Photoessay #896 - More 'Hey ya'

More on the 'Hey ya' Shorecrest video. I really wondered how it came together. The piece on Channel 5 was not very good, just hype. But this interview with the teacher in the PI gives a lot more detail. The discussion afterwards also gives some insights including the challenge to Shorewood (rival school)

Curtis also shared a video (mentioned in the discussion) out of Quebec as inspiration. I think that seeing some videos done by others and then suggesting to your own students that they, together, can make one themselves can be very powerful.

Great excitement for the local high school kids.

Picture of Mr. Mitchell, the teacher

below is part of the PI article

A clip shot by the video production class at Shorecrest High School in Shoreline has gone viral, drawing more than 10,000 page views on YouTube and raising excitement to levels so unprecedented that teacher Trent Mitchell could hardly keep his students quiet while he talked to me on the phone this morning.

"The energy level in my class the last couple weeks has been really, really high," he said. "It's kind of the talk of the school."

It all started when a student -- no one can remember who -- introduced Mitchell to the YouTube music genre known as "lip dubs," one-take videos featuring multiple people lip syncing to the words of a popular song.

The students loved it, and Mitchell assigned a "lip dub" as a class project. The kids picked their song -- the Outkast hit "Hey Ya," in mid-October and posted the video on Nov. 5.

But not before a lot of work -- and a lot of worry.

"After the first day, we thought there was no way this was going to work," Mitchell said. The kids hadn't memorized their lines. The pacing was all off. "Oh it was terrible."

Six rehearsals later, things came together. The props were ready. The words memorized. The students learned where to walk so as not to get in the way of the next singer or trip up the Steadicam senior Kollin O'Dannel weaved down the hallways.

Meanwhile, other teachers were getting hounded by requests to leave class and be part of this crazy video thing. Four teachers caved, and about 150 students appeared in the final take, shot over four minutes and 29 seconds at about 11 a.m. that obnoxious Thursday.

Mitchell laughed at his grading criteria: lip-syncing ability, dance moves, costumes.

But the lip dubbing won't end with his class. Mitchell challenged the video production teacher at nearby Shorewood High School to beat his students' masterpiece. That teacher accepted -- with the principal's blessing.

Meanwhile, Shorecrest students are loving the attention. The whole student body heard the announcement this morning: The video will be featured on KING-5's "Evening Magazine" tonight. KUBE 93 also did some interviews, and the calls keep coming in.