Similar to the band's video for "Here It Goes Again", the "This Too Shall Pass" video features a four-minute, apparent one shot sequence of the song being played in time to the actions of a giant Rube Goldberg machine built in a two-story warehouse from over 700 household objects, traversing an estimated half-mile course.

[8] The MAKE magazine 1993 Ford Escort racecar, used for the 24 Hours of LeMons, appears in the video along with a miniature LEGO version of the car.

[8][13][14][15] While they considered the idea of the machine for each song on Of the Colour, they opted to use "This Too Shall Pass" to make the end result "majestic and epic", even though it already duplicated the previous marching band video.

[16] They sought help through online science message boards, eventually coming in contact with Syyn Labs.

[14] From a pool of talent at a Syyn Labs-hosted "Mindshare LA" gathering, about 55 to 60 people from Syyn Labs, the California Institute of Technology (including some who work at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and participated in the Mars Exploration Rover program, hence the model rover seen in the video) and MIT Media Lab helped to design and construct the machine.

The team had to work on a limited budget, using recycled trash for many of the props in the device;[10] after filming, the total estimated cost was approximately $90,000.

[6] The warehouse where filming took place was in the Echo Park section of Los Angeles, and was secured by Syyn Labs in November 2009.

[9] Many of the takes ended only 30 seconds into the process, at the start of the song's chorus, where a tire would fail to roll properly into the next section of the machine.

[13] Ball tracks and other features had to be wiped clear of dust and debris to prevent slowing down rolling objects.

[8] Kulash noted that their largest "nightmare" for the machine was a set of mousetraps, triggered to release a display of colored flags; they were found to be overly sensitive to earlier actions of the machine, such as the dropping of a piano, and redesign and padding were needed to prevent the traps from being set off prematurely.

[13] While the video was filmed as a single shot on at least three different occasions, they planned on using post-editing to slow down or speed up certain parts of the take to keep it in time with the final soundtrack.

[18] Both Tim Nordwind, bassist for the band, and Adam Sadowsky, president of Syyn Labs, said that while the machine worked in its entirety 3 times, and no cut was needed, the decision was made so a better result on the downstairs portion could be included in the final version.

[24] Despite the success of the videos on the Internet, this has not translated into sales for the album Of the Blue Colour of the Sky which the song is a part of, selling only 40,000 copies since its January release.

[29] At the time of the creation of the video, Syyn Labs had just been formed; the viral success of "This Too Shall Pass" brought the company to light for several similar creative projects involving the innovative combination of technology.

[30] When OK Go appeared on The Colbert Report on April 29, 2010 in which they performed "This Too Shall Pass", Stephen Colbert opened the show with another, shorter Rube Goldberg machine created by Syyn Lab's Brett Doar, one of the chief creators of the "This Too Shall Pass" music video, using assorted props from the show.

[31] Syyn Labs have since created advertisements for Disney and Sears, and have been contacted for future work in music videos and movie opening sequences, and are considering a reality television show based on their creative process.

According to Kulash, EMI disallowed the embeddable play of the video because they only receive royalties for views on the YouTube site itself.

[33][34][35] The band was able to secure the rights to allow the "This Too Shall Pass" Rube Goldberg video to be distributed via embedding prior to its premiere, in part due to funding support from State Farm Insurance, which helped to settle issues with EMI;[6][17][36] in exchange, State Farm had some say in the creative process, and the video includes elements with the State Farm logo, including a toy truck that is used to start the machine.