A Miami Christmas record turned into a music video, shot through Little Havana by day and a room full of string lights, brass, and dancers by night.
Cris Cab
Music Video Production
C&I Studios produced the music video for Cris Cab’s Feliz Navidad, a holiday record made in Miami and shot in the city he is from. The camera runs through Little Havana in daylight, then moves indoors to a night set built to feel like a block party nobody wanted to leave.
The shoot came in two halves. A vintage convertible rigged for camera car work on the street, then a live band, a brass section, and a room of people under string lights once the sun went down.
Our own crew shot the making of this one. Slate to wrap, the rig going on and off the convertible, and the part of a music video nobody sees. We cut it black and white so it reads as its own document.
A Room Full of Christmas
The night set was lit almost entirely on practicals, string lights, neon, and whatever the room gave back. That is a thin margin to work in, so we balanced it to keep the gold bokeh doing the heavy lifting while faces stayed readable through every cut.
Then we filled the frame. A brass section, a bass player, dancers, falling confetti, and a crowd that had to look like it belonged there rather than like it had been placed.
Music Video Production for Cris Cab
C&I Studios handled music video production for Cris Cab on Feliz Navidad, a holiday record from a Miami artist shot in the city he comes from. The brief was simple and hard at the same time. Make a Christmas video that feels like Miami rather than a snow globe, and make it look like a party you wish you had been invited to. Every frame of the finished piece was captured by our crew on location, from the daylight run through Little Havana to the night set where the band and the crowd took over.
Shooting a Holiday Music Video in Miami
Music video production on a record like this lives on location. We built the day around a vintage convertible moving through Little Havana, rigging the car with suction mounts so the camera could ride alongside the performance instead of watching it from the curb. That approach keeps the artist inside the neighborhood rather than in front of it. Street signage, storefronts, palm trees, and the Little Havana mural all read clearly in the cut because the camera stayed at street level with them.
The night half of the shoot was a different problem. A holiday party set lit almost entirely with practical string lights, neon, and a lot of gold bokeh has very little margin. Our team lit it so the practicals carried the look while faces stayed readable, which is what lets the video cut between a wide room and a tight close up without the exposure jumping. Falling confetti, a brass section, a bass player, dancers, and a full room of people all had to hold together in the same frame.
Camera, Crew, and Coverage
This kind of video production is a coverage exercise. A performance video needs enough angles that the edit can stay on the beat without ever feeling like it ran out of material. We shot the performance repeatedly across setups so the song is covered wide, medium, and close, then gathered the detail work that gives an edit somewhere to breathe. Hands on a bass. A car radio dial. Ornaments catching light. Those inserts are what turn a performance recording into a music video.
Our Miami video production crew ran camera, grip, and electric on the street and on the night set, with the camera car rig built and reset between passes. The behind the scenes reel on this page is our own footage of that process, cut in black and white so it reads as a separate document from the video itself.
Post Production and Delivery
The footage from this job runs well over a terabyte, which is normal for a multi setup music video and a real consideration for post production. Media management on a shoot this size is not an afterthought. Everything was offloaded, backed up, and organized on set so the edit could start from a clean, verified library rather than a pile of cards.
Work With C&I Studios
We take on music video production for independent artists and labels across Miami, Los Angeles, New York, and anywhere the record needs to be made. The same crew that shoots documentary, commercial, and brand work brings that discipline to music, which usually means better coverage, cleaner audio sync, and a finished piece that holds up on a big screen and a phone. If you have a record and a release date, we can build the plan around both. Tell us about the song and we will tell you what it takes to shoot it.
Every music video production we take on starts with the same two questions. What does the record sound like, and where does it actually belong. On this one the answer to both was Miami, so that is where we put the camera and that is what you see in the finished cut. A crew that knows the city, a location that means something to the artist, and enough coverage that the edit never has to settle.
Start With the Song
From music videos to documentaries and brand films, we build the shoot around what the work actually needs, then stay with it through the edit. Crew, camera, and a plan that survives contact with a real location.
Tell us about the record, the release date, or the idea you have not figured out yet, and we will take it from there.
