Coldplay
2005
Products: Versa TUBE
Designer: Mike Keeling

Coldplay's video for its newest single, "Speed of Sound" debuted today--backed up by Versa(TM) TUBE units from Element Labs. In an unprecedented application, nearly the entire video shoot was done with LED lights from a total of 700 Versa TUBEs. Filmed on a massive sound stage, the video features a delicate, half crescent back wall composed of 640 Versa TUBEs placed on approximately 6" centers. Since the TUBEs were used without diffusion sleeves and the surrounding structure is quite minimal, the lights appear to be suspended in midair.

Production designer Mike Keeling of Project X and director Mark Romanek put together this singular look. "The idea here is having the band on this raw stage and everything is done in silhouette with lighting and key lighting," Keeling explains. "Once we embarked on it, Mark and I just decided to do the entire video in LED lighting. That was the criterion. I got chills just thinking about it."

When Keeling originally introduced the director to the Versa TUBE and Versa TILE technology, they had planned to use only 30 to 40 TUBEs. "But then I showed him it was video capable, so we talked about using it differently, and I suggested we take the sleeves off," Keeling says. "And Mark liked them that way--he liked the flare. So after that, the whole concept exploded, and it's a phenomenal look."

Keeling also used an inventive approach to programming the lighting. "We used audio programming," he says. "Using Chris Martin's vocal track, an animator on site took stems of the track--which is taking vocals, keyboards, drums, and bass guitar and splintering them out. Then we keyed off just his vocal range and, within an animation, let that oscillate with the music. Then, what we animated there on several Apple computers was then put through the MBox from PRG, which was controlled with a Wholehog II console with the programming that was then sent to the Versa Drive D2 processors from Element Labs. Then it was all projected on the screen. The director and I just looked at each other and said, 'Wow!' It just blew us away."

The MBox provided DMX-controlled video playback. "So the video was running the Versa TUBEs," explains Jeremy Hochman of Element Labs. "In addition to the 640 Versa TUBEs in the wall, key lights were composed of two, four, eight and 16 Versa TUBEs. Those key lights were also controlled via an MBox and could either be white (a dialed-in shade of white to match the white balance that they needed for camera), or they could play video.

"The wall would be doing one thing and one key light would be white on the singer and then another key light on each side was playing video content so that the singer or the guitar player or whoever was also properly lit," Hochman continues. "At the same time, you could see that images along the side of his face or on his body were mimicking the colors on the wall."

Hochman helped the programmers map the content with three Versa Drive D2 processors. "Two were running the back wall and one was running the key lights," he explains. "I worked with Martin Philips, who was the programmer, and Andre Lear from PRG who was setting up the MBoxes for the appropriate resolutions. I created several maps on the Versa Drives so they could precisely map the video content to the specific areas that they needed. Andre created masks so that in the MBox they could dial in color or video to specific key lights. And Martin programmed everything on a Wholehog II. The actual content was animated by a couple of guys--one was Vello Virkhaus, who owns V squared Labs, which produced the animated content."

"One of the things that Mark wanted to do was make sure the transition of the LED lighting on the background also replicated what was going on in front," Keeling adds. "So everything in the front turned out to be a gorgeous, soft front light from the LED source. So we could go no color, we could change it to any color and we could also change it to video feed in the front, which was replicating what we were putting up in the background. Every close-up shot that you see in the video was done with an LED front light. It's just mind-boggling."

"This was the largest TUBE array that we've ever done," adds Jeremy Hochman of Element Labs. "It was really visually interesting and an exciting project just because it was so massive. It looked beautiful. It also went more smoothly than people thought it was going to because no one was really sure how the equipment worked at first. Once we got everything running and they saw how easy it was to use, the guys were very easily able to grab the key lights that they wanted, depending on how much light output was needed. On the fly, we were able to dictate what content went to which key light."

"This is my most passionate achievement on film," Keeling says. "Here is new technology at its finest--nobody can match it. You've got a light source that is cool in temperature--you don't burn the talent's face after being under these lights. When I did Justin Timberlake's "Rock Your Body" video, I had to bring in $20,000 worth of air conditioning. With this gear, I didn't even have to use one dimmer rack. Also, out of 640 working lamps on the wall and another 40 or 60 on the floor, only two LED units went bad during the entire shoot. Element Labs is extremely supportive and we had not one problem.

"Element Labs is definitely pushing the envelope and I'm excited about where it's going to be 16 months from now," Keeling concludes. "I've got a lot of different ideas in mind in terms of using this product. I love that it's a low-res video that is not just your standard video playback system. I get to play with lights and combine it with video. I can [incorporate] artists' live playback if I want to within a certain resolution constriction. The fact of the matter is that light from video is pretty awesome. I support them wholeheartedly."