Happy Holidays from Fox Music 2012

This is the latest ecard for work.   The pressure to top myself every year gets greater every year.   I though of this concept two years ago but didn’t do it last year.

For this card I had tried a Merlin Steadicam.   I bought it on Ebay and did a lot of practicing.  It was hard!  Not only was it challenging to balance the camera with my big 16-35 wide angle lens, it was hard holding it for long lengths of time.  The concept of this video was a single take, long tracking shot.   The ultimate being the entrance to the restaurant in Goodfellas or even So I Married An Axe Murder opening   So I scrapped the Steadicam.  I couldn’t hack it.

I had a serendipitous meeting with a DP one day in the office.   He’s shot a lot of movies and video with a Canon DSLR and never uses Steadicams!   That day I was practicing just doing hand held.   He also said he would never do that either…   But he offered to lend me a rig and I accepted.

Morning of the shoot the rig arrived.  Actually just minutes before the shoot was to start.  I had to mount the camera then do a quick practice.  It was a shoulder rig with two handles in the front – kind of like this.   I also had to practice the hand-off at the top of the video.  My assistant had the rig, walked into my office and I take it away and do the rest of the shoot.   It worked.

We did two full takes.  The first one was good but I knew the second one would be better since everyone knew what was coming.   I yelled my directions and warned everyone before I came into their space.   The audio on this thing is hilarious!

Post was easy and hard.   I edited the footage with Adobe Premiere Pro.   Didn’t take much longer than a couple of hours.   I did however spend a week and a half on getting the After Effects 3D tracking text right.   I wasnt hard once I figured it out.  I just had to figure it out!

Anyhoo, working on ideas for next year already….

MUSIC: “Saving the House” and “Premiere” by Danny Elfman from HITCHCOCK

STARRING:
MUSIC PUBLISHING –
Cathy Merenda, David Leiman, Janet Landrum, Kristina Sommer, Fran Block, Ryan Tomlin, Carolina Ossandon, Carmen Pon, Mike McGill
FINANCE –
Leanna Rossmann, Haydee Garcia
FILM CLEARANCE –
Ellen Ginsburg, Robert Kane, Jessie Roberts
TV CLEARANCE –
Rodney Griffis, Elaine Sir, Rey Espinola, Anna Novosel, Vanessa Little
LEGAL –
Tom Cavanaugh, Craig Renwick, Abby Hafermalz, Sandy Miller, Mitzi Brewer, Sarah Rahman
FILM –
Danielle Diego, Rebecca Morellato, Patrick Houlihan, Johnny Choi, Areli Quirarte, Jo Ann Orgel, Lisa Azille, James Patrick, Brianne Porcaro

PRODUCED & DIRECTED BY: Cathy Merenda

ASSISTED BY: Carmen Pon
PEOPLE WRANGLER: Janet Landrum
ASSISTANT CAMERA: Mike McGill
SUPPORT: Ryan Tomlin

Filmed on Location at Fox Studios, Los Angeles

Soundtrack available on iTunes and Sony Masterworks

©2012 Fox Music, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

http://foxmusic.com

One Response to “Happy Holidays from Fox Music 2012”

  1. […] Again!   I had a lot of pressure to top last year’s card.   It was a good one.  One take like in Goodfellas (albeit not nearly as good).   So this year […]

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.