Director of Photography

Denzil Armour

Most enjoyable cycle-centric video for Mark Ronson's new one by Warren Fu, following up the impeccable Eighties TV stylings of <a href="http://www.promonews.tv/2010/06/15/mark-ronson%E2%80%99s-bang-bang-bang-feat-q-tip-mndr-by-warren-fu/" target="_blank">Bang Bang Bang</a> with outdoor fun, featuring Kyle Falconer, Spankrock and girls on bicycles.
An object lesson in making London look good - almost like Paris in fact - in the summertime. And Ronson gives good demo of being dashing and urbane even on a vintage BMX and with the hairstyle that Sting had in 1982.

Warren Fu

Partizan Darkroom

Rachel Rumbold

Hayley Williams

Sam Tidman

Madeline Weaks

Simon Hilton

Munky

Daniel Millar

Mark Ronson The Bike Song (ft. Kyle Falconer & Spankrock) by Warren Fu

A hit for Don Fardon back in the 70s and used in Five Alive's 'dancing dodo' <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watchv=qQIOHJxqAUc" target="_blank">tv commercial</a>, the drinks company thought it would be exciting to make a fullscale music video of it - and what a cracker.

"The week before the shoot, hoodlums broke in and stole all the copper pipes - so the whole ground floor was under an inch of water. A few days later, the miscreants broke back in and set fire to the place - possibly an over-enthusiastic attempt to get rid of the flood damage. Then they celebrated by having a fight with lots of margarine. Their weapon of choice: Bertolli. 
"But Sam and Arthur tidied it all up, and so the actual shoot went just fine. The old people had a grand time trotting around all day, Don Fardon popped round and had a cameo as the gardener, and amazingly we didn't have to cut any shots. Proper ballet dancer Patrick Wood was clearly brilliant in the lead role, Denzil Armour-Brown lit everything beautifully and speedily, Jim Cole ran the set like clockwork, while if Tamsin Glasson hadn't been producing I don't know what would have happened".

Tom Kingsley

Tamsin Glasson

Alex Reynolds

Hannah Glossop

Jim Cole

James Bamford

VCCP

Don Fardon’s I'm Alive by Tom Kingsley

Don-Fardon’s-I'm-Alive-by-Tom-Kingsley

After his No. 1 single Pass Out, Tinie Tempah replays his successful team-up with Tim Brown for new single Frisky - and this Tim gives the British urban video an injection of high fashion promo. 
Tinie's subterranean vibe gets invaded by couture-garbed girls - styled by Cynthia Lawrence-John. It's frisky.

Tim Brown

Colonel Blimp

Cynthia Lawrence

Mel Arter

Ernesto

David Leighton

James Wright

James Hackett

Tinie Tempah’s Frisky by Tim Brown

Dizzee and WIZ reunite for their second video together, and deliver another passionate broadside at England in its utter rottenness. 
Diz, the voice of reason in artful dodger garb, takes on the celebrity-obsessed, money-worshipping, torch-wielding, grotesque mob - in a typically ye olde English procession hailing new English values. 
Broad sweeps of symbolism hit the nail firmly on the head - and the whole thing rocks as well. Great work, produced in about two weeks flat by Phil Tidy.

W.I.Z

Phil Tidy

Factory Films

Imogen Hammond

Julia Knight

Prime Focus

Sean Mayo

Dizzee Rascal’s Dirtee Money by WIZ

Calvin's new one by Ben Ib, who's produced this through Agile Films.
It has a charming 12 inch disc theme - and, of course, the dancing girls - and naturally Ben did all the VFX himself.

http://www.youtube.com/watchv=D2Z56le7-H4[/youtube]

Agile Films

Ben Ib

Helen Potter

Semera Khan

Calvin Harris’s Ready For The Weekend by Ben Ib 

Calvin-Harris’s-Ready-For-The-Weekend-by-Ben-Ib-

Performance and projections, pulled into a typically polished, very watchable whole by Grant Gee.
It looks great - beautifully shot by Denzil, graded by Richard Fearon at Prime Focus - and so is Jerry Chater's edit. But Paul Smith will still insist on wearing that bloody hat...

Grant Gee

Claire Oxley

Jerry Ch

Laura Tunstall

Maximo Park’s Questing Not Coasting by Grant Gee

Trudy's new one for new pop cutie Pixie Lott is a big production number, featuring a whole new dance craze.
Which sort of hurts, as she explains below.

Trudy Bellinger on making the video for Pixie Lott's Mama Do
"This song has an infectious clap that runs throughout and I wanted to visually reference the clapping and embellish it as the unique hook of the video.
"As this is Pixie's debut video it was important for the label to show off all her incredible talents - she is stunning, and a brilliant dancer. I wanted the choreography to really stand out as being fresh and different. The clapping was the obvious starting point to create a fusion of pat-a-cake, capoeira and physical theatre. In order to achieve this fusion of styles, I worked with two choreographers: Paul Roberts for his slick sharpness, and Kate Pearson for her innovative physical theatre.
"The fusion really worked, and after two days of intense rehearsals we had an amazingly tight piece, although we had problems with the twenty dancers being covered in bruises! In order to get the attitude across and the intensity with the choreography they really had to slap each other. We had to change the styling to hide all the bruises, particularly on the thighs.
"The concept was also brought about by the lyrics, which are about sneaking out in the night and getting up to no good without your parents knowing. The idea of her crawling through her bed into this other world made it fantastical and gave me creative licence to have a few surreal elements. The bed scene was made up of thirty or so mattresses inside a tent of giant silk. The light was amazing, and once inside the bed set it felt so calming and peaceful. This serenity really reflects in Pixie's performance in this section.
"Through a door in the bed we see Pixie and the girls arrive through a locker into a locker room where they start to prepare themselves for the clap off. I shot at MC Motors and as this location is used a lot, I didn't want it to look like other videos but liked the textures and the structure. We built a locker room with a leopard print floor, a boudoir/girls cloakroom with a pink perspex floor, leopard print drapes and a circular red leather pouffe.
"The contrast of the hot pink next to the red brought a contemporary fashion edge to the video. Using red and pink neons sewn together with lots of pipes and industrial props, the main dance area was transformed into a more power station or factory feel with a club edge creating an exciting backdrop to the clap off.
"Denzil Armour lit it and Sam Brown did second unit, whilst Mark Adcock shot Bolex enabling me to get coverage of the six sets and choreography in one day. The drama of the clap-off was created shooting at 100fps and speed ramping and jump cutting. And Ducati supplied all the bikes for the guys as well as Pixie's white one, which we added her logo to."

Merge@Crossroads

Trudy Bellinger

Hera King

Alicia Farren

Barry Wasserman

James H

Kevin Ford

Karen Alder

Sam Jones

Henry

Dan Curwin

Pixie Lott’s Mama Do by Trudy Bellinger

Dancing girls with video cameras, spectacular hats, moody lighting, Franz Ferdinand's Alex's beautiful androgenous alter-ego...
With a bagful of ideas and some sexy glamour, Nima gives Franz some of that Hot Chip vibe and turns the band's performance into a multi-faceted art installation.
To be enjoyed over several viewings - not least for another excellent edit for Nima by Dan Sherwin at Final Cut, who presumably had to wade through a ton of 'dancer-cam' footage.
But then, an interactive version for the punters to edit themselves wouldn't be such a bad idea either, would it

Nima Nourizadeh

Malachy McAnenny

Martin Zahringer

Gregg Shoulder

Hannah Edwards

Steven Hoggett

Nana Klimek

Dan Sherwen

The Mill

Mick Vincent

John Moule

Franz Ferdinand’s No You Girls by Nima Nourizadeh

Gary Go is the new kid in town - thin enough to get into a tight Italian suit, and fit enough to do some serious running in Mike Baldwin's cinematic, retro-tastic and somewhat enigmatic video.
When not running, Gary is shadowed in the studio by a line of spec-wearing Gary-alikes. It looks great - shot by Denzil Armour-Brown - and Mike explains his interpretation of the theme of the song below. Gary is Go.

Michael Baldwin on making the video for Gary Go's Wonderful
"The song has a very strong yet simple message about self-belief and picking yourself up when you're low. So I wanted to have a theme of identity running throughout. The running symbolises a 'journey' and the identical people were choreographed to deliberately 'echo' Gary's moves, which proved harder than I had imagined!
"I didn't want any dancing or specific choreography but more of a 'Simon Says' ripple of movement where they just copied what Gary did. Luckily we had Supple and his crew in charge of all that, so it turned out great in the end.
"All the scribbling in the middle eight are actually Gary's handwriting. I asked him to write down random thoughts that related to the song in some way. Luckily he has really nice handwriting!
"Building up a relationship with an artist before a shoot makes the world of difference to the finished video, and Gary was brilliant with his input and a real trooper on the shoot.
"I wanted it to be quite celebratory at the end, hence the extra people and the 'echoes' breaking away from Gary and the game show type signs. It's a feel-good video ultimately."

Flynn Productions

Michael Baldwin

Charlotte Woodhead

Luke Day

Supple Nam

James Rose

Ross Anderson

Gary Go’s Wonderful by Michael Baldwin

It's pop, but just like Trudy's vid for Sexy No No No, that palette of red and black gives the fantasy an almost noir-ish edge - accentuated by those mirrored rooms. And things do get broken.

http://uk.youtube.com/watchv=T5vkDo_dT3w[/youtube]

Crossroads Films

Fran Barnes

Ed Butcher

Victoria Adcock

Lisa Laud

Liz Martin

Quin Williams

Tom Russell

Girls Aloud’s The Loving Kind by Trudy Bellinger

Girls-Aloud’s-The-Loving-Kind-by-Trudy-Bellinger

Fabulous colour-splattered video for Robyn directed by Rankin and Chris Cottam that always looks great despite the mess, and has smart ideas chucked around with the same abandon as the paint.
Love that the sprayed-on band stay deadpan throughout, leaving the emotion to the wonderful Robyn - who gets to stamp on the camera. Did Hype ever get that shot
Top drawer pop stuff, from a top drawer team including producer Juliette Larthe, DoP Denzil Armour-Brown and editor Dom Leung.
Dang di dang diggy diggy.

Watch: <a href="http://www.hsilondon.co.uk/clip.aspxid=759">Quicktime movie</a>

Rankin &amp; Chris

HSI London

Juliette Larthe

Scott Robert Clark

Dominic Leung

Nicole Erlich[/pay]

Robyn’s Cobrastyle by Rankin & Chris

Marco Puig on making the video for Kooks' Sway
"Sway is all about losing a friend. I wanted to create a film which explored how losing someone close to you really felt; it feels shit!
"In the promo we see an underground dressing room tear itself apart. I guess the dressing room is a metaphor for Luke's heart - it breaks up till Luke is left alone with nothing. I decided to put Luke in a chain mail shirt to again emphasize the idea of him trying to protect his heart, but even that comes off at the end.
"All the effects are done in-camera. Paul Mann at Machine Shop did an amazing job. I just kept asking for more and more, and he just kept giving me more. He's my second favourite person.
"The first is Tom Gander, the production designer, who did an incredible job. Working as a production designer myself for the last ten years, I think I may have been a little bit of a control freak when it came to the set! The ceiling being blown off has to be one of the most fun moments on the shoot. We had loads of SFX hands up in the gantry running at break neck speed, pulling wires attached to the panels below. I was also really pleased with the long tracking shot through the debris.
"Olly Goodrum, the producer managed to persuade ten students from Bournemouth College to come down, be 'mummified' in black drapes and puppeteer huge sections of broken set whilst two dolleys hurtled past them.
"Denzil Armour-Brown made everything look really beautiful. I wanted to make something that looked like film, not this shitty crisp video I see everywhere else. Denzil really embraced the early Wong Kar-wai look I was trying to achieve. We pushed the stock to the extreme and used uncoated lenses from the 1940's.
"Finally Simon Hargood (The Quarry) did an incredible job in the edit. I think he took the film to a whole new level. I love working with Simon cause he gets so involved in a project, really making the work his own. All in all I loved directing my first ever promo. And I can't wait to make another!"

Amarillo Films

Marco Puig

Oliver Goodrum

Tom Gander

Simon Hargood

Byron Wooffindin

Carole Burton

The Kooks’ Sway by Marco Puig

Duffy the Voice hooks up with Sophie Muller, and they push that Sixties thing for all its worth. But it's not just a good look (although it is, especially in black and white, and lovely work from Denzil A-B).
Without resorting to the raw emotion of Warwick Avenue, Duffy backs up the 'do, nice clobber and lovely torch singing with a performance that would work in Up The Junction or Alfie.
She talks the talk, but when push comes to shove she just can't keep away from the bad 'un with the frightening shoes...

Denzil Armour

Director of Photography

Videos featuring Denzil Armour

2010 (3)

2009 (6)

2008 (4)

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