Come Rain or Come Shine, We Make It Happen

By Danni Parpan

Everyone knows if you live in Portland, you are not allowed to own an umbrella.

The unspoken rule is that one must walk from the MAX or your car or - more PDX accurate - ride your bike in it, with no protection and pretend like you’re totally 100% okay. Everyone does and if you pull out an umbrella everyone will immediately know you moved here from LA and they will solely blame you for the rising cost-of-living and you’ll find yourself single-handedly carrying the burden of why avocado toast is suddenly so expensive. There’s a reason for why I’m speaking to this, I promise…

Way back at the beginning of January, The Oh! Team was on the fence about cancelling an upcoming outdoor shoot due to a rainy forecast, but I wouldn’t have it.

“WE ARE NOT RESCHEDULING THIS SHOOT.” I yelled. It was a little dramatic, but my team was there for it.

As a Creative Director at Oh!—where our main intention is to do whatever it takes to tell our client’s story—I knew in my guts this would be a perfect opportunity to use our team’s talents to tell the most beautiful story we could - come rain or come shine.

One of our clients—Resonance Ensemble—called on us to help find a way to perform their music DESPITE the pandemic. Through our work, their Under the Overpass series was born. This video series showcases artists coming together under bridges around Portland six-feet apart, masked, and ready to make sweet, sweet music. For more on this series, click here.

The song that was to be performed on this particular shoot was Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water” and directly speaks to the idea of showing up and being there, even when times are tough. I suddenly had this vision. What if we gave everyone clear bubble umbrellas? Not only would this protect them and all the film equipment from the rain, it would create another barrier of COVID protection and - bonus - the rain streaks on the umbrellas would make for a sick shot!

Cut to me at a local store nervously asking for someone to point me in the direction of umbrellas (THE SHAME OF IT!) It turns out they had the exact amount we needed for the cast in the exact right style and they were all so dusty because like I said, no one in Portland is buying umbrellas!

The morning of the shoot, we arrived on set early to set up all our emergency rain gear and unload all the umbrellas. The only the thing was…there was no rain. The sun was actually shining, the temp was unusually warm and the birds were chirping. It was a beautiful January day.

I smelled a hint of magic in the air.

This story ends with that magic. We never used the umbrellas once. The sun was out the entire time - the incredible sun flares stayed for all to see the incredible footage we captured, and we couldn’t have asked for better weather. People in the park stopped to listen to the amazing choir sing and it was just perfect and wonderful and perfect and we are so excited to have been able to play a part in the magic and to share it with all of you.

It just goes to show that preparing for the worst - INCLUDING UMBRELLAS, PORTLAND - ensures that we know there’s a solution somewhere on set waiting to help us keep the action happening if ever we should need it.

The video premieres for these fabulous people today at 3:00PM PT. Click the link here or below to see for yourself how amazing it turned out and let us know if you too, feel that magic.

And maybe, go buy an umbrella, Portland.

XODanni