So you've just joined Kode Media as a brand new video director, so can you tell us how this opportunity came about, and how excited you are about this? I had been speaking to one of the managing directors (Alex Harman) for a little while and he briefly mentioned that he was thinking about turning KODE Media into an agency and essentially run as a production house with a broad roster of directors. In my mind it sounded like a great plan but I couldn't see it happening for a while, however in true KODE style (as I've now learned) things picked up very quickly and within a few weeks of our conversation he started sending me briefs from some major record labels. Eventually the pitch for Don Broco's video came through and ended up being the first video I shot with KODE. It's an exciting prospect as KODE are much further ahead than Daniel Broadley Films due to their networking skills and broader portfolio so when pitches from big clients come through they often have much larger budgets, which doesn't always mean more money for me to pocket but more money to play with and create something that I haven't always been able to do due to small budgets. I think what also makes it exciting is that KODE are still growing, so being around them and watching them learn helps me to learn, I absolutely love taking knowledge in from all aspects of the media industry and being around such great creative and business minded people is always a fantastic opportunity.
You've done a stack of video sessions for LAB Records, so can you tell us about your relationship with that label, and what's it like to set up such cool videos for these guys? LAB is a record label that I have always looked up to, their passion and drive to really push their artists is a great thing to see, It's rare to see such passion still in the industry. I worked a few jobs with LAB for a band called FutureProof who were excellent clients to work for, giving me complete creative control on all of their projects. Through this I ended up speaking the record label owner Mark Orr a lot and a small friendship formed over time, he's a very interesting and excitable person, much like myself which always makes the conversations high octane as we are so passionate in our particular fields. Eventually he approached me about management and whether I would like to be represented by LAB Records and helped to reach a bigger audience in the industry and public eye. We still skype fairly regularly and talk about different ways Daniel Broadley Films can go as a business, even with the jobs happening with KODE I'm very keen to keep Daniel Broadley Films going, it is something I have nurtured for almost two years now and something I would love to see take off in many years to come.
You recently shot a video for the Don Broco track 'Hold On' so how fun was this project for you, and can you tell us about the concept the band wanted their audience to get from watching this video? The Don Broco video was such a fast paced project, I returned from a short holiday away to a very urgent email from KODE asking if a treatment could be written in under 12 hours for a deadline the morning after. In my eyes it was probably impossible for me to conceptualise and write something viable in such a short space of time. However, with nothing really to lose I worked all night to write something that fitted to their brief. The brief they gave highlighted a few different videos they liked as well as a visual style they were into (which is where the split screens came from), I went on a whim and wrote something that was a little different to what they may have first imagined but written in a way that they could very easily visualise it too the song. It all happened very fast, they OK'd the treatment over dozens of other directors submissions and within in a week we had shot and edited it, the whole thing was a blur thinking back to it now. I think the band just wanted to show that they were still the same old band, that everything wasn't completely serious now they had signed to what is essentially a major label.
What was it like to work with Deaf Havana on their music video for 'Little White Lies' and what do you think you learnt the most from this experience? Deaf Havana were probably my first major clients, It was a very exciting project as the idea they wanted was something they hadn't really done before. It was also the first chance for me to make a video that was as funny as this, something that I could really stick my teeth into. I don't think I learned a huge amount from the project, for me this project was applying everything I had previously done into this particular piece. All the camera techniques were all done previously in other videos, for me it's sometimes what the camera does and shows that makes the video most interesting.