Acme Filmworks' Scott Ingalls Directs Cartoon Schizophrenia For Publicis/Bloom, Dallas.
By JEREMY LEHRER
If there were an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records for the most animation styles used in the shortest period of time, Iron Kids Bread’s "IronKid n’ Wheel Skiddin’" may just take the prize. The :30 incorporates 23 animation styles ranging from clay animation to paper cut-out animation.
The spot, directed by Hollywood-based Acme Filmworks’ Scott Ingalls via Publicis/Bloom, Dallas, wasn’t the result of a crazed animation pledge. Publicis came to Ingalls with the idea of creating a commercial that featured an animation smorgasbord. "The way [the agency] originally presented it to me was they wanted the spot to look like Iron Kids had done its own festival of animation," Ingalls recalled. Howard Goldthwaite, creative director/copywriter at Publicis, wrote the lyrics to a song that provided the rhythmic foundation for the spot. "When I talked to Howard, he had the song worked out in his head, and for every line of the song, he wanted to cut to a different style of animation," Ingalls said. The agency added the constraint that the spot had to begin and end with snippets of live-action footage from previous Iron Kids commercials.
Goldthwaite explained that the agency settled on the pastiche approach after watching a sample reel of Acme’s animation, noting that using quick bits of animation was also a way of keeping children’s eyes on the ad. "The more you can keep something new in front of [kids], the more it reawakens their attention," he said. "[Many] of these scenes are just fifteen frames long, so every half-second you get something brand new to look at." The lyrics and the vignettes in the spot highlight different uses of Iron Kids Bread while portraying the active lifestyles of animated kids who eat it.
For Ingalls, figuring out how to get from one animation snippet to the other was nowhere near as easy as connecting the dots. He had to figure out all the steps in between the two live-action bookends, and develop scenarios for each section. To prepare, Ingalls elaborately storyboarded the spot so he knew exactly what would be hap-
pening in each section. To determine the animation genre for each scene, Ingalls chose the animation approach he thought would "maximize the payoff of each scene."
Ingalls and his Acme team then collected a range of samples and stills to be used as reference points during the animation process. Ingalls also worked in oodles of allusions throughout the spot. A scene that features a girl snowboarding down an incline was a reference to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the classic stop-motion animation rendered by Rankin/Bass. "If you were to faithfully render a modern skateboarding girl as an elf from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, that’s how I saw [this character] looking," Ingalls noted. Another section featuring a cutout of Francis Bacon’s head swaddling atop a bacon-strip body was an homage to the Monty Python-era animation of Terry Gilliam, who is one of Ingall’s favorite directors. Another section, in which a smiling piece of bread jumps into a lunchbox, evokes early Fleischer Brothers’ line-drawings. Ingalls, who had recently become interested in woodcuts, also rendered a skateboarder sliding around a half-pipe in an imitation woodcut technique.
Ingalls had extensive praise for his "small but very talented crew" at Acme, which accomplished everything the director wanted within a limited budget and time frame. Perhaps the most time-intensive scene features a photo cutout/stop-motion piece in which a gargantuan slice of bread is hoisted by a construction crane and lowered onto a sandwich the size of an SUV. Because the shots involved complex camera moves and a preparatory photo shoot, Ingalls estimated the sequence as taking seven 20-hour days to complete.
Some animation styles fell by the wayside during the animation process. One section showcasing an Iron Kids’ rocket ship was originally going to be rendered using a puppet animation style reminiscent of Thunderbirds, a television program that ran in the late ’60s and featured what Ingalls described as "puppets and rocket ships with very thin plots." But Ingalls decided that it would be more contemporary to use an animé style for that piece.
Ingalls had many observations about the various animation genres. Of clay animation, Ingalls said that regardless of when the set-up began, the actual shooting never started before nightfall. "It’s a phenomenon I’ve witnessed many times," said Ingalls, who attributed the delay to the demiurgic tendencies of artists: "When you’re creating a whole world, there are always little bits and pieces that you can make better."
The team at Publicis included Steve Feldman, executive creative director; Kelly Scott, producer; and Dean Hlavinka, art director. At Acme Filmworks, Ingalls was assisted by Ron Diamond, executive producer; Gwynn Adik, producer; Keith Mack, assistant director; Michael O’Donnell, technical director; Darren Shaw; technical assistant; George Khair, postproduction coordinator/editor; Rick Potts, animator/painter; Youngki Yoon, animator; Evan Mack, background painter; Christiane Cegavsky, stop motion animator/model maker; Julie Stern, digital matte cutter; and Jennifer Nethsawath, cutter. Cel coloring was done at VirtualMagic Animation, North Hollywood, where VP Andrea Romero was executive producer; Chrisie Russell was production manager; Rick Moser was technical director; and Billy Mejias was assistant technical director. Tabletop shots of Iron Kids Bread were done at Sato Films, Santa Monica, where Gary Sato was director/DP and Rick Brown was executive producer. At 525 Studios, Santa Monica, Paul Bronkar was colorist and Eric Novisedlak was Henry artist/online editor. Los Angeles-based CIS Hollywood’s Steve Bowen was also a colorist. Music, sound design and audio post were done at Admusic, Santa Monica, where personnel consisted of John Adair, composer; Steve Sauber, sound designer; Rob McInteer, sound engineer; and Pat Weaver, producer.
Jury Presidents Named For The One Show 2025
The One Club for Creativity has announced the global creatives from around the world who will serve as jury presidents for The One Show 2025.
These creatives will lead judging for each discipline, and have a vote on the work.
Confirmed One Show 2025 Jury presidents, by discipline, are as follows:
--Brand-Side/In-House: David Lee, CCO, Squarespace, New York
--Branded Entertainment: Malcolm Poynton, Global CCO, Cheil Worldwide, London
--Creative Use of Data, Creative Use of Technology: Nancy Crimi-Lamanna, CCO, FCB Canada, Toronto
--Cultural Driver: Bianca Guimaraes, partner, ECD, Mischief, New York
--Design: Liza Enebeis, creative director, partner, Studio Dumbar/DEPT®, Rotterdam
--Direct Marketing: Vicki Maguire, CCO, Havas London
--Film & Video: Javier Campopiano, global CCO, McCann Worldgroup & McCann Global, Madrid
--Gaming: Taj Reid, global chief experience officer, US CCO, Edelman, New York
--Integrated, Experiential & Immersive: Chris Beresford-Hill, worldwide CCO, BBDO New York
--Fusion Pencil: Walter T. Geer III, CCO, Innovation North America, VML, New York
--Green Pencil: Barbara Humphries, ECD, The Monkeys, Sydney
--Health & Wellness, Pharma: Wendy Lund, chief client officer, WPP, New York
--IP & Product Design: Ronald Ng, global CCO, MRM, New York
--Moving Image Craft & Production: Irene Kugelmann, chief creative officer, DDB Group of Companies Germany, Berlin
--Music & Sound Craft: Joel Simon, CCO, JSM Music, New York
--Out of Home, Print & Promotional: Kainaz Karmakar, CCO, Ogilvy India, Mumbai
--Public Relations: Patricia Ávila, regional director for Latin America, Ágora, São Paulo
--Radio... Read More