CLIENT
Self-Initiated Project
BRIEF
Produce a music video immortalising Colonel Stevenson’s speech against Senate Bill 150, emphasising her advocacy for trans and human rights.
OBJECTIVES
- Capture the essence of Stevenson’s speech
- Represent diverse communities and unity
- Integrate AI-generated imagery with real footage
- Craft a unique audio experience supporting the original speech, mixing and mastering
- Produce a compelling visual narrative
PLATFORM
- MidJourney AI for image generation
- DistroKid for distribution
SOFTWARE
- Adobe Illustrator
- Adobe Photoshop
- Adobe After Effects
- Studio One + Various VST Plugins for audio production
After hearing Colonel (ret) Pamela Stevenson’s passionate speech against Senate Bill 150, her strong advocacy for trans and human rights moved me. It inspired me to immortalise her words through a visual story. And what better way to make her message echo far and wide than through the powerful medium of a music video?
Driven by an irrepressible passion and a vision that demanded to be realised, my alter ego, dellodee, took on the ambitious task of crafting an evocative music video with a $0 budget but an abundance of creative fire.
The core of this project was a series of images, all generated using MidJourney AI and experimentation with prompt engineering to capture the essence of the speech in visual form. I created around 60 background images featuring TV sets in surreal scenarios against the backdrop of government buildings. In these compositions, the TVs and buildings are not just physical structures; they symbolise the channels and institutions of power. What really drives these scenes, though, are the people and Colonel Stevenson’s impactful words.
These elements merge together, creating a surreal yet meaningful landscape where it’s not just the imagery that speaks but also the passion and critical decisions shaping our society.
Each generated AI image, a blend of reality and imagination, was upscaled using Topaz Gigapixel. Imported into Adobe Photoshop, I created masks for the TV screens to seamlessly integrate actual footage of the speech, ensuring every frame resonated with her powerful words in Adobe After Effects.
Her words are skillfully incorporated into the scenes, taking the form of captions that gently come to life as 3D elements. These 3d captions blend naturally into the scene, making her powerful statements feel essential to each visual. This approach adds depth to the imagery and serves a practical purpose, allowing viewers to read her words as they are spoken, enhancing their understanding and connection to her message.
In the video’s climax, where the ethos ‘This house is for the People’ comes to life, I used 40 images depicting people from diverse communities celebrating. Overlapping the scenes with stock video footage of slow-motion paint throws is a colourful climax and a metaphor for merging various ideas and perspectives. As the different colours collide and blend, they symbolise how varied viewpoints, much like the hues of the paint, can come together to create something vibrant and new. This embodies the spirit of inclusivity and unity, bringing vivid clarity and a deeper dimension to each celebratory moment.
The music production was a solitary yet fulfilling venture, completed in Studio One with various VST plugins. Every aspect, from mixing and mastering to creating cover art in Adobe Illustrator and managing distribution on DistroKid, was a testament to the power of independent artistry.
The line ‘This house is for the People’ is brought to life with twelve vocal layers, all sung by me, merging to symbolise the collective strength and unity.
Reaching out to Colonel Stevenson for publication approval and receiving her team’s endorsement was both humbling and affirming. Their response was heartening:
“Colonel Pam loves your video and the track and so appreciates your kind words! She is overwhelmed with how people around the world have been so affected by her speech.”
This endorsement underscores the global resonance of her message. Their appreciation for the video and track not only validates the project but also reflects the far-reaching impact of her powerful words.
This project is more than a music video; it’s a holistic creative expression and a tribute to the impact of words.
