Open Up

Clarissa and Simon, our director, already had an actress in mind, Millie, and I met her for the first time at this meeting. From there we planned out exactly what that would look like and how we would go about it. I also asked a lot of questions of Clarissa. I really wanted to capture her vision and make that happen for the music video. 

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So afterwards, armed with notes, I sat down with the song and the lyrics, and started to map out our characters progression through the song. There were a few key shots that we wanted to make sure we had, and an overall feeling we were aiming for. I had to figure out how to write a script for a music video. Something with no dialogue and that fits in with lyrics of a song. 

 

In the end I decided to take each line of the song, and write down a narrative overview, a story that we could follow. Once that was approved we took the next step forward. We had already picked a date, had the main actress, Millie, and plans for Clarissa, Roedolf and Adele to head out to a beach and take the photo for the song, so that it could be made into poster. We wanted to have a lot of little reminders that the character had scattered around the place. 

 

Not long before we were set to film, our set location fell through, so we had to scramble to find another location. I volunteered my place, after getting permission from my flatmates to film. With a quick evening visit from Clarissa, Adele and Roedolf to check the place was okay, and for Adele to make notes on what she needed to bring to get the set to match what we envisioned. Thankfully my place worked pretty well, and we already had most of what we'd envisioned. While we kept our house in a tidy condition, I still did an extra clean just to make sure it was film ready.

 

Then the day of the shoot, I discovered something, there is very little for a script writer and supervisor to do on a music video set. I had a lovely relaxing day, getting to talk with everyone and just sit back and watch what was happening. For the most part we just stayed back especially as there was limited space, we left it for Roedolf, Simon, Millie and the gear

 

We also roped in Talia from our Gamblers film to play as the character's friend. Someone for the flashbacks, we also had a few ideas for the friend to do that we never ended up shooting. A bunch of them were outdoor shots of Talia’s character trying to convince the main character that she should come outside. A mix of rain and a lack of time prevented this, but Talia and I had a lot of fun coming up with weird ideas and options of things her character could do.

 

I also learned how to do time lapse for this shoot, the director, Simon, knew how to do it. This turned out to be quite fun, as we set up a camera, and the girls just got to hang out in the kitchen. Millie commented at one point that it was funny trying to pretend to hold a conversation with Talia while all of us were watching and commenting in the background. I for one was guilty of making a lot of jokes. 

 

The day passed by really quickly, and soon enough we were all packing up to head home, and begin the next steps of the process. Simon and Clarissa worked together quickly to produce and publish the finished product we have today. 

 

This was really cool to do. I enjoyed the challenge that came with having no dialogue available, and how to convey the story of the song in a way that highlights the song. I also think this is the shortest thing we’ve shot. I would do this again in a heartbeat. 

 

If you’re interested in Clarissa’s band and music, you can find them on Spotify at TEAM152, or Clarissa Chai.