Promo
GO by Nina Hynes. A music video.
A NEW LANDSCAPE
As the walls closed in and the seriousness of the Covid-19 crisis became apparent, as nurses, doctors, hospital porters, cleaners and supermarket checkout workers, became national heroes, I began to ask myself some questions. How can I make a meaningful difference in the current climate as a creative person? What can we as the Contented team do to make some kind of positive contribution in a rapidly changing world. I don’t have the answers but here’s what I have found helpful.
MUSCLE MEMORY
Firstly, pandemic or no pandemic, creativity is like a muscle, it needs to be exercised in order to continue to work effectively. The longer it slacks off the harder it is to get it back up to speed. Secondly, see limitations as assets rather than liabilities. Use what’s available to you. My kids got so bored while being away from their friends that they were happy to join in creative exercises. We shot several scenes from their favourite tv shows with them in the lead roles. You’ll be amazed at how rich the possibilities are.
RECONNECT
Despite my reclusive tendencies and the constant struggle to get away from the screens, I found lockdown to be a great time to be more active online and reach out to friends and acquaintances. Several years ago I used a track by the artist Nina Hynes on a tv commercial, and since that time we have been facebook contacts without really knowing each other. With a new album out and the prospect of a long lockdown looming, Nina put out a facebook call to filmmakers to ask if anyone might have the possibility to create some visuals to accompany the new songs.
ANAMORPHIC
Meanwhile, I had finally received delivery of a new anamorphic lens that I had purchased from Atlas Lens Co. in L.A. and I was very keen to test it out. At first I thought of just going around the city shooting cityscapes, perhaps with a some people shots too, but I quickly realised that this would be a waste and it would take as much effort to do that as to make something simple but specific for someone else to make use of too, whether they had a budget or not. I listened to the album and one song, Go, stood out for me. I particularly liked the line in the chorus ‘Dancing in my head’. In visual terms I felt that it opened a door into an imaginative space and this would enable the character or characters in the video to do things out of the ordinary. The use of the new anamorphic lens, albeit playing down the anamorphic look, would be another tool to pull the story into a slightly surreal territory.
COLLABORATION
Then, I thought about Michael, a professional dancer from Paris now living in Oslo. As well as being the boyfriend of my kids’ French teacher, which is how we met, we had been on the same flight to Oslo from Barcelona in January and had a chance to talk as we headed from the airport back into town. One of the things we discussed was the idea of doing a short dance film. I got in touch after one of the kids’ Skype French classes recently and he agreed that we could do something so long as we maintained social distancing through the shoot. He also said that he could bring two of his dance students on board and contribute as a choreographer. The idea that we wanted to capture was to express, through movement, the feelings of frustration that people have had since the lockdown began. The sense of missing even the small things that we may have always taken for granted. The difficulty of readjusting to the new normal. And, of course, the fact that we have to keep our distance from other people, something that goes against our natural human instincts.
ENGAGE WITH THE MOMENT
So going back to my starting point what can we do to make a positive contribution as creators? Use your skills in service to something bigger – we have also produced a promo film, pro bono, for a national fundraising campaign, and keep creating. Look for ways to make sense of a changing world. Will a music video help the world to heal? Probably not, but possibly just a little. The point is engage creatively with the moment, especially when it’s as monumental and historical as the one we are in right now. It may resonate, it may help someone make sense of something in their life and perhaps even help them get through the day.
if … | Opening film World Congress of Architects
Being fathers of young kids ourselves, we get to see the creativity of our children up close every day. There is something precious about it. As Picasso said “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist as we grow up.”
We felt that the best way to respond to the call for ideas from the International Union of Architects (UIA), who wanted a film to open the 2017 World Congress of Architects in Seoul, was to take the attendees back to the beginning of their own creative journeys. To take a fun look at nerdy kids, the ones who can sit for hours, even in the age of the iPad, and become engrossed in their drawings and their lego and, ok so we’re back on the screens, their Minecraft worlds. Our aim was to revisit the creative spark in it’s purest form.
We decided we could tell this story best as a kind of inquiry using talking heads interviews to lend some authority to the children’s point of view. We used these interviews along with vignettes where we took some of the kids out into the city and engaged them somehow in an architecturally related task. We were keen to include kids from different parts of the world to reflect the international make-up of the audience. Luckily Seoul has also become so much more international that we were able to find all these kids who are growing up in the city. Many of them have been in Seoul for several years, they speak Korean as well as their mother tongue and go to school with Korean kids.
Seoul as a city is also a fantastic place for architectural diversity, with a great selection of historical, traditional, functional, residential, infrastructural and contemporary constructions to explore. Thank you very much for your interest if…!
Nils Clauss & Neil Dowling from CONTENTED
MINERVA | Global Immersion: Seoul
THE GLOBAL IMMERSION SERIES
Founded in 2014, Minerva Schools is designed around a new vision of higher education that combines a reinvented curriculum, rigorous academic standards, innovative technology, and an immersive global experience. Students study in seven different cities over the course of four years, where they engage with local civic partners to apply classroom knowledge to practical, real-world problems. The above film is part of a series directed by LA based Andrew Hida in collaboration with Minerva’s Creative Director Ayo Seligman. As part of CONTENTED, Nils Clauss and Mini Kim had the pleasure to work with Andrew and Ayo together on the Seoul instalment of this global video series.
“Global Immersion: Seoul” is a short film, which highlights how classroom curriculum extends into the urban fabric and shapes their personal, professional and academic growth. As part of a broader marketing campaign a series of 60-second cuts were also produced for social media engagement.
BRIEF
The target audiences of this series are prospective students and the parents of these students who are seeking to better understand the Minerva global experience. Andrew and Ayo describe how they wanted the viewer to understand the full spectrum of daily life, from the demanding academics, to the immersive social and co-curricular activities. The goal was to make a film which quickly convinces the viewer why they belong at Minerva by telling the story of how the Minerva experience stands apart from that of the traditional university through personal stories of challenge and growth.
CHALLENGES AND RESULT
Over the course of two years, Andrew and Ayo have directed the first four short films in the Global Immersion series. Andrew says that each subsequent episode pushes deeper into stories of personal and professional development as they come into their own. Instead of replicating the same mold for each episode, the storyline instead evolves in parallel to student growth and an evolving world view. This distinct approach enabled Andrew together with Minerva to build on existing story and expand on emotional impact.
In order to achieve the authentic, cinematic documentary style that defines the Minerva brand, Minerva and Andrew say that they assembled a team of cinematographers with a strong background in visual journalism. They further note that weeks of creative design and pre-production proved essential to manage the complex timing and logistics of multiple shooters and photographers, navigating large, foreign cities.
For us at CONTENTED, it was great to take part in this great and meaningful project and we are glad that we were able to offer our services with Nils Clauss as the Director of Photography and Mini Kim as the local producer for the above film. We would like to thank Ayo, Andrew and everyone at Minerva for all their great support.
Finalist
LAST LETTERS has been shortlisted as a finalist in the documentary category of the One Screen Short Film Festival 2017.
About the One Club
One Screen is the original film festival for the creative community by the creative community. It’s the premiere festival that unites the film and advertising world on One Screen. The One Club for Creativity, producer of the prestigious One Show, ADC Annual Awards and Creative Week, is the world’s foremost non-profit organization recognizing creative excellence in advertising and design. The ADC Annual Awards honors the best work in terms of craft, design and innovation across all disciplines, including Advertising, Digital, Design and Motion. Creative Week takes place in New York City every May and is the preeminent festival celebrating the intersection of advertising and the arts.
The One Club and ADC announced their merger last fall to form The One Club for Creativity, which serves as the umbrella organization for The One Show, ADC Awards, Young Guns, Young Ones, Creative Week, One Screen, Hall of Fame and a wide range of global education and diversity programs. The new entity celebrates the legacy of creative advertising and design, and uses that legacy to inspire future generations.
The awards shows each have their distinct focus: the ADC Annual Awards maintains its historical concentration as the champion for craft, design and innovation, while The One Show continues its focus on creativity of ideas and quality of execution.
The Line Up
I am honoured that LAST LETTERS is part of this year’s strong documentary section line up by competing with exciting films like Anderson Wright’s NZINGHA, Joris Debij’s PERFECTLY NORMAL, Henry Busby’s THE UNBELIEVERS: BURNELL COTLON, Keith Rivers’s THE QUIET MAN, FCB Chicago’s THE UNFORGOTTEN, Wild Breed Productions NEPAL: A FRAGILE STATE, Supply & Demand’s PICKLE and Jon Bunning’s THE TABLE.
The Event and Tickets
Winners will be recognized at the awards ceremony on October 17 at Sunshine Cinema (143 East Houston Street), a Landmark Theatre in New York City’s Lower East Side. You can now secure your tickets if you tickets. Doors will open at 6:30 pm and the screening starts at 7:00 pm. After the event there will be a networking reception from 9:00 pm onwards. Ticket prices are $US 15 for members and $US 20 for non-members. Drinks and hors d’oeuvres will be served following the screening.
Last Letters
On the 16th of April 2014 a ferry en route from Incheon to Jeju Island in Korea capsized. 304 out of 476 passengers and crew members died in this tragic accident. LAST LETTERS follows eight families that lost loved ones that day, and explores the physical and emotional spaces that the tragedy left behind. The film juxtaposes documentary and fictional elements. It shines a light on this still unsolved tragedy and shows the isolation the families feel while they pose for an incomplete family portrait.
JOURNEY TO LADAKH. A Samsung Promo
Three different characters on a journey through the rugged beauty of the Himalayan landscape in and around the town of Leh. As their paths cross we are shown how technology and tradition go hand in hand in this remote part of the world.
CONTENTED is very excited to get the opportunity to work on this project both in terms of working in India and with a big brand like Samsung. None of us had been to India before. Ladakh may not be the India that comes immediately to mind for most people, but it was an extremely evocative place all the same with so much to fascinate and inspire us.
First we had to shake the altitude sickness and figure out how to walk up a flight of stairs without being completely out of breath. After that we could easily see what makes Ladakh and the town of Leh such a popular starting point for visitors who want to explore the Himalayas.
As well as the simple storylines that we had outlined beforehand, we were very keen to capitalise on the character and flavour of the place. We were ably assisted in this by teaming up with an experienced local support team. They pointed us in the right direction and shared some of the many secrets of their home town with us.
We wanted to show in a subtle way how Samsung has a presence even in the most remote communities around the world and how that presence can co-exist without having an adverse effect on the local culture and way of life.
We hope we have succeeded and that you enjoy our film.
MILLET. M LIMITED S/S 2016
This is a short video produced by CONTENTED, directed by Jean-Julien Pous and shot by Nils Clauss. The video was made for M Limited Spring Summer 2016, a sportswear division of Millet.
Best Short Documentary for Bikini Words
Great News! BIKINI WORDS by Nils Clauss just won Best Short Documentary at the Liverpool Lift-Off Film Festival 2016!
As a winner BIKINI WORDS will now be screened at proceeding Lift-Off global film festival events in Tokyo (in April), Las Vegas (June), Vancouver (August), Los Angeles (September), Amsterdam (October), Singapore (Late October), Sydney (November), and London (December).
BIKINI WORDS on THE ATLANTIC
After the short documentary Choa now also Bikini Words has been featured as an Editor’s Pick by The Atlantic. Thanks to Nadine Ajaka for showcasing the video!
BIKINI WORDS takes a look at new linguistic developments among factory workers during the industrial expansion of Korea in the 1970s and 80s.
BIKINI WORDS at Liverpool Lift-Off Film Fest
Lift-Off Film Festival Global Network selects BIKINI WORDS by Nils Clauss to be part of their prestigious line up of true independent cinema at this years Liverpool Lift-Off Film Festival 2016!
BIKINI WORDS was selected out of 1300+ global entrants, to screen at the prestigious Liverpool Lift-Off Film Festival, the only fully accredited film festival in the city.
At the event all of the films will be scored by the attending audience, where the winners are potentially screened at the ten proceeding Lift-Off global events. Lift-Off currently has festivals in London, Liverpool, Tokyo, Las Vegas, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Singapore, Sydney, Hong Kong and Amsterdam.
James Bradley Co-Director and Co-Founder of Lift-Off says…
“Getting into any Lift-Off Film Festival is a massive achievement. The world of independent film has grown so much over the years that many of the grass rooted filmmakers and emerging professionals are left without much of a platform. We felt that many of these artists who were producing exceptional work were being hugely ignored – and deserved to be seen! Our judges are rigorous and we are quickly building a reputation of finding true undiscovered talent.“
BIKINI WORDS focuses on new vocabulary, which evolved amongst factory workers during the rapid industrialisation of South Korea throughout the 1970s and 1980s in order to put names to the radically new aspects of their urbanised lives.
The film will be screened on Thursday 3rd March 2016 from 9:00 to 10:30pm at Small Cinema Liverpool (57-59 Victoria Street, Liverpool, L1 6DE) within the Shorts Programme 1 (Evening of Shorts).
Ticket can be purchased Lift-Off Tickets.