The only thing worse than a guy with a big head is two guys with two big heads.
Jordan Keller, frontman of The Okay Lakes, asked us to produce a music video for his song “Sleeveless Hearts,” a song that is, as he puts it, “about the realization that sometimes, you just have to get out of your own way.” His concept was ambitious––two men at a bonfire party enter into a head-to-head contest to discover which is the most pretentious jackass. Throughout their confrontation, each of their heads literally grow too big, which proves to be too much weight––again, literally––for them to carry.
To achieve this effect, the to-be-head-puffed actors wore motion tracker caps that allowed for us to recreate their movements in concert with the movements of the camera. Reference photos of the actors’ heads were taken to model their shape accurately in Blender, where they were later animated to inflate at pivotal moments of the story.
The music video for “Sleeveless Hearts” has everything we love in a project: a vivid and relatable narrative, empathetic characters shaped by strong performances, opportunities to showcase multiple capabilities, and we like to laugh.
- Cast: Jordan Keller, Colin McCaw, Ashley McCaw, Katie Baar, Erin Sangalli, Tony Sangalli, Emily McCaw, Chris De Silva
- Original Concept + Writer: Jordan Keller
- Director + DP + Editor: Ben Nissen
- Producer + Assistant Director: Margo Siwak
- VFX + Gaffer: Joe Siwak
