Directors Research Task

Patric Ullaeus:

• Is the founder of the Revolver film company, which is based in Sweden and specialises in the production of music videos, promotional pictures and concert films.
• He has won numerous domestic and international awards for his work. These include Advertising Effectiveness Awards, Grammy, Clip, US Film Festival, among others.
• He has been critically acclaimed due to his cinematic style and his vivid imagination, which has taken him all around the world to collaborate with numerous talented artists, advertising agencies and record companies.
• He mainly seems to collaborate with rock/metal bands for his music videos.

Artists he has worked with include:

In Flames, Dimmu Borgir, Europe, Arch Enemy, Lacuna Coil, Children Of Bodom, Kamelot, Dream Evil, Firewind, Sirenia, Evergrey, Enslaved, Within Temptation and Sonic Syndicate.

Notable vidoes he has directed:

• Heaven's A Lie - Lacuna Coil
• March Of Mephisto - Kamelot
• Come Clarity - In Flames
• Book Of Heavy Metal - Dream Evil
• The Serptentine Offering - Dimmu Borgir

One thing I like about his directing style is that he has a very cinematic approach and uses a distinct artistic style. He uses a number of tracking shots and pans in order to keep the action moving and uses a number of low angle shots in order to make the band seem larger than life. He uses a large variety of distinct and exotic locations as the backdrops for his videos like a desert in Come Clarity and an abandoned church in Heaven's A Lie.

His videos often use a number of different editing techniques to increase their glossy image and cinematic scope. They are often heavily saturated, giving the video an increased sense of atmosphere and mood, like the harsh greys and browns used in The Serpentine Offering and the bright yellows and oranges used in Come Clarity.

Robert Schober:

Notable videos:

Mastodon - Divinations
Mastodon - Oblivion
Metallica - All Nightmare Long

His videos are often very surreal and often use a wide range of editing effects and computer generated imagery. Both of the Mastodon videos use the band members themselves as characters in the video's narrative, thus helping to blend the story and performance elements together. They also seem to concentrate more on telling a story more than showcasing the band's performance, keeping the viewer immersed in what's happening while still making it recognisable as a product of that particular artist. His videos are often very slick and of a high quality visually. Often when CGI is used in music videos it looks cheap and out of place, but that often isn't the case with his work.