VerveCast

Last week I gave a sneak peek photo of something we built for a TV commercial we were filming. Here’s a full photo of it during set-up.

The table is about 20 feet wide, and consists of 18 threaded rods, 36 skate wheels (with 72 bearings), 144 nuts, and a lot of two by fours and plywood.

We started concepting the table at the end of December, and I spent a little time doing some research and a bit of design work. I also whipped up a quick 3D model to explain how it would work to others.

The 3D modeling was new to me, as I usually just explain things with bad sketches, but I figured this was a good time to work on my 3D skills, so I took advantage of it.

I also built a small version hacked together with scrap wood to test things out. It worked well enough that I used it to brainstorm improvements with a few of our helpers for the final build.

When crunch-time came, we had less than a week to do the construction on it, and I ended up not doing any of the actual building on it, but our “helpers” (who are much better with tools than I am) ended up completing it a full day before our dry run.

Here’s the table on the set. One of the requirements was that the movement be quiet enough that it wouldn’t be picked up while recording audio. The skate bearings were nearly silent. We got a few squeaks during shooting, but nothing a little WD-40 couldn’t take care of.

We originally thought about motorizing it and having a speed controller, since it needed to move at various speeds during the filming. We decided that being human-powered was the easier path, and that worked fine once we got used to the moves, which had to match up with what the actors were doing and saying.

This is what you’ll see in the final commercial. Even though the table is 20 feet wide, you’ll only see about 7 feet of it at a time. The two actors stay in place as things slide past them.

This project was a great challenge, and it’s always fun to go from R&D to a final working piece in just a few weeks, especially something as large as this was. I’d also like to give a big thanks to the team who worked on this, especially Rob and Steve who did the table construction…. Great job guys!

Photo from LA Times

Now, here’s an interesting sales/marketing tactic. McDonald’s announced this week that it will be launching a TV channel for its dine-in customers that will feature exclusive original content. The programming will be customized to specific communities around the individual restaurants, and will include local news and entertainment features, such as spotlights on upcoming films, albums and TV shows, reports the LA Times. The channel will be rolled out slowly during the next few months and will soon be up and running in 800 McDonald’s restaurants in Southern and Central California.

In terms of sales and marketing, the McDonald’s Channel is a great idea. I would think the programming would help draw in diners and increase their length of stay, thus increasing their purchasing. In terms of America’s well being, however, the McDonald’s Channel is a terrible idea. Not to beat a dead horse, but we’re all aware of the obesity rates in our country. Bringing TV to fast food is a recipe for disaster.

What’s a fauxgo? A fauxgo (fake logo) is a symbol or other small design created to represent a fictional company that exists only on film…

Check out fauxgo.com for all of them, but here’s a few favorites…

Image: WorstProductPlacement.com

I’m a Biggest Loser fan. Actually, I’d consider it a love/hate relationship. Yes, the show is long-winded and 97% cheesy, but I’m still drawn in by the amazing transformations that take place each season. It’s quite incredible.

What I’m not a fan of is the ridiculously obvious product placement segments thrown into the storyline. Each time I see Bob walk into the kitchen at the Biggest Loser house, I know he’s going to start pushing a product on the contestants and us viewers. That said, after several years of these lame scenes, I’ve finally just accepted them. Can you blame a weight-loss show for pushing products? Although irritating, it’s really a natural fit.

Now, here’s an example of an unnatural fit. I’m sitting in my living room watching Pawn Stars on the History Channel the other evening and one of the main characters walks into the shop with Subway breakfast sandwiches for his employees. He then proceeds to detail what ingredients are in each of them. I was so disheartened. (If you aren’t familiar with the show, it is all about daily dealings in a Las Vegas pawn shop and is usually fairly interesting.) The Subway placement seemed so incredibly out-of-place and its execution just too obvious.

Now I’m not knocking product placements in general. I think they can be effective when used in the proper context and when incorporated with discretion, but it seems like TV shows have a difficult time getting them right. Maybe its because the two I mentioned are considered “reality shows,” lacking trained actors and proper scripts? I’m not sure, but I do hope the execution improves sometime soon.

This was a fun project we did back in 2010 for Assurant Health. It’s a 10 second TV spot that was done using stop motion animation. We shot it using a Nikon D3x, frame by frame.

It took a few attempts to get what we wanted, and there was a good amount of Photoshop work in there as well (editing of all the individual images) before it all went to Final Cut for assembly.

Oh, we also composed and recorded the original music. The voiceover? That’s C. Thomas Howell.

As for the airplane itself, the only magic involved is a piece of aluminum foil we spray glued between two pieces of paper to get the plane to stay in position as it was folded.

There’s no crazy 3D rendering involved, no real complicated video editing, just a simple idea, a bit of trial and error, and some creative thinking. Sometimes that’s all you need. :)