Trounce Alley Lighting Company

This music video for Arkadia Picture was shot on 35mm Film on a houseboat in beautiful Sycamouse, BC. Produced by Alex Galanis and Directed by award winning Stephano Barberis with cinematographer Ron Williams C.S.C. The video echos the sentiment, “When life is rough go sit on the lake and put some alcohol on it”.  You heard it from Gord Bamford and his band. Happy summer.

Factoring in 41 years of inflation since Woodstock ’69 LOVE has somehow managed to stay free in Canada suggests, The Higgins, in their first single from their second album, Dreamers Like us, which is scheduled for release in Spring 2010.

Official music video for “Free Like Love” by The Higgin.
Directed by multiple award-winner Stephano Barberis and produced by Arkadia Pictures Inc.

Scroll down for a technical lighting summary of the setup.

The Higgins are John, Eileen, and Kathleen Higgins, brother and sisters, from Delta, BC, Canada.

Lighting Summary:

We rigged the stage for cinematographer Ron Williams C.S.C with a 4×8′ softbox above the band.

The rig consisted of 3 blondes and a frame of 216 diffusion. It was built with pipe and burtons from a goalpost allowing it to “pendulum” down so the angle of light would be less overhead and more in the eyes of our talent. Due to the weight of the rig our goalpost consisted of three 20′ schedule 40 pipes (1 1/2″ Aluminum) joined together into a triangle formation using Modern Studio Equipment mini-truss brackets. We cranked the rig up in super-crank roller stands (12.6′ max height). The wheels on the stand allowed us to roll the entire rig closer to the camera to make the lighting more frontal for the closeups.

Of primary concern to Ron was beauty lighting for the band’s two female musicians.

In addition tot he softbox over the stage we filled from over the heads of the crowd using a 10k fresnel through a 6×6 frame of half grid cloth. We used solid blades and flops to cut most of the spill off the crowd so it would project over their heads into the eyes of our band. There was also two tungsten units on the ground through diffusion frames to fill from below the stage in front of the band because that was the direction they would look down at the crowd. These units were hidden from camera between the crowd and the stage on the ground.

TALCO built a 4x8' softbox with pipe & burtons and suspended it over the band with a makeshift 20' truss on super cranks. A 10k key through a 6x6 frame cut off the crowd provided fill.

Technical Notes:

If doing a similar rig consider using a specialized truss lifting support from the theatre/live event industry in place of super-crank stands. They are usually load rated much higher then super-cranks and some of them can go upwards of 20′ in height which would be a huge asset if the stage was any higher (compared to 12.6′ for a super-crank stand).

Also consider using real truss for less sag across the span. We used ropes and pulleys from the truss of the studio to safety our rig but if you didn’t have access to a lift to get up there you’d certainly want to make your truss more rigid.

We provided additional fill from tungsten units on the ground through 24'x36' Diffusion Frames hidden from camera between the crowd and the stage.

Official music video for “Nobody Says No” by Jessie Farrell. This is the second single and video off Jessie’s new album Good, Bad & Pretty Things (604/Universal). Directed by multiple award-winner Stephano Barberis and produced by Arkadia Pictures Inc. Cinematography by Ron Williams C.S.C.

We have discovered two more videos by premiere 35mm country music video production company — yes this is probably our 15th one with them – Arkadia Pictures the collaborative duo, director Stephano Barberis / producer Alex Galanis.

As with all of Arkadia Picture’s beautiful country videos, much of the magic in the cinema is brought out by senior Technicolor Creative Services colorist Gary Shaw in a 2K film to digital transfer session. The details are extracted from the 35mm work print. The end result is delivered digitally to the TV networks. The film latitude and the extensive digital timing allows us to get by during the shoot with more available light and less time consuming setups then typically on a feature film shoot. This helps offset the huge time constraints of trying to cram an entire narrative story and live performances into a single days shoot.

Above: The charming (dare I say sweet) “If I Fall” by Doc Walker – cinematographer Ron “Rocket” Williams presiding.
Below: Another timeless combination…girl’s and power tools!  Greg Hanna – “It’s a Man’s Job”:

The first was filmed with an Arri 435 by Rocket and lit with a 6k HMI Par and some custom string lights. The background was a 20×20 painted backdrop suspended on location in a barn. The second video was filmed by producer Alex Galanis himself using an antique Arriflex 35 film camera with a rotating turret of prime lenses. We shaped available light with grip gear and did not require a movie generator or HMI for our interiors to produce a quality video on a tight budget

Arkadia Pictures music video director Stephano Barberis was at it again with another CMT music video, this time for Canadian Country Music artist Jaydee Bixby in support of his album, Cowboys and Caddillacs. Shot by the Rocket a.k.a Ron Williams C.S.C. using an array of 9-light maxi brutes pulsing together on a 600 amp dimmer pack, he backlit the performances and flared the lense, often accentuated by streak filters. We had a second generator available to power our 6k HMI Par key because the amount of line disturbance from the fluctuating high current created visible HMI flicker until we re-patched to the backup generator.

Stephano intercut the video performance with a second day of b-roll footage using the band on location around town with available light. This allowed us to concentrate on lighting the performances at the farm location and for pyrotechnics expert Darcy Davis to blow up a van for the finale.

Award winning director Stephano Barberis posts  facebook notes on several music videos, including one we did with his production company Arkadia Pictures, for a country music video artist trio - The Higgins.

UPDATE 2009:  The video has been disabled for embedding (probably by the label)
UPDATE 2010:  It’s been reposted in HD and can be embedded again, here it is below:

And here are some photos Stephano had posted which happen to show off some of our grip gear:

ARKADIA PICTURES JAN 2009: GI Track & TALCO's 14' MSE Pipe Boom Kit (menace arm) for Ron Williams CSC

Above, our Modern Studio Equipment pipe boom kit (menace arm), which we built into a 14′ length using Schedule 40 Spec aluminum pipe. We placed this on a mambo combo stand with add on studio wheels. We use this thing on just about every music video we do because it is quick to adjusts with ratchets and glides around on a studio floor with ease. Cinematographers love it because it can easily boom soft light in close to the performers face for flattering sex appeal guaranteed to make their agent’s (and groupies) pleased.

You can also see the GI Track we laid for the dolly. This is the cadillac of track because it is rigid and all the parts, including the capping we ride on, is replaceable with bolts and screws without having to ship the whole unit back to the the manufacturer at great expense to us. The track is sturdy enough to lift 2 or 3 lengths connected together at one time for quick repositions, which is always important for the high speed shooting style of music videos.

The photo below demonstrates a lighting setup by cinematographer Ron Williams CSC (the rocket) utilizing several 20′ goalposts and a duvatyne teaser to slow the front light off the background. In this particular shot we keyed the performers with a 12′x12′ frame of Lt. Grid Cloth using 2 10K Fresnels. We wanted the biggest softest light we could create and the largest distance from the background to let it fall into darkness.

ARKADIA PICTURES JAN 2009: An example of goal posts and teasers for Ron Williams CSC.

It appears to be the end of the year music video round-up for TALCO and we have found two more postings of our work from earlier in the year. These two videos were both done for Triton Films.

The first is for young country music star Jaydee Bixbee, “Old Fashioned Girl”, and the second for pop singer Melissa Cavatti, “Passenger”. The artists appear to be getting younger and younger by the day.

We had to go all the way to Chilliwack to find a suitable panorama farm location for Jaydee’s video which involved a circular dolly track around a 4-man band. It was simply dizzying  Melissa’s video was filmed on 35mm around Vancouver including jerrico beach, a skate park on main, and even a moving bus. 

Enjoy the videos below:

Jaydee Bixbee – Old Fashioned Girl

Melissa Cavatti – Passenger