New York studio Nathan Love created an animated world depicting what one might find in the depths of Santa Claus’ beard for client the Oregon Lottery and agency Borders Perrin Norrander, Portland, Ore. It’s a beard full of kooky holiday characters as well as potential winnings from playing lotto.
Set to a whimsical holiday track, the commercial swoops inside Santa’s beard to reveal a snowman in his kitchen, the sink running syrup from a candy cane wall. Next up, a pine tree decorates a man with ornaments, a walrus flosses his tusks, and French hens in red high heels gossip over wine in a hair nest café. The spot closes with a cameo of local Oregon legend D.B. Cooper, who in the early ’70s infamously stole a suitcase of cash and parachuted out of a commercial Boeing 727, never to be seen again (the Oregon Lottery spot posits where he’s been hiding all along!)
Directed by Nathan Love’s Anca Risca, the all-CG spot is rich in detail, with a handcrafted feel and stop-motion-style animation. Risca and her team imagined Santa’s beard as a clay-sculpted world inhabited by characters carved from wood and environments imbued with the look of miniatures. The one continuous camera move, which was inspired by Nathan Love executive creative director Joe Burrascano’s recent trip to Disneyworld, plays out like an amusement park ride as it takes the viewer through the different “rooms” inside the beard.
To execute the concept, the team cut storyboards while character designs were being refined, starting with a timed :30 2D animatic, then moving into a more detailed 3D previs during which time they also placed all the beard hairs into the various environments and finalized camera motion. The seamless camera move was split into six different shots, which were edited together concurrent to the compositing phase. Once animation was finished, lighting, rendering and compositing continued until the final look was achieved. A core Nathan Love group of about 10 was tasked with the project, with an additional 20 extra hands coming on board during production. The project was secured for Nathan Love by production house Mothership which handles West Coast representation for the N.Y. studio.
Ron Cicero and Bo Clancey Launch Production House 34North
Executive producers Ron Cicero and Bo Clancey have teamed to launch 34North. The shop opens with a roster which includes accomplished directors Jan Wentz, Ben Nakamura Whitehouse, David Edwards and Mario Feil, as well as such up-and-coming filmmakers as Glenn Stewart and Chris Fowles. Nakamura Whitehouse, Edwards, Feil and Fowles come over from CoMPANY Films, the production company for which Cicero served as an EP for the past nearly five years. Director Wentz had most recently been with production house Skunk while Stewart now gains his first U.S. representation. EP Clancey was freelance producing prior to the formation of 34North. He and Cicero have known each other for some 25 years, recently reconnecting on a job directed by Fowles. Cicero said that he and Clancey “want to keep a highly focused roster where talent management can be one on one--where we all share in the directors’ success together.” Clancey also brings an agency pedigree to the new venture. “I started at Campbell Ewald in accounts, no less,” said Clancey. “I saw firsthand how much work agencies put in before we even see a script. You have to respect that investment. These agency experiences really shaped my approach to production--it’s about empathy, listening between the lines, and ultimately making the process seamless.” 34North represents a meeting point--both literally and creatively. Named after the latitude of Malibu, Calif., where the idea for the company was born, it also embraces the power of storytelling. “34North118West was the first GPS-enabled narrative,” Cicero explained. “That blend of art and technology, to captivate an audience, mirrors what we do here--create compelling work, with talented people, harnessing state-of-the-art... Read More