Animated music video for “Ponto de Fuga” by Iguana Garcia
Iguana Garcia is a solo indie-pop act from Lisbon, with an electronic, 80’s flavor.
Iguana Garcia applied for Inéditos Vodafone, an initiative by Vodafone, part of the “Portugal #EntraEmCena” movement. The initiative would select 20 unreleased songs from all applicants, and would then distribute a monetary prize to all of them equally.
After being selected, Iguana Garcia contacted me to make a music video for the song, we had collaborated before, and the only guideline he gave me was for the music video to have something to do with vanishing points (the song’s title “Ponto de Fuga”).
The deadline was tight for an animated music video so I had to quickly come up with an idea that would be appealing and have narrative, but would also be easy to materialize and expand on.
Concept
After listening to the music, I decided to explore the themes of obsession and intersection that are present on the lyrics, and expanded from there.
I wanted to have a character that would slowly succumb to an obsession. This eventually came to be in the form of the dream shadow/bubble that shows our character different shapes, and the small yellow balls that follow and surround the character.
After listening to the music, I decided to explore the themes of obsession and intersection that are present on the lyrics, and expanded from there.
I wanted to have a character that would slowly succumb to an obsession. This eventually came to be in the form of the dream shadow/bubble that shows our character different shapes, and the small yellow balls that follow and surround the character.
While being transported from space to space through the shapes that are shown by the dream bubble, the character is eventually swallowed entirely and shown the origin of it’s thoughts/obsessions, becoming then entirely defeated.
Design and Post Production
Having collaborated with Iguana Garcia before, and paying attention to what he usually likes and shares on his social media, it wasn’t too hard to come to a visual style. I knew I had to touch on the synth/vaporwave look, due to his personal preferences and sound.
However, I wanted to deviate from the classic “black and neon purple, grids, cars and palm trees” language, and tried to meet it halfway with with my own flat colors / simple shapes style, throwing in some elements of the more classic language.
Having collaborated with Iguana Garcia before, and paying attention to what he usually likes and shares on his social media, it wasn’t too hard to come to a visual style. I knew I had to touch on the synth/vaporwave look, due to his personal preferences and sound.
However, I wanted to deviate from the classic “black and neon purple, grids, cars and palm trees” language, and tried to meet it halfway with with my own flat colors / simple shapes style, throwing in some elements of the more classic language.
To achieve a more VHS/Retro feel, in post production, I played the final animation on an old CRT monitor, and filmed it with a camcorder. Then layered that film over the final animation with a simple opacity overlay.
The distortion in both the CRT monitor and the camcorder lens gave the whole animation more depth and a certain feeling of chromatic aberration. Many colors were also blown out, becoming more faded and gaining a "natural" glow.
Directly recording a screen with a setup like this also creates heavy flickering, which is a staple of 80s VHS, and also creates interesting masking effects between original animation and filmed versions.
Directly recording a screen with a setup like this also creates heavy flickering, which is a staple of 80s VHS, and also creates interesting masking effects between original animation and filmed versions.
The results varied wildly from shot to shot, some of them becoming completely blown out, others having a very heavy presence of black bars flickering, making the final result very organic and dynamic.
From left to right: Original >> CRT + Camcorder >> Final Mix
~thank you~
