown man and just typed "wtf"...get over it.

Cinematic was the goal and I think we achieved it, so overall I was happy with the video. I can send anyone the treatment if they want, it unfolded exactly as written (to answer your question).

All the skies were real with no sky replacement. Grads were used to cut the light down somewhat and give us more definition up there. Also some pulling down in telecine. We were anticipating 100 degree sunny weather so when it started raining we had to change somethings on the fly. Ultimately we were lucky to get the weather we had because it adds production value. I'm always a fan of weather in videos. While the rain poured down we all hung out in the tour bus and shot between clouds for the limited time we had.

Not sure why the youtube video is credited to Patric. He's done a lot of their videos so I'm sure it's an honest mistake.

As for the FX, they were done by Diesel FX in Venice, CA. Great guys and did a great job, as usual.

So yeah, I think that clears up any confusion. Sorry to take awhile to get back on these comments. I've been shooting out of state and a little behind in my daily blog checking.

Cheers,
Lex
         
(original post was a cheer, although kind of a backhanded crap one because I was really distracted and doing eight things at once)