From London to Chicago, we've brought together the latest and greatest grades by Mill Colourists. Take a look at top work and recent news from The Mill Colour team:
Oisin O’Driscoll, Colourist at The Mill LDN, was shortlisted for several awards: Best Grade in a Music Video at this year’s UK MVA's for Radiohead 'I Promise'; Best Colour Grading International at the Kinsale Shark Awards for his work on Alt-J 'Deadcrush' and Sampha 'No One Knows Me (Like My Piano)'.
(L to R) Radiohead 'I Promise'; Alt-J 'Deadcrush'; Sampha 'No One Knows Me (Like My Piano)'
Luke Morrison, Head of Colour at The Mill CHI, was featured in Filmlight's 'Meet the Colourist', as well as being interviewed in Digital Media World. Matthew Osborne, Colourist at The Mill LA, discusses ‘The Craft of Color’ in Post Magazine’s October issue.
John Lewis ‘Moz the Monster’
Director: Michel Gondry | Production: Partizan | DP: Tim Maurice Jones | Agency: adam&eveDDB
Debenhams ‘You Shall’
Director: Hanna Maria Heidrich | Production: Believe Media UK | DP: Christophe Collette | Agency: JWT
Mill Colourist James Bamford explains his process, "We aimed to give the spot a genuine Christmassy feel using rich and warm grades whilst keeping it Cinematic. The shot with Ewan McGregor added an additional challenge as the shots of him were added after the original grade and therefore had to be regraded to seamlessly fit in with the rest of the spot.
"Having worked closely with Director Hanna Maria Heinrich before we had already established a great relationship meaning we were able to communicate and share test grades with ease despite Hanna being out of the country during the grading process. This ensured that Hanna was still heavily involved in how the spot looked as a Director."
Heathrow ‘It’s a Wonderful Flight’
Director: dom&nic | Production: Outsider | DP: Tom Townend | Agency: Havas
The festive feel of the spot was enhanced in the grade by Mill Colourist David ‘Luddy’ Ludlam, paying careful attention to complementing each historical era, whilst matching the overall colour palette.
Chanel ‘Gabrielle'
Director: Ringan Ledwidge | Production: Les Fils De x Rattling Stick | DP: Hoyte Van Hoytema
Alt-J ‘Dead Crush'
Director: Young Replicant | Production: Pulse Films | DP: Martijn Van Broekhuizen
Mill Colourist Oisin O’Driscoll shares, "Working with Director Young Replicant was quite an honour for me, I've been a long-standing fan of his work and was very much into the track and treatment from an early stage. This drove me to research a lot of styles and looks in advance of working on the material. We tried a number of effects and decided to start with strong colour separation and strong mid tone contrasts would be best suited to the narrative of the track.
"Challenges arose when creating strong mid-tone contrasts as we wanted to preserve the highlights and shadows. To overcome this and create a more controlled look we reduced the contrast and added a blue-green tint to enhance the stylistic content of the video.
"I wanted to create a powerful yet pristine look so I added a slight sharpen to the shadows in order to enhance definition and subsequently de-saturated the black tones. The result was a clean and diverse image that maintains all the frame’s details, which I felt was very important in order for the viewer to fully connect with the movement of the piece.
"In the final stages of the grade, I worked on the highlights to create consistency and add further naturalism to the images. Each shot has amazing composition, choreography, cinematography and colour and I hope the viewer enjoys the images as much as I do."
Playstation ‘Rivalry’
Director: Wayne McClammy | Production: Hungry Man | DP: Dion Beebe | Agency: BBH
JAY-Z ‘Marcy Me’
Director: Ben and Joshua Safdie | Production: The Directors Bureau | DP: Darius Khondji
Volvo ‘Long Distance’
Director: Dan DiFelice | Production: Biscuit Filmworks | DP: Jeff Cronenweth | Agency: Grey NY
Dave East ‘Phone Jumpin ft. Wiz Khalifa’
Director: Sebastian Sdaigui & Fidel Ruiz-Healy | Production: Forty Forty Films | DP: Nicholas Matthews
The Future is Fearless
Director: The Hudson Dusters | Production: Greenpoint Pictures | DP: Logan Roos
HP ‘Reinvent Gifting’
Director: Sara Dunlop | Production: Rattling Stick | Agency: BBDO
Cover Girl ‘Made in the Mirror’
Director: Matt Lambert | Production: Prettybird | DP: Tracy Hauser | Agency: Droga5
St. Vincent ‘Los Ageless’
Director: Willo Perron | Production: Ways & Means | DP: Tarin Anderson
State Farm ‘Neighbors'
Director: Michael Sugrue | Production: Gravy Films | DP: Jon Chema | Agency: DDB CHI
Kitchenaid ‘Yours for the Making (Director's Cut)’
Director: Julius Metoyer & Will Hoffman | Production: MJZ | DP: Alwin Kuchler | Agency: Digitas
The grade, completed by Head of Colour at The Mill in Chicago Luke Morrison, was instrumental to the piece. He shares, “This type of work is the perfect example of how collaboration across all disciplines allows for the best creative to shine through. The visuals were perfectly cut and synced to the track. With those components seamlessly sewn together, it was natural for me to proceed in the same way with the grade. We wanted to underscore the parallels within each juxtaposed shot and reinforce the continuous thread running through the edit: balancing kitchen scenes and outdoor scenes, while keeping a clean and natural aesthetic."
Nike ‘Sixth Sense’
Director: Nic Yiallouris | Production: Mill+ | DP: Dan Frantz | Agency: Highdive
See more projects from Mill Colourists here.