They are commercials designed to take your breath away, and they were as breathtaking to produce as they are to watch. "New Frontier" and "Pumping Gas," two spots for the United States Air Force, were directed by Jeffery Plansker of bicoastal Anonymous Content, out of GSD&M, Austin, Texas. They feature stirring images of planes in motion and blue sky, intermixing scenes of mundane civilian life with those of the exciting life of pilots in flight. At the end, they showcase a dramatic horizontal line of Air Force personnel, backed by a glowing blue horizon. The compelling image seems relatively simple—yet was created through a complex collaboration between the Austin-based 501 Post and the creatives at GSD&M.
Parts of the ads were shot on green screen. Then Eric Pham, an art director/visual effects artist at 501 Post, used tests he had developed to create blue line imagery, to make the images of the horizon and the column of Air Force personnel. Ultimately, he created six versions of the horizon, and the final effect was completed in the Flame. The horizontal shot of a line of Air Force personnel in military formation is actually a composite of each figure individually dropped into a perfect line-up. This was accomplished with a Henry, under the supervision of Jim Reed, a Henry artist at 501 Post. "The goal of the campaign was to define the difference between the civilian world, and the world of the Air Force," explains George O’Dwyer, executive producer at 501 Post. "New Frontier" and "Pumping Gas" were a part of a $50 million recruitment campaign for the Air Force. "We strengthened the message through many editing techniques, including color corrections and special effects."
501 Post is one of many Texas postproduction houses that are reporting good commercial business in the Lone Star State. But many of the state’s production and post facilities also admit that they are concerned about a slumping economy, cutbacks in ad dollars, and fierce national competition.
The economy is the major worry. The effects of the growing recession were already being felt in the summer of 2001, and were compounded by the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. Agencies, already cutting back on personnel, put a hold on much advertising. "Things came to a grinding halt," recalls Tony Miglini, partner/executive producer at Sugar Film Production, Dallas. (Director Chris Smith is co-partner at the shop.) "It made people re-analyze projects they were working on nationally. Everybody became more cautious with ad dollars."
That complicated a situation that has been made more complex by merger mania. Recent consolidations have left fewer clients and therefore fewer spots—but just as much competition among production and post facilities. "There is a big impact on work because of all the mergers," says Lisa Cobb, president of Blind Spot Media, which has administrative offices in Dallas; the shop’s main base of operation is in Santa Monica. "There used to be something like fifty-two banks [locally and regionally], but through consolidation, there are now two: Bank of America and Wells Fargo. So instead of fifty-two different campaigns, you have two. And that’s happening across the board—all the local and regional companies are disappearing. Every time one company buys another company, the advertising gets eliminated. It’s pretty devastating to our business. Agencies built around a client lose that client and the work disappears overnight."
"Business in Texas has gotten a little bit quieter, and agencies in Texas had horrendous layoffs [in the past year]," adds Jeremy Besser, co-executive producer at Dallas-based directorz. "One agency cut its production staff by sixty percent. Every agency across the board is experiencing layoffs, so there is not as much work to go around."
"We have decreased the number of spots from the middle of last year," admits Jan Wieringa, executive producer at Idea Studios, the feature film production division at GSD&M. (Until recently, Wieringa was head of production for GSD&M; Dorothy Taylor has since assumed those duties.) She reports that cautious clients, in the wake of the terrorist attacks and the recession, saved money by reusing material from old spots in new ways. "Budgets in general are down and people are cautious. I attribute it to the downturn in the economy, and the capper was the tragedy on Sept. 11. That froze everybody for a period of time. Everybody wondered what was appropriate. Clients said, ‘Let’s stop and look at what kind of advertising we’re doing; let’s do an analysis of the market and the economy.’ People stopped dead in their tracks. That spun the economy downward even further."
Diversity
Some production companies have sought out new agency opportunities. "We saw many agencies slow down in their business, but then the Hispanic agencies picked up the slack," notes Richard Gillespie, owner/editor of Fast Cuts Edits Dallas, and the newly elected VP of the Association of Independent Creative Editors (AICE). "They are real growth areas," he says, adding that his business is level with last year and now growing. "The budgets aren’t as strong as [for] English-speaking commercials, but they are doing a lot of work."
The terrorist attacks and the recession apparently had a somewhat beneficial effect for post houses, however: They kept agencies closer to home. "When the country goes into a recession, national work slows down but local business does better," reports Lola Lott, owner/ executive producer at charlieuniformtango (CUT), which has offices in Dallas and Austin. "People watch their budgets; they’re not as willing to travel; they spend their money differently."
"We do an awful lot of our postproduction work here in Dallas," agrees Greg Gibson, director of broadcast production at Spotmakers, the in-house production division of Dallas agency The Richards Group. The shop recently worked on Nokia’s "On," directed by Gregor Nichols of bicoastal/international @radical.media, and posted at CUT. "There are some terrific postproduction suppliers here in town, and we all like to go home at night. So we don’t leave town that often [for post]."
While Texas post houses have a thriving local business, they also compete on the national level. To that end, many companies have recruited out-of-state talent. For instance, 501 Post has transplanted cutters from Los Angeles (Gavin Tatro, formerly of Hanks Editorial, Santa Monica), Miami (Austin Rexach, who was a freelancer in South Beach) and San Francisco (Angelo Valencia, who was previously with FilmCore San Francisco). "I felt Austin was an environment conducive to a high-end creative business," says O’Dwyer. "The atmosphere is great in Austin. The city exudes creative juice and a vibe conducive to doing material for a youthful, cool market. So I wanted to offer agencies the highest end of creative editors. But they weren’t available in Austin. The market in Dallas has a high caliber of editors, but I wanted to offer that capability right here."
Post house technicians are also traveling out of state, as they offer more and more specialities. Gillespie recently returned from a trip to Los Angeles, where he supervised a telecine transfer for a package of 20 spots for jewelry retailer Zales, which were directed by Irv Blitz of bicoastal HSI Productions for Publicis Mid-America, Dallas. "We offer all levels of postproduction supervision," Gillespie explains. "Our creative editorial includes offline editing, supervising transfers, mixing and online editing."
O’Dwyer travels, as well. "We do most of our transfers in Los Angeles," he reports. "There is more variety in the colorists available in that market, and ninety percent of our work is taking place in the Los Angeles market. So that’s where we go."
Some facilities are expanding their presence, offerings and client base. CUT, which is headquartered in Dallas, opened its Austin office last year. In addition to spotwork, that office has also begun pitching itself for longform and corporate projects. "We started [moving into longform] just last year," explains Lott. "And we opened offices in Austin because we feel like that is becoming a strong, viable market." She adds that the company also offers graphic design—"that area has really exploded"—and audio post and sound design for TV and radio.
Production Side
"Business in Texas is relatively flat right now," admits Miglini. "If national agencies could see the wealth of talent we have in Texas, they would come to us. We’re fighting with the perception that we’re not New York or L.A. But we have everything [technically] that big cities have, and we’re friendly and easygoing."
"Texas gets a bad rap compared to the Los Angeles or New York markets," agrees Lott. "L.A. and New York have been at it a long time. You have the majority of good directors on those two coasts. When [a Texas] agency uses a director, he often develops a relationship with an L.A. editor. So they stay there. It’s a catch-22. We’ve had great opportunities. It just takes Texas companies a little longer [to get attention]."
Even some Texas-based agencies generally go out of state for production talent. "The majority of our production services are from outside the state—primarily from Los Angeles," reports Wieringa. Land Rover’s "Orbit," helmed by Eric Saarinen of Plum Productions, Santa Monica, is an example. "The directors just aren’t here. You go to a production house ninety-nine percent of the time because of directors. There are talented people here, but when you’re looking for national ‘A’ level directors, nine times out of ten, you find them in L.A. If you use an L.A.-based director, it doesn’t make sense to import Texas production services." For post work, she says the split is about "fifty-fifty—half the time in California, and half in Texas. Austin has really, really good editors and post facilities."
"We travel for production quite a bit," agrees Gibson, "because the bulk of our work is done by directors from out of town. It’s not that we don’t have talent here. It is just easier to do a spot set in Santa Monica with a Santa Monica-based director."
For all the problems, Texas companies are cautiously optimistic about 2002. "We have a lot of bids out," notes Miglini. "There’s a lot of interest in Texas and what we have to offer."
Besides production facilities, he says, "Texas is as big and broad and grand as you can imagine: We have every location from snow forests in the east to beaches down south. We have every location you can imagine short of the Himalayas."
Indeed, that optimism can be seen in the companies that are attempting to compete by branching into other areas. Blind Spot, for instance, has set up a sister company called Alchemy Studios, Austin, which is developing and marketing a proprietary technology that involves real-time live interactive video on the Web. "It allows you to see things in real time without having to download," explains Cobb. "We’re working with corporate clients on this to develop point-of-sale promotions."
"It really is a matter of going beyond traditional commercial production," she continues. "We are looking at Internet advertising, longform programs and other areas. I think that a lot of people are looking for different avenues and different forms of production beyond the thirty-second spot. It is evident that the companies that are going to survive are the ones that are thinking ahead and looking at new ways to reach consumers."
