SHINING | Taja Riley

Interview with Cinematographer Zev York

If you have yet to see Shining , you are seriously missing out! Taja Riley brings us an amazing retro styled dance video set to Beyonce’s hit song Shining. Directors Matt Day and Zev York step in to make Taja’s creative dream a reality while still maintaining a personal cinematic flair. The Beast Network had the amazing opportunity to sit down with Director Zev York and ask him a few questions about the creation process!

What was the concept?

On the phone Taja said,” We have an awesome dance community. We have tons of talented people and choreographers who each have something very unique that people love about them. But they haven’t worked together yet.”

Her idea was to have a video centered around her and her day, but has tons of really talented friends and wanted them and their work to be featured in the video.

What did you do specifically in the video? What are your moments, and what are you most proud of?

There’s a scene in the middle of the video that we shot on Melrose known as the flirt scene. I put go pros in each corner of the car while Noel and Taja sat inside. It was really fun, I had my friend drive me along side their car to get the shots from that perspective. It took about an hour to shoot those 10 seconds of the video.

How long did the video take to shoot?

Taja started shooting in March. The whole video took about three months to shoot with all of the editing.  The VCR effect was a last minute change that I decided to make. We were planning to release it on April 13th, but it ended up coming out on June 2nd. It took a long time to find the perfect effect we both loved. Since we had a few directors and a bunch of people shooting the video, all of the videos looked pretty different. The VCR effect worked as a final layer to make everything cohesive.

Where did you shoot?

We shot in Culver City at the Blind Barber, on Melrose, Joy Rich, and the final scene was in Hollywood called Adults Only Bar. Alex Fetbroth was having a party that night while Taja was DJ-ing at the party. We used that night to shoot the last scene of the video. It looked much more real than it would have if we just did a party for the purpose of a shoot.

What are you working on now?

I actually just got signed with Nelson Diaz as a director which I am very excited about! The next video I’m shooting is a concept with Alex Fetbroth this weekend. We’re having a big party on the beach for the shoot Friday night.

Connect with the following

IG | Taja Riley

IG | Zev York