Director Sam O’Hare, who directs commercials via Aero Film, Santa Monica, has generated considerable buzz this year with his independent short filmmaking, first with The Sandpit, which captured a day in the life of New York City as seen in time-lapse miniature style. O’Hare directed, shot, edited, finished and funded the film, which went on to gain inclusion in SHOOT‘s “The Best Work You May Never See” gallery (3/19) and then helped him earn a slot in SHOOT‘s 2010 New Directors Showcase.
The Sandpit entailed much hand-held shooting from lofty perches, be they hanging over the edge of a roof or through a gap in fencing on a bridge, to present a perspective that pared New York down to size without losing any of its charm, energy and often frenetic nature. For example, from a penthouse apartment on Park Avenue, O’Hare captured the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, giving a miniature feel to that historic landmark as people streamed in and out of it. Virtually all of the short was shot with a Nikon D3 still camera, usually at four frames a second. O’Hare deployed some slower frame rates on occasion. He lensed a total of 35,000-plus stills over five days and two evenings.
The Sandpit also caught the attention of organizers of The Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival in Indio, Calif., and they gravitated to O’Hare to give their 2010 fest this past April a Sandpit-like perspective. The result is Coachelletta, a moniker reflecting a miniaturized Coachella Festival in four minutes (including closing credits). This film deployed four cherry picker cranes to give the desired POVs for covering a multi-faceted festival, with O’Hare directing, shooting, cutting and finishing the short. He worked with a pair of crane boom operators and found himself scurrying from crane to crane with his Nikon D3, again operating usually at four frames per second, and occasionally opting for slower frame rates.
Over four days and nights, O’Hare shot some 50,000 stills which comprised his time lapse coverage of the festival. As he did for The Sandpit, O’Hare turned to music house Human to score Coachelletta. He credited that score with helping to smartly and elegantly drive the piece.
Deploying his extensive visual effects and postproduction expertise, O’Hare spent some eight weeks finishing Coachelletta. This stretch of time wasn’t in one block but rather on-again, off-again between his other projects. The post work was detailed with his using depth mattes to bring additional depth and perspective to certain scenes, helping to highlight artwork on the ground. “My priority was capturing the feel of the festival, the excitement of the people there in that warm, summery backdrop,” related O’Hare.
The short was recently wrapped and earlier this month debuted on the Coachella website. In fact, fest organizers took down the regular Coachella website and replaced it with the short. All that’s there currently is Coachelletta. It’s slated to stay that way for another week or two, after which info on the 2011 Fest will be made readily available on the site.
At press time, Coachelletta–akin to the online/viral dynamic generated by The Sandpit–has been well received with some 500,000 views on YouTube and another 300,000 or so on Vimeo.
O’Hare had to spring into action immediately to take on the Coachella gig. He flew out for the 2010 Festival four days after he was initially approached for the job.
While he found both The Sandpit and Coachelletta to be creatively gratifying experiences, O’Hare is looking to get back to his roots as a filmmaker, combining live action and visual effects, frequently making it difficult to distinguish what was shot in-camera from what was created in CG. His work in commercials, film and music videos often reflects this mesh as well as people-based storytelling and dialogue.
Ron Cicero and Bo Clancey Launch Production House 34North
Executive producers Ron Cicero and Bo Clancey have teamed to launch 34North. The shop opens with a roster which includes accomplished directors Jan Wentz, Ben Nakamura Whitehouse, David Edwards and Mario Feil, as well as such up-and-coming filmmakers as Glenn Stewart and Chris Fowles. Nakamura Whitehouse, Edwards, Feil and Fowles come over from CoMPANY Films, the production company for which Cicero served as an EP for the past nearly five years. Director Wentz had most recently been with production house Skunk while Stewart now gains his first U.S. representation. EP Clancey was freelance producing prior to the formation of 34North. He and Cicero have known each other for some 25 years, recently reconnecting on a job directed by Fowles. Cicero said that he and Clancey “want to keep a highly focused roster where talent management can be one on one--where we all share in the directors’ success together.” Clancey also brings an agency pedigree to the new venture. “I started at Campbell Ewald in accounts, no less,” said Clancey. “I saw firsthand how much work agencies put in before we even see a script. You have to respect that investment. These agency experiences really shaped my approach to production--it’s about empathy, listening between the lines, and ultimately making the process seamless.” 34North represents a meeting point--both literally and creatively. Named after the latitude of Malibu, Calif., where the idea for the company was born, it also embraces the power of storytelling. “34North118West was the first GPS-enabled narrative,” Cicero explained. “That blend of art and technology, to captivate an audience, mirrors what we do here--create compelling work, with talented people, harnessing state-of-the-art... Read More