WATCH IT: Walk Off The Earth "Red Hands" (Ellis Bahl, dir.)

Takes a certain kind of mad genius to imagine a one-take video, but in a non-linear fashion that requires an edit (of sorts) to fast forward and rewind the footage so as to hit certain narrative/performance marks. That mad genius is director Ellis Bahl.

Ellis Bahl, director (via NPR video premiere): "The way we did it is rather simple. I figured out how I wanted the video to look and then I recut the song completely out of order for the band to learn before the shoot. I added extra choruses and split up the outro throughout the playback. I rearranged all the verses and added a lot of half measure counts throughout. I also messed with the speeds of the choruses and "oh yeahs" to make it slowmo. It's probably the most confusing thing a band could be handed a couple days before a music video shoot. I just said, "here, learn this" ... I was actually really concerned that it was going to be impossible, but they were awesome and nailed it."

Actually not a surprise that Walk Off The Earth was able to pull it off, since it's the same band that learned to play "Somebody That I Used To Know" on one guitar with 10 hands.

--> watch "Red Hands" and read more @ NPR

Doomsday Ent Walk Off The Earth
"Red Hands" (Columbia)

Ellis Bahl, director/editor | Courtney Davies, Jason Colon, producer | Doomsday, production co | Pat Scola, DP | Max Orgell, production designer | Danielle Hinde, exec. producer

Weight: 
0

Comments

Rob's picture
This concept again? <a href="http://keithschofield.com/1br-video/" rel="nofollow">http://keithschofield.com/1br-video/</a>
Steven Gottlieb's picture
Maybe the germ of the idea, but very different I think in terms of conception and execution. Schofield is playing off the scratching with the rew/ff stuff. And yes, its brilliant. Ellis is onto something even more non-linear here, almost like hes inspired by grouping clips in FinalCut for an edit.
ellis's picture
Wow... I've never actually seen that video before. But yeah, while it's similar, I don't think it's the same concept. It always makes me laugh... You never hear anybody groan and say "oh... another artist performing to camera concept".
Rob's picture
Ellis, I believe you when you saw you never saw the video. I'm not here to call anyone a concept stealer. I do agree with Stephen when he said it feels like you were scrubbing through a FCP edit. Overall, it's a fun video. Been a fan of your stuff for a while now. I don't think anyone groans when they see another artist-to-camera video because we kinda just already assume those videos are not so creative to begin with :) But anyways, good work. Looking forward to seeing what's next.
AlbatRoss's picture
Love these guys! cant wait to catch them live in Porltand on the 28th. Anyone seen they’re cover of “sombody that i used to know”? its amazing!
Alex's picture
These guys are a lot of fun to see live if you get the chance. Its really cool to see them begin to grow past their major success playing covers with their "R.E.V.O EP".