Chris Kasper: Walking on Water

by Paul Stanek

When Philly folk favorite Chris Kasper approached me about creating a music video for a song from his latest album “The First Hundred Years are the Hardest,” the multi-headed visual animal in me instantly flew somewhere way over the rainbow. I have long searched for the perfect project to satisfy my craving for photography, video, illustration and computer animation in one fell swoop. Tall order, I know, but hey…I’m a tall guy. Fortune must’ve been smiling on me, for upon listening to Kasper’s “Walking on Water” on repeat for an evening, I was sure I’d at long last found the consummate conduit.

Now, after several months of what I like to call “a vacation from social life,” I’m quite excited to share the final result: a music video that was 100% shot, illustrated, animated, composited, rendered and edited all right here at Wonderful Machine. Enjoy!

For the curious minds, here’s a brief recipe for this dish:

• 1 Canon 5D Mark II
• 1 Green Screen (well, more of a grayish seamless backdrop)
• 2 Hotlights
• 1 Wonderful Machine studio
• 1 Chris Kasper
• 1 Incredible song
• 1 Paul Stanek
• 1 Fox
• 1 Droid 3 camera (and its surprisingly crisp macro shots of spongy Injera bread)
• 3 Sharpies
• 1 Stack of Paper
• 1 Scanner
• 1 Copy of Adobe Photoshop CS5
• 1 Copy of Adobe Illustrator CS5
• 1 Zillion hours of keying, matte choking, curve tweaking, layer blending, alpha channeling, compositing, rotoscoping, animating, landscape building, bump mapping, lighting, effecting, and much much more in Adobe After Effects CS 5.5
• 1 gazillion particles
• Copious amounts of patience

Stir well. Taste, evaluate, then stir some more. Repeat until flavor makes your brain smile. Render for about an eon or two. Serve while hot.

Share with friends, enemies, lovers, strangers, and several small species of furry animals.

Special thanks to Chris Kasper, Andrew Lipke, the Wonderful Machine crew, and all souls who facilitated, inspired, supported and endured the making of this video (you know who you are).

Keep on dreamin’!

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