Behind The Scenes of Deschanel's Dancing

Following on from the releease of last week's hypnotic music promo She & Him: Stay Awhile shots talks to Oscar Romagosa; executive producer for creative collective CANADA, about the challenges of the peice.

What was the most difficult part of shooting the promo?

The shoot was a real challenge as we had to do everything in only one day, when we always thought we needed two at least. That forced us to simplify a lot of the shot list, cutting it down to eight main shots or camera positions. We were using two small MOCO rigs in order to be re-setting one to a new position as we'd be shooting with the other one - which wasn't always easy. 

That is just one example to show that we had to very much attach the development of the creative idea to the reality of the logistics of the production. Some may say that happens in every production and it is true, but in this specific case it was particularly drastic.

How difficult was the post-job?

The post job was extremely complex. It implied a mix of techniques and a very good hand to put it together frame by framel, almost all the way. No one in the team had ever really done anything similar, or at least not to the extent we were planning to do here. To be honest no one in the post team could say that we were going to make it in the time we had... so we actually took one hell of a risk with this one! But we knew how good the guys at La Huella FX are and that they'd achieve something outstanding, as they've done. We're super grateful. 

But yes, we've struggled a bit along the whole process if you want to know the truth. We were lucky to have the complicity and patience of the guys at Columbia [record company] and The Directors Bureau, though. Altogether this has been possible because an amazing team was put together to make it happen.

In this case, more than ever, post is good if you just don't see it!

Was the shoot hard and did Zooey take to it all easily?

The shoot was hard, indeed. And Zooey was extremely busy those days so it was very difficult to have a bit of time to discuss together about the video. Despite her crazy agenda though, she managed to find a day to rehearse and then, the day of the shoot, she stayed a bit longer than she first said she'd stay to help us end with her shots, and we appreciated it very much. I just don't know what we would have done without that extra time. Despite all this she was very supportive all the way.

Had the directors ever work on anything like this before?

I don't think so. Every time we do a music video we kind of put ourselves in front of a new problem to solve. I guess this is how we feel we can push a bit the boundaries of our work, abandon our comfort zone. It sort of steals a number of hours of our sleep, but at the end of the day, when you reach the final result, you normally feel it was worth it.