I thought it would be interesting to visually break down the makings of a greenscreen music video, by actually showcasing a side by side comparison.  The left side is the original greenscreen rough cut and the right left is the final product.

1.  The first video is from the video I did for GI called “Temptation”.

We did this for literally NO money and the post was just myself, my boy Ali Santana (http://www.aliboombaye.com/) and 3D artist Zancois Rice (http://www.zanswork.com/).

We worked on this during our off hours or in between jobs.  I was on a roll that year with a lot of bigger videos, so suffice to say this video was a labor of love to finish.

2.  The second video is from Bone Thugs -N- Harmony called “Rebirth”.

I was originally commissioned to shoot one main music video for Bone’s single “See Me Shine”.  Literally a few days before the actual video, management told the label they wanted to shoot FOUR viral videos on top of the main video (in actual terms, that means free).  Needless to say, me being the hungry director that I am, I agreed to it.  (There was good and bad about this, but I’ll save that for another post one day to go into what I learned from that experience.) 

What we actually ended shooting was three music videos on top of the main one.  What we pulled off should be considered a small miracle for the budget and time we had.  We shot “Rebirth” and “Meet Me in the Sky” on the same day, with very little prep time.  My ideas were grand, but my time with the group was limited (we shot four music videos in three days), and my post budget for EFX and editing was basically zero.   Not to mention having to finish three other videos at the same time.

For this, I did all the editing and EFX, while my boy Zan came in to save the day with some additional 3D.  We were both inspired by the limbo world of the video game “Assassin’s Creed II” and I had always envisioned a tech-like world in which this video would be based.  For a “viral” free video, the end result was pretty good.

I hope this was interesting to get a glimpse behind the scenes of some of the videos, and maybe this may inspire you to do your own.  Just be aware of the work that it takes to do this….three to four minutes of greenscreen work is a lot of shots and time to fill up!  If I had a larger team and more money, just imagine what else I could do….not so subtle hint ;)