When creating a music video, it is important to correlate song’s lyrics to the cinematic story itself. One of our video production projects was for the song “Save me” (“Spasi me”) by Michael Bob Vidaković. This is how we did it.
1. Initial meeting
First, we talked about the lyrics. What does it mean? What do we want to say with this video? What is the mood of the song itself? We came to a conclusion that the poetic narative of the song is related to imaginary relationship between the singer and the girl who doesn’t even know that he exists. That gave us some ideas.
2. Script and casting
What is the goal of the girl’s character in this story? It was simply to find the guy and save him. Save him from himself, actually. Then, the point of the video is searching. We needed the location and just one actress that will fill the requirements for rebelious, sexy girl the singer wants. The story would take place in some abandoned or rustic building full of hallways where the guy could call her with his song and she would go and search for him. But search for him how?
Through dance.
The next step was to write the actual script and to see what would be the culmination of the music video. In the end, of course, she will find him. And he will not have to call her through the song anymore. She would be wondering through the corridors searching for him, getting closer and closer, dancing more and more.
The dance was important. That’s when Bojana, our choreography master came into the scene and we auditioned several actresses that fit the description we made. She tried her signature moves with them and we decided to choose one actress that is the perfect fit. The actress was not entirely free with her moves and she had that dreamy look we wanted, which was good as she would fit in the space itself and the story.
3. Location scouting and the final arrangements
We considered several locations for our music video production, but the one that was especially important to us was the “BIGZ” building in Belgrade, which was to be sold soon and repurposed into something entirely different. The building had great importance in Belgrade’s history, and we wanted to make some sort of omage to it’s hallways, vastness and all the stories that took place there.
The rest was just to go and find the exact locations for the shots that we will be using in the music video. We took several test shots, agreed on the camera angles, costume, lighting (decided eventually to go full natural with the light we already had there because of the unique atmosphere in the BIGZ building), and the shooting schedule. And what was left? Just to shoot the video!
4. Conclusion
The crew came and the shooting started. The details of the shooting are pretty borring, but what was interesting is that exactly the next day from the shooting, the “BIGZ” building was sold. It was not the part of Belgrade as we knew it anymore. We took the location that is very important for all of us and preserved the piece of history trough one music video which, ironically, has the title “Save me”.
Of course we are proud of it. But the more important thing is that we included something with a greater importance in one “regular” music video. And that’s why this story is special.
Oh and yes, below is the song if you’re interested: