Hannah Clair for Pomplamoose Music Video

A still from the video

Bright Artist Hannah Clair started her illustration career in 2019 after graduating with a BA Hons in illustration and Animation, and this year saw the release of her first professional project; an animated music video for Pomplamoose Music. Hannah did the art and the direction for the video, collaborating with animator David Scott Kessler to create the beautiful visuals for the track Invisible People. We caught up with her to find out about her work and process, and what it was like to work on this project.

Hannah Clair - Invisible People Music Video from Bright Illustration on Vimeo.

‘Invisible People’ Music Video

How did you get involved in the project?

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My agent, Helen, sent my work to Nataly, the lead singer of Pomplamoose who then came back and asked if I could work with animation. We started discussing how it the project could work and due to tight deadlines and because I have a background in hand-drawn animation, we decided that working with a digital animator would be the best way to go to get the project completely in time.

Interview with Nataly from Pomplamoose Music about the making of process

Talk us through the process of coming up with the creative for the video - did Pomplamoose have a lot of input on the ideas?

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Nataly sent me the song, and I clicked with it instantly. She described the ideas behind Invisible People and how it’s mainly about the conversations we have with people in our heads. I kept that in mind while I listened to it and jotted down the visuals that came to me as I listened. I’m very inspired by emotional experiences, and I think that comes through in my work a lot. For me, the video is mostly about the ghosts that follow you around, the people who have a huge impact on your life, whether negatively or positively, and how you grow from it and get through it. Once I had jotted down my initial responses I needed to think technically. Using my knowledge of animation, I planned the scenes, how they would move and then the transitions between each scene, making it all flow the way a dream would to match the dreamy tones of the song. I created a storyboard that I sent to Nataly, and luckily the band loved it and we went from there!

Hannah’s storyboards for the video

Talk us through the making of the video

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Working with David, the animator, was amazing. I’m so so lucky I got to work with such amazing creatives on this project. David and I worked closely (as closely as we could with him being in New York and me being in North Wales!) for two months putting this all together. I would create the artwork - the backgrounds, different elements, texture, and vector puppets for David to work with, and he would take all of that and put it into his software to create 3D digital animation. I learned so much working with him; it was amazing! And he’s definitely inspired me to branch out from hand drawn animation.

Making of the car scene for the video

How much feedback and editing did you have to do? Were there lots of changes as the project evolved?

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We didn’t make many changes to my original art and direction. The only changes that were made were to the scenes at the end - making the people dance - and adding in some lyrics to accent certain points in the video. I feel extremely lucky that I got to have so much creative freedom with this project - from start to finish it’s pretty much exactly what I had in mind the moment I first listened to the song. It’s been so amazing to work on this and have my vision come to life, and then for people to also love it has been incredible. As an artist you’re never totally sure if what you’ve done is good until it’s out there and people are telling you what they think.

A still from the video

Do you have a favourite scene in the video?

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I love the water scene starting from the teardrop to the bubbles filling the screen! I just think it’s a particularly emotive moment in the video.

A still from the video

What’s your dream animation to work on?

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I loved this so much! I would be thrilled if I could do more music videos, I think it’s so fun and offers so much room for creativity.

Other art by Hannah

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Hannah is represented by Helen Biles. To work with Hannah, please get in touch. You can see more of Hannah’s work here.