“I make so many bad, bad choices. And here’s the thing that I admit, I always know they’re bad choices.” A music video for Shout Out Out Out Out.

Creative team

Co-writer/co-director: Chris von Szombathy
Co-writer/co-director/producer: A.J. Bond

Director’s statement

A.J. Bond says:

“In order to capture the frenetic, confessional quality of Bad Choices by Shout Out Out Out Out, we embraced the dizzying pace of the beat and amplified the repetition with an editing technique developed specifically for the song. The video features a cut every six frames that repeats the previous five frames.

This single frame variance creates a dizzying, animated .gif quality, yet still slowly allows the action to advance. In keeping with the theme of the song, this obsessive editing pattern took months longer than anticipated to finish and was arguably a ‘bad choice’.”

About the creative team

Above: Chris von Szombathy and A.J. Bond

Chris von Szombathy

Chris von Szombathy is a visual and auditory artist, art director, designer and writer residing in Vancouver, Canada.

His visual artwork has been shown in galleries in Vancouver, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Barcelona, Madrid, London, Manchester and Edinburgh as well as within various magazine publications from the UK, France, USA, Canada and Asia. His music has appeared globally on podcasts, internet radio and standard radio as well as on television and within digital applications.

He is currently published by Drawn & Quarterly and is working on his first book with Simply Read. He also has one book of essays out with Publication Studios. His work also appears in volumes by TV Books/Gutter, Gestalten, LN Press, Publication Studios, Anteism, Trineo and in various books and zines by honorable homespun publishers.

He has been nominated twice for a Leo Award and has also been nominated for a Western Canadian Music Award and a Pigskin Peters Award (from the Doug Wright Awards). His first music video placed first at the Olio Festival and third at the Stiffed Film Festival.

He recently collaborated with Burton on a clothing line. You may have seen his work in connection with these fine folks as well: Giant Robot, Ricepaper, Hubba Hubba, Jess3, BC Translink, Momentum, GeoID, SHRKS & HMMRS, Bastion Grey, the Vancouver Review, Discorder, Eclair de Lune, Spoken Dress, RXVP and so forth.

A.J. Bond

A.J. Bond began his film career as an actor appearing in several Canadian films including Gary Burns’ Kitchen Party and Anne Wheeler’s Better Than Chocolate. In 2003, A.J. graduated from the UBC film program where he produced and edited the award-winning short, Why the Anderson Children Didn’t Come to Dinner (TIFF 2003).

A.J. began working as a producer on several successful short films including The Saddest Boy in the World (TIFF 2006) and The Patterns Trilogy (TIFF 2006) both with director Jamie Travis. A.J. formed the production company The Siblings in 2006 with Amy Belling to produce his debut as a writer and director, the award-winning short film Hirsute. The short premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2007 and went on to play at over 50 film festivals around the world. Hirsute was nominated for seven Leo Awards and won nine film festival prizes.

A.J. has been invited to attend both the Berlinale Talent Campus and TIFF Talent Lab as an emerging writer/director. His most recent short film, the mystery/fantasy Madame Perrault’s Bluebeard, was selected to screen Coup de Coeur at the 2011 Cannes Short Film Corner.

A.J. is currently finishing his first feature film, Stress Position, as well as developing the psychological thriller Wisteria.