Bo Saris is a soul singer based in Holland but making a big splash in the UK and USA right now.
His management came to me specifically because they wanted something a bit different for their lead single, 'The Addict'. The title instantly led me to pursue the theme of drugs, but I didn't want to go the grotesque way of Trainspotting and Irvine Welsh. Instead we treated it with a nod to the psychedelic and Alice in Wonderland, by sending Bo on a tea-induced psychedelic acid trip. Its actually based on a dream I once had where I awoke in front of a selection of brightly coloured cups of tea, with each one sending me on a different sub-dream within the dream. My original nightmare also featured a cameo from Rolf Harris, and in retrospect we're pretty lucky we didn't contact him to be involved!
We shot in a green studio on a green treadmill, and painted Bo's face black with white lips. With the addition of a pair of white gloves I inadvertedly started a heated debate on racism and minstrels within management, and we opted to give him a more purple hue.
We also used an Xbox Kinect to capture motion data for use in some of the scenes where Bo becomes a fully animated, rigged character. The Kinect gave us basic tracking points around the body which we could use to create a simple skeleton structure to animate around. It has the added advantage of giving us realistic 3D data - the motion tracking in after effects for example, would only give us 2D data and feel quite flat. Unfortunately, we didn't count on the Kinect being renowned for not detecting dark skin! So we had to do a seperate pass at the end of the day with Bo 'unpainted'.
His management came to me specifically because they wanted something a bit different for their lead single, 'The Addict'. The title instantly led me to pursue the theme of drugs, but I didn't want to go the grotesque way of Trainspotting and Irvine Welsh. Instead we treated it with a nod to the psychedelic and Alice in Wonderland, by sending Bo on a tea-induced psychedelic acid trip. Its actually based on a dream I once had where I awoke in front of a selection of brightly coloured cups of tea, with each one sending me on a different sub-dream within the dream. My original nightmare also featured a cameo from Rolf Harris, and in retrospect we're pretty lucky we didn't contact him to be involved!
We shot in a green studio on a green treadmill, and painted Bo's face black with white lips. With the addition of a pair of white gloves I inadvertedly started a heated debate on racism and minstrels within management, and we opted to give him a more purple hue.
We also used an Xbox Kinect to capture motion data for use in some of the scenes where Bo becomes a fully animated, rigged character. The Kinect gave us basic tracking points around the body which we could use to create a simple skeleton structure to animate around. It has the added advantage of giving us realistic 3D data - the motion tracking in after effects for example, would only give us 2D data and feel quite flat. Unfortunately, we didn't count on the Kinect being renowned for not detecting dark skin! So we had to do a seperate pass at the end of the day with Bo 'unpainted'.
