Bicoastal design studio Scout breathes life into the quirky creatures of popular animal portrait illustrator Ryan Berkley for a new social media campaign for Residence Inn by Marriott, out of mcgarrybowen. The Instagram-tailored :15 videos tout the amenities and perks of staying at Residence Inn for every personality type with playful animations that transform Berkley’s animals into talking personalities. The campaign, which appears on Residence Inn’s Facebook, Instagram and YouTube pages, includes six videos that appeal to The Resident Gourmet, Swimmer, Night Owl, Socialite, Sprinter and Coffee Connoisseur and is the first Instagram campaign for the brand to date.

Since Portland-based Berkley had never animated his own art prints, Scout creative directors Chace Hartman and Brian Drucker were brought on to bring the stills to life, while keeping the original artistic viewpoint intact. They worked closely with Berkley and the mcgarrybowen team to create believable mouth movements that were in sync with the voiceovers and truly enhanced the character to add flair of personality that would be unattainable with a still image.

“I was definitely nervous about seeing my animals given animated personalities and voices in general, but I had a grin from ear to ear during every second of each one,” said Berkely. “We had great communication and Brian and Chace assured me that my sketched ideas, once finalized, would work well in the animations.”

The mcgarrybowen team included executive creative director Al Kelly, group creative director Oliver Dudley, associate creative directors Michael Camarra, Brett Dixon, Becky Armentrout and Joe Esposito and sr. producer Dan Fried.

Rounding out the Scout ensemble were Manus Goan who handled animation, and head of production Whitney Green.

Academy Nicholl Fellowships Bestowed Upon Screenwriters
Three individual writers and one writing team have been selected as winners of the 2014 Academy Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting competition.  Each individual winner and the combined writing team will receive a $35,000 prize, the first installment of which will be distributed at an awards presentation on Thursday, November 13, at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.  For the second consecutive year, the event will also feature a live read of selected scenes from the fellows’ winning scripts by members of the Academy.

This year’s winners are:

• Sam Baron, Cambridge, United Kingdom, The Science of Love and Laughter

• Alisha Brophy, Los Angeles, and Scott Miles, Austin, TX, United States of Fuckin’ Awesome

• Melissa Iqbal, London, The Death Engine

• Sallie West, Charleston, SC, Moonflower

The winners were selected from a record 7,511 scripts submitted for this year’s competition.

People In The News…
Dapper, the dedicated comedy division of Believe Media, has added director/DP Damien Toogood to its roster. A Sydney native now living and working in Los Angeles, Toogood helmed V/Line’s “Guilt Trips” which took home the 2014 Cannes Grand Prix for Creative Effectiveness. Existing first as only a print campaign, Toogood approached McCann Melbourne with the script that would evolve it into a hilariously relatable spot, employing deadpan humor to showcase how parents “guilt” kids into returning home for a visit. The centerpiece spot helped to grow total off-peak monthly sales for V/Line by 15 percent while boosting call center inquiries by 28 percent. Toogood’s work spans such clients as Coca-Cola, Chevrolet, Renault, Pepsi, and Nescafe. Already at Dapper, Toogood has shot a Hyundai campaign for Innocean Canada and a Dannon campaign for Y&R….Director/DP Dan Waymack has signed with Dictionary Films, the integrated production arm of Cutters Studios. He has already wrapped his first project at Dictionary–an assignment for the Bud Light Whatever USA campaign from Energy BBDO. Waymack has directed and shot for such brands as Allstate, Kellogg’s and Kimberly-Clark, as well as the U.S. Army. Over the past 10 years, he has served as founder and partner at the Little Rock-based production company Service Station….

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