Director/DP Brendan Williams, ACS, has joined Passport Films, the Santa Monica shop headed by owners/executive producers Patti and David Coulter, for U.S. representation. Williams has already wrapped his first project under the Passport banner: a Cooper Tires campaign for agency Marc USA, Pittsburgh.
The campaign’s premise was to follow a tire traveling along and through the scenes of the lives of people who trust the safety and quality of Cooper Tires. Williams’ approach was to shoot at high speed (up to 1500fps) and have the camera motor by the scene at up to 60 mph on a camera car.
“We came up with the idea of a second high-speed camera car pulling/towing the lone tire on a long pull rig,” related David Coulter. “The rig was then taken out in post, leaving the tire traveling down the street by itself at normal speed while all the other action in the scene was seen in extreme slow motion. For scenes where we didn’t need the tire traveling at 60 miles per hour we used a specially designed rig attached to the camera car to “launch” the tire on its own.”
Williams noted, “It was a great challenge to achieve in three days and working on the roads at 108 degrees made it that much harder. However, creatively it was really fun. The guys at the agency were really lovely, they were keen for me to try this crazy technique that created the ‘moving through a still photo’ type of feeling we were after.” The work was shot on the high-speed Weisscam HD camera.
Williams’ work spans such genres as automotive, tourism/lifestyle, food and people. Before turning to directing, he was a DP for 10 years, contributing to dramatic series, commercials, films and documentaries. Williams is among Australia’s most awarded DPs, and has earned the ACS designation. He made a successful transition to the director’s chair, having helmed and lensed assorted spots for such clients as Subaru, Mitsubishi, Toyota, Queensland Tourism, Tasmania Tourism, Nivea, Domino’s, Subway and eBay. Williams continues to be repped Down Under by production house 8com in Sydney and his own shop B Films in Brisbane. Earlier he was briefly repped stateside by Original Film.
William’s penchant for blending original shooting styles and approaches with postproduction techniques is evidenced in his work for BMW out of Melbourne agency Badjar Ogilvy, Melbourne, and Hyundai via ad shop Innocean in Sydney.
For the former, a silver sedan from the 1960s magically morphs through successive models until it eventually becomes a current BMW. All the while, the car is driving around a racetrack at high speed. In one transition, the car is travelling down the straight of the racetrack with the camera chasing the vehicle in a profile from a helicopter. Suddenly the car morphs into the next model. The section of track, the hero car’s speed, helicopter altitude and camera angle were matched as closely as possible and multiple passes were photographed on each car to provide as much information to the VFX team who performed the morph in postproduction. Williams used a picture-car mounted boom that was rigged out of the sunroofs of the hero cars and tied to the seatbelt points. Completely freestanding and counterweighted, the boom allowed for a 360-degree circular track around the car while it was driving on the racecourse. Passes were shot on two different models and the shots were married together in post.
Meanwhile the Hyundai spot featured time-lapse photography. “Working with our research team we threw a whole lot of ideas around for potential locations/events that would make for stunning time-lapse shots. One of the first thoughts that we knew would make for amazing pictures was the Northern Lights. We were fortunate that our filming was taking place right across the season where the Aurora performs,” recalled Williams.
The mathematics involved made every shot quite tricky taking in to account time, light changes, speed of objects moving in the frame, predicting the weather, and also using a special motion control dolly and calculating the speed of that in between frames and the speed of our pan and tilt head. “This all made for a nice brain teaser,” said Williams.
The weather varied greatly on location. “From the Northwest territories of Canada at minus 40 degrees where we had to devise heating systems to ensure our cameras and dolly rigs would still operate–not to mention trying to set up intricate pieces of equipment in an environment where taking off your gloves and mittens would result in frozen fingers within minutes,” said Williams. “Our other most challenging location was the Salt Lake in Ceduna, South Australia, which the day before our arrival had received unseasonal rain that resulted in a lake with a layer of water a few inches deep. Thankfully it made for amazing pictures; however, working through the night in gumboots and trying to keep our equipment dry and off the water was challenging, to say the least.”
Lensing entailed up to six Canon SLRs on this project, 5Ds and 7Ds. The main unit had three, second unit had two, and the third unit had one. This was necessary in order to be in so many places at once given the time frame of the production. Williams regards the Canons as the best tool for shooting hi-res time-lapse pictures.
Passport Films is represented by Sarah Jenks on the East Coast, Sarah Lange in the Southeast, and Donna D’Aguanno in the Midwest. Patti Coulter oversees the West Coast.
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More