Arlo & The Others (Live from Studio A)

This was an awesome whirlwind project that I worked on with a very talented friend at CMU, Alex ByTrade. He had written a concept album and approached me a few weeks before winter break and asked if I would help him bring the album to life. Over the span of two weeks, we checked out a videography camera from the school and planned and filmed b-roll, music video style shots, and promo material for the twelve song album in locations around Pittsburgh. We booked WQED Studio A and over two nights recorded the album with a very talented group of student musicians and our incredible recording engineer Ryan Onestak. It was a very fast process from the start to finish, but it was extremely rewarding to see it all come together when we hosted a premier at The Manor Theatre in Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill, complete with themed sugar cookies and the stickers that are featured on the album cover. After the premier, the visual album was released as a movie on YouTube, and the album itself was released on all major streaming platforms.

Between the roles of Co-Director, Cinematographer, Animator, and Co-Creative Lead on the project, I did a lot of coordinating schedules and bouncing ideas with Alex, from planning what visuals we wanted for each song to designing the cover of the album. Alex had a very clear artistic vision, and it was so fun to tackle the project together and do my best to amplify his vision and bring it to life. I also did all of the filming; it was fun to learn how to use the cinematography camera that we checked out from CMU’s Integrative Design, Arts, and Technology lending desk.

I designed stickers for each song on the album and drew an album cover that had all of the stickers on a notebook cover, but we decided to try to re-create my vision for the album cover in real life. We got the stickers printed and set up a notebook in the living room, and that was our album cover! For the premier, I also hand made some fun sugar cookies and we had the extra stickers for people to take.

For one of the songs (Tokyo Station), Alex wanted a simple animation, so I mocked something up in Procreate and then made some changes for the final video. It was the first time I used the animation features in Procreate, which was a fun learning experience.

Overall this was one of the best experiences of my senior year at CMU; it was a fun project that I did with an amazing friend, it involved skills both old and new, and at the end we have a super cool final product. Go listen to Arlo & The Others!