Viso Energy drink commercial - poor man's anamorphic

[Sean Rawls]

Hey,

I directed this commercial for Portland, OR based drink company, Viso Beverages. My production company, hot damn films, produced it.

The spot had a unique evolution in that I shot the initial spec about a year ago. While the client was happy with the spec footage, in the meantime they released a new bottle, so we had to reshoot portions of the dance party with the new bottle but match it to the old footage so it cut seamlessly.

The Initial spec dance footage was shot on Picture This Production's Red and a 9.5mm S16 Zeiss B-Series prime. To achieve an anamorphic flare I taped a plastic DVX anamorphic adaptor to the prime. Even though the plastic filter degrades the image a lot, I feel the internal reflections, etc enhance the atmosphere of the scene. If no one has done this before I'm coining the "poor man's Abrams". Also interesting, the new dance stuff is MX, amazing how much tighter the "grain" structure has gotten.

The Library scenes were shot on Indent Studio's Red MX body with their set of Red Primes. Focal lengths used were 50mm, 85mm, and 100mm, primarily at a T5.6. These scenes were shot by the excellent Sam Garr.

I've included our original boards for the project, always interesting to see how close we got to the goal.

Love to hear any comments about the spot.

Here's the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icHfQQfF0ko

 

[Kwan Khan]

Nice...

 

[Jason Comparetto]

The green background/over-exposed nature, under-exposed interior didn't agree with me. If anything, it needs to be the other way around for a product commercial. The product really needs to "pop" on every shot.

I might have tried laying big rolls of ND to cut those windows, or use white seamless over the windows to create a white glow, or maybe a large billboard type of print could be rented and draped off the exterior of the building, creating the illusion of a skyscraper of sorts.

perhaps something can be done in post, too.

 

[Sean Rawls]

Yeah I agree about the exterior highlights, but the budget was so low we couldn't afford the ND to gel the windows or big enough lights to balance the exterior exposure levels. You'll notice in the actual product shot, where we could control things, the exterior is properly exposed.

Thanks for the feedback though.

 

[sidbarnhoorn]

Nice work Sean.

 

[Joshua Brown]

Congrats! For the budget, it looks fantastic. Have a link to that Poor Mans Abrams?

-JA Brown

 

[Sean Rawls]

Hey, thanks guys!

Here's the link to the DVX Anamorphic adapter:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...A7200G_AG_LA7200_Anamorphic_Lens_Adapter.html

As you might expect it doesn't cover 4k, only 2k, but it does work. I made AJ at Picture This promise not to sell theirs (apparently I'm the only one who's used it in years . . . ) . I initially discovered this trick tinkering around with shooting stock anamorphic flare elements on a black background. I'm impressed with the flare quality that this trick is abel to create, but obviously if you have a budget go get some Hawks =)

 

[Sean Rawls]

Dancetacular Jam - Director's Cut

Dancetacular Jam - Director's Cut

Hey,

The original video was a success and launched Viso's new bottle.

Here's a director's cut just featuring the dancing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdwlA-Ujx58