When you go from the short stuff to videos, you’re going to face things you never face in design packages. Like emotion, tone, pacing. So for example ‘Toy Soldiers’ was emotional stuff. Your effects could’ve gotten in the way, but I see only a few cityscapes that cry out ‘Saline!’ How’d you handle that vid from the point of view of it being heavier than most?
JESSE: Very carefully.

BRENT: We planned to have teardrops overlaying the whole video, and the bullets that struck down Proof were going to shed rose petals and dove wings, and there were plans for a longer cut with tons of close ups of children being sad, but there was no time. No time.

JUSTIN: With our videos, narrative has to be the first priority. When we write the treatments, Adam and I work really hard on setting up a narrative that will work for the entire course of the video (that song is 5 minutes long). And while we plot out the scenarios and the overall story, we try to include moments where we can flex some technical muscle too. Whenever possible, though, we want the technique to advance the story. I hate it when you’re watching a film and you see a CG shot, and then you’re sitting there waiting for the shot to be over so we can move along with the story. We also want to be on the cutting edge of graphics, transitions, compositing, but the story has to come first—again, it’s the combination of narrative and technique that makes us us.

ADAM: I think that one of the keys to our success is that we’ve always kept the concept/narrative as the focus of our work. You see some technically amazing stuff out there, and some of it is unbelievable, but my favorite stuff has a really simple gem of an idea that is executed in a clever and smart way. It’s mainly about what’s important, and humans and human emotion is more important than sick graphics. I only say that because we’re more moody than slick. I dunno, it’s great to tell stories in the midst of making beautiful images.

I love how Eminem does the ‘cut’ thing across his throat just at the point when he’s doing the bit about ‘soldiers willing to die for us whenever we give the orders.’
JUSTIN: That, my friend, was just directorial brilliance. (Translation: sheer coincidence.)

ADAM: He’s good. There’s a reason why that guy is on top. I don’t think we can take much credit for his being an exceptionally talented guy. We did our job on that video and are proud of our children.
Where do you get your ‘handles’ from in concepting a music vid? Take for example the Televators bit.

ADAM: I don’t really know how that concept materialized. The music was so ridiculously different and wonderful and we attempted to match it. The whole thing makes perfect sense to us, but the narrative is as abstract as the music and I enjoy the fact that people interpret it differently. That was a “thin air” situation. You listen to the track with your eyes closed and images start to appear (that’s how we get 90% of our ideas). The key is to know which ones to follow through with (which images), and how to make them happen. Televators is my favorite of our videos. Some people hate it. But I think it’s potent and people are going to tlove it or hate it. A lot of my favorite art is love/hate. It’s definitely not wishy-washy.

BRENT: We have a big metal box sitting in a darkened corner of the office. It’s really noisy while we work, so we usually keep an old tarp over it. We blow the dust off the thing when we need ideas. It lights up. Sometimes this big metal box goes over the top with its concepts. For instance, with the Cure videos, we told the machine to give us scary, and it got a little too scary. The printouts it gave us were unmentionable. Babies had cockroaches crawling out of their mouths and Dracula popped out of a coffin wielding a rifle.

Ever go camping? I ask because of all the forest images. You’d think you’d fucking run for the hills shrieking based on the spookiness in your vision of forests.
JAKE: I grew up in Minnesota and spent a lot of time playing in the woods, building forts, camping, hiking, canoeing, fishing. There is an element of creepiness going into the forest, a feeling of not belonging, or intruding. It can be scary being so isolated and away from civilization. But I also feel privileged out in the woods, like I’m witness to something natural and innocent, the way the world was meant to be.

JESSE: I don’t like to sacrifice tiled bathrooms. No.

BRENT: Camping is where high school kids drink beer, not where tumor-ridden tigers flee from spooky monkeys.

ADAM: A couple times. I’m obsessed with forests because of running around in forests as a kid wanting to be a knight. There’s something wonderfully compelling and mysterious about forests (man that sounds dorky).

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