Feedback from effects artists who had a hand in this year’s crop of commercials earning Visual Effects Society (VES) Award nominations yielded some common, shared themes when it comes to turning out high caliber work, perhaps the most prevalent dynamic being teamwork whether it be between the 2D and 3D teams, and/or positive cooperative collaborations among the director, the effects studio ensemble and agency creatives.
Teamwork was cited as being key in meeting creative and technical challenges, not to mention the ubiquitous time crunch. On the latter score, when 2D supervisor Katrina Salicrup of Method, Santa Monica, Calif., first got the call that the visual effects team she works with had a scant one month timeframe to produce two 60-second spots for client Microsoft, she knew that there was going to be a lot of long working days.
“Basically the team and I didn’t have a day off for something like 30 days straight.” Salicrup added, “It was a tremendous challenge for us to be able to do the kinds of shots that we wanted to do in the time we had…[A tight schedule] can actually be a blessing or curse depending on how you look at it. Essentially, for us, it came down to the entire production team from the director all the way through, being able to work together in order to get the work out on time.”
One of those spots was Microsoft Zune’s “The Ballad of Tina Pink” directed by Patrick Daughters of The Directors Bureau, Hollywood, for San Francisco agency T.A.G.. “Tina Pink” earned a VES Award nomination in the mainstay VES competition category honoring outstanding visual effects in a commercial.
Also nominated in that category were: effects studio Digital Domain, Venice, Calif., for BMW’s “Road” directed by Carl Erik Rinsch via Marken Film, Hamburg, for German agency Jung Van Matt; Fuel International, Sydney, for BMW’s “Hydrogen” directed by Andrew van der Westhuyzen of Sydney-based Collider for GSD&M’s Idea City in Austin, Texas; London effects house Moving Picture Company (MPC) for Bacardi’s “Bacardi Sun” directed by Pleix of Blink, London, for Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R, London; and Framestore-CFC, London for Smirnoff’s “Sea” directed by Daniel Kleinman of Rattling Stick, London, for JWT, London.
Other visual effects studios scored VES Award nominations in other competition categories inclusive of commercials. Asylum, Santa Monica, garnered three nominations, including two in the compositing category: Nike’s “Leave Nothing” directed by feature filmmaker Michael Mann via Alturas Films, Venice, Calif., for Wieden+Kennedy, Portland, Ore.; and Levi’s “Change” helmed by Filip Engstrom of bicoastal Smuggler for BBH, London.
Additionally Asylum earned a nomination for outstanding animated character in a live-action broadcast program or commercial on the strength of Propel’s “Stress Monster” directed by Baker Smith of Santa Monica-based harvest for Element 79, Chicago.
Two other spot-related VES Award categories also produced nominations. For outstanding created environment in a live-action broadcast program or commercial, Sway Studio, Culver City, Calif., attained nominee status for Subaru Impreza’s “Peel Out” directed by Gavin Bowden via the former Plum Productions for DDB New York.
And for outstanding special effects in a broadcast program or commercial, Full Scale Effects, North Hollywood, earned a nomination on the basis of Lexus’ “Hydrant” directed by Nicolai Fuglsig of bicoastal/international MJZ for Team One Advertising, El Segundo, Calif.
Winners will be announced and honored at the VES Awards ceremony on Feb. 10 in Hollywood.
And on a separate note, with its first quarterly Visual Effects & Animation Top Ten Chart of ’08, SHOOT gets a jump start in this issue on what current work might garner VES and other industry awards attention down the road. For example, SHOOT’s very first Top Ten Visual Effects & Animation Chart in September ’07 included two of this year’s VES Award-nominated commercials, Levi’s “Change” and Subaru’s “Peel Out.”
(Editor Note: The next installments of SHOOT’s ’08 Quarterly Top Ten Visual Effects & Animation Chart will appear in the May 9, July 18 and Oct. 10 issues. Submissions for Chart consideration meeting criteria are accepted one month prior to issue date. Contact rgoldrich@shootonline.com for information.)
Meanwhile, read on to gain insight from the some of the talented effects professionals behind this year’s VES Award-nominated spots relative to the creative and technical challenges that these projects presented.
James Allen, compositing supervisorAsylum, Santa Monica
Nike’s “Leave Nothing”
“Leave Nothing” was an extremely challenging spot both in determining the final aesthetic of the commercial, as well as how to technically join multiple plates and make it feel seamless. The footage was shot entirely at the Rose Bowl on 35mm at frame rates of either 52fps or 104fps. While there were multiple cameras running on every take, in the end, every shot (with the exception of the first two) was taken from the hand-held cam or Steadicam running down the field with the hero players.
We worked at 2K in order to have the ability to reposition where necessary, often removing players from one plate to put them in the next, so that we could transition cameras independently of the players. Compositing was done in Flame. Stadiums were all built in 3D using Maya. Massive software was used to create the CG crowds, Houdini was used for the weather effects and used as the main pipeline for all digital assets where it was finally rendered in Mantra.
Matt Hackett, lead animatorAsylum, Santa Monica
Propel’s “Stress Monster”
The biggest challenge for us from a technical standpoint was to create the Stress Monster from thousands of various objects that ranged from Post-It-notes to crashing tow trucks, and ambulances. Our goal was to have the Stress Monster photo realistic, and all its components in the proper scale to the live action environment, as if it were an actual event that the audience was viewing.
We achieved this by mapping out the city while on the shoot, then animating the creatures movement in Maya, and exporting that into Houdini, where we attached the main mass of the creature. Once the full scale creature was established, we created various sized Stress Monsters for the erosion of the character as it peels away back to its human form.
Chris Nichols, CG supervisorSway Studio, Culver City
Subaru’s “Peel Out”
Our team faced many challenges while working on this fun and exciting project, one being the animation of the Subaru Impreza itself. By utilizing Sway’s proprietary Drive-A-Tron(tm) driving simulator, we were literally able to get behind the wheel of the Impreza to create an extremely realistic car animation on a very challenging and nearly impossible-to-navigate terrain.
To make the interior living room environment look 100 percent believable, we employed strategic methods of combining photogrammetry and very high resolution HRI imagery. We used a more scientific approach capturing extremely precise textures and shaders allowing a very realistic look that served both in modeling as well as lighting.
Katrina Salicrup, 2D supervisorMethod, Santa Monica
Microsoft Zune’s “The Ballad of Tina Pink”
We had a lot of technical challenges for this spot, from having to mix 2D and 3D elements in order to make realistic looking water, to the use of extended sets, multiple rigs, and wires that we had to later remove. We had some stock HD jellyfish footage that we were using and must have done about 20 versions with changes in order to get the look for the scene that we wanted.
We had to make it simple, but real. I think that one of the biggest creative challenges for the team was the incredible amount of work that we had to do in a limited amount of time.The team had to know both the why and the what of what the client was looking for so we could get into it (the work) quickly and complete the spots. The biggest compliment we received is when a fellow professional said he couldn’t tell where our work stopped and where the “real” elements started. It is the favorite spot I’ve worked on so far.”
Simon Maddison, VFX supervisorfuelfx, Sydney
BMW’s “Hydrogen”
The biggest challenge on the BMW ad creatively was definitely the look of the liquid car at the end of the spot. The liquid had to look real to a degree, which in some ways conflicted with the client’s needs. They effectively saw this shot as a product shot. They wanted to see the headlights defined, the shape of the grill, as well as some of the interior, to name a few points. As the interior of the car would be visible through the surface water layers, we were required to simulate a lot of different sections during the car’s collapse. These included the drive chain, the steering column, the seats (front and back), the engine, the headlights and the suspension. As it is rather difficult with current tools to simulate a body of water within another, we needed to generate these elements separately. And as we were dealing with refractions, they all needed to be rendered within the one scene.
William Bartlett, VFX supervisor
Framestore CFC, London
Smirnoff’s “Sea”
As ever with these sorts of jobs, the biggest challenge is getting the most from the resources that the budget provides. Creativity, in this context, I take to mean the combination of inventiveness and judgment that take up a large part of the visual effects supervisor’s time.
For example, we discussed a few ways of getting the oil rig for the sequence in the North Sea. We considered generating it entirely in 3D, we considered trying to shoot it for real, we considered stock footage, we considered models and we considered a combination of all these things. Overall, the thing I was most proud of was the way the team worked on this job. It really had everything in it. A lot of complex models with complicated textures, particle systems for the coins and water spray. Add to that the fact that there were many camera moves either tracked or constructed in Flame which needed to go back and forth to 3D and you can imagine how important it was to keep everyone coordinated and on track together.
Jay Barton, VFX supervisorDigital Domain, Venice, Calif.
BMW’s “Road”
Our biggest technical challenge was to marry the extremely rigid and mechanical world of automotive engineering with the fluid and organic feel of time-lapse nature imagery. Starting with CAD data of the vehicle we had to re build every piece of geometry to work with the advanced deformation necessary for organic growth.
The creative challenge was turning a four-minute movie into a 30 second spot. As can often be the case, the first meeting with the director we were presented with the boards for an epic four to five-minute film. It was obvious that there could be no compromise in the scale of the production even though we needed to fit it into 30+seconds of CG.
Tim Davies, VFX supervisorAsylum, Santa Monica
Levi’s “Change”
The biggest challenge, just like any compositing job, was to make this commercial look as seamless as possible. Levi’s was particularly tricky due to the huge number of layers that needed to be created and integrated at just the right level. We needed to show as much carnage as possible, but retain enough of the outside world to show what was actually going on.
Adding to this, the different color palates from the indoor world to the outer world also needed to be animated at just the right moment to keep everything convincing.
Franck Lambertz, VFX supervisorMPC, London
Bacardi’s “Bacardi Sun”
One of our core philosophies at Moving Picture Company (MPC) is about keeping it simple.
For our Bacardi “Sun” spot we wanted to find the best solution for each element that we needed to produce.
For example we had one shot where we did not like the lighting at all. It wasn’t bad lighting, we just didn’t like it for that particular shot. So we recreated the light source in CG.
We also had a very good mix of 2D and 3D work. We had live actors that we had to put entirely into black by painting them in order to make it work.
So mixing the live action and the visual effects and making it all work was quite satisfying. It was up to us to turn the work around in five weeks.
The 2D and 3D units worked very well together. It is how things are in this business. You have to move quickly.”
Dave Peterson, general manager/special effects coordinatorFull Scale Effects,
North Hollywood
Lexus’ “Hydrant”
From the creative side of things the challenge was coordinating all the movements to happen in the allotted time frame and from a technical perspective we had special rigs that we had to devise for the shoot.
We had to be able to roll up the streets with large drum rollers and build pivoting points for buildings to swing out and generally just large rigging for cranes for the spot.
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