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DP Ross Riege was true to the old school method of trying to get everything he could in-camera," the editor explains. Cutting on Avid Media Composer 6.5, Gueer shaped a lot of the narrative, exploring editorial options and contributing different ways to tell the love story. "I'm a huge fan of having a third eye that sees outside ourselves," he explains. "So it was sort of my idea to have the couple look at themselves — it brought a new layer of psychological drama to it." The band wanted a stream-of-consciousness feel to the flashbacks so Gueer referenced film noir and silent movies to create the overlays. "You can see influences of Fritz Lang's expressionistic techniques translated to modern times," he points out. In the offline Gueer added various VFX that were later composited by Zoic Studios' Jerome Knight. The work included split screens, painting out anachronisms as well as rotoscoping the young man and woman for superimposition. For Gueer, When We Fell stands out "as a work of art that talks to you on a complex subliminal level. It's almost like a short movie. You walk away from it feeling inspired." AARON VASQUEZ A VFX artist for over 15 years, Aaron Vasquez (www.aaroncv.com) finds that music videos are lately in the forefront of his work. "They're super-creative and very hands-on," he says. "I've had the good fortune to work with some directors who are also editors. They might give me a small creative brief, then ask what I can bring to the table and let me run with it." One of Vasquez's most recent projects was director Jose Javy Ferrer's El Amante, which headlined artists Daddy Yankee and J Alvarez in lush tropical locations. Ferrer approached Vasquez with an initial concept for the title sequence, and Vasquez crafted an underwater typographic treatment that sets the scene for the narrative to come. Then the director sent the VFX artist the rest of the video footage to make sure the title sequence tied into its ambience. "Once I was well underway with the construction of the open, I was curious as to the body of the video," Vasquez recalls. "After Jose Javy Ferrer shared it with me I sought more input in the whole process to tie everything together in a cohesive way. My initial thought was to grade the footage in a unique way to tie into the color palette of the intro. "He shot the video on various formats, ranging from Canon 5Ds to GoPros for more of the action shots. I graded the footage and grained it in a way that seemed stylized and cinematic. The director was instantly happy with the results of the grade, as were the artists. It was a very liberating feeling to know all avenues were open for exploration on this project." For his color grading Vasquez used Autodesk Smoke on Mac, which had just hit the market and "felt so comfortable to me. It's similar to Flame — I'm a Flame artist by trade — and has all the editorial tools I need so I could do all the color grading as well as the title design." Director J. R. Saint already had a VFX company working on his video, The Game, starring rappers Ali Bomaye, 2 Chainz and Rick Ross, when Vasquez reached out to him. Curious about what Vasquez could offer, the director asked him to make Bomaye look over-thetop demonic for a shot early in the clip. "He had mocked up a still," Vasquez recalls. "It was a moment that would flash by yet he wanted it to capture viewers' attention." And Vasquez's VFX do just that with Bomaye's eyes glowing gold and devilish in a performance sequence. Most recently Vasquez wrapped a music video for hip-hop artist Torch with the same director. Lord Knows had scenes of Torch shot against newspaper clippings of his past history. "It had nice framing, lensing and lighting," says Vasquez. "What could I add to that? I came up with the concept of clippings stored in a scrapbook; we'd flip the pages, highlight sections and transition in and out to the performance footage. The director and Torch fell in love with it, so I did that as an opening sequence. Then the artist and the label wanted to roll it out throughout the video, so it became a much bigger part of the video than I anticipated." Vasquez used 2.5D and 3D techniques for the newspaper effects, combining Maxon Cinema 4D with After Effects and finishing on Smoke on Mac. "I pick projects based on a director I'd like to work with," he explains. "I want to work with someone who's not afraid to let me run with an idea. I seek out directors who've been editors or are intimately involved in the creative process — you get a better product at the end of the day." Vasquez has been so successful in building relationships with music video directors that some now pull him in for on-set VFX supervision. Aaron Vasquez says while working on El Amante, his initial thought was to grade the footage to tie into the color palette of the intro. FLUID Despite competition from music videos for The Rolling Stones and Maroon 5, TKO by singer-songwriter Wynter Gordon netted a recent AICE award for editor Peter Sabatino of New York City's Fluid (www.fluidny. com). Sabatino partnered with Fluid editor/ graphic artist Zeke O'Donnell and director Stormy Weather on Super 35mm and HD StormStock® The world's premier storm footage library. (817) 276-9500 www.stormstock.com www.postmagazine.com Post • August 2013 25