The Energizer Bunny is perhaps one of the most recognizable advertising icons in history. We first met the Bunny—a pink hare famous for banging on a drum and wearing shades—back in 1989. Since then, the character, who was created by Chiat/Day—now TBWA/Chiat/Day—Los Angeles, has been a mainstay in Energizer battery ads, and the world-famous Bunny pops up once again in "Silver Spinning Bunny," a new effort promoting Energizer’s e(approximately) (that’s e-squared) Titanium battery. The e(approximately) is a high-performance battery made with titanium, which increases the life of the battery.
But the Energizer Bunny in "Silver Spinning Bunny," which was directed by Alex Frisch of Method, a Santa Monica-based visual effects shop, isn’t the same old Bunny we know and love from before. Yes, he’s still charming and irreverent. But he’s also cool and hip—and no longer pink, instead he’s silver. Also, he is now literally inside of the battery, his ears, body and tail coming through what looks like the skin of the battery.
Rob Schwartz, executive creative director at TBWA/Chiat/Day says that when the original campaign for the Energizer e(approximately) Titanium battery was launched by predecessor shop DDB Chicago, the Bunny was not part of it. (TBWA/Chiat/Day was awarded duties on the account earlier this year.) "The problem with [not using the bunny was] that the product awareness was very low for the client," Schwartz relates. "So, we had a creative shoot-out between us and DDB, and we came up with the idea of having the Bunny inside the battery. The idea was to say that the Bunny—this cute, great wonderful Energizer Bunny who stands for longevity—is not just in basic Energizer products, but now he’s also available in the more sophisticated, e(approximately) Titanium product."
Of course, placing the Bunny inside of a battery is easier said than done. So the TBWA/Chiat/Day team turned to visual effects pro Frisch. "We love Alex. He’s a great director," says Schwartz, who acted as executive creative director/copy- writer on the spot, along with creative director/art director Jerry Gentile and producer Elizabeth Giersbrook. "We just had the sense that he was going to make the spot fun, but also make it feel real."
Frisch, who also directed an Energizer Max spot featuring the Bunny at the same time, suggested setting the Bunny into all sorts of action in "Silver Spinning Bunny." The commercial opens with a shot of a stationary Energizer e(approximately). Suddenly, the famous shape of the Bunny pops up through the skin—his ears, sunglasses and drum are all visible. "And you thought all we put in there was titanium," the voiceover announces.
Suddenly, the Bunny—who remains inside the battery throughout the spot—zooms into action, riding the battery like it is a snowboard, then flying it like it is an airplane. While the Bunny twists and moves, he never actually bursts out of the battery. The skin of the battery simply stretches to accommodate his every maneuver.
The Real Thing
Actually, one of the primary challenges involved in this job was ensuring that the audience definitely knew it was indeed the Energizer Bunny inside the battery. To help the animation team at Method, the agency loaned them a pink Bunny prop made a few years ago. "It actually came in a suitcase—all protected," Frisch says. "We measured it, so we could precisely recreate the Bunny [in a CG environment]."
Was that tough? "We had to play with the ears for awhile," Frisch says.
It should be noted that animator Bob Kurtz of Kurtz & Friends, Burbank, Calif., created pencil sketches of the Bunny. The animation studio also did the storyboards and the animatic for the project. Schwartz says that Frisch and Kurtz made a good team. "Alex brought cool, realistic, hip direction, with Bob bringing fun and charm from the animation side," he praises.
While the Bunny was a crucial piece of the puzzle, the rest of the job also required thorough and precise preparation. Storyboards were drawn to get the pattern of action set. Then, the team at Method produced an animatic to show the agency, and then 3-D animation was done concurrently with a second pencil test. Gil Baron, a 3-D artist at Method, led that process. James LeBloch, another 3-D artist at Method, and freelance 3-D artists Ken Berland, Olivier Revillon, Gil Baron, and Scott Metzger, also worked on the project.
"The main technical challenge of this job was to match the skin of the bunny with the texture of the battery," relates Frisch says. "We had to develop internally a special program to achieve that. There was some R&D involved. This job was unusual in the fact that the core of the commercial was based on something we had to do R&D on. We didn’t have that technology available when we took on the job, so it was really essential for us to come up with a good technical solution to pull it off."
Method’s team wrote special codes on the software programs Maya and RenderMan to achieve the seamless skin effect. Frisch relates that the character animation was done in Maya. The final render of the bunny—the lighting and the shading—was completed in RenderMan, and the elements were composited in the Inferno.
Method’s Neysa Horsburgh served as visual effects executive producer on "Silver Spinning Bunny;" Sue Troyan was the visual effects producer. Mark Tobin was the visual effects producer on the Energizer Max spot. Apprentice Inferno artist Ryan Yoshimoto also contributed to the ads.
It took the Method crew about two-and-a-half months to finish both the e(approximately)and Max spots. At least six weeks of that time was spent on preparation, which included drawing storyboards to get the pattern of action set and producing an animatic for the agency and client to view and give feedback on. There was a lot of give and take, Frisch says. "It was really pleasurable to work with the agency. They were very supportive and very open to our ideas," notes Frisch. "They definitely put a lot of trust in us and our ability to come up with something good. It was really the last week or so that everything came together to everyone’s liking. Up to that point, it was like, ‘Hmmm …’. It was a difficult project, but in the end it came out very well."
