“Girlfriend” by Canty

CSM PDP year 2 Music Video Project:

Our project begins with an idea of captivity drawn from Canty’s lyrics. It depicts a spectrum of emotions, from sensuality and desire to jealousy and possessiveness, reflecting the complexities of human relationships and emotions. The singer’s deep affection and attachment are emphasized, and the song revolves around the intense emotions in the singer’s life. It reflects the complexity of romantic relationships, between right and wrong, love and hate, and the nature of duality found in human complexity. This portfolio showcases the diagnoses of the issues I encountered on set and outlines the steps I took to resolve them.

Color Grading

Scene #1: Cinema

in frame: Yeukai Makoni | costume by: Anna Cantes-freeman

Before

historgram

After

problems:

In spite of the intentional darkness intended for this set, the lighting conditions were still insufficient, resulting in underexposure. Our setup incorporated two primary light sources—the projector and the screen. While I managed to capture some reflections from the screen onto the subject, the distance was too great for the light to adequately reach. Consequently, I had to increase the ISO to 1250, risking potential graininess in the images.

#1 Lighting - set:

The primary visual focus in this context lies more on the costume rather than the subject, as the costume inherently introduces and defines the character we've created. The challenge isn't solely centered on ensuring proper exposure for the face or mask; instead, it extends to encompass the entire body and costume as a cohesive visual element.

#2 lighting - subject in frame:

^^^________light curve/histogram leaning extremely towards left

solutions:

The histogram above illustrates that the images predominantly lean towards the left, indicating that they were mostly captured in shadow or underexposed conditions. By strategically placing control points and anchoring both shadow and midtone areas, I managed to effectively separate the subject from the background. However, because the relfection off the cinema screen isn't strong enough, I had to find other ways to create highlights on the subject. I then decided to apply a star filter to catch flares off the subject. Our costume features a lot of reflective surfaces, which became ideal for the concept.

A completely dark environment with controlled lighting has long been recognized as ideal for human sensorial manipulation. This principle underlies why cinema, theater, and circus performances all take place or are screened in darkness—a spotlight of focused attention. In terms of post-production, dealing with underexposure tends to be less problematic than managing overexposure, especially considering we're shooting on digital cameras rather than film. I was able to play with the light curve with controlling point of the shadow in both red, green, and blue channels to create a vintage-look to ease-out the grainy images.

aim for film-look to ease out the grainy issue

Histogram indication and fix:

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uplifted exposure on the main curve.
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low control points on shadow to manipulate vintage tone.

halation on the highlight to create convincing vintage lens craftsmanship.

denoise to deliever quality cinematic touch

Denoise & Halation

Background Removal: Subject Masking

before

After

This background removal is rather easy since it was a static shot/still-frame. I could easily remove the background with content-aware fill by detecting the surrounding region (shadow area). However, a complication arose when the subject's hand overlapped with the air conditioner and emergency exit sign in a few frames. Creating a mask around the elements to be removed risked erasing her hands in those specific frames. To tackle this challenge, I adopted a workaround: I duplicated the original clip and superimposed an identical layer. Rather than directly removing the elements, I employed a different approach by masking the character herself, preserving her hands in those frames.

Background Mask

Subject mask

Scene #3.1: Pub - extras

Cinematography & Color Grading

This set was originally intended to be set at night for a cozy, home-like, classic british-pub scene. Due to the lack of resources and the availability of the pub, we had to compromise to a daytime shooting schedule. The lighting was disastrous, and we were underprepared to say the least. With the intense daylight coming from the outside, I had to compromise and use it as keylight. We then lit up a few candles as fill lights to create a warmer touch to the shadow.

lighting:

Before/after

Cinematography

Scene #3.2: Pub - dances

camera movement

I received a shot list instruction initially geared towards a stationary tripod setup. However, recognizing the potential of our wide-angle lens to create compelling dramatic distortion, I proposed using a gimbal for dynamic camera motion.

Wide-angle lenses offer immersive visuals and establish a subjective viewpoint, ideal for accentuating camera movement. Their exaggerated depth alters perspective, making subjects in the background appear smaller while rapidly enlarging those closer to the camera, creating a sense of speed.

In the video on the left, I had all gimbal axes unlocked, granting complete control over the flow of this FPV (First Person View) camera movement.

before

After

Special thanks to canty and Full time hobby for this collaboration

Credits:

 Shan Huai Chiang, 
Andrea Proano
Shan Huai Chiang
Yeukai Makoni, 
Anna Cantes-Freeman
Rothie Jang
Rothie Jang
Raphael Godfrey, 
Andrea Proano, 
Yeukai Makoni
Raphael Godfrey
Yeukai Makoni

Cinematography:

Color grading: 
Costume: 

Makeup design: 
Stylist: 
Story: 


Choreography:

Yeukai Makoni
Anna Cantes-Freeman
Matthew (Newtion)
Raphael Godfrey
Ben Soltani Stevens
 Kai
Bautista Aragones

Creature 1 - Oyster: 
Creature 2 - Octopus: 
Dancer 1: 
Dancer 2: 
Extras 1: 
Extras 2: 
smoker 1: