Treatment
Director's vision and creative synopsis for "Ballerina Flats" by Deer Park.
The Video
The video opens. It's sunrise, the song begins. You are standing on the front of a boat alone. The Miami skyline is behind you. The sun is behind you.
Cut to the plume of smoke creeping out over the water and rising into the air. You're standing in front of it performing as if it's any rap video. You deliver your first lines. We will shoot this angle on two cameras — one slow-mo, one not.
We cut to a wide shot on a long lens of the building before it collapsed. We hold on this through the entire implosion process which should be about 20 seconds.
We cut to different angles of the implosion from start to finish. This lulls us into a trance. This repeating process of the building existing then not existing is the foundation of the rest of the video.
On the boat during the chorus you perform as the building falls behind you. We cut back to this throughout the video. It can cut jaggedly or smoothly into the trance of the collapsing building.
You ride on a boat during sunrise. The bare ocean. The Miami skyline.
Unimaginable smoke rises from behind you.
The building collapses.
It collapses again.
And again.
You flex on the boat.
You sing the song.
Again. And again.
The sun is rising and the smoke settles.
Camera & Coverage
Wide Shots
Shot on any high digital camera with a large sensor. Long lenses for the wide shots to create a painterly and relatively flat image.
Performance Coverage
For the coverage of Deer Park we will use something wider and more personal, shot in both slow motion and a standard frame rate.
Cinematic Framing
The wides will be framed cinematically so they transcend the typical low-res images building implosions proliferated online.
Multi-Cam Setup
Video of the implosion will be shot on a multi-cam setup with footage captured from all angles, textures, and lights.
Filming Locations
Boat on Biscayne Bay
Primary performance position. Sunrise shots, skyline behind artist, smoke rising over the water.
Building on the Isola
Directly next to the demolition. Ability to film from inside the building during the implosion.
Brickell High-Rise
Approximately 40 stories higher than the Mandarin Oriental. Ability to film the implosion from above.
Editorial Vision
Simplicity
Edit will prioritize simplicity. The footage itself is the spectacle — the edit should serve it, not compete with it.
Restraint
Cuts will be used sparingly. The hypnotic quality of the repeating implosion footage creates its own rhythm.
Color
Color grading to be prioritized. Sunrise tones, smoke texture, water reflections — the palette is already there.