Radium recently contributed their creativity and expertise to a clever campaign for Kyocera Wireless. Via ad agency Vitro Robertson, the three energetic spots showcase Kyocera’s multi-faceted yet easy-to-use cell phones.

Kyocera boasts all the advanced features of leading cell phone models such as text messaging, speakerphone, camera and video. The vibrant effects and composite work, as well as the edit completed by Radium added to the comedic storyline of the spots.

In VACUUM, a geeky college guy tries to impress a pretty girl with his cell phone’s “vacuum messaging” capabilities, as opposed to her Kyocera phone’s easy-to-use text-messaging function. With beaming pride he shows her an odd-shaped cell phone that resembles a hairdryer. The phone sucks in a piece of paper with his digits on it and shoots out a paper ball that bounces off the girl’s face. Her appalled expression doesn’t faze the boy who winks at her and mouths “Call me.” At the conclusion of the spot, the not-so-suave hero tries to shoot out his digits to yet another attractive girl who’s walking by, but his crazy phone ends up sucking off his t-shirt, leaving him half naked and quite uncomfortable. “Wireless phones by Kyocera,” concludes the voiceover. “All of the features. None of the hassle.”

In another spot, ROBOT, two women are hanging out at a club when one of them brags about the ease of using her cell phone. “I just dictate and its sends a text message,” she boasts. Opening her phone, a robot emerges and the woman says, “Thanks Mike. I had fun last night.” The robot repeats the dictation, but declares, “Thanks Mike. I have lip fungus.” Enraged, the woman tries to clarify and only complicates the situation. She vehemently denies that she has lip fungus, which causes the music to stop and the club-goers to stare. The spot ends with the woman again refuting the lip fungus claim and her robot phone telling her to “Get over it.”

According to Radium creative director Aladino Debert, one major challenge was creating the CGI cell phones that were displayed during the demo portion of the spots, which needed to look photo-real. Careful research was done on product photography, and several techniques, including the use of mental ray’s renderer, helped to achieve the right lighting. The Radium team also used real phones as reference to create the shaders and textures of the photoreal CGI phones.

To capture the best lines and comedic nuances, Radium editor Alan Chimenti extensively utilized split plates. Several takes of each scene were filmed, providing Chimenti with a selection of shots from which to choose the best performances. Chimenti extracted them from the live-action footage and combined them to form split plates. The split plates were then made to appear seamless using Discreet’s inferno. Radium co-founder/compositor Simon Mowbray remarked, “Alan [Chimenti] did a wonderful job on editing these spots. His in-depth knowledge of effects, timing and comedy really added to the performances.”

Radium artists also performed screen replacements with custom animations, smoke trails and lightning bolts. “This was an incredibly fun project to work on,” added Debert. “It was a nice change of pace to work on a such a humorous campaign. I personally loved the comedic timing of the spots and feel that Alan and the other artists did an excellent job in making it happen. We’re very pleased with the outcome.”

Radium credits include:
* CG artists Deb Santosa, Chris Biggs, Val Sinlao, Aaron Wilson and Don Campbell
* Vfx/inferno artists Simon Mowbray and Colleen Brattessani

San Francisco and Los Angeles-based Radium (www.radium.com) tackles a project from creative pre-production consultation and shoot supervision to effects execution and editorial integration. The studio also just launched a new design division with eight award-winning designers, who are well versed in a variety of mediums such as broadcast, film, television and print design.