At www.vwfeatures.com, which recently won a Cyber Lion Award Gold at Cannes, consumers can build their own Volkswagen Jettas and crash test them with everything from a rhinoceros to a chicken truck or create Rabbit models and watch them fall in love and breed. This is not the typical ho-hum “build your own” function on car manufacturers’ Web sites, and that’s exactly what Crispin + Porter Bogusky. Miami, and Digital Domain, Venice, Calif., wanted.
The Crispin team believed the “build your own” category was an underutilized marketing opportunity where more compelling, brand appropriate imagery and messaging could further drive pre-existing TV branding and build relationships between consumers and the cars.
“Every major car manufacturer has a Web site, and for the most part those Web sites tend to be a very clinical display of the various models the manufacturers make. They tend not to resonate with the advertising brand. Or you can click and see the TV commercial on the Web site, but it’s not what it could be,” said Ed Ulbrich, senior VP of production/executive producer at Digital Domain.
“I was literally blown away when we got the brief for the Volkswagen GTI, which has become the building block of vwfeatures.com. It’s revolutionary, and it’s going to set the new gold standard. Crispin has set the bar now and we are honored to be part of it.”
Digital Domain’s visual effects techniques allow customers to “build” cars, which are placed into “Webisodes.” But depending on how you design your car, you get a different experience–so it’s a more interactive experience than a regular Webisode is capable of.
“This is about designing the car and taking that rather mundane experience that isn’t very satisfying into a very strategic way to connect with customers and entertain them, and deliver a consistent message and imagery to the experience they’ve already had of that vehicle, which brought them to the Web site in the first place,” relates Ulbrich.
After choosing the model, body, interior, transmission, wheels and accessories for their Jetta, consumers can choose from eight different ways to crash it. These films correspond with VW’s “Safe Happens” campaign featuring Jettas getting into accidents but keeping their passengers unharmed. The scenes take place in a crash lab and are crafted to look like research footage using multiple camera angles to study the accident.
In the case of the Rabbit, visitors can customize their vehicle but instead of crashing it, they can choose a mate for it and send them both off on a flirtatious ride that culminates with them “parking.” A few seconds later, a family tree pops up.
Because of all the options available through this customized filmmaking experience, this undertaking would be unrealistic without Digital Domain’s visual effects. It would require hundreds of cars and shooting each scene hundreds of times. Instead, the company created the car models, crash test site, animals and objects entirely in CG. From there it animated the scenes and, using proprietary technology, placed each car into the scenes to create the hundreds of possibilities necessary.
“We set up creative elements for one shot and then in the background we have procedures that go out and render all the other various configurations just like the first one,” explained Ulbrich.
He said the most challenging part of the project was having to deploy a substantial amount of Digital Domain’s fire power and arsenal to execute the films because they had to be done in just a few weeks.
“It’s like doing 50 commercials on one tenth of the schedule we would normally get. Logistically it is a substantial endeavor,” Ulbrich related. “It’s about redeploying your resources and deciding for this period of time this project is going to get an atypically large percentage of our computer power. …That’s the benefit of a large environment with significant rendering capacity.”
Looking ahead, Ulbrich says the Web site will continue to grow with more models and describes this period as a “cool time in automotive advertising.
“We are watching in general considerable amounts of money being spent on the Web for automotive. We’re seeing budgets that are not unlike commercial budgets. It’s an exciting time.”
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More