KODE's Josh Sondock Directs Ambitious One-Shot Promo for Singer-Songwriter Nick Leng

Marking his directorial debut with the London-based production studio, KODE, Josh Sondock launches what he describes as “one of the most technically ambitious videos [he’s] ever made”, for singer-songwriter Nick Leng. The work, morning/midnight was shot in one continuous take; the narrative capturing a struggling musician as he exhaustively attempts to film his own music video.

The 4 minutes 15 second promo comes into focus with protagonist Nick Leng adjusting his dishevelled appearance in the camera lens, in preparation for yet another attempt at shooting his film. As he positions the camera in place, so begins the seamless transitions between frames which link the movements of Leng together.

The promo was filmed from the inside-out. Josh filmed the innermost ‘layer’ first from the beginning to the end of the song, before playing back that one-take clip on a monitor and filming back and forth between that monitor and a new one-take setup with Nick. He then would move onto the third, fourth, etc. layers. Sondock and crew filmed six layers in total, wherein all of the zooms, focuses, actions and camera movements were expertly coordinated, synchronised and planned, to ensure that the video captured the ambitious storyline – that of an artist making his own music video from “morning until midnight” (a nod to the name of the track).

Sondock and Leng wanted to create a video that disrupted the preconceived idea of what a director or musician should be, and the expectation for them to present as ‘curated’ and ‘artsy’. With this in mind, the concept for Morning/Midnight was born; we never really know when we get a chance to look at the “real” Nick, as our frame of reference is, quite literally, always changing. The real and performed Nicks’ exist at odds but also at the same time as one another, capturing how Sondock and Leng feel about the frictions between their work selves & non-work selves.

The promo was shot in Brooklyn, NYC earlier this year on Arri 416, RED Komodo and Alexa Mini with Angenieux lenses.