Tony Petrossian
The director I have decided to do my study on is Tony Petrossian. Tony Petrossian is an Iranian director of music videos and advertisements. He was born in 1975 in Tehran and moved to europe during the Iranian revolution. His interest in directing stemmed from when he was 12 and his father brought home a video camera and he spent all night in his room fidling with the single frame recording function and made a 30 second stop motion animation peice in which his G.I. Joe action figure was filmed having fights with other toys. Tony got into 3D animation using the 'lightwave 1.0' software at the age of 13. At the age of 18 he majored in English Literature at UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles). He took a break from the world of film after this and Law school at USC (University of southern california). After passing his bar exam he went back into the world of directing for good. Tony signed with 'Rockhard Films' in 2002 and has been directing ever since. He has done groundbreaking work for many artists. Tony's Three Days Grace video "Never Too Late" was nominated for Video of the Year at the 2007 Much Music Video Awards. His Slipknot video for "Vermillion" won the Audience Award at the SXSW Film Festival in 2006. And his video for "Before I Forget" won Slipknot their first and only Grammy for "Best Metal Performance." Now, he supplements his music video career by helming commercial spots around the world. He has directed such music videos as, Slipnot, Gene Simmons, Killswitch engage, The diplomats, Millionaire, Orson, Avenge Sevenfold, Automatica, Bullet For My Valentine, Stone Sour, Three Days Grace, Taking Back Sunday, Slayer, Rise Against, Apocolyptica, Serj Tankian, Seether, Lloyd Ft Ludacris, Sam Beeton, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Theory Of a Deadman and Newton Faulkner. He also directed such Advertisements as, Futuroscope - "Robotic Seats" (Paris, France) (2005), Nike - "Beijing Ballers" (Beijing, China) (2006), Zoo York - "Tough" (New York, NY) (2007), Zoo York - "Spread The Word" (New York, NY) (2007), Environmental Defense Fund "Grounded" (Los Angeles, CA)(2008), Subway "Fence" (Charlotte, North Carolina) (2008), Dannon Danimals "Into Thin Air" (New York, NY) (2008), Beeline "Sea of Communication" (Kiev, Ukraine) (2008), Beeline "Wakeful" (Moscow, Russia) (2008), Beeline "Hockey" (Moscow, Russia) (2008), Beeline "Tattoo" (launch into Cambodia) (Bangkok, Thailand) (2009), Beeline "Baby Chickens Rave Party"(launch into Vietnam)(Los Angeles, CA) (2009), Beeline "Baby Chickens Rock Concert" (followup into Vietnam)(Los Angeles, CA) (2009), Sony Ericsson AINO global launch (Barcelona, Spain) (2009), Sony Ericsson SATIO global launch (Barcelona, Spain) (2009), Sony Ericsson SPACE HOPPER INVASION viral film (Barcelona, Spain) (2009)
Bit about the career: Tony’s early passion for filmmaking has evolved into a full blown directing career. He signed with Rockhard Films in 2002 and has been directing ever since and has worked with many artists such as Slipknot, Rise Against, Orson, Newton Faulkner and many more. Tony's Kenna "Freetime" video was nominated for both best director and best editor at the MTV Music Video Awards in 2002, his Three Days Grace video "Never Too Late" was nominated for Video of the Year at the 2007 Much Music Video Awards and his Slipknot video for "Vermillion" won the Audience Award at the SXSW Film Festival in 2006. Now, he supplements his music video career by helming commercial spots around the world.

Videography:

2004
Duality - Slipknot
Firestarter - Gene Simmons
Vermilion - Slipknot
The End of Heartache - Killswitch Engage
S.A.N.T.A.N.A. - The Diplomats

2005
Before I Forget - Slipknot
I'm On A High - Millionaire

2006
No Tomorrow - Orson
Beast and the Harlot - Avenged Sevenfold
Bright Idea - Orson
Graduation Day - Head Automatica
Tears Don't Fall - Bullet for My Valentine
Through Glass - Stone Sour
Pain - Three Days Grace
Liar (It Takes One to Know One) - Taking Back Sunday
Eyes of the Insane - Slayer
Prayer of the Refugee - Rise Against

2007
Never Too Late - Three Days Grace
I'm Not Jesus - Apocalyptica feat. Corey Taylor
Empty Walls - Serj Tankian
Fake It - Seether
Scream, Aim, Fire - Bullet For My Valentine

2008
Sky Is Over - Serj Tankian
Rise Above This - Seether
Breakdown - Seether
Never Too Late - Three Days Grace
How We Do It In The A - Lloyd featuring Ludacris
What You Look For - Sam Beeton
You Better Pray - Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

2009
Not Meant to Be - Theory of a Deadman
Careless Whisper - Seether
If This Is It - Newton Faulkner

My personal favourite out of his videos has to be the video for 'Looking through the Glass' by Stonesour, im not entirely sure why i like it so much, but i think its because its just such an interesting video i find myself never being able to look away and the idea of the fake blown up pictures of evryone just fits the whole fakeness of the hollywood scene
I looked on google to see if i could find some reviews of Tony Petrossian's work, but as he isnt a very well know director i found it difficult to find reveiws of his work. i decided to go onto youtube to see what reveiws of his work i could find, and ater sifting through thousand's of comments i found some that were directely reflectice of the work of Tony Petrossian. One comment i veiwed read "i have been looking at a lot of work by Tony Petrossian and i looked at hours and hours of his videos, and all i found is that he likes slow motion lol" Tony Petrossian has recieved several good reveiws and his strong use of slow motion has been labelled as one of his main characteristics. i read comments left on videos he had directed and been posted on youtube.com. One read "for those of you raniting about how good it is this video is directed by Tony Petrossian, one of the greatest musiv video directors of all time!" As with all work not all reviews are good, one comment i read said "i usually like the work of tony petrossian, but then you get crap like this".


The two videos I have decided to look at in particular are, “rise above this” by Seether, and “not meant to be” by Theory of a deadman.
The two videos have a lot of similarities. The costumes are quite similar in the way that they are made to look quite well off. The location is also very similar in the way that they have decided to shoot it in an apartment type of place with very nice views out of the window, which are there to just make the video cinematically nice to look at. The editing is the most interesting part of the videos as they are so similar. Both of the videos use parallel editing and switch between the band playing their instruments to a type of narrative that is going on. We can tell these two videos are the work of the same director as the shots where the band are playing their instruments are all panning shots and the camera is never stationary filming the band, which is the same as the video with Theory of a deadman.