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?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§Good things come to those who wait’s is the Guinness slogan, and that certainly been the case for the Mill team who between them spent eight months perfecting ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§Tipping Point’s, the brand latest commercial ?‚àö√ë‚àö¬®its most spectacular yet.

The team, led by Neil Davies, Jordi Bares and Paul Harrison, worked with agency AMV BBDO to ensure that not only was the ad’s ‘domino effect’ absolutely seamless, but also that it all looked suitably atmospheric, dusty and moodily picturesque. Their work involved using the software Houdini which has never been used for a Mill job before.

Filmed in the hillsides of Argentina, the 90-second spot shows a whole village waiting with eager anticipation as a carefully placed domino is ceremonially flipped, tipping over not only a roomful of other dominos but also furniture, suitcases, legs of meat, cars … even the local fire crew join in, contributing burning bales of straw.

Down the steep narrow streets it all goes, in an increasingly ingenious and bizarre cavalcade, until finally reaching a tower of books whose pages flick over like an oversized destination board to reveal – to the cheers of the locals – a giant glass of Guiness.

Flame was used to enhance the cinematic feel of the opening shot, to age the texture of buildings and to add in extra villagers and all the small details ?Äì mice, graffiti, birds ?Äì that help to make the film so rich. Perhaps the biggest acheviment in Flame was compositing the four end pint shots into the rest of the film so seamlessly.

Telecine artist Paul Harrison was then brought in to create a washed-out ‘s70s look. ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§It was a difficult job as there were five cameras used to film the commercial over five days,’s he says. ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§So there were many different light levels in the shots used. That all needed to be balanced out, indoors and out. We also wanted to accentuate the colour of the village and the people in it, so we spent time on their faces and the on the landscape.’s

Perhaps the biggest challenge for the Mill was the ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§pack shot’s ?‚àö√ë‚àö¬® the first time ever that Guinness hasn’st shown a real pint glass at the end of one of its commercials. The initial aim had been to build a set in Argentina ?‚àö√ë‚àö¬® but the difficulties of the location 4,000ft elevation put a stop to that, and the CG pint glass was instead created at the Mill in London.

Avoiding traditional 3D techniques, and after much research and testing to find out just how fast the pages of the books should turn and how many were needed, the decision was made to use the Houdini software ?‚àö√ë‚àö¬® a first for the Mill. ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§It was one of the most difficult jobs I have ever worked on,’s comments Jordi Bares. ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§But it turned out to be a big success and I am very proud of it.’s

To view ‘Tipping Point’ click here.

www.themill.com

Popularity: 3% [?]

SG//Arts, a design and motion graphics studio, has completed the promotional package for ABC’s new popular reality series: “Dance Wars: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann.”

The six-week series, which premiered on ABC on January 7th, follows “Dancing With the Stars” judges Bruno Toniolli and Carrie Ann Inaba as they create the ultimate performance group in a live, one-hour show. The series is hosted by 2nd season “Dancing With the Stars” Champion Drew Lachey.

SG//Arts has collaborated with ABC several times over the past few years. However, this was the first opportunity they had to produce the entire promo package for a show from beginning to end including an extensive live-action shoot. Lucas Aragon, Design Director of ABC Entertainment Marketing says it was SG//Arts’ work on “Project Runway” for Bravo that convinced him they were perfect for “Dance Wars.” “SG//Arts helped create a look that is big and important, and incorporates high production values,” comments Aragon.

“We produced the entire shoot from start to finish, which was great,” says Neil Berkeley, Executive Producer/Partner for SG//Arts. “We chose where to shoot, and directed the piece, which gave us the ability to keep our creative vision intact.” That creative vision included a military theme mixed with a Broadway Show flair.

“From the concept and storyboarding stage, all the way through our process, the clients at ABC Entertainment Marketing were really easy to work with. They liked our ideas and really got the direction we were going in from the beginning.” Scott Grossman – SG//Arts’ Creative Director/Partner.

About SG//Arts:
Founded in 2004, SG//Arts is a full-service broadcast design and motion graphics studio. The company’s clients look to SG//Arts for all of their broadcast design and production needs. SG//Arts’ focus is to create a unique brand identity for its clients’ projects. In doing so, they draw influence from the art world, music and the city itself. Working in close collaboration with clients, SG//Arts is able to create a final package that combines the original appeal of an SG//Arts design with the unique individuality of each client’s brand. In addition to design and broadcast animation, SG//Arts also offers its clients the following services: production, editorial, 3D design and animation and music/audio.

Popularity: 3% [?]

The Mill Helps Launch the New home of EurostarDawn over St Pancras, London. As the dark fades and the day begins, clouds scud across the horizon. The sun rises higher in the sky, its light glinting and reflecting on the spectacular glass and iron structure of the newly-restored station.

This is ‘Today’, a 90-second spot celebrating Eurostar’s move to the new 800 million terminus (and marking a farewell to the train operator’s home of 13 years, Waterloo). Directed by Joaquin Baca-Asay for Falon, it’s a wordless hymn to the beauty of this famously fabulous station, which launched its first high-speed Paris/Brussels service on 14 November.

The visuals are all about light ?Äì flooding the massive train shed, filtering through on to glass walls, escalators and departure areas, highlighting both the high-tech new structure and the original 19th-century brick building, and finally shining on four high-speed trains ready for departure.

The idea behind the ad was to use time-lapse photography to show day and night at the station as it awaits passengers. Lead Flame Judy Roberts made sure the light looked perfect (and tidied away any stray clues that construction wasn’st completely finished when filming took place.)

The biggest challenge in Flame was to shoot the interior areas, as the crew had only been able to film the interiors with either emergency low lights or the house lights on full. The dramatic lighting effect was impossible to create in-camera and so Judy animated it in Flame using multiple lighting plates, which had been shot with lighting rigs in frame. These were cleaned up and combined to create the epic shots of the terminal lighting up in its full splendor.

The Mill

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Popularity: 3% [?]

A lush, illustrated pastiche of well-known fairytale imagery drives the main title sequence for Walt Disney Picture’s highly-anticipated new film Enchanted, created by yU+co, the three-time Emmy nominated creative design studio founded by Creative Director Garson Yu. Kicking of the holiday movie season, Enchanted opens in theatres on November 21.

“We always challenge ourselves to create something that people haven’t seen before, to combine different storytelling techniques and layers of animation to come up with a new way to tell a story,” comments Yu. “The narrative will drive us to a new look and that’s what’s most rewarding. For Enchanted we took a very organic approach, using hand-drawn illustrations and a watercolor look to tap into the iconic fairytale world of imagery and create a playful narrative that blends elements from the film with broader fairytale symbolism.”

Enchanted, directed by Kevin Lima, is a classic Disney animated fairytale that turns into a modern, live-action comedy. It follows the beautiful princess Giselle (Amy Adams) as she is banished by an evil queen (Susan Sarandon) from her magical, musical animated land and finds herself in the gritty reality of modern-day Manhattan.

The yU+co created title sequence begins with an overhead shot on the cover of a 3D animated storybook with the title “Enchanted.” The camera then zooms into the cover and thrusts viewers in a magical world of fairytale lore. Set against the weathered leather background of the book cover, stunning camera moves take us in and out of the imagery, which transitions seamlessly from flowers to fairy wings to a princess kissing a frog and more. Tying it all together is the elegant typography that seems to envelop each scene like vines on a plant.

According to yU+co Art Director Synderela Peng, the piece feels so authentic because early in the creative process they brought several freelance illustrators onboard who drew much of the imagery by hand. Those drawings were then scanned into the computer and composited with other 2D and 3D elements created by yU+co.

“We took inspiration from traditional children stories, as well as original Disney animated classics, but nothing too specific because we didn’t want it look like something you’ve seen before,” said Peng. “Kevin also directed the Disney film Tarzan so he is very literate when it comes to animation and design, and because of that he was a great person to work with. Our instincts matched very well.”

About yU+co:
Recognized as an industry leader in design and motion graphics with offices in Los Angeles and Hong Kong, yU+co (www.yuco.com) specializes in TV show opens and network graphics packages, main and end titles for film and television, trailers, theatrical logos, and commercials. For more information contact: Dianna Costello, Director of Business Development for yU+co. (323-505-6060). The company is represented for commercials on the west coast by MUTT, Los Angeles (310-990-6100); on the east coast by John Naitove (212-633-6211) and in the midwest by Donna D’Aguanno (312-953-7029).

www.yuco.com

http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/enchanted/

Creative Credits:
Client: Walt Disney Pictures
Project: Enchanted main title sequence

Design/Animation: yU+co, Hollywood, CA
Creative Director/Art Director: Garson Yu
Executive Producer: Claire O’Brien
Art Director/Designer: Synderela Peng
Designers: Synderela Peng, Martin Surya
Animators: Alex Yoon, Gary Garza, Chris Coogan, Andrew Gura, Adam Neuman
Illustrators: Ron Yavnieli, Dean Tschetter, Collin Fleming
Shake Artist: Rob Cribbett

Popularity: 4% [?]

?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§Crazy, sexy, over-the-top and hugely entertaining.’s An almost inadequate description of ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§Naturally Juicy’s, the steamy, new 145-second spot for Orangina, currently airing in France.

Crazy, too, for the Mill team who worked to very tight deadlines with Psyop’s Todd Mueller and Kylie Matulick to bring the Orangina cast of 12 racy animal characters – including a flamingo pole-dancer, bikini-clad rabbit and octopus waitresses – to life on screen. Opening on a shot of a quiet, sunlit glade, and ending in a riotous multi-character Orangina-splashed dance sequence, the commercial presented many head-scratching challenges for the Mill’s 3D team, one of the trickiest being to perfect the wealth of fur and feathers.

After a two-day, highly detailed and choreographed motion-capture shoot involving professional dancers performing the moves and acting out the central story, , a basic edit was completed, to be replaced later on with the 3D animated characters.

The Mill 3d team led by CGI & Animation supervisor Juan Brockhaus then took all the motion-capture data in to ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§motion builder’s where it was mapped to the rough 3D models to establish the timings of the edit. It was then brought into XSI, where hand animation of details such as fingers and facial expressions was carried out including some major re-animation of the characters. It was one thing motion capturing a dancer and quite another translating human motion to that of a ten foot high giraffe!

Meanwhile, the Mill environment team were busy collaborating on the look and feel of the scenery, mixing 3D elements such as grass, shrubs, trees and the stage with matte paintings for the landscape. In-house tools gave the Mill artists the opportunity to exchange data between Maya (used for the backgrounds) and XSI (used for the characters).

Working to such a tight deadline called for some technical hoop-jumping: the team had to begin the animation with unfinished rigs, changing the models as they went along while animating on top of the motion capture. At the same time compositing in Shake in order to integrate CG elements, atmospheric effects and live action seamlessly. Using the up-to-date motion-captured animatic, compositing supervisor Darren Christie was able to ensure that the practical effects elements lined up with the animation. ?‚àö√ë‚àö‚â§On set we used mix and overlay, superimposing the animation with the live action, to make sure we got what we needed,’s says Darren.

Practical effects were created for the waterfall, flash dance and bottle-bursting moments, using techniques supplied by Asylum. The Mill compositing artists also spent time developing a general look and colour palette for the commercial four main scenes ?Äì woodland glade, strip club, flash dance and party. When rendering the finished composites, the Shake team created various coloured mattes which along with the composited scenes were passed as film resolution data to Baselight where Colourist Jamie Wilkinson utilised the mattes to give Todd and Kylie the flexibility and freedom to create a stunning cinematic look.

Click here to view Naturally Juicy.

CREDITS

Product
Orangina

Title
Naturally Juicy

Agency
FFL Paris

Creatives
Farid & Joe

Producer
Robin Accard

Production Company
Stink

Psyop Directors
Todd Mueller and Kylie Matulick

Executive Producers
Daniel Bergman
Sylvaine Mella

Producers
Richard Fenton
Mariya Shikher

Editing Company
Trim Editing

Editor
Paul Hardcastle

Animation & Post Production
The Mill

Producer
Stephen Venning

www.themill.com

Popularity: 3% [?]