[From Us to You] Christmas Party Song
behind the scenes
From Left: David Vukovich, Ola Kiermacz, Andrew Beach, Chloe Rabideau
My mom told me my first word was Santa…
So when I ran into David Vukovich and he mentioned possibly doing a Christmas music video, I had to be a part of it. He was considering working with another filmmaker on the project, but when he texted me a week later, I responded with a full video treatment.
David and Ola wrote a Christmas album the year prior, this year they wanted to bring one of the songs to life. I just wrapped production on the lastli video, and they had a deadline of 3 weeks, but the mood was right and we made it happen.
Behind the scenes photography: Minhal Enam
Alright, so the first thing I want to say is sleep is important. About 2 hours into this shoot, I came down with the worst migraine I’ve ever had in my life. The rest of the day I had to constantly leave set to go and puke in an alleyway. I also spent a good amount of time underneath a blanket, blocking out the light. All of the extras probably thought I was some cold diva director, and if you’re reading this I’M SORRY. You caught me at a bad time. Thanks to Mrs. Kiermacz’ stash of Gravol and Tylenol, I was able to power through, but wow.
Chloe’s Mom’s attic.
Shout out to John Henley, a collaborator whom I worked with when I was in school, for coming out to this set during the holidays.
I had Joey Hill (from the Just Quit It music video) come and ‘meet’ Chloe at this Christmas party. We filmed this in between shooting Just Quit It.
Looking back, I’d say I’m pretty happy with how the video turned out. We had a tight turnaround time, which actually motivated us.
This video was a great look at how local artists can come together. ‘From Us To You’ is a collaborative project in itself, but for the video alone we also featured ‘The Bae Beach Club’ and Damian Birsdsey in brief scenes.
On top of that we filmed at St. Catharines own slice of Europe: Chocolates, etc…
The video was filled with friends of Ola, and her brother Patrick. We had wine and chocolates to share, and, despite being sick, everything went as smooth as Mr. Kiermacz’ chocolates.
Several months after we released the video I heard from our costume provider that the video was shown at a St. Catharines Town Hall meeting as an example of Niagara’s talent. Good things come from collaborating.
