Outside's Steve Mottershead Wears Both Fx Artist & Director Hats

Outside, the SOHO-based editorial, visual effects and finishing boutique's team of collaborative artists all bring a mix of talents to the table - and last summer, when they signed Inferno/Flame artist Steve Mottershead to their roster, he was no exception.

Over the years this award-winning visual effects artist had directed an impressive roster of Music Videos, adding yet another dimension his artistic perspective. And, recently Mottershead was called upon to direct, as well as create visual effect for The Willowz, an up-and-coming group whose recent release, "Talk In Circles," was selected by Rolling Stone Magazine as one of the 50 Best Albums of 2005.



Steve Mottershead and LA-based Craig Bernard, who joined forces in 2005 to form the bi-coastal directing duo, The Beta movement, were recently called upon to create a surreal Music Video for The Willowz's track, "Walk Straight." Mottershead & Bernard will be in good company, as the Music Video they created will be one of 21 videos on the compilation DVD, featuring the work of such high-profile directors as John Watts, Ace Norton and Michel Gondry, who selected a number of The Willowz's songs for the soundtrack of his feature film, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind."

With so many videos produced for the compilation DVD, entitled 'SEE IN SQUARES,' there was virtually no budget remained when it came time for Mottershead and Bernard to begin working on "Walk Straight." The pair was challenged to complete the 35mm shoot-on-a-shoestring at various LA-area locations.

Mottershead took the post and visual effects work on the project back to his suite at New York-based Outside. He initially approached the project by mocking up the video's concept in Autodesk's Discreet Flame, and creating a key still image for the pitch. Once he sold the band on the idea, Mottershead and Bernard developed the scenario, which centers around two of the band members in a field, dreaming of times past. Their contemporary scene was then inter-cut with shots of a Victorian-era picnic at the same location. Observing the picnic are the band members, whose torsos appear to be grafted onto the trunks of trees as they take on the trees' personae.



Working on Outside's Flame, Mottershead used a flat-pass transfer for color grading, which enabled him to retain a normal, colorful palette for the present-day scenes. He then added a number of flares and other sun effects during the post production process. For the Victorian-era scenes, he created a gray and faded-blue palette reminiscent of the period.

He then composited the two band members - whom he had filmed green screen in locked-off shots - onto still photos of tree trunks. He added visual interest by introducing handheld camera moves and adding shadows and depth to the surreal landscape.

Steve Mottershead also composited in stylized birds, rendered at various angles, and a lifelike insects, which were crafted in Newtek's LightWave 3D by Christian Moreton of Skoda Werks/Toronto.

Outside's Steve Evans did the video's offline edit, inter-cutting the contemporary and Victorian-era footage with some digital SLR images of plant and grass elements which Mottershead had shot at 5 fps. Then Mottershead conformed the video in Flame.



Steve Mottershead also created the cover for the compilation DVD. For this element of the job, he composited digital stills he had taken in Flame at 3K resolution. The Willowz DVD was recently released by Follin Artist Management/NY.

Outside is an independent editorial, design and visual effects boutique dedicated to providing advertising agencies with high-end, innovative solutions to their every-changing needs for creative content for both traditional and emerging media. Their 4,000 square foot loft-like duplex space is home to a world-class roster of talent, cutting edge technology, and over-the-top client services. Outside's recent projects include spots and web-based interactive work for such companies as Jaguar, Samsung, Volvo, Yahoo, Lugz, New Balance and Intel.

Outside Editorial: http://www.dexigner.com/directory/detail/7224.html

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