New Director: Dexter Navy

Dexter Navy refuses to accept his success so far. The impressive work he’s done with hip-hop icon A$AP Rocky this year, to him, is just the start. On the blog section of his Tumblr site an anonymous fan comments: “Dude you blew the fuck up, that’s so rad. Congrats.” The director responds: “Haven’t even begun, movies next.” The ambition runs deep.

Navy got into directing after emailing all the production companies and directors he knew about and blagging a job doing everything he could to gain experience. He hasn’t stopped since.

It was through his role as a photographer at i-D magazine that he first got introduced to Rocky and whenever the New York rapper was in London the pair would bond, keeping the camera close, with everything well documented on Navy’s fruitful Instagram account.

Navy says he always knew he wanted to shoot a video with the artist but didn’t feel it was the right time at first: “I didn’t want to force it. We became friends more than anything and just hung out and I’d take a few pictures. We never really spoke about videos.” But when the young director got invited to one of Rocky’s UK shows at the same time he was in talks with Partizan, his confidence and ambition prevailed and the pair sat and spoke for hours about the possibility of making something happen. “Three days later we shot Chevy [yet to be released] which had a really psychedelic feel and fit well with Rocky’s next album. Then three months after that he called me to shoot L$D and it was all quite natural.”

L$D is the first commissioned piece from Navy and takes the viewer on a warped, psychedelic trip round Tokyo, highlighting Navy’s technical knack. “I love interesting camera techniques and transitions,” he says. The piece is set in the bright lights of the city and features Rocky in a relationship with a girl, representing the euphoria of drug taking. The seamless, dissolving camera movements and strong colour palette make for an immersive viewing experience and the video earned the director an MTV VMA nomination this year for Best Editing.

“In the end the girl disappears, relating to the effect of the drug,” states Navy, who was given just three days’ notice before the shoot and only 48 hours to complete it in the Japanese capital. “I got the song the night before the shoot. I’d heard it six months before and the idea came to me as soon as I heard it again. I was inspired by Birdman and the seamless transitions in that movie. My grader, Matt Turner, and I just thought, ‘Let’s go overboard!’”

Despite his love of the internet and Instagram, Navy is a big fan of film as a medium. “I love it. You only get a certain amount of time to shoot and you have to make sure everything’s perfect, otherwise you’re just wasting time and money. I like being clever with every part of film, but I feel like I still have so much to learn.”

Navy has recently shot another promo with Rocky for i-D’s digital magazine and video channel Amuse, as well as a content piece for Red Bull Music Academy through Partizan Paris. After chatting with shots, he flew to Cuba for a Havana rum shoot and a betting man would say his career is also about to take off.