Animated videos have come a long way since the square removal men of Dire Straits’ ‘Money for Nothing’ and dance music in particular has embraced their reality-bending potential. Rob Wicksteed - an award-winning animator who has worked on some of the most exciting and innovative projects of recent years - is the man behind the Shapeshifters’ ‘Helter Skelter’ video. We caught up with him to find out a bit more about the video and why he thinks people are so drawn to animation.
What is the attraction for you of making animated films and why – if done well – do you think people respond so well to them?
The main thing that attracts me to making animated films is the no-holds-barred idea. With animation you don't have to worry about silly little things like lights or cameras or the laws of physics. As long as you can draw it, you can pretty much do what you like. If you want your video to be filled with steam powered musical machines, or your characters to be shaped like potatoes, there's nothing stopping you.
I think this is also the reason why people respond to animated videos so well. Music videos are a great platform to produce short little movies; an outlet for aspiring directors to get a go at shooting their own short films – the best being the ones that try something different. The only problem is that a lot of music videos are notoriously low budget. The knee jerk reaction is often to get the band or the artist into a warehouse for a day, play the track and film them miming; stick a few special effects over the top, and you're done. This was all well and good in the 80's, but personally, I'm starting to get a little bored of it now. What animation lets you do is really let your creative ideas go. You don't have the same restrictions as live action. You can create that sci-fi, action horror or film noir, western rom-com without having to commandeer a Hollywood blockbusters budget.
A lot of your projects have related to electronic music. Do you have a particular affinity for the genre?
I have always had a particular affinity to electronic music. My personal tastes have always been rather downtempo. I grew up listening to things like Massive Attack and Air. It was only when I started getting into VJing that I really started to appreciate dance music. I used to VJ for a number of club nights down in Southampton. I always found the indie nights kind of boring. It was hard to find the right clips to play, and the nature of the music is very stop, go, stop, go. But with the house nights, once you got into the groove, the whole thing would just naturally flow.
Tell us about the new video for ‘Helter Skelter’..how did it come about?
'Helter Skelter' is a literal roller coaster ride through a dreamy, psychedelic world, which is full of steam-powered music machines, desert island ravers and scary giant, floating, blue heads.
The project actually started out with a student of mine. I was workings as an associate lecturer at Southampton Solent. A student, who was on the Nocturnal Groove label, mentioned that the Shapeshifters were looking to commission a new video. I jumped at the opportunity and got him to pass on a few of my details. The guys liked what they saw and invited me in for a chat at Defected. My initial ideas for the video were very different from the final product, and the guys and I didn’t see eye to eye straight away. However, after a few failed pitch ideas, Simon and Max mentioned the concept of a rollercoaster. There was a lot of scope there, and the potential to work as a really fun idea. I took this away to develop, and came back with what you see today.
When you sit down to create a video, where does the initial idea come from? Is it entirely your own imagination or do the clients have some input too?
To be honest, I'm not quite sure where a lot of the ideas came from. Often they just come to me on the tube. I'll be sitting there day dreaming, thinking about something completely different, and then suddenly a connection will be made. Of course I can’t take all the credit. I love to think aloud, constantly telling people what I’m working on. So all the best ideas come from friends, family and colleagues!
Simon and Max were always quite open with the actual content of the video. However, there were two main specifications; the first, was the style had to be dream like. The phrase that kept being used was 'modern psychedelia'. The second was for the video to be a visual metaphor for the lyrics. This manifested itself as the rollercoaster symbolizing all the naughty things you know you shouldn't do in life, but you still do anyway!
This isn't always how it works when creating a video. Sometimes the client has a lot of input and other times you are left to your own devices. Personally I like somewhere in the middle. No input can be a little daunting, as not everybody likes the same things that you like. But on the other hand, too much can just get plain annoying! It's about striking that nice balance, where you each trust each others’ judgement.
You won a competition to create a video for The Prodigy’s ‘Run With the Wolves’. Tell us about it…
The last project I worked on was a competition to make a video for the Prodigy track ‘Run with the Wolves‘...which I won! My boss at the time, Adam Comiskey at Pew36, was the one who brought it to my attention. He came in one day and said "We should make a video for this competition as a studio side project…anyone got any ideas?" Immediately on hearing the track the first thing I thought of was robot hookers! It just had to be robot hookers! I'd grown up listening to the Prodigy, and thought it'd be right up their street. Sadly, not everyone agreed with me, so adamant that my Electronic Whores were the way to go, I went it alone. My persistence paid off and I ended up winning.
I had to do most of the work in my spare time, and used it as a great opportunity to experiment with some new ideas and techniques. I remember on one particular night where I stayed late at work. I turned to a colleague of mine and said, "I really don't have to energy to finish this video. I think I'm going to just give up. I mean, it's not like it's going to win." Luckily I was wrong.
What would be your dream commission?
I was actually asked this question by Steve Edwards, just after the video had been released. It was during sound check at the Defected Night at the iTunes festival. As I stood there trying to think of someone cool to say, Simon Hawes from Nocturnal Groove leaned over and whispered, "Rob, the correct answer is The Shapeshifters, with Steve Edwards performing guest vocals." I'll go with that!
Interview by Greg Sawyer
To check out more of Rob’s work, visit www.rob-wtd.co.uk and www.pew36.co.uk
Helter Skelter – including Daddy’s Groove remix and the Shapeshifters Dub – is out 01..09.10 – click to listen & pre-order
