fuck yeah delphic

grizzlybro:

Dave Ma, the video director, shared some memories of the experience with us as well.

How did you come up with the concept for the video?

DM: I knew I wanted to film something that had a strong human element in a well known place with a dark past. Initially I thought of going to the West Bank in Palestine but that just wasn’t feasible this time round so I had a look at some images of the Chernobyl area and read about elderly people moving back into the exclusion zone and knew it would be an interesting concept.

Almost everyone knows of Chernobyl, but not a lot of people know what happened or what the place is actually like. That seemed an interesting thing to try and capture in a music video and the band were kind enough to agree.

Why did you feel the setting fitted the song?

DM: The song seemed quite haunting yet positive to me and I like the idea that even in the most fucked up places and situations people just get on with things. Ultimately, on some level, they have the same needs and wants as anyone even if there is more struggle. The sense of reflection on that and the idea of everything changing in a moment worked well with the track.

The line ‘Let’s do something real’ became a kind of mantra for the project and was the perfect way to join the footage to the track. Ultimately it was about the human element and the people that perfectly complimented the vocal lines in the song.

How did you approach working in a place like Chernobyl?

DM: A lot of research before flying out and we made sure our guide/translator knew the area well.

Once there, in Pripyat the abandoned town, we were lugging a lot of equipment up into abandoned buildings that were not so structurally sound at times. Constantly you’re thinking about the radiation because you’ve got a geiger counter freaking out in your hand. I went out there with two pairs of Dunlop Volleys and came back with one pair. I wanted to film area in a very composed way rather than just swinging the camera around at whatever we saw. That took time and was frustrating at times but I think the results were great. Ross McLennan, the Director of Photography on the job, was incredible as always.

How different was it from how you expected?

DM: The Chernobyl area is very large and the first thing you realise is just how much nature has taken over. Pripyat is the perfect example of what would happen to a city if everyone just left. Trees and plants and decaying concrete. The other thing that struck me was how active the area is in places. There are still people working around the Nuclear Power Plant and it was still operating up until the year 2000! That was a revelation.

What’s the longest you can spend in the exclusion zone?

DM: People live there, so I’m assuming quite a while. Though I wouldn’t want to hang out round the power plant too long. All the workers had little badges that measured cumulative radiation and we had to stand on a screening device each day to measure our radiation levels. We all got the OK on that one.

But really - the whole thing is like a massive human experiment. Who knows what kind of long term affects they’re going to discover down the line. I think our guide said he had aged more quickly during the time he lived in Chernobyl town.

What was the most challenging aspect of shooting there?

DM: The uncontrollability and language barrier. The language barrier made it hard to quickly adapt to situations. With the people I had to make sure our translator understood what I was trying to do with the portrait shots which at first he didn’t get. After a while I worked out some good hand signals and ways of asking people to stare into the camera for 10 seconds without smiling. I think he assumed we would be a documentary crew and happy to shoot wandering camera stuff but I wanted to get really well composed frames and a stillness to the subject.

What response did you get from the people who appeared in the video?

DM: I was surprised how willing people were to be filmed. No-one questioned us wanting them to stare at the camera or drive their car around for us. People were so welcoming and quite insistent on making us drink vodka to protect us from the radiation.

At the school I was asked if this was going to be a positive or negative film - and I assured them I wanted it to be positive and show the area not as a desolate wasteland because it isn’t. They seemed pleased and that made me feel an even greater responsibility to try and make the video meaningful.

What did you take from the experience?

DM: I don’t think anyone could go to the area around Chernobyl and not feel a connection with the place and people there. Ross, Neil Andrews the producer and I have all discussed going back there when we can to film another project.

It was incredible to have the chance to make a music video on such a real and meaningful topic. Credit to Delphic and Jill Kaplan the commissioner for placing a lot of trust in the idea and letting us get on with the job at hand.

(excerpt from Quietus article)

(Source: giventothewild)