This spot opens on a basic GPS map, outlining a suburban town. As the camera zooms in, an automated voice directs us to the next moves on our route, and a blue arrow guides us down streets that become increasingly more detailed on the map. The graphics progress from flat, one-dimensional buildings, to 3D representations that grow progressively more realistic as we speed closer to our destination.
The arrow then unnervingly goes off course, no longer on streets but instead zipping through residential backyards, maneuvering over fences and twisting itself to slide through fences and gates. The arrow makes its way into a residential backyard, and smashes into the house of an innocent victim: a small girl, playing quietly. The arrow-bullet shatters the window in slow motion, and shards of glass frame the girl as a target, freezing on her unprotected face. An explosive crash and sudden jolt of red signal despair as the scene cuts to a graphically beating heart, then silence. The voiceover continues, “you have reached your destination,” and the tag appears, “Stray bullets find people.” A black screen with the website endgunviolence.com closes out the spot.
The animated :30 PSA was produced by bicoastal design/production studio Blind for agency Martin Williams, Minneapolis. Blind’s art director Sakona Kong oversaw the project as creative director while also serving as a designer and 3D animator.
“The misdirection of the bullet posed the greatest challenge,” related Kong. “There needed to be a seamless transition from the familiar, mechanical GPS display and arrow to something that, while unclear, conveys an ominous event.” Kong and his animation team found solutions by moving into and through the 2D display and having a dimensional world evolve around the viewer. An additional element the team had to work with was taking a benign GPS arrow on a straightforward path, and turn it into something dangerous and menacing. For this, Kong altered the movement of the arrow, giving it an arbitrary yet violent characteristic. Utilizing various tools including Cinema 4D, Maya and AfterEffects, the result is a seamless transition and narrative that is surprising, shocking and effective.
The Martin Williams creative ensemble included creative director Randy Tatum, art director Toby Balai, copywriter Steve Casey, exec producer Stan Prinsen and senior producer Jennifer Cadwell.
Chris Oneil and Josh Childers joined Kong as 3D animators on the job for Blind. And Kong, Kenny Kegley, Paul Kim and Stef Roberts were Blind’s designers. Producer was Dana Vaden.
Does “Hundreds of Beavers” Reflect A New Path Forward In Cinema?
Hard as it may be to believe, changing the future of cinema was not on Mike Cheslik's mind when he was making "Hundreds of Beavers." Cheslik was in the Northwoods of Wisconsin with a crew of four, sometimes six, standing in snow and making his friend, Ryland Tews, fall down funny.
"When we were shooting, I kept thinking: It would be so stupid if this got mythologized," says Cheslik.
And yet, "Hundreds of Beavers" has accrued the stuff of, if not quite myth, then certainly lo-fi legend. Cheslik's film, made for just $150,000 and self-distributed in theaters, has managed to gnaw its way into a movie culture largely dominated by big-budget sequels.
"Hundreds of Beavers" is a wordless black-and-white bonanza of slapstick antics about a stranded 19th century applejack salesman (Tews) at war with a bevy of beavers, all of whom are played by actors in mascot costumes.
No one would call "Hundreds of Beavers" expensive looking, but it's far more inventive than much of what Hollywood produces. With some 1,500 effects shots Cheslik slaved over on his home computer, he crafted something like the human version of Donald Duck's snowball fight, and a low-budget heir to the waning tradition of Buster Keaton and "Naked Gun."
At a time when independent filmmaking is more challenged than ever, "Hundreds of Beavers" has, maybe, suggested a new path forward, albeit a particularly beaver-festooned path.
After no major distributor stepped forward, the filmmakers opted to launch the movie themselves, beginning with carnivalesque roadshow screenings. Since opening in January, "Hundreds of Beavers" has played in at least one theater every week of the year, though never more than 33 at once. (Blockbusters typically play in around 4,000 locations.)... Read More