If you tuned into Superbowl 2011, you may have seen a slew of dazzling commercials that caught your eye. Here at Motionographer, we where particularly impressed by the latest from Fx & Mat, Coke Siege. As luck would have it, we were fortunate enough to rope the directors in for an exclusive interview about the teams latest piece (full interview below).
“Our intention was to make an epic film using the codes of the fantasy world. As illustrators ourselves we love the energy we see in concept art for films, books and games and we thought this project had great potential for bringing that into motion. We wanted illustrated landscapes, integrating the characters as much as possible with their environment. Wherever possible, we wanted to use graphic tricks to create depth – using atmospheric depth and coloured haze, rather than very photographic optical depth of field.”
Director Edouard Salier and production company Paranoid US deliver another amazing football themed spot in time for the World Cup. This time working for Coke, they tell a story in almost mythic grandeur of a boy’s quest for a personal and unique celebration. The spot elegantly shows the spirit of the game and isn’t too blatant in it’s delivery. Kudos to Coke for once again trusting in their audience to have some intelligence.
Oh, if anyone is interested, the track is by K’naan
Global Brand Director – Shay Drohan
Project Lead – Emmanuel Seuge
Creative Excellence -Jonathan Mildenhal
Agency – SANTO, Buenos Aires
Creative Directors – Sebastian Wilhelm, Pablo Minces
Art Director – Maximiliano Anselmo
Copy Writer – Pablo Minces
Producer – Ezequiel Ortiz
Account Director – Ignacio Diez
Planner – Martin Cole
Production Company – Paranoid US
Director – Edouard Salier
Executive Producers- Claude Letessier, Cathleen O’Conor
Flame Artist – Christophe Richard
Flame Assistant – Amandine Moulinet
Producer – Anne Lifshitz
Graphic Designers – Yué Wu, Corentin Rouge, Marthe Salier, Damien Martin, Julien Michel, Xavier Reyé, Florent Gombeau
Post Company – Digital District
Post Supervisor – Peggy Tavenne
Executive Producer – David Danesi
VFX Artists- Marc-Thomas Cave, Jean Lamoureux, Thomas Marque, Florian Rihn
Modeling – Jimmy Cave
Animation – Romuald Caudroit, Remi Gamiette, Margaux Durand-Rival, Nicolas Dabos
Lighting – Nicolas Belin, Nicolas Vion
Audio Company – X-Track
Mixer/Engineer – François Roy
Executive Producer – François Roy
Track Artist – K’NAAN
Built atop the repertoire of his work with Passion Pictures for the Gorillaz, director Pete Candeland’s buzz reached a fever pitch with the indelible Rock Band cinematic for The Beatles.
In “Happy Kingdom” for Coke Zero, Candeland delivers the goods again and lines the court with a rich cast of characters plucked straight from medieval times. Chock-full of pizazz, “Happy Kingdom” is a spectacle— a dazzling array of eye-candy that embodies the directors flair for extravagance and lavish aesthetics into an eclectic parody of fairy-tale clichés.
Title: Happy Kingdom
Length: 1×60 with 1′45′, 1×40′, and 1×30′ CD
Client: The Coca-Cola Company
Product: Coke Zero
Agency: Ogilvy Argentina
Executive Creative Director: Gastón Bigio
Head of Art: Jonathan Gurvit
Creative Directors: Javier Mentasti, Christian Camean
Agency Producer: Laura Passalacqua
Production Co: PASSION PICTURES
DIRECTOR: Pete Candeland
Producer: Debbie Crosscup
Executive Producer: Hugo Sands, Michael Adamo
Head of CG: Jason Nicolas
VFX Supervisor: Neil Riley
Technical Direcor: Julian Hodgson
Directors Assistant: Giles Dill
Storyboarding: Kevin Dart, Kim Frederiksen
Character Design/Development: Ron Kurniawan, Pete Candeland, Dan Sumich, Mario Ucci
Production Coordinator: Crystal Crompton
Matte Painting / Backgrounds: Kim Frederiksen, Lukasz Pazera
CG Modelling: Mario Ucci, Ian Brown, Matthias Bjurstrom, Doug Lassance, Dan Sweeney, Craig Maden
Rigging: Chris Dawson, Francois Pons, Julian Hodgson
CG Animation Supervisor: Wes Coman
Animation CG: Cath Brooks, Chris Welsby, David Sigrist, Melanie Climent
Animation FX: Jamie Franks, Tommy Andersson
Art Director: Mario Ucci
Texture \Shading: Mario Ucci, Ian Brown, Sally Wilson, Rick Thiele, Matthias Bjurstrom, Melanie Climent, Craig Maden, Nico Domerego, Dan Sweeney, Doug Lassance
Lighting/Rendering: Quentin Vien, Guillaume Cassuto, Claire Michaud, Rick Thiele
Lead Compositing: Niamh Lines
Compositing: Johnny Still, John Taylor, Lee Gingold
Editor: Jamie Foord, Dan Greenway
Technique and Software: XSI for CG, AFX/Nuke for Comp
Telecine: Rushes
Sound Mix: Toby Griffin at The Jungle Group
Music: Power Solo
Oscar-nominated directing duo Smith & Foulkes (Nexus Productions) put their powers to use for Coca Cola and Weiden+Kennedy Portland in an endearing Super Bowl spot entitled “Avatars.”
Playing with the idea that most of us live double lives—one digital, one physical—the :60 project features oodles of alter-egos designed and brought to life by Smith & Foulkes.
Smith & Foulkes explain their approach:
The challenge for us was to film the live action in a documentary style, incidentally observing moments of human behaviour, and then animating the Avatars into the footage in a very naturalistic way. It wasn’t about crazy 3d characters running amok, more about the everyday human behaviour of idly sitting around in parks and coffee shops.
We initially shot the footage on very long lenses to give the sense of the observational camera, before starting the huge technical challenge of believably replacing humans with Avatars in each shot.
I especially like the care S&F showed in creating the digital counterparts for each person. It’s as if they crawled inside the brain of each character to discover what idealized image of themselves would manifest itself in digital space.
Obviously there was a lot of fun to be had in casting each Avatar for each human, showing how people might select their online identity. Some would be a complete fantasy, while others a slightly more exciting version of their real selves.
The track is “Stranger in the Crowd” performed by Cee-Lo Green of Gnarls Barkley (and originally made famous by Elvis Preseley).
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