BBDO New York won agency of the year honors while Smuggler earned the production company of the year mantle, and Henry-Alex Rubin was named the year’s best director at the recently wrapped CICLOPE Festival 2017 in Berlin. All three wins were tied in large part to Sandy Hook Promise’s “Evan,” one of three pieces to earn a CICLOPE Grand Prix–directed by Rubin of Smuggler for BBDO NY.
The short film is the story of Evan, a teen counting down the days to summer break, who demonstrates his boredom by writing on a table in the school library. The next day he finds someone has responded back. While we watch Evan’s story, another darker tale is unfolding simultaneously. The other story contains warning signs that a teen may be planning a school shooting. Those signs–which initially go unnoticed even though they were right in front of us–are later called to our attention.
The other two Grand Prix winners at CICLOPE WERE Jay-Z’s “The Story of O.J.” directed by Jay-Z and Mark Romanek, produced by The Mill, and Audi’s “Enter Sandbox” directed by Kjetil Botten Skogly and produced by Media Monks.
Among other special honors, The Mill was named animation company of the year, MPC the top VFX studio, NO6 the best editing company, Ring The Alarm the outstanding music company, ArtOfficial Agency the leading sound company, and MediaMonks the digital company of the year.
More than 100 entries were awarded in different categories at CICLOE. For a full rundown of winners, click here.
SCHROM x Yacht Club and Be Electric Studios Launch Electric XR for Virtual Production
SCHROM x Yacht Club, a full-service live-action, tabletop, and postproduction company, has teamed with Be Electric Studios, a soundstage, equipment rental, and virtual production company, to launch Electric XR, a virtual production collective.
Industry veteran Thomas Rossano will lead the new venture, which provides advanced virtual production solutions across multiple facilities. He brings over 25 years of experience in live-action, tabletop, postproduction and talent curation to enhance Electric XR’s offerings as a resource for brands and agencies, as well as other production companies in need of virtual production solutions. Additionally Rossano continues to serve as EP at XR New York (XR-NY), a role he’s held since December 2022. SCHROM x Yacht Club originally established XR-NY to help provide XR services for third-party rentals. While XR-NY will continue to function independently for SCHROM X Yacht Club, it now operates under the Electric XR umbrella.
Rossano’s expertise spans producing live-action commercials, branded content, interactive and experiential content. In addition to leading Electric XR, he holds responsibilities at SCHROM x Yacht Club which include driving business development, collaborating with sales reps and expanding the company’s creative talent network. Rossano’s career includes serving as an exec producer at Hungry Man for about 11 years, right from that company’s inception. He then went on to become a partner at Station Film where he also had a lengthy tenure. Later he was a partner at PRISM. Then after the pandemic hit, he became a freelance EP for nearly two years, looking into opportunities in virtual production, which led him to XR NY and now Electric XR. Over the years, he has produced high-profile... Read More