Creative + technology studio Preymaker, founded in New York in 2020 by industry veterans Angus Kneale, Melanie Wickham and Verity Grantham, has opened a studio in Cape Town.
Leading the day-to-day business at the new South Africa outpost are industry veterans Julie Brown, serving as head of operations, and Byron Tofas, creative lead. Brown has recently held leadership positions at Engage Video Group as the head of production and delivery while also playing a key role in the strategic leadership of the business through a five year growth phase. At Ogilvy & Mather SA, she oversaw and led delivery for some of the agency’s biggest client portfolios. Tofas, a creative whose honors include multiple Loeries and PromaxBDAs, was previously VFX supervisor at BlackGinger overseeing teams on commercials, series and feature films. His credits include Hollywood blockbusters such as Avengers: Age of Ultron, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter and Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle, along with the 2023 VFX Craft Gold Loerie-winning “Ya’ hunga forever,” a hilarious Black Panther parody for Big John.
Preymaker, using the studio’s 100% custom cloud-based platform created in collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS), has already tapped artists across SA whose contributions spanned design, animation, look dev, lighting, FX and compositing on Goodby Silverstein & Partners’ “The Aviators” for Xfinity from Academy Award-winning director Kathryn Bigelow and Oscar-winning cinematographer Greig Fraser; and BBDO NY’s “A Do What Moves You Film” featuring Camila Cabello for Bacardi. The SA team was also instrumental on the multiple award-winning original short film BLUE, created entirely in the cloud using Unreal Engine’s real-time technology.
“South Africa has a rich creative community,” enthused Angus Kneale, Preymaker chief creative. “The society has high appreciation for the arts–from music to design, and photography to animation and filmmaking in general. This melting pot of cultures and talent creates an exciting place to attract and invest in creative people. In the global advertising world, some of the world’s finest creatives got their start in South Africa, there is something there that creates these exceptional people. We started Preymaker Cape Town to tap into and to find, develop and nurture these people.
“I attended college in South Africa,” Kneale continued, “and had a very exciting early career working on some of the best work in the country. In order to further my career I made the difficult decision to leave a country that I loved in order to grow and work on international work. South Africa needs people to be part of making the country a better place for future generations. Preymaker truly believes in South Africa and that its creative future is bright. This is why we are investing in our South African team, developing talent and providing scholarships.”
Preymaker SA’s Tofas said, “We’re building a team of multi-talented, dynamic artists and producers who are enjoying our studio space in Cape Town. We have a great vibe with inspirational art on every corner, a concierge service, private meeting rooms and barista coffee. We offer a maker-mentorship program, the opportunity for South African artists to collaborate on high-end projects with some of the best talent in New York, both remotely and in-person, and a top-tier work experience utilizing all the latest tools in creative technology.”
Verity Kneale, Preymaker executive producer, said, “What we have built in Preymaker up to this point has been focused on our people, the technology and the creativity, and a huge part of building these pillars has come from the growth and input of our South African team. They are an integral part of everything that we do at Preymaker and having the people and the country where I grew up being so key to our foundation makes me so proud.”
Preymaker SA’s head of operations Brown added, “We’re looking to attract the best talent in the country, people who can bring not only world class VFX skills to the team but a desire to share their skills and learn from the vast talent pool already at Preymaker. We’re unique with our cloud-based workflow, so our team can move freely between home and office with quick access to ongoing projects along with the ability to work across multiple locations globally. Streamlined communication, channels and tools are critical to our success. Constantly optimizing and improving these is a core focus of mine and the entire operations team at Preymaker.”
South Africa natives Kneale and Grantham attest to learning everything they know about advertising while growing up there. The new Cape Town office is an invitation to aspiring talent and a celebration of the country’s long history of advertising excellence. “We’re so pleased to pay it forward,” they shared in a joint statement. “We’re offering a three-year scholarship for a talented SA student aspiring to pursue a career in animation and VFX in collaboration with The Animation School. The scholarship seeks a young individual with a strong aptitude for animation and VFX, and provides an opportunity for those who may lack the means for university education. We see Preymaker SA as a place where talent can grow and thrive.”
Preymaker is behind some of the industry’s most innovative and noteworthy work including Google’s “American Gothic” and “Selfie,” the Fanta x Beetlejuice Beetlejuice movie teaser, Lincoln Aviator 2025’s “Skipped Exits,” Delta’s “Olympics 2024,” and the “Liquidity Maze” VR experience for State Street Global Advisors and McCann New York.
Preymaker works in linear content, along with interactive immersive media and Metaverse. Other highlights from Preymaker include the D&AD Award-winning integrated creative campaign for Volkswagen’s fully electric ID. Buzz, a design-led effort inspired by the original iconic VW bus, The Lord Of The Rings “The Rings of Power” promo for Kathryn Bigelow, and the Sanofi-Aventis spot, “Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing” which features an entirely CGI photoreal wolf.
