
--
-- --
SCREEN AFRICA EXCLUSIVE:
South Africa-born musician Toya De Lazy was first introduced to acclaimed director Kyle Lewis's bold aesthetic style in 2014, when he produced the colourful music video for her hit single Forbidden Fruit. Since then, the artists have remained great friends and worked on several other projects together.
Now based in London, Toya has reinvented her sound to a newly-formed genre called Afro-Rave a combination of African beats and contemporary British sounds like garage, bassline and grime. Toya debuts her fresh new look and sound in a music video for her new song Funani, directed by Lewis.
According to Toya, the song is about embracing yourself to the fullest while also reclaiming your culture and language. Lewis is known for having a hands-on approach with regard to art direction - this includes the designing and making of props and d cor, as well as lending a hand in the costume department - and it was no different with the video for Funani. The result is a bold visual explosion that celebrates Toya's edgy artistic sound and cultural identity, and could easily be mistaken for a fashion film.
Eccentric fashion designer, Bl nke Janse van Rensburg, who is also known as an advocate for self-acceptance, offered some of her first-year varsity pieces to Lewis and his team to work with on the video. Additionally, a crotchet wander-piece' was made and supplied by stylist Thom van Dyk. Lewis and his team put together all the props and d cor, including the eye masks, intricate headgear and comical sock puppets.
Kyle has to be given the credit here - he made 95 per cent of the props and accessories you see on the screen. We'd be having Skype meetings while he was glue gunning eyes to shoes! comments producer, Vjorn du Toit. As adults, we've forgotten to a large extent how to play and imagine. I love how if you look at the video closely, it is everyday washing up gloves, hair curlers, etc. which Kyle has given life to.
Between Lewis's busy work schedule and Toya making the trip from London to Johannesburg, the art direction team had just one week to prepare everything needed for the shoot. Kyle had the concept for a while now, he was just waiting for a gap in his schedule to shoot it. Once he did, he phoned up Toya, told her his vision and asked how soon she could be in SA. A week later we were shooting in Tembisa, Johannesburg, shares du Toit.
Funani was shot by cinematographer Rick Joaquim on the Arri Alexa Mini with Panavision Primo anamorphic lenses. Kyle knew from the start that he wanted to go over-the-top with the art direction and wardrobe So I did the same with the camera, says Joaquim. We shot most of the video handheld but then also over-cranked the camera at times and messed with a higher shutter speed, which gives Toya that robotic and animated feeling in parts of the track.
Joaquim says that while Panavision Primo anamorphic lenses are amazing , they aren't always the easiest to shoot handheld with due to their size, but they render skin tones beautifully and flare wonderfully, he adds. I lived mostly on my Easyrig Vario 5 with Flowcine Serene to help with the weight.
The video was shot on a sunny day in Tembisa, with a small crew working hard to maximise the use of natural light as best as possible. I still lit the talent and dancers with a mindset of fashion' or beauty lighting'. I embraced their beautiful skin tones using softer sources or bounced light to pull out the reflection in darker and stunning skin tones, says Joaquim. When dealing with harsh sunlight I've seen others lose the details of faces. So I wanted to make sure we kept that in.
Since the release of the Funani music video it's garnered over 49,000 views on YouTube, with local and international fans clearly enjoying Toya's new look and sound, leaving comments including sick visuals , lit dance moves and fresh sounds to name a few.
We make music videos for the art and enjoyment factor. We want to wow the audience and for ourselves walk away feeling like we made something special, du Toit concludes.
KEY CREW
Director: Kyle Lewis
Producer: Vjorn du Toit
DOP: Rick Joaquim
Technical Team: Dean Hibbert, WP Haak, Tyler Geldenhuys
Facebook
Twitter
Google
Pinterest
-- --
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
02/05/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
01/05/2026
January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...
01/04/2026
January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION
Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...
12/03/2026
Staines-upon-Thames, UK, 11th March, 2026 - Yospace, the trusted leader in Dyna...
12/03/2026
Utah Scientific Expands Technology Partner Program With Integrations From Audina...
12/03/2026
Techex, a global expert in live video solutions over IP and cloud, announces the appointment of Matt McKee as Senior Director, Sales, Americas, further strength...
12/03/2026
KOKUSAI DENKI Electric America has appointed Mondae Hott as Regional Sales Manag...
12/03/2026
At the 2026 NAB Show, Interra Systems will showcase its latest advancements in a...
12/03/2026
The 15th National Games of China concluded after a two-week celebration of athletic excellence and regional collaboration. Held from Nov. 9-21 across Guangdong,...
12/03/2026
Live-production academic program Butler Sports Live produced a total of 40 fall-...
12/03/2026
The University of Nebraska's HuskerVision has completed the second phase of ...
12/03/2026
Grass Valley and integration partner Tab M Solutions have completed Phase 1 of a...
12/03/2026
The broadcaster expands its campus-production model as the university handles tw...
12/03/2026
Disney has announced the addition of March Madness - the NCAA Division I Men...
12/03/2026
Apple TV's Friday Night Baseball MLB doubleheader series returns for its f...
12/03/2026
The senior from New Jersey is making his mark in South Bend, both on the mic and behind it...
12/03/2026
After a relatively quiet January, the month of February was jammed packed with l...
12/03/2026
Long-time production partner Echo Entertainment is producing the broadcast, while Cosm played a vital role in the collaboration...
12/03/2026
By Jessica Herndon
We love kicking off each year by introducing the world to po...
12/03/2026
Samrat Chakrabarti, George Basil, Kiran Deol, Katie McCuen and Vishal Vijayakumar attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Didn't Die at the Lib...
12/03/2026
In Latin America, women are shaping music and defining its future. To kick off t...
12/03/2026
En Am rica Latina, las mujeres est n moldeando la m sica y definiendo su futuro....
12/03/2026
Let's turn back the clock 20 years: The music landscape was a world away fro...
12/03/2026
Bad Bunny is no stranger to Spotify's Billions Club. In fact, he has a whopp...
12/03/2026
Spotify was at the London Book Fair this week, joining conversations across the publishing industry about how people can make reading part of their daily lives....
12/03/2026
Mastering tool improves mono compatibility
Tokyo Dawn Labs' Ohlhorst Digital range is a series of mastering-focused plug-ins developed by Jan Ohlhorst, ...
12/03/2026
Wave FX processor integrated into four products
Lewitt have teamed up with Elgato to create a new processor for the company's Wave Next product range, i...
12/03/2026
Free tool for annotating audio files
Mix Notes is a new, free iOS App that provides users with a simple way to annotate their audio files. It's been cre...
12/03/2026
Side-chain ducking tool gets an upgrade
Devious Machines' popular side-chaining and envelope-shaping tool has just been kitted out with an improved enve...
12/03/2026
Ceremony to take place on 16 April 2026
The MPG (Music Producers Guild) have revealed the full shortlist for this year's MPG Awards, which will be takin...
12/03/2026
Emulates three classic dbx 160 variants
The latest arrival to Overloud's Gem Series plug-in range faithfully recreates not one, but three versions of th...
12/03/2026
New granular soft synth announced
Said to be their most advanced software synthesizer to date, Baby Audio's latest release has been built on a new granu...
12/03/2026
Latest version now live!
Edit 11 March 2026 - Bitwig Studio 6 is now live, and available for all to download!
The latest version of Bitwig's DAW softwa...
12/03/2026
Latest free eBook now available!
Designed for recording engineers, audio-technology students and technically minded musicians, our latest free eBook deliver...
12/03/2026
AFL and NITV partner to launch new First Nations led program Inside the Huddle&...
12/03/2026
Rohde & Schwarz Cybersecurity expands SITLine network encryptor portfolio - more...
12/03/2026
Rohde & Schwarz to showcase future-proof EMC testing solutions at EMV 2026 Rohde & Schwarz will participate in EMV 2026, Europe's premier trade fair and c...
12/03/2026
Johannesburg, 11 March 2026 - The 19th Annual South African Film and Television ...
12/03/2026
MELBOURNE, Fla., March 11, 2026 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) and Shield AI have successfully demonstrated a first-of-its-kind integration combining L3Har...
12/03/2026
The incorporation of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning into modern, converged all-domain systems is enabling true Joint Electromagnetic Spectrum Oper...
12/03/2026
MELBOURNE, Fla., March 12, 2026 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) today announ...
12/03/2026
Modern media operations demand a platform that unites automation, orchestration, and human oversight without compromise. In this post, we explore the six key te...
12/03/2026
A deep dive into the platform
Architecture The Blue Lucy platform follows a distributed microservices architecture, meaning the overall operational capability...
12/03/2026
Orchestration platform enables broadcasters to deploy multiple AI models safely with full auditability, rights protection, and regulatory oversight.
LONDON, En...
12/03/2026
Cost pressures, switching intent and demand for savings and credit products are ...
12/03/2026
For the first time, Nielsen breaks out demographic information about FAST and AV...
12/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/03/2026
Appear's high-performance, ultra-low latency encoding platform augments LTN's fully managed global IP network and orchestration platform
LTN, a leader ...