Laura Hollick and I keep stepping up our video projects. In this latest one, we wanted to communicate the concept of “becoming art.” We used nude bodypainting as the medium. We called on Sue Upton to do the actual bodypainting. Laura started out nude, and then Sue painted her white to match the canvas. Afterwards, Sue painted her and the canvas blue. Finally, we animated the painting of the bird on Laura’s chest. Here are some behind the scenes photos of the process. You’ll see the camera mounted on a boom arm. I used that to film some smooth HD video clips panning over the body, but when it came to the editing phase of the project, it was clear that the smooth video clashed with the stop motion footage, so I abandoned it. We’d also animated a sequence of painting the Soul Art logo on her chest, which then transformed into the bird, but we let that go too, since we really wanted to keep the video short and sweet. It’s amazing what gets left on the editing room floor!
Here’s the final video. This is the first video in which I also produced the music. I dug back over 20 years to my high school days when I used to write electronic music and dusted off those rusty skills to put together an instrumental track to accompany the video. After watching the video, check out the 3 questions to unlock your inner soul artist.
It’s a bit embarrassing for me to notice that I haven’t posted in my blog since the end of July, but in any case, here we are at the beginning of 2012. At the threshold of a brand new year, it’s my habit to have a look back at the year that was and look forward at the year to come.
2011 was a big one for me. I learned a lot of new things and worked with many fantastic people. This was the year I took my first serious steps into the world of video production. This year, I plan to continue that work to expand my high definition video capabilities and skills. I also plan to revisit music production, something that my passionate hobby over 20 years ago. I find that my work with the amazing Laura Hollick, who is my partner in so many ways, has allowed me to dovetail all of my creative pursuits and give them direction, purpose and outlet.
Finally, I’d like to present a video collage showing some of the results of some of the many photo shoots that I did during 2011. It was great fun sorting through my archive to pull out these images. Just like last year, I want to thank everyone who entrusted me with the task of capturing a lasting image. I’m looking forward to working with you all again soon!
