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INDUSTRY NEWS Copyright Lighting &Sound America November 2019 complete issue: http://plasa.me/mbzbv Desert Flight: Verge Aero Makes Its Music Video Debut The video for “All of Us,” the recent track from award-win - CEO Nils Thorjussen. “Nils talked to me about the quality of ning Australian dance music trio PNAU, features American the drones, their reliability and how well they deal with singer Ollie Gabriel having a playful close encounter with a winds,” Kutsko says. “He felt they had so many possibilities group of 81 colorful drones—supplied and programmed by and he was excited to work on something creative that Philadelphia-based Verge Aero. would showcase that. Having worked with the band last year on the group’s “With any big project like this, you need to find some - video for “Changa,” director Benjamin Kutsko put the con - body who is also excited about it and wants to try and do cept together with musician Nick Littlemore of PNAU (Peter something incredible,” Kutsko continues. “We needed to Mayes and Sam Littlemore round out the trio). find a creative collaborator, but one who also understood “When we started talking about ideas for this song, Nick the technology so we could work together to create the kind mentioned having seen moving light drones at a music festi - of movements and aerial shows to match the music, so it val,” Kutsko says. “We both became really excited about the would feel like something more than a live drone show. And idea of using the drones in a way that felt like Close Nils also used to do some work in lighting for concerts in Encounters of the Third Kind or Batteries Not Included . We the past, so that was great.” used those old sci-fi movies as a reference for creating an Indeed, Thorjussen was a co-founder of Flying Pig alien encounter that felt playful and alive. We wanted to do Systems, whose Wholehog console helped revolutionize something that felt like a psychedelic Close Encounters stage lighting control technology in the 1990s. episode with this singer out in the desert. I believe it’s the “When Benjamin called me about his idea, I knew there first time that drones have been used as part of a narrative was really nobody else who could give them the kind of or plot device, so we were even more excited to do this services that we were able to give them,” Thorjussen says. when we realized that this would be a new application.” “We’re the only company with this kind of toolkit. We can As he began researching how to put the project together, turn things around quickly, create custom content, and fly Kutsko quickly found Verge Aero and got on the phone with shows over and over again.” 20 • November 2019 • Lighting &Sound America Kutsko’s concept centered on making the drones into a to them via sound,” Kutsko says. “And we have body paint character, an intelligent force interacting back and forth with on Ollie with all these types of symbols and sacred geome - the video’s main character, Gabriel. “I quickly learned that try, which I wanted to sort of mimic. In a music video, you you have to preplan everything you do with the drones,” have to build everything visually, so that was his way of Kutsko says. “You basically design the whole show in a communicating those symbols back to them. That way, we computer program ahead of time—and then you just hit Go could metaphorically build the back-and-forth communica - and it happens in real time.” tion between the two of them.” Kutsko began working with a team from Verge Aero, For the color palette, Kutsko relied on blues, purples, and including Tony Samaritano, who did most of the program - pinks to keep the look soft. “I thought a lot about color the - ming, using tools developed by Chris Franza. “We spent a ory and what colors mean, so we avoided the yellow and solid six weeks going back and forth, with me throwing out green spectrums and only used little touches of red,” he things that I thought would be cool and asking them if they said. “By keeping a limited color palette, you feel that it’s would be possible,” Kutsko says. “We wanted to create just undulating colors going in between. The programmers looks that were interesting and different from what had been helped to make the color changes feel organic, as if they done before, with shapes twisting and turning into other were moving through the swarm instead of just changing or shapes. I wanted it to feel alive, almost as if this organism blinking. I didn’t want to do anything that felt electronic or was communicating.” programmed. I wanted to give it life.” Kutsko’s concept intentionally focused on an abstract sit - The team at Verge Aero created algorithms and designs uation in which the drones represent a hive of intelligent to breathe life into Kutsko’s designs, then exported the beings but each is definitively separate. “I wanted a sense looks for him to assess. “You can place the program in any of playfulness between two different types of intelligences environment you want with Google Earth,” he says. “So we trying to communicate with each other,” Kutsko says. were able to create it and then just place it over our location “That’s why we used lights and shapes because I think so we could see it over that landscape. It changed my that’s the initial way that different beings would have to thinking on how some things could work; it was just differ - communicate with each other—because math is the univer - ent than I had pictured once I realized the scope of all the sal language.” drones. Just feeling all of that out, it took a different shape As the main character, Gabriel begins by running toward each week as we slowly built this plan for the whole show.” the drones and singing up to them. “They are communicat - The shoot took place in Agua Dulce, in the desert hills ing back down to him via light while he’s communicating up outside of Los Angeles. “We were originally going to shoot www.lightingandsoundamerica.com • November 2019 • 21 at the El Mirage dry lake bed, but there was a flash flood vers at any time.” there three days before shooting, so we had to change At the end of the night, no drones or humans were locations,” Kutsko says. “But those guys are such profes - harmed during the filming process. “It was great working sionals that they were able to quickly adjust the program - with Nils and his team,” Kutsko says. “They’re very pas - ming by switching the geographic location.” sionate about what they do, and they brought a lot of Once on location, having worked out much of the logis - heart to this project. And it’s always great working with the tics by planning out how to get the story across was a huge guys in PNAU. We’re all really excited that we were able to plus. “It’s such a big ordeal to do it each time and you have put this great team together and make something kind of to take into account the safety of everyone there while you out there and psychedelic that also has a little bit of a are shooting,” Kutsko says. “We only had one night of heart to it.” —Catherine McHugh shooting, so you have to account for the time to do every single take and every different angle. We wanted to make sure we could film everything we needed to be able to tell the story within the number of run-throughs that were possi - ble in the time we had.” On the set, each drone had a GPS coordinate for its landing pad and would go straight to it at the end of the show. “We had videos of everything that would happen, so we could really go through the moments with Ollie,” Kutsko says. “Everybody knew where the drones were and not to go to launch pad areas, even while they were up in the air. We never crossed that area.” Safety was a big emphasis from the get-go and the drones’ program is designed to ensure they always main - tain a safe distance from each other. “Safety was an important consideration throughout the planning process of the video,” Thorjussen says. “Benjamin wanted to swarm the drones as close to the singer, Ollie, as possible, while keeping safety in mind. We implemented a variety of additional safety measures and gave Ollie direct control over the drones so that he could initiate abortive maneu - 22 • November 2019 • Lighting &Sound America.