Hasta La Creative!

This is Brickyard’s fourth straight year working with the NBA on their playoffs campaign. “Unity” juxtaposes footage of rivals Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, and uses interview clips with each player to emphasize the importance of team unity in achieving victory. Ultimately the seven spots are tied together through different spins on the NBA Playoffs’ “where amazing happens” tagline. DJ Steve Porter set the footage to various beats, mixing and looping dialogue to create the innovative rap-like flow of the spots.

For GMC’s “Most Wonderful Time” out of Leo Burnett, Piper and Chemical Effects turned their talents to creating a whole new mood for the Sierra. Delving back into footage shot for an earlier campaign, the creative team turned the truck from a hard-driving, terrain-crushing vehicle to a nimble, festive frolicker, enjoying rather than conquering nature. Visual Effects Supervisor Tim Rudgard and the Chemical Effects team added elegant plumes of airborne snow surging from beneath the truck’s tires and brilliant lens flares, and extended snow across the environment to give the landscape a pristine feel.

Directed by Michael Lehmann of Dark Light Pictures (credits include “True Blood” and cult classic “Heathers”), the spot opens in the midst of an intimate moment between a 60s-era executive and his female secretary in his office. Their would-be tryst is interrupted as the executive’s wife enters, pulls a pistol from her purse and fires. In a series of dramatic slow motion shots, the bullet soars toward the couple. Just before impact, the Turn logo animates on screen, leaving the viewer in suspense.

Brickyard VFX crafted the visual effects, color correction and animation in-house at its Santa Monica shop. While on set, Brickyard’s VFX Supervisor Mandy Sorenson and CG Supervisor David Blumenfeld assisted in choreographing the shot sequence, and captured HDRI to seamlessly integrate the CG bullet into the live action. Brickyard also created photoreal animation of the shell casing and muzzle flash at the instant the gun is fired.

“We did extensive research on ballistics and the specific type of bullet in the previs stage to ensure the animation would match the “Mad Men” era without any modern undertones,” said Blumenfeld. “We also worked closely with Michael and DP Matt Jensen to determine the best angles and lighting for the shoot to achieve a photographic level of realism.”

The Brickyard team used Autodesk Maya for animation, Autodesk Flame for visual effects, and Autodesk Lustre for color correction, achieving a period-appropriate palette throughout the spot.

“The team at Stardust did an amazing job showcasing the AICP Partners and Sponsors,” said Matt Miller, President and CEO of AICP. “This use of image and sound to acknowledge – and convey our appreciation – to our supporters is so important, and sets the tone for the evening. The look and feel of the piece is very much in keeping with the AICP Show’s relationship to art and cultural institutions.”

Every year the AICP features stand-out design teams to create artful video treatments to present their show open and sponsor loop; Stardust was chosen to produce this year’s sponsor loop introducing the AICP Show sponsors and the AICP Partners. Stardust first met with the AICP in January and followed the group’s direction to showcase partner logos in a way that celebrates the artistry of the advertising industry. Stardust founder and director Jake Banks approached this project as a fine art piece, exploring deconstructed logos against natural and urban landscapes, moving in and out of frame with a bevy of abstract design elements that range from exploding shapes to streaming trails of objects from nature. The beautiful juxtaposition of imagery is complemented by a modern, sound design-heavy track by Stardust collaborators Squeak E. Clean. Footage for the loop was provided by Corbis Motion.

“We aimed to design a video short that was equal parts sponsorship reel, equal parts art piece—since the work debuts at the MOMA in New York,” said Banks. “We didn’t want the animation to be too clean or too perfect, and went for a look that was a little more abstract—exploring movements in particle streams, reconstructing and deconstructing logos to integrate them into the design.”

Under the direction of Hinge Digital’s Alex Tysowsky, a 30-person crew delivered multiple pieces of the campaign from concepting and storyboarding to character design and modeling, animation, VFX, editing and more – all within less than three months. The team faced a number of complex animation challenges throughout, especially in making the characters stand out without dialog and adapting design elements to ensure they would work across all facets of the campaign.

“Truly unique, the first ad introduces Goldie and Blue for the first time without any dialog, so our animation really had to drive the story. The success of the entire campaign hinged on our ability to visually convey the story through our animation on this first spot,” said Alex Tysowsky, director, Hinge Digital. “Adding to the challenge, we had to carefully design the characters to work graphically across multiple platforms: TV, twitter, pens, plush animals, billboards.”

In “Carrington College Squirrel,” an amiable squirrel atop a tree sees three other squirrels on a neighboring tree indulging in acorns – representative of the student demographic. Intent on joining them, he edges out to the end of the branch, but one look down below petrifies him, and he returns to the base of the tree defeated. Goldie and Blue, symbolizing Carrington career counselors, appear and encourage him to take a leap of faith. After confiding in Goldie and Blue, he musters the courage to leap across – joining his friends. Outtakes of the spot, which started airing at the end of August on Carrington’s website, offer an uncut, insider’s look behind the shoot.

“The creative process on this project ran smooth. BVK came up with the initial concept but gave us the freedom to design these characters and bring them to life in an interesting way that would translate across the campaign; it was pure magic,” said Hinge Digital VFX Supervisor Michael Kuehn. “When you run through dailies with a client and receive a genuine positive, passionate reaction to the characters you’ve worked so hard to create, that’s a great feeling.”

BVK Art Director Ryan Smith shared, “Hinge Digital offers the right mix of creative talent, artistry and technology that this sort of campaign requires. They were there for us throughout the entire creative process and played an integral role in developing loveable, believable characters that carry this campaign.”

Hinge Digital leveraged a variety of technology throughout the project including proprietary plug-ins, Maya for 3D animation, Shave and a Haircut, Mari for 3D painting, Nuke for compositing, Mudbox and ZBrush for modeling, headus UVLayout, mental ray and SquidNet for rendering, as well as Shotgun, Revolver, Tweak RV and cineSync.

About Hinge Digital
Based in Portland, Oregon, Hinge Digital is an award-winning animation and visual effects studio providing comprehensive creative services across the film, television and commercial industries – from strategy, concept design and storyboarding through to animation, visual effects and more. Home to more than six decades of feature film and commercial talent from prestigious studios such as Walt Disney Feature Animation, Sony Pictures Imageworks, LAIKA Entertainment and Double Negative Visual Effects, Hinge Digital comprises an accomplished team of passionate creatives and solution-oriented technical artists, industry standard tools and a robust infrastructure.

Hinge Digital has collaborated with agencies like BVK, draftfcb, Doner, Razorfish, AKQA, CAHG, BooneOakley, and Zimmerman Advertising to deliver broadcast, interactive and print work for clients such as Carrington, Carfax, Nike, Merck, Adidas, Minute Maid, Microsoft, The UPS Store, COX Communications, Target and more. For more information, please visit http://www.hingedigital.com/.

For Mid West Sales contact Mary Ida Bonadio (missmib@earthlink.net), for everywhere else contact Ramiro Gomez (Ramiro Gomez ramiro@hingedigital.com).

Yes, the unlimited edition bottles and cans created by the Traveler Beer Company, available immediately, until further notice. In collaboration with itself, the company created the unlimited edition label with not only the same look and feel as regular Traveler Beer, but also the same design. Exactly. See+ Same. same same same same same. Oh and that bit too.

See also, the online film announcing it. Funny, guys.