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MUSIC VIDEOS www.postmagazine.com 28 POST JULY/AUG 2022 IMAGINE DRAGONS — SHARKS Ingenuity Studios (www.ingenuitystudios.com) in Los Angeles recently completed work on the latest music video for Imagine Dragons. Sharks is a fully-animated, Saul Bass-inspired video, and marks the studio's fifth collabo- ration with the band, having also worked on their Natural, Bad Liar, Follow You and Cutthroat videos. Ingenuity Studios' motion-design department worked from concept to final delivery, taking inspiration from iconic graphic designer Saul Bass. The team developed a cast of shark characters and stylized band members in order to bring the story of the song to life. As the story unfolds in 2D, the song's lyrics appear as stylized typography, filling out the frame and helping scenes transi- tion from verse to chorus. The creative team primarily worked with Adobe's After Effects & Illustrator, as well as Blender. The typeface — called "Hitchcock" — was created by Matt Terich and made available on typographica.org. Character rigs were a combina- tion of Duik Bassel and Limber, and the artwork was imported from Illustrator using Overlord. "Interscope has had a great track history working with Ingenuity Studios across both animation and VFX for many of our projects, and I'm very glad we have been able to collaborate over the years on some great animated videos for Imagine Dragons," says Jared Shelton, director of creative content, Interscope Records. "This has culminated on the latest animated video for Sharks, which feels like a perfect accompaniment to our song and creative campaign, and we couldn't be happier! This homage to Saul Bass' art style has been something I've wanted to do for a while and fits so perfectly with the song and creative." "The Sharks brief was completely open-ended, and the winning pitch was just one of four or five phenomenal pitch ideas that the team came up with," adds Alex Popkin, director of motion graphics & animation at Ingenuity Studios. "Since every member of our team has a Swiss Army knife skill set, we are accustomed to solving a wide variety of motion/VFX problems with all the tools at our disposal. We bring a boutique mentality to our projects — every- thing is made by hand, by artists and animation lovers who put a lot of thought and care into what they are making, and the result shows." The Ingenuity team included VFX supervisor/founding partner David Lebensfeld, VFX supervisor/partner Grant Miller, senior animator Bailee DesRocher and character designer Claudia Dillard. Christian Klein, Aiman Samat, Aubie Udochi, Simon Edl and Nick Canton all worked as animators on the project, with Edl also providing sound design. Cheryl Lee was 3D animator and Doni Petersen served as production coordinator. NIKKI LANE — BLACK WIDOW Nashville vocalist/songwriter Nikki Lane recently debuted a new song and mu- sic video. Black Widow was directed by Austin Leih and shot in Austin, TX. The track is from Lane's forthcoming album "Denim & Diamonds," which is slated for release September 23rd via New West Records. Black Widow is presented in black & white, though red tint appears through- out the video, hinting to the threat of its namesake spider. Lane is shown in a Texas motel, getting dressed following a night with a cowboy. A red sand timer suggests that time is running out for her former lover. The cowboy is seen run- ning from the hotel and along a deserted highway, knowing that Lane is after him in her classic Mustang. As she approaches to deliver what looks like his demise, she instead throws him his hat, and speeds away — the Black Widow symbol on the hood of her hot rod. According to Leih, Black Widow was shot using Sony's Venice camera, along with Canon FD primes and Angenieux's Optimo 30-80. The project was edited in Adobe Premiere Pro. "Black Widow evoked imagery of exploitation cinema — graphic, tactile and immediate," Leih explains. "With each step in production, the aim was to layer those foundational elements in a way that best supported Nikki and the song." "Recording 'Black Widow' was an exhilarating experience," notes Lane, "with both Carla Azar and Matt Helders on drums, alongside the rest of the players (Joshua) Homme curated. The room was pulsing as we followed the lyrics of a female Black Widow spider, presumably chasing after her prey — a moniker easily associated with powerful women, which I had found intriguing. For me, it's always been more fun to just move on."