GOLD Rush at Green Dot Films

Director Richard Farmer is no longer a part of the directing team HAPPY--instead, he's struck GOLD.  That’s the word from the execs at Green Dot Films in Los Angeles, who have signed the new directing team of Richard Farmer, formerly half of the award-winning duo HAPPY, who’s joined with Sinuhe Xavier to form GOLD.  The team has just produced its first spot together, for EA Games titled Skate It. The agency was Heat in San Francisco.

Having directed through HAPPY for the past six years with long time partner Guy Shelmerdine, who continues to work out of Smuggler, Farmer amassed a wide body of work including commercials, music videos, and shorts.  During his time as half of HAPPY, Farmer co-directed award-winners for such brands as Mini Cooper, Ikea, Coke, Sprite, Virgin Mobile, Playstation, Bacardi, Skittles, Wrigley’s, Brawny, Bud Light, and Nike/Foot Locker, as well as music videos for Adam Freeland, David Gray and Gnarls Barkley.

Recently, HAPPY won two categories in the 2008 MVA’s for “Best Choreography” and “Best Art Direction” for Gnarls Barkley’s Run.  The video featured Justin Timberlake performing dance moves from classic 1990’s music videos on a fictitious dance show called City Vibin’. Other notable achievements with HAPPY include placement in Saatchi’s 2002 New Directors Showcase, and being ranked in the Top 25 Directors by Creativity for four years running.

In 2006, their groundbreaking short film Jane Lloyd won Best Short Film at the London Film Festival and Malibu International Film Festival. Also the premiere of their second short film, Green, commissioned by Adidas for the AdiColor short film showcase, garnered millions of Apple iTunes downloads.

Farmer grew up on a ranch in Oklahoma dreaming of working in movies, he says.  After college he lived in Prague, London and Seattle, working on indie films and videos from the ground up.  Upon arriving in Los Angeles in 1998, he worked as a producer for Ground Zero, then went on to produce for Mindfield, a production, editorial and animation company for commercial television and music videos.

Xavier, meanwhile, landed in L.A. in 2002 to work in film and photography.  His first project was co-writing the Sony Dreams film “Little Pony” with Filip Engstrom at Smuggler, part of the Y&R series of shorts.  This was the beginning of four years in the trenches as Engstrom’s creative assistant.  Not one to sit still, he also freelanced outside of Smuggler for Yael Staav, Jess Hall and Douglas Avery of Furlined, to name a few. That exposure led to shooting still photography for advertising clients such as ING Direct, Volvo, Pontiac and Dell.

Also of note are his two projects with Creative Artists Agency, first directing the critically acclaimed stop motion Lego piece for the eBay “Let Them Post” campaign, and most recently directing the EPK for Spinal Tap’s 2009 twenty-five year reunion tour.

Xavier started his photography career in front of the lens as a professional extreme skier for The North Face, working with National Geographic photographer Gordon Wiltse. He’s traveled the world and stood atop some of its highest peaks, laying down first descents. During this time he also designed the “Heli Pack” for Dakine, a design that went on to be the best selling technical backpack in history and is still in production 15 years later.

While studying architecture and photography at Montana State University, Xavier transitioned his way from in front of to behind the camera, and discovered the appeal of telling stories visually. He is currently a photography instructor for the outdoor-oriented Overland Institute and photographer-at-large for Overland Journal. He feels most at home in his beat up Land Rover, roaming the Southwestern desert.