A man is about to move on from a campsite when his companion, a young lass, informs him that the once burning campfire is still smoldering. He responds that they did a good enough job of dousing the fire and it’s time to get going. However, when he turns to see the woman’s reaction, she is no longer there. In her stead is a towering CG Smokey Bear who takes him to task for his carelessness. Upon realizing his irresponsibility, he sets out to do a better job of making sure the fire is totally out, at which point Smokey reverts to being the young lady.
Titled “Bonfire,” the PSA was directed by Jason Zada of bicoastal Tool of North America, with effects, including the CG Smokey, created by Ntropic, San Francisco, for agency Draftfcb, Irvine, Calif.
The Draftfcb team included executive creative director Teddy Brown, group creative director Scott Murray, senior producer Tom Anderson, and associate producer Jeff Perino.
The DP was Ross Richardson. Editor was Jim Staskauskas via Optimus, Santa Monica. The Ntropic ensemble included creative director/VFX lead Andrew Sinagra, CG artists Dustin Zachary and Rob Hubbard, animator Joel Fletcher, exec producer Dana Townsend, and producer Esther Gonzalez.
YESSIAN BOWS IPHONE APP FOR MUSIC SEARCH Music/sound house Yessian, bicoastal and Detroit, has released an iPhone application designed to allow companies seeking music for licensing to browse the shop’s library of original music available for licensing or buyout. With over 5,000 tracks to peruse, Yessian creates and licenses music for assorted media outlets, including television, radio, web, video games and entertainment attractions. The free application will allow advertisers to quickly browse tracks at their own convenience anywhere they go, and search using keyword, genre or even tempo. Over the course of the next year, Yessian plans to add more features to the application that will allow users even greater ease in searching for music.
“Our iPhone app is a music production company first,” claimed chief creative officer Brian Yessian. He said it offers “our clients a truly seamless way to search for music, whether it be with the app, widget or on our website. With this trilogy, we are now accessible to people in the office and on the road.”
With a registered user ID and password, users will have full access to all available tracks on the Music Search site. There is a complete audio description along with touch screen features that allow people to directly call or email any of Yessian Music’s studios directly from the application.
PEOPLE IN THE NEWS…. Robert LePlae has been named president of McCann Erickson North America. Based in San Francisco, he will have responsibility for McCann Erickson and T.A.G., San Francisco, as well as McCann Detroit, Los Angeles and Canada. LePlae was most recently president of the TBWA North American group of companies….Toronto-based Holiday Films has added Legs and Lena Beug to its directorial roster for Canadian representation. Beug continues to be repped by Moxie Pictures stateside. Her credits include anti-smoking PSAs for Colorado, and the short film Mandy & Lester for Liberty Mutual’s Responsibility Project. Meanwhile Legs, a creative team of writers, directors and producers working out of MILK Studios, N.Y., recently wrapped 15 station IDs for Diet Coke’s sponsorship of Ugly Betty in the U.K. via Mother, London….
