Steve Mason 'Alive' by Rok Predin

Cat Velez - 30th Mar 2016

Director Rok Predin at Trunk has animated Scottish artist Steve Mason's second single Alive from his third solo album Meet the Humans.  The video is a homage to 1990’s video-gaming, but rather than employing the iconic platform style as seen in Trunk’s recent video for Blur’s Ong Ong, Rok adopted the isometric look of early 16-bit video games such as Street Fighter and Sim City,  lovingly recreated using Cinema 4D and After Effects.

The song’s theme drove the concept of the video, which sees a game in which each character is held in stasis by a virus that hovers over them. To break free, the characters first need to understand what is keeping them captive wearing a pair of glasses that reveal the virus, before having a big, all out scrap! 

Trunk’s producer Richard Barnett notes, “To create a well-known, classic look, such as a 90’s console game, and to do it with an amount of believability, is always tricky. We used a number of rules and techniques to help us, such as an aged colour palette, balanced pixilation, and we were always very conscious of the audiences point of view when playing those games. We recreated that feel by using a lot of aerial shots that moved through the city and side on fixed shots that we all remember well from playing the games endlessly as kids.”

ROK PREDIN:

“Alive was a really inspiring song to work to. Once we honed in on the visual language of the story that Steve wanted to tell everything else came pretty naturally. The idea that we're all just participating in a sort of game, a power-play of forces beyond our control, is very Orwellian and something that everyone can relate to.

"Nonetheless, our story does have an optimistic twist. What we are saying is that insight into the ways in which the power structures operate and influence our opinions and everyday decisions is all you need in order to free yourself from being PLAYED."