Alex Southam

Alex Southam

Alex Southam is a director in the UK, who has made mass success with his videos for many artists, such as Chase & Status, Tom Odell and Laura Mvula. His big break was for his video on Alt J's Tessellate. This video was hugely acclaimed and it was a twist on the Italian Renaissance painter Raphael's 'The School of Athens,' although it was set in a modern day's gangster paradise.  He has worked for Agile Films, who described him as: "an exciting new talent, working in a dizzying variety of styles across live action and animation. Entirely self-taught, his inventiveness and creativity have caught the eye with a series of diverse promos for the likes of the walkmen, Alt+J and Lianna La Havas. Alex joined Agile in August 2012."



To start off, Alex Southam undertook all the tasks on his videos, which were:

• Camera
• Lighting
• Editing

He now uses a director of photography.

Alex Southam likes the format of music videos as "You can try new techniques and can have real artist freedom." However, he is less keen on commercials and adverts as they have much less freedom. He has an account on Vimeo, which he uses to showcase his videos. This is becoming an increasingly important platform as it is considered to have a 'higher status' than YouTube. 

Alt J - Tessellate

Alex Southam's breakthrough was with the video for Alt J - Tessellate. Its budget was £10,000 and it took one day to shoot. This video had a very large cast. This video is a twist on Italian Renaissance painter Raphael's "School of Athens," which presents a cathedral type room, with many different people standing inside it. The costumes in this video are very urban and the characters in this video seem to take the form of a modern day Gangster's Paradise. This video has women subjected to the male gaze and it contains voyeuristic treatment of the female body because the females in this video are doing sexual dances and are wearing very revealing clothing. There are also close-ups of the female body which would attract a male audience. There are many varieties of costumes in this video, which could be representative to some members of the audience. The beat of the song is quite calm and relaxing, and it goes along with the speed of the camera. Alex Southam used After Effects for his special effects in this video, and the editing worked with the timing of the song.

"School of Athens"

Chase & Status - Lost and Not Found.

This video was filmed with a £50,000 budget, and it was filmed in Los Angeles. It's a slow paced filming, however, it contains many interesting scenes which catches the audience's attention. It is filmed in an area which a boy is riding his bike through. The camera films in many different buildings, such as a restaurant, a block of flats, and it films in peoples houses. However, on everyone's news, there is a clip of a girl, and then "fugitive on the run." Police cars are then filmed arriving to the flat, which builds up suspense for the audience. Then it goes to the TV which shows a clip of the police entering a house, and it pans to the actual footage of the police capturing the fugitive who we see has "kidnapped" a girl. The girl is then walking with the police appearing scared, however she then pulls the gun from the police woman and escapes with the fugitive. This video makes it seem as though the audience are watching in the point of view of the boy riding the bike, as it starts and finishes with a shot of him riding past. This video used a steadicam, and it had only three shots in the whole video. It was filmed at 36 frames per second, and then it was slowed down. This video was influenced by Massive Attacks "Unfinished Sympathy, and Southam went for an early 1990's VHS video look.

Massive Attack "Unfinished Sympathy"                                                1990 VHS look.

Tom Odell - Grow Old With Me

This video starts off with with an old lady putting on a record player, which relates to the title of the song "Grow Old With Me," and it automatically suggests that she will be the young girl throughout the video. This video shows a girl and a boy who obviously have an attraction for each other. This video goes along with Andrew Goodwin's rules for it has a recurring image of Tom Odell playing he piano singing the song, and then it goes back to the story. The ending is quite ambiguous for it is assumed that the boy and the girl are told they cant hang out anymore, and the boy rides away from the girl. However, it ends with an old man going to hug his wife, which could mean that the boy and girl did end up with each other.