World’s biggest online fashion show.
Creativity always finds a way.
“My Perfect Cousin not only produced an excellent film, but really helped us structure, coordinate and manage what was a mammoth undertaking involving over a hundred models across the world during global lockdown. Alex and Adrian did a great job creating a series of set moves to capture the content needed to create an almost kaleidoscopic effect on Zoom.
The WhatsApp group Alex created to manage this process was a stroke of genius! It not only meant the models were actively helping each other on a practical level, but it also fostered a wonderful sense of community. With so much footage, MPC had quite a job to ensure the edit was brand reflective and showcased a broad range of product with a diverse cast. They worked tirelessly to ensure we were delighted with the final edit
As the project evolved and took on its own spirit, we needed to evolve the music in line. My Perfect Cousin were incredibly accommodating of this changing picture and worked closely with us to get the track perfectly to our liking.
My Perfect Cousin really took our concept to the next level and we are thrilled with the final result!”
Emily Bendell
CEO, Bluebella
Mad idea - quote please if you fancy it ;-) this was the email subject which greeted us, from our long standing clients and friends Bluebella. They had this crazy idea to create the worlds biggest online fashion show during lockdown.
The deadline was tight (isn’t it always) and we’d be working with mostly amateur models from all over the world, filming themselves. What could possibly go wrong? We’d need to instruct them how to film, including lighting, camera position, choreography and get all of this sorted in a couple of days. So far so good. We also had to deal with over 4000 clips for the edit. Ok this might be a bit of a logistical nightmare.
However, we were sold on the idea of a ‘Zoom’ catwalk the moment Bluebella shared it with us, we were also very aware of the production challenge which lay ahead. So we created instructional videos to inform everyone as to exactly what was required from an aesthetic and technical view. Moving swiftly we determined the best methods for managing clips coming in from all over the world.
Alex ran a WhatsApp group to field any questions people might have. All this culminated in an extremely high yield of content, only a few clips were rejected on technical grounds. As with any production every day of pre-production saved many days of post production.
Putting all this together.
At the same time as dealing with pre-production filming, we also briefed motion graphics cousin Paddy on the requirements, we supported him by creating clips of the same moves the talent would be doing which could then be used to start building the template ready for the footage as it arrived. This also enabled our client to see our vision as it was developing. Oh Yes Cousin Andy (more about him below) created a holding track for the music, this was a rough track we’d agreed up front the Beats Per Minute, so whilst the music might change (it always does) the BPM would remain the same.
Here’s what Paddy had to say about his journey:
“We’ve worked on many successful projects together and this looked to be the most challenging, it contained more than four thousand video clips composed within complex moving grid systems, easily making it my most ambitious editing job to date – but certainly one of the most rewarding”
You Can’t Stop the Music.
We always say that music is half the picture, Cousin Andy is our go-to guy for compositions, we felt this needed a special track right from the beginning and Andy smashed it, so we are going to let him talk about this from his point of view below, he’s not a bad writer either:
"There were three phases to creating the Bluebella theme, and as the project evolved, the music had to evolve with it. Initially it was little more than a looped beat that tempo matched the clients reference track and provided a bed for the instructional videos created by the team at My Perfect Cousin.”
Part two of the process centered around constructing a new track that fit the brief and concept, and built on the electronic/organic foundations that had been established, with lots of edit points and layers. As the project developed, and it developed fast, it became apparent that the scale and depth had grown much wider and deeper than we could have dreamed. It was amazing to see.
“In a conference call during the closing days of the edit the client really wanted to express the celebratory nature of this global, diverse group of women. So, instead of re-engineering the track we had, I began from scratch, totally inspired by the conversation we’d just had. We forgot about any reference track and decided that something bold and bombastic was the way to go. 24 hours later, the completed soundtrack to the film was delivered. Actually we did keep one key aspect from the original track and that was the BPM (Beats per minute) this way it would support the existing edit ensuring the deadline was met”
Let’s get social.
So whilst Paddy was working away on the main event, Cousin Gabor created the social edits, he rose to this challenge beautifully. He had been working on another edit for several weeks so this was possibly a welcome relief. Have a look at the social cuts posted here, we like the work to do most of the talking.
Well that’s it from us, thanks for reading all the way down to here.
