A few weeks ago, Asia Pruyne wasn’t sure how she would get the various cliques at her school to work together.
Pruyne, an Oak Harbor High School junior, was the director of an ambitious project to make a campus music video using only one song and one take.
It’s called a “lip dub,” and more than 300 students became part of the filming Wednesday afternoon. The term refers to a video that combines multiple participants lip synching to a song in an unbroken take with no edits.
The project was organized by the film class of Chris Douthitt, and is part of a five-school competition involving Anacortes, Burlington-Edison, Mount Vernon and Sedro-Woolley high schools.
The lip dub concept has earned Internet fame in the last few years, with YouTube videos emerging from schools, universities and business offices across the nation. Last year, a video from Shorewood High School near Seattle gained over one-million online views.
“I’ve seen videos from Europe and Brazil so I know it’s a worldwide thing,” Douthitt said.
After studying other lip dub videos, the filmmakers decided to base their video on the infectious song “Blame it on the Pop,” by DJ Earworm, a mash-up of ‘90s pop songs ranging from country to rap.
“It resonated with students,” Pruyne said. “Oak Harbor is such a diverse community with so many cliques and groups and musical tastes.”
Lip dubs are generally meant to look spontaneous, as if someone pulled out a personal video camera and persuaded everyone to break into song. Unlike an MTV video, there was little time to stage an extensive rehearsal. Most of the classes practiced their parts individually.
The project may have taken weeks of planning, but Pruyne and her team’s concept was executed in 40 minutes. Cameraman Cody Brydges followed an elaborate route through the halls and classrooms of the Student Union Building with a handheld Steadicam apparatus.
As the song played over the intercom, the teens danced in unison, cheered and took turns jumping in front of the lens to lip-sync. Because of the sheer number of people and props used, it’s difficult to process everything the camera caught. Scenes included banana costumes, sombreros, pottery wheels, pom-poms and instruments to name a few.
By the third run through, fifth period ended and the adrenaline-charged students returned to class. Pruyne had accomplished her goal.
“It was a real unity builder,” Douthitt said. “In a very short time frame, kids figured out dances and moves. It was fantastic.”
The video is scheduled for a multi-school premiere at Broadniak Hall in Anacortes Monday, April 12 at 7 and 8 p.m. Admission is free.
If you’d like to check out the Oak Harbor High School lip dub video click here.
