Director of Photography

Larkin Seiple

After making the&nbsp;era-defining This Is America,&nbsp;Hiro Murai's next music video project&nbsp;was always going to be a big deal. And this does not disappoint. Murai's collaboration with FKA Twigs is an&nbsp;action-packed epic affair, embracing Chinese martial arts. It is a brilliant, and beautiful - and brutal - showcase for the artist's unique talents.In characteristic&nbsp;Murai style, and with the help of regular collaborators like DoP Larkin Sieple and colourist Ricky Gausis, the grittily mundane is transformed into something breathtaking. As with so many of his music videos, this is shot entirely at night and again Murai shows his mastery of the specific atmosphere that night creates in the quieter parts of a cityscape. And in this case, the city is London.In a late night café, Twigs encounters a male alter-ego (played by Teake), and their assignation quickly becomes violent. A terrifying swordfight begins within the cafe, with Twigs' and her rival's athleticism taking them headlong through its shopfront window. Then&nbsp;their fight moves across quiet suburban streets, via the&nbsp;swooping, sensual movements of Wushu martial arts - so the conflict begins to hint&nbsp;at a complex backstory to their relationship/rivalry.&nbsp;But within the café again, at close quarters it gets brutal again and there is an extraordinary&nbsp;outcome - arguably not for the fainthearted.&nbsp;[imgtoken data:1]This climactic moment, where Twigs is divided by a samurai sword, is the most obvious contribution of VFX in a piece which, as with much of Murai's work, employs extensive VFX without drawing huge attention to itself. He worked in close collaboration with a team at MPC in Los Angeles to create those crucial sequences. Not only the&nbsp;choreographed fight sequence across buildings, epic smashes through shop windows, and that dramatic final scene,&nbsp;but digital matte painting was also used throughout to enhance the gritty backdrops. &nbsp;The result is a majestic piece of work, a reminder of Murai's phenomenal body of work in the medium.&nbsp;The same applies to Twigs. It is further evidence that she is a great action hero(ine)&nbsp;in the making.

United Kingdom

Hiro Murai

Jason Cole

Doomsday Entertainment

Danielle Hinde

Brad Weston

Anita Gou

Nate Matteson

Michael Stirton

FKA Twigs

FRIEND

Luke Lynch

Parallax Editing

Ricky Gausis

Michael Gregory

Luke Tierney

Nicole Powell

Alternative

FKA Twigs 'Sad Day' by Hiro Murai

Fka-Twigs-'"sad-Day"'-by-Hiro-Murai

A young boy&#39;s journey through Deep South country becomes a gripping visual metaphor of African-American suffering in Savanah Leaf&#39;s dazzling video for Gary Clark Jr&#39;s This Land.Combined with Clark&#39;s&nbsp;ferociously passionate, almost Hendrix-like performance of the song, the boy joins with his schoolmates to walk across the land which has been synonymous with oppression, and make a symbolic stand of taking ownership of the land.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;And then as Clark makes his guitar sings, Leaf continues to expand the visual universe of the video, into&nbsp;ever more impressionistic and surreal territory. In a dream sequence,&nbsp;there&#39;s a brilliantly startling&nbsp;image of a cosmos existing under the boy&#39;s shirt. This is a hugely ambitious, richly rewarding video for a very powerful song.

United States

Savanah Leaf

Alicia Martinez

Charles Mulford

Mike Bayer

Arianna Tomasettig

Jason Wallis

Devin Sarno

Warner Bros. Records

Rock

Gary Clark Jr. 'This Land' by Savanah Leaf

Gary-Clark-Jr.-'This-Land'-by-Savanah-Leaf

Donald&nbsp;Glover returns as Childish Gambino with This Is America, and a new video by long-time collaborator and comrade Hiro Murai - a scathing satire on the state of the nation.With everything to Glover&#39;s &#39;Jim Crow&#39; pose to the appearance of a Horseman of the Apocalypse being <a href="http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/39966/1/childish-gambino-this-is-america-meaning-jim-crow-dancing-liberty" target="_blank">analysed and deconstructed </a>all over the internet, the details are there to be debated and discussed. But the themes of violence, gun reverence, chaos and fear - and the fact that this comes from a black man&#39;s perspective - are plain as day. Draw your own conclusions.&nbsp;With it&#39;s anarchic, cartoonish action, set in a gigantic hangar,&nbsp;this is a stretch&nbsp;from the uber-cool urban-set videos&nbsp;by Glover and Murai when Childish Gambino was just starting out, and before they started making Atlanta, their Golden Globe-winning TV show.But at the same time this seems in keeping with what has gone before. Glover is a virtuoso performer, who can be different things at different moments. And this is a seriously absurd comedy&nbsp;for serious times.<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/10/donald-glover-childish-gambino-this-is-america-grim-surrealism" target="_blank">Childish Gambino captures the grim surrealism of being black in America</a>&nbsp;(Guardian)<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESKmRiLjNpg" target="_blank">An expert&#39;s take on the symbolism of This Is America</a> (TIME)<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/10/arts/hiro-murai-atlanta-finale-this-is-america-interview.html" target="_blank">Hiro Murai on &#39;Atlanta&#39; and&nbsp;the This Is America video</a> (New York Times)&nbsp;

Ibra Ake

Fam Rothstein

Brian Freesh

Ernie Gilbert

Hip Hop

Childish Gambino 'This Is America' by Hiro Murai

Childish Gambino - This Is America (Official Video)

A brokenhearted young woman heads for the dance studio to chase her blues away - and succeeds in releasing an explosively sexual dance fantasy in Jesse Fleece&#39;s video for Cathedral.With its &#39;80s detail, fashion sense&nbsp;and film feel (courtesy of a dream team of DoP Larkin Sieple and colourist Ricky Gausis)&nbsp;Try To Fight is a beautifully-crafted reworking of that famous scene in Flashdance, and dancer Kylie Shea is great in the Jennifer Beals role, conjuring her fellow dancer Nick Baga from her erotic imaginings. It&#39;s hot stuff!

Jesse Fleece

Tara Alexis

Cristina Bidagor

Steve Bagnara

Matt Sanderson

Jonathan Dec

Mike Beckman

Heather Farah

Abigail Francis

Amadora Biscette

Ethan Feldbau

Kylie Shea, Nick Baga

Nick Baga

Cathedrals 'Try To Fight' by Jesse Fleece

Cathedrals-'Try-To-Fight'-by-Jesse-Fleece

Having taken to directing TV&nbsp;like a duck to water with Atlanta - and helped the show to a couple of Emmys in its first season - Hiro Murai returns to music videos to reassert his mastery of the medium for hiphop legends A Tribe Called Quest.And this really is a sight for sore eyes. In a way it&#39;s a throwback, and not because ATCQ were big in the Nineties. The irresistable propulsion of Dis Generation comes alive in a tracking shot in which visual elements repeat but also develop. It provides the basis for more of Murai&#39;s FX ideas - the giant Q-Tip, Busta Rhymes facing off with himself, and so on.And&nbsp;the classic black and white look adds refinement, dignity and warmth. That feels connected to great American music videos of the past, from the likes of Romanek, Fincher and Daughters.Good to have you back, Mr Murai, at least for a while... &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

Brooke McDaniel

Jocelyn Webber

Hannah Espinoza

Michael Beaudry

Bemo

A Tribe Called Quest 'Dis Generation' by Hiro Murai

It begins with a howl. The disappointed howl of a single man, like the howl of decades from voices never heard while a helicopter hovers with menace above. &lsquo;I&rsquo;ve got nothing left to say,&rsquo; he tells us. &lsquo;I&rsquo;ve lost everything I had, and I&rsquo;m not angry, I&rsquo;m not mad,&rsquo; he reassures a culpable nation built on&nbsp;plunder.And so it begins. A song. A film. With a clarity of voice, a clarity of vision that somehow feels lessened if it were called just a music video. Because it&rsquo;s so much&nbsp;more.With the able hand of Hiro Murai&rsquo;s direction, this video carries unfathomable weight on its shoulders, with a grace and lightness of touch that is deeply&nbsp;arresting.There is no indictment. No direct accusation, in lyrics or images. And still, we can&rsquo;t help pine for a lost innocence that was likely never there. &lsquo;I&rsquo;m in love, but I&rsquo;m still sad. I found peace, but I&rsquo;m not glad&rsquo; we hear while a young boy stands alone at an intersection he&rsquo;ll never cross. Our illusion of where our society&rsquo;s debts lie quietly shattered as a police car violently strikes a&nbsp;life.This video is nothing short of breathtaking. Its beauty surpassed only by its effortless, haunting&nbsp;substance.&nbsp;It leaves you crushed. It leaves you hopeful. It leaves you a different person than before you&nbsp;watched.Already a stand-out video this year, and one of the finest examples of Murai&rsquo;s directorial&nbsp;voice.

Michelle Thompson

Mindy Kelly

Justin Hantz

Semera Khan

Polydor

Emily Tedrake

Michael Kiwanuka 'Black Man In A White World' by Hiro Murai

Michael Kiwanuka - Black Man In A White World

Into his familiar mis-en-scene, Hiro Murai introduces something powerful, brutal and mesmerizing, for Baauer&#39;s Day Ones.The Revolutionary Wars come to the night-shrouded &#39;hood - plus powdered wigs and floating candleabra. A study in contrasts, with typically memorable Murai imagery,&nbsp;and&nbsp;a reminder of where the right to bear arms started, and how it often ends.

Jason Colon

Paul Maertens

Chad Nicholson

Grant Culwell

John Richoux

Theodore Zaleski

Luckyme Studio

Alternative, Hip Hop

Baauer ft Novelist & Leikili 47 'Day Ones' by Hiro Murai

Massive Attack return with their first new music for over five years, and a video for the excellent Tricky-featured Take It There by Hiro Murai&nbsp;which is pretty much everything&nbsp;you could hope for.The situation is familiar Murai territory - LA suburbia&nbsp;at night, shot naturally&nbsp;by DoP Larkin Sieple &ndash; into which comes the presence of a barely recognisable John Hawkes - shambling, decrepit, in a really bad way... and with his own personal band of demons.And what appears like a dramatic set-up becomes something very music video - a bit&nbsp;like Thriller, even, through the joint, bleaker perspective of Massive Attack, Hiro Murai and choreographer Ryan Heffington.&nbsp;A match made in&nbsp;heaven.

Ryan Heffington

Mindy Le Brock

Ari Robbins

Mandy Brown

John Hawkes

Virgin EMI

James Hackett

Trip-hop

Dance, Alternative

Massive Attack, Tricky & 3D 'Take It There' by Hiro Murai

Massive Attack, Tricky & 3D - Take It There

From the echo of a lone lighter in the darkness, a monster of dense sound crawls through Grief, the debut track on Earl Sweatshirt&rsquo;s second album&nbsp;I Don&rsquo;t Like Shit, I Don&rsquo;t Go Outside, and its video by Hiro Murai translates eerie sonic textures into equally unsettling images.&lsquo;Ain&rsquo;t been outside in a minute,&rsquo; Earl spits, while the video unfolds as if from the perspective of some nocturnal creature that only sees in negative space. There are no bounds. No borders from which to frame the universe of this video. No way to get your bearings. It just emerges from the thick muck, while the backing sound ploughs ahead, like the hollow sweep of Badalamenti&rsquo;s ambient Twin Peaks score as if Burial had created it.The longer you watch, the more you&rsquo;re unnerved. Sucked in. Unsure if you&rsquo;ll ever make it out. Earl and his crew clearly haven&rsquo;t, stuck in limbo as x-ray video game characters. &lsquo;I&rsquo;ve been livin&rsquo; what I wrote.&rsquo;This is the third outing for Hiro and Earl, who previously collaborated on Chum&nbsp;and Hive, and if anything, this video feels obvious. That is to say, these two are so well matched, much like Hiro&rsquo;s ongoing work with Childish Gambino, that once you start watching, you&rsquo;re immediately struck by the inevitability of it all; it&rsquo;s a perfect visual realisation of what the music calls for. So much that you have to wonder if any other approach could even come close.I Don&rsquo;t Like Shit, I Don&rsquo;t Go Outside drops on March 23, and we can only hope to see Earl and Hiro continue their collaboration with the same brutally haunting momentum as this first release.

Courtney Davies

Isaac Hagy

Gloria FX

Bryan Younce

Urban

Earl Sweatshirt 'Grief' by Hiro Murai

Earl Sweatshirt - Grief

Director Björn Rühmann (formerly of directing team The Vikings), co-creator&nbsp;Kerstin Rühmann and songwriter/composer Anthony Frattolillo have created a trilogy of powerful short films that act as individual music videos for songs by&nbsp;American folk outfit the Herbert Bail Orchestra. And within each video, a series of broken characters face the drama of alienation and existential despair over the course of a single day.In the first part of the trilogy, The Nature of Things, the scene is set&nbsp;for the harrowing journey of a man (played by English actor Richie Coster) through the barren American desert, trying to save his only companion, his&nbsp;dog. His spirit and perseverance, beyond all hope, is the reason to keep watching this viscerally punishing film - and then be hooked by an ending that will make you want to watch the next one...

Björn Rühmann

Furlined

Diane McArter

Kerstin Rühmann

Anthony Frattolillo

Ed Buhr

Charlotte Culina

Andrew Katz

Marcia Rennert

Keston Ridley

AJ Murillo

Jay Liquori

Toby Tomkins

CHEAT

Kenichiro Tanaka

Margaret Parus

Matt Ardine

Folk, Indie

The Herbert Bail Orchestra 'The Nature Of Things' by Björn Rühmann

Hiro Murai takes us on a beautiful journey in his promo for Telegraph Avenue by Childish Gambino. The trip - along scenic winding roads, lush forests and crashing waves on idyllic beaches - takes an incredibly&nbsp;unexpected twist in the final segment...

Jason Baum

Kimberly Stuckwisch

Jessica Cole

Angela Tillson

Jacquelyn London

Graham Schofield

Jerami Robinson

Arielle Vavasseur

Elise Velasco

Archie Ahuna

Kyle Davis

Jhene Aiko, Childish Gambino

Ballad

Electronica

Childish Gambino 'Telegraph Avenue' by Hiro Murai

Childish Gambino - Telegraph Ave ("Oakland" By Lloyd)

After Kahlil Joseph&#39;s remarkable Until The Quiet Comes promo, winner of Video Of The Year at the UKMVAs last year, the bar on future Flying Lotus videos has been set very high indeed. But greatness can and should provide&nbsp;inspiration, and that&nbsp;is certainly the case here.Hiro Murai&#39;s video for Never Catch Me, FlyLo&#39;s collaboration with Kendrick Lamar, captures the spirit of what has gone before. As with Joseph&#39;s visual poem, different&nbsp;sides of the human condition - joyful innocence, exuberant expression, violence and tragedy&nbsp;- merge together.But Hiro handles the material in his own way. He draws happiness from a situation of sheer tragedy, as two children - presumably the innocent victims of gang violence - rise from their coffins at their joint funeral, and dance around the church, and escape. It is a fantasy, and the congregation are oblivious, but the boy and girl&nbsp;are not exactly ghosts.&nbsp;Joyful and happy, they are very real, and&nbsp;this is more like a brilliant&nbsp;blend of two realities.&nbsp;&nbsp;In a year of fantastically high achievement - reflected in his Best Director nomination at this year&#39;s UK Music Video Awards - Hiro has arguably made his most cherishable video yet.&nbsp;

Keone & Mari

Hannah Hurney

Flying Lotus ft. Kendrick Lamar 'Never Catch Me' by Hiro Murai

Flying Lotus - Never Catch Me ft. Kendrick Lamar

Hiro Murai delivers another fine video with&nbsp;a graceful, beautifully atmospheric one-shot promo for Chet Faker&#39;s Gold. A late-night drive - filmed from the back of moving vehicle - focuses on the centre road&nbsp;marking. And then three roller-skaters gradually appear, and do an impressive routine.Hiro is certainly on a roll...

Chris Velasco

Appleusa McGlynn, April Corley, Candice Heiden

Soul

Chet Faker 'Gold' by Hiro Murai

Chet Faker - Gold

David Wilson delivers a righteous, ultimately joyous accompaniment to a classic Arcade Fire cri de ceour We Exist, thanks to a gripping performance by&nbsp;Andrew Garfield, showing that he is a more courageous actor than the&nbsp;Amazing Spider-Man allows.&nbsp;In fact, this also involves a change of garb, but a more profound transformation. The Garfield character&#39;s need to express himself as a woman&nbsp;leads him to a bar where he puts himself at the mercy of the local rednecks. But the predictable outcome of victimisation and violence - with echoes of Boys Don&#39;t Cry, the film about the murder of transgender teenager&nbsp;Brandon Teena &ndash;&nbsp;gets turned on its head.Drama becomes fantasy, as Garfield&#39;s aggressors become dancers - this is the second collaboration&nbsp;in quick succession, between David Wilson and&nbsp;choreographer Ryan Heffington who (as well as working on the Sia Chandelier video) choreographed David&#39;s superb video for <a href="http://www.promonews.tv/videos/2014/05/06/hercules-love-affair-ft-john-grant-i-try-talk-you-david-wilson" target="_blank">Hercules &amp; Love Affair&#39;s I Try To Talk To You</a>.And then comes the brilliant payoff. Garfield is led by his dancer guardian angels through a portal into the real world: Coachella 2014, and Arcade Fire are playing We Exist. A moved (or quite possibly terrified) Garfield joins the band on stage. What a moment.&nbsp;

David Wilson

The Director's Bureau

Thomas Grove Carter

Trim Editing

Sue Yeon Ahn

Jason Kisvarday

Francis & Pereira

Simon Bourne

Colonel Blimp

Hayley Simpson/Plaster Casting

Framestore

Chris Bristow

Munky

Indie Rock

Arcade Fire 'We Exist' by David Wilson

Arcade Fire - We Exist

In&nbsp;the second release in a music video series commissioned for international online retailer SSENSE by&nbsp;System Magazine, David Wilson delivers this fluid monochrome piece for Hercules &amp; Love Affair&#39;s I Try To Talk To You, featuring John Grant on vocals.Powered by some wonderful choreography by Ryan Heffington&nbsp;and brilliantly fluid&nbsp;camerawork, David&nbsp;Wilson&#39;s very sensual promo&nbsp;centres on two men finding intimacy through interpretive dance...

Nathan James Tettey

Paul Weston

Posy Dixon

Allan Wachs

Patrick Colman

Final Cut

Dance

Hercules & Love Affair ft John Grant 'I Try To Talk To You' by David Wilson

Hiro Murai&#39;s perception-altering and&nbsp;trippy video for Childish Gambino&#39;s next single Sweatpants, sees the US rapper&nbsp;experience&nbsp;his own Groundhog Day scenario in a local diner, with increasingly surreal results...

Glassnote

Childish Gambino ft Problem 'Sweatpants' by Hiro Murai

Childish Gambino - Sweatpants ft. Problem

Queens Of The Stone Age singer Josh Homme is the businessman&nbsp;enjoying a celebratory night on the town in Tokyo with his Japanese colleagues in Hiro Murai&#39;s promo&nbsp;for the band&#39;s new single Smooth Sailing. And perhaps not surprisingly, things get a little out of hand...In fact, this is&nbsp;a brilliant thrill-ride, as serious saki-drinking&nbsp;and drugs&nbsp;leads from fun to obnoxiousness and way beyond. Hiro captures much of this in the tried-and-tested style pioneered by Scorcese in Mean Streets. But what is so transfixing about this is sensing something really bad is going to happen. And it does.&nbsp;

Matador

Indie

Queens Of The Stone Age 'Smooth Sailing' by Hiro Murai

Queens Of The Stone Age - Smooth Sailing

Chromeo singer Dave 1 plays the part of the envious&nbsp;pastor at a Las Vegas wedding chapel in Ryan Hope&#39;s promo for Jealous (I Ain&#39;t With It).Ryan casts a group of odd-looking couples in his fun, tongue-in-cheek video&nbsp;which sees pastor Dave abscond&nbsp;with one of the brides -&nbsp;only to get his comeuppance at the finale...

Ryan Hope

Laura Jones

Greg Scruton

Arcade Edit

Michael Utsinger

Lindsey & Greg

Alex Bittan

Chromeo 'Jealous (I Ain't With It)' by Ryan Hope

Chromeo - Jealous (I Ain't With It) [Official Video]

How much fun can you have&nbsp;while just about keeping&nbsp;your clothes on?DANIELS get back to videos for the brilliant, hilarious, typically nuts video for&nbsp;DJ Snake &amp; Lil Jon&#39;s Turn Down For What - starring the infectious lunatic moves of DANIELS&#39; very own Dan Kwan, the snake-like contents of his track bottoms,&nbsp;a brilliant cast of characters, mayhem, destruction &nbsp;- and&nbsp;dancing boobies.

DANIELS

DJ Snake & Lil Jon 'Turn Down For What' by DANIELS

Larkin Seiple

Director of Photography

Videos featuring Larkin Seiple

2020 (1)

2019 (1)

2018 (1)

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2016 (3)

2015 (2)

2014 (9)

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2012 (17)

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