For years, health professional students have been creating music video parodies. And for all those years of hard work and creative lyrics, the only award was the collective laugh of the very few people who understood the jokes laced within the healthcare jargon. Not anymore. This year, the University of South Carolina School of Medicine accepted submissions for the first annual Medical Emmy Awards (or Memmys)!
Why do I bring this up? Because I was able to participate in my classmate Jonathan Dong’s video submission of “Thrift Opt”–a parody of the Macklemore & Ryan Lewis hit “Thrift Shop.” With more than 50,000 views on YouTube in under a month, it’s certifiably viral. If you haven’t seen it, check it out:
Now if you look closely, you can find me, along with many fellow first years, dancing away in the back of numerous scenes. These scenes were shot in many locations including the RC, the IEI clinic, and a secret spot in the depths of Chinatown. It was a blast being able to participate in such a fun idea, not to mention a great way to get my mind off schoolwork for a few hours. I’m excited as ever to find out how this video stacks up to the competition, but I don’t know when the winners are announced. Submissions were due several weeks ago, so hopefully we’ll get some positive feedback soon! In the meantime, keeping liking the video on YouTube to increase ICO’s chances of bringing home first place and giving optometry a good showing to the healthcare community.
Here’s a few behind-the-scenes pictures of the filming process:
Jon performing his directorial duties
The class of 2016 dancing it up in the Eyepod
Shooting out in our secret Chinatown location
The whole video was written, directed, shot and edited by Jon. Since this is one of the many projects we’ve seen him accomplish over this first year, I asked him a few questions regarding his latest achievement.
What prompted the idea of creating the “Thrift Opt” parody video?
It was just an idea that popped up in my head one day! Since I am a videographer in my free time, I’ve been looking for a project to do here at ICO. When it turned out that we had dancers and actors in our class, I knew we had to make a music video of some sort sometime. Macklemore was huge back in Seattle where I’m from, and so one day when I had “Thrift Shop” stuck in my head, the lyrics came to me, “I’m gonna pop some adds…”
Between writing the lyrics, filming, editing, etc., what parts of the process did you enjoy the most?
Definitely the most fun part of it all is the filming. That’s when everyone gets to come out and it was kind of like a big party!
Have you done anything similar to this in the past?
I’ve produced a couple music videos in the past for musicians back in Seattle. My last couple of videos before this one were with a singer named Tess Henley, I did the production for the official music videos for her songs “Daydreaming” and “From The Get Go.”
What do you think our chances are in bringing home first place for this year’s memmy award?
We might have some stiff competition from medical schools, but I think optometry’s got a pretty good shot this year!
So now that you are a campus celebrity, has anything changed for you when walking the halls of the RC or ICO?
At one of our last school optometry meetings (the Practice Opportunities Symposium), one of the visiting ODs stopped Rich and I while we were walking, points at Rich and says, “Hey. You’re poppin’ adds, right?” Rich’s very appropriate reply, “Yep, I’m poppin’ adds.” It’s already so easy to get to know people at ICO, I’m glad it’s opened some doors to meeting with people outside of school.